IMDB Bottom 100: No's 26 & 25 - House of the Dead and Space Mutiny

Number 26: House of the Dead (2003)

(couldn't find trailer for the film, so here's one for one of the games instead)

Video games and movies are synonymous with being a perfect match for each other. Every time you see a film is ‘based on the hit video game’, you know you are getting a high quality production.

And no one has done more to advance the art than German director Uwe Boll, the finest director of his generation, universally adored by fans and critics alike…

…is probably what Uwe Boll dreams people say every night.

Boll is the definitive hack director of the noughties. He takes popular video game titles and makes films that bear little resemblance to their source material.

House of the Dead should have been an easier one to do but he still cocks it up somehow.

I have fond memories of playing House of the Dead in the arcade. It was a basic light gun shooting game developed by Sega, fighting off hordes of zombies and other undead creatures. It even had an inspired spin-off game, The Typing of the Dead on the Dreamcast where instead of shooting zombies, you had to type in words that appeared on screen to kill them. Genius. Good times.

Now back to the not so good times.

Following conventional horror movie tradition, a group of teenagers are out on a trip to the woods. Ok, they are going to an island but it’s got woods on it. There’s some big rave party going on but they miss the one boat that goes to the island, so they have to hire out a boat owned by a smuggler. And to be fair, the smuggler captain is the only decent character in the whole film because he’s so badass.

If I was arranging a big rave, location would be important. I’d hold it somewhere with more than one rickety boat going out to it per day but you know, movie.

The name of the island is Isla de Muerte or ‘Island of the Dead’, that’s a strike against the movie. An island is not a house. Pedantic maybe but that’s what happens when you watch dreck like this, every little thing must be held against it.

The teenagers get to the island and let’s not waste time with this here, there are zombies. Lots of zombies. Storywise, there isn’t a lot else to say about it. There is some convoluted story about Spanish conquistadores which is not part of the games lore. There are some nods to the games such as one of the characters is a science student called Rudolph Curien, the villain of the game is Dr Curien.

There is a girl called Liberty in the film who is of Asian descent dressed in a sexy American flag catsuit. One of the other girls says she is ‘not your traditional all red, white and blue girl’. A random thing to bring up here but then it was a random and unnecessary piece of racism.

Being based on House of the Dead, there is a lot of zombie shooting going on but not much reloading. They obviously worked out all you need to do is shoot off-screen to reload. But somehow, Uwe Boll manages to make the shooting and blowing up of zombies boring. I don’t even know how that’s possible but they found a way. It just seems to go on forever.

The acting is competent but I didn’t feel I knew anything more about the characters at the end then I did right at the start.

There are little clips of the video game that pop up constantly throughout the film. Basically, Boll is using them as wipes to cut between scenes. Which is fine, except I would rather be watching those than the film in between.

What Uwe Boll should have done is gone to an arcade and just filmed someone playing House of the Dead. That would have been awesome.

Comparatively.

Number 25: Space Mutiny (1988)

So it’s mutiny. I never thought I’d see the day.

It’s a weird one this, watching it feels like you’re only seeing half the movie. Presumably the other half would have made it all make sense.

The film starts off ok with a space battle straight from the original Battlestar Galactica TV series (the 1978 one, when Starbuck was a man). No really, it is literally footage from Battlestar Galactica. Same ships and everything.

The characters are…strange. I don’t know what they told the actor who plays the captain what his role in the film was, he looks like he’s trying to play a cross between Zeus and Santa Claus. The hero is just a bland musclehead but I think there is a director’s cut of this film where we get to hear the other half of his conversations, as most of the time it just seems like he’s talking to himself. He has a love interest and IMDB says actress Cisse Cameron was 34 when this was released but she looks 20 years older.

There’s a creepy European guy and an officer with a limp, could they be our villains? Is that even remotely possible? If they are, they’ve done an amazing job throwing us off the scent. (They are).

There is an amazing error in continuity. Usually continuity errors are dull little things like a man might be wearing a tie in a scene but in the next shot he isn’t and then he is. In Space Mutiny, a bridge officer is murdered then it cuts to the next scene and there she is sitting on the bridge. Forgetting a character had been killed off is a new high/low for continuity errors.

Oh yeah, if anyone has a hula-hoop you are ahead of the game as along with lots of neon (obviously) everyone will be bringing hula-hoops to nightclubs in the future. Exciting times.

The rest of the inside of the ship looks remarkably like a factory warehouse, complete with windows. Then there’s the absurd overuse of slow-motion, a common complaint in bad sci-fi films.

