drugs – Bad Movie Twins

Next Day Air Preview

“Curses is right, LePumice,” Adult Mikey sneers and with that launches into a stirring explanation of exactly how we arrived at this moment in time and space. You see, Mikey was just your ordinary kid. But when he got that fish in his overalls it started a cascade of familial disaster resulting in his parents’ entry into a life of illegal gambling. Learning the tricks of probability and statistics from the blackjack tables he got into MIT and made his way to the World Police Academy, a secret cabal of conspirators designed to avert global disaster. There he headed the Obsidian Dongle Destruction Team (ODDT) which was tasked with destroying the most powerful object on Earth. But Mikey had different ideas. Instead of destroying it maybe they could steer it into the hands of unwitting egotistical nincompoops. Every time the power of the Dongle corrupted and Mikey was there to replace the useful idiots with the next in line. All so eventually Mikey could suggest the candidates he wanted: Jamie and Patrick, the now world famous Bad Movie Twins. “You proved quite adept at protecting the Dongle. Almost destroyed it a couple times even, that would have been a shame. And even more surprising, when it came time for my plan to bear fruit you were nowhere to be seen. Lost in time thanks to your uncanny ability to gain friends from foes.” With that he shakes his head at LePumice. “Fortunately we had time on our hands and we spent it building a Time Cop Academy to go back and stop whatever you were up to. Now we’re here, and now you’ll die.” With that he and the younger Mikey get into fighting stances. Jamie and Patrick reciprocate and drop their world famous catchphrase: “Let’s fly,” That’s right! We’re transitioning to the next cycle of the year with Next Day Air. This film is short and sweet and features Mos Def, which is perfect since this cycle will feature different Hip Hop artists-turned-actors in each film. Let’s go!

Next Day Air (2009) – BMeTric: 29.9; Notability: 22

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 24.8%; Notability: top 32.4%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 16.6%; Higher BMeT: Dragonball Evolution, Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, The Twilight Saga: New Moon, S. Darko, Stan Helsing, Halloween II, Year One, The Unborn, All About Steve, Did You Hear About the Morgans?, Bitch Slap, Obsessed, Madea Goes to Jail, Paul Blart: Mall Cop, The Final Destination, G-Force, Miss March, Land of the Lost, Sorority Row, and 42 more; Higher Notability: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, 2012, Angels & Demons, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Terminator Salvation, The Lovely Bones, Nine, Fast & Furious, Confessions of a Shopaholic, Halloween II, Surrogates, G-Force, The Twilight Saga: New Moon, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, Fanboys, Fame, Land of the Lost, Bride Wars, Crossing Over, and 61 more; Lower RT: Labor Pains, Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li, Miss March, Old Dogs, All About Steve, Whiteout, Beyond a Reasonable Doubt, Echelon Conspiracy, Post Grad, My Life in Ruins, Malice in Wonderland, The Unborn, Couples Retreat, Bride Wars, The Cry of the Owl, Did You Hear About the Morgans?, The Stepfather, S. Darko, The Pink Panther 2, I Love You, Beth Cooper, and 20 more; Notes: That is a shockingly large drop from IMDb for this film, I guess the super fans loved it. Look at those BMeT films, 2009 was a wild time.

RogerEbert.com – 3.0 stars – “Next Day Air” is a bloody screwball comedy, a film of high spirits. It tells a complicated story with acute timing and clarity, and gives us drug-dealing lowlifes who are almost poetic in their clockwork dialogue. By that I mean they not only use the words, they know the music.

(WOW. Three out of four is nothing to scoff at. Ebert himself did, especially later in his career, start to heavily subscribe to the concept of being “good for what it is intending to be.” And this review excerpt is overflowing with that concept. They went for something and did it and films that do something interesting should be celebrated. Shocking to see that concept applied to Next Day Air though.)

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

(Alright … well having seen the film there is something crazy about this trailer. Faison and Mos Def aren’t really in the film all that much. Mos Def is in it for maybe 5 minutes. And Faison for 15-30 in total (I’m not joking). That whole drug dealer storyline? That is actually the main storyline. They legit show both of the scenes Mos Def is in, he’s only in two, how is he the top billed actor?!)

Directors – Benny Boom – ( Future BMT: All Eyez on Me; BMT: Next Day Air; Notes: Directs a lot of television these days including 6 episodes of Black Lightning. Also a huge music video director which is where he got his start.)

