Oh man, so get this. I’m Mister Web, Madame Web’s long lost brother. But also get this, instead of giving me like future predicting powers instead the spider bite just made me super sick and gave me amnesia. Now I can’t remember a thing. Do you remember what happened in Madame Web?
1) A bit of set up here. Madame Web falls into a river and reawakens her nascent spider powers. What was she doing when she fell into the river?
2) Meanwhile, the eeeeeeeevil Ezekial Sims is just using spider powers for evil, nbd. But he has an issue, and that issue is a super scary dream. What happens in this dream?
3) In order to address this dream Ezekial decides he basically needs like … that computer system Morgan Freeman builds for Batman in The Dark Knight. How does Ezekial get that sweet computer system?
4) Oooooo, actual trivia. What song do the girls dance to in the diner?
5) In the finale at the fireworks factory in Queens Madame Web uses her uh … like teleportation powers or some shit to save the girls. What super secret power do they use (that Madame Web taught them) to save her life in turn?
Bonus Question: Right after getting out of my fifth showing of Madame Web, puzzled as always (I need to see it a sixth time I guess) I get a call from my agent Harold. What does he want?
“That was beautiful,” Jamie says, tears in his eyes. “Yeah, I know,” Samantha replies, “but I think we should escape the Fashion Police before going into more detail about how great it is.” When they turn to run, though, they find themselves in a jail cell with the rest of the gang. “What thuuuu,” Jamie says dumbly. “Yeah, well this is what happens when you read a full book to each other when we should be running from the Fashion Police,” Patrick says, his voice dripping with disdain. “So what do we do now? You don’t think *gasp* we could be put to death for our Fashion Crimes?” Jamie says, his knees quaking. “Nah, I got a lawyer,” Kyle mumbles through a mouthful of apple fritter the jailer snuck him because everyone loves Kyle. “Rachel,” he finishes. Jamie and Patrick gawk at him. “The pretzel girl… er… I mean, you’re wife/pretzel girl!” Jamie exclaims. Kyle nods, taking a filet mignon from the jailer. “That’s right,” he says proudly, “turns out the pretzels, while delicious, were funding her law degree.” “Great!” Samantha says, “then we’ll be out in no time.” Kyle coughs through a mouthful of creme brulee. “Well, uh, maybe not no time,” he says, “more like once she’s done with the other cases on her docket.” Jamie and Patrick cannot believe how boring this all is. “This is so boring,” Jamie says exasperated, “if this were a book and someone had to read it they wouldn’t even believe just how boring it is and would wonder why they were even reading it.” Now it’s time for Samantha to cough. “We could always read something that everyone agrees isn’t boring,” she says, tapping her next Holly Ween book, Holly Ween’s Llama Drama. That’s right! It’s not llama drama for us, but rather another LIVE! BMT. You know we couldn’t pass up some Madame Web action. It’s Madame Web! Let’s go!
Madame Web (2024) – BMeTric: 77.8; Notability: 33
StreetCreditReport.com –BMeTric: top 0.0%; Notability: top 0.8%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 6.7%; Higher Notability: Argylle, Lift; Lower RT: Air Force One Down, The Painter, Wanted Man; Notes: Hellllllll yeah. That BMeTric ain’t never going down. This is probably one of the only 75+ in years. One second. Only the fourth since 2020. Space Jam 2 is the one very notable one.
RogerEbert.com – 2.5 stars – “Madame Web” is not the unmitigated disaster that its clunky trailer or its calendar spot in February would suggest. It’s the big, noisy action sequences that bog “Madame Web” down. Yes, they’re crucial to the genre, but they’re also the least interesting part. And you don’t need to be clairvoyant to know that more movies in this series are in store.
(Uuuuuuuh, I think that might be wrong. This franchise seems directly on the DCEU path of getting thrown right into the dumpster. Like … why make Madame Web 2 again? Why have like a Kraven the Hunter and Morbius team up again? It doesn’t make sense.)
(“He was with my mother in the Amazon when she was researching spiders right before she died,” is officially an iconic film quote. Not really for the reason you would imagine, but it was joked about not once but twice at the 2024 Oscars.)
Directors – S.J. Clarkson – ( BMT: Madame Web; Notes: Directed a ton of television, but this was her shot at a bit film. She has nothing on the docket so … I don’t know that it was a very successful debut.)
Writers – Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless– ( Known For: Power Rangers; Future BMT: Dracula Untold; BMT: Morbius; Gods of Egypt; The Last Witch Hunter; Madame Web; Notes: Also wrote Morbius, so they are clearly in a major position for the bizarro Sony Spiderman universe they are building.)
Claire Parker – ( Notes: A producer of a bunch of British shows. I assume she got into writing this since she shares a background with Clarkson to some degree.)
S.J. Clarkson – ( BMT: Madame Web; Notes: The only thing she’s written is a British series called Mistresses. And she got credit for the American story based on that.)
Kerem Sanga – ( Known For: First Girl I Loved; The Violent Heart; The Young Kieslowski; BMT: Madame Web; Notes: This writing room is wild. Like … I don’t know any of these films and then suddenly Madame Web out of nowhere.)
Actors – Dakota Johnson – ( Known For: The Social Network; 21 Jump Street; Black Mass; Bad Times at the El Royale; The Five-Year Engagement; The Peanut Butter Falcon; How to Be Single; Suspiria; The Lost Daughter; Persuasion; A Bigger Splash; Cha Cha Real Smooth; Wounds; Our Friend; The High Note; Date and Switch; Goats; Cymbeline; For Ellen; Chloe and Theo; Future BMT: Crazy in Alabama; BMT: Fifty Shades of Grey; Need for Speed; Fifty Shades Darker; Beastly; Fifty Shades Freed; Madame Web; Notes: People deny it, but it is true, there is an effortless charisma to Dakota Johnson that I can’t explain. It is wild that she was in the Fifty Shades films. It is also crazy that we’ve almost seen all of her BMT films.)
Sydney Sweeney – ( Known For: Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood; Under the Silver Lake; The Ward; Anyone But You; The Voyeurs; Night Teeth; Reality; Big Time Adolescence; Nocturne; Spiders; ZMD: Zombies of Mass Destruction; Dead Ant; Clementine; Angels in Stardust; The Martial Arts Kid; Americana; BMT: Madame Web; Notes: Nominated for two Emmys for Euphoria and The White Lotus. Amazing that two of the biggest stars currently are both from that show.)
Isabela Merced – ( Known For: Sicario: Day of the Soldado; Instant Family; Sweet Girl; Dora and the Lost City of Gold; Let It Snow; Migration; Father of the Bride; Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life; Rosaline; Spirit Untamed; The House That Jack Built; Future BMT: The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature; BMT: Transformers: The Last Knight; Madame Web; Notes: Was a Nickelodeon star and was Dora in the live action film. Do we ever do The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature? Who knows.)
Budget/Gross – $80 million / Domestic: $27,783,405 (Worldwide: $53,576,774)
(Of course this is a disaster. There was no other way it could go. I honestly can’t believe they actually produced this film and released it to theaters.)
Rotten Tomatoes – 13% (27/208): Madame Web’s earnest approach to the title character’s origin story has a certain appeal, but its predictable plot and uneven execution make for a forgettable superhero adventure.
(What is this consensus. Give the people what they want! This film is a disaster area and seems almost like a parody orchestrated by the same person who put those limes in Dakota Johnson’s house. That’s my consensus.)
