Movie Scum

I would have to say my first real viewing of anything Freddy related, other than brief snippets, was Dream Warriors . I vividly remember fighting my brother for the VCR rights to record the horribly-tv-edited version while he wanted to record wrestling. That resulted in the VCR being thrown down the stairs and a hole being kicked into a door. Was it worth it? Fuck yea! At that time (I was probably about eight or so), Freddy was still savage, gruesome, deadly, and appeared in good (relatively speaking of course) movies. This installment is more or less the true sequel to the original. Certain things were different from Freddy’s inception but the story line actually progressed instead of stalling out like Kristen running in that goop while trying to escape Freddy. Here we get a little more backstory on his origins but the pleasant thing was they did not seemed to be shoe-horned in by studio dictation into an already completed story line. These plots points added nicely to the overall

If Chris Nolan ever needed to be consulted on a franchise, it was right after the original Nightmare on Elm Street . Granted, he may not have been up to the task at the time but he like few other directors know how to make a follow-up film to a highly regarded sequel, not by making a carbon-copy of it, but by expanding upon its original characters, story-lines, and plots. Sadly, A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy’s Revenge did none of that. It is almost as if New Line took a page from the Exorcist II fiasco of jettisoning everything effective from the first movie for the sequel. We replace Nancy with a whiny bitch, even though he does scream like a girl. Rather than focusing on developing the characters and humanizing them to make their inevitable deaths have an impact, we have a half dozen or so lazily-written characters with almost no defining characteristics. And most importantly, instead of a definitive motive for Freddy to avenge his death by striking back at the loved

Written by: PBF I am going to warn you. This is possibly the worst movie you will ever see. I realize that I may have said that about a couple of other films. Forget about those. THIS IS POSSIBLY THE WORST MOVIE YOU WILL EVER SEE. So, college student goes to Belize for archeological dig that last through the summer. Dead body is discovered. Dead body comes to life. Kills everyone but the college student. College student comes back to college. Dead bodies come back to life and kill people at the college. Fairly simple. And yet so much damage to my soul was done. Where do I even begin with this? Well, the acting is just horrible. And not charming horrible like kids in an elementary school production about the first Thanksgiving. Horrible like genocide, or when a child is kidnapped. We here at Movie Scum, have better production values than this film. This is as low budget as it gets. The directing is ungodly. There were these really odd stretches of what looked like a show on Anim

Here we are less than a week away from the release of the latest part of my childhood to be repackaged and resold to me. Rest assured, I will be there to see Nightmare 2010 on opening day but let us forget about that for now as I cannot say I have high hopes for it. Instead, just like every other horror and/or movie related website, I will revisit the original films and see how they hold up … or don’t. It is quite astonishing that Wes Craven was able to create such an iconic character with a budget reportedly of less than $2 million. Equally amazing is that through the various production and financial issues, the original Nightmare on Elm Street still remains as a highly regarded tentpole in the slasher subgenre twenty five years later along with the Halloween and Friday the 13th franchises. I would argue the Nightmare series did not fair as well as the Myers and Voorhees based ones due to studio interference and rushing production to maximize revenues at the expense of the stor

Written by: PBF I really like it when I revisit a movie that I have not seen in some time and it turns out to be actually good. Not just nostalgic good, but genuinely good. Such is the case with Critters . It was not the cheese ball horror flick I apparently erroneously remembered. We start off in space where a group of prisoners called Krites are being transported to a prison asteroid. Something goes awry and the Krites steal a ship and escape. Two space bounty hunters are commissioned to find them. The Krites land in rural Kansas and the bounty hunters follow them there. We meet the Browns, your typical family with Dad Jay, Mom Helen, and brother and sister Brad and April. Brad and April get on each others nerves as brothers and sisters usually do, and Brad tends to misbehave a bit. April is a hormone engulfed teen who just wants to bang her boyfriend Steve (a young Billy Zane ) in the hay. This invasion of Krites serves as the event that will remind them of how important it is

