Bad Movie Twins

Pinocchio (2002) Recap

Jamie

Easily the most interesting thing about Roberto Benigni’s Pinocchio is just how true an adaptation it is from the original tale. Watchmen ain’t got shit on this. Perhaps only Gus Van Sant’s Psycho can surpass it. It’s almost a scene-for-scene, line-for-line transcription of story to screen (with some scenes excluded for time). The only thing explicitly changed is a random expansion of the Candlewick character (called Leonardo here). Benigni seemed to go out of his way to include him in as many scenes as possible. Why only change that one aspect? Hard to explain. Anyway, this is probably why many reviewers of the film regarded it as so bizarre. They chalk it up to misguided vanity that Benigni would prance around on screen spouting macabre nonsense, perhaps not realizing (or deciding to not acknowledge) that the nonsense was just the original story. It would be like if a Cinderella adaptation was made where in the end birds fly down and poke out the eyes of the evil stepsisters striking them blind for the rest of their wretched lives. Or a Snow White adaptation where the evil queen has to dance in burning hot iron shoes until she dies. American reviewers would be like “WTF, mate! This is a children’s film!” Benigni simply made the most accurate adaptation of a book that we may have ever witnessed and it probably flew over a lot of people’s heads. The real story just isn’t particularly well known here. Does that mean it’s actually good? Ha! Oh deary me, no.

Do I dare do a Settings 101 for Pinocchio? Seems so obviously Italy. Although the fact of the matter is that I can’t remember if they actually say that it’s set in Italy. It obviously is, but treats it as a given. You almost have to give it a D, just for leaving it implicit. Instead I think I’ll just make a SklogCycle for the film. Don’t know what that is? Neither does anyone else cause I just made it up. Inspired by the ridiculous(ly awful) voice cast of Pinocchio, I’m going to make up a BMT cycle featuring stars of that cast. It would be called Pi-NOPE-io cause Patrick nailed it. Let’s see:

Scattergories (Calendar): The Country Bears (features Queen Latifah who voiced The Dove)
Comedy: Underdog (features Jim Belushi who voiced Farmer George)
Action: The Mod Squad (features Eddie Griffin who voiced The Cat)
Horror/Thriller: Mary Reilly (features Glenn Close who voiced The Blue Fairy)
Rom Com: Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous (features Regis Philbin who voiced Ringmaster)
Chain Reaction: The Out-of-Towners (features John Cleese who voiced Talking Cricket)
Sci-Fi: Delgo (features Eric Idle who voiced Medoro)
Razzie: Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties (features Breckin Meyer who voiced Pinocchio)
Scattergories (Based-on-a-book): Christmas with the Kranks (features Cheech Marin who voiced The Fox)

This cycle would physically harm me. The Country Bears, Underdog, Delgo, Garfield: A Tale of Two Kitties, and Christmas with the Kranks all in one cycle? No thanks. Pretty impressive though as I even got a Chain Reaction coming from Cheaper by the Dozen 2 and two transition points, which means this cycle could have legitimately been inserted between the Calendar and Based-on-a-book cycles. Boom. Don’t worry about it.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Pinocchio? More like Pi-NOPE-io!!!! Benigni is out of his mind, let’s get into it:

The Good – It is a beautiful movie. The acting, given that it is an Italian film (by which I mean, there is clearly a different style of comedic acting in Italy, far more slapstick, which you can see in other Benigni films), is rather good. It is an incredibly bold accurate retelling of a children’s tale from 1885 …
The Bad – Yeah, so anyone familiar with Grimm’s Fairy Tales might know that the original tales are rather, hmmm how do you say? Bonkers insane terrifying nightmare fuel? This is no different. At one point the Blue Fairy fakes her own death and effectively makes a tombstone that says “Fuck you Pinocchio, you did this!!” and he flips out only for her to be like “haha, you passed the test! Hooray!” At another point she has creepy rabbits with a coffin come in to convince Pinocchio he is dying so he’ll drink medicine. At the end of the movie he is essentially working himself to death because he “learned his lesson” about being a good boy. It is ridiculous.
The BMT – … I am very much glad we did this movie for BMT. It is super weird, but at the same time it makes you say “why did someone at Miramax think this would sell again?”. The Brekin Meyer voiceover is bar-none the worst voiceover in movie history. I am not at all shocked that zero people could psych themselves into saying “you know what? There is more good than bad here”. But yet it is an interesting and beautiful movie nonetheless. It is wild and weird and bad and I would totally watch it again with someone game to see a wild and weird and bad film. So there.

Phew. I’m going to cut it a bit short to announce a new project from BMTHQ. It was five years since our first BMT last February and that got me thinking about how much I’ve learned about bad movies in those years and also just how different our approach to watching bad movies is now than then. So in order to take advantage of this wealth of knowledge we have decided to introduce the Bad Movie Twins Hall of Fame (BMTHoF). Last week we voted our first class with the stipulation that it must have been over five years since we saw the movie (so if you look at the archive anything from before Norbit on June 30, 2011. In the coming months we will be producing induction speeches for each of the five movies we voted in and (and this is depressing) at least one of us will be re-watching each film. Oof. How do we find the time (it is hard, our lives are hard, pity us). Without further ado the first BMTHoF class is:

Old Dogs, Battlefield Earth, Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li, Wicker Man, and Norbit.

I know that I for one am especially excited for watching Old Dogs and Norbit (still the most unpleasant movie I have ever seen) again. And Jamie is going to demolish the 1000 page book for Battlefield Earth. And when it is done a de novo preview and recap will be created for the Archives! Truly exciting times at BMTHQ.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Pinocchio (2002) Preview

This week we move fully into the Now a Major Motion Picture cycle with the comedy entry. Since I’m required by BMT law to read each book that the film is based on, I requested that we do something real short for this entry just to make sure I don’t fall behind right off the bat. This worked out wonderfully as one of the worst reviewed films of all time just happens to be based on a 150 page children’s book. That’s right, we are watching Roberto Benigni’s much reviled adaptation of Pinocchio! Did I say that Basic Instinct 2 was a vanity project? We ain’t seen nothing yet. Let’s go!

Pinocchio (2002) – BMeTric: 47.1

(This is another super weird rating plot! It goes down and then completely recovers over years. It doesn’t make sense. Typically for a kids movie I would say this might be the youth factor, the fanbase of a shitty movie coming of age and using nostalgia to rate things. But what kind of weirdo kid was watching Pinocchio starring Roberto Benigni? No one. It is impossible. There has to be a weird “it was a hit in Italy” thing going on. It has to be foreign audience power.)

Leonard Maltin – 1.5 stars – A carved wooden puppet comes to life as a mischievous boy who can’t resist temptation of any kind. Benigni’s interpretation of the beloved 1885 story by Carlo Collodi emerges as a test of one’s tolerance for the bombastic comic actor. This was a big hit in Italy … but then, so was Mussolini. U.S. Version was cut to 100 m. and dubbed with Breckin Meyer (as Benigni) and a host of stars.

(Goddamn Leonard that film had a family! Let’s all revel in Leonard’s need to invoke Italy’s fascist past in order to deliver an adequate burn for this travesty of a movie. This was well known at the time as a disastrous American dubbing as well and somewhat inexplicable if not for Benigni’s Academy Award a few years prior.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnyD71SK-wk

(Well that’s unfortunate. Notice that they do not let anyone talk in the trailer other than to say the word “Pinocchio!” Didn’t want to reveal that it was foreign in hopes to attract more people. Didn’t work. From the trailer it also looks a bit like those Israeli live-action fairy tales we used to watch as a kid. The Frog Prince used to freak me out. Giant scary frog. But I loved them. So maybe I’ll love this.)

