American: The Bill Hicks Story (2009) [REVIEW]

November 29, 2011 Leave a comment

 

Wait a second, isn’t this a documentary? It is! It is a fucking documentary! How the fuck do you review a documentary?! I think I only reviewed one other documentary, which was Exit Through the Gift Shop, and that was probably just because I was so excited to tell other people about it. I’ve watched quite a few documentaries since doing this blog, but clearly don’t review many. The first reason why I don’t really review them is because the content is typically something of fact, and it’s hard to critique facts. If I watch something about Abraham Lincoln and talk a whole bunch of shit about the Emancipation Proclamation, it doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen. For the record, I wouldn’t talk shit on it, it was just the first example that came to mind. I can’t really argue that he only freed the slaves because of how popular Paranormal Activity was or some bullshit like that. The second reason is that I feel all documentaries are essentially persuasive essays, or an op-ed piece. Someone will take a point that they want to get across, they use research, facts, and editing to put their argument together to convince the audience of what that point is. No matter how political or mundane the documentary might be, there is a message they’re trying to get across. Even something like The King of Kong, about a guy trying to get the all time top score on Donkey Kong, portrays a clear underdog and a huge egotistical dick as his enemy, yet after the film’s release, both parties came out and admitted things were dramatized for entertainment’s sake. So why did I decide to review this documentary? Well because it pissed me the fuck off, that’s why.

 

So wait, Bill Hicks wasn’t always wearing weird turtlenecks and shit?

 

Bill Hicks grew up in a few places before settling in Houston, TX. His friends loved comedy, and Bill made his way to performing stand-up as early as the age of 15. Despite partaking in a heavy amount of hallucinogenics, Bill didn’t lose sight of what he wanted, and was able to move to L.A. to further pursue his career in comedy. Hicks found some success, but also found lots of rejection with his writing. Feeling defeated, Hicks moved back to Houston where he started drinking, leading to alcohol abuse. Despite being intelligent and entertaining, his stage antics caused a fallout amongst his friends and fellow performers, leading to his stint in rehab. Once cleaned up, he had refocused all of his energy on comedy and his peers considered him to be at the top of his game. Unfortunately, a lot of his material involved religion in politics, as well as commenting on the sad state of the American population. Despite being regarded as one of the most talented comedians of his time, he was never accepted by a mainstream audience, causing more feelings of defeat. Hicks found lots of success in the UK, being an American whose material spoke out about America, only to return to the United States and have his material frowned upon. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, which is when he went even further into his frustrations with America, the press, and broadcast television. His last tour had a lot less humor, but a lot more honesty, and Hicks seemed to embrace death as an inevitability, until he passed away in 1994 at the age of 32.

 

Shitty photo of Hicks or a good photo that was intentionally made to look shitty for the artistic goals of the documentary? YOU DECIDE!

 

Unfortunately, this was a pretty shitty documentary. It could be argued that the movie fails because of the facts it represents, but I’ll get to that in a moment. The biggest flaw would be the visual style that was used to “recreate” moments from the past. There wasn’t that much video of Hicks when he was young, so they instead chose to use motion graphics to give some sort of energy to photos of him. What does that mean? Well, it means they would take a picture of Hicks, cut everything out around him, then put that picture in the front seat of a car, and animate the car to show him driving somewhere. It looks like someone who was a huge fan of Saul Bass trying to emulate his style, but it was done poorly and looked more like an episode of South Park. After tolerating that for the first 20 minutes or so, a lot more actual footage was used, and it was enjoyable for about 45 minutes. The last 20 minutes reverted back towards the South Park style, and it looked like shit again. The filmmakers had interviewed people whose voices were used to narrate over some of the animated sequences, yet we don’t see these people until the very end of the film. I guess I can appreciate the attempt at making a documentary in a different style, it’s just disappointing to see that syle being done so poorly. Anyone remember that show on MTV called BIORhythm, where they used pictures and played music instead of having a voice over? It looked a lot like that, and that show got canceled for a reason. And now that there was a documentary about Bill Hicks, we’re going to have to wait years and years before another one comes out that will hopefully accomplish more than this film did.