Reviewer Highlight: “Madame Web” is a dud, but it’s one that Johnson transcends long before the final credits roll. – Manohla Dargis, New York Times
(Yes. Yes. Yes. That is a mess in the most delightful way. Nice font though. C-.)
Tagline(s) – Her web connects them all (C-)
(Sure, why not? A perfect amount of laziness in that tagline. It’s like Dakota Johnson wrote it herself.)
Keyword(s) – year 2024
Top 10: The Beekeeper (2024), Teri Baaton Mein Aisa Uljha Jiya (2024), Color of Victory (2024), Fighter (2024), Lift (2024), Argylle (2024), Merry Christmas (2024), Guntur Kaaram (2024), Hanu Man (2024), Madame Web (2024)
Future BMT: 57.3 Night Swim (2024)
BMT: Madame Web (2024), Argylle (2024)
Best Options:75.4 Madame Web (2024), 57.3 Night Swim (2024)
(Helllllllll yeah, we couldn’t miss a 75+, it was impossible. We had to pull the trigger on a second Live early in the year. Quite rare. But also, we have been doing a good job hitting big films during the year. I think these have both been good choices.)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 18) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Dakota Johnson is No. 1 billed in Madame Web and No. 6 billed in Beastly, which also stars Alex Pettyfer (No. 1 billed) who is in Endless Love (No. 1 billed) which also stars Bruce Greenwood (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 6 billed) => (1 + 6) + (1 + 1) + (3 + 6) = 18. There is no shorter path at the moment.
Notes – According to Dakota Johnson in an interview with The Wrap, the screenplay underwent extensive rewrites, saying, “There were drastic changes, and I can’t even tell you what they were”. The original screenplay, which was described as darker and “very ‘Terminator’ inspired,” would have seen Madame Web and the Spider-Women trying to protect a pregnant Mary Parker from Ezekiel Sims, who wants to kill her to prevent the birth of Peter Parker.
Dakota Johnson said, “I’ve never really done a movie where you are on a blue screen, and there’s fake explosions going off, and someone’s going, ‘Explosion!’ and you act like there’s an explosion. That, to me, was absolutely psychotic. I was like, ‘I don’t know if this is going to be good at all! I hope that I did an OK job!’ But I trusted [director S.J. Clarkson]. She works so hard, and she has not taken her eyes off this movie since we started.”
Dakota Johnson left her agency WME in favor of CAA less than a week after the first trailer for this movie dropped. According to Variety, this “raised industry eyebrows,” and generated unfounded rumors that Johnson didn’t like the movie. However, The Hollywood Reporter found that “since CAA was also willing to represent her production company, TeaTime Pictures, along with her indie film, ‘Daddio'” which will be released by Sony Pictures Classics, it is likely the seemingly suspicious timing for the move was nothing more than film-business shuffling.
Dakota Johnson did much of the stunt driving in the film herself, including that of the taxi and the ambulance. She expressed she wanted to perform the stunt where the vehicle drives into a diner but the stunt team wouldn’t let her.
You better believe it’s time to finally put to rest the Halloween series and end its BMT reign of terror. Much like Michael Myers it is an unstoppable force of lore. Even when you think they are rebooting the franchise they can’t escape the lore that weighs heavy on their souls. That sums up the first of the reboot films, once again titled Halloween, which appears to serve a singular purpose: to tell everyone that Laurie Strode is in fact NOT Michael Myers’ sister. Literally every other dumb thing in the franchise? We love it and you also love it so that’s how we’ll make the movie. We shall construct the entire film of references. Is it Spring? Cause I’m finding all these easter eggs in my movie. Yummy yummy. But you better forget Laurie Strode being Michael Myers’ sister. That’s not an easter egg. That’s duuuuuummmbbbbbbbb. Sorry, I didn’t even like the first film in this reboot… and that got great reviews! I’m sure the second will be better.
To recap, Michael Myers is back, Jack! This time he’s surviving a big ol’ fire and starting back up on his rampage. Laurie Strode is in the hospital and everyone just wants her to get better (awww). So when they hear that Myers actually survived they want to keep it from her. But her granddaughter Allyson is like ‘F that fo sho,” and joins up with Tommy Doyle (just can’t stop, won’t stop bringing everything back) to hunt him down. Once Laurie wakes up she finds out about Michael and is all like “He’s definitely coming here because he targets me for some unknown reason even though I’m not even his sister cause that would be dumb.” Everyone gets all jazzed to the point when a different escaped asylum patient stumbles his way into the hospital they all chase him to his death. It’s hilarious (no, no really. It’s unintentionally hilarious). Oh right, I forgot, Michael is still killing people this whole time, but it’s random. Tommy, Allyson and the gang catch up with him. Guess what? He kills some of them. They then track him to his old house where he kills them some more. Eventually Laurie’s daughter Karen is able to lure him to his “death.” So that’s about that. Or is it? It’s not, come on. He wakes up and kills a bunch more people. THE END.
Oh nooooo! It wasn’t better at all. In fact it was way worse. The scene in the middle of the film where a different escaped mental patient is being chased by a mob and eventually jumps to his death is peak unintentional comedy. They could have played it during I Think You Should Leave and I wouldn’t have blinked. The first film had me thinking “we get it, Laurie Strode isn’t Michael’s sister. Give it a rest,” and it’s like the filmmakers heard me and said “Oh yeah, watch this.” The entire second act of the film seems to be made expressly to hammer home that Laurie isn’t special at all. That everyone assumed Myers had a reason for his kills, but he doesn’t. Great… so why did you spend so much time going on about how everyone thinks Michael and Laurie are connected? Why in this world would that even be a thing? It feels very Scream-ish… as if the whole series of films exist in this world and so everyone is trying to guess Michael’s next move based on their years of accumulated knowledge about him… but he’s just an old dude who escaped once before and killed some people. The meta-ness of it broke my brain and my spirit. I really did not like this movie. What have you done to my sweet, dear Halloween. Don’t you remember when you were young and full of hilarious lore? Why have you forsaken me?!!!!
Hot Take Clam Bake! You guessed it. Halloween.. You doth protest too much. Methinks Laurie Strode is in fact Michael Myers’ sister. Let’s look at the facts. First, you protested far too much. I didn’t even think she was his sister until you brought it up. Second, we don’t have any proof that he isn’t her sister. Have you seen a genetic test? Didn’t think so. So why are you doth protesting so much? Are you afraid of what the truth will reveal? Finally, have you thought about how funny it would be if in the third film they were suddenly like “you know what… fuck… she actually is his sister.” Just for that it’s got to be true. It’s just too good. Hot Take Temperature: A house aflame.
Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! Are we talking about people tricking fans into thinking Halloween was back Jack, when in reality it was just as out as it has ever been? Let’s go!
While watching the Rob Zombie Halloween I didn’t find that vision particularly compelling, but at least it was something. The second of his seemed to be intentionally provocative and a bit more annoying as he seemed to clearly not want to do a sequel.
But compared to this one? At least it had something to say. I guess a brief discussion of the first in the Green trilogy is warranted. That one positions itself as a direct sequel to the original (interesting) and explicitly throws out Laurie being Michael’s sister (excellent). After that though for the most part the film once again fails to have anything interesting to say. It tends to just reheat a bunch of leftovers from the now deprecated sequels (e.g. the gas station bathroom scene which is pretty much directly from the sixth I think). The only thing I would say is it ends on something of a high note as a coordinated effort by Laurie and her daughter manage to trick and trap Michael in a way that I found both surprising and delightful.
Now as for this one … it all turns to ashes in my mouth.
