writing team – Page 2 – Bad Movie Twins

Dumb and Dumber To Preview

“I ain’t afraid of no gh-gh-ghosts,” Jamie says, looking at the stately manor that Patrick has taken them to. Patrick tells him that he had graduated from the Style Section of Love 101 and was ready to ‘Get all the feels.’ “And by feels I mean time to seal the deal with what every woman wants,” Patrick explains. Jamie nods in understanding. “A firm handshake,” he says matter of factly. “Only the firmest,” Patrick agrees. Kyle looks wistful for a moment remembering when he and Rachel shared their first firm handshake. “But what does this have to do with a ghost house (with the most house)?” Jamie asks. Patrick chuckles. “What’s a better way to strengthen those handshake muscles than busting ghosts?” He says, handing proton packs to Jamie and Kyle. “Wait a second, where’s your proton pack?” Jamie asks. Patrick slaps him on the shoulder and assures him that he’s been shaking hands with his lady since 1982. As they approach the house Jamie is just glad that Samantha had that European tour set for her new book. It sure does look spooky and he wouldn’t like her to see how scared he is. Just when he is about to declare this lesson to be the dumbest one yet, Patrick pipes up jovially. “This actually reminds me of when we all first met,” he says. “You mean in jail?” Kyle asks, his voice hitching in fear. “Oh yeah,” Jamie says, momentarily distracted from how hauntingly spooktacular the house looks, “we had to clean out the basement of the jail, remember? Now that you mention it, that was way scarier than this.” Suddenly he’s not feeling so bad. “Yeah,” Patrick says remembering, “we were all just too young and dumb to be scared.” That’s right! We are doing a double dose of “dumb” with a healthy serving of “meet” by watching the Dumb and Dumber prequel and sequel: Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd and Dumb and Dumber To. We saw the prequel in theaters oh so many years ago and it has always been a point of pride. This cycle seemed like the perfect time to break it out by pairing it with the sequel that is a surprising BMT qualifier. Let’s go!

Dumb and Dumber To (2014) – BMeTric: 47.8; Notability: 61

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 10.8%; Notability: top 2.0%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 27.0%; Higher BMeT: Left Behind, The Legend of Hercules, Kirk Cameron’s Saving Christmas, Ouija, God’s Not Dead, V/H/S Viral, Devil’s Due, The Pyramid, Tammy, A Haunted House 2, The Prince, Sex Tape, Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones, I, Frankenstein, Outcast, Rage, American Heist, Annabelle, Everly, Annie, and 7 more; Higher Notability: Transformers: Age of Extinction, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Exodus: Gods and Kings, Dracula Untold, Transcendence; Lower RT: Left Behind, The Prince, Kirk Cameron’s Saving Christmas, Outcast, I, Frankenstein, The Legend of Hercules, Ouija, Some Kind of Beautiful, A Haunted House 2, Just Before I Go, The Forger, The Angriest Man in Brooklyn, The Cobbler, The Longest Week, The Bag Man, Seventh Son, God’s Not Dead, The Best of Me, Good People, Rage, and 47 more; Notes: We’ve seen the top four BMeT, but then it gets spotty. My god, The Pyramid. We really need to do The Pyramid at some point.

RogerEbert.com – 2.0 stars – Bottom line: For every joke that works, there are five that fall flat and one that elicits waves of disgust. You might be able to handle that ratio, however, just to hear absurd discussions like this one between Penny and Lloyd. “I’ve always wanted to go to India and work in a leprechaun colony,” Penny says. Counters Lloyd, after digesting the statement: “I think you mean Ireland.”

(Not a terrible joke, although it is borderline “cadence of a joke”. Like I get the joke, but also it feels like Lloyd is almost too dumb to make the joke in a way that makes sense. Overall I agree with the sentiment though.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmNddThxi4c/

(I remember seeing the beginning of this trailer and being like NOPE. Such a dumb joke. I would rather they suggested they just had silly adventures for 25 years or whatever. Some of the others are decent, although all the good jokes are probably in this trailer.)

Directors – Bobby Farrelly – ( Known For: There’s Something About Mary; Me, Myself & Irene; Shallow Hal; Kingpin; Stuck on You; Fever Pitch; Osmosis Jones; The Three Stooges; Champions; Future BMT: Hall Pass; The Heartbreak Kid; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Notes: They have kind of struck out on their own recently. He directed Champions without Peter for example.)

Peter Farrelly – ( Known For: Green Book; Dumb and Dumber; There’s Something About Mary; Me, Myself & Irene; Shallow Hal; Kingpin; Stuck on You; Fever Pitch; Osmosis Jones; The Three Stooges; The Greatest Beer Run Ever; Ricky Stanicky; Future BMT: Hall Pass; The Heartbreak Kid; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Movie 43; Notes: Ricky flipping Stanicky. That one was Peter on his own as well. He also won two Oscars for Green Book.)

Writers – Sean Anders and John Morris – ( Known For: We’re the Millers; Hot Tub Time Machine; She’s Out of My League; Instant Family; Mr. Popper’s Penguins; Sex Drive; Spirited; Never Been Thawed; Future BMT: Horrible Bosses 2; Daddy’s Home 2; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Notes: They’ve had an amusing string of bad sequels. No upcoming which is odd, last film was Spirited.)

Peter Farrelly – ( Known For: Green Book; Dumb and Dumber; There’s Something About Mary; Me, Myself & Irene; Shallow Hal; Stuck on You; The Three Stooges; The Greatest Beer Run Ever; Ricky Stanicky; Outside Providence; Future BMT: Hall Pass; The Heartbreak Kid; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd; Notes: Yeah won the Oscar for Green Book. A lot of their films are set in Providence or sometimes a place that could be confused for Martha’s Vineyard where they also own houses.)

Bobby Farrelly – ( Known For: Dumb and Dumber; There’s Something About Mary; Me, Myself & Irene; Shallow Hal; Stuck on You; The Three Stooges; Outside Providence; Future BMT: Hall Pass; The Heartbreak Kid; Bushwhacked; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd; Notes: Huh, he wrote Bushwacked under a pseudonym it would seem, as Danny Byers. Strange.)

Bennett Yellin – ( Known For: Dumb and Dumber; In the Blood; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd; Notes: Writing the forever-in-production remake/sequel/requel (?) of Police Academy.)

Mike Cerrone – ( Known For: Me, Myself & Irene; The Three Stooges; Ricky Stanicky; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Notes: Seems to be a friend of the Farrellys as he gets punch up credit on a few of their films and bit parts as well.)

Actors – Jim Carrey – ( Known For: The Truman Show; Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; Bruce Almighty; The Mask; Dumb and Dumber; Yes Man; Liar Liar; Ace Ventura: Pet Detective; How the Grinch Stole Christmas; Me, Myself & Irene; A Series of Unfortunate Events; Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues; The Cable Guy; Sonic the Hedgehog; Horton Hears a Who!; Man on the Moon; A Christmas Carol; Mr. Popper’s Penguins; I Love You Phillip Morris; Sonic the Hedgehog 2; Future BMT: Kick-Ass 2; Fun with Dick and Jane; The Incredible Burt Wonderstone; Pink Cadillac; BMT: Batman Forever; Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls; The Number 23; Dumb and Dumber To; Once Bitten; Notes: I remember looking at this ages ago, but he’s never not been famous since he broke bit with his golden year with The Mask, Dumb and Dumber, and Ace Ventura. It seems like he’s faded on occasion, but if you look he never really has, he just changes audience focus. Nominated for an Emmy for Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond.)

Jeff Daniels – ( Known For: The Martian; Looper; Dumb and Dumber; Speed; Steve Jobs; State of Play; The Hours; Pleasantville; Good Night, and Good Luck.; The Squid and the Whale; Arachnophobia; Terms of Endearment; The Lookout; Traitor; Away We Go; The Purple Rose of Cairo; Blood Work; Radio Days; Gettysburg; Fly Away Home; Future BMT: Allegiant; 101 Dalmatians; RV; My Favorite Martian; Space Chimps; The Butcher’s Wife; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Gods and Generals; Notes: Won two Emmys for The Newsroom and Godless. Was nominated for three more. I find it crazy he’s never been nominated for an Oscar for things like The Purple Rose of Cairo.)

Rob Riggle – ( Known For: The Hangover; 21 Jump Street; 22 Jump Street; Step Brothers; The Other Guys; Hotel Transylvania; Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby; Hotel Transylvania 2; The Lorax; 12 Strong; Going the Distance; Absolutely Anything; Strays; True Memoirs of an International Assassin; Big Miracle; Just Before I Go; Super High Me; The Curse of Bridge Hollow; Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life; Dead Rising: Watchtower; Future BMT: The Internship; Let’s Be Cops; Larry Crowne; Night School; The War with Grandpa; The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard; How to Be a Latin Lover; UglyDolls; BMT: Dumb and Dumber To; Killers; Midnight Sun; My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2; Furry Vengeance; Unaccompanied Minors; Notes: The classic story: a soldier turned comedian who now is a pretty standard punch up guy when they need someone to be funny randomly in a film. Nominated for an Emmy for voice over in Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice.)

Budget/Gross – $40,000,000 / Domestic: $86,208,010 (Worldwide: $169,837,010)

(That actually is pretty good. I’m constantly surprised more comedies aren’t still making it to theaters. You can clearly make them on a budget with experienced comedy filmmakers.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 30% (46/153): Dumb and Dumber To does have its moments, but not enough of them — and the Farrelly brothers’ brand of humor is nowhere near as refreshingly transgressive as it once seemed.

(Yeah I think that is constantly the problem with films like this. The humor has evolved but it is almost never enough to make sense in making a good sequel.)

Reviewer Highlight: The Farrellys are still not much interested in film as a visual medium, and when Lloyd and Harry aren’t smacking each other or dropping their pants, you might as well be listening to a radio play. – Manohla Dargis, New York Times

Poster – Sklog and Skloger Sklog

(It is an iconic image and even the silly 90’s font is iconic. I think some people cringed at the title, but it’s totally in keeping with the first film. Anyway, it’s fine. B-.)

Tagline(s) – The average person uses 10% of their brain capacity. Imagine what he could do with 1%. (D)

(Lol, what?)

Keyword(s) – 2007-2015

Top 10: Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011), The Hangover Part II (2011), X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009), In Time (2011), Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009), 2012 (2009), Terminator Salvation (2009), Due Date (2010), Fifty Shades of Grey (2015)

Future BMT: 96.3 Disaster Movie (2008), 90.5 Vampires Suck (2010), 84.3 Prom Night (2008), 84.2 Spy Kids 4: All the Time in the World (2011), 80.0 Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience (2009), 79.2 Daddy Day Camp (2007), 78.5 Shark Night (2011), 78.0 The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure (2012), 78.0 Who’s Your Caddy? (2007), 77.8 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel (2009), 77.5 Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked (2011), 77.1 Paranormal Activity 4 (2012), 75.2 The Apparition (2012), 75.0 Superhero Movie (2008), 74.4 God’s Not Dead (2014), 74.1 The Spirit (2008), 73.6 The Last Exorcism Part II (2013), 73.2 The Unborn (2009), 72.0 Dance Flick (2009), 71.2 Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension (2015)

BMT: Epic Movie (2007), Meet the Spartans (2008), Dragonball Evolution (2009), Jack and Jill (2011), Scary Movie V (2013), The Last Airbender (2010), Left Behind (2014), Fifty Shades of Grey (2015), The Love Guru (2008), In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (2007), Fantastic Four (2015), Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2011), Norbit (2007), Movie 43 (2013), I Know Who Killed Me (2007), Bratz (2007), The Legend of Hercules (2014), Dragon Wars: D-War (2007), One Missed Call (2008), Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009), Skyline (2010), The Devil Inside (2012), Sex and the City 2 (2010), Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (2007), Kirk Cameron’s Saving Christmas (2014), Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (2015), Furry Vengeance (2010), The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009), After Earth (2013), Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son (2011), The Gallows (2015), Jonah Hex (2010), Are We Done Yet? (2007), Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star (2011), Getaway (2013), …

Best Options (Comedy): 96.3 Disaster Movie (2008), 90.5 Vampires Suck (2010), 84.2 Spy Kids 4: All the Time in the World (2011), 79.2 Daddy Day Camp (2007), 78.0 Who’s Your Caddy? (2007), 77.8 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel (2009), 77.5 Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked (2011), 75.0 Superhero Movie (2008), 74.4 God’s Not Dead (2014), 72.0 Dance Flick (2009), 70.2 Delta Farce (2007), 69.6 College Road Trip (2008), 69.4 Gulliver’s Travels (2010), 69.1 Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore (2010), 68.5 Yogi Bear (2010), 65.1 An American Carol (2008), 64.8 Sex Tape (2014), 64.7 The Comebacks (2007), 64.6 Tooth Fairy (2010), 63.7 Underdog (2007), 63.5 Hot Tub Time Machine 2 (2015), 62.1 Space Chimps (2008), 61.1 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip (2015), 60.9 Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007), 60.9 Madea Goes to Jail (2009), 60.8 Meet Dave (2008), 60.7 College (2008), 60.0 Code Name: The Cleaner (2007), 60.0 Witless Protection (2008), 60.0 Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil (2011), …

(It is there, but obviously lower than the absurd options we still have available. My god. There are so many bad movies that to speed things up I only scraped data on the bad ones … there were like 100 qualifying movies one year, it was an insane time. Anyways. Out of all the movies I can already tell most are going to be no fun nonsense, but someday we’ll watch Meet Dave and Holy Man and stuff and finish off Eddie Murphy’s catalog.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 14) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Jim Carrey is No. 1 billed in Dumb and Dumber To and No. 1 billed in The Number 23, which also stars Virginia Madsen (No. 2 billed) who is in Firewall (No. 3 billed) which also stars Harrison Ford (No. 1 billed) who is in Hollywood Homicide (No. 1 billed) which also stars Josh Hartnett (No. 2 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 3 billed) => (1 + 1) + (2 + 3) + (1 + 1) + (2 + 3) = 14. There is no shorter path at the moment.

Notes – No CGI was used for the full body paint on Rob Riggle to blend in with the hotel hallway. It took six hours to paint him and blend in accurately with the vending machine.

The Farrelly Brothers couldn’t get in touch with Brady Bluhm to reprise his role as Billy. They eventually found him through Facebook and were able to get him for the sequel. Due to regulations, Bluhm had to audition for the Farrellys.

Jim Carrey nearly dropped out of the sequel because he felt that the project’s original producers, Warner Bros., weren’t enthusiastic about the film. Carrey eventually decided to rejoin the project, although Warner Bros. dropped the project, which was then taken up by Red Granite Pictures and Universal Studios.

This marks the first film since Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls (1995) where Jim Carrey reprises his character from a previous film.

Numerous posters and official pieces of artwork depict Harry and Lloyd in the “dog van” from the original Dumb and Dumber (1994). However, in the actual movie, they are in it for less than one minute of screen time.

