Candyman: The David Klein Story

Note:  This is a review that's being reposted from my Epinions account.

One of the nice features of Netflix is that I get to watch a lot of movies streaming.  I don’t have to wait for a DVD to come in the mail; I can just start watching it whenever I want.  One of the movies I might not have otherwise watched is Candyman:  The David Klein Story.  I’ll admit that I never gave much thought to who came up with the idea for the Jelly Belly.  Jelly beans have been around forever.  I had always seen The Herman Goelitz Candy Company on the Jelly Belly packages and figured it was a specialized jelly bean.

The movie starts with David Klein saying that Jelly Belly ruined his life.  It’s a great hook, as far as hooks go.  Is it hyperbole or is he really in ruins?  If so, is it really Jelly Belly’s fault?  The movie starts by showing what Klein did to get the brand started.  He approached Goelitz about making a new, gourmet jelly bean with all sorts of flavors.  It seemed that jelly beans, up to this point, came in only a few flavors.  There was no reason we couldn’t have piña colada or root beer.  It was just a matter of someone coming up with the right formula.

This all started in 1976, the year I was born.  The Herman Goelitz Candy Company came up with the formulations, but David Klein did a lot of the work in terms of getting brand recognition and making sure stores were supplied.  He would go on talk shows, call potential clients and everything.  He also had the trademarks on Jelly Belly.

By 1980, Goelitz realized that they needed to expand.  They felt that they needed control of the entire operation to secure bigger and better loans.  They forcibly bought out what Klein owned for several million dollars.  His biggest mistake was in not getting a lawyer.  (This is odd considering that Klein graduated top of his class from UCLA law.)

It’s not a high-quality film, but it’s a story that needs to be told.  I’m sure there’s a slant in favor of Klein, especially considering that his son, Bert, is listed as one of the producers.  David Klein is shown as being a nice guy.  His son recalls a trip to Disneyland where David Klein bought a batch of balloons and passed most of them out.  He also is shown as renting an ice-cream truck and giving out the ice cream to kids.

It’s one of those stories that has two sides.  Yes, The Herman Goelitz Candy Company came up with the formulation, but Klein did do a lot of work promoting the product.  This was something that he wanted to see happen and he seemed to enjoy doing.  When I told my parents, my father laughed.  My mother felt like that was just business.  It’s sad that a company would take advantage of someone’s kindness.  I can totally believe that something like this would happen.  (Despite what happened, he’s still at it.  He and his daughter both invent candy, many of which were novelty candies.  There are a few that seem like they have a chance of taking off.)

Most of the documentary is David Klein and his son, Bert Klein.  There are other people that David Klein has known, including people he’s helped.  Strangely, there’s also “Weird Al” Yankovic.  I’m not sure what the connection is.  IMDb doesn’t seem to offer any trivia for this title, so I don’t know if he was a friend or if they happened to catch him on the street.

The movie also seems a bit long, especially towards the end.  It runs for about 75 minutes.  I felt like the last 15 were unnecessary, as it seemed like we had covered all of what there was to know.  One other complaint is that David Klein comes off as maybe a little bitter.  He doesn’t seem to care about the money.  Instead, he’d like the recognition for the work he put in.  On that note, I would recommend watching the movie.  I think he does deserve recognition for his contribution.  I don’t think a lot of people know this aspect of Jelly Belly’s history.  I’m not sure I’ll look at Jelly Belly the same way.

Robot Monster = Sob, Tormentor

Note:  This is a review I'm reposting from my Epinions account with a few modifications.

It’s hard to say for certain which movie is the worst.  Many have poor production values but are still entertaining.  Mystery Science Theater 3000 proved that.  Some movies have a good amount of talent and money behind it, yet still fall flat.  Then there are some that have almost nothing going for them.  Robot Monster was just such a movie.

The movie starts with a boy and girl, presumably brother and sister, playing together.  He’s playing alien invaders despite her insistence that they play house.  Finally, they wander off and find two people examining a cave.  That’s when mother comes along and tells her children that it’s nap time, so they go to sleep on their picnic blanket.

For no apparent reason, we get to see some clips of some close-ups of reptiles.  This serves only as a segue to a deserted Earth.  There are only eight surviving humans on the planet, two of which are never seen.  We have the boy and girl from before, their mother, father, older sister and the father’s assistant.  It’s soon explained that Ro-Man has killed everyone as part of an invading force, or so he thinks.

The Great Guidance, Ro-Man’s superior, informs Ro-Man that there are still eight survivors.  (Both characters are played by the same actor wearing a gorilla suit and a diving helmet.  A separate actor also voices both characters.)  It’s up to Ro-Man to hunt down and kill the remaining “hu-mans”.

You wouldn’t think it would be that hard to find and kill eight people, even if they are the last eight people on the planet.  The survivors survived because they all had a serum that was supposed to ward off any sickness.  (The father and his assistant have invented the panacea.)  By dumb luck, Ro-Man happens to be in the same area as the eight survivors.  In fact, the characters often go over to see  Ro-Man, so he could easily walk there.

Of course, the survivors have an electrical device that blocks Ro-Man’s equipment.  He can communicate via magical plastic screens that he can’t put a physical trace on.  Also, all of the survivors leave their little camp at one point, presumably leaving the protection of their device.  Couldn’t Ro-Man see where they left the protective field and at least narrow down where the camp is?  At the very least, he should know which direction they're in.  All Ro-Man does is offer them the chance to surrender or face an “indescribable” death.

Speaking of Ro-Man and The Great Guidance, I don’t think that the guy in the gorilla suit ever talked to the guy doing the voice.  In retrospect, I don’t think he knew that his character even had lines.  All he did was move his arms around in a very humorous way, hoping to look menacing.  His voice was also meant to be menacing, but was laughable at best.

Also, I understand that CGI wasn’t very advanced in the late 50s and you had to have a human play the part, which limits your options.  But a guy in a gorilla suit with a diving helmet?  I’m sure you could find something more menacing to work with.  This was another movie where strings were evident in several places.  (Pay attention to the scene where the two other survivors are supposed taking off in a rocket.)

I understand that Ro-Man has his orders, but the Robot Monster race wants to be rid of humanity because they may pose a threat.  Eight people are not a threat.  Of course, we’re talking about robots, so I suppose that explains why they have to stick to The Plan so closely.  ("There can be no error.")

Another big problem that I figured out early on was the problem of inbreeding.  With eight people left, five of which are already related to each other, you don’t have many mating options.  I’m not saying that they should just give up, but the problem isn’t really even mentioned.  I think it was mentioned that there was a space station, but I wasn’t really clear as to whether or not there were people up there.

What really surprised me is that there’s a 3-D version out there somewhere.  I’m not even sure that it would be worth it except for the bubble machine and the very last scene.  There weren’t many scenes that I felt would have benefited from seeing it in 3-D.

The movie is so lame that I think this qualifies as the lamest that I’ve ever seen.  (When the movie ends, you sit back and think, “Well, yeah.  That would explain it.”)  It’s truly a horribly made movie, but you have to see it to fully understand how horrible it is.  With this movie, a binary ‘Recommended’ option doesn’t quite work.  In the words of Ro-Man, “I cannot, yet I must.  How do you calculate that?” 

Edward H. Julius - Rapid Math: Tricks and Tips, 30 Days to Number Power (book review)

Note:  This is a review that's reposted from my Epinions account with a few minor modifications.

I’ve always been impressed by people that could write thousands of words on a topic when I could only get a few hundred. Many of these people knew a lot about the subject and had a lot to offer. I could only do this when I was reviewing something, such as a game, that required a lot of detail. Math is a subject that I know a lot about, so I’m about to reveal how and why some of the tricks work.

While going through the bookcase recently, I came across this book. My brother bought it many, many years ago. He seemed to like it, but hasn’t used it much since he left for college. The book promises greater calculating speed and over 2,000 practice problems. I figured that I’d take a look through it. Presumably, it’s meant to be done over the course of a month, since the subtitle is "30 days to number power". If you made it all the way to high-school math, the book won’t seem that  impressive.

Each day has two tricks. It starts off with multiplying and dividing with zeros. For example, if you have to multiply 50 by 30, remove the zeroes and multiply 5 by 3 to get 15, then put the two zeroes back to get 1500. That’s an entire trick. The next one is about multiplying and dividing with decimals. It’s the same concept with different powers of ten. You should have mastered this before leaving elementary school. Of course, both of these are on the first day. I don’t imagine that it would be a good idea to throw anything too difficult your way so soon.

