Tag: spoof

High School High Preview

September 1st, 1998

Jamie and Patrick are looking dope. Collars? Popped. Jean short? Tight. Coca-cola? Ice cold. It’s nearing the end of middle school and they are grabbing onto one last taste of childhood. Their dad had one word of advice for them on the eve of this momentous year: “Try to watch less bad things, perhaps.” With that he swept his arm in the general direction of the beach and called it ‘nature’s movie.’ Despite this being wrong (Nature’s movie is Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, obviously) they ventured forth and found themselves feeling the sand between their toes and the rays hitting their chest. As a couple of sweet babes walk by they lower their shades and do a patented Twin Double Take, a.k.a. The Quadruple Take. Suddenly they feel a hand on their shoulder. “You guys checking out our babes?” A couple of beefy high school bros asks them. His tone suggests they shouldn’t answer truthfully. They explain that they were simply checking out their swimsuits since they believe they would look great on their girlfriends. They assure them that they will buy said swimsuits for the next time they are in the Niagara Falls area, but this doesn’t fool the beefy bros and Jamie and Patrick find themselves upside down in a trash can. “We can’t abide this!” Jamie says, slamming his tiny fists with a metal clang. The beefy bros’ mistake was insulting their very real girlfriends who happen to live in Niagara Falls. “Time to get even and schoolz these foolz,” Jamie says, pulling out a very cool phrase he coined. With that their eyes glaze over and they enter a patented Twin Memory in order to recall the last time they had to pound some high school fiends. That’s right! We are back in the saddle of the Daddio cycle for High School High. It’s a Dangerous Minds style parody film starring Jon Lovitz that aired on TV on September 1st, 1999. I recall seeing it as a kid, but don’t remember much about it. It aired the same day as the Michael Dudikoff film Soldier Boyz. It’s a film that I honestly can’t believe is real. Let’s go!   

High School High (1996) – BMeTric: 40.1; Notability: 48

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 12.0%; Notability: top 7.2%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 19.7%; Higher BMeT: Barb Wire, Kazaam, Striptease, Bio-Dome, The Island of Dr. Moreau, The Crow: City of Angels, Ed, Hellraiser: Bloodline, The Stupids, Spy Hard, Mr. Wrong, Poison Ivy II, D3: The Mighty Ducks, Solo, The Glimmer Man, First Kid, Eddie, Chain Reaction, Dunston Checks In, Maximum Risk, and 10 more; Higher Notability: The Fan, Jingle All the Way, Spy Hard, Chain Reaction, Daylight, Up Close & Personal, Mulholland Falls, Eddie, The Associate, Dear God, Eye for an Eye, Sgt. Bilko, The Island of Dr. Moreau, The Crow: City of Angels, The Adventures of Pinocchio, Space Truckers, Larger Than Life, Girl 6; Lower RT: The Dentist, Big Bully, Ripe, Bio-Dome, Kazaam, Ed, Faithful, Mr. Wrong, Spy Hard, Eye for an Eye, Bulletproof, Solo, Celtic Pride, Curdled, House Arrest, The Glimmer Man, The Crow: City of Angels, In Love and War, Larger Than Life, Down Periscope, and 26 more; Notes: Played 38 times, premiering on December 5th, primetime on Showtime. Some oddities: Spy Hard played 0 times on television despite coming out in 1996, that seems odd, but I’m 99% this is true. Daylight also played once, but that makes more sense since they were holding big films for rental by that point.

RogerEbert.com – 1.5 stars – High School High” opens with a big laugh (“Produced by the producer formerly known as David Zucker”) and goes downhill. Zucker, associated with the “Naked Gun” movies, wants to do the same thing here for the urban high school genre, but the movie makes two mistakes: (1) It isn’t very funny, and (2) it makes the crucial error of taking its story seriously and angling for a happy ending.

