Tag: 50+ BMeTric

Epic Movie Preview

My gawwwd! Is that Friedberg and Seltzer’s music? That’s right! We’re taking this Street Credit Report (dot com) cycle and punching ourselves in the face by watching one of the many ridiculously awful spoof films made by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. In this case we decided on Epic Movie because it’s not quite as small as some of the later films (former Obama aide Kal Penn is in it after all). For its street cred it stands at a brutal 2% on RT and #42 on the lowest rated films on imdb. However, it surprisingly wasn’t nominated for a Worst Picture Razzie in 2007, so perhaps it won’t totally destroy our will to live. Sigh. Who am I kidding? The Razzies don’t know shit. God help us and see you on the other side. Let’s go!

Epic Movie (2007) – BMeTric: 95.9 (#42 on IMDb bottom 100)

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(That’s it though, right? That steady sub-3.0. It doesn’t rise up, it didn’t drop down at any point. Ten years ago this came out and people were like “this is trash”. And throughout the years others heard that this movie was awful and they watched it and said “this is trash”. It is why this movie is probably legendary. I mean … legendary in that it will be just brutally unfunny and annoying. But legendary nonetheless.)

Leonard Maltin – BOMB – Four siblings find themselves meandering through lame slapstick parodies of recent epic movies and other obvious pop-culture targets. Typically tedious, unfunny hack job, with an array of cameo appearances including Crispin Glover, who (as a perverted, sadistic Willy Wonka) provides the film with its only moments of admittedly sordid energy. Kevin Hart appears uncredited.

(Secret Kevin Hart film, I like it. We’ve probably technically watched something like six Hart films at this point (although Scary Movie 3 and 4 are not actually recorded in the archive … oops). This will be and sounds like trash. I will watch out for Crispin Glover though, that could be fun.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=SN&feature=plcp&hl=fr&v=AZKIr7r6Op4

(Uggggggh. I remember when this trailer came out. What really does it for me is that the last joke of the entire trailer, where Superman is shot in the eye, is just horrible. It involves an actor I don’t know with such a throwaway garbage joke. The cast is pretty solid ultimately, and they should have kind of just focused on that I think … I don’t know, it looks horrible.)

Directors – Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer – (BMT: Epic Movie; Meet the Spartans; Disaster Movie; Date Movie; Vampires Suck; The Starving Games; Best Night Ever; Notes: Even their wikipedia says they make “parody movies that have received extremely unfavorable reviews”! They started directing after years of selling scripts that never got made (upwards of 40 they claim). Friedberg’s father (Rick Friedberg) gave them the in by introducing them to Leslie Nielson when making Bad Golf Made Easier)

Writers – Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer (written by) – (Known For: Scary Movie; BMT: Epic Movie; Meet the Spartans; Disaster Movie; Date Movie; Vampires Suck; The Starving Games; Scary Movie 4; Scary Movie 2; Spy Hard; Scary Movie 3; Best Night Ever; Notes: Their spec script called Scream If You Know What I Did Last Halloween was accepted after Spy Hard and reworked into Scary Movie. Sounds like the title to this film, weird that it wasn’t written by these two then.)

Friedberg and Seltzer Razzie Street Cred – Nominated in 2011 for the Razzie Award for Worst Director and Screenplay for Vampires Suck; and in 2009 for Disaster Movie, and Meet the Spartans; in 2008 just for Worst Screenplay for Epic Movie

Actors – Kal Penn – (Known For: Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle; Superman Returns; Speech & Debate; Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay; A Lot Like Love; A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas; The Namesake; BMT: Epic Movie; Son of the Mask; Van Wilder 2: The Rise of Taj; Deck the Halls; Malibu’s Most Wanted; Love Don’t Cost a Thing; The Girl in the Photographs; Man About Town; Van Wilder: Party Liaison; Notes: I remember him first from Van Wilder, and then Harold and Kumar, and finally House. He worked for the Obama administration and now is on the show Designated Survivor as the White House Press Secretary.)

Jennifer Coolidge – (Known For: American Pie; A Series of Unfortunate Events; Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day; Legally Blonde; American Reunion; American Pie 2; Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me; Zoolander; Robots; American Wedding; Best in Show; Mascots; Bad Lieutenant; Trial and Error; A Mighty Wind; BMT: Epic Movie; Date Movie; Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde; Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip; Pootie Tang; Down to Earth; A Cinderella Story; Igor; A Night at the Roxbury; Click; Austenland; Gentlemen Broncos; Notes: Has been in a few Christopher Guest movies. Otherwise I basically only know her from American Pie where she played Stifler’s Mom, and Legally Blond. An alumnus of The Groundlings.)

Fred Willard – (Known For: Harold & Kumar Get the Munchies; WALL·E; Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy; This Is Spinal Tap; Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me; Monster House; Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues; American Wedding; Best in Show; Youth in Revolt; Roxanne; Silver Streak; Mascots; Planes: Fire & Rescue; I Could Never Be Your Woman; A Mighty Wind; Waiting for Guffman; BMT: Epic Movie; Date Movie; Fifty Shades of Black; The Wedding Planner; Love Wrecked; Chicken Little; Idle Hands; How High; Movie Madness; Harold; Notes: Again, very notable for his work with Christopher Guest, but also a titan of comedy in general I would say. He was part of The Second City. Makes me think a good cycle would be something like The Second Shitty … amirite? Movies involving The Second City alums.)

Budget/Gross – $20 million / Domestic: $39,739,367 (Worldwide: $86,865,564)

(That’s solid. No wonder they’d go on to make two (!) spoof movies in 2008. At the time it must have seemed like they could just print money with these things. This garbage genre is somewhat saturated now though and I think must mainly go to VOD. I guess we’ll see with the next plot.)

#17 for the Comedy – Spoof genre

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(Just below A Haunted House seems okay. Obviously Fifty Shades of Black was the most recent big release. Kind of puts this haul in perspective, Fifty Shades sits at number 48 with only $11 million return, oof. This literally is the start of the genre saturation (as I guessed), and indeed the genre is straight dying. People lament the death of the spoof genre, but its been dead since the 80s. Scary Movie was an aberration. If only more things like Wet Hot American Summer existed, sigh.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 2% (1/64): A crude comedy with nothing new or insightful to say about the subjects it satirizes.

(Yup. Sounds about right. I’ll have to just psych myself into “everything is funny” mode for this. I remember watching InAPPropriate Comedy. This can’t be worse than that. I will survive.)

Poster – Epic Sklog? (U)

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(Ho-ly shit. That’s a U for Unacceptable. I do not accept that this is a poster that someone made for a film released to over a thousand theaters.)

Tagline(s) – We Know It’s Big. We Measured. (What the FFFFFFFFFFFFuuuu…)

(This is worse than the poster! Why are you doing this to us? What did we ever do to you?)

Keyword(s) – orphan; Top Ten by BMeTric: 95.9 Epic Movie (2007); 93.0 Dragonball Evolution (2009); 89.6 Alone in the Dark (2005); 86.0 Norbit (2007); 85.5 Fantastic Four (2015); 85.5 The Room (2003); 83.4 Super Mario Bros. (1993); 81.1 Prom Night (I) (2008); 77.9 Superhero Movie (2008); 71.4 The Next Karate Kid (1994);

(Ooooo The Next Karate Kid would be a nice one to do. Finally have an excuse to watch the third one too. I like this list because, I think, all of them nicely fit the keyword which is not always the case. Also, logging a 71.4 BMeTric as the tenth makes the list guaranteed to be amazing.)

Notes – Jayma Mays and Adam Campbell met on the set of the film, and they married in October 2007. (cool)

This film was not screened for critics. (Of course it wasn’t. It would be the biggest upset in film history if they screened this for critics)

The rest of the notes basically just explains all of the things this movie parodies … we get it, Glover impersonated Johnny Depp’s Willy Wonka.

Awards – Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actress (Carmen Electra)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Remake or Rip-Off

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Screenplay (Jason Friedberg, Aaron Seltzer)

10,000 BC Preview

Well this does it for the punctuation cycle. Only one more punctuation mark to hit and it’s a simple one (the comma). We are officially transitioning to a cycle we’ve been looking forward to all year. We call it StreetCreditReports.com as we are aiming to hit nine films that garnered the coveted <10% on RT to continue to up our bad movie street cred. It’s particularly rare for such a rating to be achieved. In fact, I believe only two major films so far this year have achieved the feat: Fifty Shades Darker (BMT Live) and the Rings sequel. So to start it off we are doing a film that has literally been on our BMT potential list for years. I remember debating whether we should watch it back when I lived in Princeton. That was two moves ago and the website was naught but a sparkle in our collective eyes. That’s right! We’re watching 10,000 B.C. I feel like this could be Pathfinder but even more ridiculous. Be still my heart and let’s try to keep expectations low. Let’s go!

10,000 BC (2008) – BMeTric: 65.4

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(This guy just smashed the BMeTric immediately. Heartening. People just went “no!” and the movie just crashed and burned. As I said last week, usually films start strong and drop like a stone … I told you that’s how it actually works. This is also a ridiculously popular film. This is a Very Popular Bad Film. If it didn’t get like 100K votes this would be a normal like 40 BMeTric film, the votes though give it that boost. A BMeTric of 60+ promises a lot though. It better deliver.)

Leonard Maltin – 2 stars –  Tale of prehistoric life follows a small group who leave their tribe of mammoth hunters in an effort to rescue others captured by slavers. This leads them to a pre-Egyptian city of ruthless pyramid-builders and much adventure. Earnest, well produced on rugged locations with occasionally good effect, but for the most part as ludicrous as other films of this type. Features cinema’s first superfluous saber-toothed tiger.

(“Films of this type” I think refers to Emmerich films. Honestly, sounds like a pretty fun film even though I know it is terrible. Can’t wait to see the tiger though. So many notes about it.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iw7ow4AmPc8

(Ooooof the “AD” at the end! But that wasn’t the important bit of the trailer. That’s right … what a kick ass dumb solo they got going to end it! Does it work? Not totally. But still gave me an interesting trailer which honestly looks like Michael Bay meets Apocalypto … so like a good movie is a serious director was making it, but instead we have Roland Emmerich. So …)

Directors – Roland Emmerich – (Known For: Independence Day; The Day After Tomorrow; The Patriot; Stargate; White House Down; Anonymous; BMT: 10,000 BC; Godzilla; Independence Day: Resurgence (BMT); 2012 (BMT); Universal Soldier; Stonewall; Notes:  Nominated in 2017 for the Razzie Award for Worst Director and Screenplay for Independence Day: Resurgence; and for Worst Director and Screenplay in 1999 for Godzilla; As an openly gay director he says he’s encountered homophobia in Hollywood, but as a director it hasn’t particularly hampered his career.)

