I tried to watch The Spirit and Dylan Dog: Dead of Night…and failed

September 7, 2011 7 Comments

Do you guys have any idea how long my Netflix queue is? I’m not trying to brag or anything, but pretty much any movie  have ever heard of, whether it’s supposed to be bad or supposed to be good, ends up on my queue. I’ve hit maximum multiple times and have to go back and erase some titles. That’s why things like The Spirit and Dylan Dog: Dead of Night end up arriving in my mailbox. When The Spirit was released theatrically, I had no interest. I heard nothing but awful things about it. However, being a comic book movie, it somehow made its way into the queue. I saw trailers in theaters for Dylan Dog, because it was supposed to get a theatrical release, but instead went straight-to-video. Still added it to the queue, thinking there would be a plethora of people interested in it. Sadly, both movies were hard to get through, and even though I don’t often do this, I had to shut them both off before they were over to get them the fuck out of my house.

 

If Samuel L. Jackson being referred to as “Octopus” or Scarlett Johansson having big boobs doesn’t save your movie, nothing will.

 

What I knew about The Spirit as a comic book was that one of my professor’s never shut up about it or about the author, Will Eisner, for any reason. I know that Will Eisner is really important to comic books, I’m not denying that, and I also know that Frank Miller had a huge boner for him. I also know that Frank Miller writes comic books, draws comic books, and does not direct movies. I have a feeling that what happened after the success of Sin City and 300 was that movie executives approached Frank Miller and said “Hey, I know you have no experience directing, but wanna direct something, anything, as long as it’s related to comics?”, and Miller’s eyes were replaced with dollar signs and agreed. I’m not knocking him or anything, because if someone offered me a shit ton of money to direct anything I wanted, and I could make a movie based on one of my favorite comics so that someone else wouldn’t have the opportunity to direct it, I’d do the same. Unfortunately, I think that if you take a comic book that was written in the 40′s with a certain tone, and have someone who has never directed anything attempt to do that over 60 years later, some things might not work. The characters and narrative were exaggerated and somewhat tongue-in-cheek, which I feel alienates you audiences who don’t quite “get it”. The film itself is exactly what it would look like if Zack Snyder took the Sin City movie out on a date, slipped roofies into its drink, then raped the living shit out of it. Every shot is either super-saturated blacks and whites, or are filmed in color, but with the saturation brought down. Don’t get me wrong, I love Frank Miller’s comic book work, but I think he should stick with that instead of attempting more movies.

 

I didn’t get this far in the movie so I have no fucking clue what’s going on here. Actually, even if I did get this far, I still wouldn’t have any idea what was going on.

 

Even though he was only in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World for a few scenes, the ones with Brandon Routh were some of the more entertaining moments of the film. Remember that whole part about the cleaning lady, dusting things, and the Vegan Police? HI-LARIOUS. Coming off of that, I was looking forward to seeing him as Dylan Dog, despite also never having read the comics. I did see Dellamorte Dellamore (a.k.a Cemetary Man) but know that it’s not a direct interpretation of the comics, so that doesn’t quite count. Even though this movie was about vampires, werewolves, and zombies, I could barely keep track of what the fuck was going on. I don’t think it’s all that uncommon for comic book movies too end up being too serialized, filled with short little adventures that are all connected to a major storyline, but I couldn’t keep track of that one thread that kept the plot moving forward. I feel the same way about Hellboy II: The Golden Army, in the sense that I can’t tell you exactly what the fuck happened in that movie, but at least when I left that movie, I enjoyed myself. Unfortunately, if you get an hour and fifteen minutes into a two-hour movie and still have no clue what the fuck is going on or why, you have to make an executive decision to put that movie into that little red envelope that will take it straight back to Netflix Hell.

 

No, this scene isn’t taken directly from The Spirit, but I was getting sick and goddamned tired of Googling “The Spirit Eva Mendes” and seeing page after page of pictures of this girl’s butt. INFURIATING.

 

I hope you guys don’t judge me for bailing on these movies without finishing them, especially after seeing how much garbage I am willing to sift through. I think I need to keep a new policy in mind when adding things to the queue, which should start to exclude the need to add EVERY comic book related movie out there. I’ve also seen a couple of those direct-to-video animated comic book movies, and although I might be entertained, ultimately decide against reviewing them. In hopes of you preventing this shit from happening in the future, I’m going to go ahead right now and delete a bunch of shit from my queue that I know I will hate. Come back soon for actual reviews of whole movies!