Directors – Roberto Benigni – (Known For: Life Is Beautiful; The Monster; Johnny Stecchino; The Tiger and the Snow; BMT: Pinocchio; Notes: Nominated for Best Director Oscar for Life is Beautiful. Although he only sporadically works in film now he is still beloved in Italy and very active in the political scene there.)

Benigni Razzie Notes: Won the Razzie Award in 2003 for Worst Actor for Pinocchio with Breckin Meyer; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2003 for Worst Screen Couple with Nicoletta Braschi, Worst Director, and Worst Screenplay for Pinocchio with Vincenzo Cerami; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1994 for Worst New Star for Son of the Pink Panther

Writers – Roberto Benigni (screenplay) – (Known For: Life Is Beautiful; The Monster; Johnny Stecchino; The Tiger and the Snow; BMT: Pinocchio; Notes: Nominated for Best Screenplay Oscar for Life is Beautiful. Also a poet and songwriter.)

Vincenzo Cerami (screenplay) – (Known For: Life Is Beautiful; The Monster; Johnny Stecchino; The Tiger and the Snow; BMT: Pinocchio; Notes: Longtime writer and assistant director collaborator with Benigni. Died in 2013 after a long illness. Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2003 for Worst Screenplay for Pinocchio with Roberto Benigni)

Carlo Collodi (novel) – (Known For: Pinocchio (1940); BMT: Pinocchio (2002); The Adventures of Pinocchio Notes: Wrote the original story as a serial in the 1800s. Apparently, the original ending to the tale was that Pinocchio was such a bad puppet that he hangs himself in despair. Solid.)

Brendan Donnison (English adaptation) – (BMT: Pinocchio; Notes: Super weird. This guy is primarily a casting director for ADR and voice work. In fact has a company Lyps Inc. based in the UK that is a major player in the ADR voice casting game. Makes one wonder how he is the only english adaptation credit for the film… particularly since he has no other writing credits.)

Actors – Roberto Benigni – (Known For: Life Is Beautiful; To Rome with Love; Night on Earth; Coffee and Cigarettes; Down by Law; Luna; The Monster; Johnny Stecchino; BMT: Pinocchio; Son of the Pink Panther; Notes: Won the Best Actor Oscar for Life is Beautiful. Had a brief moment of fame in American film in the early 90s ending with Son of the Pink Panther.)

Also starring Nicoletta Braschi his costar in Life is Beautiful (and real life wife)

Budget/Gross – €40 million / Domestic: $3,684,305 (Worldwide: $41,323,171)

(An absolute travesty of a US release. Still 150th on the worst openings for a 600+ theater release (it opened at #19!), but obviously earned enough in Italy to break even (probably). The rumor is that it was well received in Italy and that a lot of the negative reaction here in the US was due to odd and off-putting voiceover choices. Sounds like it may have come down with a serious case of the Doogals.)

#13 for the Toys Come to Life genre

(Normally I wouldn’t show this, but … what is this genre? Turns out it is Chucky movies, the Toy Story series, Pinocchio adaptations, and, of course, the classic smash hit Small Soldiers. We’ll just forget about Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium. There is obviously no trends in the all-important toy’s coming to life genre.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 0% (0/55): Roberto Benigni misfires wildly with this adaptation of Pinocchio, and the result is an unfunny, poorly-made, creepy vanity project.

(Yuuuuuup you are reading this right. This is an extremely rare 0% on RT. To name some of the BMT films with 0%: A Thousand Words, Bucky Larson Born to be a Star, The Ridiculous 6, Mac and Me, Highlander II The Quickening, and American Anthem. And guess what? Pinocchio has more actual reviews than any of them! It really is incredible.)

Poster – Sklognocchio (B+)

(This seems to be the primary poster. I like the base color and creativity used in both the image and the title font. Kinda striking and beautiful in its simplicity. And he can get away with it due to the popularity of the source material. Needs a tagline and almost too simple to be interesting, but doesn’t assault the senses.)

Tagline(s) – None! (F)

(Unacceptable.)

Keywords – fairy; Top Ten by BMeTric: 80.7 Movie 43 (2013); 56.1 Tooth Fairy (I) (2010); 47.8 Troll (1986); 47.1 Pinocchio (2002); 32.6 Pan (2015); 29.0 Arthur and the Great Adventure (2009); 27.5 Snow White and the Huntsman (2012); 27.2 Spanish Movie (2009); 27.1 Get Over It (2001); 25.9 Return to Never Land (2002);

(Interesting list. I still need to see Pan (not BMT unfortunately). Besides that the only for sure BMT film I think would be Get Over It which looks like an absolute travesty. I need to watch that film.)

Notes – This was the most expensive production in Italian film history, with a budget of about $45 million.

This is the first film in a non-English language to be nominated for Worst Picture at the Razzie Awards.

Roberto Benigni originally conceived this project as a collaboration, with Federico Fellini directing it. When Fellini died, Benigni became its director. (wow)

Awards – Won the Razzie Award for Worst Actor (Roberto Benigni, Breckin Meyer)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Picture

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Screen Couple (Roberto Benigni, Nicoletta Braschi)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Director (Roberto Benigni)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Remake or Sequel

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Screenplay (Vincenzo Cerami, Roberto Benigni)

Fair Game Recap

Jamie

Fair Game, God damn! I love when we have a plethora of media to work our way through. I, of course, read the book that this (and the Sly Stallone masterpiece Cobra) was based on, A Running Duck by Paula Gosling. It’s a dime store thriller that was only available to me by ordering it in large-print edition (for the visually impaired) from a Wisconsin library. If there was ever anything that made me question everything that BMT stands for, it’s imagining a little old lady in Wisconsin working her arthritic fingers to the bone trying to find the only copy of A Running Duck that exists in the MN/WI area. She probably thought some other near-blind little old lady in MN wanted a thrill ride for the ages, but nope. Just me. Anyway, the book is nothing really to write home about. A standard thriller and honestly a bit boring. Someone wants to kill a woman, a Vietnam vet-turned-cop troubled by his violent past is set to protect her, they bone, he kills the bad guy. The only interesting thing to talk about with it is the odd similarities that exist between a book like this and current bestsellers like Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey. Throughout the book I was hit over the head with dominance/submission overtones. The male protagonist frets constantly over the safety of the female protagonist (who always seems to be defenseless and in a daze). Much like Twilight there is a powerful force out to get the female character and eventually the male character takes over her entire life to battle this force. There is a lot of talk of “doing as I say” and “learning to obey commands” with the idea that the female character will in the end be safer. And she of course realizes that this type of relationship is what she has been missing in her life and falls in love with him. You could have really replaced the characters in the book with Bella and Edward, and the assassin with a rival vampire and you would have basically had Twilight. Certainly interesting to think about.

As for the adaptation, to truly get a full picture of it I rewatched Cobra. This turned out to be a good thing because it helped realize that both adaptations are actually pretty good. They take key aspects of the plot of the book, but twist them in slightly different directions. They are neither too close or too far from the source material. In fact they are almost complements of each other, things that are changed in Cobra are often the same as in the book in Fair Game and vice versa. I think Cobra is the slightly better adaptation, because a lot of the changes for Fair Game were pretty silly and lame (the bad guys are now Russian hackers plotting a heist, random setting of Miami, Billy Baldwin is not a particularly good cop, etc.) while Cobra kept a lot of the cool shit. This by no means implies that Cobra or Fair Game are good films. They are not. They are both ridiculous.

