johnjohnson68510's Reviews

Cryptozoo (2021)

3/10

11 June 2023

This is not so good. The critics' review were positive, even gushing. So I was intrigued. But it's adolescent storytelling. Puerile even.

Story opens with a hippie couple getting naked in the woods, humping, then the guy gets gored to death by a unicorn. A few scenes later a satyr is having an ugly human orgy. Then a gorgon shows up. She wants to help the protagonist save crypto animals because she's faced prejudice herself as a crypto. (She can turn us to stone if she takes her contacts out.)

So I think, okay, lousy first act. Let's see. So I skip ahead and land on a scene with an old lady looking at her crypto zoo. A big green abominable snowman comes in behind her.

I think, you don't suppose the writers can't think of anything else?

No, they can't. Green snowman and old lady be banging. And as the cartoonist said, I'm sorry, brother, I didn't start that 'abominable' stuff. But I'll need you to help if we're going to get anywhere.

I found it unwatchable, which is too bad, because I liked the concept and the animation. The dream-eating creature was cool.

John.

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Prey (I) (2022)

8/10

Loved this. And I'm an old white conservative male

16 August 2022

Really well-made movie retells the 1987 original, but the setting, the Comanches completely renew it. Kind of a Predator / Black Robe mash up.

I only mention the identity nonsense in the title of my review because I believe the hatred of this movie falls along political party lines. The Message taints so much media, it's hard to ingest a girl power movie even if it's just a solid action flick. If you can rise above our times, and you like action movies like the Predator, I think you are likely to enjoy this as much as I did.

Like St. Bernadette said, my job is to tell you, not make you believe.

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The Action Hero's Guide to Saving Lives (2009 Video)

10/10

Funny. Perfect. I used it to teach my college students

4 May 2022

I LOVED THIS. I'm of the opinion, if it's got Patrick Warburton in it, I'll see it. I was teaching English when this came out. Somehow I got the link to it from the producers who I think were still shopping it around. Laugh out Loud Funny.

I would play it to my students once per semester in my composition classes. At some point they'd be dragging, and I'd bring this out. I would introduce it by saying, This short will teach you everything you need to know about editing and revising your work.

It would get the point across, and we'd all have a good time.

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The Scrub Lady (1917)

6/10

10 minute fragment on YouTube

21 February 2022

It's in YouTube under the title "Marie Dressler comedy. Archive film 1910s. Archive film 2402." It's presented with Huntley Archives (dot com) watermark front and center.

It's pleasant slapstick, that exaggerated goofing around. It reminds me of high school students making it up as they go along. What was crappy was the implication that of course she was deluded that the man loved her. Ha ha ha ha! She's fat and not beautiful! She's in her 40s! She's lower economic class. Ha ha ha ha. Ugh. That's the main joke that sustains the plot fragment. Hollywood even in it's eeriest days portrayed love as something only beautiful people deserve.

IMDb spells her name Tilly, which is incorrect. Tillie.

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Bloodshot (2020)

8/10

Terrific Science Fiction Action

6 February 2022

I'm surprised for all the lukewarm reviews. I thought this thing was a ton of fun. I'm a huge science fiction fan, and I thought this was first rate. Yeah, the third act mano a mano could have had more ka-pow; I think the earlier action was heavier, so the tempo could be a bit down beat. But for me, all the excellence of tech, hard sci fi, eye candy, Easter eggs, and terrific acting more than makes up for that. It's not Shakespeare, it's not even Dune, but it's as good as all those 80s Arnold Schwarzenegger science fiction films, which I for one love. If you like that stuff, you'll likely enjoy this one.

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Infinity Chamber (2016)

7/10

Starts slow -- ends well.