(Oh … was that the big laugh? The first third of the film is decent. Not funny, but pretty amusing at times, and Lovtiz I think is a surprisingly good leading comedy actor. The second part makes sense though, I do mostly remember it getting pretty earnest in the end.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4ZUi1mEbG0/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4ZUi1mEbG0/

(Ha the Dangerous Minds start is great. I remember this trailer so well. It feels like it should be funny. But it also feels like it is going to be super duper racist.)

Directors – Hart Bochner – ( Known For: PCU; Just Add Water; BMT: High School High; Notes: He appears to have become an actor almost exclusively after this, including ten episodes of The Starter Wife. He was Ellis in Die Hard, who I think was the coke guy, which is hilarious.)

Writers – David Zucker – ( Known For: Airplane!; The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!; Top Secret!; Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult; The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear; BASEketball; The Kentucky Fried Movie; Future BMT: An American Carol; BMT: Scary Movie V; High School High; Notes: He’s tried a few spoof films more recently and they don’t really work (I’m looking at you American Carol). It seems like his career got sidelined a bit when he started to explicitly work on Republican ads.)

Robert LoCash – ( Known For: Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult; BASEketball; CB4; Bad Girls from Valley High; BMT: High School High; Notes: He wrote a bunch of the Zucker spoofs. He also wrote the iOS game The Naked Gun: I.C.U.P. which is maybe intriguing, although I assume it is basically lost to time at this point.)

Pat Proft – ( Known For: Real Genius; The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!; Hot Shots!; Bachelor Party; Hot Shots! Part Deux; Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult; The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear; Police Academy 3: Back in Training; Police Academy: Mission to Moscow; Moving Violations; Brain Donors; Lucky Stiff; Future BMT: Scary Movie 3; Scary Movie 4; Wrongfully Accused; Mr. Magoo; BMT: Police Academy; Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment; Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol; Scary Movie V; Police Academy 5: Assignment: Miami Beach; Police Academy 6: City Under Siege; High School High; Notes: The rumor was Zucker and him were going to make a new Naked Gun, although I wonder if that was right around when Scary Movie V was released and the fact that that was a huge catastrophe basically stopped that from happening.)

Actors – Jon Lovitz – ( Known For: Matilda; A League of Their Own; Big; The Wedding Singer; Happiness; Three Amigos!; Hotel Transylvania; Rat Race; Hotel Transylvania 2; The Producers; Southland Tales; Cats & Dogs; The Brave Little Toaster; I Could Never Be Your Woman; Sandy Wexler; An American Tail: Fievel Goes West; Extinct; Small Time Crooks; Hamburger: The Motion Picture; Casino Jack; Future BMT: Coneheads; The Stepford Wives; Loaded Weapon 1; My Stepmother Is an Alien; Jumpin’ Jack Flash; Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star; Mr. Destiny; Eight Crazy Nights; Mom and Dad Save the World; Trapped in Paradise; City Slickers II: The Legend of Curly’s Gold; BMT: Grown Ups 2; Little Nicky; The Ridiculous 6; Mother’s Day; The Benchwarmers; North; 3000 Miles to Graceland; High School High; Lost & Found; Notes: Obviously well known for his years on SNL, and also for voicing The Critic. What I know of him now he basically has his comedy club in L.A. and does stuff there. Nominated for two Emmys as part of SNL.)

Tia Carrere – ( Known For: True Lies; Lilo & Stitch; Wayne’s World; Wayne’s World 2; Showdown in Little Tokyo; Easter Sunday; You May Not Kiss the Bride; Wild Cherry; My Teacher’s Wife; Hard Breakers; Zombie Nightmare; Showdown in Manila; The Immortals; Gutshot Straight; Merlin: The Return; Aloha Summer; Top of the World; Hollow Point; Back in the Day; The Legend of Hallowaiian; Future BMT: Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man; Jury Duty; Kull the Conqueror; BMT: Rising Sun; High School High; Notes: Mostly a television actress now. She was discovered in a grocery store in Hawaii. Sang on the soundtrack of Wayne’s World.)