 

There’s that crazy 90′s fashion I was looking for!

 

The story of Bill Hicks might not seem that exciting, compared to any number of other comedians who have had documentaries about them, but what was exceptional about Hicks was the content of all his materia. By no means was he the first angry comic, and you could trace his influences to influences to influences, but I feel his style really impacted any number of more popular “angry” comedians today. He talked about every subject on stage with as much passion as any other topic, whether it be a rant about his frustrations with the Catholic church, to a stories involving dicks, to a story about his taking hallucinogenics that had no punchline. it wasn’t his job to make you laugh, because he made you work for the joke. If you understood what he was saying and found the punchline, good for you, but he wasn’t going to hold your hand through the process, and if you didn’t get the joke, then that’s your problem. An acquaintance in college used to always say Bill Hicks was his favorite comedian, and I didn’t think that guy was funny, so I ignored him. Only now, years later, do I truly understand how big of an impact he has had on stand-up comedy, and it’s too bad that he died so young, and without more people realizing his talent.

 

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The Dark Half (1993) [REVIEW]

November 27, 2011 2 Comments

 

If you’ve been paying any sort of attention to my blog at all, you’ll see that I’ve been thinking a lot about Stephen King lately, which is what led me to watch this movie. I vaguely remembered the trailer for it when it originally came out, but apparently I had replaced Timothy Hutton for Kyle Maclachlan. How the fuck am I supposed to keep the two of them straight, huh!? They both had dark hair and seemed like they were both fucking weirdos. Oh yeah, let’s not forget the fact that I was NINE years old when this came out. Jesus, I don’t mean to make anyone feel old by saying that’s how old I was, but it’s the truth. That’s what you get for making me feel like an asshole for confusing the two of them.

 

Uh oh, looks like Hutton has that crazy “I’ve got bandages on my head” look in his eyes.

 

Thad Beaumont (Hutton) is a college professor and writer who as yet to find success under his own name, yet has found a great deal of success under his pen name of George Stark. These books are pulpy crime novels, which clearly aren’t within the realm of Thad’s real life, so when someone discovers his secret and threatens to expose him, Thad embraces the opportunity and publicly “buries” George Stark. That’s when shit gets funky. A series of murders start happening where the victims are all people involved in “killing” George Stark. The clues point to Thad, but the audience can see he clearly isn’t anywhere near any of the crime scenes of victims when these murders occur. Trying to find answers about what’s going on, Thad recalls surgery he had as a child where he had a tumor removed from his brain. The tumor would cause hallucinations, mostly of sparrows, along with other visions and sounds. It turns out that the “tumor” that was removed was a twin that he shared a womb with, but Thad absorbed the other twin and physical evidence was left attached to his brain. This means Thad has some sort of psychic bond or mental powers or something, and the one committing the murders is a manifestation of his absorbed twin…or something? The murderer, who goes by George Stark, tries forcing Thad to write more books about him, thus keeping him alive, but they get into some sort of physical or mental power fight thing where sparrows come in and kill George. OR DO THEY?!

 

I really don’t remember the context of this image, but it’s pretty creepy, isn’t it?

 

Why did this movie need to be two fucking hours long? I think that’s one issue I have with so many movies that were based on Stephen King stories, and especially short stories. I know that this was a full-length novel, but I think you get what I’m saying. They clearly should have taken the “less is more” approach. The first 30-45 minutes had a pretty interesting concept being established, not knowing if it was actually Thad or maybe the guy who threatened to expose him, you didn’t know what was going on. When you see Timothy Hutton wearing some weird makeup, it gets a little wonky, and then it’s unclear the extent of this mental bond thing. Not saying I wanted more of an explanation, or that I needed more information, in fact, the less I knew the better, but when it takes you almost 90 minutes to learn that there was a twin that was absorbed, that means there’s a good 30 minute chunk where you don’t really give a shit about what’s going on or why. Even though this movie wasn’t received all that well, I read that everyone was commending Timothy Hutton and his performance, which I just found to be a little much when it came to the character of George Stark, and he was more like a cartoon. I understand that Stark’s character was supposed to be drastically different from how Thad really was, but I guess I just wasn’t too impressed. That probably comes from the direction of George Romero, and when he uses that type of character in other movies, typically works well, but it was too strong a juxtaposition to the point that it was silly. I don’t think this movie was all that bad, but there was too much wasted time for a movie that could have easily been an hour and fifteen minutes.