Poltergeist (2015) Preview

“That was amazing,” Jamie says and then turns to everyone else. “Wasn’t that am…” he stops, looking bewildered. Apparently while he was listening to Sam’s story they were let out of jail. He looks up at a banner hanging above him that reads “The Men in Black Take London: Fashion Made Simply Complicated.” Next to that nonsense is a picture of Kyle, Jamie and Patrick posed like Charlie’s Angels in tuxedos. “What thuuuuu,” Jamie says dumbly. “Finally, the prodigal son has returned,” Patrick says from behind him. Jamie swings around to find Kyle and Patrick smirking at him. How dare they smirk like a couple Sir Smirks-a-lots at him! Outrageous! “And by prodigal son I mean your brain since you’ve been listening blankly to Sam recite that (I have to admit, quite good) book for the last 48 hours.” Sam blushes at the compliment given by one of their generation’s great American writers. “Meanwhile, Kyle here has been putting in the work,” Patrick says, patting Kyle on the back. It’s time for him to blush. “The Fashion Police weren’t such bad guys and with the help of Rachel they all agreed that it was all a misunderstanding.” Patrick elbows him in the ribs. Kyle continues, “And maybe the Fashion Police invited me to be part of their softball team and then maybe I mentioned my idea for a tuxedo that was not just hard to put on, but almost impossible.” Patrick butts in, “It’s a tuxedo that’s like an escape room, except you’re trying to escape into the tuxedo!” Patrick’s eyes are shining maniacally. “Ahem, anyway,” Patrick says, “our work here is about done.” Then gathering himself and pulling Jamie aside. “ But your work is just beginning,” he says softly, “How do you feel about ghosts?” That’s right! Busting makes us feel good, and by that I mean we like to bust up franchises that we haven’t quite finished for BMT. In this case we fairly recently watched Poltergeist II (crazy ending) and Poltergeist III (Ammmaaaazzziinnnggg) and that completed the original trilogy. But we still had one disastrous remake left. Poltergeist (2015). Let’s go!

Poltergeist (2015) – BMeTric: 68.6; Notability: 38

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 3.6%; Notability: top 12.0%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 25.8%; Higher BMeT: Fifty Shades of Grey, Fantastic Four, The Human Centipede III (Final Sequence), Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2, The Gallows, The Boy Next Door, Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension, Knock Knock, The Ridiculous 6; Higher Notability: Entourage, Jupiter Ascending, Pixels, Pan, Terminator Genisys, The Divergent Series: Insurgent, Point Break, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip, Fantastic Four, Blackhat, Mortdecai, The Last Witch Hunter, Child 44, The Wedding Ringer, Fifty Shades of Grey, Unfinished Business, Little Boy, Daddy’s Home, The Ridiculous 6, Victor Frankenstein, and 10 more; Lower RT: The Ridiculous 6, Freaks of Nature, Home Sweet Hell, Extraction, Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2, Rock the Kasbah, Survivor, Hot Pursuit, Hitman: Agent 47, Fantastic Four, Pay the Ghost, Unfinished Business, Point Break, Mortdecai, The Boy Next Door, Area 51, Hot Tub Time Machine 2, Return to Sender, Sinister 2, Regression, and 43 more; Notes: Out of the Higher BMeT we’ve seen all but three. And oh man … you remember Unfinished Business? My god. It was like the Waiting For Forever of its era. Remember Waiting For Forever?

RogerEbert.com – 1.5 stars – Rarely has a remake felt more contractually obligated than the 2015 version of “Poltergeist.” There are a few decent performances, a nice riff on the technology fears that drove the original movie, and a centerpiece of horror that works, but never once do you get the feeling that the people behind this remake are here because of artistic passion or creative drive. They’re here because, well, somebody had to be here, so why not them? With remakes of “Nightmare on Elm Street,” “Friday the 13th,” “Evil Dead,” and more already on the books, “Poltergeist” is even arguably a bit late to the party. And they didn’t bring a gift.

(Sounds correct. What a wild time the early 2010s were with horror. I feel like we are in the same place today. They are trying to kick start big budget mainstream horror and something is tripping them up. Probably that real horror-heads expect things that are more extreme than what the mainstream is willing to handle. So you end up with Scream 6 or M3GAN as the big hits (i.e. borderline horror-comedy).)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HD2sz9RVzfM/

(“We can’t call the cops, what are we going to tell them?” Uh, that your daughter is missing? Good to see Jared Harris though.)

Directors – Gil Kenan – ( Known For: Monster House; City of Ember; A Boy Called Christmas; Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire; BMT: Poltergeist; Notes: Holy shit, the director of Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire … that makes a lot of sense. Nominated for an Oscar for Monster House.)

Writers – David Lindsay-Abaire – ( Known For: Oz the Great and Powerful; Rise of the Guardians; Robots; Rabbit Hole; The Family Fang; Future BMT: Inkheart; BMT: Poltergeist; Notes: Frankly, the fact that they seemed to have gotten kids’ film writers and directors for this film is probably all you need to know about it. Apparently did a pass on Kung Fu Panda 4.)

Steven Spielberg – ( Known For: A.I. Artificial Intelligence; The Goonies; Close Encounters of the Third Kind; Poltergeist; What Lies Beneath; The Fabelmans; The Sugarland Express; Ace Eli and Rodger of the Skies; BMT: Poltergeist; Notes: The rest are just the people who wrote the original including Spielberg himself. At one point he was running all of WB’s cartoon division back in the day, trying to resurrect Looney Tunes and creating Roger Rabbit.)

Michael Grais and Mark Victor – ( Known For: Poltergeist; Death Hunt; Future BMT: Marked for Death; BMT: Poltergeist; Poltergeist II: The Other Side; Cool World; Notes: Cool World! They got credits on the video game which I now feel like I should play.)

Actors – 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; G-Force; Strictly Business; BMT: Poltergeist; Argylle; Notes: Interesting career in that he really doesn’t seem like he is ever in bad films, and then we watch two in quick succession. Won an Oscar for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. Nominated for another for Vice.)

Rosemarie DeWitt – ( Known For: La La Land; Cinderella Man; Rachel Getting Married; Kill the Messenger; The Company Men; Promised Land; The Professor; A Little Bit of Heaven; Your Sister’s Sister; Margaret; Sweet Virginia; Arizona; Digging for Fire; Nobody Walks; Afterschool; The Estate; Touchy Feely; Purple Violets; Tenure; The Great New Wonderful; Future BMT: The Watch; The Odd Life of Timothy Green; Men, Women & Children; BMT: Poltergeist; Notes: I don’t know why but she gives me heavy television energy, but really she’s only been in things like Unite States of Tara, but mostly does movies. It feels like she plays “mothers” a lot.)

Kennedi Clements – ( BMT: Poltergeist; Notes: She hasn’t been doing much, but probably is in school and junk.)

Budget/Gross – $35,000,000 / Domestic: $47,425,125 (Worldwide: $95,437,994)

(Yeah, pretty bad. Always bad when the original makes a ton more than the remake 35 years later.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 29% (40/136): Paying competent homage without adding anything of real value to the original Poltergeist, this remake proves just as ephemeral (but half as haunting) as its titular spirit.

(Sounds correct. Although I might challenge the concept that it was competent.)

Reviewer Highlight: [A] professionally executed yet bloodless film … an act of homage that hews reverently to its source material while missing the essential spirit and vitality that once powered it. – Andrew Barker, Variety

Poster – Poo-tergeist

(Yeah, well… they all can’t be winners. I don’t like how dim this is. Also it takes the least scary part of the first film and puts it front and center. That clown was always ridiculous. C-.)

Tagline(s) – They know what scares you. (C)

(Cool. ‘They’re back’ would have sufficed. This is accurate and short. That’s what I got.)

Keyword(s) – 2015-2023

Top 10: 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), Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021), The Revenant (2015)

Future BMT: 85.5 Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023), 79.4 Jeepers Creepers III (2017), 79.0 Black Christmas (2019), 76.4 Jeepers Creepers: Reborn (2022), 74.7 The Grudge (2019), 73.7 The Turning (2020), 71.2 Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension (2015), 70.7 Snatched (2017), 68.8 Norm of the North (2016), 68.3 Meet the Blacks (2016), 67.0 Max Steel (2016), 66.5 The Disappointments Room (2016), 66.3 God’s Not Dead 2 (2016), 64.9 Brahms: The Boy II (2020), 64.5 Blair Witch (2016), 63.5 Hot Tub Time Machine 2 (2015), 62.9 Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (2017), 61.2 Like a Boss (2020), 61.1 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip (2015), 59.5 Jem and the Holograms (2015)

BMT: Cats (2019), 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), Poltergeist (2015), Fantasy Island (2020), The Exorcist: Believer (2023), Expend4bles (2023), Meg 2: The Trench (2023), Morbius (2022), After We Fell (2021), Moonfall (2022), Blacklight (2022), Independence Day: Resurgence (2016), Transformers: The Last Knight (2017), Hot Pursuit (2015), The 5th Wave (2016), The Snowman (2017), Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City (2021), …

Best Options (2015): 71.2 Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension (2015), 68.6 Poltergeist (2015), 63.5 Hot Tub Time Machine 2 (2015), 61.1 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip (2015), 59.5 Jem and the Holograms (2015), 58.0 The Lazarus Effect (2015), 57.8 The Transporter Refueled (2015), 56.0 Sinister 2 (2015), 53.2 Aloha (2015), 49.5 Blackhat (2015), 42.7 Pan (2015), 39.2 Rock the Kasbah (2015), 38.9 Masterminds (2015), 38.1 90 Minutes in Heaven (2015), 35.7 Love the Coopers (2015), 35.6 Victor Frankenstein (2015), 35.4 The Perfect Guy (2015), …

(Goddddddamn, Pan. We’ve seen Hot Tub Time Machine 2 actually … in theaters. Probably the worst decision we made at the time. Real dumb film and I don’t look forward to watching it again.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 18) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Sam Rockwell is No. 1 billed in Poltergeist and No. 2 billed in Argylle, which also stars Henry Cavill (No. 5 billed) who is in Justice League (No. 2 billed) 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) => (1 + 2) + (5 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (3 + 3) = 18. If we were to watch G-Force we can get the HoE Number down to 15.

Notes – Rosemarie DeWitt wanted to do the film, after she experienced the engaged and lively audience reaction at the premiere of The Conjuring (2013), which she attended because it featured her husband Ron Livingston.

(at around 1h 26 mins) The bumper sticker on the Bowen vehicle during the last scene of the film says: Hooper High School. This is a direct reference to Tobe Hooper, who directed the 1982 original version.

In a Q&A, Saxon Sharbino admitted that she had never seen the original Poltergeist (1982) until filming was complete on this production.

The original cut ran for 101 minutes with 7-8 minutes of footage missing from the theatrical cut. This footage was released as a director’s cut on the DVD and Blu-ray release.

Parapsychologist/Anomalist Christopher Chacon, one of the world’s foremost authorities on “poltergeists”, was utilized by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/20th Century Fox studios as their official expert on the phenomenon to internationally publicize and promote the release of the movie.

Men in Black: International Preview

Plain Jane is back, Jack! Her new boo, Brad, is away on a big ski vacay with the boys for Xmas break. Holiday blues, anyone? Brain blitz! How about a working vacation for a solo girl on the move? Off she jets to Peru to research her new book: Holly Ween’s Llama Drama. On her way there she has a startling thought: ‘New country, new you.’ With that she dons her Holly Ween disguise and soon she’s the toast of first class. You can take the girl out of the country, but you can’t take the Plain Jane out the girl, apparently, as the first thing she does getting off the airplane is crash right into Alejandro. No one told her that her llama wrangler was going to be so darn tootin’ hot. There’s no crime against flirting is there? After a hijinks-filled tour of Peru, they arrive at their destination, Alejandro’s llama farm. It’s Xmas and Holly Ween and Alejandro soon find themselves under some mistletoe. Just as they are about to share a chaste smooch, Alejandro pulls back. Did he finally see the Plain Jane inside of her? With a pained look he decides to reveal his three darkest secrets. The first is that he actually hates llamas ever since his mother was killed while researching them in the Peruvian jungle. The second is that this wasn’t a chance job assignment. He made a bet with his guy pals that he could make anyone his girlfriend before Xmas and she was the lucky loser. Before she can storm off in disgust he reveals his third secret. He’s in love with her. Oh dear! Plain Jane’s in trouble this time.

“Wow,” Jamie says. Holly Ween’s love story went international… but his is standing right in front of him. That’s right! We are going international with a little Men in Black: International. The last of the MIB saga (people call it that, right?), this one made the mistake of a) not bringing back Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones and b) being terrible. Adding to the mix is our Bring a Friend, which is also ending a significant cultural touchstone. That’s right! After Everything, the concluding chapter of the After series. There were some claims that this had some theatrical release but not according to any reputable news source. Good enough for us. I love After! Let’s go!

Men in Black: International (2019) – BMeTric: 47.8; Notability: 70

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 8.8%; Notability: top 0.8%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 6.1%; Higher BMeT: Cats, Black Christmas, The Grudge, Secret Obsession, Escape Plan: The Extractors, IO, Trauma Center, The Fanatic, Hellboy, After, The Curse of La Llorona, The Silence, The Poison Rose, Tall Girl, Rim of the World, The Hustle, Primal, Polaroid, Playing with Fire, Serenity, and 2 more; Higher Notability: Dark Phoenix, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil; Lower RT: Polaroid, The Coldest Game, The Poison Rose, The Hustle, The Fanatic, Hellboy, After, Polar, Cats, The Grudge, Trauma Center, Serenity, Jexi, Miss Bala, Dark Phoenix; Notes: Wow … I kind of forgot this film came out so recently. Only five years ago? And I also forgot the second Maleficent film qualified. That’s wild. We saw some weird films that year, Hellboy? After? Serenity? Weird.

RogerEbert.com – 1.5 stars – Most of what’s enjoyable about this sequel have been cribbed from other movies, like the star pairing from “Thor: Ragnarok,” the villains’ similarity to the Twins in “The Matrix Reloaded” and the many references to the original “Men in Black,” including the score and the basic character arcs of a rookie learning the ropes from a top agent. Without its stars’ chemistry, there’s little life left on this sequel planet besides surface-level jokes, too-cute aliens and a convoluted story.

(Makes sense for a spin-off especially in light of the third ultimately concluding the series in a reasonably satisfying manner. What’s left is to try and spin as far away from the series as one can … but then you have to ground it with the basic plot and soundscape and junk. Only way to do it.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3lJwV7ZIIk/

(Even our own agents … spoiler alert that isn’t the plot of this film. I mean, it is, but not in the way it is indicated with like a thousand agents all pointing guns at them. This trailer is soulless trash (in my opinion), hate the music.)

Directors – F. Gary Gray – ( Known For: The Italian Job; The Fate of the Furious; Straight Outta Compton; The Negotiator; Friday; Lift; Set It Off; Future BMT: Law Abiding Citizen; A Man Apart; BMT: Men in Black: International; Be Cool; Notes: He directed “Waterfalls” by TLC. So … like one of the best directors ever I suppose.)

Writers – Matt Holloway and Art Marcum – ( Known For: Iron Man; Future BMT: Uncharted; BMT: Transformers: The Last Knight; Men in Black: International; Punisher: War Zone; Notes: Oh snap, they are credited with Kraven the Hunter later this year. That could be exciting.)

Lowell Cunningham – ( Known For: Men in Black; Men in Black 3; BMT: Men in Black II; Men in Black: International; Notes: He’s the comic writer. I’m surprised the other writers of Men in Black didn’t get a credit.)

