Category: Recap

Nine Lives Recap

Jamie

What?! Tom Brand (Kevin Spacey) is a high powered business man who only cares about one thing: his brand (get it?). After getting a cat as a present for his daughter, a freak series of events leaves his body in a coma and his spirit trapped in the cat! What a cat-astrophe! Can he learn to love and live as a cat before his business is sold and he loses his family forever? Nine Lives!

Why?! The primary impetus in the film is that Tom Brand is a shitty guy and needs to change. He loves his family, but doesn’t show it very well and appears to love his business and himself more than them. So the mysterious pet store owner, Mr. Purrrkins, turns him into a cat to teach him lesson. Basically, if he can’t learn to live as a cat in his own house, then he can’t learn to love and will remain a cat forever.

How?! It isn’t really made particularly clear how being a cat will teach Spacey to love or what he had to do to be free. He is just told to act like a cat. However by the end of the film you come to understand that it’s more about being there for the people in his family when they need him (just like a cat is… or whatever). He plays with his daughter and comes to understand that simply being there is what she needs. He snuggles with his wife and comes to understand that he needs to be a comfort for her when she needs comforting. And finally he comes to understand that he needs to recognize his grown son for the skills and loyalty that he has ignored for so long. Throughout the film the son is dealing with a fairly complex business scheme that the COO of Brand’s company has undertaken in the absence of Tom (just what the kiddos are craving in a film: intricate business talk). Only by truly understanding his son’s contributions to his success is he finally able to be free.

Who?! I’ll give a little shoutout to Talitha Bateman, who played the daughter of Tom’s first wife from a new marriage. Not only is she already a BMT veteran (playing Teacup in The 5th Wave), but she had one of the better running gags in the film. It becomes clear that she is a minor internet celebrity and posts amusing videos to a youtube-type channel. It’s an unacknowledged subplot of the film and even initiated my favorite joke of the film (where a security guard tasers his partner in the testicles while trying to catch Tom as the cat… can’t go wrong tasering testicles).

Where?! Pretty standard New York City fare. We get direct confirmation of the setting, numerous license plates, and even some GPS map visuals. However it is definitely not integral to the plot. Could have been Chicago pretty easily. C+.

When?! There is nothing that explicitly tells you the date. Did I give up? No! Scouring the film I found a scene on a bus with an extra reading a New York Times. The front cover clearly indicates that it was the April 2nd, 2015 issue. A vast majority of New York City dwellers will be reading the current issue so we can say that the film takes place on or around April 2nd, 2015. I’m the best. D-.

One last quick note about Nine Lives. It is the newest edition of Chris Klein’s Number Line, where we try to collect integers that appear naturally in a film’s title. This is the 17th such title that we’ve watched (Patrick’s Note: We watched the 17th title a mere week before the beginning to 2017? Coincidence or a sign from above?). It’ll end the day that Chris Klein himself makes a number line title… so it’ll never end. Hooray! I’ll also make a visual for this game for the site at some point. For now you just have to trust me.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Nine Lives? More like Weak Try (haaaaaaalf-rhymes. Nine Lives is a surprisingly hard rhyming trick). We watched Nine Lives, a movie where Kevin Spacey is a cat. I slide head first into second with the lowest of low expectations, let’s go!

  • The Good – This movie isn’t as bad as you would think. Merely by not having Kevin Spacey act like a cat and instead put him in a movie-long coma it was a major win. Things are a bit fun, but it’s a kids’ movie. Do you like kids’ movies? I don’t. So I didn’t really like this movie. No skin off my back.
  • The Bad – Basically this movie immediately jumps in the middle of a very adult story of corporate power brokerage. It is boring to me, let alone kids who just want to see a cat run around. The CGI cat looks terrible. This is also not a body switch movie. Kevin Spacey does not run around acting like a cat. That was definitely in the original script, but they clearly cut it in order to get better talent all around. He is in a coma during the movie, and thus never acts like a cat. Mistake for entertaining Patrick, smart move in making this movie tolerable.
  • The BMT – There are a ton of things going for this movie from a BMT perspective. It has a terrible CGI animal; to the point where Kevin Spacey was probably on set for two days, and in the studio for two more, and that was his shooting schedule. They definitely made back their money from LG and Lexus in product placement. And this is a classic example of mixing two genres: why are kids interested in high level corporate sabotage again? Oh yeah, they aren’t, why is that literally half of this movie then? It is BMT, but just by being a great example of: (1) Body switch that isn’t body switch, (2) mixing an adult storyline into a kids movie, (3) product placement, (4) star power that was on set for fifteen seconds total. It is solid. But not as bad as you would think.

Obviously let’s go for a Prequel/Sequel/Remake and obviously we are doing a sequel. I will call it Ten Lives. The cat from Nine Lives is living out his ninth life with the Spaceys when sadly it is time to say good bye. But nay, after winning in the business world and winning with his family, there is only one last thing Kevin Spacey needs to conquer … the afterlife. Travelling through hell Kevin Spacey learns exactly how much his earthly success means for his soul. Spoiler alert: Not much!! Upon finding Mr. Fuzzypants can he convince Cat St. Peter that their furry friend deserves a tenth life? Find out in Ten Lives!

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Gods of Egypt Recap

Jamie

I’d like the record to show that I actually didn’t mind Gods of Egypt all that much. It was at times beautiful (albeit inconsistently so) and played a bit like Thor (patently ridididiculous, but still fun). So in the end I was actually surprised that this landed at 16% on RT. I guess perceived/actual racism can go a long way. Let’s get into it.

What?! It’s been years since Set took the throne of Egypt from Horus and left him blind and powerless. A mortal thief, Bek, steals and returns Horus’ eye (the source of his power) in the hopes that Horus can bring order (and the woman he loves) back to Egypt. They must work together to defeat Set before he destroys both the world and the afterlife in his own vain pursuit of immortality. Gods of Egypt!