Word up. Once again I’m going to go with the Settings 101 game that I love so much. Right away in Fair Game we get a clear idea of the city and state that we are dealing with. That’s because whenever there are cops involved in a film you can’t just make up a police department. Billy Baldwin has to be from the Miami PD. Perfecto. What takes this up to the B grade is the fact that the bad guys spend most of their time (life?) on La Tortuga, a boat that located off the coast of Miami. How do we know where it is? Because the film continually shows a map depicting exactly where in the ocean they are floating. Wonderful. Of course, Miami itself doesn’t really get to shine all that much in the end, so it can’t really make it up to A-level. In fact I honestly can’t really think of famous Miami landmarks. Are there any? I guess they would have had to set up a sting at a Marlins game or something (a la Abduction). Anyway, just for kicks we can also give Cobra a C+ or B-. It also clearly takes place in Los Angeles with the LAPD… but that’s all it really has. Kind of the bare minimum with a clear setting without resorting to license plates.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Fair Game?! More like Fairly Lame! Kind of true. This was a weird one, let’s get into it:

The Good – The movie was pretty much composed of non-stop adrenaline-fueled in-your-face action, if that’s your thing. The actions scenes were also often quite impressive from a technical perspective (even if they were often ludicrous). The movie is more of a movie than I expected, but …
The Bad – The movie still felt like it was barely theatrical released. Basically Billy Baldwin was all that stood in the way of this being Firestorm starring Howie Long, and it was about two levels below the other A Running Duck adaptation Cobra in quality. Cindy Crawford was genuinely terrible and there is no excuse really. Selma Hayek’s character makes no sense.
The BMT – Yes. More so that Firestorm. 40-50 I think. Quality stuff, but again, not as much of a “real movie”™ as one would hope. Would I watch it again? Yeah, maybe. I could imagine it fitting in quite well with a Seagal / Van Damme / Baldwin trilogy bonanza. Like … On Deadly Ground / Timecop / Fair Game would make you question everything you’ve done with your life.

I’m going to keep this a bit short, so let’s think of a quick game. I’m feeling Sequel / Prequel / Remake and especially a sequel. Imagine an older Billy Baldwin and older Cindy Crawford running around like idiots pretending like any of this still makes sense? It would be truly glorious. I would even still make the bad guys Russian and the theme of the movie would still be heavily focused on the neo-Luddite ideals of technology allowing criminals to control the world. I would call it Fair Shake and could make it on a dime Netflix.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Fair Game Preview

We are finishing up our first BMT Calendar cycle and boy what a success it was! The Calendar in a way represents the worst of the worst, so every week we had some gangbuster film on tap. Don’t be fooled though, the Calendar also hides days of the year where no truly spectacular critical flop ever was released. So like the mapl.de.map that came before it, the calendar will eventually descend into sadness and disarray (hooray). But we don’t live for the future. We live for the now! And now we are officially transitioning to my favorite cycle that we’ve done. It’s time for another Now a Major Motion Picture cycle! In this cycle all the films have to be based on a book (which I will also read cause I’m insane). We start off with the classic Fair Game starring Cindy Crawford and William Baldwin. It’s based on a small dime store thriller released in Britain as A Running Duck, which was released in the US under the title Fair Game, was adapted into the Sly Stallone BMT film Cobra, rereleased in the US under the title A Running Duck (Now Filmed as Cobra), adapted into Fair Game, and released under the title Fair Game. It was an absolute terror to find through my local public library, but that’s a story for next time. For now, let’s go!

Fair Game (1995) – BMeTric: 56.1

(Only somewhat interesting for the fact that its rating over the last 10 years went down a bit and then up. Just a somewhat abnormal trend. Kind of crazy this movie I would have literally never heard of if not for BMT (and a movie we might not have done if not for book cycles being such a smash hit) has a 50+ BMeTric. The pull of Crawford in a rare acting role must elevate it beyond its expectations.)

Leonard Maltin – BOMB – Totally pre-fab action thriller that almost looks as if producer Joel Silver is trying to satirize himself. Miami lawyer Crawford survives the requisite amount of firepower and fireballs during her pursuit by former KGB operatives. Baldwin is the cop trying to keep them both alive. Arguably the worst movie of 1995. In her acting debut, supermodel Crawford makes a good jogger.

(Acting debut!? Loving it! A very rare BOMB from Maltin, although his review is hardly scathing. The worst he says is what? That it is a pre-fab action thriller? People basically satirizing themselves is a new theme for BMT. I’m looking at you Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct 2)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YC3npzqwXcs

(That is a perfect BMT trailer. We have Billy Baldwin in his heyday looking sweet, whatever it is Cindy Crawford is doing and calling it acting, a mustachioed Shooter McGavin, explosions, more explosions, and even more explosions. Woooooo! Let’s do this! I’m excited! The night’s still young! Woooooo!)

Directors – Andrew Sipes – (BMT: Fair Game; Notes: One and done! One and done! A sparsely cited television writer prior to his break. He quit Hollywood in 1997 and is now a tech entrepreneur having founded eCasablanca, MyPermitting, OurHistree, and Our Stay. The latter two companies are certainly still functioning.)

Writers – Paula Gosling (novel) – (BMT: Fair Game; Cobra; Notes: Hilariously based on the same single book A Running Duck. And after both films they re-released the book under difference titles Otherwise a very successful crime novelist. )

Charlie Fletcher (screenplay) – (BMT: Fair Game; Mean Machine; Notes: Okay this guy’s filmography is amazing. He wrote Mean Machine in 2001 which is described as “A soccer star jailed for assault leads a group of inmates in a match against prison guards.” … That’s the plot of The Longest Yard with soccer (and it is literally described as an adaptation of The Longest Yard on wikipedia!). He is now best known for writing the YA trilogy Stoneheart)

Actors – William Baldwin – (Known For: Forgetting Sarah Marshall; Flatliners; Born on the Fourth of July; Backdraft; The Squid and the Whale; Internal Affairs; Bulworth; Aftermath; Noise; Three of Hearts; Adrift in Manhattan; BMT: Virus; Fair Game; Sliver; Notes: Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1996 for Worst Screen Couple for Fair Game; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1994 for Worst Actor for Sliver. Shockingly low number of BMT films in his filmography, although he has been mostly VOD/Direct-to-DVD for a long while.)

Cindy Crawford – (BMT: Fair Game; 54; The Simian Line; Notes: Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1996 for Worst Actress, Worst Screen Couple, and Worst New Star for Fair Game. One of the most famous supermodels in history, also famous for the Pepsi Superbowl commercial in 1992 and was the wife of Richard Gere for a few years. Valedictorian of her high school class she got a scholarship to study Chemical Engineering (what what) at Northwestern, but dropped out to pursue modelling after one quarter.)

Budget/Gross – $50 million (estimated) / Domestic: $11,534,477

(Oooooof. We’ve been on quite the streak of box office bombs. That could explain a bit the popularity of this film relative to my expectations. People love a good box-office bomb. The bombs of the 80s and 90s particularly can be somewhat legendary for sinking studios (who couldn’t absorb failures as well as they can today seemingly). Cutthroat Island (which we still need to watch) comes to mind, which sunk Carolco pictures. Coincidentally Basic Instinct was also made by Carolco.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 13% (3/24) No consensus, so bonus Ebert review snippet: Works as a thriller for anyone who lives entirely in the present. Those with longer memories will find the film grows increasingly funny as it rolls along.

(What Ebert is tactfully trying to say with the line, “Works as a thriller for anyone who lives entirely in the present,” is that it works for dumb people… you might like it if you’re dumb. If you are not dumb though you will merely find it funny… because of how dumb it is.)

Poster – Sklog Game (D)

(Nope, I do not like this. I don’t like when people (and all their mish-mash of colors) are the focus of a poster, the font here is not interesting or unique, and the tagline is hilariously long. I guess it has OK blocking… or something.)

Tagline(s) – He’s a cop on the edge. She’s a woman with a dangerous secret. They’ve been targeted by the Russian Mob, and now they’re both… (D)

(Fair Game… to finish the tagline for you. Way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way too long, but doesn’t get an F because I didn’t feel like giving it an F. So there.)

