The Avengers

“There was an idea to bring together a group of remarkable people, so when we needed them, they could fight the battles that we never could…” – Nick Fury

The next movie up in my library is the superhero team up of The Avengers. This movie is a high visual roller coaster that keeps our attention the whole way by giving us the best in which each character has to offer. Each actor does their best and it just works so well. This movie is straight up fun and everyone who watches gets a hero they love the most and get to root for. Joss Whedon gave us what we wanted and what we needed for a superhero team origins movie. Some people were miffed about the two and a half hour movie length. Personally, I could have went through another hour as long as there was more Hulk.

The only qualm I have with the movie is when the Hulk showed up for the final battle and all of a sudden he can completely control the Hulk and then one punches the flying leviathan. Okay I just read that sentence again never mind, that scene was amazing. One of my favorite parts was actually in the middle of the credits when Thanos turned around I went into full comic book nerd mode and wished so hard that the next movie would be out soon. Unfortunately the sequel is not set to come out until 2015 and I hope they forced the cast of The Avengers to stay on. I would hate to see any of them leave. All of the actors did such a wonderful job portraying their roles. Yes even Mark Ruffalo did well even though I wanted Edward Norton doing the Hulk again.

This movie easily makes up for Iron Man 2 and sets the bar at a higher level for future Marvel movies. Now they have to keep on topping themselves or otherwise the franchise can easily fall apart. Giving three years between sequels though I’m sure they will have something great to show us. They should have another great story to tell in Avengers 2 and 3 with that amount of time. Of course Sam Jackson gets two more motivational speeches that will bring everyone together when it seems like all is lost and one of the heroes will rise up above the others to truly outshine and do what is necessary to save the team and the world. Would it be too much to ask for if they gave us at least a Sentry cameo in the next two movies? Please Joss? Just a glimpse of the S would be good enough for me.

Overall The Avengers is a fun flick and I will definitely pay to see every sequel they have to offer and really can’t wait to see how Joss Whedon writes in Thanos. It’s a hard character to write because of how powerful he is but I’m certain he is up to the challenge. Catch my next blog when I watch Ash take on the Army of Darkness. Time for a good old action comedy horror movie. Until then this cinephile is out.

Alice in Wonderland (2010)

“Do you think I’ve gone around the bend?” – Alice

Today my library brings me to the Lewis Carroll classic story Alice in Wonderland from 2010 directed by Tm Burton. There are so many versions of this movie it is hard to keep track of them all, thankfully I only own this one. This one stands alone in my opinion because it takes pieces from Carroll’s classics and mashes them into this movie. With Tim Burton at the helm you of course have to have Danny Elfman doing the music, Johnny Depp as a supporting character and Helena Bonham Carter as the most interesting role. Not that I am complaining I love just about anything they make together.

Even though the whole story is done thru computer animation it doesn’t come off as having too little happening or it being too dense. The colors and background it uses gives us a sense that Wonderland could be just down the rabbit hole or in our next dream. Other British made Alice in Wonderland movies have tried this but they just don’t work. They don’t look like Alice fell through a rabbit hole or went through a looking-glass they looked like Alice went out into a forest. This one though just worked between the good acting, great CGI, and an original story based on all of the good elements of every Alice story.

The Hatter and Cheshire Cat seem to represent Lewis Carrol in this movie. They both drive the story, mad in their own way, speak in riddles, and both always have something hidden up their sleeve. From start to finish though this movie is fun and pays the right homages to the story and stays true to Carroll’s original vision. Helena Bonham Carter gets the great honor of being a great villain and the most original character in this movie. At a certain point you can see Wonderland from her eyes and you see why she is the way she is and you almost feel bad for her. Well nothing really makes up for the animal cruelty but hey they tried. The casting was great and they didn’t act it as though they were in a movie they acted as if they were on a Broadway play which works since this story is so crazy. Which worked very well these days since people are so much more vocal about being a little mad or weird. Which thankfully I’m a little of both myself watching and owning over 300 movies mostly alphabetically.