Writers – Blair Cobbs – ( BMT: Next Day Air; Notes: Basically nothing about him on IMDb. According to Variety his nickname is Butta.)

Actors – Yasiin Bey – ( Known For: The Italian Job; The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby; Monster’s Ball; Begin Again; Cadillac Records; Life of Crime; 16 Blocks; Brown Sugar; The Woodsman; Be Kind Rewind; The Hard Way; I’m Still Here; Bamboozled; Journey to the End of the Night; Civil Brand; Tour de France; Island of the Dead; Where’s Marlowe?; Future BMT: Showtime; BMT: Next Day Air; Notes: Birth name Dante Smith, I knew him primarily as Mos Def, but he changed his name to Yasiin Bey in 2011. He was a major rapper-turned-actor and appeared a few times on Chappelle’s Show.)

Mike Epps – ( Known For: The Hangover; Faster; Hancock; Girls Trip; Dolemite Is My Name; Uncle Drew; Acts of Violence; The Last Black Man in San Francisco; Term Life; Guess Who; Troop Zero; Something New; Dr. Dolittle 2; School Dance; Mac & Devin Go to High School; Roll Bounce; Love Jacked; The Fighting Temptations; Sparkle; Soul Men; Future BMT: The Hangover Part III; Malibu’s Most Wanted; Resident Evil: Apocalypse; Next Friday; Resident Evil: Extinction; How High; Friday After Next; All About the Benjamins; Welcome Home, Roscoe Jenkins; Meet the Blacks; Lottery Ticket; Bait; 3 Strikes; The Honeymooners; BMT: Death Wish; Fifty Shades of Black; Next Day Air; Notes: Started as a comedian on Def Comedy Jam, he quickly transitioned to acting and most recently was in the new show Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty. He is not related to Omar Epps.)

Donald Faison – ( Known For: Pitch Perfect; Clueless; Remember the Titans; 12 Monkeys; Can’t Hardly Wait; Game Over, Man!; Juice; The Wave; Big Fat Liar; Josie and the Pussycats; Waiting to Exhale; Little Evil; Embattled; Something New; Wish I Was Here; Let’s Kill Ward’s Wife; Good Boy; New Jersey Drive; Double Whammy; Homie Spumoni; Future BMT: Kick-Ass 2; Uptown Girls; The Perfect Match; Sugar Hill; Trippin’; King’s Ransom; BMT: Skyline; Next Day Air; Notes: Definitely most notably Turk on Scrubs. Apparently his current wife was the assistant to Jessica Simpson for at least a little bit.)

Budget/Gross – $3 million / Domestic: $10,027,047 (Worldwide: $10,172,519)

(Actually not bad at all. For such a low budget a lower figure directed to a small audience seems fine. I wonder if they just didn’t really set up for sequels or what. It would seem to me that a sequel would make sense if they can make it for $3 million.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 21% (14/66): Rife with half-baked jokes and excessive violence, Next Day Air is an uninspired stoner comedy.

(Yeah, the violence seemed to be a particular sticking point for a lot of critics. The theme generally seems like it is going for a farce where the real-life consequences of drug-dealing are actually happening.)

Reviewer Highlight: In the end, it’s a fitfully amusing, sloppy comedy that doesn’t work very hard for your 10 bucks. – Dan Kols, Washington Post

Poster – Next Day Sklog

(Mos Def being front and center on the poster is insanity. Don’t love the whole look of it, but the framing is cool and obviously the font is banging. I think overall pretty good, but needed to tie it all together a little better. B+.)

Tagline(s) – It’s all in the delivery. (D)

(Booooo, this is obviously a phrase and it’s being manipulated for the poster, but my god, at least try to have it means something in the context of the film. Just because there is a common phrase with the word “delivery” in it doesn’t mean it has to be your tagline.)