Why?! The main driving force in the film is the aim to take down Set and return Horus to the throne. Even before we learn that Set is aiming to destroy the world and obtain immortality, we know that Horus, Bek, and his lady love Zaya want to take that power from him for totally different reasons. We have Zaya who worships Horus and wants him to bring order back to Egypt, we have Bek who needs Horus to bring Zaya back to life (she died, duh), and we have Horus who really doesn’t give a shit about Bek and is more focused on his own sweet tale of vengeance. Interestingly, this whole triangle of motivation is very similar to the motivations in Ride Along… It’s basically just Ride Along in Egypt… Now I’m having fun imagining this film starring Kevin Hart instead of [Insert Anonymous Actor’s name here].

How?! The original plan is that Horus is going to squelch the source of Set’s power, the desert fire, to leave him weak and vulnerable. Then he’ll have a chance to defeat him since he only has one eye. They first go on a quest to get some of the heaven’s water to squelch the fire, then they need to find Thoth to solve the riddle of the Sphinx who guards the fire, but they are stopped before they get a chance to destroy Set. When all seems lost and the world is being eaten by a giant space demon (seriously), Horus learns that all he ever had to do to defeat Set was to believe in himself a whole bunch and everything was cool (it’s like a children’s movie). Unfortunately none of this actually makes it possible for Horus to bring Zaya back from the dead… psych! Ra totally comes down from his spaceship and is like “No probs, bro,” and everyone is alive again at the end. It may be the truest example of Deus Ex Machina in cinematic history. Literally God comes down from the heavens and fixes everything. Hoo wee, what a weird plot.

Who?! I wanted this part to be highlighting the “Planchet” of the film, however so many of these films don’t have a shred of humor in them. Sure there are quips between Bek and Horus, but it’s on a Hitman: Agent 47 level of laziness. Instead I’ll just highlight that this marked the return of Rufus Sewell to our BMT lives (seen first in Bless the Child). Hopefully we can complete the Sewell trilogy with the XxX precursor Extreme Ops, which looks aaammaaaazzzzziiinnnggggg.

Where?! Boom. A+ in the hizzouse. Set in Egypt as the title informs you. Although, you would have thought it was set in Europe given the cast and accents. Zing!

When?! Uh…. ancient? It’s… uh… ancient times. D.

If that didn’t get you excited for the film then… you probably won’t like it because it’s just as ridiculous as I described.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Gods of Egypt? More like God I Feel Ripped Off (I was going to say gypped, but that is racist. The more you know). This was one of the most anticipated movies of the year for us, so I went in with a bunch of expectations. Let’s go!

  • The Good – I liked the world building. It was interesting and the script was able to be a lot tighter than you would think given the subject matter. I hate the “this should have been a Game of Thrones like show, not a movie” nonsense, you could say that about almost anything. But this could have probably sustained itself as such a thing, and I would have been thoroughly entertained. It’s not that bad … because “that bad” for this movie is literally the worst film of the year. It isn’t the worst film of the year which is actually an achievement.
  • The Bad – The acting. The CGI was pretty atrocious. Actually, the movie itself is beautiful, no joke. But a bunch of scenes are really just terrible. I would say that while he gives it his all, having Gerard Butler in the film hurts it because it ends up too over the top. They should have stuck to totally television actors and gone from there, I think it would have ended up being a bit better.
  • The BMT – Yes. I would say 40 is just about appropriate for the film. Definitive, top 10 (maybe 5) for a year. But not the worst by any stretch. To kick it up a notch it either would have had to make literally no sense (it was shockingly coherent as I said) or just looked like a complete pile of shit throughout. But it didn’t. Part of me is impressed it managed to charm me at all, I’m down for a sequel to be honest.

Boom. Speaking of which let’s do a little Sequel Prequel Remake and rock a sequel. I think you fast forward a bunch of years and Horus is killing it as the main god. He rules a prosperous Egypt and the people love him. But alas, all good things come to an end. Ra is set to perish (they make it clear gods merely age slowly and aren’t in fact immortal in this world), and he reveals that Horus as the ruler of Egypt must lay down his mantle and take the throne. Refusing, Horus goes in search of a mythical weapon to forever strike down Apophis that would allow him to remain in Egypt after Ra’s passing. Meanwhile, Set, escaping death and returning to an Egypt missing its king, attempts a takeover of the kingdom. In the end, Horus battles Set yet again, and ultimately strikes a deal: Set can remain in the land of the living on Ra’s ship to battle Apophis, a beast which it turns out is vital to Egypt’s continued existence as well. … Confused? Me too.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Ride Along 2 Recap

Jamie

What?! Ben is on the force and marrying Angela, but James is not sure he can cut it as an officer. To prove it he takes him down to Miami for a routine pickup to show him he doesn’t have what it takes. On this ride along Ben needs to prove his stuff or lose his badge. Ride Along 2!

Why?! Ben wants to be a detective. James doesn’t want him to be a detective. It’s the same story as last time except switch out Angela for a career in law enforcement.

How?! After screwing up a major operation, Ben is on thin ice with the Lieutenant, so he clearly thinks sailing smoothly through an easy operation will help him out. For whatever reason, though, James thinks that even on this routine pickup in Miami Ben will screw it up to the point that he’s fired. In some senses he’s right (since they bumble and stumble their way to the edge of unemployment), but there is little reason to think that he will. Unfortunately though, once again this routine “ride along” uncovers a massive criminal enterprise that Ben eventually takes down. Really fortuitous… although I guess that’s why they made these documentaries about him.

Who?! Can’t believe I’m going to say this but I kinda have to give a little shoutout to Ken Jeong (famed star of Furry Vengeance), who played the computer hacker James and Ben went to pick up. I generally have not found any character he has played funny, but in this case I didn’t mind him. There was a level of self-deprecation that I think worked for the character. He kinda sucked, kinda knew it, but couldn’t help himself.

Where?! Miami playa. Gotta get out of the hometown for this one and Miami was the primo spot. This one edged up into the B range, not only because the location was a little more necessary to the plot (needed to be close enough to Atlanta to drive), but also because the film used a “Miami” intertitle to alert the audience to the new locale. Next up for Ride Along 3? I say international (Cuba, Rio, China?) or Los Angeles (bring it home for Cube).

