The 30 Worst Films Of All Time Pt. 2

Continuing where the last part left off...

19. Barbwire (1996):

I should have included this film simply on the blatant T&A aspect of it, but I felt with the the rather obvious pillaging of comic books to make hit movies out of happening again, I should include this box office bomb from the first time the movie industry felt that the best thing to do was raid comic book properties for money again. See, back in the late 90s, indie comics were all the buzz, and with films like Men In Black and The Crow being giant hits, the movie industry wanted to see what else they could pillage for theaters, enter Barb Wire. Barb Wire was among the many characters that was created by Dark Horse comics as a means of competing with the super hero genre, they had a world with 4 (I think) major cities, and each city had its own basic style of hero, Barb Wire was from Steel City, where it was full of mob style villains and many vigilante style anti-heroes, the most popular of them, for obvious visual reasons, happened to be Barb Wire, which is why she was picked for film creation when Dark Horse decided to try and expand into movies. The problem with this is, like most of the "bad girls" of the 1990s comic book era, the only reason people liked Barb for her looks and the fact she was always shooting things, apparently back in the 1990s it was concidered X-TREEEME!!!! to have a giant chested blonde in a corset, mini-skirt, fishnets and knee boots shooting machine guns and wearing sunglasses while rocking a long trench coat and sometimes riding a rice burner style racing motorcycle, I never got it, but hey, whatever. The only problem with this really was, no one told the studio that by the time they got this Pamela Anderson headed bomb to theaters, the whole "bad girl" craze in comics was just about over, as was the X-TREEEME!!!! phase.

18. Laserblast (1978):

How many times have you been left completely dumbstruck and speechless because of a film? You got a number? Ok, now, of those times, how many of them were because of just how bad that film was? Ok, you got that number too? Good, now, if none of those times were because of the crapfest that was Laserblast, then shame on you! Or, maybe good job, I haven't really figured out which yet, but when I do, I shall let you all know. Laserblast is one of those films that in written form doesn't sound all that bad, sure the dialog is kind of crappy, but you can look past that if the F/X are good in most cases, but the problem is, you can't in this case, there is infact nothing at all that is redeemable in this film, the acting is horrible, the special effects are just plain sickening to watch, and you really kind of feel like you've just been mugged watching it. I think its biggest drawback of all is its plot, the whole plot of this film centers around a laser gun left behind with the dead body of this mutant killed by an alien bounty hunter (I think) thats found by an outcast loner kid who's teased and tormented at his school and how he uses it to get himself some respect. Yeah thanks for the reminder of that whole kids shoot up schools thing thats so topical these days... idiots.

17. Hercules in New York (1969):

This film only gains points because of two things, yes, its the first time we see future action star turned comedy and action star turned guy thats running the state of California into the ground, Arnold Schwarzenegger (called Arnold Strong here), on film, and because they dubbed over his voice because it was seen as too thick for american audiences to understand what he's saying. The film itself, other then two aspects really is not redeemable value or have any real saving graces, it tells the story of Hercules and how he's bored with life on Mount Olympus so he goes down to earth, disobeying his father's decree that he stay on Mount Olympus, because, well, Zeus is a shitty father and Hercules has daddy issues, so DJ Kool Herc ends up in New York City, because calling the film Hercules In New York and having it based in Austin Texas would be kind of stupid, and ofcourse all the things of the modern world confuse Herc because the gods are stupid and stuck thousands of years in the past, and eventually through all of this mess and over used culture shock joking, somehow, Herc finds love, because why else would a god come down from Mountain Olympus? Certainly not to start a roller disco... oh wait, we'll get to that in another film on the list, sorry, spoilers, anyway, Herc meets this woman and falls in love, and the rest of the film is him using his demigod powers to fight off those sent by Zeus to return Hercules to Mount Olympus, Herc has decided to stay and be in love... the only thing that could have saved this film is if they had a kid who grew up to be Percy Jackson, but alas... he doesn't.

16. Flowers In The Attic (1990):

Ok, in the 1970s there was a rather controversial book that everyone was talking about and was selling out across the united states, it was called Flowers In The Attic and was seen as not only one of the most controversial, but one of the most sexual books of its time, apparently its rather taboo nature of the second half of the book is why. See Flowers In The Attic is two stories in one, the first part of it, is the story of this widowed woman that moves back to her parents very rich estate, where her insane mother gets the idea that to marry her off again, she must make suiters before she doesn't have any children, thus locking and eventually trying to kill, her grandchildren by leaving them alone on the top floor of the estate, which was used as an attic, and the second half is the love story between the eldest boy and eldest girl of the children, and how they fall in love and decide to escape to a life where they can raise the others as their children in safety and away from their insane family. Think about it, that'd be like if Twilight was about incest. Anyway there was debate for years and years and years on if this book would ever make it to the big screen, and alittle over 11 years later word came out that it would, people started buzzing about it all over again, the problem was, no one at the studio had read the book or knew what it was really about, they just saw a classic book to adapt to film, and thanks to the studio gutting this film of everything except the grandmother's treatment and attempted murdering of the kids and their escape, and its budget, and changing the ending, there is a lump of crap that doesn't even resemble the book it was ment to be, no wonder it got show on TV which edited it more and finally aired it almost two years after it was filmed, and is still in somewhat heavy rotation on the lifetime movie network, but hey, they show The Legend of Lucy Keyes too, so... yeah...