The next movie up is the Marvel superhero get together The Avengers. Time to watch Thor bring down the hammer, watch the Cap take point, Iron Man blast some ACDC, Sam Jackson gets to motivate us with a good speech, Hawkeye get a good shot, Black Widow to show off the goods, and let the Hulk smash. Until then this cinephile is out.

Freddy Vs Jason

“I had to search the bowels of Hell, but I found someone, someone who’ll make ’em remember.” – Freddy Krueger

My next movie in the Nightmare franchise and the last is the monster showdown movie Freddy Vs Jason. This movie strays from horror and goes into a straight up showdown were the movie goer gets to root for their favorite monster and the people in the movie have to figure out how they are going to survive the battlefield. This movie is my favorite of the monster showdown movies. It just barely beats out Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman and I’m pretty certain it’s because of the generation I was born into.

Now for the monster showdown and what works. The opening scene when Freddy faces the camera is one of the best scenes in the movie. Englund is the only person that could make us really believe that he is a dark entity that has been stuck in Hell and is planning out his escape. The scene is so simple and sets a great tone for the movie. You feel like you are going to get see some fun stuff. The movie uses very clear color lights to show changes in the tone. From light blue, to dark green, and a blood-red the movie shows us that the tone of the scene is about to change drastically. The humor is kept to a minimum even though they have a character that looks like Jason Mewes and acts like he is straight out of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. When they started to go for humor I was a little weary of the movie but then they went back to the fighting. The biggest thing I noticed was that finally the adults in Springwood are no longer completely brainless. They finally acknowledge that after so many strange deaths that Freddy is real and they do something about it. The only mildly dumb people are finally the teenagers who don’t know what is going on. The adults are the only ones who have any hint of what Freddy is. At the same time they won’t hear anything about Jason. The characters in the movie pose the best question though, how can two unbeatable opponents kill each other or even have a clear winner?

I think that the only problem that the movie suffers from are the sequels from the previous movies. Jason has taken an axe to the head, machetes to the eye and shoulder, drowned, covered in toxic waste, and blown up. Exactly how is Freddy supposed to beat him? Even taking the knives to both of Jason’s eyes doesn’t kill him. Then of course Freddy who I’ve already pointed out all of the crazy ways they have killed him over the years in dreams and in the real world. So how is Jason supposed to kill Freddy? Both of these characters have been blown up so what can they really do to each other? The previous sequels remind us when they are trying to kill each other of what isn’t going to work. Writing this movie must have really been a pain because how can you kill what you’ve already shown can’t be killed. I guess decapitation is the only thing that hasn’t been done to either character.

Overall it’s a great monster showdown flick but again most fans wanted a comedy slasher horror. If you just expect a monster movie it works. If you wanted slasher it has elements but overall just isn’t a slasher. Still I really enjoyed the movie and still recommend it to anyone who is a fan to either franchise. Well Freddy is done with and its time to move on to Tim Burton’s vision of Wonderland with Alice in Wonderland. Time to return to a little madness. Until then this cinephile is out.

A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)

“Why are you screaming when I haven’t even cut you yet?” Freddy Krueger

My next movie up for review is A Nightmare on Elm Street the 2010 remake. Now as I said before on the subject of remakes they are hard to make and are held up to a higher standard. When it comes to remakes you can’t expect the exact same movie that was made in 1984. Before watching any remake I close my eyes and say this is a new movie and I won’t compare it. Try it sometime it’s hard to do and you have to forget the elements that made the first movie that made it a classic. So forget about Robert Englund and Wes Craven and enjoy this actually well made horror flick.

Overall I really enjoyed this movie that it really has good horror roots. Freddy terrorizes the teens and works them down to the point where they can’t resist going to sleep. The story works and has that hint of mystery with us wondering who Freddy was. I enjoyed it when Freddy was simply trying to scare them at first but not really trying to kill them. Freddy seemed more like a man trying to slowly cut down a tree and enjoying every chop. Even though I enjoyed watching Freddy doing this it didn’t make me root for Freddy it made me more worried about Nancy. How was she supposed to beat this seemingly invincible entity? I also thoroughly enjoyed the homages to the original series they did them well and with class. This movie went for the classic horror formula and played it well. Of course though people compared it too much to the original.