The story is something about weapons being smuggled off the ship but that’s all secondary. The real star here is the car crash that is this movie.

Recycled footage, complete lack of attention detail, bad acting, odd characters, poor sets, rubbish directing. I loved it.

It’s a great example of the so bad its good movie. Everything is wrong, it goes round the dial of being a bad movie but the needle keeps on spinning until it becomes good again.

I urge you all to see it.

IMDB Bottom 100: No's 28 & 27 - Die Hard Dracula and Who's Your Caddy?

Number 28: Die Hard Dracula (1998)

When I saw the title of this film, two possibilities came to mind:

1)      This is a little known entry in the Die Hard series where John McClane takes on the undead. With huge explosions and helicopter crashes (not likely)

2)      This is a spoof comedy (more likely)

Actually it’s neither. At least, I don’t think it is. It’s obviously not Die Hard but I’m not exactly sure what it is. I think it’s supposed to be a standard horror update of the Dracula but it’s so goofy in places, I’m not sure it isn’t meant to be a comedy.

That’s the biggest problem this film has: it doesn’t know if it’s a serious horror or a comedy. It’s another cheaply made film, to the point where if you listen closely enough, you can hear the director giving instructions to the cast.

This film goes wrong right from the opening narration when they recount the story of Vlad the Impaler, long believed to have been the inspiration for Bram Stroker’s most famous creation. It states he died in 1599. Vlad the Impaler actually died in 1477 so history is already a loser.

Then we see Dracula’s coffin flying through the air. Yeah. Apparently he got fed up listening to all the prayers from the local church for 300 years. As good a reason as any to move I guess.

Cut to present day and we meet Steve and Julia, enjoying some water-skiing. Steve gives Julia a life jacket to wear but she turns it down. Can you guess what happens next?

To get over it all, Steve heads over to Europe. And actor Denny Sachen had obviously been watching Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 Bram Stroker’s Dracula because he is really channelling his inner Keanu Reeves. A blanker slate you will not find.

Dracula on the other hand is channeling his inner Meatloaf from the I Would Do Anything for Love video crossed with Arnold Schwarzenegger as Dr Freeze in Batman and Robin. He likes to make a pun but he feels deep inner pain because of it.

Van Helsing makes his appearance and well, even in the original book the good Doctor was a bit eccentric but here he is just ridiculous. I don’t even know what country he is supposed to be from, we’ll say Germerica. He is the expert in killing vampires, apart from thinking silver tipped bullets kill vampires. Not that I’d ever try to tell Dr Van Helsing how to do his job but that’s werewolves.

He actually tries to kill Dracula with his silver bullet which doesn’t work because he’s not a werewolf. But Van Helsing comes to the perfectly logical conclusion it didn’t work because Dracula’s heart floats around his body. It sounds so obvious when you say it out loud. Or maybe it’s because Dracula is NOT A F&*%ING WEREWOLF!

The story is the standard Dracula village-in-peril plot where young ladies are being taken and transformed into vampires. The village is somewhat confusing because it’s not quite sure what time period its set in. Some of the people are dressed in modern clothes while some are from the 18^th century. Amongst the confusion, Van Helsing and Keanu Steves have vowed to stop Dracula.

Where I will give this film some props is the ending, it’s not what you would expect and dammit, it works.

The soundtrack is a curious thing in this film. The background music is taken from 80’s episodes of Dr Who while the rest comes from Now That’s What I Call Classical and mostly doesn’t fit with the images on screen. Though there is one part where Dracula is playing Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake on the piano. This is actually something I thoroughly approve of as this is the main theme from the 1931 Universal adaptation of Dracula (and as an aside, Bela Lugosi is still the best screen Dracula there has ever been).

It’s an odd thing this one. If it tried to be a horror or a comedy this could probably have been a half decent film. Unfortunately, because it’s neither it comes out as a confused mess. But it’s an enjoyable confused mess.

Number 27: Who’s Your Caddy? (2007)

Oh God. I just looked at the title and knew this was going to be painful. Who’s your caddy and what does he do?

It’s a comedy so that’s always a bad sign for this list. Bad films can have redeeming features such as ridiculously bad acting that can make them enjoyable, bad comedies are always just bad.

It’s a hip-hop comedy with black rappers as well, so better get my white guy subtitles on.

This film wastes no time with the implied racism as two minutes in we are given the main crux of the film. Rapper C-Note (played by rapper Big Boi) arrives with his entourage at an exclusive golf and country club wanting membership. Never explicitly stated but heavily implied is they don’t want him to join as they don’t want a black member in their club.