Many of the ‘tricks’ could be consolidated. For instance, one trick is how to multiply two numbers that differ by 2. Almost a week later, you learn how to multiply two numbers that differ by 4. Both of these tricks rely on the same principle. Lets say you have two numbers, 31 and 29. According to the book, you multiply by the average of the two numbers and subtract 1, thus getting 899. If you have 32 and 28, you multiply the two numbers and subtract 4, thus getting 896. What the book doesn’t explain is that this works for any two numbers. (For the sake of convenience, it's generally only used for whole numbers that differ by an even number.) The rule is that (x+y)(x-y)=x?-y?. It’s just that the larger the difference between the two numbers, the less convenient it becomes. If you look closely, you’ll notice that this rule comes up several times throughout the book.

Look also at the trick for multiplying by 12. The author says to multiply by ten, then to double the amount so that 38 times 12 should be 380+76, which amounts to 456. The trick for multiplying by 11 is similar. To multiply by 11, take the number, split the digits and put the sum of the digits in the middle, carrying if you have to. 59 times 11 is 509+140, or 649. I have news for you: this is how you usually do math. The author is just pointing out two different cases that are easy to do in your head.

Multiplying a two-digit number by 101 is a similar case, where you just repeat the two-digit number. 48 times 101 becomes 4848. Multiplying by 99 is more of a trick which most people wouldn’t necessarily be able to figure out on their own. Instead of multiplying by 99, you multiply by 100 and subtract 1. 48 times 99 is done by multiplying 48 by 100 to get 4800. You then subtract 48 from 4800 to get 4752.

The author also points out that you can reassemble factors to make multiplying easier. Instead of 2 times 14, you can multiply 2 times 2 times 7, or 4 times 7. This is essentially the same thing as dripping zeroes. 30x50 is like 3x10x5x10, or 3x5x10x10. (It also works great until you hit prime numbers. If you have to multiply 13 by 7, you’ll have to find another way to do it.)

The author presents it in a way that is easy for someone to understand each trick, but the reader might not necessarily understand the underlying principle, and that’s the problem. The trick from the paragraph before last could be used with other numbers or in combination with other tricks. For instance, 48 times 98 would be like 48 times 100 minus twice 48, or 4702. The real lesson to be learned is to notice proximity to an easier number to multiply by.

I would say that if you paid attention in math up until high school, you’ll find about 30% of this book to be stuff that you could have figured out on your own. (I’d say that a person of average mathematical abilities will find at least a few tricks that they already have figured out on their own.) Another 20% will be stuff that will serve no practical purpose. For instance, the book has parlor tricks, which the author admits are nothing more than mathematical curiosities that are meant to amuse people at parties. One will allow you to tell the day of the week for any date in the 20th century.

There are also a few things, like adding large sets of numbers, which will probably still require pencil and paper of most people. On the whole, I’d say that among the 60 tricks in the book, very few of them are of any benefit to me. Many are of great use, but I already know much of the information contained herein. I think that it would have been better to write a book on why these tricks work.

Gravity (2013) Review

I had seen the coming attractions for Gravity.  It was the kind of movie I’d be interested in seeing, but not necessarily in renting.  When my parents got it from Netflix, they kept it over the weekend, giving me a chance to watch it myself.  The story goes that Ryan Stone, played by Sandra Bullock, and Matt Kowalski, played by George Clooney, are making repairs to some orbiting equipment.  When disaster strikes, they have to make it to the International Space Station to get home.  I was mostly curious to see how they made a 91-minute film from this.

Normally, I’m accustomed to going into greater detail about the plot, but there’s not much to describe.  After the Russians destroy one of their own satellites, the debris destroys the shuttle that Stone and Kowalski were planning on taking back home.  Kowalski has thrusters, which he can use to get the two of them to the ISS, which has escape pods.  Unfortunately, one has been used and the other is in no condition to be used safely, making the only remaining option a nearby Chinese escape pod.

Much of the movie comes from suspense.  Unless they can make it to an escape pod, there are three ways the movie could end for the two characters:  They could drift off in to space and die a cold death, they could drift towards Earth and die a fiery death during reentry, or they could continue in orbit and hope the debris doesn’t get them.  Unfortunately, Kowalski wasted a lot of his jet fuel having fun around the equipment they were supposed to be repairing.  (I can’t say I blame him.  I wouldn’t expect Russian space debris, either.)

I could also see this being a vehicle for 3-D effects.  I’ve always hated that DVDs tend not to have a 3-D version.  I imagine that the big problem is not wanting to have to ship special glasses.  Then again, it might be something that they could sell separately.  (Maybe free 3-D glasses with an upgrade?)  I would have like to have seen this movie in 3-D.  I probably would have watched that version if I had been given the option.

There was some notoriety when Neil deGrasse Tyson pointed out a few mistakes that the movie made.  )He later pointed out that the movie got a lot right, including how the debris behaved.)  Admittedly, though, a few liberties were taken for the sake of the story.  I don’t think it would have been as suspenseful if they had stuck to all the laws of physics.

I should warn you that people do die.  This isn’t ruining anything, as it happens in the first few minutes.  I bring this up because we get to see them after they’ve been killed and it’s not pretty.  If you’re squeamish about this at all, you may want to consider that.  Overall, I would probably only recommend this to someone if they’re a fan of Bullock of Clooney.  I probably wouldn’t have watched this if my parents hadn’t rented it.

Robot Holocaust (1986) movie review

Note:  This is one of my reviews reposted from Epinions.

How, exactly, do you define a truly bad movie?  We’re not talking, oh, sorry I wasted $10 bad.  I mean how do you define a movie as being a total waste of time, effort and film?  I think Robot Holocaust may be the poster child.

The movie takes place in what I think is supposed to be what’s left of New York City.  We have some people fighting each other so that their evil overlord, The Dark One, can figure out which one is strongest, only to kill him in the end.  The idea is that by weeding out the strongest, there will be no uprisings.  It seems that they’re producing power for The Dark One and are called air slaves.

I’m assuming that this is because of their dependence on clean air.  It also seems that the air outside cannot be breathed by any human except by those that can somehow breathe it.  This includes a scientist and his daughter as well as a wanderer named Neo.

As it happens, Neo and his robot wander in during the fight.  Where he came from is not clear, since we’re told that there’s one city left. Shortly after the fight ends, The Dark One pumps in poison air and everyone (except the scientist, the daughter and Neo) fall down.  The doctor tells his daughter to fall down to avoid detection, so she does, which leads The Dark One to take him in for questioning.

So the movie starts. Neo, his robot, the daughter and a few others set out to rescue the scientist.  Along the way, they meet some warrior women that aren’t too big on men.  The only use they have for men, apparently, is breeding.  (Not only can the women breathe air, but there’s no shortage of men who can breathe air.)  As you might expect, they can deal with any man except for Neo, who is able to defeat the leader easily.  She agrees to go with them until she sees an opportunity to kill Neo.

During their epic quest, they come by Killer Man-eating Worm-looking Sock Puppets.  (No one gets past the dreaded Worm Puppets unless the worms are distracted by a robot, which the party has.)  They also have to get through an electrified gate and blow up a door with some C4 that one of them was hiding until it became necessary.  (Script editor: “Oops!  Forgot to write in the C4.”)  The Dark One’s assistant is told to keep them all out.  (Except for the daughter, that is, who may be useful, although I’m not sure why considering that The Dark One will be able to get what he needs from the scientist.)  The assistant’s idea of keeping them off is reassuring The Dark One that the group will never get past the next stage of their journey.

As you might guess, they do manage to make it through with only a few losses.  They find the father turned into a big mango or something.  The Dark One will ultimately absorb all of his knowledge and find out how he’s able to breathe poisoned air.  It also turns out that the assistant is a robot who likes using some Pleasure Machine and has it in for her boss.  She almost does the heroes a favor until one of them accidentally flips a switch.  Fights ensue.  The Dark One is done in.  In the end, the last city of humans is saved.