When?! I bet you’re all like, “Uh uh, no way does Jamie get another exact date for this film. Impossible. Only a master of disaster could do that.” Well, that’s Dr. Master of Disaster to you. That’s because 25 minutes into the film our main bad guy holds up a giant check that he’s giving to the Miami PD. Date on the check? March 13th. Boom. Takes place in present day so you can only assume a current year. I call that an exact date (years are dumb unless we’re in the past or the future. At best current years can be mildly interesting). B again.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Ride Along 2? More like Way Too Long Too! (Not really, it was a fine length I think). Let’s get into in quickly, I’ve already spent too much time watching and thinking about these movies:

  • The Good – I liked Ken Jeong in this, his character was less grating somehow than the ones he is often cast as. I also thought Benjamin Bratt was a good bad guy. Good use of the Miami setting. It actually got me excited to see where they might take the odd couple next.
  • The Bad – Olivia Munn, but she didn’t have much to work with. As a matter of fact this film was a little bit less … kind to the female cast. Tika Sumpter’s only major scene saw her dress up as a sexy police officer, and Olivia Munn showed up in simply ludicrous costumes. The cast exploded Lethal Weapon style except in one movie instead of across three sequels. There were more “bad” scenes, like a particularly dire short scene of Kevin Hart pointlessly emerging from the water Predator-style, and a really bad CGI crocodile.
  • The BMT – But still nope. I don’t mind these films. They aren’t not-that-bad, but they aren’t really that bad either. You just have to buy into Kevin Hart and some of Story’s weirder choices (the video game car chase comes to mind). I wouldn’t recommend sinking four hours into watching the series, but if you’re looking for something dumb that will give you a chuckle or two they might work. Does not supplant Dirty Grandpa as worse comedy of the year for me.

Final game and we are home free, this time we have a new Audio Sklogentary! This is the second Tim Story audio commentary I’ve listened to (the first being Taxi), and the review is basically the same: (1) Commentaries are always worse when it is only one person. (2) But you can do a lot worse than Tim Story for a solo directoral commentary. He has funny anecdotes, he tells you a lot about the filming (the bar was a courthouse! The police station a nice hotel lobby!! The bikini shop was a very wealthy man’s foyer!!!), and generally just has glowing things to say about everyone and everything. Pleasant. I would give it a B.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Ride Along Recap

Jamie

Gotta split this into two parts to accommodate our double feature this week. First up, Ride Along.

What?! Ben Barber (Kevin Hart) is dead set on two things: becoming a cop and marrying his girlfriend Angela. Both depend on him getting along with Angela’s tough-as-nail cop brother, James (Ice Cube). When James offers to take him on a ride along, Ben knows that he’s in for the ride of his life. Ride Along!

Why?! The entire why of this film can be summed up in a single sentence: Ben wants to marry Angela and James doesn’t want Ben to marry Angela. Done. That’s it.

How?! Confused? Not sure how a ride along with Angela’s brother is connected to either of those goals? It’s like a constellation in the night sky. Stars connected to make a shape that only vaguely resembles a swan (or in this case, a plot of a film). Here it goes: Ben says he can’t marry Angela until he is a cop. Angela says he can’t marry her until he gets along with James. James says he can’t marry her until he proves he’s a man. For Ben all three of these goals can be accomplished via the ride along. For James all three of these goals can be mercilessly crushed via the ride along. Fortunately for Ben they get directly involved in a major police operation whereby he is able to save the day and wins Angela’s hand in marriage. If that didn’t happen James probably succeeds and crushes all of Ben’s dreams. It’s kind of the theme of the series. Ben sucks at everything… but comes out on top at the most opportune moments.

Who?! Give a little shout-out to Lil’ P-Nut, a child actor/rapper who appears in the film. When  you got a music video like this and you’re 7-years-old you know you’re crushing it.

Where?! HOTlanta alert! Second film in a row set there. However, unlike the lily white Atlanta portrayed in Mother’s Day, we get a much more diverse cast representing the city in this case. This is pretty much as clear as you can get with a location without it being necessary to the plot. Obviously could have been LA or Chicago or Boston or New Orleans. C+

When?! Exact day alert! Near the beginning of Ride Along Ben gets a letter from the Atlanta PD informing him that he made the academy. That letter is dated October 16th. Word up. The satisfaction I get from an exact date is somewhat sad… it’s just so exciting. That’s a B.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Ride Along, more like Misguided Slog (ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-half rhymes, ya heard?). We’ll make this quick, we got two to do, woo!

  • The Good – I honestly find Ice Cube, this director, and Kevin Hart (to an extent) very entertaining. I think the way the go about making light of and parodying cop dramas is somewhat unique in the present landscape, in that it isn’t an over the top parody, but instead a ridiculous (but relatable) person being put in extreme situations and acting accordingly. The soundtrack is excellent.
  • The Bad – As one would expect it is a bit too much Kevin Hart. The way they portray women in general is basically just to have them as eye candy (you could make an argument that Tika Smpter has equal footing to her fiance and brother, but in reality that comes across as very token, we’ll get more into that in the second recap). The movie is long and too unstructured, it is classic string-of-vignettes screenplay common in a punched up comedy.
  • The BMT – No, not this one I don’t think. I was pretty entertained to be honest. I like what Tim Story and Kevin Hart are trying to do here and I totally get why Story is the most profitable black director in history.

I’m going to do a Sequel/Prequel/Remake here because I have something else for the second one, so let’s complete the trilogy (apparently coming out in 2018 by the way). So they started in Atlanta, they went to Florida, it is time to go to California I think. Story already said he wanted to get Ice Cube’s childhood home in the film, so make the story focus on finding the killer of Ice Cube and Tika Sumpter’s father in LA. With Hart and Olivia Munn tagging along (not to mention Ken Jeong, we got a regular Lethal Weapon level exploding cast up in here!) they discover a little bit about the family. My twist? Their father is still alive and a crime kingpin in LA. Amid questioning who he is Ice Cube discovers there’s more to being family than blood. Throw in a half-brother police officer trying to take Papa Cube down and we got a red hot Kevin Hart Brother-In-Law meltdown. Book my trip to the Oscars boys, I got best adapted screenplay on lockdown.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Mother’s Day Recap

Jamie

Thank god for my rhetorical questions this week. Not sure I could have kept track of the storylines in Mother’s Day without my undivided attention on the necessary details. I use the word “necessary” ironically of course. Let’s dive in.