Louise Fletcher – ( Known For: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest; Cruel Intentions; Exorcist II: The Heretic; The Player; Two Moon Junction; 2 Days in the Valley; Blue Steel; Brainstorm; Grizzly II: Revenge; The Cheap Detective; Thieves Like Us; The Lady in Red; Strange Invaders; A Map of the World; Return to Two Moon Junction; Big Eden; Strange Behavior; A Gathering of Eagles; Cassadaga; The Last Sin Eater; Future BMT: Flowers in the Attic; Mulholland Falls; Invaders from Mars; Best of the Best; Gone Fishin’; BMT: Virtuosity; Firestarter; On Deadly Ground; High School High; Notes: Won the Oscar for One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. She died in 2022. I’ll let you get into her personal life “controversies” if you want, they seem mild by today’s standards.)

Budget/Gross – N/A / Domestic: $21,302,121 (Worldwide: $21,302,121)

(That isn’t bad, but probably wasn’t actually considered good at the time for an SNL alum. Sandler was already hitting decent numbers at this point. Still, most than I would have expected.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 19% (3/16)

(Oh good a consensus: A one-joke movie, and that joke isn’t very funny anyways. That about sums it up.)

NY Times Short Review: Senseless plot, blunderbuss comedy.

Poster – High School Sigh

(Oooooohhhhhh boy. I gotta give that an F out of principle. My word.)

Tagline(s) – There’s a new teacha in the hood! (F)

(Nope. No. Not a chance.)

Keyword(s) – daddio

Top 10: The Shawshank Redemption (1994), The Godfather (1972), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), Back to the Future Part II (1989), Dead Poets Society (1989), Citizen Kane (1941), Platoon (1986), The Game (1997), Dumb and Dumber (1994), O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)

Future BMT: 78.9 Daddy Day Camp (2007), 61.2 Pet Sematary II (1992), 58.9 Jury Duty (1995), 57.4 The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter (1990), 57.0 Ghost Dad (1990), 50.8 Getting Even with Dad (1994), 49.2 My Girl 2 (1994), 47.7 Delta Force 2: The Colombian Connection (1990), 46.4 Daddy Day Care (2003), 44.5 Man of the House (1995), 43.6 The Final Conflict (1981), 41.6 My Baby’s Daddy (2004), 41.5 Speed Zone (1989), 41.0 Iron Eagle (1986), 38.2 My Father the Hero (1994), 37.9 Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995), 36.9 Desperate Hours (1990), 35.8 Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo (1984), 35.7 I Got the Hook Up (1998), 34.7 Leviathan (1989)

BMT: Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997), Troll 2 (1990), Super Mario Bros. (1993), Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (1993), Poltergeist III (1988), Cyborg (1989), Shanghai Surprise (1986), Return to the Blue Lagoon (1991), The Lawnmower Man (1992), Arthur 2: On the Rocks (1988), Fire Birds (1990), Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989), Virtuosity (1995), Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment (1985), Navy Seals (1990), Rambo III (1988), High School High (1996), Ernest Goes to Jail (1990), Clifford (1994), Man Trouble (1992), Hard to Kill (1990), Universal Soldier (1992), Days of Thunder (1990), No Mercy (1986), The Postman (1997), The Marrying Man (1991), Wild Bill (1995), Hackers (1995), Lock Up (1989), Magic in the Water (1995), The Adventures of Ford Fairlane (1990)