While doing a little research of this movie most of the reviews were very harsh while comparing it to the original. Of course if you compare this to the original the original wins every time without fail. The reason being is that the original is just that its the original and after 26 years of being in our minds that this was the first movie and anything that tries to be it is just wrong the remake didn’t have a chance. If you forget the past this movie is a good horror movie and in another life this could easily be a classic. Unfortunately all you can hear is Jackie Earl Haley is not Robert Englund. Of course he is not, but Haley wasn’t trying to be Robert Englund he was trying to play Freddy. I thought he did a very good job and was very brave for knowing that he would constantly hear that he wasn’t Robert Englund. I especially hated to read that this movie some people thought was the worst Freddy movie ever. Did any of them watch Freddy’s Revenge? If they did and they still say this movie was the worst I would stop talking to those people because they have no taste in movies. Maybe it would be easier for people if they just thought that the original movie was all just a well written dream?

This is all I got for this well done movie. I will continue my journey with the last movie in the nightmare franchise with Freddy Vs Jason. Yet another movie were a couple of monsters duke it out to see whose boss of the slasher genre. Until then this cinephile is out.

Remakes, Reboots, and Sequels

“Are Hollywood writers and producers lacking creativity these days?” – Megan Korn on the Daily Ticker

Since I have not done a blog on a remake or a reboot but plenty of sequels I thought that just before writing about a remake I ought to put out my opinion on the subject of remakes, reboots, and sequels that Hollywood has been making over the last decade.

I have mixed emotions about remakes or reboots and have only mild concerns about sequels. A remake has the problem of having to be just as good if not better than the original. The reboot has to recapture the story and tell it the same way but in a different way with different actors. The sequel is only as good as the last sequel and if the bar is set high enough it has to outshine the first which is a near impossible feat. Each one of these has their own problems and movie goers as well as cinephiles like myself love to complain constantly about how Hollywood isn’t giving us anything better to watch then recycled ideas. Even on Facebook there is a group called One Million Fans Tired of Remakes, Reboots, and Sequels. At the same time though we are paying Hollywood to make these movies so is the culprit Hollywood or is that person looking at us in the mirror?

When I complain about movies it is more about what Hollywood has control over such as the writing, directing, casting, and effects they have full control over these elements. What I can never complain about is what they eventually decided to green light because essentially that is my fault. Put yourself in a Hollywood studio executive’s mindset before you judge what he or she puts out. Making movies is yes an art from beginning to end and if you don’t hire the right artist to make that visual it can fall apart fast. What we forget is that it is also a business. The movie studios have to make money and their job is to make as much as they can. Let’s say for a moment that you are a movie executive and you have two choices of a movie to make. One is a great story about life, music, and living your dream. It is well written and with right actors could really be a great flick however it won’t even make back its budget of 45 million and you’ll have to fire some people because you can’t pay their salary. Or you could do a Batman sequel that has a terrible script even worse acting and make twice its budget of 140 million because it says Batman on it. Any idiot trying to make money would choose Batman. This really did happen and we got 1997’s Batman & Robin. So who was to blame for the worst Batman movie ever? Some say Joel Schumacher but I say everyone had a hand in that including us. We paid to see Batman Forever and with our dollars we told Warner Brothers, “I loved that campy movie! Please make just one more!”. Okay maybe it was Joel Schumacher that shot Batman in the balls but movie goers gave him the gun and bought the bullets.

It is not the lack of creativity that is making some really crappy movies but our willingness to buy to the tickets. There are hundreds of writers in Hollywood and tens of thousands of potential writers with good stories to tell out their. But we aren’t willing to pay for good storyline we want special effects, stories we already know, and actors we like . This is why Twilight, Harry Potter, and The Hunger Games did so well. They all had an established fan base that Hollywood could bank on. This is also why Michael Bay has a job because he can deliver all of the crap we like. All of those directors that we think have horrible ideas and bad movies are not going away any time soon because we are paying them to stay. If you hate these types of movies do just a little bit of research on who makes the movie rather than say, “Wow Johnny Depp or(insert any actor you think is hot) is in this movie let’s go see it!”. With a simple Google search you can find that the same writer who wrote Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter also wrote Dark Shadows with Johnny Depp. Didn’t think that one through before you bought that ticket did you?