I love DVDs. Right after high school, I was buying at least a half dozen a week if not more. Yet there are several things that just pluck my nerves. This list is not in any particular order and certainly not inclusive. I am quite sure there could be a revisit to this topic eventually. 9. “Large Screen” Releases Essentially, these are films originally in a larger aspect ration, usually 2.40:1, that are cropped during a certain group of scenes. Not only do I despise not watching movies in their original ratios, the way this was handled for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was quite poor, and I’m not only referring to the movie itself. The jump back and forth between scenes (and even different shots within the same scene) is quite jarring. I know a normal movie-goer might not notice but it is rather annoying regardless. 8. Delayed Releases Now that Netflix and Redbox have caved to several studios’ demands to withhold new releases for almost a month after they hit DVD, the only wa

In case you were unfamiliar with it, Yo Gabba Gabba is a pretty crazy looking pre-K show on Nickelodeon. It features five characters who are toys that come to live when DJ Lance Rock places them into their playset/whatever. Thereafter ensues a bunch of singing, dancing, and lessons for our youngest members of society. I started watching this as my 3-year-old was quite picky in her television tastes and would only sit still in front of this (she has since “graduated” to Dora but I sincerely recommend DO NOT make a Dora movie). So, why would I want to see a movie based on a kid’s TV program? Simple. Intertwined with the moral stories about eating vegetables and cleaning up are some pretty funny occurrences, interesting guest stars, and trippy graphics. Surely you’ve seen the Kia commercial with the Sock Puppet and Muno (that’s the big red Cyclops thing) bowling and getting tattoos. I would imagine the plot would go in the direction of the characters are lost in the real world, they t

Now I can cross another classic teen 80s movie off my list. For this, The Breakfast Club , and others, it was not as though I was actively trying not to see them. My younger days normally reserved for mostly harmless fare like this was instead spent watching 70s and 80s horror and action movies instead. Yes, I saw the entire franchises of Nightmare on Elm Street , Friday the 13th , and even Maniac Cop before getting around to some of the more relatable films of my generation. So sue me. I now have seen it. I would imagine that everyone else has seen Better Off Dead so I will keep the synopsis short. Lane Meyer is for the most part a typical adolescent. He has really random daydreams, a crazy family, and a typical teen's awkwardness. After meeting Tina, err Beth, he seems to be on a straight path up the popularity ladder in high school. When she dumps him for a 23-year-old-looking-professional-skier-turned-high-school-student, Lane is downtrodden enough that he attempts to k

Written by: PBF The most important thing that I learned from Phantasm IV , is that being an ice cream man is a trade. Whatever you have to tell yourself, Reggie. Phantasm IV picks up at the end of part 3. Reggie was being held up in the air by dozens of spheres by the Tall Man. The Tall Man releases him, telling him that there is a final game to play. We get some flashbacks as Mike is driving somewhere and as Reggie is driving somewhere. Jody (Mike’s dead/alive/sphere brother) shows up and tells Reggie that he is going to get Mike. Reggie doesn’t want to have anything to do with this, and even tells Jody that he is done with the whole thing. In his defense, I would be tired of it too, having just come out of part 3. After an encounter with an undead cop, Reggie decides to take Jody’s advice and head south west. Mike ends up in Death Valley and wanders through time trying to find out where the Tall Man came from and how he can stop him. You’ll be happy to know that Reggie still m

Meinhardt Raabe, the Munckin Coroner that pronounced the Wicked Witch of the West dead with the following lines: As coroner, I must aver I thoroughly examined her And she’s not only merely dead, She’s really, most sincerely dead! He died today of a heart attack. He was the last surviving cast member of the entire film with any significant dialogue. Malcom McLaren, manager of the punk band Sex Pistols also died, after battling cancer. He left us yesterday, April 8th. McClaren appeared in The Great Rock and Roll Swindle and The Filth and the Fury, both films by Julien Temple, thus securing my ability to make a post about him on am movie website. McLaren, formed the pistols as a “product” that he would use to make a significant amount of money. Often times, the band would actually be paid to leave their current record label due to their drunken anti-establishment (mostly just drunken) acts. McClaren also formed Bow Wow Wow, managed the Clash for a bit, and produced television show