Best Options (Comedy): 78.9 Daddy Day Camp (2007), 58.9 Jury Duty (1995), 57.0 Ghost Dad (1990), 50.8 Getting Even with Dad (1994), 49.2 My Girl 2 (1994), 46.4 Daddy Day Care (2003), 44.5 Man of the House (1995), 41.6 My Baby’s Daddy (2004), 41.5 Speed Zone (1989), 40.0 High School High (1996), 38.2 My Father the Hero (1994), 37.9 Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995), 35.8 Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo (1984), 35.7 I Got the Hook Up (1998), 34.3 Man’s Best Friend (1993), 34.2 Spring Break (1983), 34.1 Father Hood (1993), 33.3 Drop Dead Fred (1991), 33.3 Mom and Dad Save the World (1992), 33.2 The Jerky Boys (1995), 32.2 It Takes Two (1995), 31.9 High Spirits (1988), 31.2 Arthur and the Invisibles (2006), 30.9 Another You (1991), 30.3 Who’s Harry Crumb? (1989), 29.7 Spaced Invaders (1990), 28.7 About My Father (2023), 28.0 Fools Rush In (1997), 26.1 Airheads (1994), 26.1 Baby’s Day Out (1994), 26.0 Feds (1988), 24.6 A Low Down Dirty Shame (1994), 24.4 A Fine Mess (1986), 24.4 Sibling Rivalry (1990), 23.1 Clean Slate (1994), 22.6 Moonlight and Valentino (1995), 20.1 Art School Confidential (2006), 19.1 Folks! (1992), 18.9 Threesome (1994), 18.8 Moving (1988), 17.8 Brewster’s Millions (1985), 17.3 Hexed (1993), 16.7 Mr. Destiny (1990), 16.0 Opportunity Knocks (1990), 11.6 With Honors (1994), 8.0 Let It Ride (1989)

(Oh … Jury Duty. But no, fine we don’t need to do that won … but like Jury Duty though? Why didn’t we do Jury Duty again? I do love the plot. The 00s films are all “Dad” or “Father” films basically. Just kind of funny in that it is two different plots smushed together.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 18) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Tia Carrere is No. 2 billed in High School High and No. 3 billed in Rising Sun, which also stars Wesley Snipes (No. 2 billed) who is in Demolition Man (No. 2 billed) which also stars Sylvester Stallone (No. 1 billed) who is in The Expendables 3 (No. 1 billed) which also stars Jason Statham (No. 2 billed) who is in In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (No. 1 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (2 + 3) + (2 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (2 + 1) + (3 + 1) = 18. If we were to watch Trapped in Paradise we can get the HoE Number down to 12.

Notes – The film is dedicated to Elisabeth Leustig and Lexie Bigham, both of whom were involved in the movie’s production and died in automobile crashes shortly after filming was completed. Bigham acted in the film, and Leustig was the film’s casting director.

Mekhi Phifer and Malinda Williams, who play love interests in this film, would later marry and have a son together. They divorced in 2003.

The car race (aka “Chicky Run”) between Griff (Mekhi Phifer) and Paco (Guillermo Diaz), where both drivers race to the edge of a cliff, with the first person jumping out of the car is considered the “chicken”, is similar to the race in the legendary film, Rebel Without a Cause (1955). Ironically, actress Natalie Wood who played Judy, the Chicky Run starter in the latter film, is the mother of actress Natasha Gregson Wagner, who played Julie Rubels, the pregnant teenage in Mr. Clark’s classroom, in this movie.

The film is dedicated to Elisabeth Leustig and Lexie Bigham.

Trey Parker turned down the chance to direct this movie even when he was a Hollywood unknown

Meet the Spartans Preview

Fresh off our hike to Spain, Patrick and I are captured by the Absterlutely FerSher Industries goons and thrust into the Amnimals machine. Turns out it was all a ruse (what a twist!) and they didn’t want to help us get the Obsidian Dongle at all! Instead they wanted to hook our super big brains (nbd) into the machine to triangulate the location of the Dongle and grab it for themselves so they can control the world (told you the Obsidian Dongle was rad). “No way!” we say. Time to double cross and grab the Dongle right back. They didn’t count on our ninja skillz as we totally karate chop them in the wrist and get all up in that Dongle business. However, upon fleeing using our jet packs the goons reverse the Amnimals machine to brain drain us! Oh no! We are becoming extra dumb dumbs! As we crash land in Greece we know deep down what we must do with the Obsidian Dongle but keep getting distracted by the dumbest things possible. That’s right! We’re watching Meet the Spartans. Almost certainly one of the dumbest things we’ll ever watch this is also the highest BMeTric scoring films left for BMT and obviously appears on the BMT Calendar. Perfect for our Challenges entry in the cycle. We’ve avoided it for too long. Let’s go!