The movie is not scary, and seems to have too many characters moving all about Haddonfield with call backs to the original 70s film and the first Green film galore.
It then also has, bar none, perhaps the most embarrassing sequence in Halloween film history. This is for a franchise where the Cult of Thorn creates a zombie Michael Myers to yada yada yada something about Celtic lore and living forever maybe (or was that the third film …). The scene in the hospital where the mob is chasing the other mental patient who ultimately commits suicide … it is like a parody film. It is shot like shit, the music is shit, the idea is shit. If that bit wasn’t in the movie it is maybe passable, but right there the movie shows its hand a bit: when introducing novel elements to the franchise it flails about completely. It really can only reheat and reserve the elements we already know, and that is either inevitable for a franchise with 13 films now, or the unfortunate product of having Green as writer/director … his track record now suggests it might be the latter.
Anyways, the film was lame. So was Exorcist: Belieber. Why can’t people get these reboots even close to being right?
I did end up watching Halloween Ends. I have to say, at least it was somewhat inventive? I don’t really like what it was putting down. In a way, it is a bit like that Friday the 13th film where it turned out it was a copycat the whole time. It feels like a cheat to have a lot of the kills being done by not-Michael Myers. But I appreciate the interesting twist. It is an idea that skirts alongside the genetic connection with the niece in the original later sequels, but it is something I feel like the Halloween franchise needed to broach. It was okay.
Obviously an always great Settings as a Character (What?) for Haddonfield, Illinois. An A+ Holiday Film (When?) for Halloween of course. And a terrible no good Worst Twist (How?) for the dumb bit where people fuck around and find out that Michael Myers is an unstoppable killer and he kills everyone and gets away, dumb. I think this is a dumb Bad film, blah.
Oh, man so get this! I killed this guy (long story), but then he didn’t die, he instead totally survived the fire I set in my house. Lame. Well, he was peeved and later came and bopped me on the head. Now I don’t remember a thing. Do you remember what happened in Halloween Kills?
Pop Quiz Hot Shot!
1) The movie opens with an alternative version of the Halloween ending, picking up where the first movie left off. How was Michael caught shortly after the initial murders in this version?
2) We are soon introduced to the Haddonfield Survivors Club. How many members are they and how do they know Michael from the first film?
3) Who lives in the old Myers house now?
4) Throughout the film they keep on mistaking someone else for Michael. Who?
5) Well, what a twist! He isn’t after Laurie at all. He just wants to go home (awwwww). All those years ago, what was he looking out of his sister’s bedroom window?
Bonus Question: I just finished up a draft of my Hellraiser reboot, Hellraiser Kills, when my new agent Greg calls me. What does he want?
Jane is just a plain ol’ girl living a plain ol’ life. Other than the fact that she’s the big time author of the tween rom com hit Holly Ween the Scream Queen. Oh, Holly is everything that she isn’t. Cool, calm, and beautiful. Sigh. One day she returns home to find her latest manuscript stolen and a note demanding that she hand over Holly in exchange for the book. But Holly isn’t real… is she? Only one way to find out. Returning home to the high school where she spent four mortifying years as Plain Jane Never-Been-Kissed she dons a Holly Ween disguise and reenters school as a 25-year-old senior who just got out of a 7 year coma. And wait… is she suddenly hot and cool? Must be just the disguise because she’ll never be anything but Plain Jane Never-Been-Kissed at heart… or will she? Cause in walks captain of the football team Brad who also just got out of a 7 year coma so is also 25-years-old. Just when he is about to ask her to the Homecoming Dance the book thieves take over the school demanding that Jane hand over Holly. Uh oh! She can’t have Brad finding out she’s actually Plain Jane! She’s got to think quickly! In a snap she gets the Homecoming committee to change the dance to a Halloween Costume Bash and dons a Plain Jane disguise. During the dance she is able to smooch Brad, convince the thieves that Holly is on her way, and set up a trap with the help of all her friends. Turns out that Holly was inside Jane the whole time and her new book Holly Ween Slays is a huge hit.
“Wow,” Jamie says, thinking that Holly Ween doesn’t just slay… Samantha does too. That’s right! We are watching the second (and only qualifying) entry in the new Halloween trilogy. Don’t be tricked by the title, though, as it seems from the reviews that this Halloween didn’t quite kill. Let’s go!
StreetCreditReport.com –BMeTric: top 8.4%; Notability: top 3.2%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 18.6%; Higher BMeT: Space Jam: A New Legacy, Home Sweet Home Alone, Cosmic Sin, Thunder Force, He’s All That, Deadly Illusions, Music, The Misfits, After We Fell, The Kissing Booth 3, Awake, Mother/Android, Apex, Spiral, Midnight in the Switchgrass, The Unholy, Tom & Jerry, Things Heard & Seen, Outside the Wire, Snake Eyes, and 1 more; Higher Notability: Space Jam: A New Legacy, Tom & Jerry, Chaos Walking, Music, Infinite, The Addams Family 2, Home Sweet Home Alone, Dear Evan Hansen; Lower RT: Cosmic Sin, Music, Midnight in the Switchgrass, After We Fell, Breaking News in Yuba County, Apex, Home Sweet Home Alone, Infinite, The Misfits, Intrusion, The Virtuoso, The Starling, Every Breath You Take, Deadly Illusions, Chaos Walking, Thunder Force, Awake, Sweet Girl, The Kissing Booth 3, Hypnotic, and 24 more; Notes: Wow, we really haven’t seen that many 2021 films, but I suppose that is because a lot of them are on streaming now. Remember Music … that’s a wild film.
RogerEbert.com – 2.0 stars – My feeling about David Gordon Green’s reboot of “Halloween” in 2018 was that the talented director fundamentally misunderstood what worked about the John Carpenter original, draining the project of actual tension, despite a few solid set pieces. Having seen his follow-up, “Halloween Kills,” I think I was right. This film muddies its entire concept with a bizarre, unrefined commentary on mob mentality that is quite simply some of the worst material in either Green’s career and the history of this rocky franchise (which is saying something if you’ve seen, say, “Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers”). It’s a shame too because, once again, there are set pieces that work—and the ones here are particularly brutal—but campy dialogue that calls attention to itself, too much fan service in the references department, sidelining Laurie Strode herself for most of the project, and truly inconsistent characters lead to a final result that definitely doesn’t kill. It barely even wounds.
(Wow … I actually agree. The first has a few interesting bits, but at the same time it mostly is a bunch of bits from the prior films strung together. The second is bad and has the single most embarrassing moment in the history of the franchise. Which, indeed, is saying something.)
(Immediately off to a bad start with the firefighter scene. I feel like if anything the first deftly replicated the less violent and more tense version that Rob Zombie abandoned. But not this one. Not at all.)
Directors – David Gordon Green – ( Known For: Pineapple Express; Halloween; Halloween Ends; Joe; Stronger; Prince Avalanche; Snow Angels; All the Real Girls; Undertow; George Washington; Manglehorn; Future BMT: Your Highness; The Sitter; Our Brand Is Crisis; BMT: Halloween Kills; The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: Now that he’s out for Exorcist: Deceiver I do wonder what he’ll be up to. Seems like maybe it is time for another smaller film … but something tells me he’s going to be roped into another big production where people mess with his film and it ends up sucking.)