Keyword(s) – cocaine

Top 10: The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), Pulp Fiction (1994), Forrest Gump (1994), American Psycho (2000), Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard (2021), Goodfellas (1990), Sicario (2015), The Departed (2006), Léon: The Professional (1994), Deadpool 2 (2018)

Future BMT: 69.0 Showgirls (1995), 64.7 Sex Tape (2014), 60.1 Hot Tub Time Machine 2 (2015), 59.8 The Mod Squad (1999), 59.2 Corky Romano (2001), 58.7 Stay Alive (2006), 57.7 The Counselor (2013), 49.4 Showtime (2002), 46.7 Delta Force 2: The Colombian Connection (1990), 43.0 Sleepless (2017)

BMT: Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard (2021), Dirty Grandpa (2016), Crank (2006), Punisher: War Zone (2008), Sliver (1993), Tango & Cash (1989), Sabotage (2014), A Haunted House (2013), Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985), Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989), Hot Pursuit (2015), A Haunted House 2 (2014), Trespass (2011), Next Day Air (2009), Never Die Alone (2004)

Matches: Goodfellas (1990), Boogie Nights (1997), True Romance (1993), Magnolia (1999), Horrible Bosses (2011), Dallas Buyers Club (2013), Blow (2001), Pain & Gain (2013), Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992), London (2005), The Last Seduction (1994), Contraband (2012), Running with the Devil (2019), Paid in Full (2002), Kill the Messenger (2014), Sleepless (2017), CrissCross (1992), A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas (2011), Puncture (2011), Descent (2007), Clean and Sober (1988), Next Day Air (2009), The Boost (1988), Down to the Bone (2004), Journey to the End of the Night (2006), Ten Violent Women (1982), Pineapple (2008), Ambushed (2013), The Preppie Connection (2015), Dirty Hands (2014), Jimmy and Judy (2006), Torchlight (1985), Cocaine Wars (1985)

(Yup … Showgirls does have a lot of cocaine. It is depressing that I’ve already seen Sex Tape and will likely have to see it again at some point in my life. It is not a funny movie.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 26) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Donald Faison is No. 2 billed in Next Day Air and No. 4 billed in Skyline, which also stars Eric Balfour (No. 1 billed) who is in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (No. 5 billed) which also stars Jessica Biel (No. 1 billed) who is in New Year’s Eve (No. 4 billed) which also stars Robert De Niro (No. 1 billed) who is in Righteous Kill (No. 1 billed) which also stars Al Pacino (No. 2 billed) who is in 88 Minutes (No. 1 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (2 + 4) + (1 + 5) + (1 + 4) + (1 + 1) + (2 + 1) + (3 + 1) = 26. If we were to watch Sugar Hill, Murder at 1600, and The Glass House we can get the HoE Number down to 14.

Notes – It was widely reported that during the filming of a scene in the movie between the characters of Mike Epps and Omari Hardwick, an altercation between the two ensued and escalated, causing Mike Epps to leave the set threatening Omari Hardwick, shouting he was going to his car in the parking lot to retrieve his gun and was going to come back and “handle” Hardwick. Darius McCrary, who was also an actor on the set, is credited with calming Epps down and de-escalating the situation, as he followed Epps to the parking lot to talk him out of it.

Shipped to theaters under the code name “Express”.

RoboCop 2 Preview

Jeez, these squeakuels are long. Almost as bad as a book cycle. JK, book cycles are the worst. Anyway, this week we move onto the Action entry of the cycle and it seemed fitting that we would hit one of the worst reviewed action sequels of all time. That’s right, we’re not only watching RoboCop 2 but the much abhorred follow-up RoboCop 3! Another two-for-one this week. The first one is a classic satire of capitalism, so I can’t wait to see how RoboCop three shits all over that. First up, the BONUS film. Let’s go!

RoboCop 2 (1990) – BMeTric: 38.5

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robocop2_rv

(Interesting from a theoretical perspective: Basically the votes has increased dramatically and by virtue of regression to the mean the rating has steadily increased as well. All the while this has somehow come out perfectly balanced such that the BMeTric has barely changed at all. Kind of cool considering the movie has a halfway decent BMeTric (somewhere around where Razzie nominees typically sit, top 10-20 worst films of the year.)

Leonard Maltin – 1.5 stars – Appallingly (and unnecessarily) mean, ugly sequel in which coldblooded corporation czar O’Herlihy and drug kingpin Noonan threaten to end Robo’s existence — while the laboratory whizzes cook up a bigger, “better” cyborg cop to take his place. Offensively violent and humorless. Phil Tippett’s stop-motion animation is the film’s only asset.