26 May 2021

This is a very likable piece of Science Fiction. I watch tons of Science Fiction and read tons of it too. The writer/director borrowed some good ideas and turned them into something unique. A bit of Hal from 2001, a bit of Groundhog Day, and a nice Philip K. Dick tone of "what's real?" If you know a lot about the genre, you'll know that a ton of ideas are cross pollinated. The Matrix took a lot of standard tropes. James Cameron probably has a reference book on SF tropes. So I'm not saying anything is wrong with the film besides the slow start. The lead actor carried the film well. This movie is a good watch.

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Amerika (1987)

3/10

One long boring slow fizzle

23 April 2021

I saw this when it came out. It was much hyped and suggested it would be profound. Night after night I watched it. I kept waiting for it to get good, to have some emotional content or some philosophical impact. I believed it would eventually go somewhere. I was denied. By the final episode I realized I had been swindled. I remember the emotion I had after the end. I had given so much time to something that refused to pay me back. Meandering, muddling plot. No pacing. No point. To this day I have not been able to forgive Kris Kristoferson or enjoy any of his other work. A few years ago I tried the movie Millennium in which he stars, but I regretted it afterwards. If Bobby Magee comes on the radio, I have to turn it off.

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Thunder Force (2021)

7/10

Hilarious

16 April 2021

This was just what I was looking for. Nice tight plot. Easy to watch. Lots of laughs. It really lightened my mood. My wife and I enjoyed it. I don't understand the hate. If you're not in the mood for goofball comedy, gosh, watch something else. It's great for what it does. Goofy movie. Tons of gags. Fun.

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Outside the Wire (2021)

6/10

Watchable. Plays like a Video Gsme.

24 January 2021

The acting is pretty solid in this action-packed adventure. It runs fast like a well-played video game. I was sorry that the sci fi aspect was only slightly involved. It could have just as easily been told without sci fi. Which is too bad. Visuals are good, and there were some really cool robot soldiers to explore, but not this time.

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The Midnight Sky (2020)

9/10

A Beautiful Drama and Cool SF Settings

30 December 2020

Wow! The hate on IMDB fur this one! All a matter of expectation I think. This is a good movie, well-crafted, and satisfying even for my non-SF bride! If you were expecting some light SF fun, you came to the wrong movie. I really enjoyed this movie, even with the little flaws scattered across it. I mean, do you cry for realism when you go to the MCU? This is a poignant movie, even sad, but it's beautiful and we'll-made.

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Ruby Robinson (2015 TV Movie)

7/10

A Pleasant Way to Spend 25 Minutes

19 December 2020

A unique, playful melodrama, done silently and with lots of colors. A crazy woman of means lives in a big house, and her nephew (son?) wants it. She has an entourage of playmates, like imaginary friends but the nephew and his family can see them. A delightful little story. Silent with a pretty and expressive score. Her entourage are perfect.

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Antonio di Padova, Il santo dei miracoli (1931)

9/10

Illustrated Lives of the Saints version

25 October 2020

If you're Catholic and like Anthony you will like this. It's like those old illustrated lives are the saints books. They take the main episodes of his life and act them out in little vignettes. The movie is one of the last of the silent films. The titles are in Italian and English. It is a very quaint film which points us to holiness.

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Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer (2007)

3/10

Couldn't finish it.

6 October 2020

I can watch some pretty bad movies and enjoy them. And while the very boring first half hour of this movie was probably of a higher production value than many schlep movies I've enjoyed, it was soooooooo dull! Aristotle said about 2300 years ago that a story should start en medea res, which means in the middle of the action. This movie was all set up and super boring. Maybe someday I'll go back and fast forward to the last half hour. That's probably not as bad.

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Assault Girls (2009)

10/10

Stylish Art House Sci Fi

17 July 2020

Art house science fiction is a difficult thing to find an audience for. The art crowd will dislike it because it's Sci-Fi, and the Sci-Fi crowd won't like it because it's artsy. I love this movie. It was beautiful. It was full of gestures and stylish movements. It was actually in five Acts, too, with a complication and typical plot points. But not at all done in the usual way. Anytime I see review that says the the science fiction movie is nothing but eye candy, oh, I know I'm going to love it. I loved Aeon Flux. I loved Tycho Moon. For me, arthouse sci-fi loses out when they try to scramble for the Hollywood formula. People hate this movie because the director didn't even try.