 

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The Wolfman will Cometh…back at some later time

November 14, 2011 3 Comments

It’s been about a year and a half since I’ve done this blog, and I don’t think I’ve taken any breaks from it. I think there might have been times here and there where I have taken a week off, but that’s really it. No real vacations or anything, no hiatus, nothing. Well, now it’s time to take one…at least for a little while. I know I just started the podcast, and you’re all excited for that, and I’m excited about it too. Unfortunately, there have been some personal things going on that take priority in my life and I’d rather focus on those things that making sure I am posting enough reviews on here. I’m going to be watching movies and probably even writing reviews, but I don’t think I’ll be posting them for at least a little while. I don’t want to sound all heavy and serious, and I don’t feel like talking about shit on here, because this blog has always been about fun and awesome-ness, and I hope to keep it that way. Hopefully you guys can understand my discretion, and I’ll probably respond to comments if you have any questions. Also, by no means does it mean this blog is dead, because some of the projects I’m working on are related to this. AND ANOTHER THING…I don’t have a timeline set for when regular posting will resume, and I probably could have just disappeared for a week or two and no one noticed, but I just wanted to proactively say that you don’t need to keep checking every damn day. I recommend you check Twitter, or subscribe through email, or subscribe to my RSS (which can all be found on the right side) to find out when I’ve posted something new. Don’t think of this as goodbye, just think of this as…smell ya later.

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Tell me what you know about Stephen King

November 13, 2011 17 Comments

Now that Halloween is gone and my birthday is over, the next thing to look forward to this winter will be Thanksgiving. One of my best memories of Thanksgiving is from a few years ago, where both Rampaige and I had to work during the day, and my roommates had friends they could go visit. This meant that Rampaige and I went to the grocery store to buy some pies, brought them to my apartment, and ate our pies while watching the Steven Weber version of “The Shining” that aired on TV a few years ago. I will defend it and don’t just write it off as being terrible, like most people think, but it also wasn’t all that great or anything. This started a Netflix chain of adding as many Stephen King based movies or miniseries as I could, and I thought that the stories were all enjoyable. None of them were particularly amazing, but I knew that the problems were all because of the creative alterations, as opposed to the content being shitty. My earliest Stephen King memory is seeing my brother’s copy of “The Stand” and I couldn’t fucking believe how long of a book it was, and the fact that anyone could ever read it. I think my next memory was watching “The Langoliers” on TV and wondering why Balki Bartokomous was getting eaten by weird monsters at an airport. I read that next month there will be a miniseries based on “Bag of Bones” and the marketing looks kind of cool, and made me want to read the book. I went to Barnes & Noble and realized there were a shit ton of Stephen King books I want to read, but really don’t know where to start. This is where YOU, the reader, come in. What are your favorite Stephen King books? What are your favorite Stephen King movies? Where do you recommend starting, and what do you recommend skipping? In other words…TELL ME WHAT YOU KNOW ABOUT STEPHEN KING!

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The House of the Devil (2009) [REVIEW]

November 11, 2011 Leave a comment

 

How long have you guys been reading my blog? No really, how long? Here’s a quick test: what did I claim were the top five horror movies of 2009? Well, if you said that this film was one of them, then you’d be right! However, in case you didn’t know the answer off the top of your head, you might have gone back and read the actual post, only to get confused by the fact that I also included Where the Wild Things Are on that list as well. I guess that if you read that list, you could deduce that this movie is as scary as Where the Wild Things Are was, which I suppose is a weird comparison. Would you believe that I made that distinction after having only seen this film once? Isn’t that crazy?! How often do I only see a movie just one time, especially if I really enjoy it? Despite having only seen it once, that didn’t stop me from buying it on Blu-ray, and it made a great choice for a chilly October evening with some people who had never even head it before, and it reminded me that this is easily one of the best horror movies of not only 2009, but at least of the past five years.