I’m still left wondering how this movie ever saw the light of day.  You may have seen movies and thought the budget was somewhere around $10, including the actors’ salaries.  I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find that to be the actual case here.  All of the actors looked like they were pulled off the street and asked to do this movie for free.

According to IMDb, many of them haven’t been in anything else, and with good reason.  The acting was really poor.  The acting start out as very stiff and monotone with the exception of Neo’s robot, who moved and talked like he was constantly being electrocuted.  The acting changed a little bit later in the movie.  I’m guessing that the director took them off of cue cards.

As you can see, the plot was very thin.  It was a basic rescue mission with a few really fake threats thrown in.  The worm things were supposed to be man eaters, but were made from old socks or something.  When a sock puppet attacked someone, it bit his neck.  The victim was able to get away easily.  Not very threatening.

The movie was long at 80 minutes.  I found myself asking how it ever got distributed.  On a similar note, you may be asking why I would bother to watch it.  Good question.  This was another one of those free On-Demand disasters that I decided to watch only to get a review out of it.  I also sort of like watching these bad movies.  Maybe one day, I’ll be able to define what makes a movie horrible.  This one gets one star.  (Oh, and yes, there is a Mystery Science 3000 version.)

Coin Dozer review

Note:  This is a review I originally posted on Epinions.

One of the reasons I wanted an iPod Touch rather than a classic model was so that I could get apps.  Sure, I’d get something useful like the ones for the Post Office or Bank of America.  However, most of them would be games.  One of the first games I got was the free version of Coin Dozer.

It’s based on the game you may have seen at a county fair or arcade.  You’re given a set number of coins that you can drop in an area.  Those coins are pushed onto a lower platform that has a lot more coins.  To the left, right and front are pits.  Any coins that go to the left or right are lost.  You get back any that go into the front pit.  If you run out of coins, you get more coins just for waiting.

The coins regenerate faster if you leave the app open, but you can close the app and have the coins regenerate that way.  Either way, you have a limit.  If you are at or above that limit, there’s no regeneration.  If you are below the limit, coins will regenerate up to that limit.  The limit does go up as you play the game.

There are also special coins.  If you get a red coin, a giant coin drops, causing everything to bounce.  Light-blue coins give you coin walls to the left and right.  Dark-blue coins give you a shower of coins.  Silver coins give you a few extra coins in your reserve.  There are also XP coins, which help you advance to the next level.  (Each level gives you one of a rotation of prizes, like a red or blue coin.)

You also have prizes like bears and sunglasses.  Each of these prizes do something if you get a set of four different colors.  Bears make the coins regenerate faster.  Umbrellas give you more coins in the showers.  As you might expect, prizes and special coins that go over the left or right side are generally lost unless you get a set of whistles.  The first set of whistles you get allows you to keep the prizes that fall off the sides.  Subsequent tiers, up to nine, allow for a chance of getting the special coins.  (You start off with a maximum of six tiers, but you can upgrade to nine.)

I should probably also mention there are puzzle pieces that fall down.  I have no idea what these do other than give you something else to work towards.  I’ve completed one and I think I got some points or something.  I don’t remember.

As you might expect, prizes and coins aren’t really worth anything.  It’s not like you can cash out or will get anything special if you get all the toys.  It’s mostly fun as a distraction.  If I need a way to waste a few minutes, I will sometimes open the app and play.  I have to admit that it was more fun when I was below the coin limit.  It got to the point with the free version that I had over 13,000 coins.  I think the regeneration limit was 70 or something.

I had the opportunity to get the pro version for free, which is the same thing minus the ads at the bottom.  It’s not a huge difference, but it at least let me start over. I’m above 800 coins and it doesn’t look like I’ll be losing any.  It surprises me that it’s so easy to accumulate coins since you can buy coins as an in-app purchase.  You’d think there would be some sort of upper limit or something.

I can’t say I regret downloading either.  I used to play a lot when I first downloaded the free version.  Not so much anymore, though.  The only real fun is trying to get special coins in combination, which is frustrating since the coins tend to go sideways.

If you can get it for free, give it a try.  There are occasionally glitches, but the games update often and problems are taken care of almost immediately.  I’ve seen other versions, like Coin Dozer: World Tour and a Halloween version.  The only difference seems to be the types of prizes and the designs of the coins.  I had these, but I got rid of them.  It got to be too much.  Why do I need four versions of the same game?

The Thirteenth Floor (1999)

Note:  This review is reposted from Epinions.

Some questions are hard to answer. What is reality? What is life? Why are we here? When a company creates a virtual reality, people have to start asking these questions. They create a rendition of the 1930s that’s a little off in terms of the colors, but otherwise seems real. There are seemingly real people who sleep in seemingly real beds and eat seemingly real food. A user can connect and take the identities of one of the characters.

Hannon Fuller, the man who created the system, figures out something incredibly disturbing. It’s so disturbing that he has to leave a note for Douglas Hall, one of his employees, in the system. The problem is that Hall is suspected of Fuller’s death. There’s a period of a couple of hours that he can’t remember, which puts doubt in his mind.

So, he goes into the system to find the note. Thing is that the guy he gave it to isn’t telling. He also finds out that Fuller had a daughter and that the daughter is here to shut down the project, as per Fuller’s wishes. Thing is that no one knew that Fuller had a daughter or that he wanted to shut down the project. After all the hard work that they put into it, why shut it down?

There are a lot of implications for a machine like that. There are some positives, like using it for training. Tweak the physics a little and you give police a chance to train in situations without risking death. You could also have virtual vacations if you perfected it. You would also have your own virtual playground, which could be a good or bad thing, depending on the user. (Imagine a virtual-reality Grand Theft Auto or interactive adult films.)

It does bring up the question of ‘being’ someone else. In the movie, the people generally assume the identities of people that look like them. However, you could put someone in the body of someone different. Someone could find out what it’s like to be bound to a wheelchair or what it’s like to be a minority. Those questions aren’t really dealt with in the movie. It's primarily a murder mystery. Did Hall really do it? If not, who did? You even get a twist midway through the movie.

Reality isn’t always what it seems. It’s also not all that it’s cracked up to be. The characters in the program go about their lives not knowing that they’re in a simulation. However, when one finds out, they begin to question what reality is. I have to give the movie credit for taking something that other books and movies have done and exploring it a little more. The movie gets four stars.

IMDb page

Movie tickets through Fandango

Every so often, I was able to watch a movie in theaters and, occasionally, review one while it was still showing on the big screen.  It occurred to me that if I'm to have a link to that movie so that you might see it, I'd have to sign up for some sort of program for that, as Amazon doesn't seem to have anything for that.  (They might.  I never looked.)

I finally got around to signing up for Fandango.  I don't know if I can link to individual movies.  I'm not sure that I'd want to, either.  The movies will eventually move to DVD.  I'll have to go back and replace the link in a few months.

So, I'm going to try this.  Let's see how it works out.

Journey to the Center of Time

Note:  This review is one of my reviews that were originally posted on Epinions.

I think I figured out why I write movie reviews. There are some movies that are classics. People will watch these because of the impact that they’ve had on society or because they’re great movies. Most people will know which ones these are unless they‘ve been living under a rock. I may review these movies if I watch simply to voice my opinion.

There are some movies that are so bad that I have to wonder why they were ever made. Some are bad, but can still be watched if only to laugh at them. (Mystery Science Theater 3000 aired almost 200 episodes based on this premise.) There are a few movies so bad that I feel compelled to warn people not to watch them. They are only a waste of time and money. They’re barely even worth renting on NetFlix. Journey to the Center of Time is one of these movies.

In case you’re wondering, there are two reasons I finished watching the movie. One was that it was one of those bad-accident movies that I couldn’t stop watching. The other was that so that I could write an accurate review. I had to see exactly how bad it was.

For those that have never come across the movie, it’s set in 1968. (The movie was released in 1967, so I have to assume that it’s supposed to be the not-to-distant future.) Scientists are on the verge of being able to see 24 hours into the past. If this works, they will eventually be able to look far into the past or the future. The problem is that, like all interesting projects, they’re in danger of losing their funding. Stanton is the name of the man initially responsible for funding them. He recently died, leaving his money to his son. Stanton, Jr., is making the rounds to decide which projects get the axe.

