Category Archives: 1 Star Movies

The Amityville Horror Review

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Disclaimer: This review is of the edited TV 14 version of the film. All thoughts written below should be addressed accordingly as a review of the unedited version would likely be even more negative.
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The Amityville Horror is a film that you could probably judge from the title and know what to expect. I came into the film with reasonably low expectations and it still managed to crash way below them. This title is filled with red herrings and uninteresting characters to distract you from the fact that not much really happens in this film. If you haven’t seen it, now’s your chance to quickly back away to spare yourself some time.

The plot involves George and Kathy as they decide to move to a new house. They are pretty strapped for cash, but they really want a new house. Unfortunately, that’s just how it is in the modern world. The house is really beat up and the previous occupants were participants in a gruesome act, but the new owners don’t mind. They quickly pay up and the real estate agent was probably thrilled that someone finally fell for her tricks. The heroes settle in with their 3 kids and things seem to be going smoothly. Then, mysterious things start to happen and the heroes realize that the house may be tougher than it looks.

Well, there are many placed to start with this film. Let’s talk about the characters first. George is a pretty terrible lead and his “strength of character” is nonexistent. All it takes is an artificial chill that the spirit produces to start corrupting him. He loses his temper constantly and yells at the dog just to provide him with some amount of “toughness” for his character. It really just makes him look petty and even worse. I wasn’t rooting for him almost from the second that he appeared. He is distracted by romance, but not enough so that he can resist the influence of the dark spirits. Feeling cold isn’t fun, but his mind deteriorates way too quickly through this feeling. He continues to crack as the film goes on. He gets a heroic scene towards the end to try and redeem his character, but that was basically impossible by that point. It helps his character to be sure, but it’s simply too late for him.

Kathy is the main heroine and she doesn’t really look much better. SHe keeps on telling George that they shouldn’t get the house, but then she relents and they move in. From then on, she basically just has to watch as George goes crazy and she can’t really do anything about it. In the climax, she decides to fight, but it’s one of the worst attempts of all time. She gives up after a few seconds and she really showed no combat experience. That’s all right, but anyone can throw a punch and I would expect a much better fight out of someone who’s fighting for several lives. That was pretty poor form and she never became likable as the film went on.

The film plays out as a reverse slasher in the sense that the spirit picks off everyone one by one, but it doesn’t typically finish them off. It just gives them a scare so they will leave the house. Failure to comply with it will result in a car crash or permanent paralysis. Sometimes both. It’s a unique approach I suppose, but you do have to wonder what the point of it all is. The spirit gets some character development towards the end, but it’s very slight.

The film also really wanted to push the “Even God can’t save you now” angle. I suppose that it can be seen as the ultimate scare since you would really be doomed. Ignoring that this scenario would never even be possible, it just goes very far to show this. The heroes put up a mini statue of the cross and the spirit makes sure to burn it. Later on, the Father at one of the churches comes over to bless the house and the spirit overwhelms him with a powerful curse. We see him try to leave a Bible, but the spirit forces him to pick it back up and run away. Later on, he tries to go back, but the spirit just takes out his car and essentially ends his life since he’s almost brain dead at this point. Most Hollywood/mainstream films like to point out that demons and spirits can be alive while the same isn’t true for Angels and God. It’s a film so they can always mess with the rules that way, but it makes the whole thing pretty lopsided. The film is also trying to claim that it’s from a true story although I suppose that we all knew better about 15 minutes into the film. Demons are real so some horror stories are probably real, but this is one of the tales that was probably just made up for a quick buck and their 5 minutes of fame.

Another negative would be the George getting corrupted part. It’s so overdone and it’s one of the worst horror plots. Give us a supernatural enemy who can’t be stopped (Which is bad enough) but let’s at least give the main characters some determination and a will to fight back. Seeing him turn on everyone is just not enjoyable and it’s an easy way out of using special effects or good writing. The hit towards the end was basically the cliff that the film went over since he was no longer redeemable although he may have already passed that part earlier.

The film is not the most violent horror film that you’ll encounter. There are only a handful of scenes, but one of them is particularly brutal as one of the main characters has a dream. It’s enough that you could instantly guess that this film was a little stronger than your average summer blockbuster and it didn’t do any wonders for the film. Violence against noncombatants always ends up appearing as a negative compared to fighting violence. See, a fighter getting injured is way different than a pedestrian getting hit since they are prepared for two vastly different roles.