 

JUST LOOK AT THE FUCKING TITLECARD AND TELL ME THIS MOVIE ISN’T ALREADY AWESOME.

 

In the early 80′s, we see a college sophomore, Samantha (Jocelin Donahue), on the search for her very first apartment. She doesn’t have nearly enough money to afford the “perfect place”, but her terrible roommate is driving her crazy, making Samantha desperate to get out of there. She sees an opportunity to be a babysitter and gets her friend Megan (Greta Gerwig) to drive her to a giant house in the middle of the woods. Upon meeting the person who placed the ad, Mr. Ulman (Tom Noonan), he admits to being dishonest in the ad. Rather than a babysitting job, this is a job to stay in the house just in case his mother needs assistance. With Samantha being so desperate, and Mr. Ulman needing so badly to go out for the evening to celebrate the lunar eclipse, she agrees to the job for $400. Megan leaves Samantha, but doesn’t go far, pulling over to listen to music in a nearby cemetery. It’s there that Megan has an encounter with a seemingly harmless stranger, played by AJ Bowen, but that encounter changes the entire tone of the movie. We realize that Samantha is in for one of the worst nights of her life, and we, as viewers want nothing more than for her to safely get out of the house.

 

I understood the high-waisted jeans, the flannel shirts, and the feathered hair, but what was that weird cord that came out of the phone and why did it have that little dial on it that she had to keep spinning? It must have been some sort of generator to give the phone power for when the batteries on their portable phones died.

 

I’m going to leave that synopsis far more vague and ambiguous than I normally do, because I encourage every fan or horror movies, fuck it, any fan of MOVIES to go watch this film. I didn’t know much about writer/director Ti West before seeing this film, but I can tell you that I will see every movie that this guy is involved in from here on out. Granted, he was somewhat responsible for Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever, which was a piece of shit, but word is that he tried to get his name removed from it anyway. Contextually, it was a great choice for him to set this movie in the early 80′s, because as he has mentioned in interviews, it was one of the last time periods that wasn’t tainted by the realm of technology. If you were a babysitter at a house in the woods, then you were a babysitter at a house in the woods.If someone said they’d be somewhere at a specific time, you just had to hope they would show up, seeing as there were no personal communication devices. It was also a time in American history where people were actually afraid of Satanic cults kidnapping you off the street and sacrificing you to some mythical demon, which is hilariously terrifying in retrospect of how stupid people were. No only did West strive to emulate the 80′s contextually, but also in the production of the film itself. For example, rather than shooting it digitally or on 35mm, it was shot on 16mm and blown up, as was the most cost-effective filming technique in the early 80′s. From the music to the outfits to the special effects and especially the opening credit sequence, this film pays homage to movies of the 80′s that really shaped a lot of contemporary filmmakers and how they view horror.

 

Look how creepy he is! Wait, did I say creepy? Look how nice he is! Wait, did I say nice? Look how creepy he is! Wait, did I say creepy? Look how nice he is! Wait…

 