What?! Not everyone in Atlanta is ready to celebrate Mother’s Day. Sandy (Jennifer Aniston) just found out her ex-husband eloped with a 20-something hottie. Jesse (Kate Hudson) is surprised by a visit from her estranged, xenophobic Mom. Kristen (Britt Robertson) is trying to deal with abandonment issues rooted in having been adopted. Bradley (Jason Sudeikis) is struggling to raise his two daughters after the passing of his wife. Egad! Will they find a way to laugh, love, and live on… MOTHER’S DAY?

Why?! This is an important question for any Garry Marshall ensemble holiday flick. The answer ends up being quite simple: “Because it’s fucking [insert name of holiday], duh! Now go kiss [the person you’re supposed to kiss on said holiday].”

How?! Loaded question. The holiday is the purpose, driving us to the inevitable conclusion that everyone kisses their loved ones. How we arrive at the conclusion comes in a variety of flavors. Interestingly, for Mother’s Day that flavor seems to be a rainbow of different shades of grief and loss (and hilarity?… if you find grief and loss hilarious). For Bradley the story is him learning that he and his daughters will grieve differently over the loss of their mother/his wife. For Jesse it’s her mother having to come to terms with Jesse’s Indian-American husband and her sister being gay (loss of her idea of what a family is). Fortunately she quickly reaches acceptance after five minutes of playing with her mixed-race grandchild. For Kristen it’s the acceptance of her own story of being adopted and accepting her mother (Julia Roberts) despite her flaws. Finally, we get the full five stages of grief from Sandy as she comes to terms with the new structure of her blended family and her sons’ new stepmother. I just went all Professor Smadbeck on you. Would be interesting to go back and see how big a role grief over loss and change plays in the other Garry Marshall films or if it’s unique to Mother’s Day.

Who?! This is a toughie since the cast is so huge. I have to give a shout-out, though, to the only significant African-American character in the film, Kimberly (played by Loni Love). If it wasn’t for Loni this would be the whitest movie since Gods of Egypt (booooooooom). She had some fun lines and hit a respectable two on the Planchet scale. Even more interesting? She’s an electrical engineer by training. Worked eight years at Xerox. Talented lady.

Where?! Spoiler alert in the trailer, this took place in Atlanta. Pretty solid setting too with many mentions throughout. But not vital to the plot. Only convenience. It gets a C+.

When?! This is a rare A+ for the temporal setting. Takes place Mother’s Day, duh. Right there in the title and the crux of the entire plot. Bask in it, for it will likely never happen again.

I had some fun with that… more fun than I had actually watching the film.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Mother’s Day? More like Bottler’s Day! (Boom, that is a deeeeep British bants cut right there. You bottlers!) We’ve completed a Garry Marshall trilogy. Did we hate it? Or did we merely dislike it? Read on to find out. Let’s go!

  • The Good – There are four main stories (Hudson and the racist parents, Aniston and the “tween” second wife, Sudekis the widower, and Julia Roberts with her daughter she never met and the daughter’s British comedian boyfriend), and of those only the last is truly effective. Sudekis, Aniston, and Olyphant are all fine. Only the Hudson storyline is a hard miss. I think that is better than at least New Years’ Eve. They’re improving!
  • The Bad – The Kate Hudson story. It is crazy disrespectful of what you might call “southern” culture. The parents are straight up racists and bigots, irredeemably so. To the point where you are expected to not bat an eye that their two daughters (1) didn’t tell them they both secretly got married and (2) both had a child. They hid their grandchildren from them! Why? Because they are racists … irredeemably so … except once the mother plays with the child for about 10 seconds, then’s all cool … let’s go for a picnic! Hooooooooooooooooooorseshit. But that is a Garry Marshall film. This was probably a primary reason the film got such terrible reviews. It genuinely sinks the entire experience.
  • The BMT – Sure. All three of them are naturally. This is probably the middle child (and without Hudson’s part it would be the best by far I think) behind Valentine’s Day (I think, I don’t really remember), but ahead of New Year’s Eve. Watching these three and the future BMT Christmas Eve would be quite the holiday marathon.

I need a game. I’m not sure if there is a name for this yet, for now I’ll call it the Mechanic Sklogification. It is like sklogification (in which we change the plot of the film to suit our needs) except the intention is to fix the film a bit. I’m targeting the Hudson storyline. Here’s the key: Hudson and her mother were both in the wrong. The mother obviously was a bigot, and Hudson shouldn’t have hidden the fact that had a child from her mother in the end. So have everything proceed as normal, but focus on a final confrontation in which both sides are laid on the table. “You’re a racist” “I said hurtful things, but you were my 20 year old daughter dating a much older man, I would have said anything to get you to stop. It still didn’t give you the right to hide my grandchild from me” “So you’ll accept my mixed-race family and that my sister is gay?” “I accepted it all the instant I realized I could have you both back in my life again, I was just too stubborn to admit it”. Tears, everyone loves this movie (not really). But seriously the vignette’s issue is more that it treats southern culture like a movie villain, almost as if the entire movie was written and stars “liberal Hollywood types”. Watching it unabashedly insult literally millions of people with their simplistic version of liberal-conservative culture class was frankly shocking.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

The Forest Recap

Jamie

A few personal thoughts before getting to the overview. It’s my opinion is that this film is awful. Really, really bad, even by horror standards. Particularly the last third of the film, which felt like it was straight out of The Haunting or An American Haunting or The Haunting in Connecticut… one of the hauntings from the early 2000’s, anyway. But as the Razzies are wont to do, it will probably not even appear on the pre-nomination list. Oh well. Let’s get into it.

What?! Sara Price’s sister Jess has entered the “suicide forest” of Japan and disappeared. Unwilling to accept that she’s gone, Sara enters the forest only to find that the spirits that dwell within may be coming after her next. The Forest!