Writers – Roland Emmerich (written by) – (Known For: Independence Day; The Day After Tomorrow; Stargate; BMT: 10,000 BC; Godzilla; Independence Day: Resurgence (BMT); 2012 (BMT); Notes: His sister Ute Emmerich is a producer on most (if not all) of his films. He has also written most of the films he’s directed.)

Harald Kloser (written by) – (BMT: 10,000 BC; 2012; Notes: Has composed the music for many of Emmerich’s films and that comprises most of his filmography. He’s flipped to (also) screenwriting later in his career and is also attached to Emmerich’s next film Moonfall.)

Actors – Camilla Belle – (Known For: The Lost World: Jurassic Park; A Little Princess; The Ballad of Jack and Rose; The American Side; À Deriva; BMT: 10,000 BC; The Patriot; When a Stranger Calls; Poison Ivy 2; Diablo; From Prada to Nada; Push; Cavemen; Practical Magic; Father of Invention; The Invisible Circus; The Quiet; Breakaway; Notes: Born a week before us. Her mother is Brazilian and despite being born and raised in Los Angeles grew up speaking portuguese. I’m going to be honest … I can’t for the life of me think of a movie where I would specifically have recognized her from.)

Steven Strait – (Known For: Sky High; Stop-Loss; City Island; BMT: 10,000 BC; The Covenant (BMT); Undiscovered; Notes: In the new (apparently quite good) sci-fi series The Expanse. We saw him in The Covenant which is probably his biggest role outside of 10,000 BC. Hasn’t had a big movie role in a while.)

Marco Khan – (Known For: The Promise; Iron Man; Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest; Camp X-Ray; Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World; BMT: 10,000 BC; God’s Not Dead; You Don’t Mess with the Zohan; 2012 (BMT); 15 Minutes; Click; Notes: Born in Tehran and educated in Italy he has been all over the place in his life, including owning and operating Italian restaurants for 12 years before getting into the entertainment industry.)

Budget/Gross – $105 million / Domestic: $94,784,201 (Worldwide: $269,784,201)

(That isn’t bad. Obviously you want more than $100 million, but these days that would be looked at as a pretty solid international success. Emmerich looks like he rarely does sequels so there wouldn’t have been any risk of that, but I can kind of see why he keeps getting money.)

#23 for the Adventure – Period genre

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(Fun plot. Period adventure films looks like it became hugely popular in the 2000s. Interestingly coincides with the gold rush of bad movies. Perhaps it is because such films became easier to produce around that time (with the ability to basically synthesize anything you want from costumes to fiberglass cars, etc.)? I think it’ll stick around though. Just look at something like Kong Island. That works really well as a period film, hearkening back to the time of pulp novel adventure (a la Indiana Jones). This sits near The Mummy 3 (ooof), and follows up the amazing recent addition of Hansel and Gretel! Let’s do it.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 8% (12/145): With attention strictly paid to style instead of substance, or historical accuracy, 10,000 B.C. is a visually impressive but narratively flimsy epic.

(I’m down, I have no problem with this. The only thing I’m getting worried about is that none of this is getting me very excited. Basically I think what is going to happen is we’ll watch this film and just kind of go “oh yeah, that wasn’t very good, but also innocuous”. I hope I am wrong because this is a movie I was looking forward to for a while now.)

Poster – Sklog Thousand BC (D+)

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(There are better posters than this one floating around out there, but I tend to default to the imdb poster and this is it. Horrible spacing, horrible symmetry, and no base coloring. Don’t like it much at all. Mediocre, but still OK font on the title. Little shout out to the release date which is provided with an “AD” at the end. Solid work on that at least, art department.)

Tagline(s) – It takes a hero to change the world (F)

(Hahahaha. What? That’s the best you could do? This might be the most cliche tagline we’ve ever had. This may as well be the default tagline for any film that comes out and the studio gets to opt whether to come up with something (anything!) better than it.)

Keyword(s) – hunter; Top Ten by BMeTric: 83.9 Jaws 3-D (1983); 75.3 Anaconda (1997); 70.8 A Sound of Thunder (2005); 70.1 Year One (2009); 68.5 Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid (2004); 65.4 10,000 BC (2008); 65.3 Eragon (2006); 60.0 Congo (1995); 57.5 The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising (2007); 54.3 Killers (2010);

(I LOVE THIS LIST. We’ve seen basically all of these films. Just need to smash both Anacondas (we’ve seen the first, but not for BMT … in theaters as eleven-year-olds). And then the last one will happen when we destroy one of the worst movies ever made Jaws: The Revenge starring Michael Caine’s paycheck.)

Notes – (at around 1h 10 mins) The film includes a glimpse of a map showing Atlantis off the coast of Spain. It’s a reference to Plato’s theory that the construction techniques used in Egypt were imported from the ancient lost civilization of Atlantis. (Were there even maps back then? … looked it up, that answer it is very unlikely anyone would have a map sophisticated enough to depict an island off the coast of Spain)

This film features some alleged historical controversies, including construction of the great pyramids 12,000 years ago (almost 7,500 years earlier), the existence of the Ben-Ben stone (the pyramidion stone missing from the top of the Khafre pyramid), the correlation between the position of the pyramids and the stars from the Orion constellation (associated by the Egyptians with the god Osiris), the Sphinx with a head of a lion allegedly correlated with the Leo constellation rising to the east (at the same time that Orion is in conjunction with the Giza pyramid complex), and the possible nonhuman origins of the first kings of Egypt. (fun facts)

D’Leh refers to one star as “the one that never moves.” That would be the North Star, which appears stationary in the northern night sky. In 10,000 BC the North Star was Vega, the fifth brightest star in the sky. It would’ve been very obvious in the dark sky. (hmmm … it never really occurred to me that the North Star would change, but it is so obvious now that I read this note)

D’Leh is “Held”, the German word for “hero”, backwards. Roland Emmerich chose the name as an Easter egg.(gross)

The constellation called the ‘sign of the warrior’ is actually Orion. It also played a key role in deciphering ancient signs in Stargate (1994).

(at around 40 mins) The computer-generated wet saber-tooth tiger was created by Double Negative. Creating it required combining several of the most challenging elements of visual effects: fur, wet fur, water, and creature animation.

Release prints were delivered to some theaters under the false title “King Dinosurs” (sic).

Not screened for critics; only a 20-minute excerpt was shown to journalists. (Not shocking)

D-War: Dragon Wars Preview

Oh how cycles fly. We are coming up on the end of the punctuation cycle with only a couple options left. The rarest of the remaining choices is the hyphen/dash and lucky for us the SciFi/Fantasy entry provides a perfect film for that. That’s right, we’re (finally) watching D-War: Dragon Wars! This 2007 film is famous for its huge budget for a South Korean film (estimated at the time of the DVD release to be upwards of $100 million US) and its major release in the US market (over 2000 theaters). Despite a huge box office success in Korea and optimism for the US release, it ultimately bombed and was critically ridiculed. I remember hearing that it may be one of the worst films of all time, but hard to tell what its actual legacy is (because people have mostly forgotten about it). If our new and improved BMeTric has anything to say about it, we’re in for a wild ride! Let’s go!

D-War: Dragon Wars (2007) – BMeTric: 79.9

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(Ha! That drop is hilarious. I guess maybe people were super into this guy in South Korea and it opening first in South Korea I assume. The BMeTric is gaudy, basically right at 80. That is the 98th percentile! Pretty impressive stuff for what is essentially a foreign film.)

Leonard Maltin – 2 stars –  With a reported budget of $70 million, South Korea’s biggest production ever is a dopey B monster movie elevated (only slightly) by some impressive effects. What story there is revolves around a 500-year-old battle that is being reborn in contemporary L.A., where a young boy is imbued with the spirit of an ancient warrior in order to take on dreaded serpentlike creatures. There’s some fun in watching a flying Korean zoo take hold of the town, but that’s about it.

(Wait… that’s the plot of this film? It sounds like a kids movie. Like Eragon or something. Everything you read about this film suggests that the effects are impressive enough to take a terrible film and make it watchable. It’s got a lot to live up to.)

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

(That seriously looks like three different films. A kids film, a monster/action film, and a comedy film. All signs point to rididididididiculous. Also, about those effects… let’s just say I hope those were preliminary before they finalized them for theatrical release.)

Directors – Hyung-rae Shim – (BMT: Dragon Wars; Notes: Apparently this dude is a wildly popular South Korean comedian, but everything he’s in that’s crossed the Pacific has fallen flat so he’s unknown here.)

Writers – Hyung-rae Shim (written by) – (BMT: Dragon Wars; Notes: He seemingly didn’t pay his employees at his studio for a while and that was a big story in Korea, but then last year there was a report that China was funding a D-War sequel. So maybe he’s back, baby!)

Actors – Jason Behr – (Known For: Pleasantville; The Shipping News; BMT: Dragon Wars; Skinwalkers; The Grudge; Notes: Probably best known as a main character on Roswell. Hasn’t really acted much since he and his wife had a kid in 2013.)

Amanda Brooks – (BMT: Dragon Wars; The Canyons; My Best Friend’s Girl; Flightplan; Notes: Daughter of the songwriter of the titular song of You Light Up My Life. Critically panned and yet that song made the AFI’s list of top film songs of all time.)

Robert Forster – (Known For: The Case for Christ; Mulholland Drive; The Descendants; Jackie Brown; Olympus Has Fallen; Lucky Number Slevin; Me, Myself & Irene; Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle; The Black Hole; Middle Men; Like Mike; BMT: Dragon Wars; Psycho; Supernova; Rise; Survivor; Ghosts of Girlfriends Past; Firewall; The Delta Force; London Has Fallen; Autómata; Cleaner; Notes: Longtime character actor. Nominated for a Supporting Actor Oscar for Jackie Brown.)

Budget/Gross – $35 million / Domestic: $10,977,721 (Worldwide: $75,108,998)

(That budget is not real. This was the initial budget. They went way over during production on the CGI and at the time of theatrical release it’s been estimated at closer to $75 million (before additional DVD CGI work pushed that even higher). This was at best a break-even affair and a huge disappointment in the US market.)

#12 for the Dragon – Focal Point of Movie genre

(Uninteresting plot so I’ll leave that alone. Dead last in this non-genre is something special. Below 1981’s Dragonslayer. Amazing.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 29% (10/35): Dragon Wars’ special effects can’t make up for an unfocused script and stale acting.

(… Am I looking at the same special effects. They look like only slightly better A Sound of Thundaaaaah CGI. By which I mean it all looks like garbage. I guess I’ll see. Maybe it will look better in glorious 4K. Joking though, I’m watching this in like 480p, probably stream it on my phone on airplane WiFi to get that real grainy quality I like.)

Poster – S-War: Sklog Wars (D+)

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(Daaaang! Check out that Dutch angle. Even the title is angled. It’s also a little busy for my taste and the color scheme is pretty drab. The one positive is the unique font that would make S-War: Sklog Wars a tough photoshop.)