Meet the Spartans (2008) – BMeTric: 95.9

MeettheSpartans_BMeT

MeettheSpartans_RV

(Even this gets a little bit of that sweet sweet regression to the mean. Given that there are now nearly 100K votes on IMDb I guess it isn’t a surprise that they aren’t all ones and twos. It must get a few threes thrown to it once in a while. This is just a shade below Epic Movie as the worst (best?) BMeTric of all time.)

Leonard Maltin – BOMB –  The creators of Date Movie and Epic Movie concocted this moronic, product-placement-laden spoof of the homoeroticism of 300, aimed at adolescent boys. Plot involves King Leonidas of Sparta (Maguire) and his self-adoring, scantily clad warriors as they battle the Persians. Oodles of pop-cultural references are complete duds. Unrated version runs 87m.

(That run time pleases me, as does the kick ass hyphen game from Leonard, and that this is the second BOMB of the cycle. Funny enough looking around I think this is only the second BOMB in something like eight months, although that is slightly less clear. He is certainly precious with them.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RY-zJtYYolo

(Oooooof the Britney Spears part. That actress plays like four or five different parts and was in over one hundred MadTv episodes (that makes so much sense …). The film looks aggressively dumb and not funny. Why? Why are we doing this?)

Directors – Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer – (Future BMT: Disaster Movie; Date Movie; Vampires Suck; The Starving Games; Best Night Ever; BMT: Epic Movie; Meet the Spartans; Razzie Notes: Nominee for Worst Director in 2009 for Disaster Movie, and Meet the Spartans; and in 2011 for Vampires Suck; and Nominee for Worst Screenplay in 2008 for Epic Movie; in 2009 for Disaster Movie, and Meet the Spartans; and in 2011 for Vampires Suck; Notes: Over a year ago it was rumored that they were working on a Star Wars spoof … I kind of hope it happens. It does have an IMDb page. So I think the title will ultimately change, seems way too close to the movies that Craig Moss produces like this and this.)

Writers – Jason Friedberg  and Aaron Seltzer (written by) – (Known For: Scary Movie; Future BMT: Disaster Movie; Date Movie; Vampires Suck; The Starving Games; Scary Movie 4; Scary Movie 2; Spy Hard; Scary Movie 3; Best Night Ever; BMT: Epic Movie; Meet the Spartans; Razzie Notes: Nominee for Worst Director in 2009 for Disaster Movie, and Meet the Spartans; and in 2011 for Vampires Suck; and Nominee for Worst Screenplay in 2008 for Epic Movie; in 2009 for Disaster Movie, and Meet the Spartans; and in 2011 for Vampires Suck; Notes: Recently they’ve been brought up on multiple sites to slam Ready Player One. The comparison is mainly about the sheer amount of product placement they use.)

Actors – Sean Maguire – (Known For: Waterland; The Dukes; BMT: Meet the Spartans; Notes: After this film he turned down Kröd Mändoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire, a British show, because he wanted to be taken more seriously. He reconsidered at the behest of his agent. He played Robin Hood in Once Upon a Time.)

Kevin Sorbo – (Known For: Soul Surfer; Let There Be Light; Future BMT: God’s Not Dead; Bitch Slap; Big Fat Important Movie; Kull the Conqueror; The Kings of Mykonos; BMT: Meet the Spartans; Notes: Hercules. Raised in Minnesota he’s done a number of Christian films recently. He claims he isn’t overly religious, although he endorsed Donald Trump for president saying that “Jesus would have voted for Trump”.)