Why?! Every horror film has you asking, ‘Why? Why are you going into the spooky ghost forest?’ And usually the answer is wholly unsatisfying. Not this time! She does it because they’re twins! Sara knows that Jess isn’t dead because they have a special twin connection, so she feels she must venture in to find her. It’s the best reason of them all! It also forced me and Patrick to confront the tough question: what would we do? The answer? Wait for the authorities and perhaps leave a note for Patrick at the edge of the forest. It would read, “Sorry, bro. I don’t fuck with ghost forests.”

How?! Fortunately for a young woman hoping to take a stroll through the ghost forest there are multiple people that are willing to help her with that ill-advised venture. These include the smarmy (or is he?) travel writer, Aiden, and his Japanese guide, Michi. Michi is the token smart person in the film and warns Sara that she’s got sadness in her heart and the forest will try to use it against her. Guess what? She doesn’t listen and the forest uses it against her. Surprise, surprise. God… they were all so dumb in this film.

Who?! I feel like when talking about a horror film the only ‘who’ you really care about is the monster. In this case the whole forest is the monster. It uses spirits and illusions to trick people into killing themselves and each other. So while the forest seems to be a suicide forest, it is hinted that the victims of the forest may have instead been manipulated into killing themselves. It’s actually pretty clever. Unfortunately, it’s also as scary as the other BMT film where trees are the primary antagonist, The Happening.

Where?! Uh, Japan. Duh. Haven’t you been playing attention? This is a clear A and bordering on A+, depending on how generous you’re feeling with the title. I think it’s an A.

When?! This is the second film in a row where the month and day that it takes place doesn’t seem readily apparent. Unlike London Has Fallen, though, this is probably just a matter of circumstances given that 95% of the film takes place in the middle of a ghost forest where everyone knows time doesn’t exist. That’s common ghost forest knowledge. Still an F.

Now that you know the details Patrick will give a little review.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! The Forest? More like the Borest, amirite? It’s twin time (and Mt. Fuji), it is twin time and Mt. Fuji. Those of you familiar with the Twin Time song (nearly none of you reading) will know the tune, feel free to sing along. This might be the greatest twin movie we’ve ever done. It at the very least gives I Know Who Killed Me a run for its money. Arguably both involve stigmata twins. Fun fact: Jamie and I are stigmata twins. But only in a specific way. When someone asks me “hey, if I punch you does it hurt your brother” Jamie instinctively says “No, that’s ridiculous nonsense”. Let’s get into it!

  • The Good – The first act in a way. The set up to this film is somewhat better that recent terrible horror fare. The protagonist has a reason to go to Japan, you get the sense of loneliness and isolation that is meant to compel you towards the forest. Thick on jump scares, but otherwise I thought it was a decent setup to a decent idea.
  • The Bad – The rest of the goddamned movie. Thiiiiick on jump scares. So thick that might as well have been the only type of scare they had. The third act is just a catastrophe. It makes no sense. All the characters are dumb. Rumor is that the Japanese suicide forest is alive and tricks its victims into killing themselves by showing this movie to them over and over until they shout “No, why would you insist on washing up when you literally just saw ghosts in a weird forest hole?! Run out of the forest lady!!!” and end it all.
  • The BMT – No. I wish I was bold enough to end it there, but no. Horror/Thrillers that are BMT make you laugh. This is just sad and morose and makes you sad, for both the characters and the state of horror today.

Game game game game game … Jamie has already alluded to it, but let’s Sklogify this movie! Open the movie, I awake in a cold sweat. From across the Atlantic I can feel that my Jamie is in trouble! I travel to the spooky midwestern forest where he was last seen and the guide says: “Beware, this forest is haunted and will trick you into killing yourself best just leave a note”. And I say “yes, that is a prudent suggestion. Thank you forest guide I have entrusted with my life.” I write a nice note, Jamie finds it, comes out of the forest a day later and fin. Horror fans wonder “wait … what?”.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

London Has Fallen Recap

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! London Has Fallen? More like Mundane and Rotten! Man, I’m all about the half-rhymes recently. Looking back at some old examples we are a far cry from the peak of this mini-game … Paul Fart Mall Crap, that is the best I’m ever going to do. Anyways, what do you get when you cross Michael Bay with the grossest parts of the torture debate surrounding the show 24? This movie. Mike Bannon is a sociopath, y’heard?

Before getting into let’s say a few words about the original Olympus Has Fallen. It doesn’t qualify at the moment (48% on rotten tomatoes), but I rewatched it as prep and … it is the most violent action film I’ve ever seen I think. Really rather gross. Mike Bannon is a sociopathic Jack Bauer wannabe who just tortures everyone (and it totally works, natch, just horseshit). The CGI is middling to bad. And the president might be one of the dumbest fictional presidents in history. I could go on for days at how inadequate this movie is, but that isn’t really here nor there. I just needed to set the stage a bit before we got into it … let’s get into it.

  • The Good – I mean, action. If you like explosions, and dirtbikes, and guns, and helicopter crashes, and headshots from Gerard Butler from 40 feet away on the run, and explosions, and your brain slowly dying as doctors look on perplexed, then this is the movie for you!
  • The Bad – The CGI is terrible. Eckhart is still the dumbest fictional president in the universe. Bannon is still a sociopath. Morgan Freeman is still the only good thing about this movie. The use of London is nothing more than an excuse to blow up well know (but not American) landmarks. The movie is indeed racist, but not in the way I expected. I mean, yeah, the basic Muslim enemy is over the top, but what really shines is the Italian Prime Minister with his mistress at Westminster and the French President intentionally being late (and the terrorists building that into their plans!). I’m sure there were a few more with the Canadian, German, and Japanese heads of state all getting some airtime, but those two were just mind blowing. Almost as good as the jabs they took at Russia early on! I’ll leave it there.
  • The BMT – Hell yes. This movie is so turn-your-brain-off dumb that you could pretty easily psych yourself into watching it edited for cable any day. I want to see Bannon become instant besties with the SAS lieutenant every day! You see, I would include the man’s name, but on IMDb he’s literally called “SAS Lieutenant”!!! This movie can be fun … you just have to be all about torture like early 2000’s Jack Bauer. Then you are golden. Easily a 40 BMeTric though. Easily. Officially amped for the trilogy.