In closing use your dollars wisely because essentially it’s a vote. Every time you buy tickets, purchase the blu ray, or rent Batman & Robin you are voting that they make another. Don’t be that guy who wants more crappy movies. Vote wisely about the movies you watch or another campy Batman will come soon to a theater near you.

That is all I got for this subject. Two more nightmare movies left of Freddy left. Until then this cinephile is out.

Wes Craven’s New Nightmare

“Horror films don’t create fear. They release it.” – Wes Craven

The next movie in this dream franchise is Wes Craven’s New Nightmare. This movie goes back to the roots of the series with making its characters descend slowly into madness and giving us some straight up horror. Even though this movie’s concept is a little strange being a film within a film and even showing the script in parts of it. The story is so original it makes this movie years ahead of itself. Wes Craven did some of his best storytelling with this movie and even though it wasn’t well received by most because of the strange story I enjoyed the hell out of it.

I found very little wrong with this movie and really it was just the story. I do love the concept of the story and using actors to play themselves, although I’m sure to the general public I sure it comes off a little too strange and a bit confusing. I had to watch the movie twice and really pay attention to everything that was going on (give me a break I was 9 when I first saw this) but when I truly realized what Wes Craven was showing me I had to watch it again. The horror works so well that makes Freddy truly evil again and you feel bad for Heather every time Freddy comes popping out like a demented jack in the box. I was so glad for Freddy’s turn back to the evil entity that he was in the first movie and gets away from the wise cracking cartoon character they turned him into from the last three movies. Unfortunately though they left the borderline retarded people and complete jackasses to surround Nancy in the formula. Well you can’t have everything I guess.

Even for the few flaws this movie has I still love the storytelling and gives me a reason to check out anything Wes Craven might make in the future. Even though Hollywood hates truly interesting stories I love them and will never stop watching them. This film works well and will always be up on the high list of my favorite horror movies. The horror is very primal and pulls at our deepest fears. From the fear we have as children when there is a monster under the bed or in the closet. To the fear we have as adults of losing the people we love and the real boogie men who are out there. Then of course it makes us fear that we too could loose our minds any second when pushed in the right direction.

Well I wish this was the last review for the nightmare series but a friend told me that I had to do the 2010 remake. I will do a review of that movie but before I do my next blog will not be a review but my opinion on the new movies, remakes, reboots, and sequels that Hollywood has been churning out the last ten years. Until then this cinephile is out.

Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare

“Welcome to prime time, bitch!” – Freddy Krueger

The next movie on my cinema trek is Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare or Looney Toons not really the final nightmare. The movie is classified as a comedy-horror-slasher film. Did they really have to re-invent a movie genre just to make this mess? But then again what else could we expect from the same director that made Tank Girl? Well at least the bar isn’t set very high.

Could it have been worse? Maybe, I heard in an interview that the original script for this movie had Jacob and Alice from Dream Child fighting Freddy until they were able to completely end him for good. I was interested in reading what they had for the original vision of this movie so I hunted down the script on the internet and was able to read it. Yes, it could have been much worse. It could have made even less sense. I won’t go into too much detail but to summarize it the Dream Police who are some of the dead Dream Warriors show up and help Jacob take out Freddy. I really wish I had made that last sentence up. Anyways back to the supposed end of the franchise.

If you cut out the blood and guts and throw in some bright colors you would have a cartoon movie. I mean really the bus scene, Freddy pushing out the bed of spikes, the magic chalk board, and then of course there is Spencer’s scene were he is turned into a possessed Mario it turns Freddy from a dark entity into Bugs Bunny. This movie strays from the formulas of horror and true slasher that the previous movies had and tries to be its own movie. If you’re the sixth movie and the supposed last in a franchise isn’t a little late to start trying to a make a stand alone movie? Changing the movie formula in a franchise is hard enough when its the second or third but to do it in the sixth movie just doesn’t work.