15. Showgirls (1995):

For some reason, hollywood seems to think that if you add nudity with overt sexuality flaunted in front of the viewer, is somehow going to bring people into theaters more so then an actual plot. And though this movie had more nudity then one could ever really need to ever see in any one film (seriously, check the ice scene, you'll know what I mean), what it was lacking was infact, a plot, not even a steamy, sultry Gina Gershon, who at times is dirtier then she was in the film Bound, or the fact it was promoted as Elizabeth Berkley breaking out of her teenager image she gained as a member of the cast of horrible television show, Saved By The Bell, opting to take this role and break away instead of going off with almost all of the cast to do that shows "college years". The problem is, for Elizabeth, both paths were doomed to failure, the show she passed on bombed, and this film bombed out of theaters faster then Madonna's book "sex" bombed out of bookstores, like twice as fast actually, this has left Berkley with a scar on her career that she has really yet to recover from or find a solution to, some say thats a shame, some day she never had a chance in the "real acting world", the debate shall forever linger on, much like the stench of this bomb, however thankfully, Gina Gershon has recovered nicely and gone on to become the walking pile of awesome that she is today, so I guess thats a silver lining.

14. Postal (2007):

And finally we've come to it, an entry by my arch enemy, if you will my nemesis in the world of film and good taste, ofcourse I am speaking of Uwe Boll, the insane german director who picks fights with Micheal Bay, boxes 18 year old blog critics, and claims he's better then such great directors as Cecil B. De Mill, D.W. Griffith, James Whale, George Lucas, and many more, the man who is a living legend only with in his mind, but in reality makes Ed Wood's movies look like Casablanca. It was hard to pick just one film of Boll's to use for this list, but I chose Postal for a very distinct reason, it has to be the stupidest attempt he's ever made at trying to make a film, let alone a film he says "is funny". Here we go, this is the plot, you ready? Ok, so World War 3 happens, and the world is left a nuclear waistland, there are survivors, as one would expect, who have banned together under the leadership of George W. Bush, Osama Bin Laden and Mini-Me from the Austin Powers films to find a safe place to live out their time. Yes, you read that right, this is basically a buddy comedy meets a road trip comedy about George W. Bush, Osama Bin Laden and Mini-Me as a trio with a plan to take their group to the promised land. Yes, that is seriously the plot, Boll thinks its funny to make movies where the worst president in american history, the most wanted man on the face of the planet, and a midget are all the best of friends on what is basically a road trip film. Yeah, see, people say Alone In The Dark and the Bloodrayne films are by far Boll's worst work, but I think this completely unfunny and completely wrong on all fronts "comedy" over shadows them by a mile.

13. Rhinestone (1984):

This film is wrong on many levels, but I will simply give you an outline of the plot before I go any farther, because, seriously, you gotta hear this.. Ok you ready? Dolly Parton is a famous country singer who has also found many other talents in her business, she brags to some record executive that she could make any one at all a country star because of her talent and knowledge of the business and what people want, as well as her eye for talent, record executive person stops staring at her giant breasts long enough to put a wager with her on that statement, a wager thats somehow either boob or stories about life in the Ozarks related, they agree on the bet and Dolly sets out to find herself a person she can turn into the next big country star. Enter Sylvester Stallone, cab driver, mumbler, and all around wrong choice for casting in a role that doesn't involve boxing or shooting guns while grimacing. Dolly, probably delirious with pain from walling around with her giant chest on such a small body, or maybe out of self hate from wearing a cowboy hat and frills, decides to use Stallone as the one she's gonna make a star. Which leads too, yes you guessed it, Sylvester Stallone singing country music. Yes, you read that right, Sylvester Stallone, SINGING country music. You know, there are so many things wrong with this film from concept to creation that it just boggles the mind, it really does. I mean honestly, Stallone is worse in this then he was in Party At Kitty and Stud's... Yeah, now think about that.

12. Untamed Youth (1957):

Normally, I love 1950s cheesecake films, mostly because they're promoted as daring and shocking, and thrilling, but really they're only about as shocking as a PG-13 movie here in the states, which in most cases is a chuckle at best, but I don't know, for some reason Untamed Youth just doesn't do it for me. Its not that its got forgotten grindhouse goddess Mimi Van Doren, or that plot is worse then most of those women in prison movies, or that the rest of the cast is just so painful to watch as they fumble through their badly written dialog or what, I just don't like this film. The plot is your basic youth repressed by the older people that "don'get them" or whatever the issues the young had in the 1950s, it tells the story of two girls sent to a prison farm to do a one month sentence and how they "turn the place upside down with their youthful revolt" or whatever the hell they called it back then. Thats seriously all this plot is, just your basic excuse to see attractive pin up style girls acting wild and crazy, and guys using outdated even by that period slang about each of them. Its not so much that the film is overly bad, I mean it is bad, but its also boring because of it being so bad.

11. Cabin Fever (2004):

Alot of long time followers of my work know this film and knew it had to be here, if for no other reason then it was the review that defined my sarcastic but informed style of review for me, and also allowed me to give the world this enduring quote, "I know there is no god, I know there is no devil, and I know there is no blair witch, because if any of them were real, when I prayed to them to save me from this pantload, none of them came to my aid.". For those of you that don't know, Cabin Fever is this horrible attempt at a film thats basically about these drunken idiotic college kids that get a cabin for the weekend in the woods, and after beating a homeless man that lives in the woods to half to death then lighting him on fire, all because he asked for their help because he was very very ill, they all come down with his mysterious illness, which basically eats away at their insides, making the flesh as thin and easy to rip as rice paper, and blood to just poor out of every single hole in their body at any given time, its like Ebola but worse, way worse. This whole film's real issue is the fact that its just so disjointed and none of it really makes sense, you have the kids at their cabin, you've got the dead guy in the town's water supply, you've got the entire small town and the guy you think is racist till the very end of the film, its just dizzying how boring and sickening this film really is. Plus its big star was Ryder Strong from the forgettable series "Boy Meets World", this was supposed to make him a "big film and tv star" following the end of that show, guess what? it didn't.