C-Note is able to exploit a loophole to get in the club using some nearby property he buys. Which is convenient. The film then becomes about villain Cummings (Principal Rooney from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) trying to get C-Note out of his club. It’s very important because a decision is being made about hosting the US Open in a couple weeks. I guess the USGA must be racist and wouldn’t want to hold their biggest event at a venue with a black member?

So shenanigans ensue as C-Note and his crew show all the stuffy, uptight white people how to hang loose and ‘be real.’ There is a touch of misogyny about it and I don’t know about the ethics of giving cannabis to horses but it is generally good fun.

The film builds towards its inevitable conclusion: a golf match between C-Note and Cummings for Presidency of the golf club. And it’s just as exciting as a real golf match i.e, it’s as exciting as watching paint dry while waiting for the kettle to boil.

It delves into 90’s Sports movie territory when losing at the halfway point, Uncle Phil from Fresh Prince of Bel Air steps in to deliver the inspirational speech. You see C-Notes father had been a caddy at the club and had broken the course record but Cummings wouldn’t accept it and he was fired from the club. Again, racism implied. This should be a major plot point in the rivalry between C-Note and Cummings but is so rarely referred to it comes across as coincidental.

I don’t need to tell you who goes on to win the game. One in the eye for da man.

There are some good characters in the film but protagonist C-Note is not one of them. That’s mainly because he has it too easy. Cummings is obviously a horrible person but C-Note has his number at every turn so it never feels like he’s ever in peril. Even when he is losing the final game it never feels like he’s in any trouble so the whole thing lacks any dramatic tension.

Even with his love interest in the film, Shannon, who is Cummings lawyer, there is nothing to it. No shenanigans or contrived misunderstandings they just meet a couple times and hey presto! They’re a couple!

I have seen worse films (such as any of Adam Sandler movies) but this is far from good. The biggest crime for a comedy film, it’s not funny and the story is dully predictable right from the start. I could have saved myself a lot of time just by seeing the first meeting between C-Note and Cummings and then fast-forwarding right to the final golf match at the end.

And I would not have missed a thing.

IMDB Bottom 100: No's 30 & 29 - From Justin to Kelly and Crossover

Number 30: From Justin to Kelly (2003)

Or American Idol: The Movie as it probably should be known.

Eager to milk the last few pennies from the 2002 American Idol series, this film was cobbled together with winner Kelly Clarkson co-starring with finalist Justin Guarini.

It’s like if a film was made with Will Young and Gareth Gates. I imagine it would be a buddy-cop movie. Gates would be the plucky, new recruit while Young would be the maverick, no bs veteran not afraid to break the rules, creating headaches for his long-suffering Sargent played by Pete Waterman. He has to deal with the Mayor, Simon Cowell, but he’s got his own criminal racket going on so it’s up to Gates and Young to take him down.

A missed opportunity, someone should make this movie.

There is a lot of pedigree behind this, relatively speaking. Director Robert Iscogrove brought us She’s All That and Boys and Girls. Writer Kim Fuller was the creative mind behind Spiceworld and the S Club 7 TV series. Her brother is Simon Fuller, the music producer behind The Spice Girls and creator of the Pop Idol format and is also executive producer of From Justin to Kelly.

So with this talent behind it, they should know the market their aiming at. Don’t expect any philosophical questions or deep underlying themes.

Obviously as it’s a vehicle to showcase the talents of Clarkson and to a lesser-extent Guarini so there are a lot of song and dance numbers. The movie is set in Miami during the curious American tradition of Spring Break, when every student in America schedules it in to get drunk. But what I realised, is how well choreographed the dancing is at Spring Break. Clearly there is a lesser known tradition where all the students get together so they can get their routines down.

This is the Disney-fied version of spring break rather than the MTV/Girls Gone Wild version we probably imagine it to be. There is laddish talk to be sure but it’s largely a sexless affair. There’s the expected college level hi-jinks but nothing on the level of say, Animal House.

Kelly travels to Miami from Texas with her two girlfriends while Justin arrives with his ‘Pennsylvania Posse’. After a brief encounter on the beach, they are instantly attracted to each other but there are misunderstandings, mainly caused by Kelly’s jealous friend Alexa, blah, blah, blah, they end up together at the end.

There are a few sub-plots going on such as with Justin’s friend Brandon and an attractive lady police officer but this is all just filler between one dance number and the next.