The only redeeming factor of this movie is when Maggie goes into Freddy’s mind. The why of Freddy’s life is explained. It shows that between nature and nurture Freddy couldn’t be anything but a murderer. Almost all other slasher movies have a quick scene on why the killer does what they do but with this franchise you get a little bit of back story with every movie and with this movie you get a whole lot of back story and it works so well that it is easily the best scenes in the movie. At the end they killed Freddy with the reasoning that Nancy had in the first movie. Bring him into the real world and hit him as hard as they can. The scene could have gone without the ending wise crack from Freddy but at least they got the rules and the original ideas from the first movie right. The amount of cameos is almost comedic with Roseanne, Tom Arnold, Johnny Depp, and Alice Cooper. I think how they got involved was telling them it was the last movie and they could be apart of cinema and this franchise’s history. But star power just isn’t enough for this movie. It still lacks true direction and a script that mashes too many ideas into one movie.

Well that is all I got for this not so final nightmare. It’s time for Wes Craven to come back with a New Nightmare. Until then this cinephile has to get back to the couch.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child

“Now there’s a face, only a mother could love!” – Freddy Krueger

Well here we are on yet another slasher sequel A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child. This movie is considered by many as the second to worst of the franchise and I agree. This movie tries to get some horror back into the franchise but fails at it miserably. But first I will tell you what I think works well in this movie.

For this movie they went with a darker setting all around. The lighting is darker, the tone is darker, the subject matter of teen pregnancy, and abortion options. But darker subject matter and lighting is not horror it’s just dark. But I do like that they have Freddy get a little scared to show how dark they are trying to get. To actually show that Freddy is afraid of something shows the audience that he has a weakness and that he is not truly eternal. It’s also the only time we ever see him truly afraid. I think the scene where Freddy tries to move through the doorway and see him afraid of his mother and show fear for the first time. I think is the best shot of him and this film. After all what could frighten the boogie man?

Now for what doesn’t work lets open the shit damn. After growing up in Springwood for years and 26 murders thus far you would think that more than three characters would believe that something was killing off teenagers in this town after a while. Nope one girl won’t hear it until she finally gets attacked and all of the parents seem to be completely baffled. Even though just the year before their little group got slaughtered mysteriously? Then of course there is the plot of using Jacob’s dreams to create a back door. They really couldn’t come up with a better idea or just say screw it we are bringing Freddy back like Dream Warriors or Dream Master. I would’ve accepted that more than the baby dream angle. The rest of the movie plays out like the others. A final confrontation with Freddy were he tries to trick them and at the last second they seem to triumph. Except something tells us at the end that this isn’t the last of Freddy he’s just locked away for now. That is another thing that bothered me about this movie was that Lisa has lived through two movies and beaten Freddy semi-easily with only having emotional damage done and zero physical. She lasted longer than Nancy or Kristen but still couldn’t really kill Freddy. The problem with this movie and the other bad sequels seems to happen though in most movie franchises that change directors and writers every movie. They really can’t decide on how to either kill Freddy or keep characters fresh and entertaining. The only person that really worked on all of the movies and that kept this franchise going was producer Robert Shaye. I have to admit though he did a decent job considering he didn’t write any of these movies but still did his best with what he had.

Well that is all I got for this sequel. Check me out next time when I review the supposed “end” of the nightmare series Freddy’s Dead the Final Nightmare. Or as I like to call it Looney Tunes with no cartoons. Until then this cinephile is out.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master

“When deep sleep falleth on men, fear came upon me, and trembling, which made all my bones to shake.” – Job 4:13

Today I continue through dreamland with A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master. Someway somehow this movie did financially better than any Nightmare movie up until Freddy Vs Jason. I found this hard to believe but I even checked Boxofficemojo.com and sure enough even adjusted for inflation this movie did better than any of the others. I didn’t want to believe it but I guess people want to see teens get senselessly slaughtered rather than a good scary story. Another thing I noticed about this movie was that they seem to use ideas that they wanted to in Dream Warriors. The characters and the dreams all fit into the third movie better than a stand alone. But this happens in movies and their sequels all the time. This movies tries to replicate the third in sense of opening with an ominous quote about sleep and eerie music trying to trick us into thinking that this is going to be as good as Dream Warriors. They pulled a fast one us real quick.

