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JeffAHayes
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Pretty Ugly People (2008)
Too Good to Have Gone Straight To DVD
I just finished watching this as a rental (It also was available only on DVD, not even Blu-Ray, which is rare these days, even for a movie that went straight to disk, but then it WAS made in 2008).
While I agree with a few of the negative comments made by some who didn't like the film, I also agree with all of the positive comments by those who did, as well. I thought it was a fair amount of fun, if not "laugh-out-loud" funny, and I've always enjoyed Missi Pyle.
I think the fact that this was made BEFORE Melissa McCarthy became a big star and BEFORE Octavia won Best Actress in a Supporting Role for "The Help," certainly DIDN'T help make it a more marketable movie for theaters, as all I can find in the way of theater showings is a bunch of film festivals and ONE "limited release" in September 2009, and it doesn't even say WHERE, plus one brief showing in Palm Springs.
William Sanderson, of course, has been around, like, FOREVER (my favorite role for him -- probably his most memorable -- was as the puppet maker in "Blade Runner"). But as a character actor, most folks don't know his name.
I think this is good enough that were it released AGAIN during a slow period of the movie year (like the fall or winter), it could probably have a decent showing -- especially now that Melissa and Octavia are stars. Jeff
The Outer Limits: Sandkings (1995)
Disappointing Adaptation of George R.R. Martin Novella
I read this novella as part of a sci-fi "short story" collection I checked out from my local library in the late 1980s, although it was almost long enough to be it's own book (close to 60 pages). At the time, I had no idea who George R.R. Martin was, or that he'd go on to create something as monumental as the "Songs of Ice and Fire" novel series that is currently in its fourth season on HBO (with some episodes being written by Martin while he also works feverishly to finish the novel series before the TV series catches up).
At the time I was halfway through my college degree and had a journalism professor who was as much or more of a movie buff than a journalism professor (he's been a local movie critic ever since). I discussed the story with him (I don't think he'd read it, but I gave him ALL the high points) and told him what a great movie I thought it would make, but he said he thought it would be too much of "a downer" to be successful in Hollywood. Of course THAT was before so many other successful movies and TV shows with "down" endings came out.
I didn't catch this "The Outer Limits" version until it was in re-runs, and I WAS NOT IMPRESSED. It completely changed the story. I'm not going to go into any details, except to say that in the original story, the central character was no research scientist and the sandkings were the result of NO research project he'd ever been a part of. Rather, he was more of an affluent business man on an unnamed alien planet (or perhaps Earth in the distant future, although from what I recall, it seemed more like an alien planet -- been about 25 years since I read it).
Who knows WHY screenwriters make the choices they do in adaptations? The professor I mentioned taught a course in "The American Short Story" which I took that covered the adaptation process from a PBS series that had done that, with a book made to accompany the series, with the original story, screenplay, and sometimes even commentary on the differences by the original author. It was QUITE enlightening, so I understand why it often NEEDS to be done. In this case, I think it just made a much LESS interesting and MUCH less powerful story.
Piranha 3DD (2012)
Lotsa Fun (if you don't take it -- or yourself too seriously)...
This is a JOHN GULAGER film written by his attached-at-the-hip writing team of Marcus Dunstan and Partick Melton. These three have been together since the two writers' script was first approved by Matt Damon and his buddies for the third (and final) season of "Project Greenlight" (the TV show where Miramax gave a supposedly amateur writer/director $1,000,000 to make his/her movie), followed by them picking mostly aspiring director John Gulager to direct the film ("Feast," which has since had two sequels by the same team). I say "supposedly amateur" because I think all three were working in the business at the time, although none of them had made a full feature film. (Trivia: In season two, they cast Shia LeBouf as the star of a movie that never made it to theatrical release "The Battle of Shaker Heights," but was his first starring role.)
"Feast" was the ONLY of the three films the Weinsteins/Damon partnership ponied up the $1,000,000 for which actually made it into theatrical release, and I own at least one of the follow-ups on Blu-Ray, although I've yet to watch it (missed the one week "Feast" was in my local theater, but caught it via Netflix rental, and enjoyed it). For those who don't know, John Gulager's dad, Clu Gulager, is a character-acting icon going back to the early 60's, from mostly TV Westerns and some movies, who I'd seen so many times I knew him well, but didn't make the connection until I saw him on "Project Greenlight." At any rate, I actually enjoyed this film more once I realized the writing/directing team behind it, since I was totally aware how tongue-in-cheek it was intended to be, then. Clu Gulager has a small role in the beginning, as in all his son's films, to date, along with Busey. The fact that they had Hasselhoff play an arrogant version of himself was another easy clue.
I think it's easy to see Gulager and his buddies are nowhere close to winning any awards. But they make "fun" horror movies. That's their genre. These films are NOT to be taken seriously. If you cry at anyone's injury or death in one of these movies, or get seriously offended, well, you've got issues for either watching the film to begin with, or expecting something different.