Actors – Chris Hemsworth – ( Known For: The Avengers; Avengers: Endgame; Avengers: Infinity War; Avengers: Age of Ultron; Thor; Thor: Ragnarok; Doctor Strange; Thor: The Dark World; Star Trek; Rush; The Cabin in the Woods; Thor: Love and Thunder; Snow White and the Huntsman; Extraction; Ghostbusters; Bad Times at the El Royale; In the Heart of the Sea; Extraction II; 12 Strong; A Perfect Getaway; Future BMT: Vacation; The Huntsman: Winter’s War; Blackhat; BMT: Men in Black: International; Red Dawn; Notes: Oh shoot, he’s Optimus Prime in the new animated Transformers film. That’s going to be dumb.)

Tessa Thompson – ( Known For: Avengers: Endgame; Thor: Ragnarok; Thor: Love and Thunder; Annihilation; Creed; Creed II; The Marvels; Selma; Creed III; Sorry to Bother You; Between Two Ferns: The Movie; Dear White People; Lady and the Tramp; War on Everyone; Passing; Make It Happen; Sylvie’s Love; Little Woods; The Human Contract; Furlough; Future BMT: When a Stranger Calls; For Colored Girls; BMT: Men in Black: International; Notes: Wait they are making a Creed IV? This series is nuts. Nominated for an Emmy as a producer of the TV Movie Sylvie’s Love.)

Kumail Nanjiani – ( Known For: Eternals; Central Intelligence; The Big Sick; The Five-Year Engagement; The Kings of Summer; Stuber; The Lego Ninjago Movie; The Lovebirds; Hello, My Name Is Doris; Migration; The Late Bloomer; Hell Baby; Bad Milo; Hell and Back; Money Shot: The Pornhub Story; Duck Butter; Addicted to Fresno; Brother Nature; A Happening of Monumental Proportions; Flock of Dudes; Future BMT: Life as We Know It; Sex Tape; Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates; Hot Tub Time Machine 2; BMT: Men in Black: International; Dolittle; Fist Fight; Notes: Nominated for an Oscar for writing The Big Sick. He’s in four movies this year, and seems like he comes in and punches them up because he’s quite funny it turns out.)

Budget/Gross – $110,000,000 / Domestic: $80,001,807 (Worldwide: $253,890,701)

(That actually isn’t bad. I wonder if they’ll make another attempt eventually. The brand is probably due to a restart. I wonder in the wake of The Slap whether Will Smith could be convinced to reprise in a passing the torch sequel.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 23% (74/320): Amiable yet forgettable, MiB International grinds its stars’ substantial chemistry through the gears of a franchise running low on reasons to continue.

(No! I don’t accept it. MIB3 shows just how easy it is to make random alien jokes work. The film is still fun and funny and feels like something that isn’t really made. That is a surprisingly low rating overall.)

Reviewer Highlight: Nearly everything here reminds you of something else, often better, cleverer, funnier. – Manohla Dargis, New York Times

Poster – Men in Black: After Everything

(This smacks of them not really knowing what people want. You want the pug? You want the bug aliens? Spoiler Alert: those two things are barely in the film. Also this poster kind of hurts my eyes. The mixture of large white spaces and humans in general doesn’t work on posters. At least it looks like someone put some care into it though. C.)

Tagline(s) – The world’s not going to save itself (D+)

(This tagline is also not going to save itself. Is this supposed to be funny? Or is it merely meant to exist? I can’t tell.)

Keyword(s) – 2015-2023

Top 10: 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), Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

Future BMT: 85.3 Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023), 79.4 Jeepers Creepers III (2017), 78.9 Black Christmas (2019), 76.3 Jeepers Creepers: Reborn (2022), 74.7 The Grudge (2019), 73.7 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), 64.8 Brahms: The Boy II (2020), 64.5 Blair Witch (2016), 63.5 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: Cats (2019), 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), Expend4bles (2023), Meg 2: The Trench (2023), After We Fell (2021), Moonfall (2022), Blacklight (2022), Independence Day: Resurgence (2016), Transformers: The Last Knight (2017), Morbius (2022), Hot Pursuit (2015), The 5th Wave (2016), The Snowman (2017), Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City (2021), …

Best Options (franchise): 79.4 Jeepers Creepers III (2017), 78.9 Black Christmas (2019), 76.3 Jeepers Creepers: Reborn (2022), 74.7 The Grudge (2019), 71.2 Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension (2015), 66.3 God’s Not Dead 2 (2016), 64.5 Blair Witch (2016), 62.8 Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (2017), 61.0 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip (2015), 59.8 Spiral (2021), 57.8 The Transporter Refueled (2015), 52.3 Boo 2! A Madea Halloween (2017), 50.7 Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2016), 48.4 Insidious: The Red Door (2023), 47.8 Men in Black: International (2019), 45.4 God’s Not Dead: A Light in Darkness (2018), 44.1 Allegiant (2016), 43.6 A Madea Family Funeral (2019), 43.4 Jigsaw (2017), 43.2 Underworld: Blood Wars (2016), 42.9 Ice Age: Collision Course (2016), 42.8 Insidious: The Last Key (2018), 42.2 Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023), 39.4 Pitch Perfect 3 (2017), 30.4 Vacation (2015), 27.8 The Divergent Series: Insurgent (2015), 27.6 Inferno (2016), 19.4 Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018), 17.1 Venom (2018), 16.1 Pokémon the Movie: I Choose You! (2017)

(Kind of mid table, but it felt like an opportunity to finish off a franchise we just recently visited with the second film. I wonder when we are going to deal with God’s Not Dead.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 17) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Chris Hemsworth is No. 1 billed in Men in Black: International and No. 1 billed in Red Dawn, which also stars Josh Hutcherson (No. 3 billed) who is in Five Nights at Freddy’s (No. 1 billed) which also stars Matthew Lillard (No. 4 billed) who is in Wicker Park (No. 3 billed) which also stars Josh Hartnett (No. 1 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 3 billed) => (1 + 1) + (3 + 1) + (4 + 3) + (1 + 3) = 17. If we were to watch The Huntsman: Winter’s War we can get the HoE Number down to 14.

Notes – Frank the Pug (voiced by Tim Blaney) and the Worm Guys (voiced by Thom Fountain) are the only characters from Men in Black (1997) and Men in Black II (2002) to also physically appear in this one. Although they have a prominent place on the movie’s poster, these characters have less than a minute of screentime.

The MiB Agents have been wearing the same standard issue Hamilton Ventura watch since the beginning. The iconic Ventura watch was first released in 1957.

There is a secret apartment at the top of the Eiffel Tower where Gustave Eiffel entertained famous guests like Thomas Edison.

Tessa Thompson loves the character of Pawny and knew that Kumail Nanjiani would be perfect for the role. Although his character is all CGI, Nanjiani flew out to London so he could read with Thompson and Chris Hemsworth in person, making the character interactions feel more dynamic.

Sir Paul Smith, who helped design the suits for the MiB Agents in this movie, appears as the typewriter repairman at the secret entrance to London’s MiB Headquarters.

Fist Fight Preview

The beautiful lady introduces herself as Samantha and Patrick can tell by the look in Jamie’s eyes that he’s already a goner. Patrick looks at Jamie’s half horse costume and wonders whether “The Eyes are the Window to the Soul” lesson has already gone too far off the tracks. Although, the way that Samantha is eying how the horse’s costume behind hugs Jamie’s own behind makes Patrick think that all is not lost. He sidles up to Jamie and whispers out of the side of his mouth, “I hope you got jorts under that horse costume, cause we’re gonna razzle dazzle with a patented Twin California Two Step.” Before Jamie can nod, Kyle sidles up on his other side and whispers, “Hope you guys know the Triplet Ohio Three Step, cause we’re all in this together.” This is thoroughly confusing. As everyone knows, there is no Triplet Ohio Three Step and Kyle has never danced in his life. Before they can utter a “What thuuu…,” though, Samantha grabs Jamie’s arm and alerts him to the music cue indicating that their time on stage is now. “This is really important to me,” she says breathlessly and no more convincing is needed to get Jamie and Samantha galloping their way to the stage. “Welp, Kyle, good thing the Twin California Two Step has a variation involving a horse.” With that they jump on to stage and “razzle dazzle” would be an understatement. The crowd is stunned. The horse is grooving while Patrick flings Kyle from one side of the catwalk to the other. Just as they are about to finish, though, Jamie bursts from the costume and grabs Patrick by his jean jacket. “What’s the deal, man, you trying to steal my girl?” Looks like things are about to get rough. That’s right! We are actually doubling up for next week by watching not just 2017’s Fist Fight, but also 2017’s The Dark Tower. Why? Is there some hidden connection between these two apparently unrelated films? Nope. They are indeed unrelated. It’s just that we needed Fist Fight for a connection to Fool’s Paradise and I couldn’t handle not watching the Stephen King adaptation disaster. So why not both? Let’s go!

Fist Fight (2017) – BMeTric: 44.7; Notability: 32

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 13.2%; Notability: top 15.6%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 13.7%; Higher BMeT: The Emoji Movie, Jeepers Creepers III, Fifty Shades Darker, Death Note, Tubelight, Rings, The Bye Bye Man, Day of the Dead: Bloodline, Snatched, Transformers: The Last Knight, The Humanity Bureau, Leatherface, The Layover, The Snowman, Amityville: The Awakening, Flatliners, Geostorm, The Circle, Wish Upon, The Mummy, and 13 more; Higher Notability: Transformers: The Last Knight, Justice League, Sandy Wexler, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, The Mummy, The Emoji Movie, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, Bright, The Current War, Geostorm, CHIPS, Tulip Fever, Suburbicon, Baywatch, American Assassin, The Dark Tower, Fifty Shades Darker, Pitch Perfect 3, The House, The Circle, and 19 more; Lower RT: Naked, The Layover, Flatliners, Hangman, The Emoji Movie, The Snowman, Rings, Tulip Fever, American Renegades, Fifty Shades Darker, Day of the Dead: Bloodline, The Vanishing of Sidney Hall, First Kill, The Mummy, The Dark Tower, Transformers: The Last Knight, The Circle, The Space Between Us, Jeepers Creepers III, Father Figures, and 14 more; Notes: Let’s see we save 5 of the top 10 by BMeT which I guess isn’t terrible, some of them don’t qualify I don’t think. I think I’ve also seen 6 of the top 10 by Notability. And 5 of the top 10 for RT. So yeah, kind of halfway on 2017 which makes sense. Late-2010s are just weak in general.

RogerEbert.com – 3.0 stars – Given this movie’s punchily obvious trailers, given the fact that its theme is similar to that of a lot of subpar entertainments, given that the producing entitites of Warner Brothers and New Line have teamed up to concoct a large number of cruddy comedies over the past ten years (“Life As We Know It” and “Due Date” spring to mind/are stuck in my craw depending on how you wanna look at it), and given the fact that said studios didn’t deign to show this movie for critics until Wednesday evening, it might be reasonable to infer that “Fist Fight” is gonna be a reasonably weak and mediocre crude yuk fest. … [G]rateful for the fact that “Fist Fight” feels like a movie—a narrative with a beginning, a middle, and an end that all have something to do with each other, … “Fist Fight” stands up, at least a little bit, for storytelling.

(Amazing. I do love when films unexpectedly get decent praise. Just heartening that you can look back at a time when films managed to qualify despite people being like “WHAT? This is genuinely good.”)

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

(Actually makes it look pretty funny. Although it also seems like a script I would have written in creative writing class in high school. Open: a high school, some funny shit and then uh oh a fist fight! Uh ………… then a bunch of other stuff and then … I guess a fist fight?)

Directors – Richie Keen – ( BMT: Fist Fight; Notes: Kind of crazy because he is a huge director for television with a ton of credits, but nothing as far as movies. Seems to have a TV Movie on his slate though which is fun.)

Writers – Van Robichaux and Evan Susser – ( BMT: Fist Fight; Notes: Same thing, a good amount of writing work, but all television, video, shorts stuff. They are apparently on the team trying to develop Wedding Crashers 2.)

Max Greenfield – ( BMT: Fist Fight; Notes: Wait … what the hell? He’s Schmidt from New Girl. That’s nuts. And yeah, he only credit at all for just the “story” so maybe an old spec script they refashioned?)

Actors – Ice Cube – ( Known For: 21 Jump Street; 22 Jump Street; Three Kings; Boyz n the Hood; Friday; xXx: Return of Xander Cage; The Book of Life; Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem; Barbershop; Rampart; Higher Learning; Barbershop: The Next Cut; Barbershop 2: Back in Business; Trespass; The High Note; CB4; The Longshots; Something from Nothing: The Art of Rap; The Glass Shield; The Janky Promoters; Future BMT: Next Friday; Friday After Next; All About the Benjamins; First Sunday; Lottery Ticket; The Players Club; I Got the Hook Up; Dangerous Ground; BMT: Ride Along; Anaconda; xXx: State of the Union; Ride Along 2; Ghosts of Mars; Fist Fight; Are We There Yet?; Torque; Are We Done Yet?; Notes: Y’all know Ice Cube. What a career. Is apparently up for some War of the Worlds remake, and of course I do imagine Ride Along 3 will eventually round out the trilogy.)

Charlie Day – ( Known For: Pacific Rim; Horrible Bosses; Monsters University; The Lego Movie; The Super Mario Bros. Movie; Pacific Rim: Uprising; The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part; Going the Distance; Hotel Artemis; I Want You Back; The Hollars; I Love You, Daddy; How It Ends; A Quiet Little Marriage; Future BMT: Horrible Bosses 2; Vacation; BMT: Fist Fight; Fool’s Paradise; Notes: Fool’s Paradise I imagine is quite bad for his directing prospects. He seems to have a few movies in the pipeline, but nothing notable. I imagine they’ll be finishing up It’s Always Sunny at some point.)

Tracy Morgan – ( Known For: The Other Guys; Rio; Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back; Rio 2; The Night Before; Coming 2 America; The Boxtrolls; Death at a Funeral; Spirited; What Men Want; Scoob!; Top Five; The Son of No One; The Star; Accidental Love; The Clapper; Why Stop Now?; Farce of the Penguins; Deep in the Valley; The Undefeated; Future BMT: The Longest Yard; Cop Out; Superhero Movie; Half Baked; G-Force; Head of State; First Sunday; A Thin Line Between Love and Hate; BMT: How High; Little Man; Fist Fight; Are We There Yet?; Notes: Nominated for 2 Emmys for SNL and 30 Rock. I think this was his first major role after his quite bad traffic accident he had in 2014.)

Budget/Gross – $22–25 million / Domestic: $32,187,017 (Worldwide: $41,187,017)

(That actually isn’t that bad. Which I suppose makes sense because Charlie Day was still considered a viable comedic lead afterwards.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 25% (33/133): Fist Fight boasts a surplus of comedic muscle but flails lazily, and far too few of its jokes land with enough force to register.

(The fact that any jokes land is something that would be praised today I feel like. Hell … Argyle is at like 35% still. The movie is terrible and is not funny even by accident. How times have changed.)