(Wow, that is an incredibly step down from Robocop. I can see ugly for sure, but I’m surprised by humorless. I vaguely remember this film from my childhood, specifically that a guy ends up with his brain in a jar and a weird CGI face.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yxumzn82V9s

(I usually don’t complain about such things but … they do actually just give away arguably the main twist of the film (that Kane, the drug guy becomes RoboCop 2). I’m also shocked Gabriel Damon didn’t make an appearance since he is a gigantic part of the film. It just kind of looks terrible (although you do kind of see the money in the trailer, it is a much grander story than the first in that way at least))

Directors – Irvin Kershner – (Known For: Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back; Never Say Never Again; Eyes of Laura Mars; The Return of a Man Called Horse; One Born Every Minute; BMT: RoboCop 2; Notes: … Why did I think Kershner had way more terrible movies than that. Interesting guy having been a surprise pick for Episode V, but not much else in his career.)

Writers – Edward Neumeier (characters) – (Known For: Starship Troopers; RoboCop; RoboCop (2014); Starship Troopers 3: Marauder; BMT: RoboCop 3; Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid; RoboCop 2; Notes: Basically all of his credits are based on the original RoboCop (which is is credited for characters in all but the first) and Starship Troopers (which he was very much involved with, he even directed the third). It appears that he declined the vice-presidency of Universal to make RoboCop and that is how he met Verhoeven and got involved with Starship Troopers.)

Michael Miner (characters) – (Known For: RoboCop; RoboCop (2014); BMT: RoboCop 3; Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid; Lawnmower Man 2: Beyond Cyberspace; RoboCop 2; Notes: For a guy who wrote RoboCop and directed Lawnmower Man 2 and Anacondas 2 this guy has nothing about him! I found this variety article about him making a movie names Marathon … yeah that movie never got made.)

Frank Miller (story & screenplay) – (Known For: 300; Sin City; Sin City: A Dame to Kill For; 300: Rise of an Empire; BMT: RoboCop 3; Elektra; The Spirit; RoboCop 2; Notes: Most well known as a comic book writer it kind of shocks me he wrote a movie so long ago. He wrote this guy in 1990 and the third in 1993 and then nothing else until 2005 over ten years later. Apparently this movie is nothing like the script he wrote … makes you wonder how they convinced him to write the third.)

Walon Green (screenplay) – (Known For: WarGames; Dinosaur; The Wild Bunch; Wages of Fear; The Border; The Hi-Lo Country; Crusoe; BMT: RoboCop 2; Solarbabies; Eraser; Notes: Just recently watched his magnum opus Solarbabies (apparently he was the “big shot” writer Mel Brooks got to write a first draft before handing over complete control to Metrov, the real genius behind that film). Pretty solid filmography he is mostly known as a documentary filmmaker.)

Actors – Peter Weller – (Known For: Star Trek Into Darkness; RoboCop; The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension; Naked Lunch; Mighty Aphrodite; Al di là delle nuvole; Cat Chaser; Shoot the Moon; Shakedown; Ivans Xtc; The New Age; BMT: The Sin Eater; RoboCop 2; Undiscovered; Leviathan; Repentance; Skin Trade; Screamers; Notes: That’s Dr. Peter Weller to you, he was awarded his Ph.D. in Italian Renaissance Art from UCLA in 2014. Most well known for RoboCop (naturally), but The Adventures of Buckaroo Bonza in Across the 8th Dimension as well. I have a weird fondness for his villainous turn on 24 personally.)

Belinda Bauer – (Known For: UHF; Winter Kills; BMT: Poison Ivy 2; RoboCop 2; Flashdance; Notes: Retired from acting now, she is a psychologist. From Australia, and was in Sklog Childhood Movie Hall of Fame … as a mud wrestler? How strange.)

Also stars John Glover – (Who was in the legendary Batman & Robin)

Budget/Gross – $35 million / Domestic: $45,681,173 (N/A)

(Not great. Makes one wonder why a third was considered. We might be hitting a little Laurentiis mirror here. Where Dino De Laurentiis was going to declare bankruptcy so he made one last desperate attempt at releasing a movie for all of the IP he owned … and they were all trash and basically sunk 1986 as a year for bad movies. In this case the third movie was made two years later while Orion was starting to go under, and might have just been a desperate last effort at saving the company.)

#25 for the Cyborg / Android / Robot genre

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(Actually made about the same as Robocop (just with a much larger budget). Actually funny that is it right at a start to a boom that was exemplified by Terminator 2. Also previous BMT Deadly Friend is on the list at 39. Terminator: Genisys may have killed the boom we’ve been seeing recently, although there is nothing like yet another Transformers movie to provide a shot in the arm for a genre like this.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 32% (11/34): No consensus yet.