Writers – John Carpenter – ( Known For: Halloween; Halloween; Escape from New York; They Live; The Fog; Assault on Precinct 13; Halloween H20: 20 Years Later; Escape from L.A.; Halloween Ends; Assault on Precinct 13; Prince of Darkness; Dark Star; Eyes of Laura Mars; Black Moon Rising; BMT: Halloween; Halloween II; Halloween Kills; Ghosts of Mars; Halloween: Resurrection; Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers; Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers; The Fog; Notes: Ha, we’ve seen all his BMT films. Surprisingly few, given how many bad Halloween films there are.)
Debra Hill – ( Known For: Halloween; Halloween; The Fog; Halloween H20: 20 Years Later; Escape from L.A.; Halloween Ends; BMT: Halloween; Halloween II; Halloween Kills; Halloween: Resurrection; Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers; Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers; The Fog; Notes: Worked with Carpenter for years, so naturally we also got her completely done for BMT as well.)
Scott Teems – ( Known For: The Quarry; That Evening Sun; Future BMT: Insidious: The Red Door; BMT: Halloween Kills; The Exorcist: Believer; Firestarter; Notes: Seems like just one of those guys brought in to write modern horror films.)
Danny McBride – ( Known For: Halloween; Halloween Ends; The Foot Fist Way; The Legacy of a Whitetail Deer Hunter; Future BMT: Your Highness; BMT: Halloween Kills; The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: Y’all know Danny McBride. Friends with Green, and they have written a bunch of modern horror now as well … to mixed effect.)
David Gordon Green – ( Known For: Halloween; Halloween Ends; Prince Avalanche; Snow Angels; All the Real Girls; Undertow; George Washington; Goat; BMT: Halloween Kills; The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: Yeah, at some point it seems like the horror films he writes and directs just lack soul.)
Actors – Jamie Lee Curtis – ( Known For: Knives Out; Everything Everywhere All at Once; Halloween; True Lies; Halloween; Trading Places; Escape from New York; A Fish Called Wanda; Freaky Friday; My Girl; The Fog; Halloween H20: 20 Years Later; Halloween Ends; Veronica Mars; Forever Young; The Tailor of Panama; Beverly Hills Chihuahua; Fierce Creatures; Prom Night; Blue Steel; Future BMT: You Again; My Girl 2; Drowning Mona; House Arrest; BMT: Halloween II; Halloween Kills; Halloween III: Season of the Witch; Christmas with the Kranks; Halloween: Resurrection; Haunted Mansion; Virus; Perfect; Notes: That’s Oscar winner Jamie Lee Curtis to you. The daughter of Tony Curtis, she is in many ways the original Scream Queen.)
Judy Greer – ( Known For: Ant-Man; Jurassic World; Dawn of the Planet of the Apes; Ant-Man and the Wasp; Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3; War for the Planet of the Apes; The Village; The Descendants; Love & Other Drugs; What Women Want; 13 Going on 30; Adaptation.; Tomorrowland; Three Kings; 27 Dresses; Halloween; Carrie; Halloween Ends; Jeff, Who Lives at Home; Where’d You Go, Bernadette; Future BMT: Entourage; Elizabethtown; Cursed; Love Happens; Men, Women & Children; Jawbreaker; American Dreamz; Playing with Fire; Kissing a Fool; BMT: Halloween Kills; The Wedding Planner; The 15:17 to Paris; Playing for Keeps; Marmaduke; Notes: I’ll always know her as Kitty from Arrested Development. Oh boy do I not want to watch the Entourage movie ever.)
Andi Matichak – ( Known For: Halloween; Halloween Ends; Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List; Son; Assimilate; Miles; Foxhole; BMT: Halloween Kills; Notes: Yeah, doesn’t seem to have many other credits. Like she’s been in movies, but not much television and has nothing on the docket. Quite surprising. I thought she was fine in the whole trilogy.)
(That is obviously quite good. I can’t imagine they are hugely disappointed with the trilogy as a whole, so it makes sense that they gave Green The Exorcist … seems like that was a mistake though.)
Rotten Tomatoes – 39% (108/278): Halloween Kills should satisfy fans in search of brute slasher thrills, but in terms of advancing the franchise, it’s a bit less than the sum of its bloody parts.
(Soooooooo close, but it did make it. And well deserved. I can’t imagine this really satisfies any slasher fans, so I don’t get that point.)
Reviewer Highlight: An indolent, narratively impoverished mess that substitutes corpses for characters and slogans for dialogue. – Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times
(I do like how tactile it is. But a bit boring otherwise. Still… it’s doing its job. You have to give it credit from that aspect. B-)
Tagline(s) – Three generations Strode strong (Ha!)
(Wait… that’s not real, right? That’s not on the poster so normally I would delete it but this is so funny that I’ll just leave it here.)
Keyword(s) – 2015-2023
Top 10: Joker (2019), Avengers: Endgame (2019), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Deadpool (2016), Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens (2015), Parasite (2019), Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), The Martian (2015), The Revenant (2015)
Future BMT: 85.1 Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023), 79.3 Jeepers Creepers III (2017), 78.9 Black Christmas (2019), 76.1 Jeepers Creepers: Reborn (2022), 74.6 The Grudge (2020), 73.6 The Turning (2020), 71.2 Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension (2015), 70.7 Snatched (2017), 68.7 Norm of the North (2016), 68.6 Poltergeist (2015), 68.3 Meet the Blacks (2016), 67.0 Max Steel (2016), 66.4 The Disappointments Room (2016), 66.3 God’s Not Dead 2 (2016), 64.7 Brahms: The Boy II (2020), 64.5 Blair Witch (2016), 63.4 Hot Tub Time Machine 2 (2015), 62.8 Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (2017), 61.2 Like a Boss (2020), 61.0 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip (2015)
BMT: The Emoji Movie (2017), Fifty Shades of Grey (2015), Slender Man (2018), Fantastic Four (2015), Holmes & Watson (2018), Fifty Shades of Black (2016), Space Jam: A New Legacy (2021), Fifty Shades Freed (2018), Fifty Shades Darker (2017), Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (2015), Rings (2017), The Bye Bye Man (2017), Zoolander 2 (2016), The Gallows (2015), The Boy Next Door (2015), The Ridiculous 6 (2015), Fantasy Island (2020), The Exorcist: Believer (2023), Firestarter (2022), Expend4bles (2023), Meg 2: The Trench (2023), Moonfall (2022), After We Fell (2021), Blacklight (2022), Independence Day: Resurgence (2016), Transformers: The Last Knight (2017), Morbius (2022), Hot Pursuit (2015), The 5th Wave (2016), Hellboy (2019), The Snowman (2017), Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City (2021), …
Best Options (franchise): 79.3 Jeepers Creepers III (2017), 78.9 Black Christmas (2019), 76.1 Jeepers Creepers: Reborn (2022), 74.6 The Grudge (2020), 71.2 Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension (2015), 64.5 Blair Witch (2016), 59.8 Spiral (2021), 52.3 Boo 2! A Madea Halloween (2017), 50.7 Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2016), 50.6 Halloween Kills (2021), 48.2 Insidious: The Red Door (2023), 43.4 Jigsaw (2017), 42.8 Insidious: The Last Key (2018)
(I refused to watch Jeepers Creepers III ever. Which leaves not many actual franchise horror films which worked. Was exciting to catch up on Halloween though.)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 15) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Jamie Lee Curtis is No. 1 billed in Halloween Kills and No. 2 billed in Christmas with the Kranks, which also stars Tim Allen (No. 1 billed) who is in Jungle 2 Jungle (No. 1 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 9 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (1 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (9 + 1) = 15. If we were to watch Love Happens, and The Black Dahlia we can get the HoE Number down to 13.