Stanton wants to see everything. He even goes into the area where the experiments are held. It isn’t long before Stanton and the team of scientists are sent 5,000 years into the future. Once there, they’re greeted by advanced aliens who reminded me of clowns. The time travelers are given a warning that humanity hasn’t changed much. In fact, we’re on the verge of destroying ourselves. The aliens want to send a warning back to 1968 so that humanity might better itself. This, of course, is assuming that the group can get back at all.

They do go back, but too far. They end up going back to 1,000,000 B.C., where they see a dinosaur that looks a lot like a lizard made to look big through forced perspective. For some reason, everyone decides to go out and explore the area, starting with Stanton. From there, it only gets stranger. This is one of those movies that I won’t spoil the ending only because I didn’t understand it at all.

I think this movie was done on a severely limited budget. (If I recall, the time travelers were about 64,000,000 years too late for dinosaurs. They couldn‘t even afford fact checkers?) Not only was the script really bad, but the sets looked like they were set up in an abandoned warehouse. This isn’t even a case of outdated technology. Have you ever seen the Star Trek episode Specter of the Gun? I think this movie may have had the same set designer.

The version that I got from Netflix had no real extras to speak of. There was a trivia game that relied on knowledge of other movies. That was the only thing I bothered to look at other than the movie. Do not buy this movie for yourself or as a gift. If you must, rent it, but I think you’ll find it to still be a waste of 82 minutes. I never watched Mystery Science Theater 3000 that much while it was on. I have to wonder if they ever came across this movie. It would have been perfect for them. I mean, leave it to scientists desperate for money to go 5,000 years into the future and not look up lottery results.

Alien Uprising (U.F.O.) review

WARNING:  I’m going to give away major details.  This is necessary to pick apart the movie.  If you want to watch the movie, which I advise against, I’ll understand if you want to bookmark this page and come back later.


I’ve been reposting a lot of reviews from Epinions, mostly because there are a lot of old reviews that I’d like to get on here.  For example, I have a list of the ten movies I consider to be the worst.  I’d like to repost those ten movies before putting up the top-ten list.  I have gotten around to finishing a few reviews of movies I saw before Epinions closed, but I haven’t been watching a lot of new movies over the past few months.  I finally decided to get back to watching movies and I may have found a new addition to my list of ten worst movies.

The story starts with several friends at a party.  Michael is a lieutenant in the SAS.  He manages to hook up with a hot woman named Carrie.  Robin, his friend, asks Dana to marry him after a three-year courtship, only to start an argument with her.  Vincient, their other friend, drinks a lot, fails at picking up women and finishes his night by puking.  In the morning, they find that anything plugged in doesn’t work; the powers out.  Their cell phones still have a charge, but no reception.  Cars still work, but gas may prove to be limited.

One night, an alien ship appears in the sky.  It doesn’t do anything aggressive, but people freak out.  It’s the sort of looting, robbery and mayhem you’d expect.  It’s decided that Michael and Carrie will go to get bullets for his gun, leaving the others to fend for themselves.  That doesn’t go so well.  Michael and Carrie have to rescue a girl from an accident that they caused.  Also, finding fuel is next to impossible, as the army took all of it.  Then, there’s some vagrant that harasses the others about some bible verse, 24:36.  As if that wasn’t weird enough, the clocks go out at 12:36.

Michael and Carrie get back with the girl just in time to see Dana rescued by some military personnel.  (Some sort of drone was about to do her in.)  Everyone’s about to hightail it out of there when the vagrant shows up again, saying that they’re all in league with the devil.  They have to shoot the vagrant, who accidentally kills Robin.

The rest of the people go off to find a military buddy of Michaels named George.  George is played by Jean-Claude Van Damme.  George’s main contribution to the movie, other than being played by an actor I recognize, is to give the group information.  He has some sort of radio that picks up alien transmission.  He demonstrates by turning it on.  He reveals that he’s had an affiliation with Area 51-type stuff and that the radios are alien technology.

Here’s where I ruin the ending for you.  George and the military people all get killed.  Carrie kills Michael, then gets picked up by the aliens.  Vincent tries to rape Dana in front of the girl right before the power comes back on only to reveal Carrie (or a Carrie look alike) delivering a report that it‘s now safe for humans to come out.  The movie ends with several aliens killing Dana, Vincent and the girl.

I’m not sure how I came across Alien Uprising.  Having Netflix, I have access to lots of streaming movies.  This may have been one that I saved intending to get a quick review for a contest.  Maybe it was recommended to me after watching a Van Damme movie.  Boy, am I sorry I ever found out about this.

It looks like this was the entire run of a television series that was condensed to 101 minutes by removing anything that made any sense.  We are told that there are aliens that look like humans to infiltrate our cities for study.  When the UFO comes in, no aggressive action is taken.  Are they here to study us?  Will they conquer us?  What’s the point?

It’s not clear who strikes the first blow, but I think we’re to assume that a second set of aliens comes to our rescue.  Or is it that a second group attacks us and the first one defends us?  Either way, it’s not clear.  We just see alien ships fighting one another.  George indicates that we’ve known about the aliens for a while, so it’s possible that humans built the ships.

What is the point, though?   With alien-invasion movies, isn’t there supposed to be some sort of message?  Why are they here?  Why do we deserve this?  Is humanity worth saving?  The characters have no redeeming qualities.  Other than the girl, I’m just as happy to see the main characters killed.  They range from flaky to dangerous.  Vincent can’t quite build up the courage to ask Dana out, but ends up attempting to rape her?  Oh, and yes, Carrie is an alien.  At first, she seems to be repulsed by the idea of killing someone.  She’s adamant about saving the girl, but has no problem blowing Michael’s head off.

I was able to watch this through Netflix streaming.  This would be the only case I would recommend watching it, other than if you love bad movies.  (Honestly, I’m surprised that this isn’t on badmovies.org.)  One last thing I’m not clear on :  Why is it called Alien Uprising?  It was released in the UK as U.F.O., which at least makes some sense.  However, an uprising would seem to imply an oppressed group fighting back.  I suppose that it might mean an uprising against the aliens, but humans don’t seem to do much except get killed.  Maybe when my head stops hurting, I’ll figure it out.

Doctor Who - The Beginning Collection

Many, many years ago, as a child, I would watch Doctor Who on PBS. Eventually, I stopped watching. However, I recently got back into it with the new series. I wanted to see more of how the show started, so I decided to buy and/or rent as much of the older series as possible.

Not many episodes survive, as no one had yet imagined VCRs, reruns and season sets back in 1963. Fortunately, I was able to get the first three story arcs on DVD from Amazon.com. I’m going to stick mostly with the actual episodes and story line, as the features seem to vary a little.

For those that don’t know, the show’s main character is The Doctor, played here by William Hartnell. The Doctor is a Time Lord, which is a race from a planet called Gallifrey. Many of them travel time and space in a device called a TARDIS, which stands for Time And Relative Dimensions in Space.

When the Sci-Fi channel started airing the BBC’s new series in the United States, I looked around and found Doctor Who: In The Beginning on Amazon.com. It contains the first three story arcs and was selling for only $24.95. How could I resist?

The first four episodes make up An Unearthly Child. (Each episode is about 25 minutes in length.) In it, we meet Susan, The Doctor, Ian and Barbara. Ian and Barbara are teachers who notice that Susan isn’t your typical student. She doesn’t know things that a typical British teenager would know and seems to make unusual mistakes about other things.

One night, they follow her to an old junkyard and see her enter a police call box. It seems that there’s another voice coming from the big blue box. They’re taken inside by Carol’s grandfather, The Doctor. They’re told that they can’t be released back into normal society because they’ve found out about the Doctor and Carol, who are both not what they seem. From there, they go back in time to meet cavemen and get caught up in a power struggle.

The Daleks is the second story, lasting seven episodes. The Doctor travels to Skaro, where he meets the aforementioned Daleks. (Imagine a big salt shaker with a plunger for an arm.) The planet has been laid waste to by a nuclear holocaust. There are some humanoid survivors, who have managed to find a treatment that the Daleks want. The Daleks have only one thing on their mind, and that’s their own survival whatever the cost.

The final two episodes on the set are The Edge of Destruction. It’s essentially a bottle episode, meant to save money The four main characters are trapped on the TARDIS and are suffering from amnesia. Since it’s meant to save money, there’s not much of a story line to it. It does, however, seem to reveal a lot about the characters and the TARDIS.