(Uh oh, looks like someone needs a consensus: Half-baked and unfinished, RoboCop 2 is gruesome and humorous at turns, but without impact. Basically it feels like RoboCop 2 was an unfinished idea with the ironic-gore peppered in without thought. Sounds fine to me honestly.)

Poster – RoboSklog 2 (C+)

robocop_two_ver2

(Considering that the original RoboCop poster is brilliant, it is hard not to be harsh with the grading. I think this poster is a pretty boring kind of sad example of just a giant picture of a face. The reflection of the primary bad guy of the film could have maybe saved the poster a bit, but I still think it is pretty bac=d)

Tagline(s) – He’s back to protect the innocents. (C+)

(I don’t really like the tagline. It doesn’t flow with the innocents part. And the reference (RoboCop Primary Directive #2 is to protect the innocent) isn’t so well known to really register. It barely registered with me and I literally watched three RoboCop movies in three days.)

Keyword(s) – drugs; Top Ten by BMeTric: 89.1 Disaster Movie (2008); 75.8 LOL (2012); 72.7 Basic Instinct 2 (2006); 71.4 Showgirls (1995); 67.1 Year One (2009); 65.1 Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993); 62.6 Ghosts of Mars (2001); 59.4 Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991); 59.1 The Crow: City of Angels (1996); 56.1 Sliver (1993);

(Kind of an amazing list in a few ways. First, I’m kind of stunned at how bad Year One is on this list. I mean, I fell asleep during that movie and really didn’t like it, but getting even close to 70 alongside something like Showgirls is ridiculous. We do need to see LOL don’t we? We do. I don’t want to. Maybe when we do another Merde (foreign films adapted into American films) we’ll get to it. We need to do more classic horror franchises as well.)

Notes – Although the producers loved Frank Miller’s original version of the script, they quickly realized it was unfilmable as written. The final screen version was heavily rewritten and bears only a superficial resemblance to Miller’s story. In 2003, Miller’s screenplay was adapted into a comic book series titled, appropriately, “Frank Miller’s RoboCop”. (Again, it makes me shocked they managed to get him back for the third film)

After the success of RoboCop (1987), director Paul Verhoeven and the original screenwriters Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner were immediately approached for a sequel by the studio. According to Verhoeven, he didn’t want to make the kind of sequel that the studio had in mind. He felt going forward so quickly with their ideas would make it feel like he was attempting to cash in on the first film, and he only wanted to do a follow-up if it was original and innovative. Neumeier and Miner had already presented a very rough outline called “RoboCop: Corporate Wars”. In this draft, RoboCop was to be shot and pulverized to metallic dust by a cannon in the very beginning. He would be resurrected 25 years later in an even more dystopian future, where he becomes a pawn in the struggle between an all-powerful corporation, the government and an impoverished population and even at one point having a love interest with a Neruobrain to humanize Robocop even more. The studio liked this idea, but the writers did not want to continue working on script due to personal interests associated with the writers strike. Verhoeven also did not support the project, having gone to shoot “Total Recall” for big money, while agreeing to all conditions of the producers and Arnold Schwarzenegger, who gave the director only three hours for making decision from the beginning of reading the script. Ultimately Verhoeven felt if the studio kept patient his idea for the sequel was far more superior.In the end, the film was shot on a new script by Frank Miller & Walon Green, but the plot also has lines from the original script and early drafts for the first movie that were never filmed. (I like the background to this, the movie business of the 80’s just sounds kind of nuts with studios going under and strikes and money (and cocaine) free flowing.)

The point-of-view shots from RoboCop show an interface based on MS-DOS . The villain Cain has the Apple based OS.interface with a skull instead of the Apple logo. (ha!)

In the scene where RoboCop was being reprogrammed by Dr. Faxx, the following hex numbers scroll quickly up the screen: “50 45 54 45 20 4B 55 52 41 4E 20 49 53 20 41 20 47 52 45 41 54 20 47 55 59”. Converted to ASCII text, it reads: “PETE KURAN IS A GREAT GUY”. Peter Kuran was the special effects photographer. (That’s just weird. Fun fact!)

A directive which is only seen briefly in the scene where they are having trouble uploading the new directives into RoboCop is ‘Directive 262: Avoid Orion Meetings’. Orion Pictures was the production and distribution company of RoboCop 2 (1990). (Fun. Fact)