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The Wandering Earth (2019)

6/10

Emotionally crude for a simpler audience

2 June 2019

No disrespect, but this movie has the emotional depth and sentimentalism of a 1930's American movie, when America was still largely rural and not too educated. The characters are simplistic and their gestures are generic. Americans have learned to watch much more nuanced gestures, much more individualuzed authenticating details. (I mean, the grandfather here waxes on the dead grandmother's noodle cooking, nothing else about her.) Judging from the reviews, a lot of Americans find this movie irritating. It's not subtle. It's predictable. Don't get me wrong. I, for one, find it worthwhile. It's not engrossing or immersive, but it is Big Science Fiction, which I like, and the hokey, corny, and cloyed elements are, for me, anyway, endurable. A nice budget. Decent effects. I've seen a lot worse. And honestly, come to think of it, I'd rather have a movie that was too sentimental than one that was too cynical. One last point, the Chinese, they sure do get the teal and orange color schemes of awesome visuals. Practically every shot. Another overdone but, for me, mostly acceptable aspect of this hulking, lumbering beast.

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Crazy Fat Ethel (2016)

Great B Movie Schlock

26 October 2018

Inappropriate in so many ways, there is something deliciously satisfying about this junk movie. The acting is actually watchable -- realist/naturalist kind of stuff, with these offhand gestures that really lets you smell the cheese. Maybe i was just in the mood. Nice, clean narrative line. I think these guys could all have done better work if they'd wanted to

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A Piece of Phantasmagoria (1995– )

10/10

Different and Delightful!

24 October 2016

Am I the only person to see this gorgeous and charming work? It doesn't have 5 votes yet as of this writing. What a secret treasure. Whimsy, fantasy, offbeat -- it's like Neil Gaimon's Japanese cousin. I found this on an app called Yo! anime -- but wherever you can find it, get it if you want something different and delightful. I haven't finished it yet; I'm savoring it. 12 episodes, total 77 minutes. Imagine if Heavy Metal had been playful and lighthearted, gently humorous. Sort of like surreal little urban fairy tales. ...

Okay, that's all I was going to write, but IMDb wants me to write more. The animation is hand drawn. The first episode is about the projector that plays the night sky, and the projectionists who run the projector, and more. Odd little bits of things on the screen to sample; kind of decentralized images like a Jacques Tati film, and some of his tone, too, sort of. Let me call it playful again. Okay! Now we're good! Go find it!

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In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (2007)

5/10

All the 1 reviews are bandwagon. It's not that bad. 5 1/2 *

13 March 2016

Okay, a crap script. Serious problem with that. But some good acting, beautiful sets, nicely shot, good special effects. If you want to see a fantasy movie, and you have seen all the good ones, this is worth a spin. Loads of action. Well choreographed. The trailer movies on the DVD imply you are an idiot man who likes to watch movies for the boobs and violence, which doesn't set the mood, I admit. But there is no exploitation of women in this movie, and some of the women even take up swords. So, okay, this isn't Shakespeare. If fact, prepare thyself for character arcs that are vapid and almost theme-less. It's basically a medieval/supernatural revenge tale. But if you're just looking for a no-brainer fix of non-dragon fantasy and action, especially on a weekend afternoon, you will enjoy this. Jason S. is excellent.

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Airlords of Airia (2013)

7/10

Visuals worth a look. Clumsy, goofy story, but who cares?