End Part Two......

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BC

The 30 Worst Films Of All Time Pt. 1

My 30 Worst Films of All Time:

Amazingly, I Did Not Just Copy Uwe Boll's IMDB Entry

I was recently talking to a friend, ok well he's more like the plucky young sidekick type then a friend, but not really all that plucky or sidekick like, anyway, we were talking about movies, and what could possibly be the worst films of all time. And after naming off afew, and sort of zoning out his attempts at googling to see what could be bad or not, I started to formulate my planned list, now you've all seen my 30 Best Movies, and my 30 Best Horror Movies lists, and I felt it was only right to share with you all, this, my list of the worst films ever made. Now, some are gonna be obvious, some won't, but thats how I roll you know? I like to keep it funky fly fresh and whatnot. Anyway, lets get down to this shall we?

The 30 Worst Films Of All Time:

30. X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009):

For the life of me, I cannot understand why someone greenlit this film to be made in the first place. See, for those of you who don't know who Wolverine is, for the past 30+ years Wolverine has been the "go to guy" for Marvel Comics, he is, what many in the writing industry call a McGuffin (its a fancy term for plot device thats used as the center or focus of a story, or chapter of a story), if a character is new and they want to bring in readers to their book? Have them team up with Wolverine for an issue, if your book wants to boost sales for afew issues, do a story where Wolverine appears for afew issues, if you want your character to have a "dark mysterious past" its some how connected to Wolverine, you get the idea. Anyway, the idea of making a movie out of the history of arguably the most popular comic book character of all time seems on paper like a great idea right? Yeah well, you're wrong. See the problem is, Wolverine's story from youth to joining the X-Men would take a Lord Of The Rings style trilogy to actually properly do, thats if you wish to not piss the fans off or insult the comic book masses, and well, as anyone thats seen the Fox Studio made movies based on characters of Marvel Comics, you'll know thats exactly how they figured on doing it. Instead of telling a rich and detailed story of how James Howlett became Wolverine, and the sadness and tragedy their in, followed by a second film explaining the metal in his body and a third with all his military work and ending with him joining the X-Men, we got a half made up on the spot, the rest made up of random characters who's bio pages on wikipedia were skimmed over and not really read, who were then changed so much most of them didn't at all look or act like they're supposed too. This film was purely made with more input from Hugh Jackman, who admits that though he plays Wolverine, he's never so much as read more then parts of the wikipedia biography on him, but yet he felt he could "make the character work in his vision of how he's ment to be", instead of the input of Marvel Comics, or a writer who wrote him for years, or even a fan that worked at the studio, nothing! What it leads to is, Wolverine instead of being the greatest comic book movie of all time, becomes the worst comic book movie of all time, worst then Daredevil, Ghost Rider, Superman Returns, Howard The Duck, Man-Thing and Batman and Robin...

29. Kazzam (1996):

Ok for those of you who were drunk or high, or young in the 1990s, or are too young to remember the 1990s or would rather forget the 1990s, we had a small fad that was called "Shaqisploitation" which means someone, I'm not sure who, had this weird feeling that because he played a basketball player in the film Blue Chips, basketball's biggest man to not make a free throw turned for some reason still relevant famous person of note Shaquel O'Neal could act, like really act, not just play a young stupid basketball player in a movie about college basketball where all he had to do is suck just slightly less then a clearly drugged and drunk Nick Noltie, which really isn't a hard thing to do, its like out acting an overly drunk and overly Scottish Sean Connery (which is kind of the same thing), you just do what you can and hope for the best. Anyway, for some reason someone believed it would be a good idea for Shaq to play a genie, yes, a genie who grants wishes. How I Dream of Shaqie ever got made I really have no idea, nor do i wish to really, I'm just glad Shaq wasn't really dressed like Babu from the I Dream Of Jeanie cartoon from the 1970s. Oh yeah, I went THERE.

28. Cutting Class (1991):

Now I wanna clear something up about this one, this film, is not here because it is the first "major" starring role for a certain actor by the name of Brad Pitt, whom for the most part, I can not stand because he takes himself to serious, this is here simply because its just a bad film. The plot of this as confusing as the fact it was ever made in the first place,so confusing infact for many years I've actually replaced it mentally with a sort of butterfly effect like film that would have made alot more sense. Its your basic teenager gets out of a mental ward and starts to kill his friends and teachers until he's cut in half with a circular saw plot, you know, like 20 other films from the time period, but the only difference is, there is nothing at all redeemable in this film not even the fact it had young Brad Pitt and Martin Mull in it, I mean seriously, Martin Mull! I mean really if Martin Mull can't sell you on a slasher film about a mentally unstable teenager who's decided to kill all of his friends and teachers once he gets out of a mental ward, and then gets cut in half with a circular saw, then I don't really know what could, I mean even for a slasher film this one is bad, like really really bad.