Keywords – russian top 10 BMeTric examples: 82.5 Street Fighter (1994), 78.0 Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987), 57.8 Tekken (2010), 57.5 Virus (1999), 57.1 A Good Day to Die Hard (2013), 56.1 Fair Game (1995), 52.7 Jupiter Ascending (2015), 51.7 The Transporter Refueled (2015), 49.1 Alex Rider: Stormbreaker (2006), 49.1 Red Dawn (2012)

(The Pacifier and Mortdecai were also close to cracking this sweet top ten. This will be our fifth seen in the top ten, and Superman 4 and Virus in particular will definitely be on the docket in future BMTs. I have no idea what actually makes any of these things “russian”. Like … I guess Zangief makes Street Fighter get the “Russian” keyword?)

Awards – Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Actress (Cindy Crawford)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Screen Couple (William Baldwin, Cindy Crawford)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst New Star (Cindy Crawford)

Notes – The Paula Gosling novel the movie is based on was previously the basis for the 1986 movie Cobra (1986) with Sylvester Stallone.

Julianne Moore and Geena Davis were originally considered for the role of Kate McQueen.

Brooke Shields and Drew Barrymore were each offered the role of Kate McQueen, but both turned down the part.

Originally set in San Francisco, changed to Miami to suit Sylvester Stallone, who subsequently left the project. (Ha, no fucking way. Was Sylvester Stallone attached to both adaptations of the book A Running Duck?! I want to live in that universe please)

Salma Hayek only took her part in the film after insisting that she rewrite it (good idea!)

Basic Instinct 2 Recap

Jamie

Basic Instinct 2 is horrific. A truly bad film. It’s probably not memorable or interesting enough to be considered in the pantheon of straight dog poo films, but it had aspects that set it apart somewhat. First and foremost, Sharon Stone competes for the title of Worst Acting Performance Ever Seen in a BMT Film. She smirked after every deadpanned line as if to wink at the audience and say “remember this character? Isn’t this fun?” No it was not. I dreaded when she would appear on screen. On top of that this provides a perfect example of one of the main ways that a truly bad BMT film is created: the vanity project. I’ve said before that I feel like BMT films have to be made organically because they are rooted in delusion. If you set out to make a bad film you by definition lack delusion (you are obviously aware that you are making something bad), and so you will not succeed in making a BMT film. Alternately, the vanity project is a product of delusion. This was Stone’s vanity project. No one really cared and they let her drive it into the ground. This will all be detailed in my upcoming books (set for a June, 2054 release): The Seven Deadly Sins of Hollywood: How Bad Films get Made. The Greed chapter would be loooooong. I’m not sure what would be in the Gluttony chapter of the book… The Island of Dr. Moreau?

I’ll just have a quick game to go through our Settings 101 for Basic Instinct 2. This is easily a solid B+. Very, very, very clearly takes place in London. It even opens with a high speed car ride through London with a professional Footballer riding shotgun with Stone. They talk about London and the police investigation is performed by the British police. But what really pushes it to a high B is the fact that David Morrissey’s office is purportedly in the Gherkin, which is the glass egg-like building in the middle of London. Perfect. Only way it could have been an A is if Stone killed someone in London Tower, Big Ben, or Parliament and it was called Basic London. An additional small note: The original Basic Instinct is also a B+ for its clear San Francisco setting. Wonderful.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Basic Instinct 2?! More like this Bullshit Stinks Too! Booooooom. To preface this discussion of the movie we have to get a bit into the original Basic Instinct which I watched for the first time in preparation. My feeling? It is like looking at the erotic thriller genre with fresh new eyes. Sharon Stone is amazing, Douglas is amazing (deep V in the original Hollywood badass bar included. The bar was so luxuriously not-crowded, you could get a drink at the drop of a hat, solid stuff). The story could have been an entire HBO series and it would have murdered all 10 hours of it. It almost has an anti-pattern of a twist as well, I found it revelatory. Like what the Thing is for sci-fi horror or Halloween for slasher films, it feels quintessential. And yet I still have two legs to the Michael Douglas erotic thriller trilogy (Fatal Attraction and Disclosure being the other two, also the three highest grossing erotic thrillers in history). So yeah, I’m excited. But not as excited as I was to see how Basic Instinct 2 butchered the original’s legacy, let’s go!

The Good – The story, while very similar in beats to the original, is at least somewhat interesting. Moving the film to London does give it something of an exotic and novel feeling when directly compared to the original. And that is honestly it, because …
The Bad – Sharon Stone is a straight up parody of herself, I don’t understand how the woman I saw acting in the original became this shadow of herself in only 15 years. The main actor couldn’t keep up with anyone else in this film. The pacing for the movie was a crawl. The directing was lazy, the writing wasn’t nearly as sharp as it needed to be, and the ending is ludicrous. It is a genuinely terrible movie made only more so by the competence of its predecessor.
The BMT – Yes. 70? Sure, but only given what came before. I think it is a solid 50 (40 if you don’t like films that are more on the boring side) regardless, but given how incredible the original is this is a genuinely incredible film. It didn’t kill the erotic thriller, but it may have killed the erotic thriller sequel genre before it even got started.

Phew! I’m going to do a quick Audio Sklog-entary for the solo director commentary for Basic Instinct. There is only one thing I would recommend about this commentary, and it is those brief moments where the director awakens from his slumber and just tears into the film. At one point he exclaims “This isn’t the cure for cancer!” and “If you didn’t like the film, I don’t care”. It is stunning. Besides that, a lot of rote directoral details and discussion of London as a setting. D, this is why you don’t get just one person for commentary, especially a non-enthusiastic technical person. Boring.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

BMT:CSI:SVU (We’re the Special Victims) #3: Razzie Prep, A Look Back

This BMT:CSI:SVU was written around October 1, 2015 during the beginning of preparations for the Razzies. It is always difficult to determine which movies are more important to watch in theaters or right as they come out on DVD, so this short study was just an initial look at how we might connect the BMeTric to real Razzie results.

The problem the Bad Movie Twins face every year during Razzie preparations is the difficult choice of which movies are bad enough and big enough to earn the almost-meaningless dishonor of being nominated for a Razzie. As voting member we take our duty far more seriously than we should. So how best to determine which movies, prior to nominations, deserve our attention? That is where this comes in.

Alright, to start, the most important point during Razzie Prep is the moment the prenominations arrive. That is when you actually know what smaller group of movies you are dealing with (as opposed to the ~600 movies released to theaters in a given year, it is whittled down to around 30). I’ll have to go to the wayback machine (thanks Internet Archive) to determine vote/rating counts on January 1 of a given year of study because that is roughly when prenominations are known.

The method: Get the BMeTric for “all” released movies based on approximated IMDB votes and rating from 1/1/2015 via the internet archive (and a simple linear extrapolation from the nearest two points archived from around that date). Separate out the movies prenominated, nominated, and the winners for the Razzies 2015 from that year and do a side by side ranking based on how well they did in the Razzies and our BMeTric.

In order to do this I also needed to define a Razzie Score. I decided that all moves in a given year should have a score that sums to 100. I decided to then split the score into three equal parts: 33.3 for all the winners, 33.3 for all the nominees, and 33.3 for all the prenominees. In 2015 there were 108 prenominees, 45 nominees, and 9 winners (I counted combinations, like Cameron Diaz nominated for both The Other Woman and Sex Tape, as 0.5 wins/nomination/prenominations for each of those movies). So a win was worth 3.7, a nomination 0.74, and a prenomination 0.3083. I’ll adjust this in the future if it doesn’t seem to work, but there is far too little data to really make a real model I think. Here are the results for 2015:

Razzie Analysis-1

So I have two main takeaways which really is one big takeaway. First, note the over-performers (movies that scored high in the Razzie Score, and lower on the BMeTric): Saving Christmas, Transformer 4, TMNT, A Million Way to Die in the West, and Expendables 3 mainly. These all are what I call “easy targets”. Kirk Cameron, Michael Bay, Megan Fox, Seth MacFarlane, Sly Stallone. It boosts their score in the Razzie voters’ eyes. On the flip side look at the unnominated list. Those are the unnominated movies with a BMeTric over 25. The yellows highlight horror films and the greens are Christian films. First, we need to stay away from horror films, Jesus Cristo. But to get back on track really basically all those films are low budget, and low budget really means: No big targets!