The kids are also pretty bad characters. The girl has an imaginary friend once again who turns out to be the spirit of the house. It explains that it wants them to stay in the house forever so that’s basically why it wants George to destroy them all. Or, so it would seem. The spirit is evidently strong enough to destroy them all on his own, but I guess it wants things to end up just like how they did last time. It mostly seems to have power over the mind, but its abilities have a real impact on the human world so it’s not just simple telepathy. Most likely it has advanced reality warping abilities since that’s a favorite for most horror writers. You don’t have to do any work, just make it able to do literally anything and you can call it a day.

I’d say that the film is actually more grotesque than scary. The film came out decades ago so you can mostly anticipate everything that it’s going to do, which is why it can be tough to be scared. The grotesque part goes back to the flies, which were some of the worst scenes in the film. One thing that I’ve never liked are insect scares since it’s just about insects crawling all over somebody so you can imagine the worst. It was a painfully bad scene as they attack the Father and force him out of the house. The guy takes his time leaving even though an ordinary person would have dashed out. The spirit continues to torment the guy with boils and such since the guy keeps trying to warn the heroes of the imminent danger.

The other scary scene would likely be when the babysitter is trapped in the closet. You’re supposed to be extra worried for her since she already has braces so everything is a little tougher for her. It’s really more unpleasant and sad to watch than it is scary and the lights turn off, but we already know that the spirit refuses to destroy anyone. It just wants to scare them over and over again until George cracks and does the work for him. The Babysitter literally had no point in the story. She was just there to get taken down.

The heroes have a dog and he’s probably the only positive thing that I can say about the whole experience. There is a little dog violence unfortunately as he scratches at a wall so hard that his paws bleed. Luckily, the film redeemed itself by saving the dog at the end so he wouldn’t have to bring the film down even more. It’s a shame that the other characters wanted to leave him (Kathy did anyway) but I would expect no less from her. George went back, which was good since it shows that he could have been a good character if not for the mind control.

The soundtrack was better than your average horror film so I guess that’s another positive. Considering when it came out, it’s surprisingly fast paced at times and it’s decently memorable. A horror film having a soundtrack in the first place is pretty surprising and it being a good one even more so. If only we had some good scenes to go along with it.

The spirit’s true form is only shown twice, but he seems like a decently tough demon. He’s pretty large, but he can probably shape shift at will so he will likely look different each time. He would have been a little cooler if he had fought some more, but the budget probably wasn’t there yet unless they used a suit like in the old Godzilla films. That would have been pretty interesting.

Some plot lines never really get time to develop either since the film didn’t know where it was going. We have the Detective who tries to act tough and sneaks around for clues, but he never ends up doing anything. He just abruptly disappears and ends up playing no role in the story. He was just there for filler, nothing more. Another woman is possessed by the spirits and tells them that the well is a gateway to Hell. Okay…I think we could have guessed that when we saw the endless tar coming out of it. What does that have to do with anything? The heroes never decide to close the well and the info didn’t help anyone out. I’m guessing that the original climax would have had the heroes plug it up, but maybe it was written out due to time constraints and a rapidly falling budget.

Overall, The Amityville Horror is not a film that you’ll want to check out anytime soon. The monster design is pretty good and the soundtrack is good as well, but everything else about the film really hit rock bottom. There was only 1 or 2 jump scenes and neither of them worked since we weren’t watching the film in super 3D in the dead of night with speakers that make you shiver with loud noises. The gross scenes will just make you back up a little and George’s plot is extremely wince worthy. The film also gives the Father way too cruel of a fate just so it could make a point that wouldn’t help the film anyway. Burning the cross and effectively destroying the Father…we get the point. (We also can’t forget making the Nun so sick that she has to end up leaving the house almost immediately) It’s hard to tell which negatives pushed my buttons the most to deserve a 1 since there were so many of them and they just kept adding up and up and up. Ah well, at least it was a pretty easy decision. I had the rating set before the film had even ended. While you’re steering clear of this film, just play a scary game like Dirge of Cerberus or take the opposite effect and take this time to rent Megaman Battle Network 5. Either way, you’ll be better off as this film goes into Sucker Punch levels of terrible. If you do watch the film, you should try to make a list of plots and characters that ended up not adding anything to the film.