I’ll actually leave it there. The BMT-view with Olympus Has Fallen will be my game this week.

Jamie

Seriously, I can now understand why Eckhart isn’t coming back for the third film. He seems to get stupider and stupider each time around. But let’s get to the root of this thing with the 6W’s.

What?! Mike Bannon, our hero from Olympus Has Fallen, is back on the beat as the President’s number one serial killer. When many of the world’s leaders are lured into a deadly trap in London, he’s the only one who stands in the way of their ultimate goal of killing the President of the United States. London Has Fallen!

Why?! Presumably you are asking, “But, why? Why do the terrorists want to do this to us? Is it our freedom?” Good question. The answer is the same answer to why Mike Bannon does anything in the film: vengeance. The UK government/world coalition took out the main bad guy’s family during a wedding ceremony and he now wants to kill the President on national television to prove a… what’s that? Did I say ‘wedding ceremony’? Uh… yes. The government killed his family while they were celebrating a wedding with several hundred innocent civilians. But don’t worry. Morgan Freeman totally said they had no idea it was a wedding… although the agent who ordered the bombing was disguised as a caterer for the wedding, so…. Just gotta take his word for it. Besides, in the grand scheme of the ethical questions that arise in these films this is small potatoes. Our hero is a sociopath.

How?! For the most part the audience is left in the dark on this one. Just have to trust that it’s the biggest conspiracy ever, involving hundreds of people infiltrating all levels of the UK government and entirely taking over one of the biggest cities in the world. By the end they throw you a little bone and reveal that a dude high up in MI6 was in on the plan. Still, Olympus Has Fallen is already hard to believe and this is 10x bigger and more complicated.

Who?! Gotta give a shoutout to Bryan Larkin, a Scottish actor who plays the head of an SAS elite squad that helps Bannon in the end. Besides looking and sounding like a buff Alan Cumming to the point where both Patrick and I thought to ourselves, “Gee, Alan Cumming is really taking some weird roles,” he also immediately becomes Bannon’s best friend. After knowing each other for about four minutes they are already exchanging one-liners at the end of the film. He hits a 5 on the Planchet scale.

Where?! Easy A+ for this one. Obviously takes place in London. It’s in the title! The only thing to add is that there are at least three scenes that take place in the country of Yemen. If we ever did a worldwide mapl.de.map this is good for that. We can’t use Salmon Fishing in the Yemen. It was too well reviewed.

When?! We actually don’t know. Patrick swears that it has to be when it’s cold cause the President is running in tights at the beginning of the film. But perhaps more experienced DC residents can watch the film and shed some light on the subject. Overall they did a good job of totally obscuring any and all indication of what month or day this took place. F.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Dirty Grandpa Recap

Jamie

Trying out something new with my part. I’m gonna try to use the 6W’s (Who, What, Where, When, hoW, and Why) to explain the what and how of the film at hand. With that in mind I’m going to keep my part totally intact rather than throw it to Patrick in the middle. So get prepared for some text.

What?! Zac Efron is roped into driving his foul-mouthed grandpa (Robert De Niro) to Boca the week before his wedding, but gets sidetracked and ends up in Daytona Beach during spring break, much to the dismay of his fiancee.

Why?! The apparent impetus of the film changes throughout because De Niro’s character constantly lies about his intentions. At first it is simply that Robert De Niro needs a ride to his house in Boca… gotta say, not the best film idea. Just driving an old person around (although, that’s basically the plot of Nebraska and Driving Miss Daisy and they were both nominated for Best Picture, so what do I know). Once that lie is revealed Robert De Niro claims he just wants to get laid and took him along as a wingman. Ha! Get it? It’s funny because he’s old and he wants to have sex. Ha! But that also turns out to be a lie. Finally he admits he actually roped Efron into the trip because he was a shitty dad who raised a shitty son (Efron’s dad) and doesn’t want Efron to turn out the same by marrying the wrong girl and being a shitty lawyer. Awwwww… or something.

How? Funny you should ask. If not for a wildly improbable coincidence (they meet an acquaintance of Efron’s on the way to Florida and they immediately fall in love) then the plan wouldn’t have worked out so well for De Niro. If you follow the storyline closely you’ll see that De Niro’s original plan seems to be that he is going to get Efron totally shitfaced at spring break and take compromising photos of him. Then at his rehearsal brunch he would put those photos up and ruin his wedding and get him fired. Apparently Efron is supposed to then be ecstatic and thankful for losing his job and fiancee. The real version of this film is that Efron ends up just hating his grandpa… probably almost as much as I hated this film. Instead he loses his job and fiancee but is OK with it because he realized he’s actually in love with someone else.

Who!? Rather than listing off character in the film (which would be somewhat dry), I’m going to highlight a smaller character in the film that I surprisingly like or really hated. I actually liked Jason Mantzoukas’ turn as Pam. The character is just Rafi from The League and guess what? I like Rafi from The League. If it wasn’t for him I probably wouldn’t have laughed at all. I think the screenwriters knew this as well since what seems like a super minor character shows up like 8 different times and plays a vital role in the climax of the film.

Where!? Dirty Grandpa really did a doozy on its settings. If you weren’t close watching like I was then you may have become very confused as Efron zipped around the Southeastern seaboard. We started pretty clearly in Atlanta. De Niro needed a ride to Boca so we know we’re going to spend most of the film in Florida. They then immediately make a detour to spring break in Daytona Beach. How do we know? Why an obese gentleman rubs his breasts on Efron’s car while screaming “Daytona Beach!!!” Obviously. Once the shit hits the fan we see Efron drive back to Atlanta, only to find out that his heart belongs in Florida and we drive immediately back (conveniently passing a ‘Welcome to Florida’ sign). Phew. This certainly borders on A territory. Like Justin and Kelly before it Spring Break almost becomes a character in itself in the course of the film. But it’s just not quite vital enough. I’m going to put it at B. Better than C territory, but not important enough to the plot.