Reviewer Highlight: It did give me something I needed. Not catharsis or uplift but a bracing dose of profane, sloppy, reasonably well-directed hostility. We take what we can get. – A.O. Scott, New York Times

Poster – Sklog Fight

(It’s a tad boring, but it’s at least putting in some effort on top of that very boring base. I’ll throw it a bone and give it a C+.)

Tagline(s) – After school. Parking lot. It’s on. (C)

(The structure looks like it’s going to be good, but then it’s not. At least it’s original and relevant, but that’s about it.)

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), 62.7 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: Cats (2019), 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 (Fools Paradise): 70.7 Snatched (2017), 68.7 Norm of the North (2016), 68.3 Meet the Blacks (2016), 66.4 The Disappointments Room (2016), 48.2 Insidious: The Red Door (2023), 44.8 The House (2017), 44.7 Fist Fight (2017), 43.8 House Party (2023), 43.2 Underworld: Blood Wars (2016), 41.0 The Kitchen (2019), 38.9 Masterminds (2015), 31.0 Wonder Park (2019), 30.4 Vacation (2015), 27.3 The Comedian (2016), 23.2 Secret in Their Eyes (2015), 18.7 Entourage (2015), 18.5 Peppermint (2018), 14.9 The Book of Henry (2017)

(Yeah it was a bit tough to reason about it because we really didn’t want to do Fool’s Paradise in the first place and then even though is seems like it should lead into a ton of places it somehow really doesn’t in the end. So we ended up splitting the difference here: Do Fist Fight as the actual, and then pick up The Dark Tower as a bonus.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 13) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Ice Cube is No. 2 billed in Fist Fight and No. 2 billed in Ghosts of Mars, which also stars Jason Statham (No. 4 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 + 2) + (4 + 1) + (3 + 1) = 13. There is no shorter path at the moment.

Notes – According to Ice Cube, the actual fight sequence took 8 days to shoot.

Tracy Morgan’s first film after his car accident.

Just before being arrested, Ice Cube (Mr. Strickland) says “f**k the police” a reference to a song of the same name by his former rap group N.W.A.

Andy’s reaction to Holly hitting him is the same as Brad Pitts “you got me in the ear” reaction to being hit in Fight Club

Charlie Day and director Richie Keen worked together on FX/FXX’s It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

Black Adam Preview

One year, one blockbuster film, and one Pulitzer later and Patrick and Jamie are ready to launch Project: Jamie in Love (awww). “This is exciting,” Kyle says, bouncing on his heels near where they are preparing their backpacks. “You guys will have to write and tell me all about all the hijinks you get into.” Jamie and Patrick smile. “Why would we write when you’re right there with us?” Kyle’s eyes glitter and he has trouble speaking due to the emotion. “Gee. But… BMT…?” he stammers. Patrick just sweeps his arm across the buzzing BMTHQ offices. “This old place? I think it can handle itself. Love is just a bit important.” They all laugh a whole bunch even though it’s not really a joke. “The key to love is just four easy steps,” Patrick then explains, “That’s how me and the wife found love that has lasted.” “Yeah,” Kyle responds with a smirk, “Lasted a millennium.” They laugh again. God they are killing it. A short time later Jamie and Kyle are following Patrick through Brooklyn. Despite having packed for a long trip it appears that lesson one is right in their backyard (although Jamie can’t say he’s ever been this deep in the back alleys of the city). They stop in front of a store and Patrick turns to face Jamie and Kyle. “The eyes are the windows to the soul,” Patrick announces. “So Lesson #1: Style.” Jamie looks down at his clothes. Sure he’s wearing a sweatshirt from high school… and his sweatpants are also just a different sweatshirt from high school he’s fashioned into rudimentary pants. “But that’s kind of stylish, right?” He asks hopefully and Kyle shakes his head. Jamie looks up at the store: Black Adam’s Black Ties. “Here goes nothing.” That’s right! We are also shopping at Black Adam this week as we use this very special yearlong cycle to smash out some of the greatest franchises we ever missed. Black Adam is the only DC film we had left that qualified for BMT… that is until Aquaman 2 came out. But at least this gets us that one step closer. So for 2022: Black Adam. Let’s go!

Black Adam (2022) – BMeTric: 27.8; Notability: 98

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 15.6%; Notability: top 0.0%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 18.3%; Higher BMeT: Jeepers Creepers: Reborn, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild, The Bubble, Brazen, Firestarter, They/Them, Moonfall, Blacklight, Morbius, Pinocchio, Me Time, After Ever Happy, Grimcutty, Umma, The Invitation, Cheaper by the Dozen, Spiderhead, Deep Water, Jurassic World Dominion, and 19 more; Lower RT: Jeepers Creepers: Reborn, After Ever Happy, Me Time, Poker Face, Firestarter, Redeeming Love, Blacklight, Brazen, Last Seen Alive, Morbius, Prey for the Devil, The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild, Prizefighter: The Life of Jem Belcher, The Bubble, On the Line, Home Team, The Man from Toronto, Senior Year, The 355, Grimcutty, and 22 more; Notes: The top Notability. Nice. A lower BMeTric than I would have expected, but I guess fans maybe liked it.

RogerEbert.com – 3.5 stars – “Black Adam” is a superlative and clever example of this sort of movie, coloring within the lines while drawing fascinating doodles on the margins. In its brash, relentless, overscaled way, Collet-Serra’s film respects its audience and wants to be respected by it. “Black Adam” gives the audience everything they wanted, along with things they never expected.

(Wow, we have a few of these. I wonder if we’ve done a four star film before. I wonder how many qualifying four star films there are. Imagine. Imagine if RogerEbert.com gave it four stars.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkomfZHG5q4/

(The Justice Society gets more play in this trailer than I expected. I would have imagined they would have been a bit more cagey about making the film introduce like five individual superheroes in a first film. Honestly, this should have been Shazam 2 and it was real dumb they went with the thing they did eventually, but also this stinks of desperately trying to parlay The Suicide Squad into something and failing.)

Directors – Jaume Collet-Serra – (Known For: Non-Stop; Unknown; Orphan; Jungle Cruise; The Shallows; The Commuter; Run All Night; Goal II: Living the Dream; BMT: Black Adam; House of Wax; Notes: He’s basically Liam Neeson and now Dwayne Johnson’s director. It is kind of wild, has done multiple for each and has upcoming films for both.)

Writers – Adam Sztykiel – (Known For: Rampage; Scoob!; Family Switch; Future BMT: Due Date; Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip; BMT: Black Adam; Made of Honor; Notes: Rampage was trach. Family Switch I think may have been a set up for We’re the Millers 2 which he has on the docket.)

Rory Haines and Sohrab Noshirvani – (Known For: The Mauritanian; BMT: Black Adam; Notes: The Mauritanian was quite well received and even had some awards buzz from what I remember.)

Bill Parker and C.C. Beck – (Notes: They were co-creators of the Marvel Family and many other Fawcett properties. So they have credits on a bunch of these.)

Jack Kirby – (Known For: The Avengers; Avengers: Endgame; Avengers: Infinity War; Iron Man; Avengers: Age of Ultron; Thor; Iron Man 3; Captain America: The Winter Soldier; Iron Man 2; Captain America: Civil War; Black Panther; Thor: Ragnarok; Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2; Thor: The Dark World; Ant-Man; Captain Marvel; The Incredible Hulk; Ant-Man and the Wasp; Zack Snyder’s Justice League; Thor: Love and Thunder; BMT: Justice League; Fantastic Four; Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer; Fantastic Four; Notes: Ah, you know Kirby by now. I’ve probably written like four bios for him. He’s arguably the best comic book writer in history.)

Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster– (Known For: Man of Steel; Zack Snyder’s Justice League; Superman Returns; Superman; The Lego Batman Movie; Superman II; The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part; Teen Titans GO! To the Movies; Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut; The Death and Return of Superman; BMT: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice; Justice League; Superman III; Superman IV: The Quest for Peace; Notes: C’mon now. They created Superman. So … yeah, they were the big DC guys before there was even DC.)

Actors – Dwayne Johnson – (Known For: Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle; Free Guy; Fast & Furious 6; Furious 7; Fast Five; Moana; The Mummy Returns; Red Notice; The Other Guys; Jumanji: The Next Level; San Andreas; The Fate of the Furious; Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw; Pain & Gain; Get Smart; Central Intelligence; Jungle Cruise; Rampage; Hercules; The Scorpion King; Future BMT: Planet 51; You Again; Tooth Fairy; Reno 911!: Miami; Why Did I Get Married Too?; Jem and the Holograms; BMT: Black Adam; Baywatch; G.I. Joe: Retaliation; Doom; Walking Tall; The Game Plan; Be Cool; Notes: Apparently tapped to portray Doc Savage, so he is running it back it would seem. Not a real superhero, but was a “superman” or sorts. Then he has like twenty sequels in various stages of development.)

Aldis Hodge – ( Known For: Die Hard with a Vengeance; Hidden Figures; The Invisible Man; Straight Outta Compton; Happy Feet; The Ladykillers; The East; One Night in Miami…; What Men Want; Edmond; Brian Banks; Clemency; Magic Camp; Green Lantern: Beware My Power; Red Sands; The Birthday Cake; The Tenants; Little Athens; Future BMT: Jack Reacher: Never Go Back; American Dreamz; Bed of Roses; BMT: Black Adam; A Good Day to Die Hard; Big Momma’s House; Notes: Oddly played two different people in the two Die Hard films he appeared in.)

Pierce Brosnan – ( Known For: The World’s End; Mrs. Doubtfire; Mamma Mia!; GoldenEye; Mars Attacks!; Die Another Day; The World Is Not Enough; Tomorrow Never Dies; Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief; The Ghost Writer; The Foreigner; Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again; Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga; The Thomas Crown Affair; No Escape; The Matador; Cinderella; Survivor; A Long Way Down; The Out-Laws; Future BMT: Remember Me; Dante’s Peak; The November Man; After the Sunset; Laws of Attraction; I Don’t Know How She Does It; Love Affair; BMT: Black Adam; The Lawnmower Man; The King’s Daughter; Notes: Mother flipping Dante’s Peak. Excited for that eventually. He was James Bond. His first wife is a sad story, both her and her daughter died of ovarian cancer at 41.)

Budget/Gross – $190–260 million / Domestic: $168,152,111 (Worldwide: $393,452,111)

(Like … kind of okay actually? Domestically weak, but overall if it is hitting that lower budget number it is kind of okay. Better than I expected given what I remembered from the release.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 38% (117/304): Black Adam may end up pointing the way to an exciting future for DC films, but as a standalone experience, it’s a wildly uneven letdown.

(It … did not. As a matter of fact, it was pretty much a death knell in the end, because any good will they got from The Suicide Squad disappeared and the DCEU was basically immediately handed over to James Gunn.)

Reviewer Highlight: A dull, listless superhero movie that hits all the expected touchstones of the genre under the guise of a transgressive new antihero story. – Maya Phillips, New York Times

Poster – Bad Saddo

(The Rock starring other people. I do like the effort here, though. Artistic flair and some nice font. No idea what this would be about though. What is a Black Adam, I would ponder. B-)

Tagline(s) – Power born from rage. (C)

(Meh.)

Keyword(s) – 2015-2023

Future BMT: 84.8 Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023), 79.3 Jeepers Creepers III (2017), 78.8 Black Christmas (2019), 75.9 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), 68.5 Poltergeist (2015), 68.3 Meet the Blacks (2016), 67.0 Max Steel (2016), 66.4 The Disappointments Room (2016), 66.2 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), 62.7 Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (2017), 61.1 Like a Boss (2020), 60.9 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), Meg 2: The Trench (2023), Expend4bles (2023), Moonfall (2022), After We Fell (2021), Blacklight (2022), Independence Day: Resurgence (2016), Transformers: The Last Knight (2017), Hot Pursuit (2015), Morbius (2022), The 5th Wave (2016), Hellboy (2019), The Snowman (2017), … (and many more)

Best Options (Action): 70.7 Snatched (2017), 67.0 Max Steel (2016), 57.8 The Transporter Refueled (2015), 57.3 The New Mutants (2020), 57.0 Robin Hood (2018), 50.7 Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2016), 50.6 Halloween Kills (2021), 49.4 Blackhat (2015), 48.3 Vanguard (2020), 47.8 Men in Black: International (2019), 47.8 The Dark Tower (2017), 46.1 Samson (2018), 45.8 The Rhythm Section (2020), 44.9 A-X-L (2018), 44.1 Allegiant (2016), 44.0 Gemini Man (2019), 43.7 The 355 (2022), 43.1 Underworld: Blood Wars (2016), 42.7 Pan (2015), 42.1 Chaos Walking (2021), 41.6 Breaking In (2018), 41.1 The Marksman (2021), 40.9 The Kitchen (2019), 38.4 Ratchet & Clank (2016), 38.1 Morgan (2016), 38.0 Freelance (2023), 37.2 The Great Wall (2016), 36.7 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows (2016), 36.6 Monster Trucks (2016), 36.0 Collide (2016), 35.6 Captive (2015), 33.6 Kin (2018), 32.3 Honest Thief (2020), 31.8 The Machine (2023), 31.5 Traffik (2018), 30.9 Miss Bala (2019), 30.7 Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (2016), 30.5 Mortal Engines (2018), 30.5 Birth of the Dragon (2016), 30.4 The Huntsman: Winter’s War (2016), 30.3 7 Days in Entebbe (2018), 29.5 Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023), 28.9 The Girl in the Spider’s Web (2018), 28.0 Medieval (2022), 27.8 Black Adam (2022), … (and many more)

(So that’s the thing, it is probably actually the best 2022 option. And we love franchises, so finally having an excuse to watch a boatload of DCEU films was too hard to pass up. If you can’t tell, we are doing one movie for each year, so 2022 was needed and was a weak year.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 12) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Dwayne Johnson is No. 1 billed in Black Adam and No. 1 billed in Walking Tall, which also stars Neal McDonough (No. 3 billed) who is in Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (No. 3 billed) which also stars Chris Klein (No. 2 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 2 billed) => (1 + 1) + (3 + 3) + (2 + 2) = 12. There is no shorter path at the moment.

Notes – Jordan Peele was originally offered the chance to direct the film when it was first announced in 2017, but Peele declined, saying, “I’m not a fan of superhero movies and I’d hate to take that chance away from a director who is passionate about them.”

While Black Adam and Captain Marvel speak the same name of the wizard Shazam as an acronym to activate their powers, in the case of Captain Marvel the acronym stands for the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Hercules, the stamina of Atlas, the power of Zeus, the courage of Achilles, and the speed of Mercury. In the case of Black Adam, the acronym stands for the stamina of Shu, the swiftness of Horus, the strength of Amon, the wisdom of Zehuti, the power of Aton, and the courage of Mehen.

Dwayne Johnson once asked his fans which character he should play, superhero Shazam or supervillain Black Adam. His fans chose Black Adam.

Black Adam was originally going to appear in Shazam! (2019), but it was later decided he would debut in his own film.

The film originally received an R rating due to several gruesome death scenes. A majority of these deaths had to be cut before the film could receive the more commercially viable PG-13 rating.