Written by: PBF What a surprise, I am reviewing a Coen Brothers ’ (Joel and Ethan) movie. The hell you say! Movie Scum is nothing, if not consistent. A Serious Man is a glimpse in to Larry Gopnick’s ever unraveling life. As of late, he has been plagued with quite unpleasant yet sometimes amusing (to us) events and he is struggling to figure out “what’s going on.” This is a re-telling of the story of Job, set in the 1960’s. Job’s faith is tested through a series of events (stemmed from a wager between God and the Devil) and though he may question why he is being tested, his faith remains intact. You will need to watch the film to see how Larry fairs. In the library of Coen films that exists, I have seen much better. The film is still “good” in the sense that the acting was extraordinary and the story was very interesting. But somehow, these did not mix together into a what should have been an awesome picture (despite the Best Picture nomination). I think the film was directed

Written by: PBF Rule of thumb when making a film about drug addicts: I have to care about someone for it to work. I don’t really have to like them or feel sorry for them, but I should not feel indifferent toward them. Cocaine Angel has us following Scott, who is a drug addict, as he wanders around town looking for Mary and drugs. We basically are thrown into his life, stay for a spell and watch him (though a very shaky camera) interact with a few characters (all addicts, with the exception of his ex-wife and daughter), and then taken back out of it. It really is no different from the dozens of other movies that exist about this subject. The last point in the above paragraph is part of the reason that I didn’t really care for this film. It does nothing to distinguish itself in a sea of addict movies. Another reason that I did not like it is because I didn’t care about anyone. Not even Scott’s daughter. The acting was certainly not good enough for me to be anything but indiffere

As we had discussed in a previous episode, I had a general distaste for movies that were Best Picture nominees as they seem to be pretentious and boring, much like another George Clooney movie that I did not care for. This movie, much like the director’s previous effort Juno , make me rethink Up In the Air but with reservations. As we are introduced to Clooney’s Ryan Bingham, we are thrust into his world of constant motion. He works for a contracted firm to break the bad news to workers that they are now unemployed. This job requires frequent traveling to the point that a vast majority of his time is spent in airplanes and hotels. He is for all intents and purposes a voluntary vagrant and he enjoys it. This is all threatened when fresh graduate Natalie Keener tries to revolutionize his industry by telecommuting and saving all of the travel expenses. As Ryan takes Natalie on the road to show her what she is getting into, he meets Alex, another wayward traveler with the same pench

Considering the fact that I have not seen Best of the Best 2 in at least ten years, the fact that I remembered the majority of what goes on is impressive. What is equally impressive is how I still find this film to be, like the original, somewhat laughable but an excellent exercise in martial arts films and damn entertaining. My previous love for this movie (maybe just a tad more than the first) may exclude this from being a totally impartial review but live with it. Years after the conclusion of the first, the three decent members of the US karate team have bonded to the point that they have become true friends and even opened up a karate studio together. The dumb one out of the bunch, Travis, decides to take part in an underground martial arts ring in Las Vegas, not for honor but for money. Sadly, Travis is killed in the ring by Brakus, a big sweaty German with big pecks and his body is found floating by the Hoover Dam. When the police refuse to take action believing the death t

You would think I would like Let’s Go to Prison . Directed by Bob Odenkirk . Features Will Arnett , David Keochner , Chi McBride and Dylan Baker . Written by Thomas Lennon . But I don’t. Perhaps it’s because it is a comedy that I laughed at once. Maybe it’s because Dax Shepard is in the majority of it. Maybe because it is incredibly boring. Whatever it is, it sucks. Yet, Comedy Central insists on cramming it down my throat 4 times a day, like they do with Idiocracy (also featuring Dax Shepard).

