Friday Throwback: Return to Oz

Return to Oz (1985)

Directed by: Walter Murch Starring: Fairuza Baulk, Piper Laurie, Nicol Williamson

Sixth months after returning home from Oz, Dorothy (Baulk) is struggling to return to normal life. She is sent to hospital but her mistreatment causes her to attempt an escape. She is swept down a river in torrential rain and when she wakes up, she finds herself in Oz once again. However, things have changed drastically since she has left. She must team up with new friends Tik Tok, Jack Pumpkinhead and the Gump to defeat the Nome King and return Oz to its former glory.

I am going to start by reading you an extract from the blurb on the DVD “If you loved The Wizard of Oz, you’ll love accompanying Dorothy on this second thrilling adventure based on L. Frank Baum’s “Oz” books!” No, no and no. Everything about that is wrong. This is absolutely nothing like The Wizard of Oz. People often discuss repressed memories, these are the events that occur for when you are a child that are so traumatic you forget them. For me, watching Return to Oz is exactly that. I completely forgot about watching this movie until I was reminded of its presence recently. I decided to watch it and all the bad memories came flooding back. This movie is freaky as shit! I was terrified as a child and I was terrified as an adult.

The film starts out with a moment that I probably didn’t understand as a 10 year old but completely threw me off my feet as an adult. Dorothy is struggling to sleep so her auntie and adoptive mother (played by Piper Laurie, who has a terrible track record with motherhood) sends her to an overnight stay at a psychiatric hospital. Fair enough because Dorothy is clearly sick but the doctor tries to give her electroshock therapy! She is a 8 year old girl for Pete’s sake! The creepiness does not stop there. One of the main enemies in the film, Princess Mombi, is a head-hunter who keeps the heads of young women she has captured in a big room on display. She can then change the head’s with her own! Holy shit! Then there is the ending. The team is forced by the Nome King to pick an ornament from a room full of them, which is supposed to be the scarecrow, or they are permanently turned into an inanimate object. Spoiler alert, everything works out ok in the end, but bloody hell, way to freak me out. Then there are the Wheelers. Forget iconic horror movie villians such as Pinhead, Freddy Kruger, and Jason Vorhees, the Wheelers are by far the freakiest villians to ever grace the screen. These things gave me nightmares for a long time.

When this movie was released, it was a massive financial flop. This was because of a couple of reasons, it holds the record for the longest time between the original and sequel (46 years) and it is way too dark and twisted for its target audience. In the end, I think this is a great movie, but as a horror movie, it is in no way suitable for children. I recommend watching this movie but on occasions think about what you would feel if you were watching this as a 10 year old.

 

Friday Throwback: Deep Blue Sea

For a new segment, I am going to have a look back at movies that I loved as a kid. However, instead of reviewing them as I remember them, I am going to rewatch them. This will either bring back fond memories or make me reassess my childhood. Either way this is going to be fun!

Deep Blue Sea (1999)

Directed by: Renny Harlin. Starring: Thomas Jane, Saffron Burrows, Samuel L. Jackson, LL Cool J, and Stellan Skarsgard.

The first movie I am reviewing in this series is Deep Blue Sea. This was probably my favourite movie as a teenager. I mean what more was there to love than massive sharks ripping people to shreds. I realised that my teen years were significantly influenced by fictional characters named Carter. I wanted to be a doctor as a result of Dr. Carter on ER. Then my back-up profession was shark handler because of Thomas Jane’s character, Carter. I thought he was the baddest motherfucker around. The cold opening is set-up to show the power and ferocity of the sharks, however, all it does it prove how much of a bad ass Carter is. Then when he takes the license plate out of the tiger shark, whooooo, I am all flustered now. I am considering a career change. 

Upon reviewing, I realised that all the characters in the movie hate each other. Everyone hates Saffron Burrows even though she is dead set keen to save millions of lives. Carter just sort of grunts and snarls at everyone, but that is why he is such a badass. Then everyone is super hostile towards Samuel L. Jackson even though he is keeping the entire operation afloat. The only person who likes anyone is the blonde girl. Like is too soft of a word though, more like LOVES everyone. When she is introducing everyone to Jackson she is “You met Saffron, I know you don’t like each other but we are BFF’s. Then there is Carter. He hates everyone but he is my other BFF. Then there is my boyfriend, Stellan Skarsgard. He hates me but I love him.” 