27. Striptease (1996):

Back in 1996, relative nobody Demi Moore had just left then husband, and still respected actor, Bruce Willis, to celebrate this, she decided she would do two things she hadn't done sense the 1980s, star in a movie that would get noticed, and buy herself a new set of beasts to make said movie get noticed, which is, ofcourse, just a sneaky way of getting a studio to pay for you to get a boobjob, which I guess both kind of sneaky and of sleazy at the same time. Anyway, whoever it was that decided this was a good idea, had a script quickly written that involved a stripper and a senator or something, ironically pre-spoofing the Anna Nicole Smith thing by afew years, anyway, the whole point of the film would be that we get to see Demi Moore's new fake breasts predominately through most of the film, which ofcourse would be the only real draw the film had that the studio heads were betting on. The other main role was given to horrible actor and failed recording artist, as well as failed being married to fellow 1970s tv star Loni Anderson, Bert Reynolds, who took time out of running his dinner theater in florida where all washed up second rate stars go to live out the twilight years of their career, to get himself covered in vaseline and walk around in cowboy boots which will I'm sure haunt the rest of the world for years to come. This movie is seriously bad, so bad infact that after the first 20 minutes, you get really tired of seeing a topless Demi Moore, which I'm sure is something they didn't really count on when the braintrust thought up this nugget of movie history.

26. The Room (2003):

For some reason in recent years, among the youth and pot smokers of the world, have decided that this film holy grail of crap movies, and though i admit, it is very bad, I wouldn't call it the holy grail, there are many that are worse, way worse, but whatever, its not my place to figure out the modern youth and their 4chan loving culture, its become so big among the youth for some reason the idiot behind this wants to make a weekly cartoon and video game based on the film. Anyway, The Room is a complete and total stinker about a love triangle between a string haired werido, his girlfriend and his best friend, thats literally all it is, all the boring acting and lack of any real moment or plot, just makes this a trainwreck so bloody its almost sick in its dizzying array of crap thats assaulting you at all ends. There is no redeeming things you can take from this film except maybe that its not made by Uwe Boll, its literally just a 30 minute story stretched out to 93 or so minutes of pure painful and sickening tripe, thats full of super bad acting. the first 15 minutes are worth a laugh, but after that it becomes useless and unwatchable even on a camp and cult level.

25. Raise The Titanic (1980):

The top of the list of what makes this film bad is that even for the time it was filmed, and even when the book its based on was written, there was alot of misinformation and things we know have proven to be false, see, back in 1980, when this film was made, we still hadn't found the actual wreck of the Titanic, we had no idea where it was along its course, and more so, no one ever bothered to mention in all the survivor accounts that the ship split in two before it sank, instead assuming it sank similarly to the SS Andrea Doria that sank off the coast of Nantucket Massachusetts USA in the 1950s, where it just lay in one moderately well preserved (at the time) piece at the bottom of the sea. We ofcourse know that this is not the case, we ofcourse also know that their hairbrained idea of "refloating" the Titanic would never actually work either. But logic alone isn't what makes this movie horrible, the acting in porn movies is actually better then this, alot of the times you find yourself realizing they're reading in a manner that sounds like they've got cue cards just off camera. Its really kind of funny at times, but not funny in the it saves the film kind of way. The only other thing of note this film has, is, it holds the record for the most expensive prop ever made, the 55 foot long 10 foot wide replica of the Titanic, which is seen by many as possible one of the greatest props ever made, and has sort of gained a cult following as a tourist attraction in Fuji where the film was made, even though its little more then a lump of mush that sits outside of a film studio now.

24. The Wizard (1989):

This is one of those films that tilts and totters on the fence between brilliance and bullshit. See, in 1989 the nintendo video game company literally owned the entire market, they had everything, top rated games, two cult television series, Captain N: The Game Master and The Super Mario Bros. SuperShow, both used to showcase their products to insanely huge viewerships, and in 1990, it was decided to tighten that stranglehold on the youth of america by creating a movie, but not just any movie, a movie that would showcase their upcoming products and their soon to be crowning jewel, the game Super Mario Bros. 3, which at the time had been being promoted for almost 6 months before its release, all of the products in the film would be released in the same week as the film so you could literally go from the theater to your local Toys R Us and get your good old fashioned down home family style capitalism on, in a sense, the ultimate infomerical, much like what toy company Hasbro had done years earlier with The Transformers and G.I Joe franchises, but unlike those two attempts at the same idea, this film is just a stinkbomb with so many plotholes and questionably bad scenes that really seem like they were written by a 9 year old. The film tells the story a young mentally ill child who's put into an institution after his parents split and his mother and step father can't deal with him, he's broken out by his older brother and they run away heading for California, along the way they meet a young girl and discover only is this young boy gifted at video games, but there is a giant video game tournament in Los Angeles that pays 50,000 dollars, which in 1989 money was alot of money as well as a plot device. The film basically follows these kids hitchhiking and hustling their way across the country unattended by an adult, as they beat the "best" each place they stop at has in video games, each saying they're going to enter the tournament too, its really kind of like how in Pokemon Ash travels from town to town beating each city's gym leader, but you know, showcasing The Powerglove, the grandfather of The Nintendo Wii, in the end the finalists of the tournament have to play "a brand new game" and surprise, that game was set to release the day the film debuted, the one that went on to become the highest selling video game of all time, Super Mario Bros. 3, yeah thats the game they gotta play. the kid beats it and his family becomes holy again, and everyone's happy, and we all feel dead inside.

23. Freddy Got Fingered (2001):

You're gonna find alot of films on here that I state from the start where just bad ideas, specially as we get down into the lower numbers, this film is one of those that was just a bad idea. See, to understand why Freddy Got Fingered is a bad idea, as well as a horrible title, you have to understand where it came from, a man by the name of Tom Green. For those of you who don't remember Tom Green or his horrible "comedy show" or his even more horrible rap albums, or even this movie, let me give you a brief explanation, Tom Green is the Canadian version of Andy Dick, only unlike Andy Dick, before Tom's career was finished he was married to Drew Barrymoore for a time, and not blamed for the death of Phil Hartman like Andy Dick was. So basically he's this idiot who does really stupid things that are mostly shock and gross out humor, mostly gross out humor, Tom's signature stunt in Canada was showing people his show's mascot, a dead raccoon he found hit on the road, once even twirling it about to the shock and vomitting of his guests and audience. With that said, its pretty much a forgone conclusion that a film with a guy like that, working many of his skits of that nature into a film where he's a "misunderstood cartoonist", just seems doomed to fail doesn't it? So yeah, you can guess it did fail, horribly.