Tagline(s) – They’ve made our world their battleground (C-)

(This begs the question: where exactly are the dragons coming from? Apparently they are from a different world since they’re making our world their battleground. Please, please, please say they’re aliens.)

Keyword(s) – korean; Top Ten by BMeTric: 79.9 Dragon Wars (2007); 78.3 Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009); 51.2 The Truth About Charlie (2002); 51.0 The Hot Chick (2002); 42.0 G.I. Joe: Retaliation (2013); 39.9 Mafia! (1998); 33.2 The Gambler (III) (2014); 29.6 Best of the Best II (1993); 25.8 Ape (1976); 23.4 Lucy (I) (2014);

(Ha! APE. That is the movie that appears on the cover of The Official Razzie Movie Guide. That would be a nice one to do in some ill-conceived pre-1980 cycle. Don’t tempt me, it is a terrible idea. Hilarious list though.)

Notes – This marked the first Korean production in nearly three decades to receive wide theatrical release in the United States. (… I wonder if it was the last one. The Host and Snowpiercer come to mind, but they didn’t get over 500 theaters widest)

The music associated with Muraki and his army makes extensive use of the “Dies irae” melody, a medieval chant traditionally used in ceremonies for the dead and, since the nineteenth century, in contexts evoking the macabre and supernatural.

The leader of the ‘Artox Army’ is actually speaking in English, as evidenced by his mouth movements, although it is significantly garbled. (These are words. They certainly sound like a fun fact even if I don’t really know what they mean)

Friday the 13th: A New Beginning Preview

Uh oh, what you talking about, of course we are hitting up two films this week. Otherwise we wouldn’t see Jason X for years. We are returning to Crystal Lake (uh … again) to hit up the fifth in the Friday the 13th series, Friday the 13th: A New Beginning. See the preview for the fourth film … right before this. I bet there is even a link at the bottom of the page. These count as the coveted “:” entry in the cycle, which could have been any number of films. We had so much fun watching the first three entries in the sequel cycle that we couldn’t resist returning to the well for some more. At this rate we’ll be watching Jason X in no time. Let’s go!

Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985) – BMeTric: 60.8

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(Genuinely terrible, especially when considering the previous installment. Kind of strange, but the reviews are also quite down. My guess: it is boring, stupid, and doesn’t have the same kill/Jason presence as the previous installments. I’m mostly interested to see how much of a reboot it is. This I would classify as a Popular and poorly rated film. The number of votes is impressive and despite the regression to the mean it is very much below average.)

Leonard Maltin – BOMB – A clever title (after … the final chapter) for more gore galore, a gruesome and disgusting as ever. Fifth in the series.

(As gruesome and disgusting as ever would be a good review for fans of the series I suppose. I bet he didn’t even watch this. He certainly gave zero details.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_q7Pz2HNJc

(Alright, that trailer wasn’t good. Just a bunch of voiceover, show a few kills, show most of the final fight (clearly). Looks cheap, and doesn’t look scary in the least. If we graded trailers this would get an F for just not getting me amped up for watching this movie.)

Directors – Danny Steinmann – (BMT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning; Notes: Ha! His IMDb page crows about how his first film (High Rise) is a hardcore porn flick. He ended up getting into horror films, and this movie was supposed to be his break into the big time. After stories of the troubled set got out they all fell through and then a bicycle accident caused him to retire from directing.)

Writers – Victor Miller, Sean S. Cunningham (character creator) – (Not sure why Kurz lost his credit at this point, but these guys are the original creators and there isn’t much more to say. Read the preview for Part 2 and Part III if you want to know more.)

Martin Kitrosser (story & screenplay) – (BMT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning; Friday the 13th Part III; Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter; Notes: Career script supervisor. His next movie? Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. He has a crazy impressive resume.)

David Cohen (story & screenplay) – (BMT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning; Notes: Wrote only three movies. One of them, Hollywood Zap which he also directed, is described thusly: Story of two friends, one searching for his father, the other searching for the ultimate sexual video game competition. … … I think Steinmann might have gotten this guy from one of his porn movies.)

Danny Steinmann (screenplay) – (BMT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning; Notes: As far as I can tell this basically ended his career in Hollywood. Let this sink in for a second: Steinmann and Cohen are the director and both main writers for this film and both evidently quite involved in the porn industry either before or after the film (maybe I’m overblowing Hollywood Zap’s porn credentials, but it sounds like a porno). And the reviews describe this as the most nudity filled of the series. Let the idea behind these hires sink in for a second … at least Kinnaman seemed game.)

John Shepherd (contributing writer) (uncredited) – (BMT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning; Notes: I’m a tad bit skeptical about this only because he didn’t get an official credit for seven more years. I do wonder sometimes where information about uncredited work comes from. A producer now, he hasn’t written a screenplay in over 15 years.)

Actors – Melanie Kinnaman – (BMT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning; Notes: Was supposed to also star in the sixth film, but at the last second they changed their mind about the direction of the series (this is a trend, I’m not sure any if the movies go beyond cameo for the leading role rolling over). Claims she spent most of fifth movie trying not to laugh because it was so ridiculous.)

John Shepherd – (Known For: The Hunt for Red October; Deep Cover; BMT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning; Bless the Child; Down Periscope; Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius; Notes: He is now one of the main producers at MPower Pictures. I am 95% sure this is a company that does Christian productions, although it is hard to be sure. He appears to have retired from acting over a decade ago.)

Anthony Barrile – (Known For: Hamburger Hill; Kiss Me, Guido; BMT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning; Notes: Performed with Ben Stiller as 12-year-olds as part of New York City’s Mini-Meri Players. About a decade ago sold a screenplay that was ultimately never produced.)

Budget/Gross – $2.2 million / Domestic: $21,930,418

(Just free money. Even back then low-budget horror was just like printing money. I suppose the issue is that the fans are brutal (along with the critics) so it is probably not the most credible genre to break into the business with. Otherwise … makes sense that is where something like Blumhouse initially focused, free money.)

#38 for the Horror – Slasher genre

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(Again, I’ll mostly ignore the plot since we’ve seen it before. But more interesting is that this is just a shade higher than Friday the 13th Part 2, and Urban Legends: The Final Cut! Now that is a movie we have to watch some time.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 16% (3/19): No consensus yet.

(Making a consensus: More nudity than any of the others, but also dumber. Out of the entire series this manages to bring the least to the table. People call it dull, dumb, and no fun … can’t wait to judge for myself. I have a feeling this one contributes to the lore more than they are letting on.)

Poster – Friday the 13th: A Sklog Beginning (F)

friday_the_thirteenth_a_new_beginning

(I almost have to go back and chance Part IV’s poster to a D- because this is somehow, someway worse. Why a gradient, guys? It’s embarrassing.)

Tagline(s) – If Jason still haunts you, you’re not alone! (D+)

(What if Jason doesn’t haunt me because I watched him get killed in the last film? Should I still be interested? Clunky and not clever. A slight hint at the plot, but that’s all its got.)

Keyword(s) – murder; Top Ten by BMeTric: 92.8 Batman & Robin (1997); 90.7 Epic Movie (2007); 89.7 Catwoman (2004); 87.8 Battlefield Earth (2000); 86.5 Dragonball: Evolution (2009); 83.7 Fantastic Four (2015); 83.5 The Wicker Man (2006); 81.9 Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2011); 81.5 Alone in the Dark (2005); 81.1 Movie 43 (2013);

(We are …. Killing movies with murder in it. Batman & Robin though? Like Catwoman murder is primary to the story, but not really a lot of these. This is actually more like “the worst movies of the last 20 years”. But whatever.)

Notes – This is the first film in the series where Jason is actually referred to by his full name: Jason Voorhees. In Friday the 13th (1980) and Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981), he is only referred to as Jason, while he is not referred to by name at all in Friday the 13th Part III (1982). (Another landmark for the series. I’ve been trying to keep track of the metamorphosis of the character. First, he was a boy in a lake. Then a full grown man. Then he gets his mask. I think he maybe gets the machete as a more standard weapon in the fourth? Good to see they nail down the name here)

The film was originally written to have Corey Feldman as the star, reprising the role of Tommy Jarvis. However, he was already working on The Goonies (1985), therefore the script was rewritten to have Feldman’s appearance limited to a cameo. (Classic Friday the 13th. Can’t nail down a lead to reprise a role)

One month prior to the film’s release in the United States, the MPAA demanded that sixteen scenes featuring sex or graphic violence be edited in order to merit an “R” rating instead of an “X”. The film ultimately required nine trips to the MPAA before finally being granted an “R” rating. (Ooof. I hope we have the unrated version)

Although “Part V” appears on all promotional material, it does not appear in the actual film. The opening credits simply read: “Friday the 13th: A New Beginning”. (Got to get that exact title yo)

Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 Preview

With the first BMT Live! of the year behind us, we continue onto the Razzies entry of the Squeakuels cycle… or I should say what was the Razzies entry. That’s right. Minor shake-up for 2017 is that this entry in the cycle is now the Challenges entry. This still includes Razzies as we continue to try to cover as many nominees as possible, but it also includes any BMT challenges we may come up with. For the moment that is just the Calendar, but the Periodic Table of Smellements and a world mapl.de.map would also fall into the cycle once we officially put them on the website. So without further ado we start this new entry off with a couple of films that are both on the Calendar. Give it up for the worst reviewed film series in history and the only set of films to both appear on the IMDb Bottom 100. That’s right, we are subjecting ourselves to Baby Geniuses and Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2. Lord help up. Let’s go!

Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 (2004) – BMeTric: 76.1 (#3 on IMDb bottom 100)

babygeniuses2_bmet

babygeniuses2_rv

(Interestingly has more IMDb votes than its predecessor (if you are going to bother voting why not for both? Or do you think *gasp* … they didn’t watch the original before the sequel?!). Below 2.0 is obviously incredible, it is the reason this film is an insane #3 on the bottom 100 list! The lowest we had gone before was #15 with From Justin to Kelly. The Baby Geniuses Franchise will represent our 10th and 11th movies on the list, and unfortunately we’d be hard pressed to find nine qualifying movies to make that a cycle. Maybe we’ll try … but probably not.)

Leonard Maltin – BOMB –  Sequel to Baby Geniuses casts Voight as a media mogul out to brainwash children via a tot-aimed TV network. He wants to use them to take over the world, but a band of tykes catches on and sets out to stop him. Gimmick has kids speaking to each other, thanks to creepy computer generated lip movement. Crude humor makes this not just bad but insulting.