Another thing I noticed is that, SPOILER ALERT, essentially every death is avoidable. Stellan loses his arm because he thinks the shark is a cat and goes to pet it. Jackson makes his speech right next to the wet entry. Simply stepping three steps forward would have saved his life. That other guy, who looks familiar but I can’t remember where he is from, attracts the sharks by conducting a wetty warmer. The positive is that he distracted the sharks from Carter. Finally there is Saffron. She attempts, and succeeds, to attract the shark by cutting her hand so it will smell the blood. The method works but just dip your hand in the water, don’t jump in you stupid idiot. The only death that seems unavoidable is the blonde girl’s, however she is probably just trying to make friends with the shark but it misunderstands her.

I have a theory about this movie after re watching; it is part of the Planet of the Apes universe. Both this film and Rise of the Planet of the Apes look into Alzheimer’s research. So I believe that Stellan Skarsgard is John Lithgow from Rise’s brother, and hence James Franco’s uncle, and they are both working on the same project. The result ends up being the same, an ultra-intelligent animal running a muck. This made me think, which animal would I prefer to be the result of the botched research, the monkeys or the sharks. The obvious choice seems to be the monkeys because sharks are obviously much scarier. However, I believe the answer is the sharks. I mean with the sharks you simply just don’t go in the water. The monkeys can take over the land, which is much more frightening.

Overall: I could talk about this movie for hours. I still didn't mention how completely bonkers it is, that LL Cool J is in it, or how everyone needs to finish their drink because the title is mentioned in the film. God I love this movie, 4 Stars

Robocop

Robocop (2013)

Predicted Rating: Pile of Steaming Shit

Directed by: Jose Padilha. Starring: Gary Oldman, Michael Keaton, Joel Kinnaman, Samuel L. Jackson, Abbie Cornish.

A reboot of the 1987 classic sees policeman Alex Murphy (Kinnaman), who is living in a futuristic Detroit, tracking down a drug lord. After his cover is blown (yep that's right, it's a pun), he is mortally wounded. Meanwhile, OmniCorp chief Scientist, Dr Dennet Norton (Oldman), is working on a secret project that converts a person into a super-soldier. He chooses Murphy as the prototype and RoboCop is born.

BAH! TABLE FLIP! WHY DO REBOOTS ALWAYS HAVE TO RETELL THE ORIGIN STORY! I know how Robocop was made so don't spend three quarters of the goddamn movie telling me how Murphy became Robocop. If you don't know and start complaining about how you have no idea who he is, just read the damn Wikipedia page! I would love this movie if he became Robocop before the opening credits and just spent the rest of the movie just fucking shit up, killing bad guys and throwing other robots through windows. I don't care if there are no motives, just give Robocop a gun and see what happens. To justify the retelling of the origin, they slightly change it by giving him a concerned family. I don't even care they did this, just make it more realistic. Murphy goes back to visit his son but his son seems unemotional and unamused. Back when I was 10 and if this happened I would be fuck yeah my dad is fucking Robocop, this is the greatest day of my life.

My gripes don't end there. Where the hell is the damn blood. The two best scenes in the original are when he shoots the rapist in the dick and the ED-209 malfunctions causing a large amount of blood to be sprayed around the room, USING REAL BLOOD SQUIBS! In order to drop the rating down in the US down from R to PG-13, they remove all the violence. This is so they can make some more money from the lucrative (really?!) teenage market. No, no, and no! Just make it super violent and make kids sneak in the old fashion way. Or do what the original did and make all its money by marketing toys to children. Then there are other things like changing Lewis to a black man from a white woman. How am I supposed to ridicule Lewis' incompetence now! Finally the chemistry between Kinnaman and Cornish is downright awful. When it comes to the not-so-sex scene they have a look on their faces like oh damn we have to have sex... again.

Despite all my complaints this is not a bad action film. It is beautifully shot, the plot is solid and the characters are fantastic. IT JUST SHOULDN'T BE CALLED ROBOCOP!