Of the three stories, the second I would think is the strongest. As I’ve said with other TV series, the first few episodes usually serve the purpose of setting up the series and/or the characters. The first and third story arcs do this. While the second story arc will have the most impact on the rest of the series, I don’t think it was meant to. It’s the first real story line.

One thing the writers did stay away from is revealing everything about The Doctor at once. The information is given out a little bit at a time. Here, we learn that he and his granddaughter come from a far distant future and that they’re renegades in exile. (What they’ve been exiled for isn’t mentioned here.)

In fact, The Doctor’s name is never mentioned. Susan’s name seems to be taken from the junk yard where the TARDIS first appeared, so it’s probable that that’s not even her real name. We also learn that the TARDIS can be bigger on the inside than the outside due to its ability to change shape. (Due to budget constraints, the circuit that does this had to malfunction. They just couldn‘t afford to build a new TARDIS every month or two.)

I’d like to watch every episode in order, but that’s not possible. Doctor Who was first made way before anyone had any concept of DVD boxed sets and reruns. Many of them were wiped from the main archives. Some survive as novels or audio recordings. I even had to download the fourth story, Marco Polo, from iTunes because it doesn’t seem to be available on any sort of video format.

The original series ran for 26 years. It was cancelled in December of 1989, but a new series was promised when the time was right. For those that have seen just the new series, you’re going to be in for a surprise. These episodes are in black and white and are serialized.

The version I got didn’t have a whole lot in the way of extras. It had the Marco Polo serial in a condensed audio version, but I would rather have the whole thing from iTunes. There is a longer cut of the pilot episode and an Arabic translation of one of the episodes, but I didn’t really watch either. Maybe I’ll go back one day and have a look.
 
I’d definitely recommend this to any Doctor Who fan. The video and audio have survived well despite being about 45 years old. It’s worth it at least for the historical value. (My mother pointed out how little the theme had changed.)

Grand Theft Auto = Daft Rate Nought

Note:  This is a review I posted on Epinions on 8/2/2005. A few appropriate modifications have been made.



The first Grand Theft Auto game I played was GTA 3, and I have to say that I was hooked. I went and got Vice City, which was even better. Shortly before the PC release of San Andreas, I went and got this package of the three original GTA games: GTA, GTA: London and GTA 2. I knew that the original GTA was a low-budget game, but I was overwhelmed with nostalgia. I had to have this game.

The game is even lower budget than I remember. (Actually, I realized that I was remembering GTA 2.) It’s a very simple game. You go over to a bank of four payphones to get set of missions. As you complete each mission, you get money. If you complete a set of missions, you get a multiplier bonus, so when you kill someone or steal a car, the score that you’d normally get is multiplied. (Rewards for missions aren’t affected.) When you complete all four of those missions, new banks of payphones open up. As I mentioned, you can also get money by doing things like killing and stealing and wreaking havoc. Once you get $1,000,000, you get to move on to the next city.

I never got to see one of those other cities. The problem is that the game isn’t that interesting. The main problem is that you can’t save. I don’t know why the game was designed like this, but it was. Other reviewers on Epinions have complained that the game is repetitive after a while. It gets really repetitive when you have to play the same four missions over and over again. It gets really frustrating when you get up to 890,000 points and die for the last time. (You get four lives, but you can get extra lives throughout the city.)

You can get arrested as many times as you want. As you kill and steal, you’ll get a wanted level. The higher your wanted level, the more aggressive the police get. The only way to get the police off your tail is with an auto shop, and those are difficult to find. (It’s either that or getting killed.) If you are arrested, you lose any guns you’ve picked up and your multiplier is cut in half, rounding down.

It also took me a while to figure out how to get guns and stuff. When I first played, all I knew was that I was getting these guns. I eventually figured out that they were in these crates. Also in the crates were get-out-of-jail-free cards, extra lives and kill frenzies. (With a kill frenzy, you’ve given a certain amount of time to kill a certain number of people or destroy a certain number of vehicles.)

I can’t recommend buying this game unless you’re a die-hard GTA fan. The graphics are extremely bad by today’s standards. The view is from above; if you pass under something, all you get is an arrow indicating which direction you’re going in. Also, the only thing to really do is go around doing the missions. Yeah, I know that I said that you could do the kill frenzies and stuff, but that’s not going to get you to the next city. The game gets very boring after a while.

I give it three stars. It was a great distraction when I first got it, but I’ve already moved on. I had hoped to be able to play GTA: London, but it’s actually an expansion for this game. I’m not even going to bother with it. I’ve already started with Grand Theft Auto 2.

Night Train = It Rang Thin

Every so often, I go through Netflix looking for movies to watch and eventually review.  I tend to add a lot that are available streaming, including this one.  However, I didn’t get to it in time; the movie was no longer available streaming, so I had to rent it.  It looked interesting, but all I really knew about it was that it was about three strangers on a train.

The description doesn’t quite do it justice.  Danny Glover plays a conductor named Miles.  There aren’t many passengers on the train.  (As the title would indicate, the train is traveling at night.)  Two passengers of interest are Chloe, played by Leelee Sobieski, and Pete, played by Steve Zahn.  They’re joined by a mysterious man who boards the train at the last moment.  He’s carrying a package, which he guards closely.  It doesn't take long for Mystery Man to die from a combination of vodka and sleeping pills.

At first, Miles wants to leave everything to the authorities.  After finding a small box containing something valuable, Miles reconsiders.  From there, things only get worse.  Being strangers, each person is quick to be suspicious of the other two.  They also have to do something with the body, preferably without drawing attention.  Eventually, someone comes looking for the passenger and his package.  Miles tries to get rid of all sorts of unwanted attention, including the train’s three other passengers and the police.

When I saw the page on Netflix, I wasn’t sure what to expect.  I liked to concept of a fairly contained story, which it was.  (Most of it takes place on the train.)  There is a paranormal aspect, though.  Each person sees something valuable in the box, but each person could see something different.  One person might see emeralds.  Another might see diamonds or rubies.  The box has the power to corrupt people who look inside.

It reminded me of The Brass Teapot in that both movies had a supernatural object that used greed to control people.  However, The Brass Teapot handled it better.  It did a better job of showing a slow descent into madness.  With Night Train, we just had three people that got greedy in a hurry.  I’m not saying that I wouldn’t be any better, but we don’t really find out much about the characters other than why each wants the money.  (Miles has a sick wife, Chloe is pre-med and Pete has a job he doesn’t care much for.)

Part of the problem was that the movie wasn’t well-written.  I didn’t see any real reason to empathize with any of the characters.  Miles seems at least smart about it.  He takes it upon himself to hide the box.  Chloe becomes very methodical very quickly.  Add to that the low production values. (The movie was released straight to video.)  The CGI for the train was fairly obvious.  (It seemed to me that the train was moving to quickly in the exterior shots.)

I’m kind of wondering what Danny Glover was thinking, taking the role.  I’m not saying the movie was beneath him, but it doesn’t seem like something he’d do.  Glover is a big name.  I can see him wanting to support an independent film.  That I would at least understand.  However, this wasn’t a great film.  Even at 90 minutes, it seemed to stretch at times.

My one regret here is not having watched it streaming.  I don’t think it was worth getting it on DVD.  I’m not saying that it’s not worth watching.  It’s just not going to be for everyone.  I asked my parents if they wanted to watch it before I returned it.  I don’t think they got past the first fifteen minutes.

The Brass Teapot = Heartbeats Stop (The Brass Teapot movie review)

Note:  This is a review I originally posted  on Epinions.

  

Most people only see money as an issue if they don’t have enough.  John and Alice can only make the rent if their landlord, Arnie, waits to deposit the check.  They have one car, which Alice uses to go on an interview.  John takes a bike to a job trying to get people to extend their warranties.  He’s not very good at it and subsequently gets fired.

Enter the brass teapot that the title speaks of.  Alice sees an old woman take it into an antique shop shortly after she and John get into an accident.  She has no problem stealing it.  It isn’t until an accident with a curling iron that she realizes what the pot can do.  Each time the user feels pain, money appears in the teapot.  More pain yields more cash.  After getting fired, John comes home to find his house wrecked.  He’s worried for Alice, but she claims to have fallen down stairs that they don’t have.  She lets him in on the secret.  So begins the story.