If you are a fan of Kelly Clarkson, it’s probably good to hear her songs but she made the right call becoming a singer rather than an actress. Justin Guarini is slightly more acceptable if nothing special.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to work on the script for Gates and Young: Vice.

Number 29: Crossover (2006)

Getting real now. This isn’t just a basketball movie, this is streetball!

What is streetball? Well, it’s just like regular basketball but they play it in the street. I’ve looked into it and streetball is a growing sport in America but there doesn’t seem to be any definitive set of rules. Its popularity stems from the way it allows players more freedom to showcase their individual skills.

This film centres around two guys called Cruise and Tech. The former is a talented basketball player but dreams of being a doctor. Tech (who is played by Anthony Mackie, better known as Falcon in the Marvel movies) done some time so Cruise can fulfil his dream but now he’s out he wants to get his GED and play more basketball.

Cruise agrees to play on Tech’s streetball team for one game, though it could potentially put his scholarship at risk (for some reason). This brings them up against a guy called Jewelz who I suppose is the villain in the film though he doesn’t really turn up very often. Jewelz is played by Eric Champion AKA Hot Sauce who is one of the major stars of streetball (see, I do research).

They lose the game but Cruise is the star player, which brings him to attention of promoter and former sports agent Vaughn. He wants to give Cruise the opportunity to turn pro but Cruise turns him down, he wants to be a doctor. Vaughn is presented as being a villain but it’s not really obvious why. All he really does is give Cruise the chance to be a professional basketball player in the NBA. How awful. What a dick.

It gets leaked to the press that he played in the streetball game and as a result he loses his scholarship. This story makes it into the papers and everything. I guess it was a slow news day.

It turns out the one who leaked the story was Cruise’s money grabbing girlfriend Vanessa. She thinks with the scholarship gone, Cruise will have no choice but to take up Vaughn’s offer. She’s also lied to him about being the father of her unborn baby (it’s actually Jewelz or possibly 2 or 3 other unnamed men). With Cruise still not wanting to try to go pro, she kicks him to the kerb. She really is a horrible person.

Now let’s check in with Tech. His own story arc has seen him struggling to get his GED, hustling people in basketball games and star in a commercial but then getting pissed off when he finds out he’s only a double for the real star of the advert.

After a falling out with Cruise they make up and talk about their plans to go to community college. They also agree to take on Jewelz team one more time. Again, Jewelz is treated like he’s a villain but there’s a 60 minute plus block of the movie in which he doesn’t appear. I don’t know why there is such animosity towards him.

Before the game though, reeling from his girlfriend’s revelations, Cruise is involved in a motorcycle accident. Tech takes it on himself to win the game for Cruise and use the winnings to pay for his medical games.

Having won the game (obviously), Vaughn offers Tech the chance to be a star player, the horrible person that he is. Tech turns him down as he wants to go to community college.

We end with a ‘Where Are They Now?’ segment. Because that’s what we really all wanted to know.

If there is one lesson this film is trying to get across its education. Education is important and doesn’t this film just know it. Every few minutes they are cramming that message down our throats.

I don’t know about this one. I don’t think this film is too bad. Sure the drama part is clunky and the dialogue could have done with some white people subtitles but the basketball games are well shot and do get across the slick showboating nature of streetball.

It’s ok.

IMDB Bottom 100: No's 32 and 31: - The Aztec Mummy vs The Humanoid Robot and Extra Terrestrial Visitor

Number 32: The Aztec Mummy against The Humanoid Robot (1958)

A nice horror/sci-fi from Mexico now. And from the title you just know this is going to be good.

The Aztec Mummy against The Humanoid Robot is actually the third in a trilogy of films about an Aztec Mummy. The first film was Attack of the Aztec Mummy followed by The Curse of the Aztec Mummy. I also found a fourth film from Mexico called The Wrestling Women vs the Aztec Mummy but I don’t think it’s related and probably not as exciting as it sounds.

You might worry coming into the third film of a trilogy, you won’t know what is going on. Fear not, TAMaTHR has you covered with a recap of events from the first two movies. A 40-minute recap of the previous films to be precise.

There’s recycling footage but that takes the piss. It’s useful to know all the background of what happened in the previous movies but when that takes up two thirds of the movie, you can’t help but feel a little short changed.

It presents a quandary for the reviewer too, do you review the whole of the film or just the last twenty minutes?

Well I guess it’s a review of the whole trilogy really. The story is that an ancient Aztec warrior fell in love with a Princess but was discovered by the King. As punishment he was cursed to guard the King’s treasures for all eternity.