Notes – Jamie Lee Curtis, Charles Cyphers, Kyle Richards, Nancy Stephens, and Nick Castle were all in the original Halloween (1978) and all returned for this sequel. The characters of Tommy Doyle and Lonnie Elam from the original also returned, but were recast with Anthony Michael Hall and Robert Longstreet, because Brian Andrews has retired from acting since 2015, and Brent Le Page never acted again after the original Halloween.
David Gordon Green recalled that when they attempted to find a yearbook photo of one of Michael Myers’ victims from the 1978 film, he came across a yearbook photo of Bob Odenkirk that he thought resembled original actor John Michael Graham. The rights issues were resolved so that Green could use Odenkirk’s photo instead of the actual actor. Odenkirk is therefore credited as ‘Bob,’ despite not physically appearing in it.
In the flashback scene to 1978, Michael attacks deputy McCabe (Jim Cummings) with a rope. In the original Halloween (1978), Sheriff Leigh Brackett (Charles Cyphers) responded to an alarm in a hardware store, and reported that a rope, some Halloween masks and a set of knives were stolen.
Twelve pumpkins are featured in the opening title sequence with the last one indicating Halloween Kills as the twelfth Halloween film.
Early in the movie, the wagon stolen by Michael Myers from Dr. Loomis and Nurse Marion Chambers at the Smith Grove Sanitarium in Halloween (1978) can be seen parked behind Young Hawkins and Pete McCabe during one of the flashback sequences to 1978.
BMT Live! Always a bit of calculus goes into picking these films. Do we hit up all the horror films that our hearts desire? Do we gobble up whatever Liam Neeson (aka The Neese) is up to these days? Do we wait for Statham to roll the dice on the seventeen films he’s starring in to figure out which one comes up snake eyes (but not Snake Eyes the Nic Cage film (or Snake Eyes the G.I. Joe picture))? These questions get us all twisted into knots until we find ourselves in the theater for a $200 million Apple film starring Bryce Dallas Howard that doesn’t even have “Jurassic” in the title. So maybe catching Argylle in the cinema was a mistake. Only time will tell. But at least we didn’t burn up a film that would have been an easy connection to the year-end Chain Reaction entry. That we are still in search of.
To recap, Elly Conway is the author of the Argylle series of books about a super spy. She, however, is not a super spy… or is she (she’s not… at least not yet). After punting on the ending of her latest entry, her parents implore her to come home and hash out the ending there. On the way, though, she finds herself seated with a mysterious man, Aiden, who claims that her books tell the future and that super spies are going to be coming in to kill her. Wha-wha-what? That’s crazy. Not as crazy as all the super spy shit that happens right after. They escape and go to London in search of a masterkey that her books are apparently leading the way to. There she ends up finding out that her parents are part of the group of people trying to get her. In fact her whole life seems to have been a set up for writing these books in hopes of leading the baddies to this MacGuffin. Ultimately, Elly finds out that she and Aiden were involved… sexually. She also finds out that she was a double agent and at one point was helping the baddies do their bad shit, but then she stole the key and lost her memory. That very clearly and obviously explains all the twists. No problem. She uses this to her advantage as she is able to flip the script on the bad guys and send the key to the former CIA director. All kinds of real kooky fighting stuff happens, but it doesn’t matter because the good guys win the day and Elly and Aiden smooch… hard. THE END.
This is some real Hypnotic starring Ben Affleck shit going on in this $200 million Apple film. It’s kind of the same movie. An agent hides a MacGuffin and then their memory is erased. They then are put through elaborate mind games to try to get the agent to naturally lead them to the MacGuffin. But not so fast, the agent actually uses this against them to prevent them from getting the MacGuffin. Then in a midcredits sequence the crowd goes wild as Jeff Fahey/Henry Cavill (the Jeff Fahey of his era) appears to be alive. So imagine Hypnotic except at one point Bryce Dallas Howard slaps some knives on her shoes and skates around a room where the floor has been covered in oil. That happened. It’s mega stupid. Straight dumb. It’s like Kingsman but real dumbo for real. As an in-theater experience it was kind of horrible. Not because the movie was dumb or anything (at times that helped), but rather because it is 140 minutes long and all those responsible for that should be arrested. Hypnotic was only 94 minutes… you taking notes, Argylle?
Hot Take Clam Bake! Seems obvious to me that Elly actually was just an author with the ability to see the future that was then hypnotized into having super spy skills so that they could then double hypnotize her into being an author again. Then they could go through the ruse of revealing the original ruse (which wasn’t a ruse at all) which would trick her into using her fake spy skillz to get the masterkey (which is worthless) and handing it over Samuel L. Jackson (who is actually Samuel L. Jackson hired to portray a former CIA agent in the context of the film). This then prompts her to go back to her life as an author and write her next book which will reveal the vital secrets about the future that the bad guys are hoping to inspire her to write using the original double ruse. That then makes it obvious why the real Agent Argylle shows up at the end. He’s always been real because the books are telling real amazing stories of the future… I mean… duh, right? Hot Take Temperature: Jeff Fahey.
Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! Are we talking about the worst trailer I’ve ever seen and dumb bullshit involving spies and ice skating?! Let’s go!
Jesus, where to start. The beginning of this film is quite fun I suppose, although any moment with John Cena and/or Henry Cavill is painful. It then takes a turn that … well we’ll get to that.
The whirly bird dance might also be the worst thing I’ve ever seen. I see what you are doing Vaughn, and I don’t find it amusing or clever or whatever you are thinking with this bullshit.
The entire middle of the film when she doesn’t know she’s an agent is a decent conceit if quite poorly executed and looking like shit. The idea that a mystery writer kind of vaguely stumbles onto a story that is reminiscent of real life spycraft and so they kidnap her. And then she has enough experience to kind of pull it off and crack the case? That’s almost like Miss Marple or Murder, She Wrote. An interesting concept I think. Unfortunately …
That isn’t the actual story. You see, actually the whole twist’em’up is that Bryce Dallas Howard was a spy who lost her memory in an explosion and the whole book thing was actually a way for the (evil) spy system to try and get her memory back before she exposes them all … dumb.
And of course it ends on a giant dumb looking set piece complete with (gulp) an ice skating scene in oil in which Howard kills a bunch of people with a knife.
We of course watched this film live and it is one of those films that begs the question of why it exists. As a matter of fact, why does the entire Kingsmen universe exist? The first was good, the second bad, the third not much better. Now there are like fourteen different Kingsmen adjacent films being made (including this one) and I just can’t quite figure out who will be watching / paying for these. Huge Zach Snyder energy.
Which I guess means I should float my hot take / theory: Matthew Vaughn and Zach Snyder I think maybe are being tricked / intentionally deceiving themselves into thinking their junk is popular? Imagine a world in which a PR person run amok creates a bot army that demands The Snyder Cut / The Kingsmen Cinematic Universe. Now imagine you are a narcissist who reads this PR material on like … r/MatthewVaughn or whatever. Now imagine you are convinced that everyone in the world loves the Kingsmen universe. Armed with this opinion (and the “data” to back it up) something like Argylle is created via a forged blank check. Actually that’s what I will call this: this is a Forged Blank Check film. A clear blank check film but where it doesn’t seem like the person earned it.
I think this is a weird Product Placement (What?) or perhaps more accurately Vertical Integration with the use of the (Apple exclusive I assume) new Beatles song which is, admittedly, quite catchy. We got a Road Trip film (Where?) which is truly an international affair. We have a MacGuffin (Why?) naturally (what spy caper doesn’t?) for the super secret thumb drive containing all the spy secrets that they don’t want to get out. And a final Worst Twist (How?) for the reveal that she is actually a spy and the whole thing was a ruse by the very eeeeeevil Bryan Cranston. I think this movie is Bad, boring, trite, and just plain not very enjoyable (it reminded me a bit of something like The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard).