So really there is one big thing that gets you that Razzie Score: Targets … BMTargets. I’ll leave it there. Where I’ll want to look to in the future is perhaps a Predicted Razzie Score. This involves two things. Mainly I’ll have to determine BMTargets, and how that contributes to the score. Also, I’ll need to actually work on the time-independent BMeTric to get a populuarity rating without knowing the vote/rating count ahead of time (obviously very important). Once I have those I think I’ll be able to determine with …. accuracy is a strong word. But I think I might be able to identify “likely” Razzie targets.

Basic Instinct 2 Preview

This week we move right back into our Calendar cycle for the Razzie entry. Since the calendar is amazing and affords us amazing choices for movies each week, we of course were able to choose a past Razzie Worst Picture winner! That’s right, we are watching 2006’s Basic Instinct 2! Quite literally the sequel that no one was asking for (and perhaps many begging Hollywood not to make). Released on March 31st, it beat out The Skulls for the honor. Thank God. We’ve (obviously) already seen The Skulls. Let’s go!

Basic Instinct 2 (2006) – BMeTric: 72.4

(Obviously considering the current score it isn’t too shocking that the historical profile is pretty mundane. And now that we know all about the regression to the mean even the vote/rating plot is kind of boring. Reaching 4.0 is kind of expected. Up to 4.3 is starting to get a bit above average. It could be because of the recent erotic thriller comeback … but nah, probably just random.)

Leonard Maltin – 2 stars – Long-gestating sequel to the notorious 1992 hit isn’t the embarrassment you might have expected – or hoped for. What should have been high camp is instead a rather dull psychological-sexual thriller in which slippery novelist Catherine Tramell is up to her old tricks in London when a male companion turns up dead in her car. Did she or didn’t she? Stone makes the best of this and looks sensational while the impressive British cast tried hard to keep it afloat.

(Wow, I was not expecting the classic two star Maltin for this one. I like his creeper comment on how good Stone looks, keep it up Maltin. Dull is bad, but perhaps he was so distracted by the gorgeous magnificence of Stone that he couldn’t focus on the enthralling psycho-sexual thrill-ride that was this film? We’ll have to see.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhNFW1AXLOg

(My God. So 2006, the music, the way they shot London, the crazy car stunts in the middle of a purported erotic thriller. The entire thing almost seems like a parody of itself in a weird way. Like they made a trailer for a fake movie sequel for April Fools Day.)

Directors – Michael Caton-Jones – (Known For: This Boy’s Life; Doc Hollywood; Rob Roy; Memphis Belle; City by the Sea; Scandal; BMT: Basic Instinct 2; The Jackal; Notes: He has bad-mouthed this film and Sharon Stone several times in interviews over the years and openly admits he only did it for the money. Despite this, he does a commentary for the film, which is very exciting. Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2007 for Worst Director for Basic Instinct 2)

Writers – Leora Barish (written by) – (Known For: Desperately Seeking Susan; BMT: Basic Instinct 2; Notes: Currently resides in New York and runs a sustainable farm school for vetrens. Won the Razzie Award in 2007 for Worst Screenplay for Basic Instinct 2)

Henry Bean (written by) – (Known For: Internal Affairs; The Believer; Deep Cover; Noise; Almayer’s Folly; BMT: Basic Instinct 2; Notes: Also directed The Believer and wrote a novel adapted from his screenplay. Won the Razzie Award in 2007 for Worst Screenplay for Basic Instinct 2)

Joe Eszterhas (characters) – (Known For: Basic Instinct; Jagged Edge; Betrayed; F.I.S.T.; Telling Lies in America; Music Box; Hearts of Fire; Children of Glory; BMT: Basic Instinct 2; Showgirls; Sliver; Jade; Nowhere to Run; An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn; Flashdance; Notes: Bad movie legend. He started his career in journalism, but was mired in some controversy, including losing a ‘false light’ case in front of the Supreme Court. Won the Razzie Award in 1999 for Worst Supporting Actor, Worst Screenplay, Worst New Star, and Worst Original Song for An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn; Won the Razzie Award in 1996 for Worst Screenplay for Showgirls; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1996 for Worst Screenplay for Jade; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1994 for Worst Screenplay for Sliver; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1984 for Worst Screenplay for Flashdance)

Actors – Sharon Stone – (Known For: Alpha Dog; Casino; Basic Instinct; Total Recall; The Quick and the Dead; Lovelace; Antz; Bobby; Broken Flowers; Above the Law; Fading Gigolo; The Mighty; Stardust Memories; Irreconcilable Differences; The Muse; Beautiful Joe; Bolero; BMT: Catwoman; Basic Instinct 2; Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol; Sliver; Cold Creek Manor; The Specialist; King Solomon’s Mines; Diabolique; Action Jackson; Intersection; Simpatico; Gloria; Sphere; Last Action Hero; He Said, She Said; Deadly Blessing; Last Dance; Notes: Nominated for an Oscar for Casino. Bad movie legend, as you can see from her Razzie street cred. Frequent visitor to the fair island of Martha’s Vineyard.)

Sharon Stone Razzie Cred: Won the Razzie Award in 2007 for Worst Actress for Basic Instinct 2; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2005 for Worst Supporting Actress for Catwoman; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2005 for Worst Screen Couple for Catwoman; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2000 for Worst Actress for Gloria; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1997 for Worst New Star for Diabolique, and Last Dance; Won the Razzie Award in 1995 for Worst Actress for Intersection, and The Specialist; Won the Razzie Award in 1995 for Worst Screen Couple for The Specialist; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1994 for Worst Actress for Sliver; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1988 for Worst Actress for Allan Quatermain and the Lost City of Gold

Also stars David Morrissey and David Thewlis (Remus Lupin in Harry Potter)

Budget/Gross – $70 million / Domestic: $5,971,336 (Worldwide: $38,629,478)

(Oh my … oh … oh my. That is not great. That is just … not very good.)

#33 for the Thriller – Erotic genre

(Sigh, if only I lived in the early 90’s once again. Fatal Attraction (1987) and Basic Instinct (1992) ushered in a heyday of erotic thrillers including BMT legend Color of Night (1994). The waves in the graph are interesting, like they saturate the market and then feel a cooling off period. And each wave smaller than the last. A slowly dying genre. But one I hope to see revived once again in the future. Until then though, enjoy one of the worst I suppose)

#43 for the Thriller – Serial Killer genre

(oooof, what was our fascination with serial killers in the 2000s? The show Dexter was right in there as well. This comes right before one last hurrah in the genre before a complete and utter collapse. And recently (The Following, Hannibal) the genre has gotten play in a little wave, but is probably dying again. Looking through things it was basically the Saw series sustaining that, and looking at the actual money being made the genre is kind of moving to microbudget/VOD releases I think. The movie, incredibly, marks an attempt at two 90s genres that are both now on the brink of total collapse. Fascinating.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 7% (10/150): Unable to match the suspense and titilation of its predecessor, Basic Instinct 2 boasts a plot so ludicrous and predictable it borders on “so-bad-it’s-good.”