22. I Bought A Vampire Motorcycle (1990):

This film has the best title of them all really, plus the fact that its one of the few on here thats a must for my bad movie nights, because come on, who doesn't wanna see a film about vampire motorcycles? Yeah thats right, everyone does, the problem is, unless you want a good mood altering laugh at just how bad this film of a motorbike le vampir is, you should really avoid it. The plot is very simple and very basic, and really lacks any real imagination, a british biker gang for some reason, probably cuz they're bored, or maybe because they're really into jesus, torment and kill a local occultist, who decides to get back at them by transmuting his spirit into the body of a beat up old motorcycle, which is found by the gang and the dead occultist slowly, and non-sparkling vampirely I might add, works its way through the entire gang, leaving their leader, the one that actually killed the occultist in the first place, for last, and the most grizzly of deaths, as one would expect in a film of this nature. Like I said its a simple and easy and not all that imaginative plot, plus what really makes it worth putting on this list is just how completely cheap and fake most of this film looks, I mean there are log budget movies, and there are movies made in some dude's backyard with a camcorder... I'm sure you can figure which this is right?

21. Ewoks: Battle For Endor (1985):

Now, I try to keep my lists pertaining to movies to simply include made for theater movies, but for this list I make two exceptions, one you will see later on, but this one, I just had to include. See, way back in the last century, when cellphones were called CB Radios and mp3s were called cassettes, there was this little series of films that big at that time, has now fallen into complete and utter obscurity, that series was called Star Wars. Now, for its breif time as a profitable commodity Star Wars was pretty much by todays standards to be a cash cow, everyone wanted in before the bubble burst and this series got sent to the back of some film vault never to be seen again, among those many companies that saught to cash in, was american television network ABC, who commissioned two movies starring these furry little midgets called Ewoks. Sense most of you don't know what Star Wars is, or was about, I'll explain, an Ewok was basically a midget with that medical condition that makes them grow animal like hair all over their bodies, riducled for this, Ewoks left earth after getting their message board trolled, and eventually settled on a forest moon called Endor, they were kind of like the Na'Vi from Avatar, but with out looking like bad ass smurfs that have a built in USB port, anyway, The Battle For Endor takes the Ewoks, some girl thats with them now, and Wilford Brimley all over Endor cosplaying Lord Of The Rings which I guess somehow saves Endor from what I guess is Witchiepoo from H. R Pufnstuf. Its seriously bad, and much like the rest of the Star Wars franchise, it was doomed to never be heard from again.

20. The Conqueror (1956):

Man talk about a killer film! I mean literally, a killer film, but I'll get to that in a second, but for now, let me explain what The Conqueror is. This one of those films that you just kind of look at and wonder why it was ever made, like, you kind of start to wonder if it was real at all, until you actually see it and even then you feel dirty about it. See, The Conqueror is a film about the life of Mongolian warlord and all around fan of not bathing or shaving and hater of walls around China, Genghis Khan. Now that doesn't sound to bad, in the old world hollywood world of lavish and realistic sets and casting that sounds pretty good right? Well heres whats wrong with it, Genghis Khan is played by John Wayne. Yes, that John Wayne that did westerns and war movies. Yes, that John Wayne who you kids that think Stephenie Meyer created Werewolves and Vampires and J. K Rowling created wizardry, odd relationships between young nerdy boys and old lonely men and British milfs, have never heard of. Now, the fact that this film consisted of an all white cast playing people of asian decent, and that John Wayne plays Khan horribly, making him sound like every other character he's ever played that wasn't Rooster Cogburn from True Grit, amazingly enough, isn't the reason this film is a killer film. The Conqueror is so bad it literally gave everyone involved in it cancer. No, seriously, this film was shot in the same place the atomic bomb had been created not even 10 years before, this place was a hotbed of radioactive radiation, and it still is, back then no one knew radiation could kill you, and by the late 1970s early 1980s, everyone involved in this film had died of cancer, blame the location, but come on, we all know the cancer was caused by how bad this was.

End Part One....

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BC

Babylon Fields

Babylon Fields:

Oh What Could Have Been...

With the fall television season here in America just around the corner, and word of what shows have made it onto what schedules and what has been held back for winter or spring or summer, that means that very soon, normally around middle July to middle August or so, the internet starts to get flooded with pilot episodes for the upcoming year, those of you who were with me last summer remember I reviewed afew shows that had their pilots hit the net, ironically I got wires crossed and gave ratings flop Sons of Tuscan a great review, and surprising delight The Cleveland Show horrible reviews, though to be fair the pilot for The Cleveland Show was pretty horrible, even if they show itself became a true delight to watch. But with fall pilot season always comes one of my favorite things in all of the entertainment industry, looking at the pilots that didn't make it, that were not picked up and are sense left to the wayside to be only spoken of by entertainment nerds who seek out such things. Personally, I find this sort of thing fascinating, because for as many unaired and rejected pilots as there are that aren't very good at all, there are some that are just mindblowingly good, and you find yourself wishing it had been picked up. Its also a good way to see how a show that is picked up can be changed, I doubt many people are aware that television classic "All In The Family" went through two pilots that were passed on before it was actually greenlit for a series, both basically the same show, just once called "Justice For All" and another "Those Were The Days", both with the only thing recognizable being Carol O'Conner and Jean Stapleton, the rest completely different, in recent years the american version of "Life On Mars" would go through a similar situation, where the pilot, which was set in L.A and was painfully bad and cheaply made, was ordered completely recast and reshot, and only then was it greenlit and aired.

