IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 64 & 63 - Warrior of the Lost World and Leonard, part 6

Number 64: Warrior of the Lost World (1983)

How to summarise Warrior of the Lost World, well I suppose it’s a case of 1984 meets Mad Max meets Knightrider meets a Duran Duran music video. And if that’s not a strange enough mix for you it’s got Donald Pleasance in it to.

Donald Pleasance was a fine actor (The Great Escape, Halloween) but he was in a lot of crud. Sadly (spoiler alert) he does come up again in the bottom 100. He’s in full Blofeld mode here as Prosser, the Big Brother of this new dystopia, replete with its own SS-style army. Actually, as far as post-Apocalyptic worlds go, this one is rather pleasant. It has green trees and everything.

The hero, known simply as The Rider (Robert Ginty), is recruited by The Elders to rescue a professor and lead the revolution against Pleasance. I’m not exactly sure who the Elders are but I think they are some sort of demi-Gods, Rider has to pass through a portal to reach their domain.

To aid him in his quest is Einstein, a computer on his motorcycle. Unlike KiT though in Knightrider though, Einstein is completely useless and even more annoying. He also has Nastasia as our love interest for the film but she gets captured freeing the Professor Mcwayne, who is her father, and that’s basically her out of the film until the end.

The Rider goes out into the wilds to recruit the savages for his revolution. He persuades them all to join him in a big fist-fight. It’s the only language these people understand.

Along the way, Rider picks up the MEGAWEAPON, an admittedly cool steel plated truck with spikes that shoots flames.

So, they get to the city and kill the guards. The sound gets a bit funny here, as they are clearly using sub-machine guns but the noise is like laser fire. Kind of. Actually, it's more like a rippling fart.

They free Nastasia who is under hypnosis and kill Prosser. Or do they? The ending sets up the possibility of a sequel. I love the optimism.

According to director David Worth, he was flown over to Italy to make this film without being given a script. He was given a poster and told, ‘make a movie out of that.’ So we should probably give him some credit for that, even if the poster did make promises it couldn’t deliver.

Number 63: Leonard, part 6 (1987)

So, it’s a Bill Cosby comedy. Lawyers on standby.

I’m stunned by this film. This is the 38^th film I’ve watched of the bottom 100 so far and it is by far and away the worst of the lot. Frighteningly, there are still 62 to go rated as worse than this. Let’s just go into. There is a lot to cover in why this is so bad, so let’s just get to it:

Bill Cosby, beloved entertainer (well, he was then) and star of the highly successful The Cosby Show, is Leonard Parker, a retired CIA agent. He is recruited back by the CIA for one last mission by Joe Don Baker who has become fatter, less charismatic and less likable then he was in Mitchell (see number 84).

The master villain in this is a vegetarian militant called Medusa, who plans to control all the animals to take over the world. Medusa is played by the late Gloria Foster, who will be best remembered for playing The Oracle in the first two Matrix movies. And she must have had a whale of a time making this as she has the best looking henchmen you will ever see all clad out in white spandex. At least someone was having fun.

Leonard is assisted by his British manservant Frayn, who also serves as narrator. Brilliant. I love narrators. Especially in comedy films. Because if there is one thing a comedy needs it’s a narrator to explain why it’s all so funny. He does at least explain why there is no part 1-5. Too dangerous apparently, so we should count our blessings.

CIA agents are being killed by animals such as squirrels, frogs and a trout. Yes, a trout. Just the one mind, not a school of them. The CIA recruit Leonard to steal a sphere Medusa is using to control the animal but he doesn’t want to do it and goes on a date with his estranged wife who he still loves instead. That doesn’t go well when he ends up with dinner all over him, so now he’s back in the game.

After a suiting up sequence, he goes off to get the sphere but not before stopping off to see a fortune teller who gives him a pair of ballet shoes. He uses the shoes to defeat Medusa’s ‘dancers’, weird hairy birdmen basically. Yeah, Bill Cosby beats them in a dance off.

He gets the sphere, brings it back to the CIA but then his wife is kidnapped. So he steals it back again to return to Medusa. This leads us to our climax and oh, is this special.

Leonard is double crossed and put in a cell with his wife. A horde of lobsters are sent in to kill them but Leonard frightens them off with some melted butter (that’s just the start of it) and they escape. They free all the animals and stop Medusa’s plan to destroy the world. Leonard fights off the henchmen by throwing meat at them. Did you know a vegetarians skin burns when it touches meat? It’s like sunlight to a vampire for them. Put a sausage in their mouth and their head will literally explode. The more you know.

With Medusa and her goons vanquished, Leonard destroys the chemical vats used to power the sphere by dropping Alka-Seltzer in them. He escapes the now increasingly filling warehouse by riding out the window riding the back of an ostrich. And once you’ve seen Bill Cosby riding on an ostrich, you can’t unsee it.

Leonard re-unites with his wife and they celebrate by pouring food all over him. 9 ½ Weeks it isn’t.

And if you think that’s all as stupid as it sounds, it is.

I suppose the lesson here is vegetarianism, not always a good thing. Can in rare cases lead to genocide (copyright Bill Bailey, although ironically Bill Cosby is now a vegetarian).

There, a review of a Bill Cosby movie and not a single reference to him being a sexual deviant. Oh damn.

IMDB Bottom 100: No's 66 & 65: Nine Lives and Brothers in Arms

Number 66: Nine Lives (2002)

Yeah, Paris Hilton. You know this is going to be a classy movie.

Hilton plays a rich, self-obsessed bimbo in this horror movie. She plays herself basically. She goes to a Scottish manor with a group of other equally obnoxious but British friends (there’s nine of them in total, hence the title). We get to see their boring conversations, with some awkward editing, all culminating in them saying their old latin school motto which they say means ‘To follow the exploits of our ancestors’ (it doesn’t, I checked). Whatever is going to kill them all can’t come soon enough.

It would seem there was an old 14^th century warrior called Murray who was former owner of the mansion and has now returned to reclaim his property after it had been seized by the English.

Now the problem you will immediately spot with this is that shots of the interior and exterior will tell you the house is nowhere near that old.

Luckily, we don’t have to put up with Miss Hilton for too long as she’s the first to be killed off around the 20 minute mark. Murray takes over the body of one of the group and starts to kill the group off. However, if the body Murray is currently in is killed he transfers to the body of his killer so he can carry on. To be fair, it’s a pretty decent plot device and a good twist on the unstoppable monster theme. So the survivors have to figure out a way to stop the ghost without killing it.

One of them does survive to the end, the Scottish one. He suggests it’s only because he’s Scottish he was spared and Murray just wanted to kill the English ones and Paris Hilton (well, why not?). There is no evidence to support this though other than the Scots undying hatred for the English. And Paris Hilton.

The film is probably guilty by association and the cast is pretty obnoxious and unlikable but I did like the idea they were put in a situation where they couldn’t kill the enemy without becoming the monster themselves. Apart from that, it’s pretty standard horror but none of the kills are particularly creative which is what these kind of movies really thrive on.

It’s ok. Better than most the Friday the 13^th movies anyway.

Number 65: Brothers in Arms (2005)

It’s different, that’s one thing you can say for Brothers in Arms. It is positively Tarantino-esque in its disregard for historical accuracy.

It’s set in the Old West and is centred round a gang planning a bank heist. They are most notable for being an almost all black gang (plus one Mexican and technically one of them is supposed to be half-native American), a rarity to see in a Western. You’d think race would play more into it but apart from one use of the n-word at the start, it doesn’t ever come up again. This is a far more multi-cultural community than you would expect in a western.