(Sorry, I’m getting a bit distracted by what appears to be a typo in the consensus there. Apparently “titillation” is spelled with two L’s. Very very odd. Sign me up for a ludicrously plotted erotic thriller all fucking day though.)

Poster – Sklogal Instinct 2 (C-)

(Just like with The Day the Earth Stood Still I think it’s generally a mistake to have a skewed perspective in the poster (which is the effect that the weird shadow creates). I do like the idea that the poster is from the point of view of someone getting murdered and we are looking through his half-closed eyelids. Interesting and artsy and polished in that way. The brown tone isn’t great and too much going on, though, so overall slightly below average. If they had kept it a bit simpler it probably would have gotten a much better grade.)

Tagline(s) – Everything interesting begins in the mind. (F… I think.)

(I can’t believe this ended up on the poster… what does it mean?! It’s an unsolvable riddle. This is one of the worst and most incomprehensible taglines I’ve ever seen for a film.)

Keywords – psychiatrist top 10 BMeTric examples: 73.9 Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (2000), 72.4 Basic Instinct 2 (2006), 71.5 Halloween: Resurrection (2002), 68.3 Psycho (1998), 66.6 Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), 62.8 Abduction (2011), 61.3 Pulse (2006), 56.9 Dr. T and the Women (2000), 55.9 Poltergeist III (1988), 54.5 Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995)

(I shouldn’t have been so surprised to see all the horror films on the list. Psychology, of course, often plays a prominent role in horror. Either in the form of dealing with past trauma or by those attempting to understand the machinations of madmen. The Halloween series, interestingly, often has both. Donald Pleasence plays a prominent role in five of the Halloween films, whereas in the long running series the “survivors” of each movie often deal with the psychological aftermath in subsequent movies. Not a pure keyword, but interesting.)

Notes – Michael Douglas declined to reprise his role from the original movie, admitting that he felt he was too old for the part. (yah think?)

Robert Downey Jr. was set to star but had to drop out when he was charged with drug possession. Kurt Russell was attached at some point but bailed out because he felt uncomfortable with the nudity. Pierce Brosnan refused to play the male lead role because of distasteful elements. Bruce Greenwood was set to star but dropped out because he hadn’t been signed on yet and feared the actors strike. Benjamin Bratt was banned by Sharon Stone for not being a good actor. (Poor Benjamin Bratt. Also, these casting choices must go back a while. RDJr. hasn’t been busted for drug possession since 2001)

Before agreeing to perform the full-frontal nude scene, Sharon Stone invited a friend over to watch the original Basic Instinct (1992). During the film, Stone, by her own admission, stripped down totally naked and asked her friend if she could “still pull it off.”

Rupert Everett publicly expressed his anger after being turned down to star opposite Sharon Stone by MGM CEO Chris McGurk for being “pervert who would never be accepted by the American public in this role”.

The film was originally intended to be made in 2000. (there we go)

Sharon Stone agreed to reprise her role of Catherine Tremell in a “pay or play” arrangement, meaning she got fully paid, whether the film would ultimately be made or not.

Jude Law, Ewan McGregor, Gabriel Byrne, Javier Bardem, Benicio Del Toro, Viggo Mortensen and Aaron Eckhart were all in the running to star opposite Sharon Stone at one point. (So many people considered and yet they ended up with David Morrissey… huh)

David Cronenberg was in talks to the direct the film for some time. John McTiernan was set to direct after Cronenberg bailed out due to producer Mario Kassar banning him from using his own cinematographer, production designer, and the rest of his usual team. (sound like a lot of people were banning other people)

Awards – Won the Razzie Award for Worst Picture

Won the Razzie Award for Worst Actress (Sharon Stone)

Won the Razzie Award for Worst Prequel or Sequel

Won the Razzie Award for Worst Screenplay (Leora Barish, Henry Bean, Joe Eszterhas)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actor (David Thewlis)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Screen Couple

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Director (Michael Caton-Jones)

Warcraft Recap

Jamie

Before Patrick gets his say on this I’m going to go ahead and address the odd dichotomy between fan and critic reactions to Warcraft. I honestly think they’re both kinda wrong about this. The critics are being a bit harsh in criticizing the fact that straight gobbledegook is sprayed at your face for over two hours and you’re expected to understand what is happening. Welcome to fantasy. They are playing at a disadvantage and trying to establish something for future entries in the series. Besides it looked great, so sit back and relax and don’t worry so much. But I’m not one to buy into the whole “the film did what it set out to do.” That’s bullshit, a bad film is a bad film. So at the same time the fans need to understand that at some point you have to stop forgiving bad films for being bad just because they never set out to be particularly good. Just because Warcraft didn’t want to have a real plot (you know, one with a beginning, middle, and end rather than just a long middle) and its pacing problem were not their fault, doesn’t mean it’s better than it actually is. It’s a mediocre film. BMT? I’m not so sure, but it was pretty fun to watch for BMT.

For my game I think I’ll Sklogify the cast. I think the most obvious recasting would have been Nic Cage as the wizard Medivh. I would also consider Ray Liotta, but he already did evil wizard in In The Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale. I think Kellen Lutz would play our main action star Anduin Lothar, Selena Gomez as the orc(ish) warrior (although I would also love to see Fergie in the role), and Neal McDonough as the King (LudaChris Klein is a good option here too, but Neal is a little more regal with his striking ice blue eyes. Billy Zane is on line 8 if everyone else turns us down). For the main Orc, Durotan, I think I’ll go with Alex Pettyfer, but besides that the orcs can be played by unknowns since you don’t really see who they are. We just really need that main orc to be as wooden as possible and we know Pettyfer can deliver. Finally for the already woefully miscast young wizard you have to go with Taylor Lautner (make a bad thing worse). God, Taylor Lautner and Selena Gomez in the same movie. Be still my heart. I think that film is properly Sklogified.

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Warcraft?! More like Warcrap! We went live for this one, let’s get into it!

The Good – The first 30 minutes of this movie had me thinking I was seeing a true blue amazing fantasy tale. The 3D and CGI was pretty stunning throughout. The main plotline has been making me think “hey, I could watch a few more of these movies, this is kind of fun”. It really is a beautiful film.
The Bad – The plot is also completely scattershot. They jump from place to place and confuse the viewer consistently for the entire middle part of the film. I could never see myself sitting down and watching the film again, it would be too boring. The wizard character is a complete miscast, it is as if I dressed up for a Renaissance fair and ended up in the movie, that is how ridiculously misplaced he seemed at all times. The final third is a complete incomprehensible mess.
The BMT – It won’t ever be BMT and that’s because its IMDb rating will never drop below 7.0, that is a fact. I loved it as a Live! because it is really divisive, but it shall remain around the worst BMT we’ve ever done (and likely the highest rated BMT film on IMDb forever more). I would think this would be a 25 though, average. It is honestly around where critics should have rated this, 30-40, slightly more forgiving. The sub-30 this movie got is kind of absurd, but so is the IMDb score. It is an enigma.