Read about my cinematic universe in the Quiz. Cheerios,
Oh man, so get this. I actually do have amnesia! I actually don’t remember a thing about this movie! I wonder … am I a super spy? I don’t know, but do you remember what happened in Argylle?
Pop Quiz Hot Shot!
1) At the beginning of the film we see the original ending to the newest book in the Argylle series. What happens (much to Elly’s mother’s chagrin)?
2) Why does Sam Rockwell originally claim that the super secret spy agency wants Elly?
3) Eventually, in London, Elly escapes and meets up with her parents, played by Katherine O’Hara and Bryan Cranston. But they aren’t her parents, are they? Who are they really?
4) Alright, then where do they ultimately find the MacGuffin?
5) I’ve been calling it the MacGuffin the whole time, but what is it actually?
Bonus Question: Right out of the theater my new agent Fred calls me. He needs to talk to me stat. What does he want to talk about?
Jamie and Patrick bust through the doors backstage and immediately stop their fist fight. They shake hands and agree that pretending to be real mad at each other so they could escape the fashion show was a perfect plan. “I just hope Kyle and Samantha are OK,” Jamie says wistfully. Just then Kyle and Samantha bust through the door engaged in what looks like a violent bout of fisticuffs. They also immediately stop and Samantha turns to shake Jamie’s hand. “Great idea pretending to be real mad at each other. Hopefully no one else realizes that you two are clearly great twins that would never fight like that.” Patrick is impressed by Samantha’s quick grasp of their twin dynamics. Generally he’s been skeptical of the many demons that Jamie has been interested in, but Samantha seems different. She seems… “Are you a demon?” he blurts out quickly. “Good question,” Samantha responds cooly, “And no, I’m just a regular old former track star from a small town in Massachusetts. Sure my life has had some ups and downs, but,” she looks over at Jamie, “things are starting to look up.” Awwwww. “That’s cool,” Jamie says, trying to act tough. Patrick, though, wants a little more clarity on these “ups and downs” she’s talking about, but before he can get it they see the Fashion Police hot on their tails. Before they hightail it, Samantha turns to grab something from her bag. It’s a manuscript for her latest novel. “Oh, you’re an author? Uh… so am I, kind of. I’d love to hear about it some time,” Jamie says, stars in his eyes. “Sure,” Samantha responds breathlessly, “How about now?” Patrick wants to tell them that there just isn’t the time, but Kyle stops him. It’s just so romantic. That’s right! Speaking of fake books we’re taking a BMT Live! detour to catch the Taylor Swift film Argylle in theaters… what’s that? Taylor Swift didn’t write Argylle? So why are we watching it? Let’s go!
Argylle (2024) – BMeTric: 27.2; Notability: 40
StreetCreditReport.com –BMeTric: top 0.8%; Notability: top 0.0%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 9.5%; Higher BMeT: Night Swim, Lift; Lower RT: The Painter, Wanted Man, Night Swim, Lift, Sunrise, Miller’s Girl; Notes: It does make sense that 40 would be the highest Notability for the year so far. I assume Madam Web is coming and will beat it out. Hopefully it beats it out for everything because that film is going to be hilarious.
RogerEbert.com – 1.5 stars – “Argylle,” the stumbling, overcooked action flick from director Matthew Vaughn, begins with a kind of joke. … It’s a shame. “Argylle” had the potential to be a whip-smart parody. It unfortunately just seems to get tired of being the butt of the joke before it can deliver the punchline. But in attempting to avoid becoming a gag—laboring to connect this film with the Kingsman franchise—Vaughn imbues his film with anonymity, making it merely forgettable.
(Yeah, that does feel like what happened. Vaughn couldn’t quite decide if he wanted to do comedy-action or action-comedy and got stuck in the dead zone in the middle where the film does neither very well.)
(This is genuinely one of the worst trailers I’ve seen in theaters in a while. I could tell it was all style and no substance right from the garbage needle drop.)
Directors – Matthew Vaughn – ( Known For: X-Men: First Class; Kingsman: The Secret Service; Kick-Ass; Kingsman: The Golden Circle; Stardust; Layer Cake; The King’s Man; BMT: Argylle; Notes: I mostly knew him for Kick-Ass which was quite fun. He’s kind of wrapped himself all up in Kingsman properties (of which this is one?) and has two separate Kingsman things in production, not to mention the teaser after this movie about an Argylle prequel which I feel like now will never happen.)
Writers – Jason Fuchs – ( Known For: Wonder Woman; I Still See You; Future BMT: Ice Age: Continental Drift; Pan; BMT: Argylle; Notes: Was/is an actor primarily and does a lot of voices. Is writing an upcoming television series which serves as a prequel to Stephen King’s IT.)
Actors – Henry Cavill – ( Known For: Man of Steel; Zack Snyder’s Justice League; Mission: Impossible – Fallout; The Man from U.N.C.L.E.; Stardust; Enola Holmes; Immortals; The Count of Monte Cristo; Enola Holmes 2; Whatever Works; Sand Castle; Night Hunter; Blood Creek; I Capture the Castle; Red Riding Hood; The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare; Future BMT: Tristan + Isolde; The Cold Light of Day; BMT: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice; Justice League; Black Adam; Argylle; Notes: Surprisingly British, was at points rumored to be up for Bond. Is going to be the main character in a remake of Highlander. I don’t care … right up until his faithful remake of Highlander II.)
Bryce Dallas Howard – ( Known For: A Beautiful Mind; Jurassic World; Spider-Man 3; The Help; 50/50; Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom; How the Grinch Stole Christmas; The Village; The Twilight Saga: Eclipse; Rocketman; Hereafter; Gold; Pete’s Dragon; Manderlay; A Dog’s Way Home; Good Dick; To Each His Own Cinema; As You Like It; The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond; Book of Love; Future BMT: Terminator Salvation; BMT: Jurassic World Dominion; Lady in the Water; Argylle; Notes: Is going to be in some television adaptation of Witch Mountain it looks like. The daughter of Ron Howard obviously.)
Sam Rockwell – ( Known For: The Green Mile; Iron Man 2; Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri; Jojo Rabbit; Moon; Seven Psychopaths; Cowboys & Aliens; The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; Charlie’s Angels; The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford; Galaxy Quest; Vice; The Way Way Back; Matchstick Men; Frost/Nixon; Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles; Richard Jewell; Confessions of a Dangerous Mind; Everybody’s Fine; See How They Run; Future BMT: The Sitter; Poltergeist; G-Force; Strictly Business; BMT: Argylle; Notes: Nominated for two Oscars and won for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, the other was Vice. Has a few upcoming projects, most significantly probably being IF with Ryan Reynolds.)
Budget/Gross – $200–250 million / Domestic: $21,431,025 (Worldwide: $38,292,025)
(Absolutely brutal. It’ll make like $50. I suppose there is an argument that as an Apple film it doesn’t matter. But I imagine they thought it was going to be a theatrical release, otherwise why wouldn’t you just Ghosted it?)
Rotten Tomatoes – 33% (82/251): Argylle gets some mileage out of its silly, energetic spin on the spy thriller, but ultimately wears out its welcome with a convoluted plot and overlong runtime.