The gang itself is introduced in a Guy Ritchie style of cuts, explaining their skills and a bit about their backgrounds. So for example, there is Slim played by Jean Claude LaMarre (who is also writer and director) who is the smooth operator of the group able to talk his way out of any situation. The most notable member of the group for film and TV buffs is the Reverend, played by Raymond Cruz better known for his role as Tuco in Breaking Bad.

The clothing the gang wear can’t go unmentioned, the gang all clad out in frilly black leather and denim jeans. Mara, the only female member of the group, appears to be wearing Jennifer Garner’s Elektra outfit from Daredevil. This is very distracting and breaks all suspension of disbelief. The only person dressed appropriately to the period is the Reverend, which just makes it harder to swallow. Tarantino plays fast and loose with history but at least you can buy his characters as being from that period, the same cannot be said here.

So, to the story. As mentioned earlier, the gang are planning to rob a bank in a cliché cardboard cut-out Old West town. It always bothers me when I see those towns: you have the saloon, a few stores 

but where are the houses? Where do all these people live?

The town is controlled by Mr Driscoll, played by David Carradine (yeah, sorry, another Tarantino connection). He is essentially a Mr Potter character who owns everything in town. Unfortunately, there was no George Bailey in this town to stop him and it’s now been renamed Driscollville.

The gang’s plans get messed up when they kill Driscoll’s son and he hires a gang of bounty hunters to kill them. They hide out in the hills for a sequence that goes on far too long before returning to rob the bank. I appreciate the director is trying to flesh out their characters but it could have been done in half the time this takes.

They go to rob the bank but get trapped inside with hostages. This is where the movie just stops dead. We know they aren’t getting out of this so now we’re just killing time until the climax.

A female sheriff comes to try and get them to come out. We learn she had a prior relationship with Linc, the leader of the gang. Until that point, gender aside, she came across like every world weary sheriff that exists in every western. She abandons her duties and tries to help them escape but is gunned down by Driscoll for her efforts.

The gangs’ numbers slowly get whittled down until it’s just Linc and his brother Kansas (played by rapper Kurrupt which explains the hip hop soundtrack). Linc makes the ultimate sacrifice so his brother can escape through a back window (why they didn’t do that earlier?). With his last bit of strength, Linc shoots Driscoll between the eyes. This would have been more dramatic if they had any interaction beforehand but they never spoke a word to each other in the whole film. It’s a shame really, as for the few minutes Carradine was on screen he was hugely entertaining. As if he knew this was a stupid movie and he was just having fun with it.

I suppose as a Western based around a black character that pays no heed to historical accuracy, I’m going to have to mention Django Unchained. Now Brothers in Arms came out several years before Django so it’s not a knock-off but how does it compare? Not very well you’ll be shocked to hear. As noted before, Quentin Tarantino plays fast and loose with history but you can buy into his characters and the stories are very enjoyable. You just can’t say the same here: the story is nothing special, the characters look out of time and they just aren’t all that interesting anyway.

Apart from Tuco, he’s always badass.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 68 & 67 - Hobgoblins and Time Chasers

Number 68: Hobgoblins (1988)

As noted in my review of Devouring Waves/Devilfish, a popular successful movie is certain to launch its own wave of imitators. In this case, it’s Gremlins.

We all know Gremlins is a bit goofy and probably tries to be a bit too clever for its own good but it was good fun. Hobgoblins is very bland in comparison.

The hobgoblins of the title are little gremlinesque creatures kept inside a vault in a Hollywood backlot that an eight year old could break into. The goblins are like yoda toys but with white fur stuck on.

Their unique gift however is they will fulfil your fantasies before they kill you. For one guy it’s to perform on stage, for another guy it’s to be a real life Rambo. For one girl, it’s to become a big slut.

After the hobgoblins escape their vault they kill exactly…zero people. Yes, they really are the most terrifying creatures in cinema history. Even a guy who is burned alive turns up at the end with only minor injuries.

I might as well explain what happens: a young guy called Kevin is working as a security guard at the Hollywood backlot and accidentally lets the creatures loose. He goes out looking for them and out of all the thousands of people in town, the hobgoblins are interested in a group of teens that happens to include Kevin’s girlfriend, Amy. Who is well out of order towards Kevin by the way, getting the hump with him because he unsurprisingly lost a friendly stick fight with rakes to a guy on leave from the army.

The goblins cause mayhem, nearly kill some of the group but don’t and are chased back into their vault. Then an old guy who had been guarding them for 30 years blows them up to end their menace. He could have done that 30 years ago. Just saying.

And the film stops dead half way through when they visit a punk nightclub and there is a whole song played by a band. The whole song. I might have to check this but I don’t think the camera changes in the whole thing, just one long shot of the band playing. There was no need for it.

That’s really all there is to it. The humour is weak, the story is stupid and the goblins look rubbish.

It’s a cheap Gremlins rip off, lacking any of its charm or humour.

Number 67: Time Chasers (1994)

Time travel is always a tricky issue in movies, chiefly because writers have little concept of causality.

The classic example of the problems with time travel is the grandfather paradox, as described by science fiction writer Nathaniel Schachner. Suppose time travel is possible, imagine you end up going back in time and killing your grandfather (let’s not worry about the whys of this) before your father was born. This is impossible as you would not exist, so you could not kill your grandfather. Therefore, you must exist and time is caught in an endless loop.

I do love a good paradox.

Time Chasers takes the slightly easier option of having our protagonists travelling forward in time.

The film was released in 1994 but looks like it was made in 1982. Everything about it looks cheap.

The star of our film is Matthew Bruch as Nick, and he does not look like a movie hero icon. He has a stupid mullet, big thick-rimmed glasses and an enormous chin. But you know what, well done to director David Giancola for challenging our preconceptions of what a film star should look like. That’s the story I’m going with rather than the more probable reason that he just picked him up from a local community theatre group.

So Nick turns his plane into a time machine, no explanation of how it works but that’s fine as it probably wouldn’t make sense anyway. Let’s just say it has a flux capacitor. He demonstrates to his friend by flying 50 years into the future, where it’s a lot as it is now but people smile more. They plan to sell it to a corporation, for the advancement of mankind. But shock, horror it turns out they are an evil corporation. Nick discovers this when he takes his journalist girlfriend on a date and they end up at the same time in the future as before, only now it’s all decayed into ruins.

Nick then has to go back in time to stop himself from signing over his time machine to the Big Bad Corporation. Nick meets himself and despite Doc Brown’s warnings in Back to the Future 2, this neither renders him unconscious or results in the collapse of the entire universe.  There is a chase through time against the CEO of Big Bad that goes back to the American War of Independence.

Future Nick slays the beastly CEO and past Nick resolves not to sell his technology.

Oh, the paradox alarm is ringing. If Nick doesn’t sell his time machine to the BBC, he couldn’t have known they were evil so he couldn’t have gone back in time to stop himself from selling them his time machine. So in order to stop himself from selling his time machine, he has to allow himself to sell his time machine.

Despite that little mindboggler, maybe I’ve been watching too many bad movies in the last couple weeks but Time Chasers doesn’t seem that bad to me. But I can’t help feeling that it should. Everything is wrong but somehow so right.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 70 & 69: Epic Movie and Alone in the Dark

Number 70: Epic Movie (2007)

Two of the biggest criminals of modern cinema are Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer.

Don’t know who they are? Well they are the ‘great’ minds that brought us Date Movie, Meet The Spartans and this, Epic Movie. Spoiler alert, but this isn’t their last appearance on this list. And yet somehow they are still making movies.