The Exorcist: Believer Preview

The next day, Patrick twirls his fake mustache in a very believable way. “Yes, well I think that room would do just fine.” He tells Jamie, pointing at a map of Fool’s Paradise, the first and only operating B&B in the interdimensional hell they now reside. Jamie is eyeing him suspiciously. “But you haven’t even seen the rooms yet,” Jamie says, confused. “Well, ahem, yes, well, once I see it, I mean… I’m sure it’ll be quite indubitably satisfactory,” Patrick says, using his substantial improv skillz to save the plan. All he needs to do is show Jamie the book. “Chapter 1: Escaping the Maze” makes it very clear exactly how they can get back to the real world. Jamie narrows his eyes and nods his head back towards the inventory closet. “Are you sure you don’t want this room?” he asks in a hushed tone. At that he grabs Patrick by the arms and pulls him into the closet. He flips on the light and rips the mustache from Patrick’s face. “My mustache! You must be a magician to have pulled a real mustache clean off like that!” Patrick exclaims, nailing the improv once again. Jamie grabs the book from Patrick knapsack and holds it up to the light. “I know when I found it that you must have the other piece of the puzzle,” he says, a note of sadness in his voice. He opens the book to the final page of Chapter 1 and places it in its proper place. Patrick looks back at what the book is saying: “To get out of the maze you must recite these words:” That’s where it had ended. Patrick assumed they could just kind of wing it, but now the words are clear: “The Prayer of Reverse Exorcism.” That’s right! We are doing our own reverse exorcism this week. In that we are watching The Exorcist: Believer and it’s the reverse of being good. A-yo. Let’s go!

The Exorcist: Believer (2023) – BMeTric: 67.0; Notability: 25

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 0.4%; Notability: top 6.4%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 6.5%; Higher Notability: Rebel Moon: Part One – A Child of Fire, Fool’s Paradise, Ghosted, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, Expend4bles, House Party, Haunted Mansion, Heart of Stone, The Out-Laws, Meg 2: The Trench, Old Dads, My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3, 65, Your Place or Mine, White Men Can’t Jump, Vacation Friends 2; Lower RT: Freelance, The Ritual Killer, 57 Seconds, Expend4bles, In the Fire, On a Wing and a Prayer, Fool’s Paradise, The Tutor, Vacation Friends 2, Robots, The Re-Education of Molly Singer, The Out-Laws, Knights of the Zodiac, Mafia Mamma; Notes: The finale for the year. Not a bad crop, but still, we’ll probably have to think through something eventually. It just isn’t pleasurable or sustainable to get 30 films a year and be scrambling around trying desperately to fill out a good slate.

RogerEbert.com – 2.5 stars – Friedkin excelled on both fronts: the drama and the whammies. The original is still effective because it takes its sweet time establishing characters who seem like real people, then puts them and the audience through a prolonged, brutal ordeal together—one that, at the time, no one had ever seen on a screen before. Clocking in at a relatively breezy 121 minutes in length, “The Exorcist: Believer” is a rare case where a long cut would play better than a short one. Given that the hero and his late wife were photographers, you’d expect photography to play into this film the way sound recording did in the first one, but either the script isn’t interested or just part of the movie got cut down to almost nothing. And there are a lot of underdeveloped themes and elements, including the notion that a culturally divided America needs to come together for the sake of the children, as well as oddly off-brand positive exhortations that everything happens as it should, even trauma, and there would be less evil in the world if we were more emotionally connected to one another. The message at the end isn’t, “The real exorcist is love,” but it almost seems that way.

(Oh boy. Yeah, that jives with a few other reviews I listened to / read. Mainly that it is a little unbelievable that (knowing the filmmakers) the idea is that aw shucks can’t we all just get along … but the movie seems maybe to lean that way unintentionally. Personally I don’t think that is the real message, but I’ll get to that in the recap.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r71FmJBoSDs/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r71FmJBoSDs/

(I thought the trailer was quite effective and was genuinely pretty surprised when it didn’t hit at least a little bit. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised (horror fans are so persnickety about their favorite franchises, and this is kind of maybe the best of the best in that regard), but I still was.)

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; Halloween Kills; The Sitter; Our Brand Is Crisis; BMT: The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: I’m not sure where he goes from here with his direction. One would hope he’d find something that maybe he could put his stamp on, but it really seems like his last few not hitting could become a problem.)

Writers – Peter Sattler – ( Known For: Camp X-Ray; BMT: The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: Kind of a weird filmography. Camp X-Ray is from 2014, and then this is the only other thing really and he directed Camp X-Ray as well.)

David Gordon Green – ( Known For: Halloween; Halloween Ends; Prince Avalanche; Snow Angels; All the Real Girls; Undertow; George Washington; Goat; Future BMT: Halloween Kills; BMT: The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: Grew up in Arkansas, but went to college in North Carolina where he met McBride. A lot of the comedians of a specific era came from North Carolina for some reason.)

Scott Teems – ( Known For: The Quarry; That Evening Sun;; Future BMT: Halloween Kills; Insidious: The Red Door; BMT: The Exorcist: Believer; Firestarter; Notes: Oooof Firestarter. Seems like a Horror punch up guy, which maybe points to one of my theories on the recent Halloween films and this: the studios are maybe noting and overwriting these things and being too careful. But I guess we’ll see if the second Exorcist ever happens and if the series can recover.)

Danny McBride – ( Known For: Halloween; Halloween Ends; The Foot Fist Way; The Legacy of a Whitetail Deer Hunter; Future BMT: Your Highness; Halloween Kills; BMT: The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: I find it so weird that he is now one of the faces of modern horror. Just given that he is also a face of modern high-concept comedy as well.)

Actors – Leslie Odom Jr. – ( Known For: Glass Onion; Murder on the Orient Express; Hamilton; The Many Saints of Newark; Red Tails; One Night in Miami…; Harriet; Music; Only; Needle in a Timestack; BMT: The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: Nominated for 2 Oscars, and seems to have been in the original cast of Hamilton as Aaron Burr. Both Oscars were for One Night in Miami… for which he wrote an original song.)

Lidya Jewett – (Known For: Hidden Figures; Wonder; Vivo; Feel the Beat; Nightbooks; BMT: The Exorcist: Believer; The Darkest Minds; Notes: Has been in a trilogy of films called Ivy + Bean.)

Olivia O’Neill – (BMT: The Exorcist: Believer; Notes: Legit this is the only thing she’s really been in, but since the IMDb has the cast list all messed up I figured I would throw her in here since the two possessed girls seemed like important characters.)

Budget/Gross – $30 million / Domestic: $65,537,395 (Worldwide: $136,169,912)

(That is really good … The budget was only $30 million? That’s incredible. They are definitely making the next film. I’m honestly surprised there are even rumors the director is going to step away given what a miracle that budget seems to be.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 22% (55/248): The Exorcist: Believer earns points for trying to take the franchise back to its terrifying roots, but a lack of new ideas — and scares — make this an inauspicious start to a planned new trilogy.

(Hmmmmmm, yeah you would think the beginning of a trilogy is the easy bit. It is the middle and (mostly) sticking the landing in the third that is the problem. Bodes poorly.)

Reviewer Highlight: [Green’s former] patience and sensitivity has now been sacrificed to the cannibalism of recycled ideas; and while I don’t begrudge him his success, I do miss the filmmaker he used to be. – Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times

Poster – The Exorcist: Belieber

(F. That is awful. Why is it sideways? Why does it appear to be a hastily cropped image from the film? Why is everything else about it boring?)

Tagline(s) – Body and the Blood. (D+)

(So just the thing they say in the trailer? It’s got a little flow to it (thus why it is in the movie) but otherwise I’m not sure what it’s up to. Can’t tell if I’m being a little harsh and it should be a C- or if it’s just bad.)

Keyword(s) – Year 2023

Top 10: Oppenheimer (2023), Barbie (2023), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023), Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023), John Wick: Chapter 4 (2023), Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023), The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023), Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (2023), Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One (2023), The Flash (2023)

Future BMT: 84.6 Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023), 48.0 Insidious: The Red Door (2023), 43.8 Fool’s Paradise (2023), 43.5 House Party (2023), 37.2 Paint (2023), 35.8 Freelance (2023), 31.6 The Machine (2023), 27.7 Love Again (2023), 24.9 Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023), 20.9 The Marsh King’s Daughter (2023), 18.4 Nefarious (2023), 9.1 The Shift (2023), 9.1 Camp Hideout (2023), 8.8 Back on the Strip (2023), 8.3 Sweetwater (2023)

BMT: The Exorcist: Believer (2023), Meg 2: The Trench (2023), Expend4bles (2023), 65 (2023), Five Nights at Freddy’s (2023), Retribution (2023), Hypnotic (2023), My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3 (2023), Mafia Mamma (2023), About My Father (2023), Haunted Mansion (2023), Fear (2023)

Best Options (2015-2023): 84.6 Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023), 67.0 The Exorcist: Believer (2023), 48.0 Insidious: The Red Door (2023), 43.8 Fool’s Paradise (2023), 43.5 House Party (2023), 35.8 Freelance (2023), 31.6 The Machine (2023), 27.7 Love Again (2023), 24.9 Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023), 20.9 The Marsh King’s Daughter (2023), 9.1 The Shift (2023), 9.1 Camp Hideout (2023), 8.8 Back on the Strip (2023), 8.3 Sweetwater (2023)

(There was no way we were doing Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey. As a matter of fact. That might be the last film we ever do for BMT as they pry it from our cold dead fingers.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 19) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Ellen Burstyn is No. 10 billed in The Exorcist: Believer and No. 2 billed in The Wicker Man, which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 6 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (10 + 2) + (6 + 1) = 19. There is no shorter path at the moment.

Notes – On William Friedkin’s passing, writer and film critic Ed Whitfield posted this on Twitter(X) and Facebook : “William Friedkin once said to me, ‘Ed, the guy who made those new Halloween sequels is about to make one to my movie, The Exorcist (1973). That’s right, my signature film is about to be extended by the man who made Pineapple Express (2008). I don’t want to be around when that happens. But if there’s a spirit world, and I can come back, I plan to possess David Gordon Green and make his life a living hell.'” Friedkin actually died two months before the movie was released.

Ellen Burstyn had turned down reprising her role and was then offered double the salary. Burstyn thought, “I feel like the devil is asking my price.” She eventually accepted, using the salary to fund an MFA scholarship for actors at Pace University where the Actors Studio teaches the program. Burstyn is a lifelong member of the Actors Studio and a co-president.

Ellen Burstyn stated in an interview shortly before filming began that she accepted the offer to return solely for the money, which she donated to her charity.

Linda Blair, Regan in the original 1973 film, was an advisor on set to the actresses portraying the possessed girls in this film.

At the beginning of the movie, a small sculpted creature can be seen in Angela’s room. This is the same creature Regan drew with wings in the first movie (1973).

Once Bitten Preview

Jamie and Patrick are 12-years-old on a field trip to the Aquarium of Dangerous Animals. “Someday I’m going to be a pretty good diver, but then transition my skillz into being the top action star of my day,” Jamie explains as they look into a tank containing the Bolivian Rhino Piranha. Patrick thinks this is pretty ambitious (top ten seems more like it) but lets Jamie have his little dream. He daren’t speak of his own secret dream: the one where he dons his cable knit sweater and writes genre-busting novels. Jamie would probably laugh. “Drink break,” the teacher calls and hands out bottled water to Jamie, Patrick and the rest of their classmates. “Drink up, because it’s time for the big show,” the teacher says excitedly. A murmur arises from the kids. It’s time for the Velocishark, a recently rediscovered shark that was previously thought to be the bold artistic vision of caveman imaginations. But those cave paintings were now known to be all too real. As they approach the Velocishark’s tank the kids crowd the edge and one child drops his water bottle into the water below. He leans precariously over the edge. “Yo, you know you can just drink water out of the tap,” Patrick says scornfully. Just then the kid momentarily loses balance and with flailing arms knocks the water bottles from Jamie and Patrick’s hands for a double splash directly on their crotches. No doubt about it, it looks like they peed their pants and everyone knows it.

Jamie and Patrick shake their heads. Horrible. They then let Metaphorical Kyle know they are ready to go. “Once bitten, twice shy, no more Mr. Nice Guy,” Jamie and Patrick say, coining in that moment what scientists contend is the perfect catchphrase. Time to pound some dweebs. That’s right! We are watching the early Jim Carrey vehicle Once Bitten. The movie played a number of times on Comedy Central back in the day, but I don’t recall ever sitting all the way through it. Mostly because I didn’t think it was funny. Or maybe I was super sc-sc-sc-scared. We are pairing that with the little known T&A comedy Summer Job, which aired on TV the same day as the primetime premier of Once Bitten (January 30, 1991). Despite how small the film is, it somehow ended up airing 39 times on TV in the 90’s (credit to Patrick who does all the legwork on our recent TV listing obsession). Let’s go!

Once Bitten (1985) – BMeTric: 41.3; Notability: 36

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 4.8%; Notability: top 9.6%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 3.6%; Higher BMeT: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning, Howling II: … Your Sister Is a Werewolf, Red Sonja, Porky’s Revenge, King Solomon’s Mines, Transylvania 6-5000, Gymkata, Perfect, Creature, American Ninja, Private Resort, Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment; Higher Notability: A View to a Kill, Spies Like Us, King David, National Lampoon’s European Vacation, Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment, Perfect, Head Office, Brewster’s Millions, My Science Project, Santa Claus: The Movie, Turk 182, Invasion U.S.A., Rocky IV, The Slugger’s Wife, Death Wish 3, Warning Sign, Heaven Help Us, Maxie, Girls Just Want to Have Fun, Creator, and 4 more; Lower RT: American Ninja, That Was Then… This Is Now, The Slugger’s Wife, Rainbow Brite and the Star Stealer, Head Office, Maxie, King Solomon’s Mines, King David; Notes: This was on an amazing 45 times, including its prime time network premiere on January 30, 1991 (the same day at Summer Job, our friend). Full page ad in the New York Times on page C7 on November 15, 1985 (quarter for week 2 and 3, then a small 16th in week 4, then done). Nothing super funny on it, besides maybe it suggesting you buy the soundtrack. The song “Once Bitten” was written by 3-Speed which unfortunately doesn’t have a wiki page. “3 Speed enjoyed considerable success after the release of the Once Bitten soundtrack; at one point they were even opening for Pat Benatar.” They were from Boston and never wrote an album, instead recording songs for the Rad and Savage Streets soundtracks.

Leonard Maltin – BOMB – Inept comedy about Vampires (Hutton) who intrudes on amorous pursuits of some teenagers because she needs the blood of a virgin to maintain her youthful glow. Pretty anemic; Carrey is very restrained.

(Fits with what I heard which is Carrey is bizarrely not … Carrey in this. And love the play on words with “anemic” and, of course, the semicolon. I’ve missed Leonard’s cheeky semicolons since I’ve switched to Ebert for the most part.)

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

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

(Wait … that was the actual trailer? Seems like it. So, I guess that is what happens when you don’t have any money to make actual television / preview spots? Is that what Canadian trailers used to be? More seriously I wonder if that was a radio spot and the graphics were added more recently.)

Directors – Howard Storm – ( BMT: Once Bitten; Notes: Was part of a comedy duo called Gale and Storm with his roommate Lou Alexander.)

Writers – Dimitri Villard – ( BMT: Once Bitten; In Love and War; Notes: Actually quite an accomplished producer in the 80s, founder of New Star Entertainment.)