Let’s see. I’m having a hell of a time trying to figure out a good game for this one actually. So I’m going special BMT Live: Theater Experience edition. I viewed this movie at the Fulham Road Cineworld in London. At the time the showings were already getting a bit sparse, usually one per day per theater, and exclusively 3D. I grabbed the earliest showing I could find (9:10PM blah) and bought an absurdly priced ticket (you also buy the glasses here, 16 pounds). There were more people than normal in my BMT Live showing, around a dozen or so. And the couple behind me decided to talk throughout the previews in French (?, couldn’t tell) and were (I think) cracking open beers as well. But everything quieted down for the movie and I had an unusually pleasant viewing experience. I was pretty proud of myself: despite not really knowing what was happening at times I remained awake and alert throughout. This was also the fourth movie in a row where no one was in the theater when I arrived five minutes before it started, which I guess is common when you book specific seats? I don’t know. I rate the experience a B+, there was a weird overhead light that bothered me throughout, but otherwise a delightful time.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Warcraft Preview

It’s the time you’ve all been waiting for! BMT Live. It’s the break in the cycle where Patrick and I take valuable time out of our busy schedule to head to the theater, plunk down our hard earned cash, and watch the worst that Hollywood has to offer (that is playing concurrently in London). If you follow the movie scene at all you might have already realized that Hollywood has provided a golden BMT opportunity in Warcraft. Not only did it get largely negative reviews, but is also far and away the most lopsided domestic/foreign grossing film in history. While it literally broke records overseas, it straight bombed here. A true curiosity. Additionally, because of the solid reception by fans it will almost certainly be the lowest BMeTric scoring film we’ve ever watched. It really couldn’t be missed by us. Almost a BMysTery in and of itself. Let’s go!

Warcraft: The Beginning (2016) – BMeTric: 1.1

Warcraft_BMeT

Warcraft_RV

(Ha. Obviously not much here at the moment. Although fun to see a film like this in action. Sitting at a 7.6 on IMDb Warcraft is an objectively good movie according to that metric, and so obviously the BMeTric is depressed. I liked this movie for Live! Because of how divisive it is. At one point it was under 20% on rotten tomatoes and internet brains were melting. So we’ll see how the BMeTric develops over time. I have a feeling though this will be a sub 15 BMeT for a long time, and yet I’m somewhat confident it will make the Razzie longlist for consideration. We’ll see.)

Rogerebert.com (Christie Lemire) – 1/2 stars – It is brutal. It is repetitive. It is numbing. And just as it’s ending, “Warcraft” leaves all kinds of plot threads dangling for the ambitious possibility of a sequel. But you’ll be likely to cry “Game Over” because this first one is easily a contender for the worst movie of the year.

(Wow. I wasn’t expecting this review to be quite this brutal. This movie seemed ripe for the classic Leonard Maltin 2 stars “Terrible movie, fun visuals” type of review where you can’t quite figure out where the extra stars are coming from. But rogerebert.com went for the jugular and took this thing down. Gaining confidence in our choice)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Rxoz13Bthc

(I believe this is the second trailer. The first trailer was an absolute catastrophe and was when I had a slight inkling this movie probably wouldn’t break the video game adaptation streak. This looks slightly better than that, but still. Leans heavily on the visuals with a somewhat trite seeming story, pretty standard for high fantasy actually.)

Directors – Duncan Jones – (Known For: Moon; Source Code; BMT: Warcraft; Notes: David Bowie’s son, Jones became somewhat of an indie darling with Moon. Subsequently Moon, due to how much of a “little known gem” it is on the internet, has become a meme related to high school aged male cinephiles. Which is unfortunate because Moon is a pretty nice little Sci Fi film, just don’t ever tell anyone you saw it because we all know … it is a hidden gem of a movie.)

Writers – Duncan Jones (screenplay) – (Known For: Moon; BMT: Warcraft; Notes: His middle name is Zowie.)

Charles Leavitt (screenplay) – (Known For: In the Heart of the Sea; Blood Diamond; K-PAX; The Express; The Mighty; BMT: Seventh Son; The Sunchaser; Warcraft; Notes: A prolific re-writer, his two main bad movie credits (Seventh Son and Warcraft) are rewrites of others works. Born in Pittsburgh, PA.)

Chris Metzen (story and characters) – (BMT: Warcraft; Notes: Well known game designer for Blizzard covering Diablo, Starcraft, all of the iterations of Warcraft, and most recently Overwatch.)

Actors – Travis Fimmel – (Known For: Maggie’s Plan; BMT: Surfer, Dude; The Baytown Outlaws; Warcraft; Notes: A former Australian model discovered working out in a gym in Melbourne. He eventually turned to acting as a career over modelling. Well known for his leading role in the show Vikings.)

Paula Patton – (Known For: Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol; Deja Vu; 2 Guns; Precious; Hitch; About Last Night; Disconnect; Just Wright; Jumping the Broom; Idlewild; BMT: Baggage Claim; Mirrors; Warcraft; Notes: At one point she provided background vocals for Usher. Former wife of Robin Thicke, he has promised to win her back through the power of song, mmmhmmmm)

Ben Foster – (Known For: The Finest Hours; X-Men: The Last Stand; Lone Survivor; The Program; 3:10 to Yuma; Alpha Dog; Hell or High Water; 30 Days of Night; Phone Booth; Big Trouble; Kill Your Darlings; Contraband; The Mechanic; 11:14; The Messenger; Rampart; Get Over It; Ain’t Them Bodies Saints; The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things; Liberty Heights; BMT: 360; The Punisher; Hostage; Pandorum; Warcraft; Notes: Best known to me as the kid in Flash Forward. He’s put together a pretty impressive resume of smaller films since then in his transition from a child actor. Born in Boston.)

Budget/Gross – $160 million / Domestic: $24,356,000 (Worldwide: $286,100,000)

(Will be a resounding financial success internationally, but is going to be an absurd Pacific Rim level catastrophe domestically. Like Pacific Rim I fully expect Legendary, which was just bought out by a Chinese company, to pump out sequels geared toward Chinese audiences going forward (see: Transformers 4 which focuses heavily on Chinese product placement in the back half of the film which was set in Hong Kong I believe).)

#190 for the 3D genre

3dAnalysis

(Again, I like these because there is just so much data it makes a pretty plot. 3D has been going down a bit (I would guess because tentpoles have been sucking up IMAX showings with or without 3D and so there are marginally less theaters available for 3D releases). I will, sadly, likely see this film in 3D, so that makes me sad. Not that I hate 3D, I just don’t want to pay for 3D for this movie).

#64 for the Fantasy – Live Action genre

liveactionfantasyAnalysis

(Will probably end up near Hansel and Gretel and between the two recent bombs in Huntsman and Alice Through the Looking Glass. This genre saw quite the surge after Lord of the Rings I would guess and seems to be a pretty consistent genre since then.)

#15 for the Sword and Sorcery genre

swordandsorceryAnalysis

(It is kind of useless to compare Warcraft to these now, but it looks like it is going to take somewhere in the 50-60 million range domestic … which is absurd. That will most likely be less that fucking Willow! Anyways, I think people were putting too much stock into this movie anyways. Look at these last three plots and realize something: All of these genres aren’t really “surging”, but rather have kind of been consistent in production and performance since 2000. Nothing is really hinging on Warcraft’s success beyond maybe video game adaptations (and they still got their best shot coming, Assassin’s Creed).)

#21 for the Video Game Adaptation genre

videogameadaptationAnalysis

(The good news is Warcraft should make the top ten in the genre. The bad news is that domestically it will now probably be at best the third highest grossing video game adaptation of the year. The genre is surprisingly consistently produced considering literally no video game adaptation has ever reached even the modest benchmark of 50% on rotten tomatoes. The best ever reviewed? Final Fantasy Spirits Within (I saw that in theaters, go me) at 44%. The best on metacritic was Mortal Kombat btw. It really is quite dire, over 15 years that RT record has stood).

Rotten Tomatoes – 27% (34/127): Warcraft has visual thrills to spare, but they — and director Duncan Jones’ distinctive gifts — are wasted on a sluggish and derivative adaptation of a bestselling game with little evident cinematic value.