I genuinely hate these movies. When I first pulled up the list of the IMDB Bottom 100, it was Freidburg and Seltzer’s movies I was least looking forward to. The jokes are never funny and they are so lazy. Just because something exists doesn’t mean it’s funny.

Pirates of the Caribbean that was something that happened wasn’t it. And Harry Potter was popular wasn’t it. Wasn’t there a Chronicles of Narnia film that done quite well. And Cribs, kids like that don’t they?

If you want to know the story, it’s Chronicles of Narnia with pop culture references. Just watch Narnia instead, I’m not a big fan of that either but it’s better than this. I don’t even want to write about this movie anymore as each word feels like a small victory for the dumbass duo but I’m obliged to.

I’m sure you know the formula for these films by now, so I won’t waste much more time on it.

Take popular films and tv shows, stick them in a blender and see what we get. Hmm, something entirely inedible and unsatisfying.

But somehow you can make a career out of it.

Number 69: Alone in the Dark (2005)

Take one video game franchise, add one of the most notorious hack directors of recent years and what you get is Alone in the Dark.

Before addressing video game movies, let’s discuss director Uwe Boll. He is a terrible director and is in the industry for all the wrong reasons. He’s not in it to advance the medium, he’s out to make a quick buck. That’s why he makes so many video game movies as he sees gamers as an easy mark. It doesn’t even matter that his films flop badly, he still makes the money back in taxes. He lives the real life of The Producers. He’s a terrible director who makes awful movies. And all the boxing matches in the world won’t change that, Uwe (in 2005, Uwe Boll challenged all the critics of his films to boxing matches because that wins you the argument).

Video game movies don’t have a great track record to begin with and Uwe Boll has done more than anyone to cement their legacy of shit. By Boll’s own admission he doesn’t play video games, so he doesn’t care if it’s faithful to its source material. As long as it has the game’s name in the title, that’s good enough for Boll. Alone in the Dark is a perfect example of this.

Alone in the Dark is a cultish video game made in 1992. It’s not particularly obscure but it’s not widely known either. It’s credited as being the first 3d Survival horror game, way ahead of Resident Evil. And the series is very, slow paced. This is something Boll can’t get his head around and has gunfights and chase sequences going on every 5 minutes.

Let’s look at the title of the film, Alone in the Dark. You know why the developers of the game chose that title? Because it encapsulates the fear and isolation the character (and by extension, the player) are feeling in the game. In the movie lead character Edward Carnby, played by Christian Slater (oh Christian, the 00’s were not kind to you), is never at any point isolated. At no point does he ever need to be afraid.

It goes without saying, the cobbled together story makes no sense. There’s secret experiments on orphans being done which involves centipedes being shoved down their throats, people turn into vampires for a bit, there’s an invasion of xenomorphs and an invisible deity killing people. None of this has anything to do with events in the games.

The annoying thing is, in the hands of a competent director, Alone in the Dark could have been a half-decent horror flick. Someone who understands tension can be as good if not better than an explosion.

But they gave it to Uwe Boll, and sadly we’re not done with him on this list yet.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 72 & 71 - Devouring Waves and Chairman of the Board

Number 72: Devouring Waves (1984)

Or Devilfish as it’s otherwise known. And this comes from Italy, making their contribution to the worst films ever.

If a film becomes popular, it is inevitable that imitators will spring up. After Star Wars a glut of sci-fi movies in space came out of varying quality. In this case, Jaws is the film being homage but the makers have differentiated it enough by making it a large shark/octopus hybrid. Those cheeky Italians.

There’s also a plot about a team of dolphin researchers being hassled by mobsters because if there’s one thing I know about the Mafia, it’s that they hate dolphins.

So the sharktopus has been killing people in the bay off, to be honest I don’t know where the bay is off, let’s say Rimini. A group of researchers try to capture the creature but the mobsters try to stop them. Luckily, the monster has a sense of social justice and kills the criminals allowing the good guy and gal to get away.

We then find out it was their employers who had created the creature and hired the goons, DUHN DUHN DUHNN! And furthermore it can reproduce asexually. I don’t quite understand the reasons behind its creation. The guy in charge said it was to do with mankind’s future being under the sea but it didn’t make a lot of sense.

The beast is lured into a small inlet and after a game of cat and mouse burn it alive with flamethrowers.

I like that they tried to do their own thing with it rather than a straight copy but Devilfish lacks the tension and great characters that made Jaws such a classic. It’s a nice effort but it just doesn’t compare.

Number 71: Chairman of the Board (1998)

Prior to watching this I had to research exactly who star of this movie, Carrot Top, actually is. It turns out he’s an improv comedian who uses lots of props in his act. I can already tell this will be painful.

Carrot Top looks exactly as you’d imagine him to, with his big mop of red hair atop his bonce. Carrot Top is a whacky character a bit like Pee Wee Herman but without the charm. Or the likeability. Or any funny jokes.

Carrot Top plays Edison, who is an inventor (you see Edison? As in Thomas Edison the, ahem, ‘inventor’). He lives out on the beach, surfing the days away and coming up with rubbish inventions. But he needs to pay his rent so he goes out looking for a, gulp, job. Then you get a montage of him trying out lots of menial jobs and sucking at all of them, such as being a crash test dummy. Wow, such originality.

He comes across an old man whose car has broken down at the side of the road and wouldn’t you know it, he’s a surfer too. They go out surfing the waves and having a great time. A couple of days pass and the old man has died and would you believe it, he was only the CEO of a large ‘inventions’ company. And he’s only named our Edison as his successor. Truly, their brief encounter was the greatest romance of our age.

You really don’t need me to explain what happens next do you? It’s the same thing that happens in every movie where a whacky character is put in charge of a stuffy corporation. Apparently, all they really want to do is have a big game of twister. Workers don’t need wages, no all they really need is to have a beach party.

The antagonist of this film is a guy called Bradford, the son of the old man who died, who is actually quite understandably pissed off about being passed over in favour of Carrot Top. He’s played by Larry Miller, one of my favourite ‘what have I seen him in before?’ actors and just about the only good thing in this movie. The only genuinely funny lines in the film are said by him and that’s not a good thing as this film was supposed to be promoting Carrot Top (you know what? I hate his juvenile name, Carrot Top. From now on if I’m referring to the actor I’m using his real name, Scott Thompson)

Bradford tries to set up Edison to fail but obviously he succeeds and the company becomes more profitable than it’s ever been.

His big success is ‘TV Dinners’, literally ready meals with a miniature TV inside the tray, showing a complete disregard for economics and the practicalities of ever implementing such a product. Think about it, what you are effectively buying is a portable television but at the same price as a regular ready meal. No wonder people were buying four at a time but where are you making your money?

Bradford does eventually get Edison is trouble, when a man claims to have caught a disease from his TV Dinner and he is booted off the board. However, Edison soon realises it was all a trick using ‘Glo-Gunk’, a body paint he invented that glows in the dark (I hate to break it to you Edi, but fluorescent body paint already exists and has done for some time).

Edison goes back to confront Bradford and doesn’t let a little thing like lack of evidence bother him. Luckily, Bradford is in a board meeting and is wearing a ‘bullshirt’. It’s a shirt that glows and makes farting noises every time you lie. Why is he wearing that? How has he not noticed the rather large battery in his shirt pocket? It makes no sense, there’s no set-up for it. There’s been no mention of a shirt like this before. Frankly, it’s a load of bullshirt.

Anyway, Bradford gets kicked out, Edison is re-instated and I get distracted by how much like Statler and Waldorf from The Muppets two of the board members look. Everyone goes to a beach party.