Final Rating: Just dreaming of the original. 3 Stars

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGemfKLV1JA

  

Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones

Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones

Directed by: Christopher B. Landon. Starring: A bunch of interchangeable teenagers

In a spin-off (or is it?) to the Paranormal Activity franchise, The Marked Ones follows Jesse just after he graduates high school. After his mysterious neighbour, Anna, is murdered, strange happenings begin in the apartment building. Along with his friends Arturo and Marisol, Jesse investigates the murder of Anna with devastating consequences.

It is common knowledge by now that I love the Paranormal Activity series. So much so, that my love for the franchise sways my opinion that these reviews become unprofessional and extremely biased. As a result, I have decided to create my own Paranormal Activity rating scale called the brown pants scale. It is based on how scary the film is, i.e. how many times I have to change my pants because they have been unfortunately stained brown. Paranormal Activity 1 definitely earns 5 brown pants out of 5, one of my favourite movies ever and it scared the shit out of me. Part 2 is probably the weakest of the series, and hence only earns one brown pant. 3 steps it up with a well orchestrated prequal, earning 4 pants. They are starting to run out of ideas in part 4 but I loved using the x-box kinect motion sensor and the ending is one of my all time favourites, hence earning it 2.5 pants. The Marked Ones continues the standard Paranormal Activity formula but this time tries to step it up with even more violence and jump scares. However, there are not enough original ideas and it feels like a Hollywood movie, rather than a genuine home movie as part 1 does. Hence, The Marked Ones earns 2 pants

This is the first Paranormal Activity film that really tries to dive into the world of humour, however it fails miserably. Instead of being funny, it turns out to be very, very racist. All the character in the film are Hispanic and there are so many Hispanic stereotypes you don't know where to look. They clearly live in the poor part of town, they have names like Oscar, Hector and Cesar, they eat tortillas, their dog is a Chihuahua, and they have a tequila drinking contest. You kind of want to laugh but you know it is clearly racially insensitive.

I am still not sold on the whole watching Paranormal Activity film in the movies thing. I am not sure whether it is the type of people the film attracts or it is the film itself but people need to learn to SHUT THE FUCK UP. It is obvious that a lot of people get scared during these films and to reassure themselves and to hide the fact from their friends, they laugh when they shouldn't or just keep talking. On one hand it is funny to listen to people and be amused by how scared they are, but on the other hand I would love to just sit back and watch the movie in peace. It is my dream one day to watch a Paranormal Activity film alone in the cinema so I can fully engross myself in the experience.

Overall: Starting to run out of original ideas but still a decent amount of scares involved

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (2013)

Predicted Rating: 1 Star

Directed by: Adam McKay (The Campaign). Starring: Will Ferrell (Old School), Steve Carell (The Office), and Paul Rudd (Role Models)

After the events of the first film, legendary news anchor Ron Burgandy (Ferrell) is hosting the weekend news cast with his wife, Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate). They find out that the weekday reader is retiring so Ron assumes that he is getting the job, however, only his wife gets the gig. Ron then goes into a deep spiral of depression but is saved when he finds out a new 24-hour news channel. NEWS TEAM ASSEMBLE!

As you can see from my predicted rating, I expected this movie to be terrible. One reason for this is because the reason why the first film was so good was because it never tried. The jokes flowed smoothly, it never took itself seriously and became one of the most quotable movies ever. Anchorman could quite possibly be the most popular cult film ever. I feared for part 2 because I thought it would try too hard not to try hard. This makes the film feel like it is full of itself. A good example of of this is How I Met Your Mother, it realised it was popular and now struts around like it is the king of the roost. I think Anchorman 2 does the exact opposite of this. The jokes follow the same tone as in the first one but it doesn't feel like it is saying look, we made these jokes before, how good are we, which is the opposite of HIMYM, which has told the same 5 jokes for 197 episodes. Anchorman 2 continues the non stop fun because it again essentially has no story. It doesn't try to thrust on you a ridiculous story but just tells the joke and plays out more like a Saturday Night Live sketch.

Another reason why I thought this film would be awful was because really, has there been a good comedy sequel? I am going to sound like Jigsaw here but let's play a game, name a good comedy sequel... *crickets chirping. The only one I could think of was Home Alone 2 and even that is stretching it. There have been many classic comedies such as Ghostbusters, Men In Black and the Hangover that have absolutely terrible sequels. I think Anchorman 2 bucks this trend because it is thoroughly entertaining and a downright hoot.