John wants to return the teapot, but finds the antique shop closed and the property for rent.  Not having many other options, he at least takes it on Antiques Roadshow to get an opinion on what it is.  (The expert looking at it has never seen anything like it before.)  His appearance on TV catches the attention of two orthodox Jews who happen to be the grandchildren of the woman from whom Alice took the teapot.  They don’t want the teapot, per se.  They are, however, more than happy to take the money.  Still having the teapot, John and Alice can still hurt themselves and each other for more money.

The couple is later visited by Dr. Ling, who also saw John on Antiques Roadshow.  His family has been following the teapot for generations.  He informs John and Alice that the teapot was meant to be given.  Having stolen the teapot, the teapot will bring out the worst in them.  Their only hope is to give the teapot to him so that he might hide it where no one can find it.

The movie is very well done.  This is one of the reasons I’m happy I have access to Netflix streaming.  Alice and John feel that they are good people.  They believe that they can quit any time they want.  Dr. Ling confirms that they are, in essence, good people.  However, having stolen the teapot makes it nearly impossible for them to stop.  Many people compare the movie to The Twilight Zone, but I’d say it’s more like Warehouse 13 in that it deals with an item that brings trouble and should probably be locked away.

It starts with Alice burning herself, albeit mildly and accidentally.  He gets dental work “the old-fashioned way.”  She gets a full Brazilian wax.  They both get tattoos.  From there, it escalates to insulting each other and revealing secrets to inflict emotional damage.  Pretty soon, she’s kicking John where it hurts.  Physical pain no longer brings the reward it once did.  Alice again can up the game when she realizes that a skater’s pain brings in money.  She can visit a woman in labor to get lots of money.

Most people ask what they would do with a million dollars.  This movie explores what a couple would do to get a million.  Alice begins a somewhat rapid descent to becoming a sociopath.  It’s easy to sit there and think that you’d quit, but I think we all know that you’d probably be no better than Alice.  At least she had John as the voice of reason.

A Gathering of Heroes: Reflections on Rage and Responsibility (book review)

Note:  This is a review that was originally posted by me on Epinions.  I'm reposting it here.



If you knew that there were people trapped in a burning building, would you go in to help people out?  Most people would stand back and let the professionals handle it, which is totally understandable.  Those without training would probably only get in the way.  Gregory Alan-Williams was on his way home from the gym one day.  He had heard the verdict for the four white police officers accused of beating Rodney King.  He knew that there would be rioting.  Instead of playing it safe by going home, Alan-Williams instead went into a dangerous area and actually helped save someone.

The book is Alan-Williams’s retelling of what happened.  He recounts growing up and facing people that would hurt him simply because of the color of his skin.  There was also a teacher that held him responsible for stealing money because of a joke. He writes about going through boot camp to become a Marine and actually beating up another recruit because he wouldn’t fall in line.

The person he saved was Takao Hirata, a man of Japanese descent who happened to be driving through the area.  A mob descended on his car and beat him pretty badly.  Despite this, a police car stopped twice but the police officers didn’t help either time.  Alan-Williams was able to manage to get Hirata into someone’s car and trusted the stranger to take Hirata to a local hospital.  If you want to see how badly Hirata was injured, there are pictures between Chapters 5 and 6.  (They’re not great, but they do help illustrate what Alan-Williams had to go through.)

I found this book at the North Miami Public Library.  I was looking for some books to read and was looking for something short.  At 205 pages, this fit the bill.  It’s definitely an interesting read.  I was in high school when the verdict was rendered on the four police officers.  To be honest, I don’t have a very clear memory of where I was that day.  I don’t think I went to school.  Either the schools were closed that or my parents had the good sense to keep me home just in case.

One of the questions Alan-Williams asks is why, when a white person threatened a black person, there was an uproar, but when black people attack black people, no one gets upset.  I have never understood the need to riot when things go badly.  You’re compounding one injustice with another.  The book doesn’t really go into that.  (Alan-Williams had a bit or backlash for bringing it up on Phil Donahue’s show.)

It’s hard to believe that the L.A. Riots happened nearly 20 years ago.  (The events described in most of the book happened April 28, 1992, although the book wasn’t written until 1994.)  While I don’t know that I’d be able to do what he did, I’m happy to know that there are people out there that would.  If your library has a copy of this, I’d definitely recommend checking it out.

If at first you don't succeed… [Timecrimes (2009) review]

Note:  This review was originally posted on Epinions.  I'm reposting it here, not really knowing what will become of the original.

I had heard that Netflix plans to rotate its selection of streaming movies, prompting me to go through the list of movies in my queue.  I had been meaning to watch Timecrimes for a while.  I knew it was about time travel, which I don‘t always like.  They tend to either be predestination movies, where nothing can be changed, or more fluid, where things can get screwy.  Thus, I kept putting it off.  It wasn’t until I saw “streaming available until…” that I was prompted to watch it.

The movie follows Héctor, a man who has moved into a new house with his wife, Clara.  They’re still getting everything set up.  While taking a break, Héctor is looking around the surrounding area with binoculars when he sees someone.  They’re not on his property, but it is unusual.  (It’s a forest, so he’s probably expecting wildlife.)  Upon closer inspection, he finds a woman undressing.  This makes him very curious, so while Clara is out picking something up, he goes over to investigate.

This is where things get unusual.  He finds the mystery woman lying naked on the ground.  He wants to help, but gets stabbed in the arm.  Some strange guy wearing bandages on his head is following Héctor.  He makes his way to a compound that appears deserted at first.  Fortunately, a scientist is there that is able to help Héctor hide from the strange man.  Héctor enters a large vat at night and comes out a few moments later to see daylight.  He realizes that he’s gone back in time a few hours.  He’d like to go home, but the scientist him advises against possibly interfering in his own life.

When events do unfold, certain things start to make sense.  (Héctor had gotten a phone call when no one should have known their number.)  More questions pop up, though.  What’s he supposed to do if he can’t go home?  Well, he comes across the woman that he saw undressing.  He might be able to help her, except that he gets run off the road, leading him to wrap his head in a bandage he had been using for his arm.

What’s interesting is that you have four main characters:  Héctor, Clara, the scientist and the woman in the forest.  That’s it.  There are also just a few locations to keep track of.  This makes it relatively easy to follow.  This is not a movie to watch when you’re tired or in the mood for something easy to understand.  It’s not that it’s difficult.  It’s more that you have to pay attention.  The story is consistent, meaning that I didn’t notice any mistakes.

Being that it’s a foreign film, I didn’t recognize any of the actors.  (On that note, Netflix streaming only has subtitles as an option, so I can’t speak as to dub.)  It’s not too heavy on suspense or on the sci-fi angle.  You have a man that gets caught up in a time-travel experiment gone horribly wrong.  From what I can tell, a remake is being made.  It would be interesting to see how that plays out.  (As with most remakes, I’m not holding my breath.)

Ten Digit Keypad = Add Tiny Geek Pit (Targus PAUK10U A0126554 Wired Keyboard review)

Note:  This is a review that I'm reposting from Epinions.  It has been modified slightly.


When I got a netbook, I soon realized that I’d need a ten-digit keypad.  I wanted something small and inexpensive.  I went to OfficeMax and found Targus USB Ultra Mini Keyboard Keypad for about $25.  It was small and under $30.  I also didn’t need to buy anything else, as it came with the cord to attach to the netbook.  There was no software to install, either.  I had a winner.

All I was looking for was something that had the ten-digit keypad.  I’m used to entering long strings of numbers using the ten-digit keypad and have become pretty good at it to the point where I find it difficult to enter numbers using the row of numbers at the top of the keyboard.  It was worth the $25 to buy the keypad just for that alone.

The keypad has been plug and play.  I didn’t have to download anything nor did I have to install stuff from a CD, which is important; my netbook doesn’t have an optical drive.  The one downside is that it does take a few seconds for the keypad to warm up.  There’s a green indicator light that lets you know when it’s good to go.  Actually, it's the number-lock key, but if you keep it on, it does serve this function well.  There have been a few times where I plugged the mouse in through the keyboard and couldn’t use the mouse until the keypad was ready.  At first, I thought the mouse had broken.  It took me a few seconds to realize what had happened.