Chairman of the Board is a predictable story, strung out with gags that are either ridiculously puerile or insultingly unfunny. This was supposed to be Scott Thompson’s big chance of crossing over to the mainstream but it failed miserably. From what I’ve read, Thompson’s stand-up is very funny, very clever and very inventive.

Three qualities sadly lacking here.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 74 & 73 - Merlins Shop of Mystical Wonders and The Starfighters

Number 74: Merlin’s Shop of Mystical Wonders (1996)

God help me, I was actually looking forward to this. The last few films I’ve watched have all been so serious and broody, I was actually looking forward to seeing something a little lighter in tone.

Merlin’s Shop of Mystical Wonders is actually two short films, linked by an old man telling stories to his grandson. The grandfather is played by Oscar winner Ernest Borgnine (I think that’s three Oscar winners so far on this list?). He pops up intermittently during the stories to provide exposition but it all comes off as poor storytelling. It’s like when you tell your friend a joke, they don’t get it and you realise that’s because you forgot to tell them the most important part which would have made it work. So you end up saying, ‘Did I mention we were in a zoo?’

The first story involves the titular shop. A man called Jonathan has a job reviewing stores for a newspaper and wanders into Merlin’s store. Merlin has returned as the world needs magic or something. His store is more like a mystical cave and has lots of weird creatures inside. Jonathan obviously believes Merlin is bogus and is going to give his store a bad review, to change his mind Merlin gives him a book of his magic spells.

The spells work and Jonathan goes mad with power. He tries different spells out and turns his cat into a crazed creature. But using magic comes at a cost, Jonathan has aged considerably in a few hours. He uses a rejuvenation that requires his wife’s blood but it reverts too far and he turns into a baby. There was a subplot with his wife always wanting a baby but couldn’t have one, now she has a son who is also her husband. How very Norfolk.

The second story begins with a robber stealing a monkey toy from Merlin’s shop. This is actually a cheap trick as what follows is actually a highly edited version of 1984 film The Devil’s Gift. Basically, the monkey toy is possessed by an evil demon and whenever it clashes its cymbals, someone dies. If that sounds familiar, that’s probably because Stephen King wrote a short story with the same premise but he isn’t given any writing credits here. It was outright plagiarised.

This segment chiefly focuses on the efforts the father of the family goes to in order to get rid of the monkey once a psychic makes it clear to him the toy is evil. When they need to cut large portions of the original film, they cut to Merlin searching for the toy monkey. In the end, just as it looks like the story is coming to its menacing conclusion, Merlin arrives in the nick of time to stop the monkey’s cymbals clashing and takes it back to his shop (if you’re wondering, the point Merlin turns up here is the same time The Devil’s Gift ended).

The best way to imagine this film is as an extended edition of Tales from the Crypt but with Ernest Borgnine taking on the role of The Cryptkeeper. Only not as good.

Number 73: The Starfighters (1964)

Don’t be fooled by the title, there is no space action in this film. No, these Starfighters are manned by regular US Air Force pilots. Top Gunning it 20 years before Top Gun was a thing.

I’m not sure if this is really a movie or an 80 minute commercial for the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter jet. Certainly after watching this I am convinced the F-104 is the best fighter jet in the world. It’s definitely way superior to those pussy F-100’s  and 86's the pilots had been flying before. The idiots.

The first 20 minutes of the film explains all about the new fighter jet, it’s advanced aerodynamics, improved weapon systems and how it has already proven itself to be superior on missions to other tactical aircraft.

There is a story about a young Lieutenant who wants to be a fighter jet pilot but his congressman father wants him to be a bomber pilot on a B-52. What a fool, doesn’t he realise the superior aerodynamic capabilities of the F-104 compared to all other active military aircraft?

But seriously, all this tacked on story stuff just gets in the way of the shots of the F-104’s in action and talk about the advantages of the F-104’s over other planes. Did you know the F-104 is much easier to refuel mid-flight than previous models?

As an advert for Lockheed, The Starfighters is fine but as a movie not so much. There’s no antagonist, no enemy they have to fight, not even any rivalry between the pilots. The closest we come to drama is when one pilot loses his plane over the Nevada desert on a training exercise but then suffers zero repercussions.

If you’re a plane enthusiast, you might enjoy all the long shots of the F-104 in flight and there is a lot of information packed inside about its development but if not there isn’t a lot here for you.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 76 & 75 - The Final Sacrifice and R.O.T.O.R

Number 76: The Final Sacrifice (1990)

I’ve watched films from all over the globe for this list: India, Germany, Norway, China even Iran. Now I get to see what America’s cousins to the North, Canada have to offer in this well, I guess it’s a Sci-Fi-fantasy, I'm not really sure.

There’s a cult of bodybuilders in leather masks who are looking for a city of a lost civilisation, led by a guy in a suit who is reminiscent of Kurrgan from Highlander with a little bit of Agent Smith. His character is called Satoris. Well, he is a snappy dresser.

Then there is Troy, a kid trying to find out what had happened to his father, this upsets the cult and they try to kill him, very badly. In trying to get away, Troy escapes on a bicycle which the villains couldn’t possibly be keep up with in their mere car. That would be ridiculous.

He comes across a guy called Zap Rowsdower. Zap Rowsdower. Zap Rowsdower, a name that manages to be both brilliant and ridiculous at the same time. Our Zap used to be a member of the cult but I guess he was kicked out for getting too flabby.

They find a weird bearded guy in the woods with the most Old West accent you’ll ever find. He’s basically there for exposition purposes filling in the blanks of what happened to Troy’s father and explaining all about the lost civilisation. The Ziox were more advanced than the ancient Egyptians, ooh impressive.

Apparently if our dynamic duo they don’t beat Agent Satoris to the lost city it means the END OF THE WORLD. Why I’m not sure but it does, accept it.

They find the city, kill Sartoris and the city floats up and flies away. At least I think it does. It definitely floats and then disappears. I think it flew but it could have just spontaneously dissolved. I don’t know why this happened. Nothing makes sense in this movie.

There was something that was bothering me throughout this movie and it took me until near the end to figure it out. There are no women in this movie. I went back through it, Troy has an aunt who speaks one line at the start and disappears for the rest of the movie. And that’s it for female involvement. No tacked on love interests, no kickass henchwomen. Now, whether the token inclusion of a female character would have improved this film is debatable but it’s weird to see such a male-heavy production.

To sum up The Final Sacrifice it’s dull in places but some of the characters are so over the top and the scenarios so ridiculous that you can’t help but find yourself revelling in it’s stupidity.

Number 75: R.O.T.O.R (1987)

Remember The Terminator? And Robocop? Weren’t they great? Great action and stories, memorable characters. Wouldn’t it be great if you could combine the two? Well, not if R.O.T.O.R. is anything to go by.

R.O.T.O.R stands for Robotic Officer Tactical Operations Research. He’s designed to be the ultimate in law enforcement but something goes wrong, he breaks out of his laboratory and goes on a killing spree.

Stepping in for Sarah Connor is Sony (Margaret Trigg), R.O.T.O.R becomes fixated on her after he kills her fiancé for speeding. Dallas is tough, zero tolerance on these things. So far, so stupid. These things matter, people. The Terminator is relentless in its pursuit of Sarah Connor because that’s what it is programmed to do and killing her wins the future war for the machines (well, maybe, you can argue for hours about Terminator timelines), here Sony is being relentlessly chased because she was in the car at the same time someone was speeding.

Trying to stop the unstoppable machine is a scientist called Coldyron (pronounced cold-iron, yeah we’re doing well on silly names today). He fancies himself as a Clint Eastwood Dirty Harry type and was responsible for creating R.O.T.O.R.

