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tryst46
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Shao Lin mu ren xiang (1976)
I recall a different title.
Vowed to remain silent until his father was avenged, Dubbed "dummy" by the other students, he proved himself more than capable as a fighter.
I bought this video some years back and I recall it had the title "Shao Lin Temple of Doom". I remember the plot very well as it was one of my favourite Jackie Chan movies. The wooden men reference made me wonder if it was the same film and the synopsis from others here assured me it was. It may possibly have been that the company doing the packaging for the DVD I bought didn't translate the tile at all, they probably tried to use the cover picture to figure out the translation and got it totally wrong.
As usual, Jackie Chan is a master at injecting a little comedy into an otherwise, serious story. He also does all of his own stunts and often there is an out takes section at the end of his film showing, not only forgotten lines and such, but some ways his stunts have gone terribly wrong. He often pushes the limit of human capability with his stunts and pays for it with injuries. However, the final result makes you wonder if he used camera tricks to do it but no, he doesn't do camera tricks to make himself look almost superhuman, it comes naturally.
2012: Ice Age (2011)
Don't go by the title.
2012: Ice Age is not what it seems.
The film title indicates a disaster movie along the lines of Day After Tomorrow but it is actually nothing like it. There are a few references to Day After Tomorrow and more than a few rip offs, but for the most part, it is all about a mile high iceberg the somewhere around the size of Texas moving South across America at 200MPH, flattening everything in its path and a single family trying to outrun it and get to New York before it in a family saloon to recover their daughter who is in college there. The film focuses around this family almost exclusively with the odd scene showing the air force trying to blow up the iceberg.
To say it gets old real fast is an understatement. The Iceberg is 200 miles off the Northeast coast just as the family starts their 6 hour journey, but they still manage to outrun it, even after a series of misfortunes while travelling. Even when you do the math: 60 MPH for 6 hours = 360 miles since they did not seem to be in any hurry when they were driving. You soon realise that the Iceberg should cover that distance in about 1.5 hours, 2.5 if you add the 200 miles to start with. Therefore, the family would not even make it half way before the iceberg overtook them.
The ending is so predictable that it's a joke. Also, the abruptness of the ending leads you to believe that the original script was meant to run on. However, someone with a stopwatch told them to quit now and the whole story winds to a halt in the last 60 seconds, leaving you feeling that there should be more about the aftermath etc.
As disaster movies go, this one is about the most lame one I have seen so far.
Behemoth (2011)
Typical end of the world monster movie.
Almost reminiscent of Final Fantasy with a huge being that lives inside the earth, protecting it from harm.
Cindy Busby makes the whole movie worth the watch for the guys but without her, it would probably rate little more than a typical low budget B movie more suited to B movie fans. Sadly, she plays the part of the cliché blonde bimbo who screams a lot and has to have a big brave man to help her. Nobody in their right mind would see a big 2 foot wide eye staring at them through a hole in the rocks and then wait around to see what is going to happen next. As with most cliché'd horror movies, there is one old man who knows what is happening right from the start but nobody will believe him. Also the military know what is happening and have a weapon to kill it but have not warned anybody or evacuated the area. Like the military would believe Mayan folk tales more than anybody else :/ The monster is inside the earth and as big as the entire planet, it can make it's presence felt right across the globe. However, it chooses not to pop up in a heavily populated and pollution spilling metropolis but instead, some backwater town that is really little more than a permanent logging camp.
I really feel that the B movie script did most of the actors a great dis-service and the weak story failed to keep you rooted to your chair. overall, a reasonable idea spoiled by bad scripts and all too obvious cliché'd events.
One continuity blooper is when the diner drops into the ground. As the old guy says they have fallen into a sink hole, you can see tape on the window covering a 2 foot diagonal crack in the lower left corner of the middle window. The next scene where you see a huge tentacle moving around the diner through the window, the window has no tape but there is also no crack either. In the next scene, the old guy finds the crack with a tiny hole and they both cover it with tape to stop the CO2 from getting in and suffocating them. The whole idea of the tape is also pretty dumb considering that there is a huge wooden frame double entrance door to the diner that wouldn't even be airtight.
Star Quest: The Odyssey (2009)
Low budget but still not too bad.
Although the whole thing was filmed on a low budget, I'd say they made the best of what little budget they had. On a par with early 70's sci-fi movies with similar special effects and sounds etc. I really nice rendering of the ship with a lot of detail though.
Acting could have done with a little more "feel" since a lot of dialogue sounded as if it was being recited parrot fashion. Only Aaron Ginn-Forsberg actually felt as though he was 'being' the part rather than just playing it, both in acting and dialogue. The rest of the cast sounded flat and emotionless.
Overall a 7/10 A well made movie considering the budget it was on.