(Whoop their ass Leonard! Seriously, I do think this is a strong contender for the worst franchise in history. Leonard is pretty conservative about BOMB ratings and both earned it, the movies have one good review out of 89! I even think both will have their own flavor of terrible. In the first I think it will be that it will just look shoddily made with the old school peanut-butter-esque mouth movements, where this, as I expected, uses the creepy CGI mouths now. This must have been pioneering in that respect, but in the last ten years it has become easy and cheap enough to do in even the worst direct-to-VOD sequels. Things like Santa Paws 2.)

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

(Oh …. Oh my God. Voight has a German accent and appears to be wearing a very Nazi-esque uniform at one point. I was very skeptical of the IMDb note claiming he based the character off Mengele, but … I mean, it certainly is a lot more possible than I initially thought! The CGI looks hilariously terrible, I might actually find this movie kind of interesting to watch. Like, how does this happen? How do you even go about directing a film like this?)

Directors – Bob Clark – (Known For: A Christmas Story; Black Christmas; Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things; Murder by Decree; Dead of Night; BMT: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Baby Geniuses; Rhinestone; Porky’s II: The Next Day; Loose Cannons; Porky’s; Notes:  Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2005 for Worst Director for Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; And in 1985 for Rhinestone; Directed Black Christmas which is widely considered one of the first films in the slasher genre.)

Writers – Steven Paul (story) – (BMT: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Baby Geniuses; Notes:  Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2005 for Worst Screenplay for Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; … He’s the manager for Bob Clark and Jon Voight which explains the cast and crew I suppose. In 1979 he was reported as the world’s youngest ever film producer at 20 years old.)

Gregory Poppen (screenplay) – (BMT: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Notes:  Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2005 for Worst Screenplay for Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Wrote an incredible number of Awards shows including seven straight ESPYs from 2002 to 2009.)

Actors – Jon Voight – (Known For: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them; Heat; Transformers; Tropic Thunder; Varsity Blues; Deliverance; U Turn; Mission: Impossible; National Treasure; Zoolander; Holes; The Manchurian Candidate; Enemy of the State; Midnight Cowboy; The Rainmaker; Ali; Rosewood; Glory Road; Catch-22; BMT: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Anaconda; Bratz; Getaway; An American Carol; Lara Croft: Tomb Raider; Four Christmases; Pearl Harbor; Most Wanted; National Treasure: Book of Secrets; September Dawn; Notes:  Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1998 for Worst Actor and Screen Couple for Anaconda; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2008 for Worst Supporting Actor for Bratz, National Treasure: Book of Secrets, September Dawn, and Transformers; And in 2005 for for Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; And in 1998 for Most Wanted, and U Turn; Father of Angelina Jolie, although they were estranged for years apparently. Is devoutly religious and a well known conservative (which explains An American Carol at least …))

Scott Baio – (Known For: Bugsy Malone; Foxes; The Bread, My Sweet; BMT: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Cursed; Zapped!; Notes: In 1997 he was rumored to have died in a car accident. Not only had he not died, he hadn’t been in an accident in the first place and it is unknown how the rumor got started. More well known for his television work in Charles in Charge, Happy Days (and the spin-off Joanie Loves Chachi), and Arrested Development.)

Vanessa Angel – (Known For: Kingpin; King of New York; Bread and Roses; BMT: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot; Hall Pass; The Perfect Score; Kissing a Fool; Spies Like Us; Sleep with Me; Notes: I will always remember her as the computer generated Lisa from the Weird Science television series, a staple of the Sklogs’ childhood.)

Budget/Gross – $20 million / Domestic: $9,219,388 (Worldwide: $9,448,644)

(An absolute disaster. The budget is probably a bit inflated, because I don’t really see why it would get a $20 million dollar budget and cast Baio in a major role. I suppose they were hoping to slightly increase the $36 million take of the original?)

#105 for the Comedy – Sequel (Live Action) genre

comedysequel_105

(Oooof, on the second page with Caddyshack II and Teen Wolf Too! Of the films below it I could see us eventually doing Return of the Killer Tomatoes, Mannequin Two: On the Move, National Lampoon’s Van Wilder: Rise of Taj, Meatballs II, and Teen Wolf Too eventually. A veritable bounty awaits. Naturally this came during the BMT gold rush from 2000-2010, the Golden Decade as I just started calling it. It would all come a-tumbling down presumably due to Hollywood’s hubris, but we have been on the rise again. A boy can dream …)

Rotten Tomatoes – 0% (0/45): A startling lack of taste pervades Superbabies, a sequel offering further proof that bad jokes still aren’t funny when coming from the mouths of babes.

(Noice. Always solid to hit up a 0%-er on rotten tomatoes. There are only 16 films with 25+ reviews on rotten tomatoes and the perfect(ly terrible) score. See here. Sorting by the number of reviews this is fifth on the list and with One Missed Call and a rewatch of Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever we’d have the top five there done. A sadly sparse list as far as qualifiers are concerned, but there are some future gems like Redline. This is the 12th film we’ve seen from that list (I think … the list is pretty long so I just skimmed it).)

Poster – Superbabies: Baby Sklogses 2 (D-) 

superbabies_baby_geniuses_two

(Wow, lot to unpack with this one… this is horrendously bad. Even with good spacing, unique font, and a blue tone to the whole film I cannot help but puke all over myself when looking at this travesty. Are those drone helicopters in the corners? Is there a bouncy ball-human hybrid? What are the ghostly objects in the background? I hate this. [EDITOR NOTE: By the way, having watched the movie, these are all random babies, they aren’t the four main characters of the film … what the fuck baby geniuses?])

Tagline(s) – Meet the new generation of superheroes (A-)

Don’t drive, crawl! (Ugh.)

(It’s almost incredible to say, but that first tagline is nearly perfect. It’s a play on the dual meaning of “new” to give a hint at the premise of the film. It’s also just short enough. Some small tweaks and we might have had an A+ on our hands. The second one makes me sad.)

Keyword(s) – science experiment; Top Ten by BMeTric: 76.1 Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 (2004); 38.6 Allegiant (2016); 35.8 Splice (2009); 35.8 Cutting Class (1989); 28.3 Gekijô-ban poketto monsutâ – Myûtsû no gyakushû (1998); 28.0 Morgan (2016); 20.1 The Incredible 2-Headed Transplant (1971); 15.8 The Experiment (2010); 15.7 The Last Mimzy (2007); 15.3 The Killer Eye (1999);

(We’ve seen none! Morgan looked like trash, I saw the trailer for that before Keeping Up With the Joneses in October. I actually don’t think we are going to get to any of the others. Just not very many good-bad science experiment bases films I guess.)

Notes – Jon Voight reportedly based the role of Kane on descriptions of Dr. Josef Mengele, the infamous Nazi doctor that performed grotesque experiments on prisoners in concentration camps. (Alright well … initially I had a kind of condemning note here angry at IMDb for not purging what appeared to be a clearly false note made by some jokester. But having now watched the trailer this seems, uh, slightly more plausible. May God have mercy on our souls.)

Last film directed by Bob Clark. He died in a car accident in April 2007. (Pretty sad story if you bother to look it up, … glad we’re ending on that note, anyone ready for a kids film?)

Awards – Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Picture

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actor (Jon Voight)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Director (Bob Clark)

Nominated for the Razzie Award for Worst Screenplay (Steven Paul, Gregory Poppen)

Baby Geniuses Preview

With the first BMT Live! of the year behind us, we continue onto the Razzies entry of the Squeakuels cycle… or I should say what was the Razzies entry. That’s right. Minor shake-up for 2017 is that this entry in the cycle is now the Challenges entry. This still includes Razzies as we continue to try to cover as many nominees as possible, but it also includes any BMT challenges we may come up with. For the moment that is just the Calendar, but the Periodic Table of Smellements and a world mapl.de.map would also fall into the cycle once we officially put them on the website. So without further ado we start this new entry off with a couple of films that are both on the Calendar. Give it up for the worst reviewed film series in history and the only set of films to both appear on the IMDb Bottom 100. That’s right, we are subjecting ourselves to Baby Geniuses and Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2. Lord help up. Let’s go!

Baby Geniuses (1999) – BMeTric: 72.1 (#66 on IMDb bottom 100)

babygeniuses_bmet

babygeniuses_rv

(Just shockingly low. It does seem like it wants to go up, but obviously also legendary because it really has stayed pretty consistent over the nearly 15 years this graph covers. This movie would also probably be a poster boy for why I need to figure out how to “backdate” the BMeTric. I would assume for the most part that Baby Geniuses increases in votes proportionally to the rest of IMDb. So you would assume the BMeTric should really stay the same over time. But it is based off of average votes for a movie today, so it’ll just rise over time. Such is life at the moment.)

Leonard Maltin – BOMB –  Unless you want to see walking, talking toddlers hypnotizing DeLuise into picking his nose, steer clear of this almost history-making comedy clinker about power-mad child psychologist Turner, who’s raising three bright babies in her lab. Technically shoddy and recipient of some of the decade’s worst reviews (though people did go see it). If these kids are such geniuses, why can’t they spark even a single laugh?

(Cooooooold bloooooded. That’s is just body-shot-body-shot-upper-cut Leonard, taking the industry down. History making boys, that’s why we do it. That’s why we play the game. If you are going to watch a kids’ movie, at least make sure it is historically bad, right? I’m getting all amped, nothing can push me off this mountain.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dgjvh4_h_lQ

(Aaaaaand, I’m out. This does look shoddy enough though that it has an outside chance of being bemusing to the point of interest. Like, I do wonder which computer graphics company developed the tech for the moving babies and whatnot, some of that did look more impressive that I expected.)

Directors – Bob Clark – (Known For: A Christmas Story; Black Christmas; Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things; Murder by Decree; Dead of Night; BMT: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Baby Geniuses; Rhinestone; Porky’s II: The Next Day; Loose Cannons; Porky’s; Notes:  Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2005 for Worst Director for Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; And in 1985 for Rhinestone; Once hit a royal flush on a video poker machine on the Strip and won over $80 thousand on a two dollar bet.)

Writers – Steven Paul (story) – (BMT: Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Baby Geniuses; Notes:  Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2005 for Worst Screenplay for Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Was a playwright at the age of 12. Well known as a producer, he produced things like Ghost Rider and the upcoming Ghost in the Shell film. He loves ghosts.)

Francisca Matos and Robert Grasmere (story) – (BMT: Baby Geniuses; Notes: Matos basically became the writing partner of Grasmere, and while they have been attached to a number of projects this is the only significant one produced. Grasmere has had a far more impressive visual effects career including films like Demolition Man, The Core, and Toys (and yeah, I chose the worst of the bunch, it is a very impressive list).)

Bob Clark (screenplay) – (Known For: A Christmas Story; Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things; BMT: Baby Geniuses; Porky’s II: The Next Day; Porky’s Revenge; Loose Cannons; Porky’s; Notes: The last feature film he wrote, although he directed more than he wrote through his career.)