When?! This is the funniest question to answer. Whoever was in charge of the continuity in the film dropped the ball a little bit. We are given a beautiful exact date for the film. Reading from a newspaper a character explains that Efron is getting married, “This weekend. Saturday, March 27th.” It is perfection. However, when you ponder for a minute March 27th wasn’t on a Saturday in 2016… the two closest years are 2010 and 2021 because of the leap year. We know it can’t take place in the future because De Niro’s driver’s license is valid, yet expires in 2018. So it’s either a 2010 period piece or they screwed up the day of the week. I would guess the latter. It was probably in the script when it was written in 2010 and they just didn’t change that random date. How could they possibly know that a crazy person would come along and rain on their stupid parade. Anyway, it gets an A- for how specific and weirdly vital the late-March setting is.

Jesus, we really blew this one out. Maybe I need to rethink the rhetorical question method (called RhetorWrecked… boom). Luckily no one reads this anyways so who cares?

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Dirty Grandpa?! More like Shitty, Bland, Flawed! (I made a list of half-rhymes, I’m pretty proud of myself). Only one question racing through my mind during this film: Am I Unfinished Business angry or just regular bad-comedy angry? Actually to be more exact the phrasing was “Am I like … unfinished business naaaaaangry?” My brain was just trying to entertain itself at the time … let’s get into it.

  • The Good – Efron can sing well. Jason Mantzoukas as Pam was indeed a delight if you like The League. He just plays Rafi the entire time, so that works fine.
  • The Bad – I have a little sklognalysis below about what was really getting me naaaaaangry during this film. But De Niro’s character might as well have just been a string of curses strung between “heart warming” I’m-old family stuff. His character kind of doesn’t make any sense. Efron is boring and his trajectory is unbelievable. The entire temporal and geographic landscape of the film is also just weird. They’re in Atlanta, then Florida, and they are there for what seems like five days (they were supposed to be gone for one). There are many many things to dislike about the film, but the cardinal sin? I laughed zero times.
  • The BMT – Yes and no. Yes because I would put this with Tammy and Unfinished Business as another example of an anti-comedy where comedy is replaced with anger and cursing. No because it is an unfunny garbage comedy.

And I’ll close with a little Sklognalysis deep dive. There were two cop characters in the film. Their introduction is promising (they are joshing around, but in a “you are dumb, you are in jail, have fun being an idiot in jail” kind of way), but then Pam (Mantzoukas) pops out and they are just like “oh, you were selling crack to children, but we like you Pam, so it’s all cool!” Their characters aggravated me to no end. Why? Because they were absurd, but taken in wildly different directions from moment to moment whenever convenient.

Exhibit A: Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle – The cop parody in this film extends along the Keystone Kops vector of idiocy, and along the Arrested Development vector of humorous brutality (if there is such a thing these days), etc. They are taken along the vector of past comedies and, perhaps, real life experiences to their logical conclusion. Along the vector.

Exhibit B: Superbad – Inverting expectations. McLovin’s expectations are that the police are going to arrest him and be jerks. They instead end up as fun loving and helpful. It works by playing off a common experience in an unexpected way.

Exhibit C: Dirty Grandpa – In this film Pam himself represents the logical conclusion for a drug dealer (or at least a common portrayal, fun loving and harmless). And that’s where the juxtaposition falls apart. The cops are at turns corrupt, but understanding to Pam. They are mean, but not really to Pam, and not really in general. They are inconsistent, but worse yet … they are not consistently along the “cop parody” trajectories you’d expect, but rather switch between the two aforementioned types: fun loving, and brutally idiotic.

Going against type can be refreshing, but here it doesn’t work because they aren’t consistent. It was aggravating and broke me out of the movie. Their ubiquitous presence also throws the balance of the film off in a way as well because it makes Daytona (and eventually the southeast US in general) feel very small. Without them the film would be more dull. But with them it fails at being at the very least self-consistent.

I call it the Along The Vector theory of parody. Without a solid case of reverting expectations, always default to parody in the direction of expectations. When when you choose a vector, stick with it.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Fifty Shades of Black Recap

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is part of the Black & Blue Bicycle where we watched Blue City and Fifty Shades of Black in one week. The two recaps are separate but go together. Here is a link to the Blue City Recap]

Jamie

This is the second part of an extra juicy post this week. That’s because we watched two films! A black and blue bicycle of Blue City and Fifty Shades of Black. You would think that as a result we would reap more from Fifty Shades, but not the case for me.

While I had some settings, MonoSklogs, and adaptation heavy lifting to do for Blue City, I didn’t really have any of that for Fifty Shades of Black. Being a spoof of another BMT film boded well, but it mostly just took all the scenes from that film and added excessive sex jokes. Like I bet you could almost play both of the films next to each other and they would proceed nearly in tandem (and look astonishingly similar). The other thing is that I generally do not mind Wayans films. Much like Madea, before BMT I didn’t think too much about the Wayans Brothers’ films. Would I have watched A Haunted House or Fifty Shades of Black or White Chicks or Little Man? Probably not. Now I look forward to them. Most comedies we watch are more boring than anything else and the Wayans don’t do boring (similarly Madea is simply not boring and I don’t care what anyone says). This wasn’t the best one though (that’s obviously White Chicks). It’s better than A Haunted House 2, but not better than A Haunted House. So on the A Haunted House metric this ranks A Haunted House 1.7… White Chicks on the other hand is A Haunted House -0.8. Ya’ll keeping up with that? Good. Because the A Haunted House metric is how I’m rating every film from now on. Phew.

The Settings 101 is pretty trash for Fifty Shades of Grey, it was obviously set in Seattle. It kind of had to be. Throw in a Supersonics joke, gratuitous shots of Seattle’s skyline, and a bus with a “Seattle” sign and we got a C or C+. Just C’s on C’s on C’s this week. Nice a brief for the bonus movie this week.

Patrick

We’re still doing this. Watching two movies in a week is haaaard when you have strict post guidelines. ‘Ello everyone! Fifty Shades of Black? More like nope, non-funny garbage movie! Let’s get into it.