Most laptops and netbooks come with several USB ports.  If you only have one on yours or you use all of them, the keypad has two USB ports.  I believe that they are USB 1.1, but I haven’t had a problem with them.  I’ve attached a USB mouse through the keypad and have been able to use both of them normally.  I’ve also been able to attach the mouse through a neighboring USB port on the netbook.

One big advantage is that, despite the name, the keys are big.  This makes things very easy, considering that I’m coming from a netbook with very small keys.   This is good both for people with big fingers or for those with not-so-good eyesight.

The only thing that I really question is a 000 key.  Presumably, this is meant for people that are dealing with whole powers of 1,000.  I find it ironic that I only need that key when I’m not using my netbook.  I’m a member of a site called Where’s George that tracks currency by entering the series and serial number.  Very rarely do I come across a serial number with 3 zeroes in it.  It almost always happens when I’m entering bills at home rather than when I’m away somewhere using the keypad.

The keypad has proven to be worth the $25.  One thing I’ve come to find about things designed to be small is that they’re often designed so small that they’re impossible to use.  This keypad has been the only exception so far.  It’s small and durable enough that I can carry it around with me in a backpack, but is still big enough that I can hit the key I want on the first try and not have problems with it.  I’d recommend this to anyone who has a netbook or laptop that doesn’t have a built-in 10-digit keypad.

Winterbeast = Re: Bane Twits

Note:  This is a review that was originally posted on Epinions.  With the closing of the site, at least to new content, I've begun to move my old reviews here.  This is one of them.

It’s hard to say what makes one movie a cult classic while another fades off into the sunset.  Some, like Plan 9 From Outer Space, were so bad that they became famous for being bad.  Then, there are those, like Winterbeast, that I hadn’t heard of until I saw it mentioned on badmovies.org.  So, I headed over to Netflix to see just how bad it was.

The movie starts with some sort of bad horror sequence.  After this odd sequence, Ranger Bill Whitman goes in to work at the ranger station.  One of the other rangers, Stillman, is already there taking a report about a ranger who is “gone” as in dead.  Whitman and Stillman figure that the missing ranger stayed out overnight putting up trail markers or something.  All of this is distracting them from sitting around looking at girlie magazines.  Stillman even has a deck of playing cards with pictures of naked women. 

Speaking of naked women, we cut to a woman is getting undressed in the local inn when a really tall monster attacks her.  The monster is tall enough that it can forcibly take her from a second-story room and kill her by beating her against the wall.  I know that it’s a horrible, random way to go, which is to say nothing of the stop-motion animation.

Several more people are killed in horrible, random manners leaving the rangers to wonder if something’s really going on.  Bill wants to put up signs warning people that there may be dangerous things going on around the trails, but Sheldon won’t have any of it.  You see, Sheldon owns the local inn that I was talking about.  Telling people that there’s something dangerous in the area could be bad for business.  (Apparently, it’s better to let a few customers be attacked and killed.)

It turns out that Sheldon has a connection to what’s going on.  A ranger finds the grave of one of Sheldon’s ancestors, but is killed before she can tell anyone.  Whitman and Stillman find him at the inn dancing to an old recording of "Oh, Dear! What Can the Matter Be?"  It’s official:  This guy is totally out of his gourd.  It doesn’t matter, though. We’re not going to have to worry about Sheldon much longer.

From here on out, the movie gets weirder, more disjointed and has a few more deaths.  I mean, I can’t even begin to explain how it unfolds.  It just happens.  The movie ends with the main demon/beast being dispatched.  At least, we hope so.

The tag line for the movie was, “It Must Be Seen To Be Believed.”  This pretty much describes it.  According to the Internet Movie Database, filming was started in 1976.  The project was abandoned, only to be resumed in 1989.  (Two scenes survived from the original filming.)  This may be the primary reason why the movie looks so bad.  It’s not that it’s disjointed.  It’s more like one of those story projects where several people each write a chapter and pass it on to the next person, except that each person only had a vague idea of what the other people were doing.

For instance, the first scene at the ranger station had Whitman and Stillman talking, but it looked like the lines were written after the scene was filmed.  There are cases where the voice doesn’t match the lip movement if there’s any lip movement at all.   The film quality also varied.  Usually, it wasn’t that bad, but there were some scenes where it looked like the film wasn’t developed properly.

There’s a reason that the movie is listed on a site for bad movies.  I could understand if you were going for a cheesy look, but this movie just sucks.  Even if you were going for a really crappy movie, you could have done better.  The acting is wooden and the script isn’t very well developed.  It’s like the story is used to string together some bad stop-motion animation.  I wouldn’t be surprised if, when the writers realized that they ran out of story, they resorted to drugs.  (Note to legal department:  I’m not actually alleging the use of illicit drugs.  I’m just saying that the possibility exists.)

This movie is not suitable for children.  The DVD that I got from Netflix started with one of the characters saying, “Holy s__t!”  Then, you have these monsters that could give small children nightmares.  Add to that the violence and a story that even an adult has trouble understanding and you have something that children should not be exposed to.

In fact, I’d almost recommend that most adults stay away from it, as well.  The one scene that I really liked was the one of the inn proprietor dancing.  It was bizarre, but was at least entertaining.  I think that it makes the rest of the movie worth sitting through.  If you can find a clip of just this scene, I wouldn’t bother renting the rest of the movie, though. 

Future War (1997)…The Best of the Worst (Movie review)

Note:  This is another review posted from my Epinions reviews.   I am making a few modifications since it was written so long ago.


I actually bought Future War many years ago at the mall. It was $3.  I figured that it was about the same price as renting. I should warn you that this movie was overpriced.

It starts with three people walking through these narrow corridors looking for something, presumably to kill it. They find it, but one of the three people trips and gets eaten. This marks the start of the opening credits, which alternate between names on a black background and scenes inside this empty ship. You get the impression that someone’s on it, but you can’t actually see anyone. Finally, Runaway, played by Daniel Bernhardt, washes up on shore. He’s a runaway slave (hence the name) running, and running from something bad. If you want to know how bad, remember that the writers didn’t bother to come up with a better name than Runaway.

Killer cyborgs and their dinosaur trackers are after him. The cyborgs look like the original concept was a vampire and the makeup department couldn’t even get that right. The dinosaurs also look like it was a real dollar-store effort. I’m not trying to demean dollar stores, but you’d think that a movie could do a little better than cheap puppets. That’s not even mentioning the point-of-view shots. For the cyborgs, we see a shot with the colors distorted and some lines framing the image. Dinosaurs only get a strong red tint.

For the first 15 minutes of the movie, there’s no real dialogue, unless you count the screams of innocent bystanders as dialogue. Apparently, the dinosaurs aren’t too smart and the cyborgs don’t talk much, so the dinosaurs will kill anything in their path until they eventually kill their intended target. This includes a guy on the beach and some homeless guy. Runaway manages to kill a dinosaur before he runs into a warehouse to hide from the cyborg. When we finally do get to see the cyborg (it had been point-of-view shots for a while) we get to see the epitome of bad acting. Think of all of the zombies, androids, and other things that walk stiffly. How it had managed to keep up is beyond me.

The set design for the warehouse looked like it was done at the last minute and/or with a microbudget. There were lots of empty cardboard boxes filled with thing that, when they fall, make a cheap, broken-glass kind of sound. We even get to see Runaway pull out some martial arts on the cyborg. There was one scene that made me think of Jean-Claude Van Damme channeling Bruce Lee. He dispatches it quickly and moves on.

He eventually hooks up with a sister who’s on the verge of losing her faith and has friends played by actors reading off of cue cards. They can’t figure out why Runaway can’t speak English. (He does pick it up eventually.) The movie takes off from there as they mobilize to take on the threat from another killer cyborg and dinosaur, both of which take a lot longer to kill than their predecessors. As is typical with a b movie, the good guys win and the bad guys stand only enough of a chance to get some good fight scenes into the movie.

The entire movie wreaks of a low budget and is even confusing at times. As I mentioned, the acting is sub par. The set for the church looks like the movie rented out someone’s bedroom. Also, notice that when the reporter from Channel 2 is doing his report, it looks like the microphone has only a piece of paper with ׀” written on it. It’s pathetic to think that someone doing a movie couldn’t bust out to have a fake microphone made up.