I mention both of those programs because "All In The Family" and the american verson of "Life On Mars" were just shy of being placed in the same catagory as the show I'd like to speak to you all about, the catagory of shows that were promoted by the networks, but pulled at the last minute, and never to be seen or spoken of again. Now yes, we know "All In The Family" went on to become an iconic series that dwarfed its British counterpart in all ways, and yes, we know that though it was well made, the american take on "Life On Mars" only lasted one brilliant season, but they both just barely missed that last second ax, that would have left them forever in the orthicon mysts of the television waistbands where forgotten and never aired programs roam. But most people are aware of the history of both of those shows, I would like to now talk to you about a show that did not share their fate of being saved from the ax even though it was promoted and placed on the time table by the network.

I would like to talk to you about one of the greatest concepts in the past 10 years, and how you will never see it, but wish that you had. I am talking ofcourse about the 2007 rejected pilot for a series called "Babylon Fields", an edgy show taking place in Babylon, Long Island, New York, and how one day, all of its dead, got out of the ground and went back to living their lives. They aren't out for brains, they aren't out for killin, none of that, they just go back to their everyday lives as if nothing had happened, they don't remember their moment of death, nor do they remember what the afterlife is like, but they were aware they've been dead, but not really for how long they were gone. This ofcourse leads for an upheaval when they attempt to return to their lives, many are shocked to discover their families have left town or moved on, many are met with violence at those who think they've come back to kill them all. Its kind of similar to the french film "They Come Back" more so then the likes of the classics by George A. Romero or other masters of the zombie genre. It takes the non "I want to eat your brains" route and instead takes more the feel of a life interrupted and the impact on those around you who have grieved and moved on.

There is the only old widow who is alone with out her husband who she'd not been with out sense they were young, there is the woman who lost her husband to cancer years earlier and only wishes to have him back, dreaming and hoping and wishing for it, the cop who's wife was dead and he just couldn't move on, and there is also the mother who murdered her abusive husband after he beat their youngest daughter to death. Its a story of how life is really as fragile and delicate as they say, and how even though they're given a second chance, most people will choose to live their live as they have, instead of changing once they have a second chance at it. Oddly, the people around them don't seem to be all that unsettled after the first few days or so, the zombies, look like you would expect a zombie to look, decaying flesh, open wounds, exposed bone, ext, but that isn't the focal point or even really a sub aspect of the plot, its just there.

Had the pilot been picked up and turned into a series, it would have gone along the lines of your average mysterious sci fi style series, focusing on the sheriff who's recently dead wife has come back to change the life he'd started to rebuild, and dealing with the murdered abusive cop who isn't aware his wife had murdered him with an ax and buried him in a school yard. It also would have followed along the lines of all non-violent zombie stories where no matter how nonthreatening and peaceful they look, deep down most zombies will go into murderous rages at the sight of blood and start to crave it and brains, implying like many that the whole trait set inherent in Zombies is not only a hardwired primal instinct, but infact one that can be repressed or possibly must be awakened, sort of like a zombie puberty or something of the like, there are many ideas out there that could fit into the series and its universe, it was open enough to go any which way really, and with time it could have maybe explored them all, but we will never know.

So the big question so many of you have right now, must be, "Why did CBS pass on what could have been a great stand out program?", well the answer is very simple really. See, its CBS you're talking about. Babylon Fields was created during CBS's experimental phase where they tried to bring in a younger, under 40 to 50 year demographical viewer base, this was the experiment that not only gave birth to Babylon Fields, but also short lived but critically acclaimed still to this day shows "Jericho" and "Moonlight", and its creations would later be altered into the mini-series Harper's Island and aired over the summer of 2009, with its second season which would take place almost 15 yeas later with a return to Harper's Island scrapped completely, believing it best to be a stand alone. And the final attempt, the incredible, but all but forgotten "Swingtown" used for filling space during 2008. There was never any real reason for why CBS felt the need to not bring Babylon Fields to the starting gate, that summer it was the hottest talked about series of all the new crop and had the most buzz up to the very day it was officially called dead by CBS at the start of the spring/summer season.

In the end, though critically acclaimed for its fresh take at possibly reinventing the line up for CBS the network known for having the viewership of most of the people between the age of 50 to 90, decided instead of reinventing themselves or showing they could do more cutting edge programing, CBS opted to stick with its old people friendly world of 6 different CSI programs and four NCIS programs as well as stale and predictable ratings getters like Survivor, instead of taking a risk and going for the younger demographics that are dominated by FOX, The CW and the cable networks, and sure we all miss Jericho and some of us argue that Moonlight and reworked and delayed for years Harper's Island were both great and I personally miss Swingtown alot, but, atleast they got to the screen, but with Babylon Fields, one of the greatest ideas i've seen in awhile, I can't help but wonder what could have been had they take the chance. I guess we'll never get to know.


But I do know this, though I can not bring the show to life for you all, I can do this, I can do this, the video below is the entire pilot episode to the series, enjoy..



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BC

Grown Ups

Grown Ups:

The Big Chill If The Big Chill Was A Comedy

Its been said often that in movies, you can't always hit a home run every time you step to the plate, and though there is alot of effort put into the coming of age buddy comedy Grown Ups, it just doesn't hit the ball out of the park, not even with its star power consisting of 90% of the last 20 years of Saturday Night Live's cast. But by all means, don't allow that to take away from the film, just because its not a home run doesn't mean its not worth seeing, it does have its moments of comedic bliss, and really isn't a bad way to spend an afternoon or a fun night out with friends, because well, you can't always hit it out of the park every single time, and as comedians age, just like regular actors, thats alright.