The other problem the movie suffers from is turning the teens into meat bags that we don’t care about. The only people I cared about were the survivors from Dream Warriors. I thought to myself, they really had no idea what to do with these three characters? They had to get through an asylum, retarded adults, Nancy sacrificing herself, and fighting an extremely strong enemy just to get easily killed in their dreams in the first half hour. Again this is another movie that the writer says, I don’t know what to do with these characters so I’m just to going to kill them. After the first three get killed I just start rooting for Freddy to kill as many as he can because why the hell should I care otherwise?

This movie is where the franchise turns from teens being terrorized into the villain slowly turning into the wise cracking anti-hero we root for. This movie is where Freddy went wrong. Because of this movie the violence eventually turns into a Looney Tunes episode and changes the dynamic. We stop being afraid of Freddy and start wanting to hang out with him.

The rest of the movie plays out like a regular slasher horror film. The teens get slowly picked off one by one until the main character has to fight him alone in a final showdown. In the most anti-climatic fashion Freddy is killed not by the strength or the wits of the main character but by a mirror. Really? Getting hit by a sledgehammer, hit with homemade explosives, and set on fire in a non dream and nothing happens to him. But the second some random girl points a mirror at him in a dream he is done for. He can’t come out again. This is truly lazy writing at its worst. What were they thinking?

Well I can’t write about this movie. With its box office returns it shows that America likes watching shit movies. Join me tomorrow as I go through yet another sequel A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child or as I like to call it A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: Can we get just five more dollars out of you? Until then this cinephile has to find five dollars.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors

“Sleep, those little slices of death — how I loathe them.” – Edgar Allan Poe

Right off the bat this movie it sets a great tone with a Poe quote, ominous music, and no dream for a change. We see that the unnamed teen is trying to staying awake to get away from Freddy and it give us that feeling that she is in the middle of what Nancy went through but plays it a little differently. When that little girl says Freddy’s home it instantly pushes that old fear you have him from the first movie. The music is done so well with a good mixture and goes along with the visual very well. I really couldn’t believe Lawrence Fishburne is in this movie especially since the first time I saw this movie was right after the first Matrix movie. When Nancy all of sudden comes into frame its a bit of a shock like seeing a ghost. Putting Nancy back in the story I thought was great because it tells me that a good chance of living and its going to be a good fight.

The only problem with this movie that I have is the adult characters. The adult characters with the exception of Nancy and Dr Gordon are completely retarded. They disregard the fact that the kids dream of the same person even though they have never met, kids are able to re lock padlocked doors from the opposite side of the door or the lock, apparently suicide by jumping into a television is a completely normal, orderlies are stealing drugs in plain view, and somehow hypnotism causes comas. Somehow the adults are either blind or want to be blind to what is going on.

There is so much sexual referencing in this franchise you wonder if a psychologist wrote these movies. It seems that Freddy is also the subconscious sexual frustration of the teenagers. Between the potential rape scenes, constant phallic images, and the rampant sexual frustration of the characters it makes me wonder if the psychologist just wanted to mess with people to think they are watching a slasher movie and end up wondering about their sexuality. That or it’s just another attempt to attempt depth in a movie that’s about hunting teenagers. But if you’ve ever just talked psychologist, writing a mind fuck like this wouldn’t be that large of a leap.

Anyways, the dream sequences are well written, acted, and the special effects are done very well. This movie and it’s contents still stands the test of time and some of it looks very real. The use of latex and clay still looks better than some of the CGI today. As you can tell this movie is my favorite of the franchise just because it is just done very well and returns to the roots of the series and sets the right tone for a good slasher horror movie. I could have had a few more scenes with the teens trying out their powers a bit more so they could build them up a bit more but the movie still works and will always be my favorite for this franchise.

My next movie in the library is A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: Dream Masters. Time to watch some easy to forget teens who’s names don’t really matter get slaughtered like lambs in the next installment. Until then this cinephile has to get back to the couch.