A villain called ‘The Bat’ is out to get the treasure but he can’t get past the mummy. This brings us to the last part of what is loosely called a trilogy. It’s more like a bonus short.

The Bat steals a body and puts it inside a robot machine. The robot suit is like one from Doctor Who. Classic Who, not the new one, where monster costumes are made from cardboard boxes and toilet tubes. The mummy isn’t much better, if a little more zombie like than mummified.

The Bat uses the humanoid robot to fight the mummy. Did I say fight? I meant cuddle. All the promise of the title leads to is a big hugging contest between a weird gargoyle monster and a cardboard robot.

The heroes (who, by the way, don’t appear to have any real stake in the outcome) take the control away from the Bat. He gets arrested, the cardboard man is destroyed and the Mummy goes back to guarding the treasure.

The acting and directing are competent enough if the monsters are a little underwhelming. Going in, I had visions of Godzilla-esque monster battles between two unstoppable titans. Instead, I got a three minute cuddlefest.

And there is no escaping that despite its claims, through cheap trickery, this film is only 20 minutes long.

Number 31: Extra Terrestrial Visitors (1983)

Can you guess which blockbuster movie came out the year before this one?

That’s not actually entirely fair as this Spanish movie actually raises the question: what if E.T had been a slasher movie? Something we have all wondered at some point in our lives.

Alternatively known as The Pod People, an alien spaceship crashes down in the woods and a young child sneaks on board and steals an egg, which is rather like one of the pods from Alien but with no face grabbing action.

He takes it back to his house and an Alien hatches out from it. It grows to child size pretty quickly and looks a lot like 80’s TV alien Alf. The boy names him ‘Trumpy’ because of his long nose. That’s racist.

Meanwhile, a group of young adults go out on a trip to the woods but there is an accident and they have to stay in the house where the boy lives with his parents and is hiding the alien in his bedroom. They try to call for help but wouldn’t you just know it, the phones don’t work.

Also meanwhile, there is another Alf roaming the forest (the mother?) but isn’t nearly so friendly and goes on a killing spree through the forest.

So rather than the cutesy E.T stuff you might have been expecting it becomes more like a Friday the 13^th type affair. That stuff is still there but it’s not the main focus.

Otherwise it’s fairly forgettable. The group of teens are bland even by horror movie standards, apart from Rick who’s a real bar steward. In true slasher fashion, they all get slowly killed off one by one until but a few remain.

The boy who plays Tommy is really bad. Child actors are generally quite bad anyway but he’s especially awful. There’s a scene towards the end when Tommy essentially breaks up with Trumpy and the kindest thing I can say is, I was very much aware I was watching a movie. I think he must have been a relative of one of the crew as I refuse to believe they went through an audition process and he was the best they could find.

I am running out of things to say about what was yet another cynical attempt to cash in on another films major success. If E.T had never been made, this would probably have been just another run of the mill slasher flick but because it was such a success, I think the writer may have added those elements to the formula at the last minute.

As a result, it fails as both a horror and as a childhood fantasy movie.

IMDB Bottom 100: No's 34 & 33 - The Maize and The Pumaman

Number 34: The Maize: The Movie (2004)

There are some things that interest me about watching the films in the IMDB Bottom 100. One such thing is what qualifies to get you on the list.

The first thing is a film has to have at least 1500 votes. The second thing is it needs to have been commercially released.

And for that I have to give The Maize some credit for getting what is essentially a homemade video distributed. I also appreciate the addition of ‘The Movie’ to the film title, just in case you got it mixed up with the TV series or the book.

Alternative title Dark Harvest 2, it’s about two girls lost in a cornfield and their father with psychic abilities who has to go and rescue them before the supernatural killer gets them.

But honestly, if you know where there’s a cornfield near you and you have a camera, you can make this movie. Just grab some friends and family members, head out there, run around for a bit, edit it all together in Windows Movie Maker. And somehow persuade Lions Gate Films to distribute it for you.

That’s what Bill Cowell done.

Number 33: The Pumaman (1980)

The old rule is never truer than here: if there is a major film release that is successful, there will be a dozen or more cheap imitators.

To put this in it's historical context, Superman had been released in 1978 and was a massive hit. I’m not a massive fan of the first Superman movie but its brilliant sequel Superman II was released in 1980. I am of the opinion those films were actually intended as one movie but got split into two (note Zod and his gang are at the start of the first Superman movie). So the first film is basically like a proof of concept before the real movie they intended all along came out.