Greg Michael (screenplay) – (BMT: Baby Geniuses; Notes: Was the second unit director for a murderer’s row of 2000s action films: the entire Mummy series, The Time Machine, The Tuxedo, Van Helsing, G.I. Joe Rise of Cobra! Has never really made the jump to director, although he is attached to a film called Wild Heart that was just announced.)

Actors – Kathleen Turner – (Known For: Marley & Me; The Virgin Suicides; Who Framed Roger Rabbit; Romancing the Stone; Body Heat; Monster House; Nurse 3-D; Peggy Sue Got Married; The Jewel of the Nile; The War of the Roses; Serial Mom; Prizzi’s Honor; The Accidental Tourist; The Man with Two Brains; BMT: Baby Geniuses; Dumb and Dumber To; V.I. Warshawski; A Simple Wish; Beautiful; Undercover Blues; Notes: A devoted activist for Planned Parenthood for years including becoming a chairperson. Obtained a reputation for being difficult to work with later in her career.)

Christopher Lloyd – (Known For: Back to the Future; One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest; Back to the Future Part II; Clue; Sin City: A Dame to Kill For; I Am Not a Serial Killer; Back to the Future Part III; The Addams Family; Who Framed Roger Rabbit; Anastasia; Piranha 3D; Addams Family Values; Star Trek III: The Search for Spock; Man on the Moon; The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension; The Postman Always Rings Twice; The Tale of Despereaux; Mr. Mum; Goin’ South; Interstate 60: Episodes of the Road; The Dream Team; DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp; Eight Men Out; BMT: Piranha 3DD; Baby Geniuses; Suburban Commando; My Favorite Martian; Dennis; Love, Wedding, Marriage; Fly Me to the Moon; A Million Ways to Die in the West; The Pagemaster; Angels in the Outfield; Camp Nowhere; Hey Arnold! The Movie; Notes: Is the uncle of Sam Lloyd known for his role as the lawyer on scrubs. What more is there to say? Has been in some of my favorite movies from my childhood.)

Kim Cattrall – (Known For: The Ghost; Police Academy; Sex and the City; Big Trouble in Little China; Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country; Ice Princess; Masquerade; The Return of the Musketeers; BMT: Crossroads; Sex and the City 2; Baby Geniuses; The Bonfire of the Vanities; Mannequin; 15 Minutes; Porky’s; Notes:  Won the Razzie Award in 2011 for Worst Actress for Sex and the City 2; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1991 for Worst Supporting Actress for The Bonfire of the Vanities; I can’t find anything about their relationship, but she appeared in four Bob Clark films: Tribute, Turk 182!, Porky’s, and Baby Geniuses! She is British, but her accent is Canadian where she grew up. She is an avid supporter of Liverpool F.C.)

Budget/Gross – $12 million / Domestic: $27,250,736 (Worldwide: $36,450,736)

(Wow, not bad all things considered. I’m pretty shocked by the foreign number. It doesn’t really make sense to release to foreign markets, although (and I don’t really know how this movie is constructed, so take this with a grain of salt), if they are merely putting voices over without manipulating the mouths too much it might have been a fairly trivial dub which could have made it worth it.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 2% (1/44): Flat direction and actors who look embarrassed to be onscreen make Baby Geniuses worse than the premise suggests.

(The rogue good review states: “With the recent popularity of baby-themed shows, this film has perfect timing. Younger patrons will be drawn into the fantasy, while the humor is sufficient to keep adults interested.” I had to look it up, but indeed, the show Baby Bob came out mere months before this review (June, 2002), bizarrely three years after the movie came out! Which also means Baby Geniuses held a 0% on rotten tomatoes for three years before losing it.)

Poster – Baby Sklogses (C+)

baby_geniuses

(The positive is that the symmetry is pretty good. Everything else is not great. Font is uninteresting and the coloring is not great. It does get the message across, though, with that baby wearing glasses.)

Tagline(s) – Think innocent. Think helpless. Think again. (I am dumber because of this.)

Naps are history. (Seriously. What is going on?)

(What in the fuck are these? The first one is like someone from a different country that didn’t speak english was forced to study taglines for a year and come up with one for this film. The second one is like an actual baby came up with it. Dear God. Those are rough.)

Keyword(s) – baby; Top Ten by BMeTric: 85.0 Date Movie (2006); 83.9 Scary Movie 5 (2013); 82.8 Son of the Mask (2005); 74.1 Junior (1994); 72.2 Baby Geniuses (1999); 71.4 In the Land of Blood and Honey (2011); 70.2 Look Who’s Talking Too (1990); 66.1 The Animal (2001); 64.7 Honey I Blew Up the Kid (1992); 63.4 Texas Chainsaw 3D (2013);

(Wow, so there are a few movies there we’ve seen (Junior, Look Who’s Talking Too, The Animal … a few times, Honey I Blew Up the Kid) but only one we’ve done for BMT. That is a new rule by the way. We’ve stopped considering movies “watched” unless we’ve done them for BMT. So a while to go in the baby top 10 … which is a weird mix of the expected and just weird films.)

Notes – The amusement park is the one at Circus Circus in Las Vegas, NV. (Circus Smircus?! We were (kind of) just there!)

Kathleen Turner, who plays Dr. Elena Kinder, and Christopher Lloyd, who plays Dr. Heep, also co-starred in Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), in which they played Jessica Rabbit and Judge Doom.

The last theatrically-released film of Dom DeLuise (although several later films he made were never publicly released). (Kind of a thing isn’t it? Terrible movies being the last release. I wonder if it is because things like voices and kids films are less demanding so actors who ultimately die of a terminal illness just end up in those roles as they approach their death. Sorry to muse about the subject, but I do find it interesting)

Dr. Elena Kinder’s surname is derived from the German word for children.

The combination for Sly’s alarm system at the beginning of the film is “1673.” (This is the kind of shit we’re supposed to do. Like me having my ATM pin be 1673 … it isn’t by the way, but that would be pretty weird right?)

The film is included on the film critic Roger Ebert’s “Most Hated” list. (These two films are hitting a bunch of marks)

Fifty Shades Darker Preview

Big week for BMT as we are attending the first BMT Live! of the year! Hooray! As expected (although not exactly desired) we will be watching Fifty Shades Darker. Less hooray! We watched the first film as part of BMT in 2015. As part of that viewing I actually read the first book. A direct consequence of that is that I did not read the second book this time around. I literally couldn’t bring myself to do it. The first book may be the worst thing I’ve ever read (and I read the first two Twilight books). It’s not even because they are ridiculous soap opera-like porn books for women. I’m fine with that (again, I read Twilight, which spends 90% of the book talking about the finer qualities of different characters abs). No, its greatest crime was simply that is was soooooo fucking boooorrrrrring. Nothing happens. Sure they have sex a few times but they could have at least attempted to make a coherent plot. Instead it’s just one long drama about two fairly boring people arguing over a legal contract… that’s it. I shudder even imagining having to read the second book. So instead we are going in blind, baby! A final note, this is the fifth BMT Live! We’ve had and this is the first instance where the film chosen actually fits the cycle that we are currently in. Congrats! We are nailing it here at BMTHQ. Let’s go!

Fifty Shades Darker (2017) – BMeTric: 54.5

(There is nothing in the internet archive for the movie as of February 19, 2017! I will say that at the moment Fifty Shades Darker has a 4.9 on IMDb whereas Fifty Shades of Grey settled comfortably at 4.1. I would guess that indeed it will regress to the predecessor in this case once non-mega fans get a hold of it.)

RogerEbert.com – 2 stars –  “Fifty Shades Darker” is less interested in exploring how the power plays of S&M have to be negotiated (a rich topic), and more interested in the conventional narrative of a damaged man terrified of intimacy and a loving woman waiting for him to transform into the wonderful boyfriend that she knows is inside of him. “Fifty Shades Darker” may wear leather and chains, but it’s still a retro bore.

(Yeah … sounds about right. I’ve heard criticisms of the films dressed up in all kinds of ways. But do you know what is always consistent? That they are boring. Can’t wait to pay money to be the creepy alone-guy in a theater … real excited.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6BVyk7hty8

(Pretty tantalizing stuff. So the last movie was basically “will she sign the sex contract”. This one appears to be “oh … is Grey going to change a bit?”. Wait … did she sign the sex contract? I feel like I’m going to end up totally lost in this movie since I have zero interest in re-watching the first one and obviously can’t read the books.)

Directors – James Foley – (Known For: Glengarry Glen Ross; At Close Range; Confidence: After Dark; The Corruptor; After Dark, My Sweet; Two Bits; BMT: Who’s That Girl; Fifty Shades Darker; Perfect Stranger; Fear; The Chamber; Notes:  Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1988 for Worst Director for Who’s That Girl; Directs some television now (including 12 episodes of House of Cards). Apparently he was offered to directing position for Purple Rain starring Prince. How could one resist?!)

Writers – Niall Leonard (screenplay) – (BMT: Fifty Shades Darker; Notes:  Oh ….. Oh my God. He is E. L. James’ husband! The person they got to write the script to the last two Fifty Shades films is E. L. James’ spouse. That is shocking. He has been bouncing around, mostly in television, for a while, but I’m surprised there wasn’t any credited rewrites by a more accomplished screenwriter.)

E.L. James (based on the novel by) – (BMT: Fifty Shades of Grey (BMT); Fifty Shades Darker; Notes: She’s expressed her surprise at the success of the novels which, she says, started as a kind of mid-life crisis. Her writing career famously started with Twilight Fan Fiction under the pen name Snowqueens Icedragon.)

Actors – Dakota Johnson – (Known For: How to Be Single; Black Mass; The Social Network; A Bigger Splash; 21 Jump Street; The Five-Year Engagement; BMT: Fifty Shades of Grey (BMT); Beastly (BMT); Fifty Shades Darker; Anarchy: Ride or Die; Date and Switch; Goats; Need for Speed (BMT); Notes:  Won the Razzie Award in 2016 for Worst Actress and Screen Combo for Fifty Shades of Grey; She is the daughter of Melanie Griffith and Don Johnson (Bucky Larson and When in Rome) from their second marriage to each other.)

Jamie Dornan – (Known For: The 9th Life of Louis Drax; Anthropoid; The Siege of Jadotville; Marie Antoinette; BMT: Fifty Shades of Grey (BMT); Fifty Shades Darker; Notes:  Won the Razzie Award in 2016 for Worst Actor and Screen Combo for Fifty Shades of Grey; Naturally got his start as a Calvin Klein model and was a member of a folk band called Sons of Jim. Sadly they disbanded in 2008.)