Overall 1/10

Hide and Seek Review

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Please note that this review is of the edited TV 14 version of the film. All of the writing below should only be addressed to this particular version as the uncut one would likely get an even lower score or the review would just be more negative.
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It’s really no stretch to say that horror films are my least favorite genre. Even romance or comedy films tend to have more heart to them. Of course, there are likely some genres that could go under horror if we really went drastic. (Infinite categories out there. Kaiju films, Space Kaiju Films, Undergeround Kaiju films, etc.) War Documentaries would be pretty close to horror films, but I barely count documentaries as films as it is. A regular War film would still be applicable though and we can’t forget about Zombie films. (Even though they would likely count as horror) I can safely say that this film was even worse than the average horror and it goes to Sucker Punch levels of bad. Can you say a 1 for effort? Let’s see what it did wrong.

First, we need to try to remember the plot that all horror films have. A guy and his daughter decide to move to an abandoned area on the outskirts of New York after the mother dies. Unfortunately, strange things begin to happen. Is the House haunted? Is the Dad crazy? Is the Daughter Possessed? Are there Demons hanging around? Zombies? Ghosts? Plot Holes? Take your pick and then get ready to cringe through the background plot as you await the chills and thrills. The body count is pretty low for most of the film, but the ending decides to quickly change this as the film becomes your average slasher. I definitely got some “I know what you did Last Summer” vibes from the ending since it’s fairly similar. (Then again…I could say that about most horror films!) The main characters are certainly in trouble so this could get deadly.

Well, the cast is pretty small in this film. That’s probably a good thing since most of the characters would have been pretty bad anyway. The main character is Mr. Callaway. I dare say that he’s slightly worse than the average lead for a horror film and that’s saying something. He’s pretty unstable and you don’t know what to expect from him. One second he’s a professional on the mind so he can out psych the daughter through her issues and the next second he’s panicking and running away from her. He needs some more training to say the least. Once the murders begin, he decides to cover them up instead of reporting it to the proper authorities and he’s definitely outmatched against Charlie. There aren’t any likable qualities to Mr. Callaway, but he’s not the only terrible character.

Did I mention that Charlie gets a big role in the film. He’s just as unlikable as Mr. Callaway. He likes to play games and it’s heavily implied that he has super speed or invisibility. He probably has dozens of other powers since horror films like to make their villains unstoppable right? Well, Charlie definitely doesn’t have what it takes to be a cool villain. His character design is pretty awful and he’s also fairly weak so he has to rely on tricks and surprise attacks to win his fights. He certainly didn’t help the film.

Emily is the daughter and she doesn’t help the film. She spends most of it being pretty distant and refusing to talk until she meets Charlie. She did just go through a pretty traumatic accident so we can sympathize with her, but it still doesn’t make her an enjoyable character to see on screen. She’s typically a downer. We find out that Emily does try to help out at certain points and she does well during the ending, but she’s still not what I’d call a very good character. She did have some opportunities to quickly end things although I’m sure that it could have backfired since most of the other characters are slow on the uptake.

We have the Sheriff who looks pretty terrible throughout the film. He wanders into the house during the climax and he knows that there has already been a murder. (More than one, but he only knows about one) So, he goes into the room and the lights turn off. He panics and runs towards the basement…that doesn’t end well. Should I mention that he never even reaches for his gun? This guy must be super confident to be walking into closets and constantly giving his back to every direction.

Catherine is another major in psychology and she proves to be more proficient at it than the main character. She doesn’t get a huge role, but this is a slasher so she does make sure to grab a gun and get involved in the climax. She looks downright terrible during most of it, but she finally gets to land a good hit in the end. She’s easily the best character in the film and it’s too bad that she couldn’t have gotten involved sooner. At least we had one pretty good character right?

We also had some supporting characters that had no point in the film except to be red herrings. So that I don’t spoil which one is the red herring, I shall quickly name 4 side characters. Apologies if it’s obvious who the red herring is, but this isn’t exactly Inception! We have the neighbors Laura and her husband. Laura’s a little overly friendly and she constantly goes to the house while her husband hangs around outside and meets up with the daughter. There’s also another acquaintance who has a daughter and they decide to visit the house as well. It should be noted that both neighbors as well as the mother look pretty much identical and I was wondering if they decided to save the budget by having one actress portray all three. Let’s face it, this film didn’t get a big budget!