Also released in 1980 was Italian movie The Pumaman, hoping to catch a piece of the superhero pie.

Pumaman is about a regular Joe who discovers he is the latest in a line of Pumamen, dating back to ancient Aztec times. He’s given a belt by an Aztec guy who reminds me of Billy from Predator. It’s not actually him but I did find myself shouting at him to ‘Get to da choppa’!!!’ anyway. Sadly for actor Miguel Angel Fuentes, The Pumaman was probably his career highlight.

The belt was given to the Aztecs by a race of aliens. What is with that? Why are Aztecs and aliens synonymous with each other?

The powers given to Pumaman are the obligatory super strength, night vision and feral claws. He can also fly and walk through walls just like a real puma can’t. Actually, a puma is the name of a genus of the cat family rather than any particular species. Members of this group are the cougar and the mountain lion. Is it important to know that? Does knowing this improve your film viewing experience? No and no. It’s just more interesting than anything else going on.

Pumaman has one of the worst superhero costumes you are ever likely to see. Costumes are pretty difficult to transpose into the real world without them looking ridiculous anyway but these guys just didn’t put any effort in at all. A black jumper, red cape and tan corduroys. Really imposing.

The flying effects are abysmal. Actor Walter George Alton looks really awkward hanging on wires in front of a projector screen. For Alton, The Pumaman was probably his career highlight.

Standing in for Lex Luger is Donald Pleasance, playing a criminal called Kobras with a penchant for tight black leather. His plan is to take over the world (what else?) using a mystical mask left behind by an alien culture (those damn aliens again?!) which he will use to take control of peoples’ minds.

Pleasance gives his best Blofeld in this but it was not a career highlight for him. He actually described it as the worst film he ever made and he done a lot of bad films.

The Lois Lane equivalent is archaeologist Jane Dobson. The Pumaman has to rescue her after her mind is put under the control of Kobras. Luckily for actress Sydne Rome, she has had a long career in film and TV so has been able to put The Pumaman fiasco behind her.

The film is allegedly set in London but it’s no version of London either you or me ever saw. They could have at least put in some stock footage of Big Ben (and yes, I know Big Ben is the bell and not the tower).

That The Pumaman is bad goes without saying but it’s enjoyable in its own campy way and I put that down to its theme song. When Richard Donner made Superman, he had John Williams doing the music. Think of a classic theme from a movie and Williams probably wrote it. Star Wars, Jurassic Park, Jaws, Harry Potter, Indiana Jones the list goes on. If you have Williams and his orchestra behind you, you are on to a winner.

The Pumaman has a guy called Renato Serio with a Casio keyboard and damn is it catchy. You’ll be humming it for weeks afterwards.

IMDB Bottom 100: No's 36 & 35 - The Class and Anne B.Real

Number 36: The Class (2007)

I was nearly caught out by this one as it turns out there are two films released in 2007 that IMDB has listed as titled ‘The Class’.

The first one was an Estonian film about bullying but I was tipped off when I saw the film had an 8.0 rating. It’s possible there was a massive spike in its rating but it didn’t seem likely.

The film I actually had to watch comes from Turkey and though it is still set in a school (sort of), somehow I don’t think it’s going to have the same quality as its Estonian counterpart.

Its original title in Turkish is Çilgin Dersane which actually translates as ‘Cool School’ but for some reason is listed as The Class on IMDB. Confusing.

It’s a high school comedy but not set in a high school, not really anyway. It’s a school in so much as they have lessons but the school is on the beach. Which sounds great in the summer but would probably be awful in the winter.

And the film just goes on and on and on. It should have been 75-80 minutes long at most but instead it drags on for two hours. As bad as the American Pie sequels and spin-offs might have been, at least they didn’t take the piss like whatever this films name is. They knew when to end the suffering.

I’d like to tell you the story of this but in order to do that there needs to actually be a story to begin with. What you have here is the usual high jinks you’d expect in teen comedy: pranks, horny teens and nudity. And a party on the beach. Every night. Repeat ad nauseum.

All the usual stereotypes you’d expect are all present and correct: the jock, the nerd, the shy one, the fat one, the Mean Girls, the goofy one. Not much to say about any of them beyond that. There are so many characters involved it’s hard to keep track of any individual storylines going on.

A plot threatens to come in at the end when they enter a competition to save their ‘school’ from closure. The events are an odd bunch. I understand the sports events, the University Challenge style quiz and the talent show events but I don’t understand the catwalk modelling contest. I have no idea how that is done competitively. As long as you don’t fall on your arse, I’d say you did a good job. It’s like Olympic dressage, I have absolutely no idea what makes it good or even better than the other competitors.