Also stars Eric Johnson – (As see in Texas Rangers!) and BMT megastar Kim Basinger (Grudge Match, Bless the Child, The Marrying Man, and No Mercy)

Budget/Gross – $55 million / Domestic: $75,500,000 ($173,300,000 Worldwide) (So far)

(Like shooting fish in a barrel. They obviously saved a bundle shooting back to back which makes it all the easier for them to rake in a cool $300+ million worldwide with each film and laugh all the way to the bank.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 9% (13/149): Lacking enough chemistry, heat, or narrative friction to satisfy, the limp Fifty Shades Darker wants to be kinky but only serves as its own form of punishment.

(Ooooof, that is stunning. I wouldn’t have really thought it would drop so dramatically from the first (25%), I figured they would also get people to dismiss most issues as “hey the books were shit too, what did you expect?” And yet this seems like it might be a whole new level of boring … I wonder how early of a showing I can get. Just to make sure I don’t fall asleep.)

Poster – Fifty Shades Sklogger (C+) 

fifty_shades_darker_ver2

(Not a huge fan of the spacing and tilt, as it’s starting to look a little like fan-art. Obviously the font is ridiculously simple and Fifty Shades Sklogger could be a reality. Besides that it’s an excellent example of where the actors are used in the poster but are modified visually enough to avoid my issues with their human-ness. They are able to maintain gray as the dominant color.)

Tagline(s) – Every Fairy Tale Has a Dark Side (B)

(Hmmm, I actually kind of like this because it’s starting to make me think about how this series relates to traditional fairy tales. Is it a play on Cinderella? Could be actually. Even the poster and masquerade ball kind of fit with that. Slightly clever and short enough to boot. Pretty good.)

Keyword(s) – helicopter crash; Top Ten by BMeTric: 78.9 Skyline (2010); 73.9 AVPR: Aliens vs Predator – Requiem (2007); 57.7 Boat Trip (2002); 57.2 A Good Day to Die Hard (2013); 55.9 Lawnmower Man 2: Beyond Cyberspace (1996); 53.8 Batman Forever (1995); 53.7 Half Past Dead (2002); 51.9 Resident Evil: Retribution (2012); 50.2 Fifty Shades Darker (2017); 50.1 Attack of the Killer Tomatoes! (1978);

(I would watch this movie marathon for sure. What an eclectic group of movies. I’d go chronological, just to get Killer Tomatoes to start. The ending of that series would be brutal too, would people just get up once Fifty Shades started?)

Notes – Rumors circulated in early 2015 that Jamie Dornan had made a decision not to reprise his role as Christian Grey in the future Fifty Shades of Grey (2015) films. However, those rumors were eventually debunked by his official rep who stated he was completely devoted to the franchise. (gross. But yeah, since they filmed the second and third back to back you’d get to basically get the series behind you and cash a huge check. Don’t blame him)

Fans have expressed interest in actresses such as Kim Cattrall, Michelle Pfeiffer and Charlize Theron for the role of Elena Lincoln aka “Mrs. Robinson”. (And we are so so glad it went to Kim Basinger instead. Love me some Kimmy B).

After receiving backlash that clean shaven Jamie Dornan wasn’t sexy enough as Christian Grey in the first film the producers decided that he could keep his stubble for Darker and Freed. (ha!)

In March of 2015, Fifty Shades of Grey (2015) director Sam Taylor-Johnson revealed she would not be returning for the film’s sequels, Fifty Shades Darker (2017) and Fifty Shades Freed (2018), respectively. As well, screenwriter Kelly Marcel also stated she would not be returning to the series. (I would guess that the producers, including E. L. James, wanted more control. I thought Taylor-Johnson did a pretty solid job, the first movie was just super boring and nothing happened.)

Screenwriter Niall Leonard is the husband of E.L. James, who wrote the book series it is based upon. (Yuuuuuuup, pretty ridic)

Species II Preview

There had been some thought that this week might be time for a BMT Live! Rings came out to absolutely horrifying reviews (see what I did there?) and we had to think quick on whether we should act. The answer: not until we see the reviews for Fifty Shades Darker. It would be irresponsible to let it go by without giving it a chance at BMT Live! glory. It deserves it. So instead we head into SciFi/Fantasy and get to do a set of films that I’ve been eyeing for awhile. That’s right, we’re watching Species and Species II. These films promise three things: nudity, a scene where someone kisses someone else and their tongue bursts through the back of their skull, and… uh… nudity again. So basically I’m super duper duper excited. Let’s go!

Species II (1998) – BMeTric: 67.3

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(Again we see the 2011 inflection and regression to the mean as the votes increase. Unlike its predecessor this one is considered definitively bad. As I said in the Species preview these plots are all starting to look the same to me, so I’m categorizing them. For Species II I’m going to call it: Poorly Rated, but Perplexingly Popular. In this case a sub-5 rating is definitively terrible, but we still see a high number of votes (I think … I think I’m going to automate this now that I think about it).)

Leonard Maltin – BOMB – The first man on Mars gets infested with alien DNA, and begins raping women who immediately, and fatally, give birth. Elsewhere, scientists have recreated the half-alien woman from the first film, hoping she’ll be nice this time. Compared to this clunker, the first looks like a collaboration between Arthur C. Clarke and Ray Bradbury.

(Well, I’ll set aside the atrocious last line there. This plot sounds bonkers. Like … the first part! This will be at least the third film in which someone gets infected by a disease on Mars. And like Doom and Ghosts of Mars before it may it be a ridiculous nonsense movie.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LE-Amil6oQc

(Also seems pretty rad … but also definitely a step down from the last one. That storyline is indeed just as bonkers as Leonard seemed to suggest. So he wasn’t exaggerating there. I having a feeling the erotic horror sci-fi genre might not attract the best and brightest you know? …)

Directors – Peter Medak – (Known For: The Changeling; The Krays; Zorro: The Gay Blade; The Ruling Class; Let Him Have It; BMT: Species II; Romeo Is Bleeding; Notes: Has had a very long career in Hollywood starting in the late 50’s. His best known film has got to be The Ruling Class for which Peter O’Toole received an Oscar nomination for Actor.)

Writers – Dennis Feldman (written by) – (Known For: Just One of the Guys; BMT: Species II; Virus; Species (BMT); The Golden Child (BMT); Notes: Just a character credit on this one. I find it amusing that he also wrote Virus, which Jamie Lee Curtis considers her worst film.)

Chris Brancato (written by) – (Known For: Hoodlum; BMT: Species II; Notes: He is the creator of the Netflix show Narcos… say what?)

Actors – Natasha Henstridge – (Known For: The Whole Nine Yards; Bounce; BMT: Species II; Ghosts of Mars (BMT); The Whole Ten Yards; Maximum Risk; Adrenalin: Fear the Rush; Species (BMT); Steal; Deception; Dog Park; Notes: Uh… I already had to make a note for the first Species so… she’s Canadian and part Native American. Fun stuff, right?)

Michael Madsen – (Known For: The Hateful Eight; Kill Bill: Vol. 1; Reservoir Dogs; The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe; Sin City; Kill Bill: Vol. 2; Die Another Day; WarGames; Wyatt Earp; Thelma & Louise; Donnie Brasco; The Doors; Free Willy; The Natural; Pauly Shore Is Dead; BMT: BloodRayne; Species II; My Boss’s Daughter; Scary Movie 4 (BMT); Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home; Hell Ride; House; Species (BMT); Notes: Brother of BMT legend Virginia Madsen.)

Marg Helgenberger – (Known For: Erin Brockovich; Bad Boys; Mr. Brooks; Always; In Good Company; My Fellow Americans; BMT: Species II; Fire Down Below (BMT); Species (BMT); The Cowboy Way; Notes: Won an Emmy for her role in the Vietnam War drama China Beach.)

Budget/Gross – $35 million / Domestic: $19,221,939 (N/A)

(Wowzer. I would genuinely believe it if this was the worst original-to-sequel ratio for a major release ever. The original made basically six times more that its sequel and they were released to roughly the same number of cinemas. Astonishing.)

#47 for the Creature Feature genre

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(Ooooof right near Shark Night 3D. I feel like 1998 is a significant year where the studio system completed its transition from the blockbuster 80’s era through slow experimentation with CGI and effects. From 2000-2010 we would enter a true golden age where bad movies flowed like wine. Here though an Erotic SciFi Horror sequel was made and released to 2500 theaters. Think about that.)

#29 for the Sci-Fi Horror genre

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(That peak though. This sadly clocks in right around Apollo 18 which undoubtable cost maybe $40 to make. But it came right at a true peak of the genre. It has been an up and down experience since, but the Species franchise could have stood alongside the second tier of the genre (Underworld and Resident Evil) if not for flaming out and pushing out two direct-to-video sequels instead of waiting on a better opportunity.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 9% (3/33): No consensus yet.

(Another consensus to make: A totally unnecessary sequel which amps up the silliness without adding any brains to the equation. Nearly exploitative in its gratuity. As EW puts it: “By now, if you’ve seen one set of slimy phallic tentacles shooting out of someone’s back during orgasm, you’ve seen ’em all.” Sounds like a plan EW.)

Poster – Mating Skloging Begins (C-)

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(I like the color tone and the font (again), but there is a bit much going on now. What are all the sparkles everywhere? Stars and… a bunch of lines like in a western blot… because DNA or something?)

Tagline(s) – Mating season begins… (C-)

(Meh. It’s short and certainly tells you what this one is all about: some aliens going to the bone zone. Rad. But nothing clever about it.)

Keyword(s) – sex scene; Top Ten by BMeTric: 89.8 Fifty Shades of Grey (2015); 78.6 Sex and the City 2 (2010); 72.7 Jason X (2001); 71.4 Showgirls (1995); 67.3 Species II (1998); 65.3 The Boy Next Door (2015); 63.8 Knock Knock (I) (2015); 62.6 All About Steve (2009); 62.0 Jennifer’s Body (2009); 59.1 Captivity (2007);

(Pretty amazing list. Wish something like Color of Night could sneak in though, those classic 80’s/90’s erotic thrillers deserve a place on the list, some representative.)

Notes – Though showing Eve in a black leather outfit on some of the posters and DVD-Covers, she never actually wears it in the film.

Shortest of all four Species movies. (small blessings …)

EVE stands for Extraterrestrial Vulnerability Experiment. (Egad)

Most of the nude scenes, such as the debutantes having sex with Patrick or the strip-club sequence, were shortened in the final version of the movie. The full scenes can be seen in the DVD extra features. (No wonder someone stole the DVD from the Minnesota public library system)

Natasha Henstridge is on the miller lite cut out in the grocery store when they are hunting her. (nooooooooooo. Never a good idea. I hope the cut out says “Great taste, less filling, out of this world.” Get it? Cause she’s a famous alien.)