David Hines and Jeffrey Hause – ( BMT: Once Bitten; Notes: Wrote an episode of the cartoon Tales from the Cryptkeeper which I had never heard of.)

Jonathan Roberts – ( Known For: The Lion King; The Lion King; The Hunchback of Notre Dame; James and the Giant Peach; The Sure Thing; Khumba; Future BMT: Jack Frost; BMT: Once Bitten; Notes: Obviously most famous for writing five episodes of 90210. The Sure Thing stars Daphne Zuniga which I just watched in Vision Quest weirdly, and we just saw in The Fly II. Maybe I should try and complete her filmography.)

Actors – Lauren Hutton – ( Known For: American Gigolo; The Joneses; Gator; Little Fauss and Big Halsy; The Gambler; Zorro: The Gay Blade; A Wedding; Lassiter; Welcome to L.A.; The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith; Paternity; Viva Knievel!; Paper Lion; Forbidden Sun; Just a Little Harmless Sex; Pieces of Dreams; Millions; Tout feu tout flamme; Loser Love; Missing Pieces; Future BMT: 54; I Feel Pretty; My Father the Hero; Malone; BMT: Once Bitten; Perfect; Notes: Had a talk show in 1995, and was a Playboy Bunny way back. Last worked in 2018.)

Jim Carrey – ( Known For: The Truman Show; Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; Liar Liar; Ace Ventura: Pet Detective; The Mask; Sonic the Hedgehog 2; Dumb and Dumber; Sonic the Hedgehog; Bruce Almighty; Dark Crimes; Yes Man; Me, Myself & Irene; The Bad Batch; A Series of Unfortunate Events; How the Grinch Stole Christmas; The Cable Guy; Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues; Earth Girls Are Easy; Horton Hears a Who!; Man on the Moon; Future BMT: Kick-Ass 2; Dumb and Dumber To; Fun with Dick and Jane; The Incredible Burt Wonderstone; Pink Cadillac; BMT: Batman Forever; Once Bitten; Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls; The Number 23; Notes: Y’all know Carrey, we just saw him in the Ace Ventura films. Honestly we’ve done all his good BMTs, but someday we’ll finish him off I suppose. Check out his career, really never a lull, it is incredibly impressive.)

Karen Kopins – ( Known For: Fast Forward; Future BMT: Troop Beverly Hills; Creator; Jake Speed; BMT: Once Bitten; Notes: Jake Speed is crazy. Never on television in the 90s, but did get play in the late 80s. About 800 theaters, 1000 votes on IMDb, and just got a fifth review a few years ago. Would be quite the borderline BMT if we ever do it. Miss Connecticut 1977, still lives there with her high school sweetheart and four kids. Was going to be a Charlie’s Angel but the 1988 pilot wasn’t picked up. Stopped acting in 1994.)

Budget/Gross – $3.2 million / Domestic: $10,000,000 (Worldwide: $10,000,000)

(Surprisingly okay, but like … do I believe it? I want to see the data. This? $10 million? How?)

Rotten Tomatoes – 10% (1/10)

(There isn’t really a consensus because no one had a snippet outside of the one good review and then one bad review. I did enjoy the bad review which called the movie icky and disturbing essentially. Having watched the film I can’t say that isn’t accurate.)

NYT Short Review: Vampire countess seeks male virgin. Too many Bloody Mary jokes.

Poster – Once Smitten Kitten

(I like the little bat, but that’s about it. There’s not really a cohesion to it. Like why is the vampire see through? I don’t get it. I do find it amusing that the title has a tiny “Samuel Goldwyn Jr.’s” at the top. You know I wasn’t gonna catch this flick but once I found out Sammy G Jr. did this one I was all in. Odd. He’s the Executive Producer. C-)

Tagline(s) – Mark Kendall just found out that his one-night stand has been around for centuries. (C-)

A tasty comedy. (D+)

(I was going to give the first one an F, but then I think I saw what they were going for. One-night vs. centuries. At least a little interesting, if extremely long. So I upgraded it. The short one under the title is nonsense. Tasty because a vampire bites people? I mean sure. But regular people also find things tasty. That’s not a vampire exclusive.)

Keyword(s) – canada

Top 10: The Matrix Revolutions (2003), X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009), Venom (2018), The Butterfly Effect (2004), Armageddon (1998), In Time (2011), Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009), 2012 (2009), Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992)

Future BMT: 90.3 Vampires Suck (2010), 89.9 House of the Dead (2003), 88.7 Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd (2003), 84.1 Prom Night (2008), 79.6 Shark Night (2011), 78.9 Daddy Day Camp (2007), 77.3 Superhero Movie (2008), 74.9 Look Who’s Talking Too (1990), 74.0 The Spirit (2008), 74.0 The Next Karate Kid (1994), 73.2 The Turning (2020), 72.5 Mr. Magoo (1997), 71.8 Dance Flick (2009), 69.4 College Road Trip (2008), 69.0 Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004), 68.9 Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore (2010), 68.8 The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause (2006), 68.6 Captivity (2007), 68.3 Yogi Bear (2010), 67.3 The Crow: City of Angels (1996)

BMT: Battlefield Earth (2000), Catwoman (2004), Dragonball Evolution (2009), Jack and Jill (2011), Batman & Robin (1997), The Emoji Movie (2017), Alone in the Dark (2005), The Wicker Man (2006), Fifty Shades of Grey (2015), The Cat in the Hat (2003), Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987), The Love Guru (2008), Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 (2004), Crossroads (2002), Halloween: Resurrection (2002), Movie 43 (2013), Barb Wire (1996), RoboCop 3 (1993), The Legend of Hercules (2014), Highlander II: The Quickening (1991), Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009), Jason X (2001), Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (2007), Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever (2002), Little Man (2006), Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (2015), The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009), Freddy Got Fingered (2001), After Earth (2013), The Bye Bye Man (2017), Caddyshack II (1988), Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son (2011), Kangaroo Jack (2003), Driven (2001), Jonah Hex (2010), Species II (1998), … (and many more)

Best Options (Vampire): 90.3 Vampires Suck (2010), 41.5 Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992), 41.2 Once Bitten (1985), 40.9 Blade: Trinity (2004), 40.6 The Forsaken (2001), 40.6 The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (2013), 37.9 Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995), 27.7 Dracula Untold (2014), 24.6 Underworld: Awakening (2012), 20.0 Innocent Blood (1992)

(I’m a bit stunned at just how many vampire films there are. I suppose the question is: will we ever watch them all? I can’t see why we wouldn’t. That would be wild.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 14) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Jim Carrey is No. 1 billed in Once Bitten and No. 1 billed in The Number 23, which also stars Virginia Madsen (No. 2 billed) who is in Firewall (No. 3 billed) which also stars Harrison Ford (No. 1 billed) who is in Hollywood Homicide (No. 1 billed) which also stars Josh Hartnett (No. 2 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 3 billed) => (1 + 1) + (2 + 3) + (1 + 1) + (2 + 3) = 14. There is no shorter path at the moment.

Notes – The role of the Countess was written for Cassandra Peterson, better known as TV horror-hostess Elvira.

By the time the film was released, writer Jeffrey Hause had blown through his initial earnings and had to take a job as a video store clerk. One day an oblivious customer remarked of the film, “Whoever wrote this shouldn’t be working in Hollywood,” and an incensed Hause retorted, “YOU GOT YOUR WISH!”

During the chase scene when Robin punches a vampire, she actually hit him in one take and knocked his fake teeth out.

Screenwriter Jeffrey Hause campaigned for Michael J. Fox to star in the film, but executive producer Samuel Goldwyn Jr. was convinced that Fox would never be able to carry a big-screen movie.

The tune Mark’s ice cream truck plays is a variation on the “Peter” theme of Sergei Prokofiev’s “Peter and the Wolf.”

Meg 2: The Trench Preview

“This can’t get any worse,” Jamie mumbles, tears dripping down his face. Bottled water! Outrageous. He and Patrick had always promised that they would burn the company to the ground before betraying the mission of BMT. That mission includes ice cold Coca-Cola. It includes the X-treme flavor blast of Mountain Dew. It includes the Rocky Mountain taste of a cold Coors Light. But it sure as hell doesn’t include bottled water. “You can drink it straight out of the tap,” Patrick says, shaking his head. “You know what Kyle would have said to all of this,” Jamie says with a chuckle, and Patrick nods his head with a smirk. “Water schmater, water is for the birds.” Classic Kyle catchphrase. They turn to the Metaphorical Kyle with determination. “You’ve convinced us,” they say, “what do we do?” Kyle is a bit bemused. “You sure you don’t want to see what they do next? I mean, it’s way worse than bottled water. This is just a front for a much more dastardly plan.” They consider for a moment and then nod their heads. The Metaphorical Kyle whispers it in their ears and their eyes widen. “Boy that is way worse,” Patrick says, looking a little sick. “I actually wish you hadn’t told us that,” Jamie agrees, “In fact, let’s not talk about that part. We’ll just make sure they don’t get the company and start selling bottled water.” The Metaphorical Kyle shrugs his shoulders and gets ready to fly them back to the Apologies Tour brought to you by Tim Horton’s. As they are about to leave Jamie and Patrick recall the root of their hatred of bottled water. It’s a story not about water being for the birds, but rather… for the sharks. Bum bum bum. That’s right! We are finally getting the opportunity for a second BMT Live! Of the year with the sequel we’ve all been anticipating. Meg 2: The Trench! The first one didn’t qualify, but I thought it was horrible. Patrick liked it a little better. Let’s see if we agree on this one. Let’s go!

Meg 2: The Trench (2023) – BMeTric: 28.4; Notability: 24

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 6.8%; Notability: top 2.8%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 15.4%; Higher BMeT: Knights of the Zodiac, 65, The Black Demon, The Ritual Killer, The Out-Laws, White Men Can’t Jump, Hypnotic, House Party, Your Place or Mine, Maybe I Do, Ghosted, Insidious: The Red Door, The Tutor, Mafia Mamma, The Old Way, Paint, Johnny & Clyde; Higher Notability: Ghosted, House Party, Spinning Gold, Haunted Mansion, The Out-Laws, 65, Your Place or Mine; Lower RT: Dead Man’s Hand, Johnny & Clyde, The Ritual Killer, Assassin Club, On a Wing and a Prayer, The Tutor, The Out-Laws, Robots, Fear, Mafia Mamma, Knights of the Zodiac, Sweetwater, One True Loves, God Is a Bullet, Love Again, Ambush, White Men Can’t Jump, Ghosted, The Machine, House Party; Notes: Solid early BMeT, but the Notability is quite surprising. I don’t know why this wouldn’t involve more big name production. It has a big name director and ensemble cast. Who knows. House Party is probably one of the weirder ones that came out this year that we have a chance of seeing.

RogerEbert.com – 1.0 stars – Anyone hoping that Ben Wheatley might bring some of the exuberant personality and boundary-pushing creativity on display in films like “Kill List” and “In the Earth” to his for-hire gig directing the dismally boring “Meg 2: The Trench” should find different cinematic waters to swim in. Much as in his atrocious remake of “Rebecca” in 2020, Wheatley mostly phones it in here, and he does so with a rotary landline. At least until the final half-hour, when he’s finally free to unleash some monstrous chaos, this is one of the dullest films of the year, a plodding, poorly made giant shark movie that inexplicably lets the giant shark take a backseat to an evil underwater drilling operation. This thing just has no teeth.

(Yup, this is basically what I’ve heard on the street (aka online). That the film takes ages to get to the good stuff and for no discernible reason at all. But once it does it is pretty fun.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dG91B3hHyY4/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dG91B3hHyY4/

(Yeah … so this was the prime example of where this trailer dropped and I was like “this looks horrible, if this isn’t qualifying there is no God.” I’m glad I still have it a bit. There seemed like there was an okay reception for it online, but when I saw it I just couldn’t help but think it looked terrible.)

Directors – Ben Wheatley – ( Known For: Free Fire; In the Earth; Rebecca; Kill List; High-Rise; Sightseers; The ABCs of Death; A Field in England; Happy New Year, Colin Burstead; Down Terrace; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Notes: British. He wife co-wrote High-Rise which he directed. Started by making viral videos, his films are considered somewhat “visionary” for horror fans. Except Rebecca which people seem to have not liked at all.)

Writers – Jon Hoeber and Erich Hoeber – ( Known For: Transformers: Rise of the Beasts; The Meg; RED; RED 2; My Spy; Montana; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Battleship; Whiteout; Notes: Boo, we were pretty close to a twofer with Transformers: Rise of the Beasts for BMT Live. Kind of wild that we’ve kind of accidentally completed their BMT filmography.)

Dean Georgaris – ( Known For: The Meg; The Manchurian Candidate; Future BMT: Tristan + Isolde; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Paycheck; Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life; Notes: Been making crap action for a while now. Does a bit of television as well, including two episodes of the new Quantum Leap.)

Steve Alten – ( Known For: The Meg; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Notes: Wrote the books. Was at one point the assistant basketball coach for the University of Delaware. Has a degree in Physical Education.)

Actors – Jason Statham – ( Known For: The Meg; Fast X; Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre; Snatch; Wrath of Man; F9: The Fast Saga; Collateral; Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels; Homefront; Furious 7; Spy; The Italian Job; Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw; The Expendables; The Fate of the Furious; Furious 6; Safe; The Transporter; Transporter 2; Parker; Future BMT: The Pink Panther; War; The One; Turn It Up; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Crank; The Expendables 3; Mechanic: Resurrection; Crank: High Voltage; Killer Elite; In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale; Ghosts of Mars; Notes: Ah Statham. Should I do it? Why not: was an Olympic caliber high diver competing for England in the Commonwealth Games.)

Jing Wu – ( Known For: Ride On; The Wandering Earth II; The Wandering Earth; Wolf Warrior; Kill Zone; The Battle at Lake Changjin; Shaolin; Wolf Warrior 2; The Climbers; Kill Zone 2; Water Gate Bridge; Badges of Fury; Legendary Assassin; My Country, My Parents; The Sacrifice; My People, My Country; Invisible Target; Call of Heroes; Home Coming; Twins Mission; Future BMT: The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Notes: Trained at the Beijing Wushu Academy because his father and grandfather were both martial artists. Was then spotted by a talent scout looking for martial artists for a film.)

Shuya Sophia Cai – ( Known For: The Meg; Somewhere Only We Know; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Notes: Oh this is the kid … I would have thought the mother / love interest would have been the second or third lead. Whatever, she lives in New Zealand and is fluent in both Mandarin and English.)

Budget/Gross – $129 million / Domestic: $12,000,000 (Worldwide: $12,000,000)

(Obviously this is just the first weekend. It seems like it is going to basically make its reported budget worldwide in the first weekend, which I think means it’ll just barely be profitable? But I don’t know how much is the somewhat less profitable Chinese market, so unclear. The CinemaScore being quite bad means it could miss it due to word of mouth as well.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 29% (34/117): It isn’t without its fun moments, but Meg 2: The Trench suffers from a disjointed story that drifts for too long before finally delivering a few campy thrills.

(Yes, the thing I’ve seen is basically that the first hour operates like Jaws … but you’ve already seen the giant shark in the first one? So it ends up being quite dull until the last act when it picks up. B- CinemaScore which is terrible, and the verified user ratings are also quite bad.)