A round of applause everyone for Kristen Wiig because she managed to move a few spots up on my favourite actresses list *woooo yeah. Well it is hard to move down from dead last but hey it is a step in the right direction. She has now leapfrogged Kat Dennings, Kathryn Heigl and Meryl Streep. I am in no way forgiving her for Bridesmaids but she was actually pretty funny in this film as the love interest of Steve Carell's Brick Tambland. I was actually thinking after the film, I wish there was more Kristen Wiig in this film, words I thought were impossible for me to say. Brick is really the glue in this film. He delivers the one liners at the optimum time and brings in by far the most laughs. As a result, it is only fitting that he gets a love interest and what better love interest that one who is essentially the female version of himself. Wiig Plays this role perfectly, maybe she is a decent actor, she just needs to be given a decent character.

Overall: In no way a good film but it is thoroughly entertaining, which is what you want in a mindless comedy. 4 Stars

Carrie

Carrie (2013)

Predicted Rating: 3.5 Stars

Directed by: Kimberly Pierce (Boys Don't Cry). Starring: Chloe Grace Moretz (Kick-Ass), Julianne Moore (Boogie Nights) and Judy Greer (Arrested Development)

A new adaption to the 1974 Stephen King novel and a re-make of the 1976 Brian De Palma film, Carrie tells the story of of teenage outcast Carrie White (Moretz). She has been raised by her radical christian mother, Margaret (Moore), who has sheltered her from any social interaction. After Carrie is teased by her fellow class mates after she gets her first period and does not know what it was, she discovers she has telekinetic powers. To punish the girls for their bullying of Carrie, Miss Desjardin (Greer) subjects them to a physical training session and anyone who does not complete it does not get to go to senior prom. Feeling sorry for her role in the attack, Sue Snell offers her spot in the prom so her boyfriend, Tommy Ross, can take Carrie to the prom.

I think the jury is still out on shot for shot remakes. Some can have their merits, whilst some, such as the abomination that is the Anne Heche/Vince Vaughn Psycho remake, can be down right awful. I was not expecting Carrie to be a shot for shot remake but in the end it wasn't half bad. However, the remake still needs to include something that distinguished it from the original. In Carrie it was the use of technology. This worked for 21 Jump Street but it was not as effective in Carrie. Granted the filming of the tampon attack and the subsequent online posting was a clever addition but far too often the use of technology would get shoved in your face with many shots of "look here is a mobile phone." In the end this is an admirable shot for shot remake because it would be difficult to differentiate from the original without essentially taking a huge dump on the book but you can't help reminisce about the 1976 version whilst watching the 2013 version.

I was a tad disappointed about some of the stuff that was left out of the remake. Most of the iconic moments such as the tampon scene and the bucket of pigs blood was included but a couple of important scenes where missing. One is not a scene but more of a technique, which is the use of split screen when Carrie destroys the prom. I can see how this may look lame by today's standard but I will have to admit it looked pretty cool in the original. The other thing was the ending. The original features one of the most iconic and shocking endings ever when Carrie's hand comes out to the grave grabbing the sole survivor of the attack, Sue Snell. I again understand that it was not included because you would see it coming, however I argue that many people would not expect it and I think it should have been added.

As this is a character driven story, the film relies heavily on the performances of the actors to truly make this a great film. The performance from Julianne Moore as Margaret White is nothing short of sensational. She seemed genuinely emotionally scarred and the addition of her self harm was chilling. Chloe Grace Moretz was good as Carrie but she often seemed to confident as she talked diminishing some of the vulnerability that Carrie is supposed to display. It is difficult to top the performance of Sissy Spacek, as she is almost perfect for the role and Chloe Grace Moretz is just a tad too attractive, but Moretz does do the best she can. Again Judy Greer as Miss Desjardin was great but not quite perfect. She is too "bubbly" for the role and she is also a tad too old. Despite some of the downfalls, all of the performances where fairly good and make the film what it is.

Overall: A decent shot for shot remake with some great performance but it does not live up to the expectations set by the original. 3 Stars