Are We Done Yet? Preview

Onwards and upwards to Chain Reaction. After painting ourselves into a corner last year we finally fully extricated ourselves from the mess by landing on Ride Along 2. This cycle we get to move from that to the Are We There Yet? Series through Ice Cube. While this is not the worst reviewed set of films in history (that would obviously go to Baby Geniuses and Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 with a shocking 2% and 0% RT scores, respectively), this is pretty spectacular in its own right with 11% and 8% RT scores for the two films. Also, it has the strange distinction of having the first film be totally original and then having the second film be a remake of the Cary Grant film Mr. Blanding Builds His Dream House (that was in turn based on a book which itself was expanded from a short story). Sometimes you can’t make this shit up. Let’s go! Finish up the week’s previews with the home-reno laugh-fest installment of the mega-franchise:

Are We Done Yet? (2007) – BMeTric: 64.7

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(Unlike its predecessor I’m not very surprised with how these graphics look because it is a sequel to a terrible film. I am rather delighted by how close the BMeTrics are (Are We There Yet? has a BMeTric of 62.5). The rating does regress to the mean more this time, although perhaps the rating is just rising to reach the equally terrible Are We There Yet?? I don’t know. Nice 2011 inflection like usual. Clockwork at this point.)

Leonard Maltin – 1.5 stars –  Inevitable sequel to Are We There Yet? Is also an official remake of the 1948 comedy Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (complete with RKO Radio PIctures logo), but Ice Cube isn’t Cary Grant and this script is much more bland than Blandings. Premise is basically the same: a man moves his growing family out of the crowded city and into his “dream house” in the suburbs, where everything goes wrong. Endlessly unfunny slapstick antics may have you looking at your watch and asking the real question: “Is it over yet?”

(Ugh, much more bland? As a person who has now seen Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House … I’m skeptical a movie could be more bland. Or at least I hope Are We Done Yet? isn’t as frustrating. I was squirming in my seat and only survived because of the telegraphed happy ending. Sigh.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Op8AlTe5Js8

(Boooooo. These don’t look like fun bad movies, they look like bad boring movies. You better not bore me for three hours. Give me something to latch onto, a little lifesaver I can float on in the rocking bad movie seas.)

Directors – Steve Carr – (Known For: Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life; Dr. Dolittle 2; BMT: Movie 43 (BMT); Are We Done Yet?; Paul Blart: Mall Cop (BMT); Daddy Day Care; Rebound; Next Friday; Notes:  Won the Razzie Award in 2014 for Worst Director for Movie 43; Wouldn’t be surprising to complete this guy’s filmography in the not-too-distant-future. Used to be a music video director and got his start with Next Friday after directing one of Ice Cube’s music videos. Currently attached to the terribly named Cinderfella which has a perfectly obvious plotline … it is Cinderella by the opposite.)

Writers – Hank Nelken (screenplay & screen story) – (BMT: Are We Done Yet?; Saving Silverman; Mama’s Boy; Notes: The only screenwriter on this project it would seem as the others are credited for either Are We There Yet? or the “original movie” Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House. This guy has a true blue pull-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps story starting in Mississippi and Texas making Bar Mitzvah videos and ultimately in Hollywood. He has no credits since 2011, but I would guess he’s been working behind the scenes for a while. He was at one point attached to a remake of the film Outlaw Blues.)

Steven Gary Banks and Claudia Grazioso (characters) – (BMT: Are We Done Yet?; Are We There Yet?; Notes: Wrote the predecessor Are We There Yet? Their note in that preview is quite interesting as it would seem they were tapped to write Just Go With It (probably with the intention of starring Ice Cube) which was eventually made without these guys and with Adam Sandler starring instead.)

Norman Panama (screenplay) – (Known For: Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House; White Christmas; The Court Jester; Road to Utopia; My Favorite Blonde; BMT: Are We Done Yet?; Notes: Long time writing partner with Frank. It is kind of amazing to see one of the founding partnerships of Hollywood, they started writing together at the University of Chicago in 1942! They only have a credit on this film because Are We Done Yet? Is apparently an adaptation of Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House, which is in turn based on a book, which was expanded from an original short story. I find it nuts that they so explicitly consider it an adaptation, the movie was made in 1950!)

Melvin Frank (screenplay) – (Known For: Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House; White Christmas; The Court Jester; A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum; A Touch of Class; Road to Utopia; My Favorite Blonde; BMT: Are We Done Yet?; The Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox; Notes: Long time writing partner with Panama. Considered to be by far the more successful of the two because after going their separate ways in the 1960s Frank continued to direct (including the Oscar winning film A Touch of Class) and produce. Fun fact: I’ve always meant to watch The Court Jester because it stars a young Angela Lansbury and I am a Murder She Wrote mega-fan. Not joking.)

Actors – Ice Cube – (Known For: xXx: Return of Xander Cage; 21 Jump Street; Friday; The Book of Life; 22 Jump Street; Boyz n the Hood; Barbershop: A Fresh Cut; Three Kings; Barbershop; Rampart; Higher Learning; Barbershop 2: Back in Business; Trespass; The Glass Shield; The Longshots; BMT: xXx²: State of the Union (BMT); Anaconda; Torque (BMT); Are We Done Yet?; Ghosts of Mars (BMT); Are We There Yet?; First Sunday; Lottery Ticket; Ride Along 2 (BMT); Friday After Next; I Got the Hook Up; All About the Benjamins; Dangerous Ground; Ride Along (BMT); Next Friday; The Players Club; Notes: It is always weird writing two previews back to back when the same actors are in both. I’ll just say that I would put him right up there with The Rock as far as people who I would watch in a movie based on charm alone.)

Nia Long – (Known For: Friday; Keanu; Boyz n the Hood; Boiler Room; Alfie; Soul Food; The Best Man; The Best Man Holiday; Lemon; Roxanne Roxanne; The Broken Hearts Club: A Romantic Comedy; BMT: Big Momma’s House 2 (BMT); Are We Done Yet?; Are We There Yet?; Big Momma’s House (BMT); Made in America; Premonition; The Single Moms Club; Held Up; Stigmata; Notes: Same as with Ice Cube, this is the third little write up I’ve done for here in about a month.  I would think Premonition is the last major BMT left in her filmography … which does actually qualify for our next planned cycle, Films That Got <10% on Rotten Tomatoes. So maybe a fourth Nia Long vehicle is coming our way.)

John C. McGinley – (Known For: Se7en; The Belko Experiment; Platoon; Office Space; Point Break; Identity; The Rock; Any Given Sunday; Wall Street; 42; Born on the Fourth of July; World Trade Center; Set It Off; Kid Cannabis; Nixon; BMT: Highlander II: The Quickening (BMT); The Animal; Are We Done Yet?; On Deadly Ground (BMT); Alex Cross (BMT); Get Carter (BMT); Summer Catch; Stealing Harvard; Car 54, Where Are You?; Get a Job; Wagons East; Wild Hogs (BMT); Three to Tango; Notes: I love McGinley and will look forward to completing his BMT filmography one day. Five movies is incredibly impressive. Favorite fact from IMDb? Raised in Millburn, NJ, and attended Millburn Senior High School, the alma mater of Anne Hathaway. Fun because that means he attended the same high school as bad movie mega-star Elliot Kalan of the Flop House, The Daily Show, and producer for the remake of Mystery Science Theater 3000.)

Budget/Gross – N/A / Domestic: $49,662,533 (Worldwide: $58,388,068)

(Interesting that there is no budget, so I can only really comment with regards to what I would consider to be a successful comedy and expectations given the first film. Considering that the first film got close to what I would call a comedy hit ($100 million) this was probably a disappointment. Perhaps it is why, I think, Ice Cube has not starred in a PG film since.)

#21 for the Comedy – Fish-Out-of-Water Father genre

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(Ah sliding right in there as the genre is dying. Classic. This came in right around Hall of Fame nominee Old Dogs. As I said in the Are We There Yet? preview the genre could potentially be dead? There hasn’t been a new contribution since 2013. Bumbling father is a classic though, I feel like it’ll come back.)

#59 for the Comedy – Sequel (Live Action) genre

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(Ride Along 2, Paul Blart 2, Big Momma 2, Be Cool and last week’s Miss Congeniality 2 are all live action comedy sequels we’ve seen in the last year or so! Coming in a shade above Miss Congeniality 2 is not a good look, and it came just as the genre was taking a little financial nap. Once they see a bit of money they bleed any and all potential franchises dry, that includes terrible family comedies with Ice Cube.)

#21 for the Comedy Remake genre

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(Ooooooo right at the end of producers yelling to their assistants: “Hey, Carl, what sweet IP we got?” and getting the response “Uh, Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House from 1948” … “Make that a sequel to something”. This comes in right above Yours, Mine and Ours (2005) and the genre has taken quite a hit recently with very few productions and a lackluster return from Ghostbusters.)

#20 for the Family – Remake genre

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(……. these last two graphics are basically the same. So yeah, Family/Comedy Remakes aren’t doing so hot. Actually, most comedy remakes are probably family oriented if the source material was from before the 80’s now that I think of it. This came in just below the classic Angels in the Outfield. Recently Jungle Book was a smash hit … wait a minute, these graphs don’t include the live action remakes of the Disney movies like Cinderella. That doesn’t really make sense but whatever.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 8% (7/93): Are We Done Yet? plays it way too safe with generic slapstick and uninspired domestic foibles.

(Less than 10% on rotten tomatoes is very rare, and more so when you consider that the film garnered almost 100 reviews. I think I can turn my brain off and enjoy generic slapstick. The domestic foibles on the other hand …)

Poster – Are Sklogs Done Yet? (D+)

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(This is the same poster as for the last one so why not copy that: There is a whole class of posters that a similar to this that I just hate, hate, hate. Too much empty space and not enough stylization of the characters on the poster. The font is still okay and, bonus, making Are Sklogs Done Yet? would be a bit harder because so much stuff is all over the title. I docked a grade because they plagiarized themselves.)

Tagline(s) – New house. New family. What could possibly go wrong? (F)

(Fuck this. This is the same as the last tagline too!! The last tagline was: 24 hours. 350 miles. His girlfriend’s kids. What could possibly go wrong? Everything. We get it. Everything can and will go wrong.)

Keyword(s) – renovation; Top Ten by BMeTric: 80.8 Home Alone 3 (1997); 74.1 Prom Night (I) (2008); 64.7 Are We Done Yet? (2007); 56.5 Poltergeist III (1988); 46.1 Meet the Browns (2008); 40.2 Xanadu (1980); 33.3 From Prada to Nada (2011); 26.4 Psychosis (I) (2010); 25.9 Baby Mama (2008); 24.1 Dark Shadows (2012);

(I think this is the first time I’ve found a keyword where we haven’t seen any of the movies. Xanadu will happen soon enough I think. Besides that though I don’t really see any of the others on the BMT horizon.)

Notes – A quote from Nick, “I don’t know karate, but I know ka-razay!” when he’s confronting Chuck, are actually lyrics from James Brown’s 1974 single “The Payback” from the album of the same name.