Just a word on R.O.T.O.R.’s appearance, he really doesn’t look that threatening. Terminator worked because Arnold Schwarzenegger had an intimidating presence, even if he wasn’t an unstoppable killing machine you’d keep your distance. R.O.T.O.R. just looks like an average and slightly overweight guy. In reality, that might work out better for R.O.T.O.R. but in films not so much.

Chilledbronze brings in a woman called Steele, who’s a bit like Vasquez in Aliens. Even though she’s called Dr. I’m not sure if she’s actually a scientist or a soldier but since she gets killed about 5 minutes after being introduced, it doesn’t really matter. He’s also ‘helped’ by a robot who is a lot like the one from Rocky IV and is what passes for comic relief in this movie.

So Lukewarmzinc sets a trap to capture the killing machine that involves using Sony as bait and then blowing it up. Does he succeed? All I’ll say is, there isn’t a R.O.T.O.R. 2.

Everything about R.O.T.O.R. is wrong. The acting is bad, especially Coolaluminium but that might not entirely be actor Richard Gesswein’s fault since the audio doesn’t seem to match with what is on the screen. This suggests all the audio was recorded later and just adds to the amateur feel of the production.

The film makes clumsy attempts at social commentary (who is the real monster? The unstoppable killing machine or is it something a little closer to home, the monster we call, man? It’s the first one). As I said at the start, it’s a mesh of Terminator and Robocop but only all the worst parts.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 78 and 77 - Tony Blair Witch Project & The Lawnmower Man 2

Number 78: The Tony Blair Witch Project (2000)

I write this on the day Jeremy Corbyn has become leader of the Labour party, with a bigger majority then Tony Blair had in his landslide victory in 1994 and a big slap in the face to all Blairite Labour members. If this was a satirical film this might be appropriate, unfortunately all this has to with Blair is the title.

If I might allow myself a moment of self-congratulations, this was a really frigging hard movie to find.

A lot of these films are easy enough to find as many are public domain, such as Body in the Web and Beast of Yucca Flats. Some more modern films have been surprisingly tricky such as Simon Sez and with foreign movies it can prove challenging finding English subtitles (and I’ve even admitted defeat on that for Iranian flick Deportees 2). But The Tony Blair Witch Project just didn’t seem to exist anywhere. And I had to search the real back bowels of the internet to find this turd.

Was it worth it? Well, it was everything I expected and less. I don’t really get it. From what I can tell this was never released in any cinemas and wasn’t put on TV anywhere, hence the difficulties in finding it. It just seems to be a bunch of college kids messing around with a camera, making their own Blair Witch Project spoof and put it on the web. But somehow, it found its way on to IMDB.

This was made in 2000, when The Blair Witch Project kick-started the whole found footage genre. So, obviously it was ripe for parody, in this case using then British Prime Minister Tony Blair, for no reason other than his name is Blair. If you’re expecting some cutting edge satire, you’ll be very disappointed as it is painfully obvious that the only thing the maker of this, Michael Martinez, knows about Tony Blair is that he was the British Prime Minister. Though to be fair, it should be noted this was made pre-Iraq, so it’s probably not too surprising they don't know anything beyond his name.

We have a bunch of people who go off looking for ‘The Tony Blair Witch’, including a guy in a Tony Blair mask who is supposed to be the man himself. Maybe I’m wrong on the satire but damned if I know what it’s trying to say. There is one bit near the end where Blair says for Britain to move forward it must become a Monarchy. So…carry on as it is then.

It’s a bunch of screaming and running around in front of the camera, as the ‘actors’ practise various voices. It mostly follows the Blair Witch Project, apart from one bit that briefly turns the movie into Deliverance, as the other people in the group start to disappear. And the Tony Blair witch kills them all.

I noticed the IMDB page credits one of the writers as Alan Smithee. If you aren’t familiar with movie parlance, this is short hand for when someone thinks a project is so bad they don’t want their name attached to it.

The Tony Blair Witch Project is one not very funny joke stretched out over an hour. Not worth the effort.

Number 77: Lawnmower Man 2: Beyond Cyberspace (1996)

For those not familiar with the first Lawnmower Man, Pierce Brosnan uses mind enhancing drugs and a virtual reality world on a simple gardener, Jobe. However, as Jobe becomes smarter he becomes more dangerous, with designs beyond cyberspace.

While we are on the subject of The Lawnmower Man let us take a moment to address the Stephen King issue. This has nothing to do with the sequel but hopefully you’ll realise in a moment why that is relevant. Stephen King is credited as a writer on The Lawnmower Man except he didn’t write any of it. He did however, write a short story of the same title in 1976 that has nothing in common with the 1993 movie. So why is his name on the credits? Because Stephen King was the hottest horror writer on the planet, why wouldn’t the producers of the movie try and cash in on that? King won a lawsuit to have his name removed from the credits. It was all a cheap, marketing trick from the producers.

It’s the same for the sequel but with a different set up. Jobe (played by Max Headroom himself, Matt Frewer) who is now a human computer able to access any system on earth. A corporation intends to use him to create a virtual reality world for the people of the earth to interact. Doesn’t sound so evil but it’s presented as such, so it must be. If the objection to them was based on the ethics of using a vulnerable human being to power their system I would understand but no, nobody has a problem with that. They just want to make money, which despite being the point of any business large or small, means they must automatically be evil.

Jobe on the other hand, has a plan of his own to make the real world so crap everyone will want to stay in his cyber-world. Which naturally, he is the ruler of.

Opposing him is Dr Ben Trace (Patrick Bergin) who is rather like a cross between Christopher Lambert and comedian Milton Jones. He’s assisted by Peter Pan and his lost boys (well, one of them is a girl but the main one is called Peter and the first scene you see them in they are flying through a VR Neverland).

There’s a countdown to something called the Global Interface, which I believe was the time Jobe would be connected to everyone in the world simultaneously and Dr Trace and his gang have to stop him. There’s a lot of guff about a computer chip and ‘Egypt’ (which is meant to have some relevance to how the chip works). They stop Jobe and he returns to his former ‘simple’ state, which I guess is a good thing?

Lawnmower Man was always a case of style of substance but Lawnmower Man 2 doesn’t even have the style. There is not a lot of time spent in the VR world and what there is doesn’t look very good. This is a big deal as the first movie sold itself on it’s (for the time) impressive visual effects.

Without the cool effects, Lawnmower Man 2 is just a run-of-the-mill sci-fi flick.

(these are from IMDB Bottom 100 list as it was on 31st August 2015)

IMDB Bottom 100: No's 80 & 79 - Miss Castaway and Santa with Muscles

Number 80: Miss Castaway and the Island Girls (2004)

It’s got Michael Jackson in it. What else do you need to know?

Well, I suppose I better say something else about it. It’s an Airplane-style spoof about a group of models on their way to a beauty pageant when their plane crashes on a desert island (it’s weird that two of the last three films I’ve watched have involved beautiful women stranded on an island). There’s a giant dino-pig monster on the island and they find Noah’s ark, which gorillas from Planet of the Apes intend to use, somehow, to take over the world.

And Michael Jackson helps one of the pilots who survived the crash defeat the apes.

If that all sounds like a lot of fun, rest assured: it isn’t. There are a (very) few amusing sight gags but mostly it concerns itself with referencing other movies. I gave up watching for laughs early on and just started counting the references.