Filed under 1 Star, 1 Star, 1 Star, Comics, Horror Film, Inane Bullshit, Non-Horror Film

The Fantastic Four (1994)

March 16, 2010 1 Comment

No, you did not enter a time warp, ladies and gentlemen. I really am reviewing a movie based on the Fantastic Four that was made in 1994, despite their being a more popular and bigger budgeted film being made in 2005. You might be wondering how to have made a worse movie than the one made with Jessica Alba, and this version made in 1994 certainly managed to do that in spades. As opposed to 2005 version that was made for around $100 million, this film was made for $2 million. Yes, you read that correctly, this version cost 50 times less than the contemporary version, but don’t let that fool you, this film isn’t 50 times worse. I’d say it’s maybe 20 times worse, which I guess can somehow be converted into a math problem, but I don’t feel like working that out right now.

In case anyone forgot how awful the 90′s were…

The story starts with Reed Richards (soon to be Mr. Fantastic) attending Empire State University with Victor Von Doom (soon to be Dr. Doom). They are working together on some sort of project involving space and explosions or something, and spend time bickering over the details. The machine explodes with lightening and Victor dies. We then cut 10 years into the future to Reed with his pal Ben Grimm (the Thing) recruiting Susan Storm (the Invisible Woman) and Johnny Storm (Human Torch) to go into outer space. They go out there and are sabotaged by the surprisingly still alive Dr. Doom. Apparently they fall from space, and we see them wake up unharmed. Everyone is confused, especially me. They get hints at their powers and get picked up by the military. Another villain starts showing up who is never actually named as the Mole Man, but might as well be. Ben’s girlfriend is kidnapped, the Fantastic Four go after them, apparently Dr. Doom loses, everybody’s happy, especially me, because it’s over.

Yes, he’s made of stone, but also requires a stone helmet?

This movie plays out like an awful episode of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. Not even a good episode or anything where the robot fight at the end was awesome, one of the terrible early ones where the bad guys were made out of clay. Reed Richards used is elasticity to trip bad guys. That’s right, HE TRIPPED DR. DOOM’S LACKEYS. Not to mention the fact that the “doom bots” were basically guys with their faces painted silver and green hooded sweatshirts. There is one scene that plays out like a back to school special where Mr. Fantastic explains that it was their personality traits were what caused their powers, Reed stretching himself too thin and Johnny always having a temper, always being a “hot-head”. I do have to say, that any scene involving the Thing is so laughably awful, it is almost redeeming…but not actually. The best is a scene where he is wandering the streets of New York looking for acceptance and finds none. So in a slow motion shot, he looks at his hands, then looks skyward, seemingly to ask God why he has been turned into a big orange pile of dogshit.

Where to look…Reed’s boner, Susan’s boobs, or the hint of the Thing’s thigh, because yes, he’s wearing briefs

Horrible acting, directing, writing, special effects, and costumes, that goes without saying. The interesting partis the fact that I was able to see this movie, that was never actually intended to see the light of day. The company that produced it had the rights to make this film for so long that had they not filmed anything, they would have lost the rights. They knew from the beginning that no one would ever see this piece of garbage, but they didn’t mention that to the actors. Even after word was getting out that this film would never be released, apparently they were being told it might serve as a pilot episode of a TV series. Despite horrible production value, I was actually kind of surprised to see ways they were faithful to the comic. In the original series, Dr. Doom blamed Reed Richards for the accident at Empire State University that made him deformed, and in Ultimate Fantastic Four their origin is also connected to miscalculations between Reed and Victor. The Thing’s love interested, Alicia Masters, is in this film as a blind sculptor, just like in the comics. Something else I appreciated was that they pointed out the original age difference between Reed and Susan, of 11 years. Other than that, total garbage. If someone asks if you have seen it, say yes, so you can advise them against ever seeing it.

Wolfman Moon Scale


IMDb
YouTube – Part 1 For the time being, you can watch all eight parts on YouTube

Filed under 1 Star, 1 Star, Comics, Non-Horror Film Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

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