(IMO the issue with the convoluted plot is that it is only convoluted because they insisted on the twist that leads into the third act which then makes the third act abominable. If they had just stuck to their guns with the fish out of water story and hired a comedian as the lead then I think it could have kind of worked.)
Reviewer Highlight: What you’re left with as the credits roll is just the realization that time keeps marching on — and you’ve just lost 139 minutes of it. – Alissa Wilkinson, New York Times
(That was what I wanted the memification of the film to be. Where we start a trend #Tárgylle and people go to the movie dressed a Lydia Tár. But that seems a little too manufactured. The tweens would see right through that. Patrick nailed it, though, and we’ll save that for the recap. Meanwhile this poster could rub people the wrong way, but just based on its work as a poster I think it’s pretty good. A-.)
Tagline(s) – Once you know the secret don’t let the cat out of the bag. (D)
(Boy, no. Why are they so focused on this cat and the bag? Just because TSwift made it a sensation and made people think she wrote the movie?)
Keyword(s) – Year 2024
Top 10: The Beekeeper (2024), Fighter (2024), Lift (2024), Merry Christmas (2024), Guntur Kaaram (2024), Hanu Man (2024), Argylle (2024), Mean Girls (2024), Night Swim (2024), Badland Hunters (2024)
Future BMT: 53.2 Night Swim (2024)
BMT: Argylle (2024)
Best Options: 53.2 Night Swim (2024), 24.0 Argylle (2024)
(Yeah Night Swim is coming for the final cycle, which is exciting. In a way we probably should have saved Argylle as well … Should BMT Live be canceled? Should we replace it with something else?)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 15) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Henry Cavill is No. 5 billed in Argylle and No. 2 billed in Justice League, which also stars Ben Affleck (No. 1 billed) who is in Pearl Harbor (No. 1 billed) which also stars Josh Hartnett (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 3 billed) => (5 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (3 + 3) = 15. There is no shorter path at the moment.
Notes – Matthew Vaughn cast Henry Cavill because “he needed someone who was born to play James Bond – which Henry is – and then nick him before Bond’s studio did.” Cavill was in fact a finalist to play Bond in Casino Royale (2006), but was rejected for being too young (he was then 22).
Alfie the Cat is played by Chip, owned by Matthew Vaughn’s wife Claudia Schiffer.
The font seen on the posters was commissioned specifically for the movie. It was created by the Walden Font Company.
Matthew Vaughn secured the rights to The Beatles’ song “Now and Then” a year before it was released. The song was being developed by Giles Martin, the son of longtime Beatles producer Sir George Martin, and Giles also served as music producer on Argylle. Vaughn recalled, “I was with [Giles] and I said, ‘I’m really struggling to find what I call the romantic song of the movie, ’cause I need it to be sad, but hopeful…’ And he said, ‘Do you want to hear a new Beatles song?’ And Giles has got a hell of a sense of humor, so I was like, ‘Yeah, yeah. Whatever.’ And he goes, ‘No, I’m being deadly serious.’ He played it to me, and it was as if Lennon had seen the film… We just slapped it on the movie, and we didn’t have to edit anything – it just fitted the picture.”
Argylle is named after the limo driver from the first Die Hard movie.
Now here’s the main event. Everything about The Dark Tower saga was a disaster. We aren’t just talking about a Stephen King adaptation, which historically have been a boon for BMT. We aren’t just talking about a “long gestating project” where every filmmaker under the sun declared the property to be very important to them, wanting to make a multimedia empire of it, and then bailing once the gestation got even longer. We aren’t just talking about a bold reimagining of the property to the point where the filmmakers had to be like “no no no, you don’t understand. It’s not actually an adaptation of The Dark Tower… it’s just another entry in the series.” This is all three of those things. Once aiming to encompass the series in films, TV, Quibi shows (probably), etc. they instead dropped a 95 minute original Dark Tower story right in the laps of the fans of the series. That… didn’t go well.
To recap, Jake Chambers is a boy who dreams about all kinds of crazy things. He dreams of a man in black aiming to destroy the world using the minds of kids like himself. He dreams of a gunslinger who is one of the only ones that stands in his way. He dreams of alien creatures scouring the Earth for… him. This would all be OK if it wasn’t for the fact that they make everyone think he’s crazy. It’s also a little strange that while he’s dreaming these things there appears to be a real life connection to a series of earthquakes in NYC. When his mom and stepdad look to send him to a special school to take care of things he starts to suspect that his dreams are real and those that have arrived to take him away are in the service of the man in black. He makes a run for it and goes in search of a house he saw in his dreams. Once there he is sucked into another dimension… the world that he dreamed of. There he finds Roland, the gunslinger, and he is convinced to help Jake interpret his dreams about the man in black, who Roland knows as Walter. Meanwhile, Walter follows the path of Jake and kills his mother and stepdad after determining that Jake is powerful enough to single handedly achieve his goal: destroying the Dark Tower and consuming Earth. Jake and Roland find out that they have to go back to Earth to get to the Tower and while there Jake is captured by Walter. Before he is taken to the Tower he is able to alert Roland about how to follow and then keeps the portal open so that Walter and Roland have to fight. They do and Roland wins. He and Jake destroy the machine and head off on many adventures we are sure to see in the sequels. THE END.
I’m always a little ready to defend films like this. Just because something doesn’t stay true to the source material doesn’t mean it’s necessarily bad. Maybe by not reading the Dark Tower books it would put me in a position to be like “it’s more different than bad.” Ehhhhhh. They really did take a beloved book franchise by a master of fantasy, science fiction, and horror and turned it into a YA novel. It reads like Harry Potter or The Maze Runner or, god help us, Divergent. It honestly is a lot like what the Platonic Solids series would be (with fewer sexy swamp monsters and phantoms of the opera). Imagine for a second that they made the It film and instead of it being a horror film it was more like Stand By Me with McConaughey playing Pennywise who now isn’t a clown but more like a land developer looking to turn their pops’ soda pop shop into a parking lot… people might have a problem with that. Just to end on a positive note, I did like how short it was and also there was a scene where Idris Elba shoots someone from like a mile away that was cool. He gunslang real good. Otherwise, I already barely remember this movie and fully understand the reviews.
Hot Take Clam Bake! What if… Earth was actually the dreams. Whooooaaaaa. Maybe when Jake was dreaming he was actually awake and when we see Jake on Earth it’s actually the dream. Five seconds after the end of the film it actually ends with a close up on Roland’s eye and it opens. Then Roland’s wife is like “Honey, you OK. Another dream?” and he’s like “Yah… I dreamed about that kid Jake again… I gotta draw it out.” And he rolls out of bed and makes a sick charcoal drawing of Jake and hangs it up on his wall amongst all the other pictures of Jake. Then the movie starts in on a perfect, straight adaptation of The Gunslinger and fans. Go. Crazy. Hot Take Temperature: The Scorch.
Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! Are we talking about yet another Stephen King adaptation except this is for maybe the fourth (?) book in a long running franchise … someone check on Stephen King he might be doing too much cocaine again. Let’s go!
Whoops they accidentally made this a Young Adult novel adaptation.
Because I’ve read the first in the series before and it is a weird and wild western / sci-fi / fantasy oddity. The stuff in this movie I don’t think comes into play until Stephen King almost died in that car accident and then he started to connect all his books via the inbetween worlds from The Mist. I think the big mistake was jumping directly into the middle of the series. If anything, make a prequel movie which then ends with Roland wandering the desert in the first book.
Instead we jump right into a story about the Dark Tower protecting humanity, and the Man in Black, and some kid, etc. etc. etc.