Carmen Electra – (Known For: Scary Movie; Starsky & Hutch; Get Over It; Mr 3000; I Want Candy; Future BMT: Disaster Movie; Date Movie; Pledge This!; My Boss’s Daughter; Scary Movie 4; Dirty Love; Good Burger; Bedtime Stories; Uptown Girls; Christmas in Wonderland; Full of It; Perfume; The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human; BMT: Epic Movie; Meet the Spartans; Cheaper by the Dozen 2; Razzie Notes: Winner for Worst Supporting Actress in 2007 for Date Movie, and Scary Movie 4; and Nominee for Worst Supporting Actress in 2005 for Starsky & Hutch; in 2006 for Dirty Love; in 2008 for Epic Movie; and in 2009 for Disaster Movie, and Meet the Spartans; Notes: I knew her mostly from MTV’s Singled Out, but her career is nuts. Fronted for a rap group in LA until being discovered by Prince, then toured with him as his opening act. Ended up getting her big break on Baywatch.)

Budget/Gross – $30 million / Domestic: $38,233,676 (Worldwide: $84,646,831)

(Solid return. Not a surprise they produced a sequel. Oh, what’s that, you think they didn’t make a sequel? Well, at one point a wikipedia page existed for Meet the Spartans 2, which now redirects to Disaster Movie. It is almost definite that they realized that making fun of 300 didn’t work any more so they transitioned the planned sequel into something more fresh. Still, not surprising that they continued on their merry way with the franchise.)

#20 for the Comedy – Spoof genre

meetthespartans_spoof

(This came at a peak for the Friedberg / Seltzer brand of spoof. Subsequently the genre has well and truly died I think. Fifty Shades of Black was the last real example and it made so little money I don’t think the Wayans brothers are going to do anymore. It really depends on how you define things like Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping. Then again, that didn’t make much money either. Given the success of the Wet Hot American Summer television series, I wonder if we’ll see a few more TV examples in the coming years.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 2% (1/48): A tired, unfunny, offensive waste of time, Meet the Spartans scrapes the bottom of the cinematic barrel.

(Amazing. That one good review basically says “don’t expect much and this isn’t literally the worst thing you’ve ever seen” .. Reviewer Highlight: What’s the point of making a parody that’s dumber than the stuff it parodies? – Gene Seymour, Newsday)

Poster – Meet the Sklogans (F)

meet_the_spartans

(Designed like a heat seeking missile aimed at me not wanting to watch this movie. Nope. Pass.)

Tagline(s) – The Bigger the Hit, The Harder They Fall (C+)

(Oh geez. This is on the level of “From the producers of..” type self-referential taglines that I don’t like. Doesn’t tell me much about the film other than that it is a spoof… which everyone knows. Though it is at least a little clever, so climbs out of the basement.)

Keyword(s) – greece; Top Ten by BMeTric: 95.9 Meet the Spartans (2008); 82.6 The Legend of Hercules (2014); 51.0 Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life (2003); 49.0 Mortdecai (2015); 48.7 Hercules Reborn (2014); 47.8 Alexander (2004); 41.1 Clash of the Titans (2010); 40.8 Wrath of the Titans (2012); 40.5 Hercules (1983); 40.2 Ben-Hur (2016);

(Sigh nothing will ever beat it. It will be stuck on the Mapstreet’s Map Alright! Sklogpacking Across Europe forever and ever. Good news is Alexander will be amazing to watch I think.)

Notes – Not screened for critics. (duh)

The entire movie was shot in a week. (WHAT)

The film led Sean McGuire to be cast as the title character of the short-lived fantasy comedy series “Krod Mandoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire”, which was discontinued after 1 season due to it’s mixed reviews.

The narrator introduces Xerxes as looking like the fat guy from Borat, he’s played by Ken Davitian who played the fat guy in Borat.

To date (2011), one of two movies written and directed by both Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, not to have the word “movie” in the title. The other is Vampires Suck (2010).