So, we have references to: Austin Powers, Jurassic Park, Catch Me If You Can, Miss Congeniality, Green Mile, Con-Air, Sixth Sense, Indiana Jones, Mission Impossible, The Matrix, James Bond, Scream, Castaway, Fantasia, Star Wars, Forrest Gump, Lord of the Flies, Planet of the Apes, A Perfect Storm, Superman, Tron, Hunt for Red October, Jaws, South Park, Men in Black, Star Trek, Spider-man, War Games, Harry Potter, Wizard of Oz, Titanic, ET, Lord of the Rings and Armageddon.

And those are just the ones I caught.

References in place of any actual jokes. Worth seeing for the curiosity value of Michael Jackson (not that he does much) but that’s about it.

Number 79: Santa with Muscles (1996)

Confession time: when I was 8 years old, I was a little Hulkamaniac. I said my prayers and took my vitamins. I had a Hulk Hogan action figure and would sing about being ‘a Real American.’ (I’ve been to America once in my life). Hulk Rules and Hulkamania would live forever.

Now I’m older, the truth about my idol is better known to me. ‘Vitamins’ was just a euphemism for steroids, he’s a reality tv star, sex-tape making racist. And you know what else? He wasn’t even that good a wrestler.

The less said about his film career the better. Suburban Commando was ok but everything else is just awful. Well, Rocky III is ok but that’s more down to Mr T than anything Hulk Hogan done.

The Hulkster doesn’t even look himself in this film with his short hair and lack of bald spot, he's a lot smaller than you remember (the steroid withdrawal had hit him bad). He’s plays a millionaire called Blake, who has a 1001 rules about being an arsehole. Then he gets hit on the head and a guy desperate for his money to pay the mob, convinces him that he is Santa Claus. But Santa, with muscles. That slightly misrepresents the chracter of Lenny, as though he does want Blake’s money, he’s not actually a bad guy.

There’s an orphanage that needs saving from an evil criminal known as Mr Frost who is after the quartz crystal buried underneath the orphanage. Hogan fights him off with his 24-inch pythons, protecting the children (including a young Mila Kunis).

After Hogan does regain his memory, he’s a changed man and still wants to go out to protect the orphanage.  As Hulk battles off the goofy henchmen (and woman) there is what is actually a fairly well done twist: Blake and Frost are former best friends, who had both grew up in the orphanage. This actually explains how Blake knew the combination to the vault where the crystals were being stored. What ruins it sadly, is there is no explanation of how they had both forgotten this.

Unfortunately the crystals Frost is after are very unstable and the fight between Blake and Frost causes an explosion that destroys the orphanage. But Blake lets them all stay at his mansion and we all have jelly and ice cream.

It’s supposed to be a Christmas movie but the California sunshine doesn’t really make it feel that way. I know that’s just the Californian climate but sounds of jingle bells and images of glorious sunshine just don’t mix.

On the whole, Santa with Muscles, well it’s a poor effort really. The jokes fall flat, the cuteness from the kids is forced and there’s not much tension to it. Usually in a film, if someone finds out you aren’t who you say you are, you have to go on a path of redemption to regain their trust. This doesn’t happen here. Hogan thinks he’s Santa until he gets hit on the head and becomes Blake again. And nobody cares. And it's cheesy as hell but what else would a Hulk Hogan movie be?

I’ll leave the last word on this to the Hulkster:

‘Whatcha gonna do???!!! When Santa with Muscles runs wild, on you! Brother!’




(these are from IMDB Bottom 100 list as it was on 31st August 2015)

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 82 & 81 - Body in the Web and Gigli

Number 82: Body in the Web (1960)

Time for some German horror now with Body in the Web. Or at least it’s listed as Body in the Web, the opening title card clearly calls it The Horror of Spider Island which would make more sense. Body in the Web sounds more film noir.

The film starts with an agent called Gary hiring a group of girls for a dance troupe touring in Singapore. The audition process seems to be mainly about seeing if the girls have nice legs. It’s actually all rather pointless since the girls who ‘failed’ all get taken anyway.

Their plane crashes and they wash ashore on a remote island. Dan is now facing every man’s worst nightmare: being stuck on a desert island with nothing but eight beautiful women for company.

They find a cabin with the dead body of a man inside, hung from a spider web. Another woman turns up and reveals he had been conducting experiments with uranium, which we are to take as explanation for the large spiders.

When the spiders do turn up, they actually look kind of cute. Like big cuddly toys. One of them bites Gary and he turns into a man-like spider creature. A spider-man if you will but with no cool spider powers. He turns up every now and then to swipe at the women, more just to remind us he’s there than anything.

It then fast forwards four weeks and two new guys arrive on the island. Apparently they brought supplies in for the old professor. What follows is a party scene with awkward attempts at romance that goes on so long I’d forgotten this was supposed to be a horror movie. From the notes I made, it was 27 minutes before Spider-Gary (or anything spider-related) turns up again. That’s a long time in a movie that’s only 75 minutes long to begin with.

When he does come back, he kills one of the new guys and one of the girls but then drowns in some quicksand. A boat comes and they all head back home.

The film was made in 1960 but everything else seems like it’s from the 40’s right down to the soundtrack. The dancing girls are all very interchangeable apart from one who seems to be more…forward…than the others. That’s as far as we get in character development but with so many of them, what do you expect?

Apart from some attempts at titillation there isn’t much to hold your interest. Spider-beast doesn’t even come across as particularly threatening.

And that’s Horror of Spider Island. Sorry, Body in the Web.

Number 81: Gigli (2003)

It’s turkey time. Gobble-gobble.

Now that’s out the way, here’s a question: if this film had starred anyone other than Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez, would it have got the same level of hate? Here’s the background, back in 2003 Affleck and Lopez were a real life couple and to my mind the originators of the amalgamation of celebity couples names into one, in this case ‘Bennifer’. For whatever reason they weren’t too popular so the film seemed doomed before anyone had seen a single frame. But is Gigli really that bad?

Well, the first time we see Affleck, he’s trying to torture a guy by stuffing him in a washing machine. He should have just shown him Pearl Harbour. At this stage in his career, Affleck had the gormless look down to a tee. Coupled with a crappy Italian accent and these two and a bit hours will just fly by.

Affleck’s character Larry is hired to kidnap an autistic kid called Brian, who is the brother of a federal prosecutor and from there on the movie threatens to turn into Rain Man at any moment. J-Lo arrives as another, well the synopsis says hit-woman but she never kills or even hurts anyone, so let’s call her a glamorous babysitter called Rikki. She’s hired because the guy in charge thinks Larry is too stupid to do it on his own. Which begs the question, why didn’t he just hire her to do it to begin with?

So, J-Lo is the smart one who likes to spout philosophy while Affleck is the dumb guy (really stretching yourself there, Ben) who doesn’t own any books. Attempted romance ensues but oh no, she’s a lesbian. Not that a small detail like that will put Larry off and this is the moment I realised this was the second movie I’d seen with Ben Affleck where he falls in love with a gay woman (Chasing Amy was the other). I don’t know if that really means anything but it seems a weird coincidence.

So, what else? Larry does eventually turn Rikki straight, or bi, I don’t know, she comes across a little sexually confused, the important thing is they have sex and everyone gets to laugh about turkeys. They become surrogate parents to Brian and even defy their orders to protect him.

There’s an odd cameo from Christopher Walken. I usually enjoy Walken cameos, he has them down to an art (see Pulp Fiction) but in this one, he just seems weird. Al Pacino has a cameo as well (turns out he’s the one being prosecuted and Brian was kidnapped as leverage) and just for a fleeting moment the movie threatens to become good. Luckily, our Ben and Jen are there to stop that happening.

Bennifer give Brian back to the authorities and drive off into the sunset. Yeah, there’s not really much more drama to it than that.