NY Times Short Review: This lively sequel to 2018’s somewhat tepid killer-shark blockbuster greatly improves upon its predecessor by getting gorier, funnier and more stylish.

Poster – Meg 2: Resurrection

(I want to hate this poster, but it’s kinda good. God damn it. B.)

Tagline(s) – New Meg. Old Chum. (A+)

(Even the tagline is good. And it’s not even good… it’s great! What the hell.)

Keyword(s) – shark

Top 10: Finding Nemo (2003), Toy Story (1995), Jurassic World (2015), Life of Pi (2012), Jaws (1975), Despicable Me (2010), Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005), Aquaman (2018), Shrek 2 (2004), Despicable Me 2 (2013)

Future BMT: 86.6 The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D (2005), 79.6 Shark Night (2011), 59.7 My Super Ex-Girlfriend (2006), 36.3 Into the Blue (2005), 34.7 Leviathan (1989), 34.2 Suspect Zero (2004), 34.1 Shark Tale (2004), 33.8 Along Came Polly (2004), 33.5 Armed and Dangerous (1986), 25.9 After the Sunset (2004), 23.7 Pirates (1986), 21.5 Colombiana (2011), 19.4 Kick-Ass 2 (2013), 19.3 Ice Age: Continental Drift (2012), 16.9 The Beach (2000)

BMT: Jaws: The Revenge (1987), Jaws 3-D (1983), Movie 43 (2013), Are We Done Yet? (2007), Chairman of the Board (1998), Return to the Blue Lagoon (1991), Strange Wilderness (2008), Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life (2003), Serenity (2019), Gamer (2009), Mechanic: Resurrection (2016), Battleship (2012), The Blue Lagoon (1980), Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017), Meg 2: The Trench (2023)

Best Options (Year 2023): 11.5 Meg 2: The Trench (2023)

(Wait, this is the only Shark film this year that qualifies?! No, I knew that. I just wanted the funny sub-genre of 2023 shark films. Looking at BMT obviously the Jawses work, but otherwise I think the rest kind of incidentally have a shark. Shark Night looks like the only other “real” shark film that qualifies.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 6) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Jason Statham is No. 1 billed in Meg 2: The Trench and No. 1 billed in In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (1 + 1) + (3 + 1) = 6. There is no shorter path at the moment.

Notes – While speaking to entertainment site DenOfGeek in April 2021, director Ben Wheatley hinted that the film might see Jason Statham facing off against not one but several giant, prehistoric sharks.

The Meg 2 has been in the works since October 2018, essentially right after the original movie released. By early 2019, producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura confirmed that a script was in the works, and the sequel gained momentum in October 2020, when Ben Wheatley was announced as The Meg 2 director. The English filmmaker is best known for helming horror movies such as Kill List (2011), Sightseers (2012) and In The Earth (2021). Wheatley has also explored other genres with High-Rise (2015), Free Fire (2016), and the 2020 Netflix adaptation, Rebecca.

Influenced by the strike of SAG-AFTRA, publicity activities such as the London premiere have been canceled. The world premiere will be held in the Beijing National Indoor Stadium in Beijing on July 28, which is also the only premiere in the world.

In April 2021, Jason Statham confirmed that things are finally falling into place regarding the sequel. He said the script is ready and that filming should begin the following January.

It was announced in Nov. 2020 that Jason Statham is set to reprise his role and will reportedly be involved in the overall creative process. The supporting cast hadn’t officially been announced, but much of the “key talent” is expected to return. In that case, The Meg 2 will presumably feature Bingbing Li, Ruby Rose and Page Kennedy, among others.

Serving Sara Preview

“Yes, like I said, I’m the Ghost of BMT Future but like… you guys didn’t kill me. ‘Ghost’ might be the wrong term. I’m… a metaphor or whatever.” Kyle explains for the fourth time. Jamie and Patrick nod their heads, but look at each other incredulously. Kyle sighs. After flying around for a bit they finally landed at a skyscraper in Toronto where BMTHQ was now located. It seems impossible that they would give up the Big Apple for Toronto, but Kyle explained that after the Apologies Tour brought to you by Tim Horton’s ended they relocated to where the Dudikoff’s felt like BMT could do the most good. A scene plays out in front of them. The Dudikoff’s sign some papers and then, with a bit of hesitation, Jamie and Patrick also sign. “You just signed over half your company,” Kyle says, and the twins gasp. It couldn’t be, they’d never make such a boneheaded mistake. Jamie grabs the contract from the desk and looks it over. He lets out a sigh of relief. “This isn’t half the company. It’s a 60-40 split. We still each have 30%. A majority. It’s fine.” Jamie and Patrick literally pat themselves on the back in congratulations of their business savvy, but their future selves don’t notice… cause they’re metaphors or whatever. Suddenly, Kyle bursts into the room. An animated argument plays out and Kyle storms away, distraught. Jamie and Patrick’s faces fall. “Right, I guess we must have written Kyle out of the company… but we had to, right? It’s for the best.” Patrick says unconvincingly. “Is it?” Metaphor Kyle says, pulling some papers out of Drake’s pocket. Patrick reads them over and a look of panic crosses his face, “But no… I love my wife and six kids… I’d never… divorce?!” That’s right! We are going from the super sweet View from the Top to the… not quite as sweet divorce comedy Serving Sara. This was in the early 2000’s superstar run of Matthew Perry and bridges the gap from Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice through a very early Amy Adams role. Let’s go!

Serving Sara (2002) – BMeTric: 48.1; Notability: 36

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 13.2%; Notability: top 19.6%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 4.2%; Higher BMeT: Crossroads, Halloween: Resurrection, Rollerball, The Master of Disguise, Feardotcom, The Adventures of Pluto Nash, Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever, Boat Trip, Half Past Dead, Scooby-Doo, The Sweetest Thing, Queen of the Damned, Maid in Manhattan, They, Full Frontal, The Truth About Charlie, Swimfan, Snow Dogs, Vampires: Los Muertos, The Tuxedo, and 13 more; Higher Notability: Men in Black II, Scooby-Doo, The Time Machine, Star Trek: Nemesis, Collateral Damage, Dragonfly, John Q, The Master of Disguise, Unconditional Love, Showtime, I Spy, Queen of the Damned, Eight Crazy Nights, Rollerball, The Country Bears, The Truth About Charlie, Maid in Manhattan, The Tuxedo, The Sweetest Thing, Bad Company, and 29 more; Lower RT: Killing Me Softly, Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever, Hansel & Gretel, Ritual, State Property, The Master of Disguise, Deuces Wild, Feardotcom, Rollerball, Half Past Dead; Notes: Solid BMeTric for a film that is surely completely forgotten. Although I suppose Perry’s odd movie roles are often pretty good bets for BMT. We’ve see 12 of the top 20 BMeTs from 2002 including the top 7, which is pretty solid. Star Trek: Nemesis, we’re coming for you.

Leonard Maltin – 2 stars – Lackluster comedy about a N.Y.C. process server who makes a deal with his “mark” to find her philandering husband and serve him with her divorce papers – in return for half of her take. This takes them on a bumpy road to Texas. It’s a long way from It Happened One Night. Mike Judge appears unbilled as a motel clerk.

(I do love when he shouts out the classics. He’s a student of history after all. Maybe I should get that one and watch it instead … who am I kidding, at the very best I’ll just watch it as well.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yH5LUdNfKb0/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yH5LUdNfKb0/

(This trailer is an insane idea with the voiceover by the star. There was a strange time in the 2000s where process serving became a thing in movies and television. Feels like an odd glorification. And of course end with the abomination that is the vet joke.)

Directors – Reginald Hudlin – ( Known For: House Party; Boomerang; Marshall; The Great White Hype; Safety; Future BMT: The Ladies Man; BMT: Serving Sara; Notes: Nominated for an Oscar for writing Django Unchained. Apparently while at Harvard he made the first version of what would become House Party.)

Writers – Jay Scherick and David Ronn – ( Known For: Clifford the Big Red Dog; Guess Who; Future BMT: The Smurfs; The Smurfs 2; National Security; BMT: Baywatch; Zookeeper; Norbit; Serving Sara; I Spy; Notes: I’m getting whiffs of Lennon and Garant here. These guys are all over the place and have a ton of credits, presumably because they are a writing team willing to take second or third passes at scripts that don’t quiiiiiiite work.)

Actors – Matthew Perry – ( Known For: 17 Again; The Whole Nine Yards; The Kid; Numb; Getting In; Birds of America; Future BMT: Fools Rush In; She’s Out of Control; Almost Heroes; A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon; Three to Tango; BMT: Serving Sara; The Whole Ten Yards; Notes: Y’all know Perry. He was on Friends? Invented sarcasm? Anyways, this film in particular has a bunch of notes about how he was publicly going through his drug issues at the time and it caused a lot of consternation.)

Elizabeth Hurley – ( Known For: Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery; Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me; Bedazzled; Aria; Edtv; The Weight of Water; Then Came You; Permanent Midnight; Father Christmas Is Back; Kill Cruise; Christmas in the Caribbean; Mad Dogs and Englishmen; Rowing with the Wind; Double Whammy; Method; An Elephant’s Journey; Bad Boy; Viktor; Made in Romania; The Long Winter; Future BMT: Passenger 57; My Favorite Martian; Dangerous Ground; BMT: Serving Sara; Notes: Remember when she was famous. I have to assume she just got rich and quite acting because … who wouldn’t? Then she’s come back more recently. She was in the TV show The Royals. You have to see that thing. It is absurd!)

Bruce Campbell – ( Known For: Evil Dead Rise; Spider-Man; Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness; Oz the Great and Powerful; Evil Dead; The Evil Dead; Spider-Man 3; Spider-Man 2; Sky High; Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs; The Quick and the Dead; Army of Darkness; Evil Dead II; Escape from L.A.; The Majestic; Darkman; The Ladykillers; The Hudsucker Proxy; Bubba Ho-Tep; The Escort; Future BMT: Cars 2; McHale’s Navy; BMT: Congo; Serving Sara; Notes: Is it possible that Bruce Campbell is only famous for Evil Dead? I feel like it might be. He tends to have bit roles, but often it is in Raimi films because Campbell is his guy obviously.)

Budget/Gross – $29,000,000 / Domestic: $16,930,185 (Worldwide: $20,146,150)

(Disastrous again! We are on a good streak of bombs I feel like. Sometimes things seem like they kind of get close to profitability, but there’s no way with this one.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 4% (5/113): A romantic comedy that’s neither funny nor particularly romantic, Serving Sara is a forgettable time waster.

(My god, that consensus is perfect. It is the epitome of the bad rom com. Like … All About Steve. Neither romantic or funny.)

NY Times Short Review: Mr. Perry’s blustery, charmless performance reaches a nadir when his character, posing as a veterinarian, must give a prostate massage to an impotent bull named Tornado. — Stephen Holden

Poster – Serving Silverman

(No, no, and no. The only thing good in this whole poster is the pop of pink. Otherwise it’s a complete disaster. No wonder you got such terrible reviews. It’s all about the poster, guys. D+.)

Tagline(s) – The One Thing That Could Bring Them Together Is Revenge. (C-)

(I don’t totally understand what they think is clever here. Because revenge never brings people together? Sure… I mean, in a rom com I guess that’s unusual. But it’s pretty standard fare in film. Whatever, it’s long and not clever, but I think they were trying to do something clever.)

Keyword(s) – canada

Future BMT: 90.3 Vampires Suck (2010), 89.9 House of the Dead (2003), 88.6 Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd (2003), 84.1 Prom Night (2008), 79.6 Shark Night (2011), 78.9 Daddy Day Camp (2007), 77.3 Superhero Movie (2008), 74.9 Look Who’s Talking Too (1990), 74.0 The Spirit (2008), 73.9 The Next Karate Kid (1994), 73.1 The Turning (2020), 72.5 Mr. Magoo (1997), 71.8 Dance Flick (2009), 69.4 College Road Trip (2008), 69.0 Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004), 68.8 The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause (2006), 68.6 Captivity (2007), 68.3 Yogi Bear (2010), 67.3 The Crow: City of Angels (1996), 67.0 The Flintstones (1994)

BMT: Battlefield Earth (2000), Catwoman (2004), Dragonball Evolution (2009), Jack and Jill (2011), Batman & Robin (1997), The Emoji Movie (2017), Alone in the Dark (2005), The Wicker Man (2006), The Cat in the Hat (2003), Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987), The Love Guru (2008), Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 (2004), Crossroads (2002), Halloween: Resurrection (2002), Movie 43 (2013), Barb Wire (1996), RoboCop 3 (1993), Highlander II: The Quickening (1991), Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009), Jason X (2001), Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (2007), Fifty Shades Freed (2018), Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever (2002), Fifty Shades Darker (2017), Little Man (2006), Ouija (2014), Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (2015), The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009), Freddy Got Fingered (2001), After Earth (2013), The Bye Bye Man (2017), Caddyshack II (1988),… (and many more)

Best Options (Justice League): 77.3 Superhero Movie (2008), 62.1 Cursed (2005), 50.0 Collateral Damage (2002), 48.1 Surviving Christmas (2004), 47.8 Sleepover (2004), 45.9 RV (2006), 45.1 The Ex (2006), 41.9 Mixed Nuts (1994), 41.5 Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992), 40.9 The Marksman (2021), 38.8 Play It to the Bone (1999), 37.8 Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009), 37.5 The Glass House (2001), 37.4 The Guilt Trip (2012), 36.7 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows (2016), 34.2 Suspect Zero (2004), 33.6 Must Love Dogs (2005), 32.9 Indecent Proposal (1993), 32.6 Let’s Go to Prison (2006), 29.9 200 Cigarettes (1999), 29.8 The Night Listener (2006), 29.6 Nights in Rodanthe (2008), 28.2 Dragonfly (2002), 26.5 TMNT (2007), 25.4 We Are Your Friends (2015), 20.8 Batman: The Killing Joke (2016), 20.0 Art School Confidential (2006), 19.5 Terminator Salvation (2009), 18.7 Entourage (2015), 16.8 Smokin’ Aces (2006), 14.8 The Matrix Revolutions (2003), 13.8 Wyatt Earp (1994)

(Yeah, again, Matthew Perry while being Canadian is not in fact born in Canada. This whole section has been a bit of a shambles since we are obviously opting to hit up very Canadian people even if they were born outside of Canada, so it is a little wonky.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 15) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Matthew Perry is No. 1 billed in Serving Sara and No. 2 billed in The Whole Ten Yards, which also stars Bruce Willis (No. 1 billed) who is in Armageddon (No. 1 billed) which also stars Ben Affleck (No. 3 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) => (1 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (3 + 1) + (3 + 3) = 15. If we were to watch The Jackal, Nights in Rodanthe, and The Glass House we can get the HoE Number down to 14.

Notes – During filming in 2002, ‘Matthew Perry’ spent some time in rehab due to an addiction to prescription painkillers. Production was slowed, but the filmmakers focused on filming scenes without Perry in them during his absence.

The outfit that Sara Moore wears throughout the second half was actually chosen by Elizabeth Hurley. The director liked it so much he decided that would be her costume.

Matthew Perry shot the scene where Joe is running from Tony who is driving a monster truck with a broken foot. According to director Reggie Hudlin if he had stumbled he would have been run over.