10 February 2016

This little film doesn't ask to be taken seriously, so when someone says this is full of bad acting, they're kind of missing the point. It is a gorgeous-looking film with a campy, clumsy little story. The acting is all overblown -- they all know they are hamming it up, which fits perfectly with the rest of the film. In terms of the story-telling, as short as it is, it has long stretches of exposition -- the voice-over just telling us the story. Telling, not showing, is the cardinal sin of narrative art for the last hundred and some years, but I personally don't get worked up over it. I don't need to be "shown" a lot of "concrete details" so I can be "immersed" in a story. Yes, I like being immersed, but I'm fine just gawking at gorgeous visuals while the director and actors goof around with a piece of fluff story line. So, if you want to watch this little film, accept that it is kind of goofy by current standards of narrative art, and try not to judge it for that. You can just enjoy it for what it is, if you want. It's basically just a little short about a steam-punk air battle, and it's meant to be humorous.

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Cosmic Origins (2011)

10/10

Finally, Good "Science and Faith"

22 November 2015

This documentary explores science and faith, using interviews with Nobel and Templeton prize winners, as well as physicists from Harvard, Cambridge and other universities, who are not only top people in their field but also sympathetic to matters of faith. I've seen so many of these documentaries on science and faith, and they are mostly just junk. They are always light on facts, and they often discredit faith by being intellectually disgraceful or even dishonest. This one, however, not only has the "utmost respect" for the methods of modern physics, but it also goes deep into contemporary physics and its history. Rarely do I watch a science show that tells me something I didn't already know, and this show had lots of bits I hadn't heard before. The animations and graphics were also well done, and the editing really made the ideas flow together. This is an important documentary. It will help skeptics see that the position of faith can be intellectually coherent, and it will help shore up the faithful.

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Person of Interest: Baby Blue (2012)

Season 1, Episode 17

10/10

Great episode

10 March 2015

This was one of the best episodes of the series, really great television. It was complex, with two main story lines and a half a dozen or more sub-plots, all smoothly interwoven. Twists and turns. Great pacing. Exciting but not crowded or rushed. A baby is kidnapped, and more or less unrelated to that, a crime boss is released from prison, and his life is threatened. I won't say more, except that every character in the episode is tested and strained almost to the breaking point. It was great to see a wider range of emotions than usual in the two male leads, Caviezal and Emerson. Just a great script. I'm going to follow the writer's credits and look for more that he or she has done. And, as a Veronica Mars fan, it's great to see Enrico Colantoni in this.

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Destination Planet Negro (2013)

7/10

Humorous, enjoyable spoof and satire

10 March 2015

Enjoyable satire of race in America, told as a spoof of 1950's science fiction B-movies.

I saw this twice in the studio in Kansas where a lot of the filming was done. I liked it. Laughed numerous times. Learned stuff.

No budget, but good script, good story, decent to good acting, and pleasant low-budge rockets and special effects.

The story is of W. E. B. DuBois and other prominent African-Americans deciding in 1939 that the only way to solve the race problem in America is for black people to colonize Mars. They plan to make it the Negro Planet. Scouts are sent on a rocket (with radioactive peanut fuel designed by George Washington Carver) to explore, but they fall into a time warp and end up in our contemporary America.

The explorers have various off-beat adventures showing how race relations have improved in some ways but remained toxic in other ways.

Some of the scenes should have been cut to serve the story, but evidently director/writer/actor Willmott decided to place commentary over story at times.

One of my favorite lines was a little throw-away remark when one of the explorers was told that the N-word has been taken out of Huckleberry Finn, because the N-word is so offensive.

The pilot says something to effect that he finds slavery more offensive, and yet you left that part in.

A lot of scenes in the movie show the weird relationship between the way we talk about race and the realities of race.

Other parables and allegories like that throughout. Definitely worth an hour and a half of your time. Reminded me a little of The Brother from Another Planet. It's funny and a think-piece.

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Jupiter Ascending (2015)

4/10

It's worse than you think.

3 March 2015

Oh, gosh, just lost two hours and five bucks. I thought, how bad can Jupiter Ascending be? I'll put up with a mediocre plot to get that eye candy. Right?