Nominee for the Razzie Award for Worst Picture

Nominee for the Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actress (Carmen Electra)

Nominee for the Razzie Award for Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-Off or Sequel

Nominee for the Razzie Award for Worst Director (Jason Friedberg, Aaron Seltzer)

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

Fifty Shades of Black Preview

See the preview for Blue City to see an in depth explanation of the Black and Clue Bicycle Transition. This is the second leg and first BONUS of the year (something that was far more typical years back and something that will likely make a comeback real soon …). We are going spoof comedy, and this time we spoof previous BMT film Fifty Shades of Grey! Let’s go!

Fifty Shades of Black (2016) – BMeTric: 59.7

fiftyshadesofblack_bmet

fiftyshadesofblack_rv

(The number two movie for the year according to the BMeTric after Zoolander 2. Very impressive graphic and extremely consistent rating. Always relaxes me to see such consistency, love it.)

RogerEbert.com – 1.5 stars –  But I will say this for “Fifty Shades of Black”: It made me laugh more often than I did in “Dirty Grandpa.” That is to say, I laughed more than once. And you really can’t ask for more than that in January.

(Really tough to pull out a quote for this guy. But the gist: This movie is terrible, but there is method to the madness in a way and when you cut through it it does give you a few hearty chuckles, which is better than most terrible comedies. So there’s that. Take that for what you will because the guy who basically liked it still gave it only a half star above the lowest review possible … so yeah.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1pOTTcdRO8

(Some funny stuff in there. Probably all of the funny bits actually. Pretty solid trailer though right? Really good side-by-side with the Fifty Shades of Grey trailer I feel like. That’s impressive. What more could you ask for out of a trailer? Can you tell I’m nervous about how boring and terrible this film is going to be.)

Directors – Michael Tiddes – (BMT: Fifty Shades of Black; A Haunted House; A Haunted House 2; Notes: Looks like he got in with the Wayans after executive producing Dance Flick (which was written by them). His only credits are these three films right in a row, and his next film looks to be one of the first non-spoof comedies for Marlon Wayans (as the star, the last was probably Littleman) in a while called Naked.)

Writers – Marlon Wayans (written by) – (Known For: Scary Movie; BMT: Littleman; Scary Movie 4; Fifty Shades of Black; Scary Movie 2; Dance Flick; A Haunted House; A Haunted House 2; White Chicks; Scary Movie 3; Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood; Notes: Nominated for the Razzie Award in 2010 for Worst Supporting Actor for G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra; Won for Worst Actor and Screen Couple, Littleman (2006), Nominated for Worst Screenplay, Littleman (2006), Nominated for Worst Actress, Screen Couple and Screenplay: White Chicks (2004). Ahhhh. Well, what is there to say that we didn’t say for White Chicks. The guy is pretty prolific and can turn a profit on a buck. This looked to be a flop, but he has a strong network of comedians around him, enough to challenge (and win seemingly) the Scary Movie franchise for modern spoof movies.)

Rick Alvarez (written by) – (BMT: Fifty Shades of Black; A Haunted House; A Haunted House 2; Notes: Not much about this guy online, but he is also writing Marlon Wayans’ next project Naked. I would assume he is Marlon Wayans writing partner of sorts.)

Actors – Marlon Wayans – (Known For: Requiem for a Dream; Scary Movie; The Heat; The Ladykillers; Above the Rim; I’m Gonna Git You Sucka; BMT: Norbit; Dungeons & Dragons; Littleman; Fifty Shades of Black; Scary Movie 2; Dance Flick; Marmaduke; A Haunted House; A Haunted House 2; White Chicks; G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra; Mo’ Money; The Sixth Man; Senseless; Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood; Notes: Again what more is there to say. Here’s to hoping him and Shawn get back together for another White Chicks-esque comedy soon.)

Kali Hawk – (Known For: Bridesmaids; Get Him to the Greek; Celebrity; BMT: Fifty Shades of Black; Couples Retreat; Peeples; The Perfect Match; Answers to Nothing; Notes: I knew her to some extent from the television show New Girl where she played Shelby. A comedian she performed for Last Comic Standing and was cast in the pilot for a reboot of In Living Color which did not go to series (which explains how she became involved with this project I suppose))

Also stars Fred Willard who has been in a multitude of spoof movies over the years.