Well, that’s basically the cast. If this doesn’t sound like a 1 star film yet, then you have not seen Man of Steel! (Man of Steel’s awesomeness in comparison should show you that this is basically a one star film) One of the numerous negatives in this film is the classic animal violence. Every horror film has it so this one quickly includes it as well. Let’s just say that it’s a cat this time and it’s as sad as you may have expected.

This is a slasher so you can expect a lot of gratuitous violence as well. We get the blood bath tub that seems to be featured prominently in all of the 18 and up slashers. It’s really their calling card I suppose. Other people get slashed and we even have doll violence where the dolls are so grotesquely broken that you have to wonder if it’s even possible. One of the characters really crushes one of them in the span of a few seconds. Sort of like Attack on Titan, this film helps to show us that too much violence can just water down the story.

This next negative is probably a given, but the film is also a downer. There’s a happy ending at the end of course, but it only gets about a minute of screentime while the other events take up the rest of the film. You would have more fun watching the Broncos get blown out of the Super Bowl again and I have to say that the game was pretty painful. (I was rooting for the Broncos) There aren’t any scenes that will make you cheer or even any that will make you smile at all. The whole film is devoid of enjoyment or entertainment.

The final plot twist is pretty generic and not in a good way. Of course, I would have said that the twist was generic if it had ended up being one of the other twists that I had labeled in the beginning. All of those are just stale at this point so none of them are surprising. As expected, the film chose the worst one of the group since that is just continuing with the film’s history of bad choices. The only twist that could have been worse would have been if the red herring was the actual villain because of the plot holes and the idea of such a threat. Nonetheless, this is still a pretty awful second and it didn’t do the film any favors. I should also mention that the film tries to be deep and complex by having a subplot filled with flashbacks and a mysterious waking at 2:06 every morning, but that won’t stop you from snoozing throughout the film and checking your watch.

“Hey, you forgot the positives!” Actually..this film had no positives. It’s one of those films that doesn’t even need to exist. It just takes all the worst tropes of your average horror film and throws them together. On that note, you could say that the film is even worse than Sucker Punch since the other film at least had action scenes, but the worst scenes in Sucker Punch are probably worse than the worst ones here so it’s a dicey showdown. Either way, this is a film that you really just want to see panned by critics and smashed at the Box Office.

Overall, Hide and Seek is as bad as the title would suggest. You’d have a much better time playing Hide and Seek in a one room apartment during the afternoon. I usually give a quick recap of the positives and negatives in this paragraph, but the whole review is basically made up of the negatives so you probably still remember them. This goes without saying, but I strongly recommend staying away from this film. (and horrors/slashers in general) If you want a classy film that’s still pretty scary, I would recommend the 4th Bleach film or even playing a level in Luigi’s Mansion. In the meantime, you’ll be spared from watching this film. Thus, saving you at least 100 minutes of your life that you can use towards racking up trophies on your PS3.

Overall 1/10

2001: A Space Odyssey Review

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Have you ever seen a film that made you go to sleep? No, I’m not talking about the Lord of the Rings! 2001: A Space Odyssey surpasses that film in that category as the scenes are even more stretched out and the film runs for around the same amount of time. With less plot than a Saturday Morning Cartoon; A main character that makes Alex Hopper look like Tom Cruise; and an ending that would make Inception viewers cringe….we have this film! I hope that you’ve prepared yourself accordingly because watching this film is basically like throwing hours of your life out the window.

What is the plot? The film never figured that out so it’s barely worth mentioning. The first plot is about animal violence and how we descended from Apes. The Apes learned to destroy each other until they managed to become as brutal as the modern humans. After that, we go to David Bowman as he goes to the board meeting. It’s a big conspiracy between the members as they can’t let the press find out what they’re about to do. This journey will be dangerous after all so they convince everyone that there is a plague on board. David takes Frank and Hal 9000 as they head off into the great unknown. However, nothing is as it seems and the humans eventually start to distrust Hal 9000. Obviously, there is only room for one type of being so now they will have to fight. Man vs Machine!

It’s like watching a bad sci-fi film that doesn’t know if it wants to be a thriller, a political film, or a thematic sensation. As a result, the story telling is very convoluted and nothing makes sense. The writing makes the Amazing Spider Man 2 look amazing and it makes the Lord of The Rings appear to be a thrill a minute in comparison. It’s no shock to say that I’m giving this film a single star and it would be hard to say where that star came from. (Or not, Hal 9000 was pretty epic after all) Let’s quickly talk about the characters since there really aren’t many to talk about.