So, that’s Gigli. Is it bad? Yeah. Is it really bottom 100 of all time bad? Not really. It’s a car wreck no doubt but it is at least an enjoyable one, which is more than I can say for some of the other films I’ve watched on this list so far.

Sure, it’s got its problems. It’s a common complaint I have with bad movies but it’s too long. There is not enough going on to justify it’s 140 minute run time. It doesn't seem to quite know if it's a serious crime piece or a feel good comedy.

A lot is made of a lack of chemistry between the actors and I can see the point. Every scene with Affleck and Lopez seems like their only meeting for the first time. In a weird way, though probably not intentional, that works in the films favour. Rikki is supposed to be a lesbian, so it makes sense she would seem stand-offish to Larry’s obvious advances.

There are some amusing scenes, such as when Larry describes the evolution of the penis (which was probably meant to be funny) which Rikki counters with her description of the vagina while performing yoga (which probably wasn’t meant to be funny but still is). Though I’m sure it doesn’t have the same meaning in America, Affleck describing Lopez as a cow is quite funny too.

And that’s all I’ve really got to say about that. Gobble-gobble.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 84 and 83 - Mitchell & Monster a Go-Go

Number 84: Mitchell (1975)

Time for some 1970’s cop drama. Boom-chika-wakka…

Joe Don Baker plays our hero, the titular Mitchell. A heavy drinking, cigar smoking cop with a large porn collection and a penchant for hookers. What a guy. He does however, have a high intolerance for anyone who does break the law (apart from himself and prostitutes, obviously. That's ok).

He’s one of those damn mavericks who just won’t do it by the book, to his captain’s constant chagrin. There is a touch of Colombo about him too, with his dogged persistence in pursuing the movie’s villain, James Cummings played by Oscar winning actor Martin Balsam. Basically, it’s harassment.

There’s a plot involving heroin being smuggled into LA which I think is the main story but it’s all so convoluted it’s difficult to tell.

John Saxon plays a secondary villain who kills a kid at the start but doesn’t seem to tie into the main story in any way, except to reveal he had been paying for Mitchell’s prostitute. Why he does this, I don't know. He offers a complicated bribe that involves Mitchell first buying a house and Saxon buying it from him. What's wrong with good old fashioned cash?

There seems to be no reason to have Saxon in there other than to have his name on the credits. Name a popular US TV series from the 70’s or 80’s and John Saxon probably made an appearance in it.

Mitchell has a lot of dumb scenes in it such as a low-speed, no thrills car chase (remember, just because you're a criminal, that's no excuse for ignoring the highway code); Mitchell getting into a slanging match with a random child and Mitchell breaking into Saxon’s house for no apparent reason.

Truthfully, Mitchell’s not much of a character, he's not very likeable and he just sort of fumbles around exhibiting zero charm or charisma. I suspect this was a pilot that was probably meant to lead to a TV series but judging by this, we didn’t miss out on much.

Number 83: Monster a Go-Go (1965)

Moving into real B-movie territory here. Cheap sets, terrible dialogue and bad acting. And a narrator.

After you have watched a few bad movies, you start to notice certain trends and themes. One such trend is the use of a narrator, explaining what is happening in every scene. This is basically like an admission from the film maker that the scene isn’t strong enough to speak for itself. Rather than helping the movie, all using a narrator does is highlight how bad your movie is. Think of all the great movies you’ve seen in your lifetime, than count how many use a narrator. Not many is it?

The plot is much the same as Beast of Yucca Flats (another film that relies heavily on a narrator, although to Monster a Go-Go’s credit at least it doesn’t try to be so preachy) with a radioactive monster terrorising a small town.

A space capsule crashes but the astronaut is missing and bodies are turning up dead, with a monster having been spotted in the area. The military turn up to try to capture the monster and then it just sort of ends with no real climax. That’s 70 minutes wasted.

The ‘monster’ is really just a taller than average guy with radiation poisoning that he passes on to kill his victims. He has been able to survive as supposedly the astronaut had been taking some radiation serum prior to going into space.

There is a twist at the end where the audience is left to wonder whether the monster was actually the astronaut or some other being but to be honest, the producers were being optimistic to think there would be an audience still around to see it.

Even the narrator doesn’t seem to know what’s going on at times. One bit of narration clearly says a character is about to be killed but at the end of the movie we see him alive and well.

I don’t really know where the ‘a Go-Go’ comes into the title. There is a bit with some high-school kids dancing in that hip-swinging 60’s style but that’s as close as I can come to an explanation. The trailer for this movie writes cheques it's ass can't cash with it's vibrant style and the big deal it makes about all the 'pretty girls' in the movie. Yeah, they turn up for one two-minute scene in a 70 minute film. Pretty girls and fun times make up little over 1% of the movie. Whoo!

In conclusion, this film has bad directing, is poorly produced, has a boring story and characters you are given no reason to care about. Monster A Go-Go is a lesson in how not to make a Sci-Fi movie but has a trailer that is a great lesson in how to make your film look interesting.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 86 & 85 - Seven Mummies and Car 54, Where Are You?

Number 86: Seven Mummies (2006)

After the last couple of movies I’ve had to sit through, it’s a relief to be back on familiar territory with a good-old, straight forward American horror story.

And this is as straight forward as they come, it’s a straight rip-off of From Dusk Til Dawn.

Six criminals (one of them is the spitting image of Chris Hemsworth, I had to look up the credits to find it wasn’t actually him) are being transported across Arizona when their prison van is involved in an accident. The run out across the desert, taking the pretty female guard with them. She really only exists for eye-candy.

They come across Danny Trejo (please Danny, get a better agent) who fulfils his customary exposition role, telling them the legend of some gold buried out in the desert. Not surprisingly, our gang go out looking for it.

They come across a town that time forgot where everyone is from the old West, which is a bit odd. They have a good time at the local saloon until the sun goes down when (remember what I said about From Dusk Til Dawn?) they all turn into vampires and go on a blood frenzy.

We then see the criminals try to survive the night but with the requisite number of gruesome deaths. They do find the gold but it’s being guarded by a group of vampires, sorry, mummies who fight them off. One of them escapes on a motorcycle with the girl and the pursuing mummy bursting into flame in the sunlight. As mummies are prone to do.

I haven’t given the names of any of the characters but that is with good reason. They are all so bland and terrible, they have forfeited the right to names.

Save yourself the time and just watch From Dusk Til Dawn instead. It’s a much better film than this mediocre horror movie.

Number 85: Car 54, Where Are You? (1994)

This is a movie based on a sit-com from the 60’s, it came out just pre-Charlie’s Angels era when reviving old TV shows became a really big thing in Hollywood.

I’d like to say this paved the way for that (or do I want to say that?) but I would clearly be lying. Nostalgia can be a dangerous thing and the producers of this comedy where clearly hoping there was enough people with fond memories of the original to make this a success. I don’t know much about the series, so I can only really judge based from this movie.

So this follows the streetwise cop Officer Tooty, played by David Johansen (who couldn’t be more from Brooklyn if he tried), and his new partner the straight-laced Officer Muldoon, played by John C McGinlay (better known these days for his role as Dr. Cox in Scrubs). Muldoon follows the law to the book, issuing citations for the most minor offences (including a blind man for jaywalking).

Tooty tries to loosen him up, arranging him a date and taking out to nightclubs. Their assigned to protect a witness in a mob case but end up losing him.

They find him but are chased by the mafia led by Daniel Baldwin (the weakest of the Baldwin brothers). The chase takes them through Coney Island, riding on rollercoasters (it’s a rollercoaster ride you see?) and through the tunnel of love. They get the witness back and capture the criminal.