Instant classic lines...
Katrina Bowden character, Shelby: "Josh cut off his penis after something came out of my vagina!"
Ving Rhames character, Victoria Lake Sheriff: "Bring me my legs!" A movie of this low caliber with Christopher Lloyd, Gary Busey, Ving Rhames, David Hasselhoff and Danielle Pannabaker??? That's a lot of stars (even if most of them don't get much work these days). One bad review said this was a $20 million budget film, but IMDb says it was a $5 million budget, which seems more likely.
I wouldn't buy it (unless it's less than $5 and you LOVE this kind of film), but it's worth a rental, which is how I'm currently watching it for the second time, while I listen to the director/writer/producer commentary.
So don't expect more (or something different) than it delivers, and "it's all good," as the stoners like to say.
Jeff Hayes
The Hunger Games (2012)
It was OK, but could have been a better adaptation.
I just came from a midnight screening, and as someone who very well understands the need to make changes from books to movies (a college professor of mine gave a class using PBS' "American Short Story" series where we read the story, the screenplay adaptation, watched the PBS TV movie -- and with living authors read THEIR take on the differences) -- I'm still a bit dissatisfied with some of the changes made from book to movie for "The Hunger Games" (and I just bought and read the book within the past week, so it's VERY FRESH in my mind).
I bought and read "The Help" AFTER seeing the film, and while it, too, had differences, they sort of balanced out. I liked some changes in the movie better, some of the differences in the book better...
It was pretty obvious, however, reading "The Hunger Games," that even though it's not a very long novel, the exposition in it would require a 4-hour movie to have all the scenes from the book, so I KNEW they'd cut a lot of the superfluous scenes, and they did (and most of the stuff they cut was OK to cut). My biggest issue, perhaps, is the SHEER POLITICS of Hollywood "Blockbuster-Making." There was more brutality in the novel than they showed in the movie, and some of it I felt important to the story, but I'm certain what they cut was to get a PG-13 rating SO the movie would be available to a much wider audience and therefore SELL MORE TICKETS! That said, the changes they made in the FINAL FIGHT SCENE -- particularly with the "wildlife" -- were, to me INEXCUSABLE. Katniss' realization of what was going on there, and the sheer horror of just WHAT this "Capitol" can, and will do, was pivotal, to me. I would recommend you see the movie first, THEN read the book, and see what I mean.
Flip side, they added A LOT of "stuff" in the movie that's NOT in the book -- mostly involving the president, played by Donald Sutherland... Of course a lot of the things he says may reflect things Katniss thought to herself in the novel. At any rate, I actually think what they did with him may have added to the impact of the story, a bit, but NOT at the expense of some of the other changes and a few deletions. I eagerly await (hopefully), an unrated "Director's Cut" of this movie that's 30 minutes or so longer and has more of what's missing.
I might have rated this a bit higher if the final battle scene had been true to the book. Then again, there were some other things after that which weren't that I actually preferred. I'll leave it to folks who've read the book to see for themselves.
I'd still recommend seeing this film to those who've read the novel. Just don't expect quite everything you may have hoped for. If you haven't read the novel, you'll probably LOVE IT. By itself, with no other context, it's a pretty great movie.
Jeff Hayes
Bikini Frankenstein (2010)
Typically well-done Fred Olen Ray movie...
A movie would have to be "Gone with the Wind" (and it would have to be 1939) to get much more than an 8 out of me -- especially if it's simply a campy sex romp, like this. For the type of movie this is, this is about as good as it gets.
Many of the cast members, such as Christine, are old hands in these sort of softcore flicks (she seems to be a regular on Cinemax "productions"). A lot of his earlier films even featured him as one of the chief (or bit) players -- quite often making some sort of comment about "the new Fred Olen Ray movie that's coming out," which I usually got a kick out of -- usually talking about how this guy made "Hollywoood blockbusters," lol.
My sole complaint about his movies is that so far as I know, he hasn't made any hardcore versions of these films, whereas some softcore movies are adaptations of hardcore movies (although if they're not done well, and just out-takes of something shot just for hardcore, the softcore version is usually a real disappointment, because of how they have to cut to make it a softcore). Fred's work is so well-done in softcore -- just barely avoiding things that would push it over the limit -- I think he could easily continue some of those scenes a bit longer and just leave that footage out of his softcore versions, and market a hardcore version...
Since the opening sex scene featured hardcore superstar Alexis Texas, that was an excellent example of a scene where he could have capitalized on a few extra camera angles and a few extended scenes that just got cut from the softcore version. This movie is good enough I might actually BUY a hardcore version of it (and I don't buy many, lol).
When you look at the industry's new trend towards true hardcore flicks with actual acting and story, most still aren't as well done as this, even though there are quite a few talented actors and actresses in the adult entertainment industry.
Oh well. This is still a fun, campy, and HOT flick to watch. Jeff