David Bowman is the main lead of the film, but it won’t matter all that much by the end since he has no real personality to speak of. He’s pretty careful around the news reporters, which is good and he doesn’t really gossip. He’s pretty much a no nonsense character and he seems to be pretty reasonable. Did he get a little too drastic in his plan to get Hal 9000? That’s something we’ll discuss later on. Overall, I would actually say that Bowman was a decently good main character. He was very bland and he didn’t have much of a personality, but that also meant that he didn’t really have time to make many mistakes. I can’t say that he fell into any character holes. He’s a perfectly acceptable main character.

Frank Poole is his friend/co worker. You could say that he’s a more aggressive version of David Bowman. Bowman never really voices his opinion about Hal 9000 being dangerous until Frank suggests that they take him out. Bowman was hinting at it, but he was very indecisive and he seemed to want Frank’s agreement before even suggesting it. Frank isn’t subtle like that and everything he does is direct. Because of this, Frank ends up being more likable than David and he’s the best human character in the film. Going outside when the ship is a suspect may be a little….optimistic at best, but every character makes a big error at some point right? Frank Poole was definitely a good character.

Hal 9000 is the big villain of the film. He’s famous and everyone knows about Hal 9000. Despite this, Hal 9000 isn’t actually a very big player. His screen time is a lot shorter than I would have thought. Despite this, Hal 9000 is still as sinister as I had pictured. You really can’t get past his sarcastic voice. “Hello Dave” “I can’t do that Dave” are some of his lines and Hal 9000 never lets up. He has nothing but contempt for humanity and it really shows. I can definitely see why he was remembered since he was one of the only really good things about the film. Right down to the end, Hal 9000’s voice will give you the chills and his end is probably where the film should have ended.

Unfortunately, the film did not end! After that, we just get a lot of scenes that don’t really have any relevance to them. There are a lot of meta readings that you can take from the scenes, but you can also just go to sleep and let the film end on its own. The problem with trying to have a lot of symbolic interpretations is that there is no correct answer. Once you put out a vague ending, the viewer can name any ending that they please and it won’t really be wrong. Thus, there really isn’t a point anymore. The film had no point and that’s one of the saddest parts. We never really begin to like the main characters so there isn’t a sense of relief at the end.

The whole film is really dragged out. The first 5-8 minutes of the film are pure darkness and we even have an intermission with more darkness. The final 15-20 minutes just consist of random oceans and other locations where we can appreciate the view. If I wanted a good view, then I’d pop in my Homer Price dvd and check out the realistic donuts! The main character eventually goes insane and that basically represents the audience by this point. I think it’s safe to say that you’ll lose interest before the halfway mark of the film anyway, but this would throw you off if you were still on board. Even eating a sandwich can take a while in this film as they slowly go for the food and they take forever to finish it. Don’t worry, they silently jog afterwards to burn off the calories. Another example of how the film is dragged out is the conversation with the media. “I’m not at liberty to discuss this” is something that the main character says when they try to get information out of him. What’s his next line? The same exact thing! The writers were just grasping at straws at that point as they just wanted to drag out the dialogue as much as possible. The characters make sure to cough and take deep breaths so that they can stop themselves from replying for a little longer. The camera also has a little lag to it so the scenes end up staying on the screen for longer than necessary. Not that we could expect anything less from this film!

Okay, we’ve established that the film is boring right? I could keep on mentioning this fact and give more examples, but I think you get the point. Still, that can’t be enough to give it a 1 right? Even the Lord of the Rings scored higher than that! Well, one big hole that the film charged into was the classic case of animal violence. Yes, there is animal violence in a space film that is about man vs machines. Why is animal violence present? Because the film forgot what it was about!

The first half hour or so is about a group of monkeys massacring each other. That’s it….there’s no plot, no point, and no fun. It’s just about the animals hurting each other and maturing into humans. It’s essentially a silent film at this stage and it makes the silent scenes of the Arthur tv show look profound and relevant. By this point in the film, I already had a sneaking suspicion that the film could not score above a three. Little did I know that it would never rise up from this error.

The end of the film is all about being trippy and we have a lot of inverted colors and random events that occur. You keep waiting for something to happen and it never does so you’re left with an empty feeling. This is why you shouldn’t make a film very crazy looking just so that you can try to win some awards and get recognition for being unique. Using the tried and true formula of the Mario Bros film would be much better.