Oh my stars, every minute was a disappointment. From script to acting to editing, all terrible. Immense plot holes, one after another. The action was over the top, with the dudes dodging tens of thousands of shots and fireballs. In between action there was long, dull exposition. The movie didn't earn one honest emotion. The romance was clichéd and unbelievable. Scenes seemed crammed, chopped off. Everything stunk, except the eye candy (which went by too fast) and Eddie Redmayne (who was super). I got five bucks worth of laughs out of it making fun of it with my friend. Just offering this to save you the disappointment. It's worse than you think. And I'm the kind of guy who usually likes bad sci fi if it's done stylishly and beautifully. I really loved Aeon Flux. I thought Battleship was okay. I was fine with After Earth. See? I'm not that picky.

Okay, that's all I had to say. Thumbs me up or thumbs me down.

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Big Eyes (I) (2014)

8/10

Ultra-passive 1950's wife with Mad Man husband.

4 January 2015

Warning: Spoilers

Highly enjoyable dramatization of husbandly plagiarism. The story is efficiently yet artistically told, and both lead performances are terrific. Tiny bits of Burton weirdness fitted in like footnotes, and not noticeable unless you're looking.

It was clear how the predicament came to be. A man with a maniacal chutzpah and an ultra-passive wife of the 1950's. She's the talent; he's the marketer. Add a little bit of luck, and her work starts getting popular. He takes credit for it. She goes along with it, at first out of financial need and later out of momentum, but always out of 1950's female deference. Finally it's a feminist tale; he goes way too far, and she battles to take credit.

Great acting. Christopher Waltz's performance is dynamic and inspired, reminding me of George Segal + Mania. And forgive me for finding Amy Adams so appealing. It may be in part that she's so darn pretty, and it may also be that the soft-voiced female fluff was the sort of ideal female beauty I was trained to like as a boy and which has all but disappeared. But mainly, I like to think I enjoyed her so much because she gives such a stunning performance; all kinds of nuance and insight into the character as she gets shoved aside, hurt, and finally pushes back. Really, I liked her just tons.

Nice little bits enriching the movie. For instance, in the grocery store, before she comes to the display where her prints are being sold, she passes the Campbell's Soup shelves. Marketing, Mass Production, Spectacle. Andy Warhol's art is Mm-mm good. Another one, when the husband is losing it into booze and craziness, scaring wife and daughter: his eyeball at the keyhole staring into their fear, like Jack Nicholson's in The Shining. Probably a dozen or more of these that I missed tucked in there.

No surprises in the story; well, one. But very little in the way of spoilers are possible. Touching all the right notes. Great look; loved the photography. Loved the tone and the pacing. My wife and I and our teen–twenty-something daughters all enjoyed it. They're all artists; I'm not.

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Amazing Stories: Fine Tuning (1985)

Season 1, Episode 7

1/10

Spielberg has two or three ideas, and this episode uses them all

28 September 2014

A really poorly executed version of E.T. and Close Encounters. High school kids soup up a TV antennae and find aliens obsessed with 1950's TV comedy shows. That's it. The aliens harmlessly come to Earth and the high school boys show them around Hollywood. Fifteen minutes of goofiness while the aliens seek out Milton Berle, etc. It's done the way that Spielberg has of trying to push your buttons, this time with cuteness and warmth. Sometimes in his career he does it, but wow, this one is such a blunder. Dunderheaded, chortling oh-so-cute aliens (dwarfs in costumes like ET- potatoes with rubber-nose-mustache-glasses on). I guess that's how Spielberg made his career, by using the main tropes of science fiction and freshening them up a bit, but sometimes, like here, it seems he thinks that all he has to do is just use them and the magic will work. I did love the old Vaudevillians. They're great. You get about two minutes of those guys around the twenty minute mark. Otherwise it is super bad. Sloppy.

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