Yeah okay, so Ti West had a clever script and stylish aesthetic sense, but what else did this film have? You might notice that I pointed out four actors by name, when I barely ever mention more than two. This film could have easily been mediocre if it wasn’t for the great casting and wonderful performances by everyone involved. First and foremost, this movie succeeds with thanks to Jocelin Donahue. I’d say about 75% of the movie is shots of her wandering around alone, not even engaging with anyone. She plays a smart character who you really feel sympathetic towards because she’s not in this situation because she’s stupid, but she’s there out of desperation. We can all sympathize with doing things we wish we didn’t have to, but understanding that the ends justify the means. If this movie were actually made in the 80′s, Samantha’s probably would have just been some buxom blonde that served as a sex object that read her lines, but we learn early on that Samantha is instead a vulnerable character who isn’t willing to let herself be a victim. She reacts to every situation she is put in with intuition and she always keeps her wits about her, no matter how intense the situation. I really hope to see Jocelin in more movies, horror or otherwise. Now let’s talk about Tom Noonan…..holy shit, talk about terrifying and kind at the same time. He was so incredibly unassuming and approached Samantha in such a genuine way, that even though we knew he was up to no good, the way his lines were delivered and even the way he carried himself portrayed a man who seemed to have nothing left in his life. And here I was just hating him for that one episode where he was taunting Fox Mulder after claiming to have been the one to kidnap Mulder’s sister. AJ Bowen is another actor that I am going to keep my eyes out for, especially after his role in this film, as well as in The Signal and in A Horrible Way to Die. Older generations already have their genre favorites like Lance Henriksen or Robert Englund, and I keep my fingers crossed that AJ Bowen gets to find his way into as many horror movies as possible to add his own special type of bearded intensity that movies needs these days. Greta Gerwig looked really familiar, and I didn’t know why, but she really played well into the role she had of a friend you weren’t necessarily going to be bragging about having, but you knew you could rely on. Apparently she was in Greenberg after this movie, so good for her!

 

You can look in my window ANY day, AJ Bowen. I said ANY. DAY.

 

I think that from here on out, this film is going to be my litmus test for whether or not I take someone’s opinion seriously about horror movies. If I talk to anyone who ever uses the word “boring” in the context of this film, then I’ll tell them that they can fuck right off. Okay, fine, I get it, the first 35 minutes of this movie there really isn’t anything going on…at all…seriously. It’s just Samantha going to this creepy house and hanging out. Might not necessarily be exciting, and it certainly is uneventful, but rather than the word “boring”, I think people need to use the word “deliberate”. West really makes you earn the fear and suspense that you enjoy after we first meet AJ Bowen’s character, and every moment after that your entire body is tense as you will have no idea what to expect. Some people might argue that the pacing or speed at which the film moves doesn’t justify the brevity of the climax and the way things are tied up, but you know what? Life’s not fair. You’re not always going to get a fifteen minute chase sequence at the end of the movie where the hero defeats the villain. And if we’re being completely honest here, I could have even had the climax have been shorter, because the less you knew about what was going on, the better. You were left with a blood lust towards some of this film’s characters that were never really fulfilled, so when the credits rolled, you were distraught over this film not giving you the retribution you deserved.

 

I’m sure other bloggers would see this image and think of an inappropriate comment to make, but I am way too mature and have far too much tact than to allude in even the slightest way to the fact that there’s blood on her face due to performing oral sex on a female who is shedding the lining of her uterus. Sorry guys, look for another blog if you’re looking for that weird, pervert stuff!

 

Since I clearly have been going on and on about this movie, and it’s quite apparent that I really like it, I’ll try to wrap things up. This movie wasn’t very heavy on special effects and didn’t have the most original or unique plot or characters, but it’s really a combination of every factor involved that this film really should be regarded as a contemporary classic. I think I might have mentioned once or twice that two of my favorite movies are Suspiria and Rosemary’s Baby. Both of these movies are relatively slow, and the latter has barely any gore or violence, but all three of these films are deeply unsettling to me. In a mere 95 minutes, Ti West scared you with what’s really most terrifying in the world. It’s not ghosts, vampires, werewolves, monsters, or mask-wearing machete-wielding zombies. I don’t know much about West’s views on philosophy, but I think he and I would agree on one of Jean-Paul Sartre’s most famous lines: “L’enfer, c’est les autres”. Or, in other words, “hell is other people”.