Now, should the humans have decided to destroy/dismantle Hal 9000 and his upper functions? He did make a mistake with the satellite, but was it really on purpose as part of some conspiracy? I definitely think that he was trying to cover up his mistake as the film went on, but I don’t think he would have felt that it was necessary to murder the whole crew if Bowman and Frank hadn’t discussed their plan. (Talking in front of a window is never a really smart thing to do) It just seemed like the humans were a little rash in their thinking. Hal 9000 may have been in error, but he didn’t seem to be malicious. There were possibly some veiled threats in his dialogue with the main characters and if he’s so smart…then the mistake had to be intentional right? Nonetheless, while there are some doubts as to what side Hal 9000 was on, they should have given him a chance. At least wait until they’re back on the ground to disable him. Going on the offensive just wasn’t a wise thing to do in their situation. Then, sending out Frank to put the satellite back in place? That’s just asking for trouble. I can’t say with complete confidence that deciding to work with Hal 9000 would have helped them out in the end, but I do think that he wouldn’t have turned completely evil. (Not so quickly anyway)

Overall, 2001: A Space Odyssey is a lot worse than you may have guessed from the cover. There isn’t much of a plot and the events that could have taken 30-40 minutes end up stretching to around 3 hours. The director really wanted this film to be long so he used every artificial technique that he could think of to keep the film going. Because of this, over a third of the film consists of pointless aerial shots or stills of the characters thinking. The intro with the animals is also pointless and the ending doesn’t add anything to the film. The only part with any meat to it was the battle against Hal and that was all too brief. Stay away from this film and all of its animal violence. You would have more fun watching paint dry or taking a nap. The only slight positive would be the main characters, but that’s really not enough to save such a long film. This film may be known as a classic, but I’ll just know it as the film that was more tedious than Lord of the Rings. Watch the latest Star Trek film if you want a good spaceship film.

Overall 1/10

Conquest of The Planet of The Apes Review

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It’s time for the Apes to return and you can tell that there will be a lot of action in this one based off of the title. That is usually a good thing, but not necessarily for this series. After the last film where the series managed to briefly rise up, this one definitely shot it right back down. Why did this film not succeed when it had so much potential? That’s what we’re about to find out!

The world has changed since the last film and around 10+ years have passed. Dogs and Cats were eliminated from the Earth by a plague and humans decided to take in Apes as pets. (Obviously, they ignored the warnings that this is how the Ape dominion would start) Unfortunately, America then decides to use them as slaves and Milo finds out about this. He switches his name to Caesar and decides to overthrow the humans, but can such a bold conquest really work? That’s the plot for this film. I’ll get into all of the negatives in a moment, but let’s look at the character roster first since it’s so small.

Caesar is the main character of the film and his main goal is to save the Apes. It’s a noble goal, but accomplishing it will be difficult. He starts off by helping the Apes make a mockery of the humans by messing up in their tasks, but it’s not enough. He needs to completely stop their tyrannical rule. Unfortunately, he basically cracks by the end as he decides to destroy all of the humans before enslaving them. It doesn’t look like things will be changing anytime soon and one race will end up enslaved no matter who wins. I also can’t say that I liked Caesar’s plans, but more on that in a minute. Nontheless, Caesar is still better than most of the other apes.

MacDonald is one of the only guys who’s on the heroes side of things. He doesn’t believe in slavery, but there’s not much that he can do about it while in the system. He tries to help out whenever possible, which is good. Unfortunately, it can also be a little sad seeing him since you know that he has no chance of stopping this through peace. War is the only thing that General Breck and his men will understand at this point.

Governor Breck is the main villain of the film. He really believes that the Apes pose a threat to the human race and he really wants to see them enslaved. He’s basically against all Apes and he takes great satisfaction in their imprisonment. He’s a rather petty villain who is definitely not very enjoyable. He needs some more charisma and character development in order to be a good villain. His final speech is also pretty nonsensical as he turns into a philosopher and explains that people only dislike the Apes because they see their dark side in them. I don’t think anyone will really buy that. If only the President was still around to save the day.

Armando is the circus owner from the last film and he’s a good guy. He probably shouldn’t have gone back to meet with the police, but he was basically doomed either way. It’s really Caesar’s fault that things got dicey for Armando, but something had to happen I suppose. Armando was definitely one of the more likable characters in the film and at least he put up a fight against the police. He does have his human rights to think of after all and nobody was going to stop him! The film could have been better if he had lasted a little longer.