A good number of Joe’s witty sarcastic comments were improvised by Matthew Perry.

The hotel concierge is played by Mike Judge who is a last minute addition to the film. According to Reggie Hudlin the original actor fell ill and was unable to appear in the movie, so he phoned Mike Judge who agreed to play the part.

Eddie Preview

Jamie and Patrick look out over BMaGOFHQ and see the empire they built over the last decade. It’s not easy combining the sharp wit of bad movie criticism with the great taste of Good Ooze, their flagship product of what became their much more lucrative beverage and (eventually) petroleum business. A statue of Scott Bakula stands towering over their busily working employees. At a certain point they had contemplated releasing the secret to Good Ooze’s great taste, but when Scott Bakula asked them on his deathbed to never reveal the secret they agreed to keep it hidden forever. But really it should be obvious. It’s like asking what makes Here on Earth go down so smooth? What makes your heart race every time you see Jeff Fahey, Bo Derek, and a motorcycle in the same room? What made the moment they kicked Kevin James’ head clean off so special to so many people? The answer is easy: Love. Sugar, water, and love. That’s all Great Ooze ever was. Kyle comes into the office bringing samples of their latest petroleum product: New Gasoline. “The third one tastes the best,” Jamie says, and everyone agrees. “But how does it align with our mission statement?” Patrick asks as they all look towards the banner hanging in their office. “Would Scott Bakula Drink This?” it asks, and in tiny letters below that, “It’s OK That You Kicked Kevin James’ Head Clean Off.” They all nod their heads. Just as Kyle is about to leave he mentions off hand about the big news. Jamie and Patrick are confused. What news? “The Caroline Hurricanes… they’re up for sale.” Jamie and Patrick are taken aback. Why didn’t anyone call them? “Call up Hartford!” they scream to their secretary. “And get ready… coach,” they say to Kyle. That’s right! We are watching Eddie, the Whoopi Goldberg comedy that came at the heyday of Whoopi. People literally couldn’t get enough of her and she has the People’s/Teen/Kids Choice Awards to show for it. For Bring a Friend we grabbed a film that aired on the only day we could find where Eddie played on TV (4/25/1999), Undefeatable. It’s a Cynthia Rothrock film, so just a couple of films featuring female leads. What a connection. Let’s go!

Eddie (1996) – BMeTric: 45.5; Notability: 61

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 6.8%; Notability: top 3.2%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 15.7%; 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; Higher Notability: The Fan, Jingle All the Way, Spy Hard, Chain Reaction, Daylight, Up Close & Personal, Mulholland Falls, The Associate; Lower RT: The Dentist, Big Bully, Ed, Ripe, Bio-Dome, Kazaam, Mr. Wrong, Spy Hard, Eye for an Eye, Bulletproof, Celtic Pride, Solo, Curdled, House Arrest, The Glimmer Man, The Crow: City of Angels, In Love and War, Larger Than Life, Down Periscope, Dear God, and 17 more; Notes: Barb Wire: played 47 times in the 90s. Kazaam: 25. Striptease: 39. Bio-Dome: 44 (including Christmas 1997). The Island of Dr. Moreau: only 4 (I think this is one of those times of trying to force home video rental / sales, it only started playing in July 1999 according to my data). This played only once according to the data, but I have a feeling it might be wrong in this particular case. The notability is pretty solid.

RogerEbert.com – 1.5 stars – “Eddie” begins with Whoopi Goldberg playing a limousine dispatcher who does a play-by-play of Knicks games over the radio to her drivers. It ends with Whoopi as the coach of the New York Knicks, who are headed for the NBA playoffs. This sounds like a sensational scenario, but, alas, almost everything in between is recycled out of lightweight sports-movie cliches, and the movie never captures the electricity and excitement of the real NBA. … The movie’s underlying plot doesn’t amount to much, either, with Wild Bill as the evil capitalist who wants to sell the team to St. Louis. How Eddie counters this desire is something I will not reveal, except to say I seriously doubt that there is a single referee in the NBA who would let her get away with it.

(I’ll also try and not spoil anything, but Ebert is right and wrong here. Yeah, they wouldn’t have allowed her to get away with it, but also the actual result (the Knicks forfeit) would have played right into Eddie’s hands. If the movie had any balls that would have been the actual result: a triumphant forfeit with Eddie suspended from coaching for a year or something.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iuDUSj5jaI/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iuDUSj5jaI/

(The trailer ending on a small dick joke is just classic 90s. The movie? Looks awful, like what’s really the point, you know all the story beats that are going to happen? Dumb.)

Directors – Steve Rash – ( Known For: Can’t Buy Me Love; The Buddy Holly Story; Under the Rainbow; Good Advice; Crooked Arrows; Queens Logic; Future BMT: Son in Law; Held Up; BMT: Eddie; Notes: No joke, Can’t Buy Me Love is basically one of the most “TV film” film in history. Nearly 100 times in the 90s, crazy stuff. He basically started doing those cheap direct-to-video sequels (American Pie Presents, Bring it On 4, that kind of this) in the early 2000s.)

Writers – Steve Zacharias and Jeff Buhai – ( Known For: Revenge of the Nerds; The Harrad Experiment; Last Resort; The Whoopee Boys; Future BMT: Revenge of the Nerds II: Nerds in Paradise; Johnny Be Good; BMT: In the Army Now; Eddie; Notes: He only wrote the first Revenge of the Nerds, the others are character credits. I’m just going to vaguely restate Zacharais’ sole IMDb trivia which is that he was his school’s best athlete in fourth grade. Genuinely on IMDb.)

Jon Connolly – ( Known For: The Dream Team; BMT: Eddie; Notes: Died in 2021. The Dream Team is a weird looking film.)

David Loucka – ( Known For: The Dream Team; Future BMT: House at the End of the Street; Dream House; BMT: Rings; Eddie; Notes: Seems like he was Connolly’s writing partner at the time, but eventually split off to make horror films instead.)

Eric Champnella – ( Known For: Thunderstruck; Mr. 3000; Alex & Me; BMT: Eddie; Notes: No joke seems to just be a writer they pull in to punch up sports comedies?)

Keith Mitchell – ( Known For: Mr. 3000; BMT: Eddie; Notes: Same thing! He was just a guy who exclusively punched up sports comedies!)

Dale Launer – ( Known For: My Cousin Vinny; Dirty Rotten Scoundrels; Ruthless People; Love Potion No. 9; Future BMT: Blind Date; BMT: The Hustle; Notes: The son of a character actor who seemed to have been most well known for playing a judge on Perry Mason. Claims he made up the term “dead on balls accurate” for Mona Lisa Vito in My Cousin Vinny)

Actors – Whoopi Goldberg – ( Known For: The Lion King; The Player; Girl, Interrupted; The Deep End of the Ocean; Ghost; Toy Story 3; Luck; In & Out; The Color Purple; Till; Sister Act; Rat Race; Star Trek: Generations; The Muppets; A Little Bit of Heaven; The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle; Boys on the Side; My Father’s Dragon; How Stella Got Her Groove Back; Ghosts of Mississippi; Future BMT: The Little Rascals; Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit; Star Trek: Nemesis; The Pagemaster; Madea Goes to Jail; Loaded Weapon 1; Bordello of Blood; For Colored Girls; Nobody’s Fool; Jumpin’ Jack Flash; Racing Stripes; Corrina, Corrina; Made in America; House Party 2; Kingdom Come; Moonlight and Valentino; Fatal Beauty; Burglar; The Associate; BMT: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles; Monkeybone; Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2; Theodore Rex; Eddie; Notes: Y’all know Whoopi. She has a crazy number of qualifying films. She has done like 1000 episodes of The View. Still does it by the looks of it. Nominated for two Oscars, one for The Color Purple and then she won a surprise victory for Ghost.)

Frank Langella – ( Known For: Lolita; Captain Fantastic; Superman Returns; The Trial of the Chicago 7; Noah; The Ninth Gate; Small Soldiers; Dave; Draft Day; All Good Things; The Men’s Club; The Box; Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps; Unknown; The Tale of Despereaux; Muppets Most Wanted; Good Night, and Good Luck.; Dracula; Frost/Nixon; 5 to 7; Future BMT: Junior; Sweet November; Brainscan; BMT: Masters of the Universe; Body of Evidence; Cutthroat Island; 1492: Conquest of Paradise; Eddie; Notes: Pretty surprising he has only been nominated for one Oscar for Frost/Nixon. According to reports he decided to be Skeletor in Masters of the Universe because it seemed fun.)

Dennis Farina – ( Known For: Saving Private Ryan; Snatch; Manhunter; Out of Sight; Thief; Midnight Run; Get Shorty; Bottle Shock; Code of Silence; Romeo Is Bleeding; Big Trouble; You Kill Me; That Old Feeling; The Grand; Authors Anonymous; Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling; Knucklehead; Sidewalks of New York; Purple Violets; Bagboy; Future BMT: Little Big League; Paparazzi; Striking Distance; Havana; The Mod Squad; Another Stakeout; Stealing Harvard; BMT: What Happens in Vegas; Reindeer Games; Eddie; Notes: Famously didn’t act until he was 37-years-old and then he was cast by Michael Mann as the lead role in Crime Story. Was a Chicago Police officer for 18 years.)

Budget/Gross – $30 million / Domestic: $31,387,164 (Worldwide: $31,387,164)

(Yeah … that’s no good. But what can you expect? It is a sports comedy starring Whoopi Goldberg. It’s just a bizarre combination.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 16% (6/37): Whoopi Goldberg may demonstrate that she can coach a basketball team with the best of them, but not even she can whip this dreary script into shape.

(Yeah, it really is just a poor concept, poor writing, no-laugh comedy. To be frank, it genuinely is a bizarre film where the sole joy is trying to figure out who the Knicks player with long blonde hair is.)

Reviewer Highlight: Avid basketball fan becomes Knicks head coach. Savvy, good-humored Cinderella story.

Poster – Coach Looks Like a Lady

(I’m actually offended by this poster. From the image down to the tagline, it’s playing into the worst stereotype of women in sports (mostly applied to women journalists). Like she’s placed in a shower with the players and then the tagline is basically like ‘ooh la la, she’s checking out these hunks.’ Weird, bad, and the most offensive part? It has nothing to do with the movie! That’s barely touched on in the film! I think there is one gag played early on, but I don’t even remember because it has so little relevance to the majority of the film. F.)

Tagline(s) – The Newest Coach In The NBA Has Got The Knicks Right Where She Wants Them. (F)

(Yeah, so I’m going to give this one an F to go with the poster’s F. In this case the most offensive part is how long it is. I’m actually surprised the NBA didn’t have the juice or wherewithal to veto this. The Patriot’s Lisa Olson scandal happened just six years earlier.)

Keyword(s) – wisdom

Top 10: The Dark Knight (2008), Inception (2010), Forrest Gump (1994), The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003), The Dark Knight Rises (2012), The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002), Batman Begins (2005), Inglourious Basterds (2009), The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Future BMT: 88.6 Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd (2003), 84.0 Prom Night (2008), 83.7 Spy Kids 4: All the Time in the World (2011), 82.2 You Got Served (2004), 80.0 Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience (2009), 79.6 Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (2000), 78.9 Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked (2011), 77.6 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel (2009), 77.2 Superhero Movie (2008), 72.3 Bewitched (2005), 71.4 The Animal (2001), 69.4 College Road Trip (2008), 68.9 Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004), 68.5 Poltergeist (2015), 68.2 Yogi Bear (2010), 65.7 Halloween Ends (2022), 65.7 The Haunting of Molly Hartley (2008), 65.3 Fat Albert (2004), 65.0 Scary Movie 4 (2006), 64.7 The Grudge 2 (2006)

BMT: Batman & Robin (1997), The Emoji Movie (2017), The Last Airbender (2010), Fifty Shades of Grey (2015), The Cat in the Hat (2003), Crossroads (2002), Norbit (2007), Fantastic Four (2015), From Justin to Kelly (2003), The Master of Disguise (2002), Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 (2000), Sex and the City 2 (2010), Space Jam: A New Legacy (2021), xXx: State of the Union (2005), Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (2007), Fifty Shades Freed (2018), Little Man (2006), Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (2015), Taxi (2004), The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009), Freddy Got Fingered (2001), I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (1998), Zoolander 2 (2016), Kangaroo Jack (2003), Are We Done Yet? (2007), Police Academy 5: Assignment: Miami Beach (1988), The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 (2011), The Boy Next Door (2015), Wild Wild West (1999), Urban Legends: Final Cut (2000), Year One (2009), Are We There Yet? (2005), Marmaduke (2010), Big Momma’s House 2 (2006), The Roommate (2011), Tammy (2014), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (1993), … (and many more)

Best Options (Whoopi Goldberg): 62.3 Madea Goes to Jail (2009), 50.8 Racing Stripes (2005), 45.5 Eddie

(This is … fake? Weird. Basically, Eddie definitely was nominated for a Kids’ Choice. I suppose either because it was for her as an actress (instead of for the movie?). Hard to tell really. It should be there. I’ll add it. But yeah, it is because I only counted movies nominated, not people, in the cycle at this point.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 12) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Richard Jenkins is No. 4 billed in Eddie and No. 5 billed in Say It Isn’t So, which also stars Chris Klein (No. 1 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 2 billed) => (4 + 5) + (1 + 2) = 12. If we were to watch Corrina, Corrina we can get the HoE Number down to 10.

Notes – The New York Knicks home games were filmed at the Charlotte Coliseum, home of the Charlotte Hornets. Only exteriors of Madison Square Garden were featured. For the final game, Hornets fans were told to cheer against the Hornets.

Many of the players and coaches portrayed in the movie were associated with actual teams: Dennis Rodman, who appears in this movie with the San Antonio Spurs, was already on the Chicago Bulls at the time of the movies release; Mark Jackson, who portrays one of the Knicks players “Taylor,” was actually drafted and played for the Knicks in the late 1980s and early 1990s; Larry Johnson, the Knicks’ biggest rival in the movie, actually went on to play for the Knicks one year after the movie was released; 3 actual New York Knicks during the time of filming had a cameo in the playground pickup scene…. John Starks, Anthony Mason, and Herb Williams all appeared during the pickup scene in the playground; and Kurt Rambis, who who would go on to coach the New York Knicks from 2014 to 2018, portrays the Lakers’ head coach in the film. Rambis would actually go on the coach the Lakers on an interim basis in 1999, but was only an assistant coach at the time of filming.

While the New York Knicks have been considered one of the worst teams in the NBA at various points in time, they were actually considered to be one of the best during the 1995-1996 season, which was when Eddie (1996) was first released into theaters. Although the movie portrayed them to be the worst, the real life Knicks had just appeared in the NBA Finals 2 years prior to the films release in 1994, losing to the Houston Rockets. As of 2023, the Knicks have not made it to the NBA Finals since 1999, and have not won since 1973.

The Cleveland Cavaliers’ uniforms were the only visiting teams’ uniforms that did not accurately match those of their true-to-life uniforms.

Both Richard Jenkins, who plays assistant coach Carl Zimmer, and Frank Langella, who plays Wild Bill Burgess, would both go on to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role in 2008.

Awards – Nominee for the Razzie Award for Worst Actress (Whoopi Goldberg)