 

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Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer (2007) [REVIEW]

November 9, 2011 Leave a comment

 

The first time I saw this movie was at the Music Box Massacre IV back in 2008. I am pretty sure it was shown at six in the morning when no one had an idea of what was going on in their lives. It might have even been later than that, I don’t feel like using my brain to remember that detail at this very moment. The parts of it that I remembered were fun, and I told my friend Duke that it might be something he would like. Another reason I thought he would like it was the fact that Jack Brooks was a plumber, so he was often wearing a tool belt and fixing things, and Duke is a carpenter, so there was that connection. A couple of weeks after seeing it, I said we should try to watch it, and Duke bought it for me for my birthday, which falls shortly after Halloween. All of these reasons combined add up to this movie being more of a nostalgic favorite of mine, rather than it actually being all that good. And the fact that it’s Canadian certainly doesn’t help matters much.

 

The facial hair/baseball hat combination also kind of looks like my friend Duke. But that denim jacket? ALL WOLFMAN STYLE.

 

Jack Brooks, played by Trevor Matthews (who was also one of the producers and helped come up with the story) has an anger problem, which certainly wasn’t helped by the fact that his family was killed by a monster when he was a kid. As in, a real life monster that came out of the woods. He’s unhappy with his life, his girlfriend, his job, and doesn’t really know what he wants to accomplish in his life. Lucky for him, his professor at night school, played by Robert Englund, uncovers some weird monster demon heart thing in his backyard that causes hm to turn into, well, a weird monster demon thing. While all Jack really wants to do is coast through life without getting too much attention or disrupt the status quo, he is thrown into the thick of an epic monster battle as his professor has changed into full-fledged monster and is infecting other students one night. As Jack attempts to escape, the song he heard while his family was murdered comes on the radio, causing him to use his anger to destroy all of the monsters. He succeeds, and when the film ends, we see him confront the monster who killed his family, as well as venturing to remote parts of the world to do the one thing that had been calling out to him his whole life: SLAYING FUCKING MONSTERS.

 

This is what Robert Englund looked like when he turned into a monster. I guess it kind of sort of looks like him?

 

I wish I could provide a more enthralling dissection of this movie, but as you can see from the plot, it’s relatively straightforward. Robert Englund was awesome in this movie while going through his transformation scenes, and considering Trevor Matthews mostly just stood in at the last minute as Jack Brooks, he does a pretty decent job. All of the special effects and gore were practical effects, so it was good to see a movie that would sacrifice “believability” for how practical effects looked. I also can’t really say this film is completely a horror movie, because there are quite a few comedic moments in it. Unfortunately, as I’ve mentioned multiple times, combining horror with comedy is a tricky subject because I feel like every attempt at the mixture ends up one or the other, but not both. Given that, I’d say this movie was a lot funnier than it was scary, but it did still have some pretty good practical effects. I’d say it was like a good SyFy movie that entertains you for 90 minutes, but unless you are like me and don’t have nostalgic memories attached to it, it’s not too memorable.

 

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New SEND MORE COPS Episode: Stealing, Danzig, and Final Paranormal Saw Activity Destination

November 6, 2011 Leave a comment

 

Episode 2

The Wolfman comes clean on where the cover art for the podcast came from and talks about how Danzig taught him how to steal things. Also, after seeing Paranormal Activity 3, the Wolfman decides to share his thoughts on the newest franchises in horror, comparing and contrasting Saw, Paranormal Activity, and Final Destination.

 

Remember folks, you can either get this through iTunes or through not iTunes. Or better yet, just subscribe! And if you do use iTunes to download this episode, PLEASE RATE IT! Whether you loved it or hate it, I am just sick of seeing “not enough information to display a rating”. I mean, I’d rather a crappy rating than no rating. And as always, feel free to comment here or on the SEND MORE COPS page with any of your thoughts. I hope you enjoy it!

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Things I’ve learned from the “Twilight: Breaking Dawn – Part 1″ poster

November 4, 2011 Leave a comment

I guess it’s really just the one thing that I’ve learned. Apparently, when you marry a vampire, you wear your wedding ring on the opposite hand.

 

THERE’S SO MUCH TO LEARN ABOUT VAMPIRES AND WEDDINGS! I HOPE THIS MOVIE HAS ALL OF LIFE’S QUESTIONS FINALLY ANSWERED!

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