They win the contest by winning a five a-side football match which I find quite amusing as looking at the score board they use it appears they play a full 90 minutes.

They lose a couple events but overall they win the contest quite easily. And they do it all fairly too. Maybe I’m just hardwired to expect these things but I thought there would have been just a bit of cheating going on and they certainly come across as a group who would try and gain an unfair advantage. I am actually disappointed in them, shame on you for not cheating.

Another party on the beach to take us out.

Too long, too many characters and bad jokes. But apparently this was one of Turkish cinemas highest grossing films of 2007. Oh yeah, there are four sequels to this movie. Sort yourselves out, Turkey. 

To think, if I hadn’t spotted my mistake I could have been watching a good film. One from Estonia, so would have still needed some subtitles but a good film none the less.

But I don’t get to watch good films anymore.

Number 35: Anne B Real (2003)

Yo, Yo, Yo, Yo. Check it:

A bad movie review,

Coming right to you

Straight from the Bad Movie HQ.

Anne B Real

Right from the Streets

Dropping the bad movie beats.

That's enough rapping from me.

I should address the elephant in the room straight off the bat, Eminem’s movie 8 Mile came out one year before this, so are there similarities? Well in both films the main character lives in a poor neighbourhood, they write lyrics as a form of escape, they need to overcome their lack of self-belief and the film ends with a rap battle. The only real difference is the main characters gender.

But 8 Mile sits a respectable 790 in the IMDB charts while Anne B. Real is in the bottom 100 out of approximately 270,000+ films, is it really Eminem’s popularity alone creating such a disparity?

The makers had the self-awareness to realise the comparisons would inevitably be made so used it in their marketing. The tagline for the film is ‘Anne Frank meets 8 Mile’.

Let’s put 8 Mile to the side a moment and address the Anne Frank part of that. If you are unaware, Anne Frank was a Jewish Dutch girl who hid from the Nazi’s during World War II, kept a diary of her experiences and became an inspiration to millions around the world. How her story parallels with writing rap lyrics is not immediately obvious.

Anne B. Real has its fans, it won critical awards. Only minor ones admittedly but awards none the less, so critics seem to have liked it. So, it’s the audiences who seem to have given it the thumbs down.

Anne, real name Cynthia, lives in the ghetto and it’s like every Spike Lee movie you ever saw. She’s dirt poor and her brother Juan is a career criminal. Cynthia writes lyrics, which Juan sells on to a rapper called Deuce, who is trying to get a record deal. He’s a fraud who can’t write any of his own material and has no freestyling ability.

I said this film was like a Spike Lee movie but the more I think about it, Anne B. Real is more like a Mike Leigh movie because for the first 70 minutes or so nothing really happens. Some people like that snail pace style, others find it insipid and boring. It’s when Cynthia’s best friend is accidentally killed because of Juan that it gets semi-interesting.

This gives Cynthia the kick she needs. She sets up Juan to be arrested and then goes to take down Deuce in the rap battle. After a mini-choke, she shows the phoney rapper up for what he is.

I’m not really sure why she’s so angry Deuce has been using her lyrics, as she knew her brother was selling them on. What did she think he was doing them?

Not much else to it. Oh yeah, Anne Frank. Cynthia has a copy of her diary which she takes quotes from occasionally. Inspiring sure but their two stories don’t mesh.

Everything in the film seems cliché. The characters are so stereotypical and have no real personality to them. If you watch The Wire, then compare the well-drawn characters from the projects to the ones in Anne B. Real and you’ll realise it’s like comparing a Ferrari to a Robin Reliant. It’s no contest.

It’s not the worst film I’ve seen so far to be fair to it, it’s just ‘meh’. And that’s the problem, it’s all a bit too ‘meh’ and you can’t get excited about it. The big climax has no heat to it because you have no idea what she’s supposed to be so angry about. Put alongside the focus of 8 Mile and there is no doubting which is the superior film.

Look out for Ernie Hudson though (aka Winston Zedmore). And remember how good Ghostbusters is. Because it’s good to be reminded great films exist.

Peace out.

IMDB Bottom 100: No's 38 & 37 - The Touch of Satan and The Creeping Terror

Number 38: The Touch of Satan (1971)

Another horror movie to watch. I’ve watched so many horror films on this list (and spoiler alert, there are a lot more to come) I feel I must have become an expert in it, if just by osmosis. One frame is all I need to tell you what year its from.