Grown Ups is based in a small unnamed town in new england, which actually looks to be central Massachusetts by the scenery and the fact everyone has Massachusetts accents, and is the story of an elementary school basketball team that in 1978 won their first, and apparently, only basketball championship, and after a speech by their coach about how they're all winners and how proud he is of them, the film fast forwards 30 years, where you see each of the five member team as they are now. Lenny (Adam Sandler) is a Hollywood agent and married to Roxanne (Salma Hayek), Eric (Kevin James) is married to Donna (Maria Bello), Kurt (Chris Rock) is a stay at home father and is married to Deanna (Maya Rudolph), who is pregnant, and Rob (Rob Schneider) is married to Gloria (Joyce Van Patten) despite the fact that Gloria is 30 years older then him, Marcus (David Spade) is still single, living in town and spends his time drunk and randomly sleeping with any woman he can pick up. Lenny gets the call first, and decides to call the others, seeing how they are and telling them he's going to the funeral, they all decide to go along with him, being the coach's only winning team in school history, and all that he taught them about life, they felt it was important to be there, as Lenny calls them, you see alittle of what life is like 30 years later for all of them, you meet their families and stuff like that, you know, normal stuff for films of this type, its not bad, but its kind of predictable.

The funeral takes place in their hometown in central Massachusetts over July 4th Weekend, for which, Lenny rented a giant lake house for them all to stay at so they can all catch up and spend some time together, which they haven't been able to do in many years given their lives, like I said at the start, its basically the Big Chill but done as a straight up comedy, not a dramatic one. As the movie progresses, you see each character starting to change, Lenny discovers that his children are far too intrenched in their spoiled rich kid lifestyle of television and video games and being waited on hand and foot to even attempt to see that there is stuff to do outdoors, Lenny decides that he has to teach them what life was like in a world before cellphones and the internet and video games and the like, and after his wife discovers that she can't remember how to skip a rock, she sees what he is trying to do, and agrees to let them all stay instead of going to Milan Italy where she'd be debuting her fashion line for the year over that week. Everyone else, who had already planned on staying that week, is overjoyed and to celebrate, they all go to a local water park, where the film's whole third act takes place, and though its got its moments of funny involving urine dye and afew drops off a zip line into the water, the entire act mostly serves as an excuse to see Selma Hayak in a really small really sexy swim suit for an entire 20 minute segment of the film, which I am sure was kind of blatant, and yet, like any other redblooded male in the world, I can not complain, because ... yeah.

Anyway, through out the entire film, Lenny keeps running into a local named Dickie, Dickie was the captain of the basketball team they beat 30 years before, who, for some reason is rather bitter about the loss still, mocking Lenny for going off and becoming a talent agent who married a high profile fashion designer and claiming he was no good for becoming something with his life, and continually challenges Lenny to a rematch, which Lenny finds completely insane and mocks most of the film. By the end of the film, they agree to a rematch, four on four given that each team had one member that was hurt given earlier accidents in the film. And after nearly beating Dickie and his team, Lenny looks around, looks at how their loss set Dickie and his team down paths of unhappy lives where they never went anywhere and just took crappy jobs in town and being unhappy, Lenny realizes that everyone deserves atleast one win in life, stating to his wife as they watch the fireworks at the very end of the film, "I wanted to let Dickie and them feel like they have won just once, and let our kids feel what its like to lose atleast once..".

I'll be honest, this movie isn't really anything new, its not some generation defining comedy or statement that will forever speak to future generations as a timestamp of what life was like in 2010, its not some film that years from now, those in the age group its aimed at will speak of how great it was and have found memories of that they tell their grandkids about, its not smurfs in space with groundbreaking special effects, hell its not even Vincent Price as a mad scientist creating hot girl robots that wear bikinis that are rigged to explode or rob rich people, but what it is, is a funny, and at times cute way to spend two hours. Sure its not the greatest film thats ever been made, but thats fine, it doesn't need to be, sometimes all a film need to do is make you laugh, and well, call me easy to amuse, but David Spade falling face down twice into animal dung, to me is hilarious, and kind of a metaphor for his career as well. You will not find any real message or definitive moment in this film, but thats ok, because sometimes all you really need is some laughter.... Oh and Selma Hayak in a bathing suit.

here is the trailer...


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BC

Huge

Huge:

A Funny And Blunt Look At The Chub Life

Lets face facts, there are alot of people in this world that are overweight, myself and a large amount of my family among them, be it slightly over what society deems as "normal" or so far overweight they're considered morbidly overweight, the fact remains, there is a large amount of us in the world that are seen as fat. Now there are those of us who are like me, who though they are aware of their size and all that comes along with it, and see nothing wrong with themselves, making jokes like saying they're "living the chub life" instead of The Thug Life (my personal favorite as the title of this denotes), or "The Life Chubquadic" instead of The Life Aquatic, and many others, you get the idea. And there are also those who are aware of their size, and instead of accepting themselves for who they are, they feel the need to change themselves, to make themselves fit more of what they are told by magazines and movies and popular culture that a woman is ment to look like, believing if they aren't skinny, they're worthless. Huge takes a humorous look inside the life of all the different types of overweight people, set at a summer camp for overweight teens, Huge is both brutally honest and at times demoralizing and humiliating, but also at times laugh yourself silly till you can't breathe funny, as it shows you that above all else, size doesn't make the person, its who you are that matters. And more so, its not preachy or ignorantly insulting with or with out intention, as most shows that attempt to breach this subject matter tends to be, but then the series was created by Winnie Holzman, the creator of the cult series "My So Called Life" so what else do you expect really?

