Movie Scum

The following exchange took place in an episode from season 4 of the great Seinfeld .

Somewhere between Peter Weller deciding to hand over the RoboCop suit to Robert John Burke , the big wigs at OCP, or whatever big business in charge, decided that RoboCop needed to be more family friendly, thus leading to the first PG-13 film in the series. Never mind the fact that the original is a gory mess, even for an 80s movie, and the sequel probably expended more rounds than the Persian War, some damn parental board decided RoboCop should be a corporate product complete with action figures and cars and even it’s own spin-off TV show not too much later. Hence: RoboCop 3 . Since the last installment, old Detroit has gone to shit even more, OCP has merged with some Japanese company, and a military-esque team is brought in to force them damn ghetto people out by force for the construction of OCP’s idealistic Delta City. Luckily the ragtag team of CCH Pounder , Stephen Root , Daniel von Bargen , and a cute, smart displaced girl with uncanny computer skills decide to fight the pr...

It’s almost funny that Irvin Kershner , director of the undisputed best Star Wars movie, was tapped as the director of RoboCop 2 . While I can’t say I’ve seen any of his other works, he seems to be the studio-appointed and restrained errand boy as opposed to Verhoeven on the original. So naturally with the law of sequels, RoboCop 2 features most of the same players but with a bigger foe in the titular character. Stripped of its social and historical allusions, RoboCop 2 is just another sequel that attempts to up the ante with less else new to offer as the evil conglomerate OCP attempts to recreate RoboCop from a psychotic drug dealer. Surprisingly things don’t work out as planned which fortunately leads to one of the best police shootouts on film. But instead of the heroic journey that Murphy endures in the original, here he is sidelined and neutered. Even though the finale of the last film had Peter Weller’s character realizing he is more than simply a corporate product of dest...

With the release of the newest RoboCop reboot trailer which I must say has me intrigued, I wanted to officially revisit the original of which I've seen approximately 413 times. While the argument can be made for just about any remake, RoboCop is one of the few "old" movies that has more cultural relevance today than it did upon it's release. Big conglomerates, similar to OCP, are basically running the United States; the city of Detroit is bankrupt and probably will snap up any corporate sponsor it can, and between drones and the NSA and everything else we know nothing about, technology seems to be far outpacing our ability to harness it. If it sounds like I am paranoid, I am (not really at least). But basically all of this was foretold twenty-six years ago with arguably Paul Verhoeven 's most complex film, excluding Jesse Spano in her Showgirls stage. Much like many of the age-inappropriate movies I consumed under the age of 10, the themes and allusions o...

From the jump, World War Z has been plagued with problems. From ire among fans of the book that the film takes the title, but little else from, to the well-publicized production and budget woes, to last minute reshoots, the writing on the wall indicated that this would be a disaster. Yet somehow, in spite of a title that is still very divisive, a director who is not quite known for his action directing abilities, and a "family-friendly" PG-13 rating, World War Z is actually a pretty solid film and juggernaut at the box office. I'm sure we'll see the sequel World War Double-Z in 2016.

SCENE: SWANKY CONFERENCE ROOM FILLED WITH OCP INVESTORS Old Man: Our system of entertainment is under assault and dangerous crime. The real crime: unoriginalty. In an effort to replace Hollywood with our own Delta City CA, we need a cop who not only has the weapons to fight these street thugs but the resources to use them. Ladies and gentlemen…. I introduce to you …..

With AMC’s Breaking Bad ending soon and Mad Men on its elongated final legs, AMC is looking to fill the void with more than just Chris Hardwick talkshows. They say there is no risk-taking in Hollywood these days, and … this announcement  couldn’t further back up that sentiment:

Dexter has come to a close on Showtime. Breaking Bad is close to its final episode. In the current television landscape you no doubt will come across someone who loudly exclaims while covering their mouth with their hands after telling them you haven't seen their favorite TV show. Unless you are an unemployed mouth breather with government handouts at your whim, chances are you are working and being a productive member of society and thus, not able to take advantage of the plethora of ways to consume entertainment these days.

I have made no qualms about my feelings about The Happening before and this is not the post to indicate that has changed. Just like many of M. Night Shyamalan’s recent movies, The Happening is a mess but one that I am more and more convinced has to be intentional.

AMC CEO Says No End to The Walking Dead in Sight (comingsoon.net) AMC is not content to let The Walking Dead die with grace and dignity when the time comes and instead will parade around its lifeless corpse to viewers and advertisers alike. But, given the massive ratings it currently gets, why would they? Perhaps when every last ounce of stupid-female subplots and wholly unsatisfying story arcs is exsanguinated from the series will it be allowed to expire. And then they’ll bring back Lori and Andrea to start the cycle of idiocy over again. And we’ll probably still watch.

While much derided, sequels can serve a purpose, not just` to the financial end of Hollywood, but also to the creative side. As a member of the audience, there is a comfort in watching a new movie with foreknowledge of its characters or its basic plot structure, especially if the preceding movie is one that you enjoyed. But at some point, every franchise needs to be put out to pasture to spend the rest of its days playing golf and listening to Paul Harvey.

If you ever wondered if the 'found footage' genre would graduate from horror into loftier pursuits (Chronicle notwithstanding), End of Watch might be the film for you. At least, sort of. I was sold on a gritty cop film starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Peña with the aforementioned style but the end result was less than impressive. Imagine COPS: The Movie with attractive actors, love interests, and a big bad in the form of a very shallow drug kingpin and you have the idea.  Gyllenhaal and Pena are two almost-rogue LA cops who manage to get entangled into more shootouts and busts than Riggs and Murtaugh with even more chatty banter but less characterization. As a result of them sticking their noses into a drug war, the two are (eventually) drawn into the seedy underbelly of Los Angeles that permeates almost every other film by David Ayer . Like the "found footage" angle that is more easily explained by having an invisible cameraman, the film suffers from havin...