It might have worked out a bit better if they'd made it a few years later when a little more care (for the most part) was being taken with old TV franchises.

There are a couple of decent jokes in it, Penn and Teller make an amusing cameo but on the whole it’s more like one of the later Police Academy sequels, when they started getting really bad. Yeah, that bad.

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 88 & 87 - Beginning of the Great Revival & A Story About Love

Number 88: Beginning of the Great Revival (2011)

Now, there’s no getting away from the fact this is a propaganda movie. Commissioned by the Chinese government, Beginning of the Revival was made to commemorate 90 years since the foundation of the Communist Party in China.

But even if you don’t agree with the politics that doesn’t mean a film can’t be good in its own right. Birth of a Nation and Triumph of the Will are still considered cinematic masterpieces despite being less than desirable politically speaking.

Just about every big name in Chinese cinema is brought in for this, including Chow Yun Fat and Andy Lau. John Woo, the man Michael Bay wishes he could be, makes a rare appearance in front of the camera.

This is basically a two hour Chinese history lesson covering a 10 year period. There is WAY too much history to cover in detail but I’ll try sum up as best I can.

So in 1911, China is being torn apart by civil wars between Imperial and Republican forces (Ooh, it suddenly sounds a bit Star Wars). The Emperor is overthrown but people are becoming hungry and restless. The students in the universities lead, inspired by their Marxist influenced teachers, begin what are depicted as mostly peaceful revolts. In 1917, the October Revolution happens in Russia and Marxism begins to become more widespread in China. The working classes are galvanised as a political force. The ruling regime attempts to suppress their movement but without success. The film ends with all the key figures together on a boat and the formation of the Communist Party on 1st July 1921. They sing the Chinese national anthem and a message comes up to say the Communist Party is now leading China into a glorious and prosperous future.

Yes, the propaganda is unescapable – communists good, everyone else bad – but as a film in its own right, it’s actually quite good.

It’s not great – too many characters (everyone who played even a minor roler is crammed in), historical inaccuracies, drawn out in places – but it is well shot, the actors are good and it has that epic feel to it.

I am trying to be as fair to the film as possible and view it in its own terms but I do recognise the difficulty of separating the film from the politics. And I think for most the politics will be the deciding factor as to whether they like this or not.

Number 87: A Story about Love (1995)

Now we head over to Norway for A Story about Love. Or Dis - en historie om kjærlighet to give it’s proper Norwegian title. And it’s the worst film I have come across so far, nothing but pretentious drivel.

‘Student Arthouse’ is the phrase that comes to mind. The film is a collection of stories about love from around the world: Cairo, Oslo, Paris and New York. The characters in the film never speak to each other, they are all too mean and moody for that. Apparently, being in love means you can’t smile anymore either.

I hope you like long location tracking shots. If not you are in a lot of trouble since that is about 80% of the movie. I now no longer feel I have to visit Cairo, I have now seen every inch of it.

The ‘story’ is told via internal narration. It’s all a lot of ‘she is beauty, love is pain’ type stuff. It’s a lot like an extended Calvin Klein advertisement but even less ethnically diverse. And it is. All. Just. So. Boring.

It frightens me there are 86 films considered worse than this. It’s only 70 minutes long but it just seems to go on forever. Thank you Norway but no thanks. Go back to doing whatever it is Norwegians are stereotypically supposed to do. Being Norwegian.

I did invent a game to make it more bearable though. Basically what I did was replace the characters narrations with Rorschach from Watchmen. Weirdly, it kind of works especially for the bits in New York.

‘All the filth and politicians will look up and say, ‘Save us from this movie!’ and I’ll whisper…’No!’


(these are from the IMDB Bottom 100 list as it was on 31st August 2015)

IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 90 & 89 - Santa Claus & Theodore Rex

Number 90: Santa Claus (1959)

Ah Santa, we’ve all heard about him? Travelling the world in one night on his sleigh with his flying reindeer, delivering gifts to all the good boys and girls. The time he fought the Devil. A classic Christmas story.

This Christmas tale comes to us from Mexico. It starts with Santa and his elves, with ‘elves’ being a euphemism for ‘child labour’. They are taken from all over the world and we are treated to a variety of folk songs and nursery rhymes to represent all the nations. The USA being particularly amusing as they appear to forget the words to ‘Mary had a Little Lamb’.

They get their revenge on Santa by tricking him into releasing the devil Pitch and…oh, my God he’s attacking with interpretive dance. The swine!

Pitch’s plan is to make children do bad things, such as stealing. Santa can do nothing as he cannot leave Lapland until Christmas Eve. All he can do is watch from his castle with a multitude of machines he can use to spy on the world’s children, even into their dreams. Santa is a good guy isn’t he? It’s hard to tell with all his creepy machines and menacing laugh.

He’s very vain too, Jolly Saint Nick really loses it when one child describes him as ‘old’.

We meet characters from around Santa’s castle, including Merlin, who give him the abilities to sneak around unseen and a key that unlocks any door. He goes through a fitness regime so he can get down all the chimneys. He claims to know ‘every child on earth’ and has a powder he can use to make them sleep. Again, he is the good guy isn’t he?

They obviously couldn’t afford real reindeer, so there are weird looking toy ones instead. And there’s only four of them, sorry Rudolph you didn’t make the cut.

The devil Pitch tries to stop Santa into going into a house by moving a chimney’s entrance out of position, showing a complete lack of understanding of how chimney’s work. No problem though, Santa’s got his magic key remember? Pitch tries various other schemes but Santa always gives him his comeuppance. One plan involves getting three ‘bad’ children to kidnap Santa, fundamentally flawed from the start. These children are all on the ‘naughty’ list, so Santa wouldn’t stop for them and he doesn’t.

There are attempts made to show the differences of celebrating Christmas between the rich and the poor but ultimately it’s about the values of being good, not just at Christmas but all the year through.

As a child I may have enjoyed it but as a more cynical adult, it’s all just a bit silly.

Number 89: Theodore Rex (1995)

If you must watch a Whoopi Goldberg movie, watch The Colour Purple. Because if you do you might forget just how far Goldberg fell afterwards.

The mid 90’s were a particular low point for Goldberg with one mediocre comedy after another, Theodore Rex being the absolute bottom of the pit.

This is a world where anthropomorphised dinosaurs live and work alongside humans. They had been genetically engineered several years previously for…reasons. The first scene of the titular character puts me in mind of Howard the Duck. Hmm, not a good start.

Goldberg, as detective Katie Coltrane, is teamed up with Theodore Rex to work on a ‘dinocide’ case. As you might expect, Coltrane is not thrilled about being teamed up with a dinosaur. Not too surprisingly, dinosaurs are not regarded as equals in this world. Speciesism is alive and well in this universe.

So anyway, the engineer created the dinosaurs decides he’s bored of Earth, wants to start over so builds his own version of Noah’s Ark and plans to bring on a new Ice Age. It’s good to have a dream.

After lots of unfunny jokes, Rex melts Coltrane’s cynical heart and they start getting along. All your standard clichés are here: incompetent henchman, the badass sexy henchwoman, a ball-breaking police captain and an insane master villain. With added dinosaur.

It’s worth noting this came out two years after Jurassic Park, so the producers were eager to capitalise on the world’s interest in dinosaurs. But once the novelty of seeing the dinosaurs living with humans wears off, you are left with another poor kids movie that were so frequent in the 90’s.

There is a nice message in the two leads of overcoming prejudices and learning we can all get along despite our differences but that’s not enough to save the movie. I would rather watch The Super Mario Brothers Movie than this and that tells you all you need to know.

Just one more film Whoopi Goldberg would rather forget.