Shipped to theaters under the name “Needs Work” (I honestly hate these “fun” facts. It just never seems all that important what a movie shipped as, nor are they ever clever or funny)

When Nick tells Chuck, who is played by John C. McGinley, that he feels good sitting on a private toilet, Chuck says, “Feeling good is good enough.” That line is said by Willem Dafoe in the 1986 Oscar winner Platoon, which stars McGinley. (Fun fact I guess)

Ice Cube was approached to do another sequel, but declined, saying that he wanted to go in a different direction. He then proposed that the movie idea be turned into a TV show, which it did: Are We There Yet? (2010). (Smart. Ice Cube seems like a smart dude. My guess is he realized he didn’t want to be shoehorned into family comedies like Eddie Murphy, Adam Sandler, and Martin Lawrence seemed to be. Also my guess as to why the writers got dropped from Just Go With It when they realized they couldn’t get Cube)

Are We There Yet? Preview

Onwards and upwards to Chain Reaction. After painting ourselves into a corner last year we finally fully extricated ourselves from the mess by landing on Ride Along 2. This cycle we get to move from that to the Are We There Yet? Series through Ice Cube. While this is not the worst reviewed set of films in history (that would obviously go to Baby Geniuses and Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 with a shocking 2% and 0% RT scores, respectively), this is pretty spectacular in its own right with 11% and 8% RT scores for the two films. Also, it has the strange distinction of having the first film be totally original and then having the second film be a remake of the Cary Grant film Mr. Blanding Builds His Dream House (that was in turn based on a book which itself was expanded from a short story). Sometimes you can’t make this shit up. Let’s go! To start the road trip extravaganza:

Are We There Yet? (2005) – BMeTric: 62.5

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(There are two interesting things in these graphs. First, I’m genuinely surprised at how high the BMeTric is. I would have assumed a film with a sequel wouldn’t have been a complete catastrophe. Second, if you ignore the initial uptick the rating is pretty stable over the years and at a surprisingly low 4.2(ish). All signs point to this being a simply terrible film. Can’t wait.)

Leonard Maltin – 1.5 stars –  If you wait long enough, just about anything can happen, including Ice Cube turning into Fred MacMurray. Actor Cube isn’t the problem here, but a stale premise is: the child-hating owner of a sports memorabilia store transports two headstrong kids over a long, disaster-prone trip to Vancouver, all to help hottie-mama Lond out of a scheduling ham while getting into her good graces. Before turning in this box-office success, director Levant did Problem Child 2 and Snow Dogs. Forewarned is forearmed.

(So much to unpack here. (1) Forewarned is forearmed? I honestly had never heard the phrase until now and it just seems so strangely out of place to me. And yet looking it up it dates to at least the 16th century and has been used throughout the years and has a quite literal meaning. (2) Calling out the director specifically for Problem Child 2, who do you think you are Leonard … me? (3) Name dropping Fred MacMurray in a review of an Ice Cube family comedy. All bold moves. Something just makes me love this entire review.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cn7IPP2bc5c

(Wow the music. I will say this though: this is a straight kids movie, why are we watching this and how are we going to judge it. Also the Paul Bunyan Ax would have seriously injured Ice Cube)

Directors – Brian Levant – (BMT: The Flintstones; The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas; Are We There Yet?; Problem Child 2; Snow Dogs; Jingle All the Way; The Spy Next Door; Beethoven; Notes:  Won the Razzie Award in 1995 for Worst Screenplay for The Flintstones; Nominated for the Razzie Award in 1997 for Worst Director for Jingle All the Way; Notable television writer starting his career on the Jeffersons and writing for other huge shows like Happy Days. He wrote Sklog childhood staple Problem Child 2. Egad, imagine doing that for BMT?! Gross.)

Writers – Steven Gary Banks and Claudia Grazioso (story & screenplay) – (BMT: Are We Done Yet?; Are We There Yet?; Notes: Writing duo. Not much about them … but their not-a-movie Family Dude seems to morph into Just Go With It, no? Just in Hawaii with Adam Sandler instead of Montana. That is kind of nuts, they must have landed Sandler and then cut Banks and Grazioso free. As a matter of fact I wonder if they were thinking of Just Go With It as the third Are We There Yet? movie starring Ice Cube as well. Would have had to be a different character though, he doesn’t need to pretend to have a family. But perhaps it was supposed to be Cube’s next PG film and he bailed in favor of better projects.)

David Stem (screenplay) – (Known For: Shrek 2; Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius; The Rugrats Movie; Rugrats in Paris; BMT: Daddy Day Camp; Are We There Yet?; The Smurfs (BMT); The Smurfs 2 (BMT); Clockstoppers; Notes: Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2008 for Worst Screenplay for Daddy Day Camp; The next two have also been writing partners since 1992. These guys worked on the Nickelodeon classic Roundhouse! Be still my beating heart. Is in the process of writing the sequel to Enchanted with Amy Adams.)

David N. Weiss (screenplay) – (Known For: Shrek 2; All Dogs Go to Heaven; Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius; The Rugrats Movie; Rugrats in Paris; BMT: Daddy Day Camp; Are We There Yet?; The Smurfs (BMT); The Smurfs 2 (BMT); Clockstoppers; Rock-A-Doodle; Notes:  Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2008 for Worst Screenplay for Daddy Day Camp; Before he teamed up with Sterm this guy wrote All Dogs Go to Heaven and Rock-A-Doodle. I’m star struck over here. He’s written several children’s books and both Weiss and Stern were nominated for an Emmy as part of the writing team behind Rugrats.)

Actors – Ice Cube – (Known For: xXx: Return of Xander Cage; 21 Jump Street; Friday; The Book of Life; 22 Jump Street; Boyz n the Hood; Barbershop: A Fresh Cut; Three Kings; Barbershop; Rampart; Higher Learning; Barbershop 2: Back in Business; Trespass; The Glass Shield; The Longshots; BMT: xXx²: State of the Union (BMT); Anaconda; Torque (BMT); Are We Done Yet?; Ghosts of Mars (BMT); Are We There Yet?; First Sunday; Lottery Ticket; Ride Along 2 (BMT); Friday After Next; I Got the Hook Up; All About the Benjamins; Dangerous Ground; Ride Along (BMT); Next Friday; The Players Club; Notes: Slowly creeping up the ladder of BMT legends. Obviously most famous for being part of NWA and in my opinion he has made an incredible transition to acting. Seeing xXx 3 as non-BMT makes me sick to my stomach. Disgusting.)

Nia Long – (Known For: Friday; Keanu; Boyz n the Hood; Boiler Room; Alfie; Soul Food; The Best Man; The Best Man Holiday; Lemon; Roxanne Roxanne; The Broken Hearts Club: A Romantic Comedy; BMT: Big Momma’s House 2 (BMT); Are We Done Yet?; Are We There Yet?; Big Momma’s House (BMT); Made in America; Premonition; The Single Moms Club (BMT); Held Up; Stigmata; Notes:  Against all odds these two movies will be the second and third Nia Long movies we’ve watched in this cycle alone! If only she had appeared in Big Momma Like Father Like Son. The younger half-sister of comedian Sommore)

Also stars Aleisha Allen (who was in School of Rock)

Budget/Gross – $32 million / Domestic: $82,674,398 (Worldwide: $97,918,663)

(That is a pretty significant success so not shocking they made a sequel. Anything near $100 million is quite good for a comedy.)

#10 for the Comedy – Fish-Out-of-Water Father genre

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(This comes in right above a recent BMT (Cheaper by the Dozen) and far above Hall of Fame inductee Old Dogs. Naturally right at the peak of as genre which may or may not attempt a comeback soon. The fact that zero films have been placed in this genre on Box Office Mojo since 2013 makes me think the odds aren’t good.)

#10 for the Comedy – Road Trip genre

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(I love it! I feel like we haven’t seen a “novel” trend in one of these in a while. Here the genre was put to quite the long term test from around 2000-2010. Given how there was an intense burst with Dumb and Dumber in 1995 and then the genre slowly climbed its was back to reasonable box office returns, I’m surprised by the lull in 2010. If I were to guess it is, like many other things, a genre that kind of got pushed to the side as tentpoles were being hastily assembled. It is nice to see that it has recovered and has not been relegated to VOD forevermore … although recent ones have not been great including the sequel to the aforementioned Dumb and Dumberer. This came in near the reviled Tammy. BMT classic Wild Hogs came in number one, where’s my sequel?!)

Rotten Tomatoes – 11% (13/116): This supposed family comedy staring [sic] the usually blameless Ice Cube and Nia Long has provoked most critics to write, “Is it over yet?”

(Hilarious type in the consensus. Not actually as uncommon as you would think. For an initial movie in a two part series that score is very very low. Supposed comedy is a little concerning. Sounds … boring.)

Poster – Are We Sklog Yet? (C-)

are_we_there_yet

(There is a whole class of posters that a similar to this that I just hate, hate, hate. Too much empty space and not enough stylization of the characters on the poster. Here the font is OK and the visual tells me a story so not a total loss. For the record: it would still be really easy to make Are We Sklog Yet?)

Tagline(s) – 24 hours. 350 miles. His girlfriend’s kids. What could possibly go wrong? (D-)

(That is for real the tagline for this film and it is terrifying. Like the worst. Can’t give it an F though cause it does give me some tantalizing details about the plot. What could possibly go wrong indeed.)

Keyword(s) – car fire; Top Ten by BMeTric: 62.5 Are We There Yet? (2005); 62.3 The Last Exorcism Part II (2013); 59.9 Cell (I) (2016); 56.7 The 5th Wave (2016); 55.7 Spring Breakers (2012); 53.2 Cold Creek Manor (2003); 49.9 Point Break (2015); 46.1 Sleepwalkers (1992); 42.1 The Black Dahlia (2006); 41.6 Southland Tales (2006);

(Thinking about it I can’t wait to watch Southland Tales. Somehow that has just flown under the radar for years. Otherwise a sparse list with the 5th Wave seeming particularly weak … kind of amazing it is near 60 BMeTric at the moment)

Notes – Ice Cube’s first PG-rated movie. (And I think this series is his only foray into that genre. Prob will stay that way I would think)

Actor Ice Cube stated on Late Night with Conan O’Brien (1993) that this film was originally intended as an Adam Sandler vehicle. (Jeez, that makes a ton of sense)

Despite the film’s title, “Are We There Yet?” is only said once in the film. (Small blessings)

Kevin said his mom (Nia Long) thinks Nick is better looking than Taye Diggs. Nia Long and Taye Diggs played love interests in The Best Man and The Best Man Holiday. (fun facts)

When Nick is asked what Suzanne’s kids names are, he answers ‘Theo and Rudy [Huxtable]’ from The Cosby Show (1984). (ooooof that joke has not aged well to say the least)