Now, there are a few things that I can’t figure out. We know that there’s a ship in the area of Earth; I’m assuming that this is the one that Runaway escaped from. However, did he steal the ship? Was it just some ship that he was being transported on? Was it the cyborgs’ ship sent to retrieve him?

About the cyborgs, it says that they were sent from the future to retrieve Runaway, but there’s no mention of time travel other than the text right after the opening credits. Also, are cyborgs the masters who enslaved Runaway or are they simply sent out as automatons? We know that the humans and dinosaurs are actually from Earth. They even have Christianity as their religion. It’s odd that Runaway could quote the Bible, even though it took him a while to figure out spoken English.

This movie is what other bad movies aspire to be.  At least it's good for a few laughs.

Alien Nation (1988)

Note:  This is another repost from Epinions.  This is why the first paragraph may seem a little dated.



Illegal immigration is a hot-button issue today.  Arizona passed a law making it legal for police to ask people for their papers.  (There’s talk of a similar law in Florida.)  There are several walls at the U.S.-Mexican border.  Immigration is on the minds of a lot of people.  There are lots of opinions and ideas on the topic.

How would you stop aliens from outer space?  Yes, the E.T., funny-looking, nanu-nanu, pointy-ear, little green kind.  In Alien Nation, Southern California had to deal with just that.  The movie was released in 1988, but set in in the 1990s.  An alien race called the Newcomers have landed on Earth and have no way to get back home.  Most were bred for slave labor and meant to survive in almost any environment.

Now, they have to assimilate to life on Earth.  They work, go to school, raise families and do everything that humans do.  They just look very different from us.  They have larger heads, no hair and spots all over their heads.  They’re also much stronger and smarter than humans.

The movie starts with two detectives, Bill Tuggle (Roger Aaron Brown) and Matt Sykes (James Caan), responding to a robbery of a convenience store.   Two Newcomers shoot and kill the guy running the store, then turn on the detectives and kill Tuggle before they get away.  Sykes didn’t like Newcomers to begin with.  Now he really hates them and wants revenge.  Sykes has been told not to investigate Tuggle’s death, but has no plans on not looking into it.

When Newcomer police officer Samuel Francisco (Mandy Patinkin) is promoted to detective, Sykes volunteers to be his partner.  Sykes makes it clear that the only reason that he’s doing this is because he needs a connection to the Newcommer community.  Francisco will be able to talk to people that Sykes can’t.  Francisco will know things that Sykes doesn’t.  Their partnership isn’t any sort of act of goodwill.  He also tells his new partner that he’ll be calling him George since he can’t very well go around calling him Sam Francisco.

The two are an odd couple.  Sykes tends to be more street smart, willing to cut corners when necessary.  Francisco is more by the books, but not very knowledgeable about humans or the new society he’s in.  Together, they find out that there’s a lot more to Tuggle’s death than just the robbery.  A group of Newcomers are making a drug that was used on the ship to keep the slaves in line.  It’s very potent and very dangerous.  It could undermine everything that Newcomers have done on Earth.

The movie has a split personality about it.  On the one hand, it’s a movie about two good police officers trying to take down the bad guys.  On the other hand, it’s a movie about culture clash.  Sykes is a racist and Francisco is the target of his prejudice.  The two of them have a lot to learn about the other.

Much of the movie deals with Sykes coming to terms with Newcomers and with Francisco learning about humans.  In one scene, Sykes has to explain to Francisco what a condom is.  (Francisco is amazed that it actually does what Sykes claims.)  Also, many of the Newcomers have weird names, which is something Sykes asks Francisco about.  (One of the other main characters is called Rudyard Kipling.)  Francisco points out that in his language, Sykes translates roughly as “excrement cranium.”

It ended up being a very good movie.  Yes, I am a bit biased towards science-fiction movies, but it was well paced.  It’s also interesting to think how our society would react to a shipload of aliens landing on Earth with no way off the planet.  Even though the difference is obvious, deporting them really isn’t an option.  (This really isn’t addressed in the movie.)

It’s not really the kind of movie I’d buy, but I do watch it when it comes on TV.  Even if you’re not a fan of sci-fi movies, it’s still possible to watch this movie.  While it does deal with societal issues, it doesn’t really beat you over the head with the aliens being from another world.  At worst, you get to see them drink sour milk, which is like beer to them.


IMDb page

I have a soul…I just don't have it with me (Cold Souls review)

Note:  This is a review that's reposted from Epinions.



Very few works of fiction try to tackle what a soul is.  What is it about or minds and consciousness that makes us self-aware?  What does a soul do, exactly?  What would happen if we could have our soul extracted and put into storage?

In Cold Souls, Paul Giamatti plays Paul Giamatti.  (A brilliant stroke of casting, I think.)  Giamatti (the character) is preparing for his role in Chekov’s Uncle Vanya, but just can’t seem to get it right.  Someone tells him about a service that will remove his soul and put it into storage.  When he reads about it in the New Yorker, he seriously considers it.

This may all sound sinister, but in this movie, it’s really not.  When Giamatti goes in to speak to a doctor, he’s told that it will remove the burden of his emotions, allowing him to go through life much more easily and clearly.  After a little convincing, Giamatti has the procedure done.

At first, it’s not so bad.  There’s no guilt or fear, but his work and social life do suffer.  When he and his wife are out with some of her friends, one of the friends is talking about caring for a terminally ill patient.  Giamatti casually suggests that she just pull the plug.  When talking about it in the car later, Giamatti has absolutely no idea what he did wrong.  As for the play, he starts overcompensating.  He’s going in a totally wrong direction.  Giamatti soon realizes that he needs his soul back.

Back at the facility, the doctor convinces Giamatti to take the soul of a Russian poet instead.  He gets through the play fine, but realizes that the only soul that will do is his own.  He goes back and insists on getting his own soul back, but it’s too late.  His soul has been stolen by Nina, a woman working for a Russian dealing in black-market souls.  His wife wanted the soul of an American actor and Giamatti’s was the only one available.  After finding out what Nina did, Giamatti sets off with her to get his soul back.

You’ll notice that Russians factor into the movie quite a bit.  Not having actually read Chekov or any other Russian literature, it’s hard to tell how much this influences the movie, but the movie can be somewhat heavy at times.  Giamatti is conflicted about having his soul removed.  A soul is a pretty big thing to have taken out.  Yes, he can have it reversed, but is it really necessary?  He’s a very tormented character.

There are also a lot of aspects of the movie that are depressing.  For instance, Nina is little more than a mule.  Transporting as many souls as she has, she’s left with residue that means that she may not be able to get her own soul back.  There is also a scene with Giamatti waiting in a Russian hotel.  It seems he has little to do beyond walking around the hotel property waiting for Nina to get back.

There are some humorous points.  For instance, each soul looks different.  Giamatti’s looks like a chickpea.  Another looks like a jellybean.  It’s not known why each looks different, but it does bother Giamatti that his is so small.  (Apparently, size doesn’t matter.)

Also, being able to harvest souls does create a black market, complete with the aforementioned mules.  The group of Russians dealing in black-market souls collects them from people that apparently need the money.  They sign away all rights to getting it back, as shown in a scene where a woman wants hers back.

The movie doesn’t deal directly with what a soul is.  The doctor repeatedly admits that modern science knows very little about the soul other than how to remove it, store it and put it in someone else.  I suppose this is a good thing.  There are so many views on what a soul is that to try to pin down a philosophy for the movie would have been unnecessary and probably would have alienated some viewers.  The movie simply explores what it would be like to have your soul removed without being too technical about it.

It gets a bit confusing at times.  Giamatti apparently has visions associated with the former owner of the soul.  It wasn’t until I started reading reviews about the movie that I realized what this was.  I think part of the problem is that even at 1:41, it drags on at parts.

The acting great as was the basic premise.  My only real complaint was that it dragged on a little too much.  About halfway through the movie, I felt like I was still waiting for the movie to get interesting.  At that point, I figured that I might as well finish it.  At the very least, I’d be able to know how the movie ended and write a complete review.

When I heard about the film on NPR a few years ago, the movie sounded interesting.  Having seen it, it’s hard for me to recommend the movie to someone mostly because I had trouble finishing it.  Had it not been for my desire to review it, I probably would have shut it off halfway through.  Overall, I’d give it three stars.  Catch it if it comes on TV, but I wouldn’t recommend renting it.