(See above for some commentary on the RT score. Basically this did nothing to help the cause in getting video game adaptations taken more seriously by critics. This film is incredibly divisive. On the internet there is much debate about the stark contrast between critic reviews and audience reviews. And yet people openly admit that the movie is in fact derivative and possessing little cinematic value. The question you have to ask yourself is: is merely being entertaining the benchmark for success for a movie like this? And this is why I’m actually genuinely interested in seeing this film)

Poster – Sklogcraft (C-)

warcraft_ver8_xlg

(I don’t like it, but I feel like I should. Like I’m an old man and behind the times and that I should somehow understand that this poster is good. But I don’t. I think it is terrible. I think it looks old, and is silly, and I hate the colors, and it is busy, and blah. I don’t like it. [Jamie’s Note: Check out The Avengers poster that is graded an F- for being the worst thing I have ever seen? Look familiar? Wow.])

Tagline(s) – Two worlds. One destiny. (B+)

(I like it. Good cadence. Short. Does a little to get across the basic plot. It is still a little vague. Like, if I was staring at the poster what does that sentence mean? But after watching the trailer it makes sense, so only a bit of a minus there.)

Keywords – based on video game Top 10 BMeTric examples: 82.4 Street Fighter (1994), 81.2 Alone in the Dark (2005), 79.1 House of the Dead (2003), 78.7 In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (2007), 78.6 Mortal Kombat: Annihilation (1997), 78.3 BloodRayne (2005), 77.1 Super Mario Bros. (1993), 69.9 Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009), 63.8 DOA: Dead or Alive (2006), 62.4 Wing Commander (1999)

(Alone in the Dark, BloodRayne and House of the Dead are all Uwe Boll. DOA will be watched for BMT as some point. Other landmark movies above 20 BMeTric are Max Payne, the entire Resident Evil series, and both Lara Croft movies. Unfortunately a cycle really can’t be made out of it, but it sounds like it is ripe for the Sequel Cycle we are planning. We have seen 12 of 34 20+ BMeTric movies based on a video game, although I would argue that maybe 26 actually qualify. I mean, I’m going to watch all of the Pokemon movies, just not in the context of BMT)

Notes – Director Uwe Boll contacted Blizzard about directing the film, but Blizzard refused. As quoted by MTV news Uwe Boll stated: “I got in contact with Paul Sams of Blizzard, and he said, ‘We will not sell the movie rights, not to you… especially not to you. Because it’s such a big online game success, maybe a bad movie would destroy that ongoing income, what the company has with it.” (Good fucking choice considering he directed 6 of the top 12 BMeTric video game adaptations)

The source for the movie adaptation is being taken from the books “Rise of the Horde”, which tells how the Orcish Horde was formed; as well as “The Last Guardian”, which shows the human side and reaction to Orcish invasion. (Oh well I guess I should have read this book… but nope. I did not.)

The film was going to be released in December 2015 but was pushed back to May 2016 to avoid the release of Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens (2015). (Again solid choice)

Duncan Jones said that the original script was very one sided in terms of the two factions (Horde and Alliance). after signing on to direct, he made major edits to the story, as well as the script, so both factions could tell their side of the story. (ehhhhhh, probably not a great choice)

Bill Westenhofer, the lead visual effects supervisor for the film, is a long time World of Warcraft player and has mentioned getting up at 2 AM to raid with his guild while on film sets. Robert Kazinsky is also a die hard Warcraft player and recalls producers telling him to turn the game off while on the set of Pacific Rim (2013). (uh oh, you mean you intentionally signed someone who worked on the other gigantic domestic catastrophe for Legendary, Pacific Rim? Yikes)

An Orcish dialect was created specifically for the movie. (And people will undoubtedly learn it. I look forward to it. Let’s leave it there).

The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008) Recap

Jamie

In an alternate world I’d be sitting here telling you that The Day the Earth Stood Still was actually not that bad. Keanu was a great Klaatu (that sounds made up), the CGI was really solid (so solid that it kinda got me excited for Dr. Strange being made by the same director), and the plethora of good television actors was fun. But it’s not an alternate world. Since Patrick and I are ardent consumers of all things bad movie related, I obviously watched the original film and read the original short story on which it’s based. Guess what both those had? Really good twist endings and meditations on the nature of the human race. What did this one have? A terrible ending and a meaningless, meandering plot. That’s the thing. When I groan audibly during the ending of a film it kinda ruins its chances of being Not that Bad.™ And when the original film is a stark christian allegory on the decline of morality in the atomic age, and the new one has an entire scene set in a McDonald’s in central NJ… well.

You know what I was loving in this film though?! The fabulous Settings 101 display that The Day the Earth Stood Still put on. They reset the original film in New Jersey/New York as Klaatu wants to meet with the world leaders at the UN. That’s satisfying enough for a nice easy C grade in the class. A main setting of the film is talked about by the characters. But wait, The Day the Earth Stood Still wasn’t done yet. We are then told via insert titles (meta-acknowledgment!) where almost every scene of action occurs in NY/NJ! And I’m serious, like every scene is like “OUTSIDE NEWARK, NJ.” It happens like ten times. Amazing work. You’re in B range. TDtESS must be done now? Not a chance. At one point Klaatu has to be picked up by Connelly at Newark fucking Penn Station. They are going out of their way to include settings in the plot! Straight up A- all over the place. They can’t do any better than this, right? Wrong. In the climax of the film, as nanobots are eating their way through the New Jersey (as they should), the film goes out of its way to show the nanobots devour MetLife stadium in The Meadowlands (as they should). A major New Jersey landmark getting destroyed in the climax! That’s an A folks! Only way it can get to A+ is if they titled it The Day New Jersey Stood Still… but alas. Can’t win them all (unless you’re London Has Fallen).

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! The Day the Earth Stood Still? More like the Hour my Brain Stood Still! Booooooooooooooooooooooooom. We watched a remake of some classic Sci Fi, so what is the worst that could possibly happen? … let’s get into it.

The Good – If this wasn’t a remake I would have said the story was at least somewhat interesting. The CGI was pretty incredible for the time. The cast for the most part handles their parts pretty well.
The Bad – Not surprisingly Jaden was a pretty bad part, but mostly because his character was totally unlikeable. But mainly the black mark upon this movie was that it was adapted from a classic. Without the previous movie as a touchstone this is like Day After Tomorrow, a movie whose fault lies in its heavy handedness. Instead it felt a bit closer to the new Red Dawn, just not a good idea in the face of inevitable comparison to a classic. Makes me want to watch the new Point Break?
The BMT – I guess. I’m honestly a tad bit surprised at how many votes this movie got, and 40 I guess feel a bit too high. I would say more like 30 ish at best. Might even go a little lower, below average even. The effects were alright, and you really have to stretch to find things that make you go “I’ve got to show this to somebody!”.

This movie is also a fine addition to the how-much-product-placement-can-you-sell-before-it-is-a-parody-of-itself pantheon. The original (table sized) Windows Surface, some watch, and an LG phone were pretty noticeable. But holy shit, right in the middle of the movie they might as well have had Keanu shout “I’m feeling hungry, but a kind of hunger that sticks, where do you Earth people go for high quality sustenance?” and Jaden and Connelly look at each other and say “Sound like someone needs a Mac-ers run!”. What followed was essentially the Mac and Me McDonald’s Dance Sequence:

And then at the end Keanu could have walked towards his space ship, turned around to look at Jaden, given a Terminator 2 thumbs up and said “Da-da-da-da-da … I’m lovin’ it!”. I’m only being mostly hyperbolic. The irony of McDonalds, one of the largest corporations and producers of garbage in the world, being on prominent display in an unabashedly pro-environment film is also hilarious (although I’m thinking that might have been the point, McDonalds trying to show they are working with environmentalists across the board at the time). Anyways, this was, bar none, the highlight of what was otherwise a nuisance of a reboot, I do love me some in your face marketing.

The assessment of product placement is a long standing tradition with us, so it needs a name. Product Sklog-ment brought to you by McDonald’s. Da-da-da-da-da, we’re lovin’ it! It’s got a good ring to it.

Cheerios,

Sklogs