Budget/Gross – $5 million / Domestic: $11,686,940 (Worldwide: $21,164,799)

(That seems … okay. Not great, but considering its budget okay. But one of the worst for Marlon Wayans ever. It is actually amazing: you can almost predict his success with the spoof movies. Scary Movie: $140 domestic; Scary Movie 2: $70 million domestic; Haunted House: $40 million domestic; Haunted House 2: $17 million domestic; Fifty Shades of Black: $11 million domestic. Basically just halve it each time. Amazing.)

#48 for the Comedy – Spoof genre

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(Right near #50 Dracula Dead and Loving It which was Mel Brooks’ last spoof movie. The spoof genre had a pretty sustained run from 1990 to 2005 and then there is just boom time (with much less money …) for a brief period and now we are kind of back to 1980s levels. That boom is when Friedburg and Seltzer re-entered the spoof game. They wrote the first Scary Movie and then Zucker (who continued the series) and them competed for that brief period until the genre flamed out. A similar thing happened recently with the Wayans who basically killed off the Scary Movie franchise with A Haunted House. The spoof genre is an interesting beast because so many people have fond memories of it, and almost all of those fond memories are from the 80s like Airplane! Perhaps we could see a re-emergence of the idea in a few years now that the three big groups aren’t likely to try and enter the game and suck all of the available funding. We’ll see.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 7% (3/43): Wildly erratic even for a spoof movie, Fifty Shades of Black bears the unfortunate distinction of offering fewer laughs than the unintentionally funny film it’s trying to lampoon.

(Haha, wow. Well, it might be boring, but like A Haunted House and A Haunted House 2 I’m sure it’ll end up being slightly underrated in the end. Critics never give the needed leeway with the inherent hit-or-miss comedy that comes out of what might as well be improv. Kind of like SNL skits turned into movies. They aren’t really good, but they are never as bad as the reviews suggest, you just need to roll with the misses.)

Poster – Fifty Sklogs of Sklog (B+)

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(Woah! Scandalous. It’s actually a really good poster. Look at the symmetry. Look at the bold red background. Which they didn’t put so many characters on it and the font could be a little less boring. But still quite well done. If you look at the notes or are a fan of James Bond you might know that this is also a spoof of the poster for For Your Eyes Only with Roger Moore.)

Tagline(s) – Once you go black, you never go gray. (A)

Way shadier than gray. (C)

(The second one doesn’t really work. Yes it gives a hint of plot and it’s concise. But otherwise not clever in the least. I think the first one is great. Clever, got some cadance, kinda spoofs Fifty Shades of Grey in itself. It’s damn good.)

Keyword(s) – reference to ryan gosling; Top Ten by BMeTric: 59.9 Fifty Shades of Black (2016); 19.6 Maps to the Stars (2014); 14.0 Vaterfreuden (2014); 1.0 Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014);

(Well … that was a crap as I expected it to be. How is that the number one keyword. Ridiculous IMDb, ridiculous)

Notes – The poster of the cast between a woman’s legs is a spoof of the iconic poster for the Roger Moore Bond film For Your Eyes Only (1981). Jane Seymour starred in Roger Moore’s first Bond film Live and Let Die (1973). (Yup)

This is King Bach’s (Andrew Bachelor) second movie. His first being We Are Your Friends (2015). (Ooooof another incredibly poorly received film)

This film also does a parody about the artist, The Weeknd, who has a song in Fifty Shades of Grey. In this movie he goes by Weekday and looks like the artist The Weeknd.

Unlike A Haunted House and its sequel, this film follows very close to the film adaptation of Fifty Shades of Grey. (Bullshit. Haunted House was Paranormal Activity and Haunted House 2 followed Sinister as well. All of the Scary Movies follow specific movies as well. Bullshit.)