Welcome to a new series on Movie Scum aptly titled Mini Scum. Here, we discuss and review a movie in 100 words or less because it does not warrant a normal random review. I’m not adverse to a movie that takes the slow approach toward its resolution. What I am not a fan of is movies that ride along for two hours (!) before a hastily written ending which does not make a lick of sense. Syriana has the star power with Clooney and Damon especially but they are fairly dull and just small pieces of the boring cog of the story. This screams to be an important Oscar movie and with two awards it succeeded. But being acclaimed does not make it a good movie. Stick with Jack Ryan instead for political espionage.

I have found that the opening crawl of a film saying "Based on True Events" means not only will the story be 90% fiction with a smidgen of reality but it will not be good. You might notice I did not file Wolf Creek under horror. While this is the common genre the film is placed in, I feel it is more of a dramatic thriller ala Breakdown or Vanishing. While there may have been some horrific moments in this film, it is not horror in my estimation. Set in 1999 Australia, Wolf Creek follows three backpacking kids as they make their way through the heart of desolation. Our trio, played by Nathan Phillips , Kestie Morassi , and Cassandra Magrath , set off to Wolf Creek, the site of a meteor crash. After their hike, they fall victim to the old plot trick, the non-working car. Seemingly a nice stranger comes along with the offer to help them fix the car and get back on the road. Sadly, the kind stranger is not as benevolent as he seems. Needless to say, this is forty minutes in

I challenge you to find one person who does not enjoy a hot tub. Putting aside the potential health issues from prolonged use or extreme temperatures (thank you Michael Myers for teaching kids about the latter), a hot tub is relaxing and therapeutic and can make a kick-ass time machine. I would argue a Delorean is better as it can also function as a normal automobile, but the titular hot tub from Hot Tub Time Machine is running a close second. Three friends, Adam, Nick, and Lou have seen better days. Now in their middle ages, they find their lives slipping away from the dreams and ambitions they once had. After Lou has a mishap (or potential suicide attempt) with car exhaust and a sealed garage, the three hit the road with Adam’s nephew Jacob to a winter ski resort that they kicked at in the old days. The first night there as the four are relaxing in the bubbling, heated water containment unit, a mishap with a Russian drink and the hot tub controls results in a transportation back

Written by: PBF Yeah, this is a lousy piece of crap. I stared at the screen trying to figure out why in the hell this movie was made. Watching this franchise is sort of like watching a dandelion on a very windy day; it starts out pretty enough, but eventually pieces of it keep flying off leaving an ugly thing in its place. Phantasm III (which does not have the subtitle Lord of the Dead either time the title is shown) starts off with the same flashback to the first movie that was at the beginning of the second one. Only this time it includes parts from the second film, carefully leaving out James LeGros, who played Mike in the second. That is because A. Michael Baldwin has returned for the role (so has everyone else that were in the other 2). After the flashback we pick right up at the end of part 2. We see the Tall Man who was “killed” come out of the doorway to the other dimension and take his own dead body back there. There is a boring “showdown” in the graveyard with Reggie a

Written by: PBF If you were not already aware, this is not a true story. Tobe Hooper purposely leads you to believe that it is. The closest thing to reality in this film is that Leatherface does some of the same things that real life killer Ed Gein (who inspired Psycho) did. That is all. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre follows a road trip of 5 friends: Sally and her wheelchair bound brother Franklin, her boyfriend Jerry, and 2 friends Pam and Kirk. They are going to Sally and Franklin’s grandfather’s grave, as it may have been vandalized and/or robbed. There has been quite a bit of that activity lately. During the trip they pick up a rather disturbing hitchhiker and end up having to ditch him. They pull into a gas station only to find out it has no gas, but is expecting a delivery later. They make it to an old family home and decide to hang out until they can go back for some gas. The events that follow are quite unnerving and horrific. This film is truly a masterpiece from start t