The kid BTW appears to just have a British accent at times. No offense to him but there are zero kids in the US who could have played this part? Are we so lacking in acting talent that you couldn’t at least plug that hole before it broke open. The accent work is quite distracting.
I do somewhat appreciate the lore though, and I also appreciate that the film doesn’t feel the need to twist stuff around to give Roland a love interest or something else weird. It has that YA feel, but more in the vein of father-son bonding rather than high school drama. That is probably at least a decent option out of all the bad YA options available.
Yeah, just a weird start to what was clearly supposed to be the beginning of a franchise. I’m not sure if they were thinking of then jumping backwards, forging a new path forwards, or whether tying up all the loose ends was just a desperate ploy once they realized that this film was not going to be well received and the franchise was dead in the water.
A decent Product Placement (What?) for Coca-Cola in the middle of the film. A bizarre Setting as a Character (Where?) for New York City since I half-expected them to reveal the kid was actually from England since that is how he sounded a lot of the time. The MacGuffin (Why?) of the Dark Tower and The Man in Black and The Gunslinger is mighty close to being that perfect Cradle of Life nonsense I love to see, but doesn’t quite get there. I think the movie is Bad, mostly boring and too YA to be entertaining, just kind of sad.
The premise of the year-long cycle is to get a whole mess of great BMT films and feed Franchise Man till he’s big and fat. Unfortunately this is also creating some angst when it comes to the always tricky Chain Reaction entry in the cycle. We have to keep on moving backwards and so how can we be sure to pick up the best of the best when we need to connect Fool’s Paradise to some random film from 2016-2022? It’s one step too far and means that instead of watching the Stephen King catastrophe of an adaptation, The Dark Tower, we instead insist on watching Fist Fight starring Charlie Day… Fist Fight?! Fist Fight. What are we doing here? A double bonus week, that’s what we’re doing. Now you might be saying “Hey wait, aren’t you guys always falling behind? And you’re going to do a double bonus week for no reason?” The answer to that is simple. Yes and yes.
To recap, Charlie Day is a teacher with an expanding family, a lack of backbone, and a tenuous hold on his job. It’s the end of the year and pink slips are being given out at an alarming rate all while Senior Prank Day is going unchecked by the administration. His fellow teacher, Ice Cube, faces this power vacuum by levying out corporal punishment and verbal tirades against the kids in his class to the point where it is upsetting. When Charlie points out a prankster in his midsts, Ice Cube goes nuclear and ultimately Charlie has to tattle on him to try to keep his job. Now the target of Ice Cube, Charlie spends the rest of the last day of school trying to prevent Ice Cube from beating him up in the parking lot after school. This involves attempting to bribe the kid you told on Ice Cube to recant his statement (he does, but the fight is still on) and trying to get Ice Cube arrested (which ends up with both of them in jail). Once back at school Charlie becomes jaded by the lack of care that the superintendent is giving to laying off his fellow teachers and grows a backbone. He lays into him and storms off to be at his daughter’s talent show. There they perform a crude rendition of a song, further cementing Charlie as a “bad boy who doesn’t give a – shut your mouth.” Jazzed up on all this backbone, Charlie heads back to the school where he battles Ice Cube and holds his own. At the end he finds out that his wife is giving birth and he and Ice Cube make up. Using the publicity that the fight generated, Charlie is able to help everyone keep their jobs and gets the school more money. THE END.
Fist Fight is way better than I expected it to be. You can see clearly why someone would read the script and be like “oh yeah, this setup has a lot of potential.” It’s like a spoof film in how far they take the bit about the kids running rampant over the school. We also get Kumail Nanjiani in a funny role and a musical act involving Day and his kid that is actually amusing rather than cringey. The only issue I had was a reliance on improvisation for the script. Someone still has to say something funny once in a while for the improv to work. Apparently people didn’t for long stretches of time. Either that or they were choosing the wrong takes. Still it was better than I thought it would be and the final fight more or less paid off so I’m not sure what happened with the reviews. Maybe critics just didn’t like Day spending a five minute section in the middle of the film shooting a commercial for Apple.
Hot Take Clam Bake! Ice Cube killed Charlie Day in the final fight. He punched him in the face and shattered his skull and Charlie Day died. Notice how everything worked out so well for everyone after he got his skull caved in and he (allegedly) didn’t die? That’s because he (not so allegedly) actually did die. Ice Cube killed him, went to jail, and then the school had to shut down when Day’s wife sued the town for his wrongful death and won a whole boatload of money and everyone lived happily ever after (except Ice Cube (and Charlie Day because he died)). Hot Take Temperature: Macbook Pro
Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! Are we talking about Hollywood megastar and definitely leading man Charlie Day fighting Hollywood megastar and perennial mean-one-in-an-unlikely-movie-odd-couple Ice Cube? Let’s go!
The movie is definitely funnier than expected. Nanjiani and Day in particular are both quite good in their parts, and I laughed more than once. That is an unexpectedly high number of times to laugh during a bad comedy. I usually laugh zero times. Or even worse, somehow a bad comedy peers into my soul and erases previously laughs from my life, making me sadder both now and in the past somehow.
I like that they didn’t pull punches with Ice Cube in the film. He isn’t just kind of mean. He isn’t just kind of rough around the edges. He is a genuine psycho who should definitely have been fired.
If anything one of the major issues of the film is what I’d call the Sandler Effect. In (mostly older) Adam Sandler films there is often a moment where he for one reason or another decides to beat the shit out of someone. Sure this person usually seems to have it coming in some ways, but still, Sandler assaults this person and then (worse) the movie twists itself and bends reality to convince you that this was definitely the correct thing to do, thus doubling down on what is already a bad message.
In this film Ice Cube is a psycho who hacks a desk to pieces and deserves to be fired. After getting his just desserts he turns around and decides to fight Day for the somewhat tenuous reason of “snitches get stitches”. Cool, he’s a psycho so this logically makes sense. But then the twist’em’ups keeps coming. Now Ice Cube figures there is no reason to fight Day because he’s a coward, but he needs to show kids that actions (getting Ice Cube fired for being a psycho) have consequences (beating up Day in front of the school) … uh okay, you’re a psycho so that logic I guess still makes sense. But then in the end Ice Cube even acknowledges that this would be fruitless, but he is still going to beat the shit out of Day because then the world will see how the broken U.S. education system has pitted teacher against teacher and yada yada yada change or whatever. Which is … that is well beyond lunatic behavior and now is into a realm of nonsense all unto itself. But then what does the movie do? Twist itself up and bends reality to vindicate Ice Cube and that is precisely what happens! People see the teacher fight and the school saves its teachers and everything lives happily ever after, hooray! Crazy.
The second weirdest bit is the Apple commercial that occurs in the middle of the film where Day buys multiple Apple MacBook Pros with AppleCare and his wife is like “THIS COMPUTER IS AWESOME!” C’mon now.
So yeah. This film kind of feels like a movie I would have written in creative writing class when I was 16 complete with messy nonsensical third act.
It might win the Product Placement (What?) for the Apple MacBook ad in the middle of the film. I think I’m going with Super Secret Holiday Film (When?) for the last day of school which does come up in other films with some relative frequency. And yeah, I’m going with a Worst Twist (How?) for the inevitable conclusion that Day doesn’t win the fight, but that he does well enough that everyone respects him a bit more. I think the film is closest to Good, I laughed a few times.
Read about my Hollywood-esque sequel to the film in the quiz. Cheerios,
Bad Movie Twins 