This is however the first one that deals with Satan himself, whom as far as horror movies go is as big as it gets. Zombies and vampires are ok but for pure evil and menace you can’t get any bigger than Lucifer. Not that you ever actually see him of course as this is about soul possession. Sort of.

This is low budget from the 70’s, so that means very slow pace and very little action. And The Touch of Satan is slower than most. I can imagine the director Don Henderson’s meeting with the actors on the first day of shooting. He’d say to them, ‘Listen folks, we’ve only got 20 minutes of script here, I’m going to need you to pad this out to 90 minutes.’

And an admirable job they do, with a minimum 5 second pause between each line of dialogue, just like real conversations go. The director chips in with long sequences of cars driving and even just re-using footage. A fine job all round.

Speaking of the actors, they are remarkably unremarkable. None of them went on to anything of note after The Touch of Satan. I’d like to tell you there was a young Martin Sheen lurking in the cast as that would be something interesting to say but there just isn’t. Lead actor Michael Berry was a medic on the set of Being John Malkovich, how’s that?

At least I’m trying, which is more than these guys ever did when they made this movie.

Basically, you’ve got a guy driving to California, he stops off in some desert town. He meets a pretty girl, she invites him to stay in her house with her oddball family and crazy, homicidal grandmother. Who could say no?

Turns out they’re a little odd and the girl is actually 127 years old. Crazy grandma is actually her sister she had saved from being burned as a witch by making a deal with the Devil. Shock horror, the Devil can’t be trusted and they are kept alive to do his bidding. The guy Jodie breaks the curse but the girl Melissa is now dying, so he makes another deal with the Devil to keep her alive. Roll credits.

That’s the whole film summarised in two paragraphs with no major plot points missed out. They stretched that out to 90 minutes, these are some talented people working here.

And if you’re wondering how to summon the Devil yourself, just raise your arm over your head with a clenched fist. It’s that simple.

Number 37: The Creeping Terror (1964)

Back to the 60’s for some sci-fi action about an alien monster on earth.

Aliens come in many shapes and sizes in science fiction. Sometimes they are perfectly evolved killers, sometimes they are small creatures encased in killing machines, or sometimes they have slathering tentacles or have pointy ears. And sometimes they are plant-blob creatures.

Looking on its IMDB page, I noted this film was written by Robert Silliphant, whose other credits include The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed Up Zombies!!? And with that kind of calibre behind it, how could this go wrong.

Well, firstly it’s got a narrator. Anyone who has followed these reviews will know I have no truck with narrators. They are a device used by poor film makers who know their film is bad. I know there are bound to be good films with narrators but they will always be the exception rather than the rule. A little narration at the start to give background and set the scene is acceptable but having it all the way through is not. And this film is about 95% narration. It’s not even good narration, it really just gets in the way. This could have been ok, not great but when the narrator was added it just never stood a chance.

The actors must have been really bad in this. Maybe they all sounded like that guy from the Police Academy movies with the high screeching voice. There are scenes with characters talking but rather than hearing their conversation, the narrator tells us everything they say. The thing is, the characters do speak occasionally so why not let them speak the whole time? It doesn’t make sense.

Maybe I’m being unfair and there is a legitimate reason why they had to do it this way. Maybe there was a problem with the sound equipment, all the dialogue came out all garbled and there wasn’t enough time to fix it. Maybe.

The story is that an alien ship has crashed on earth and the weird tree blob creature escapes and starts eating people. It's a Triffid basically but nowhere near as menacing. And it's 'mouth' where it eats people, looks like a vagina. We know this film was from the 60’s because there is a party where all the kids are dancing in that hip-swivelling style that was so prevalent at the time. When the monster invades they try to escape. They…very…slowly try to get away.

After the army’s weapons all fail to take down the beast, it’s killed after getting hit by a car. There is a twist that the monster has actually been gathering information on humans and sending it back to its home planet. This leaves us with a somewhat ambiguous ending where we look out at the stars and wonder what future threat awaits mankind.

With a title like The Creeping Terror, this was never going to be fast paced action. The slow pacing might appeal to some as it’s rather reminiscent of old British sci-fi series. But personally, I don’t need to spend five minutes watching a housewife go through all of her household chores before a 30 second pay-off.

Watching The Creeping Terror is a real test of endurance. I couldn’t tell you if the actors are any good because we so seldom hear them speak because everything is told through the narrator so the audience won’t care anything for their predicament. The monster just looks ridiculous and lacks any kind of menace.

So my advice is to creep away from The Creeping Terror.