  • The Good – I counted two chuckles and one hearty laugh, so about the same as Keeping Up With the Joneses as far as actual humor. The description of being “ashy like ET when he was sick in the river” cracked me up for like 5 minutes, I had to stop the movie. I do like Marlon Wayans, I think he’s a very funny actor with incredible screen presence. The way he can control his body and face to play to the camera is incredible. As a matter of fact the acting was pretty solid for a spoof movie all around.
  • The Bad – If you don’t like wall-to-wall sex jokes this movie isn’t for you. Literally people pretend to have sex on-screen for maybe 20 minutes of the total 90 minute runtime. There are two prosthetic penises (one gigantic and one really small naturally). I deadpanned the last hour of the film as well. None of the jokes really landing after the opening salvo. Irreverent spoof films are hard to pull off and this certainly does not.
  • The BMT – Certainly, 50+ easy. It is going to ultimately be top 5 worst film of the year for me. I would watch it again though. I would watch it while running a giant mind-melting 2000s spoof movie extravaganza (Scary Movies besides the first, Disaster/Epic/Date Movie, Haunted Houses, and this I guess, ten films, oof).

Let’s see … Since A Haunted House and A Haunted House 2 were both BMT let’s go back in time and learn a little BMHisTory. In particular, all those long year ago what did I think of A Haunted House 2? BAM, a little digest of my thoughts:

  • Marlon Waynes is a funny guy who can single handedly keep a movie from devolving into the Friedberg and Seltzer garbage that pervades the genre.
  • Relies way too much on sex and racial jokes.
  • But like the first four scary movies and Haunted House there are some laughs here (as cheap as they are), and I like all the players. I would (I’m serious) welcome a third movie (once again, totally serious).

My wish was Marlon Wayan’s command it seems, except it wasn’t a third Haunted House, it was this. And I’m having weird flashbacks here, this might as well literally be my review of Fifty Shades of Black! Patrick and Patrick from a year ago are so in sync.

Cheerios (for real),

The Sklogs

Blue City Recap

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is part of the Black & Blue Bicycle where we watched Blue City and Fifty Shades of Black in one week. The two recaps are separate but go together. Here is a link to the Fifty Shades of Black Recap]

Jamie

Prepare for a extra juicy post this week. That’s because we watched two films! A black and blue bicycle of Blue City and Fifty Shades of Black. I doubt anyone has actually heard of Blue City. It only has 755 votes on IMDb and its popularity ranking is so low that it comes in behind the 1986 gymnastics film American Anthem. This Italian Terminator rip-off is ranked higher for God’s sake!

As we all know (“You’re a crazy person,” the crowd chants in unison). Yup, I’m a crazy person. So I obviously read the book that Blue City was based on (that obviously no one has heard of either). It is a boilerplate noir thriller. Our hero returns from war to find his estranged dad murdered. With nothing to lose, he descends into the darkest corners of the city to find his father’s killers and bring them to justice, even if it costs him his life. Blue City! As far as an adaptation goes it was a pretty solid example of how some of the best films get made. Find a book of middling quality but with a solid story, tighten the screws, add some meat, and voila! Did it succeed? Ha! No. Lots of changes, merging of character, change of setting (more on that later), etc. etc. etc. But in most cases the changes were simply to try to clean up the seedy characters you are meant to root for. A general brat pack-ification of the material. As for the film itself I actually wasn’t totally disappointed by it. I’ll let Patrick discuss its finer points, but there were some bonkers MonoSklogs being thrown around and some crazy editing/directorial choices. While somewhat boring, it gave me enough to provide sense of peace with what would have otherwise been an odd choice for BMT considering just how unknown it is.

Taken in tandem is the longest post we’ve had since… well actually probably not that long ago. Still, I’ll try to keep the Settings 101 brief…ish. Blue City had a very interesting setting. The book was purposefully set nowhere. Our hero arrives in “The City” without acknowledgement of which state he is in. There is mention of Chicago being somewhat close and that The City was a big tire and rubber center, so I guess it’s a take on Akron, Ohio. But a fake state capital is explicitly mentioned, so that confirms the N/A setting for the book. The movie on the other hand was working hard for its setting. That production designer has so many “Blue City” signs and decals my head was spinning. However, the true setting was only shown once: on the side of a police car where it said “Florida” above the Blue City Police department shield. While there are a lot of mentions of Miami being nearby, there wasn’t enough to float it above C. Similarly, you can almost get an exact date for the temporal setting from a calendar on the wall and a visit to a graveyard (April 1985), but didn’t play a role and wasn’t exact. C- or maybe a C.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Blue City? More like Real Shitty! We completed the Black and Blue Bicycle, which means you’re going to get two, so let’s try and keep them each shorter. Let’s go!

  • The Good – It is an okay crime story with okay acting from Caruso and an interesting fictional grimy southern setting. I could see someone accidentally watching the film and not realizing it was incredibly reviled upon release.
  • The Bad – Nelson and Sheedy, woof! Sheedy in particular was just atrocious in this film, it kind of threw me. This was also probably an editor’s nightmare, it came across as just kind of cut to pieces and barely 80 minutes, the first time directing was exposed there. The story is also just unpleasant with undesirable characters thrown around with little regard for how they would eventually have to resolve the story.
  • The BMT – Naw, again, just kind of a blah, boring crime film with terrible characters and action that hasn’t aged particularly well. A 10 would be right in line, definitely poor, but never popular enough to make it a hit.

And I’m thinking Sequel for this one. Billy Turner, now a long time Florida politician running for Governor, is assassinated at a campaign stop in his hometown of Blue City. With no suspects and no hope his son Jim Turner returns to try and untangle the threads that tied his father to the dark underbelly of the town that tore his family apart. Was it corruption that felled Billy Turner at his moment of triumph, or is that yet another lie surrounding his tragic death? Blue City: Legacy. I’m hearing through the grapevine that I’m writing the screenplay and John Krasinski is attached to the lead role of Jim Turner.

That’s it, cheerios,

The Sklogs