Huge starts out on the rather humiliating first day of camp at a location called Camp Victory, a camp for overweight teenagers, from the very start you are tossed headlong into the somewhat unsettling and socially demoralizing world of fat camps, where in on the first day, each person is made to stand around in their bathing suit while the staff takes their picture, its ment to be show a "before" picture for them to see how far they've changed at the end, but most find it socially and personally humiliating, as you see the staff going around taking pictures, this is where you meet the main star of the show, Willamina or "Will" for short, she's a sarcastic sharp witted overweight girl who doesn't see anything wrong with her size or who she is, as she is, she states she likes herself just fine, and states she more then likely is going to gain weight while here, you also meet Becca, a shy and nervous girl who reads alot, and latches onto Will almost emediately, the two become close, and even share a cabin with a group of other girls, among them Amber, described as "the thinnest and prettiest girl at fat camp" Will takes an almost instant dislike of her, believing she has no real reason to be there. The two later clash when Will is caught selling contraband food to other campers and blames it on Amber, who she then plays a rather mean trick, but rather hilarious, trick on her to get her back.

The show also deals with all the different ways people try to become thinner, one of the campers that shares a cabin with Will, Becca and Amber is sent home for forcing herself to throw up, that sort of makes them all look at themselves and wonder why instead of them all dealing with it as a group, one went and reported her, though it was the right thing to do, you find out that sending the girl home was the worst thing they could have done for her. After all the stress and drama of the first day, Will decides she has had enough, she packs up her stuff and runs off, planning to hitchhike to her uncle's house where she'll stay the summer so she doesn't have to go home and deal with her parents. At a roadside diner she stops at to have a bite to eat before her journey, Will accidentally runs into the director of Camp Victory, Doctor Rand, who though there to speak to her father, whom she apparently has a very estranged relationship with, confronts Will and makes her see that the camp is there for her help and well being, you later find that Rand herself went there as a teenager, which I'm sure will be addressed at some point.

There are alot of stand out characters in the secondary cast too, Poppy, the girl's councilor who "floats around like an annoyingly hyper pixie" at times, Ian the odd and kind of awkward musician who spends most of his downtime playing his guitar and floating around in a rowboat, him and Will become friends given their similar taste in music, Alistair, the odd boy that sort of lives in a dreamworld that keeps him from dealing with his own personal problems, and George, the muscular camp councilor who Amber has a rather large crush on, even if he can't remember her name. What makes each character in the cast stand out though isn't really that they're all kind of based on all the different aspects of your average teenage scene, jocks, pretty girls, popular people, nerds, ect, its that they all go out of their way to show you that it doesn't matter what size you are, people are people, and that if you look past whats on the outside, you'll see we're all kind of alike, and unlike most shows, it doesn't smack you with this fact like a spiked bat to the head, which is good, because I hate preachy shows about accepting people for who and what they are, they always mean well but always come off insulting, Huge does not do that, which really is a refreshing change of pace.

Among the many things that make this show great, is the cast itself, everyone knows well written characters are a dime a dozen really, but it takes a great actor to make that character live to its potential, and Huge has great actors by the ton, if you pardon the expression. Nikki Blonsky is Will, Nikki is most known as the golden globe nominated star of the recent remake of "Hairspray", and probably one of the most noticed of hollywood's movement toward not noticing size over acting talent the others being Gabourey Sidibe of Precious and the soon to be aired series The Big C, as well as Amber Riley of Glee, Nikki took the role because she felt that Will stands for alot of whats good, as well as whats bad, about most overweight people, and she feels she can show alot of young people that they are not alone or outcast simply because of their size. The surprise of the main cast has to be Hayley Hasselhoff as Amber, I had no idea she was the daughter of former joke of a star turned drunken douchebag of a former star David Hasselhoff was overweight, and more so, such a good actress, that was a massive surprise for me, but a good surprise none the less, she plays a good foil to Nikki's in your face Willamina, as does Raven Goodwin as Becca, Raven's career has mostly been forgettable shows on Nickelodeon and Disney Channel and alot of one time appearances and small roles in tv and movies, you start to feel rather sad for Becca as the show goes on, I have a really bad feeling something bad is gonna happen to her as the show goes on honestly. The other major stand out is Gina Torres as Doctor Rand, I've been a fan of Gina's sense her days on the short lived (and blatantly T&A) Cleopatra 2525, which has the distinction of having its theme song stuck in my head at this very moment, Rand is rather complex and has to come off as both really hard edged, but also trying to get the kids to trust her, which is never really an easy double task for anyone to take on, you feel for her in that respect.

Over all the series does a great job of making you feel for its cast, and what they stand for, like I said earlier, its not really ment to be a preachy "we're all the same no matter how we look" bullshit that you find with alot of series these days aimed at teenagers, and though Huge probably won't offend anyone with its blunt and matter of fact nature, it will make you start to think and wonder about yourself and anyone you know thats overweight, and again, most importantly, it doesn't come off insulting, sure you can see certain characters are ment to be certain people that are known for being overweight, Trent the jock is ment to be Jack Black and Ian the musician is blatantly ment to be Seth Rogan, and Alistair is ment to be Jonah Hill, the girls are alittle harder to figure out, but I'll let each of you figure them out for yourselves, though who they're ment to be really isn't all that important, so much as the fact they truly make you believe in them and look past the outer shell, to see the person inside, which is what the point of this show is. So if you really want something different, and something thats eye opening but also a great way to spend an hour of your tv watching lives, give Huge a chance, you won't regret it.


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BC