The soundtrack definitely isn’t that good. The opening scene is mostly lolz worthy as we get a fairly comedic tune as we see Apes performing all kinds of tasks. A tragic piece of music would have been more appropriate. What’s worse is that the scene takes a very long time to end. It keeps on going and going until you wonder how long this song can actually be. The film finally starts, but it wasn’t a big improvement. Time to see why the film wasn’t that good for me…or rather, why it was pretty bad.

The slavery aspect would definitely be the first part. There’s no way that America would fall so low. Of course, that’s optimistic, but it’s hard to picture America allowing slavery in any form. We just finished getting rid of it so bringing it back for the Apes would not make sense. That was part of the main plot and it was pretty bad. That was definitely a bad sign for the film since the slavery wasn’t going to disappear as the film went on. Maybe a few people would believe that Apes would destroy us all, but certainly not the majority. Only conspirators could possible believe this and it is still taken so seriously.

Another part would be how cruel the people are to the Apes. It doesn’t make economic sense to train them all to do these tasks when they just end up doing it sloppily and are forced to go back for more training. What’s the point of using these Apes for the task? The film explains that they are really useful in some areas, but it never shows us any of them. All we see is the fact that the Apes aren’t really good at any of the tasks because the humans won’t bother tho show them anything. If anything, it takes longer to do everything when you have to worry about apes making a mistake or doing something incorrectly.

Building off of this, the scenes also drag on for too long. We get that the humans are really mean to the Apes so we don’t need to keep on seeing it. At one point, the humans lead Caesar through a lab where we see how the Apes are conditioned. They get practice on how to get beaten up without fighting back, how to get burned to stop being frightened of the fire, and how to get zapped for no real reason except to make them fear humans. These scenes are pretty terrible and they guaranteed that the film was going to get a low rating. The sheer amount of animal violence in the film is off the charts. The Apes don’t typically count as the same kind of animal violence as an average dog or a cat would, but things change in this film. Most of the apes are normal apes now so they are back to totally being animals so all of the scenes are pretty relentless. If you’ve been reading my reviews long enough then you’ll know that animal violence is an instant no no. Viewers shouldn’t have to put up with that and it’s bad enough that Lassie is a fan favorite..

Meanwhile, the acting hasn’t gotten any better. The humans are all right of course, but the Apes still seem very fake. They’ll glare at each other and move really slowly at times for the drama. You almost feel like chuckling when Caesar glares at the Apes from the shadows. The suits definitely need a lot of work, but that kind of work takes time so I wouldn’t expect it to get much better in the sequel. We can hope of course….we can hope.

I also need to criticize Caesar’s military tactics. He’s never fought a war of course, but I expect better out of him. He uses some of the Apes as pawns as he gets many of them to mess up in their duties so they are sent to his base. After they launch the assault, Caesar definitely didn’t count on the villains having guns. The whole army walks right towards them and the complete slaughter of his troops is prevented by the humans hesitating before firing. Most of them still go down quickly and the others only manage to stay upright through plot convenience. The fire plan definitely didn’t do the Apes any wonders. Maybe it’s time for Caesar to step down as leader eh?

By the end, he basically admits that the Apes are doomed for a while and that they’ll have to wait until World War Three to strike again. I guess that means that the Apes involved in this rebellion are probably all doomed. Well, maybe they’ll be able to stay in hiding or something until the tensions die down, but it’ll be tough.

It almost goes without saying that the fight scenes were poorly done as well. We get a lot of Apes tackling humans and vice versa as they wrestle around for a while. The camera makes sure to keep on shifting from side to side and all around so that we get to see many fight scenes instead of focusing on any of them. It becomes rather chaotic and since we can’t root for either side, it’s rather boring. I still don’t buy the fact that any of the Apes lived when the humans had so many guns at the ready. Talk about getting one shotted….

Overall, This is definitely another bad installment in the Apes franchise. It may not have been quite as bad as the second film, but this is certainly open to debate. There was nothing good about this film once again and the characters were unlikable. I liked the circus owner and MacDonald was okay, but they weren’t strong enough to hold up a whole film. The massive amounts of animal violence mixed with the sheer dullness of the film ensured that this would not be an enjoyable experience. I definitely do not recommend checking this film out and you would be better watching a retro episode of the Andy Griffith show. I can only hope that the final installment in this series is better than this one. How can it be worse or even on the same level right? Well, that’s what I thought after the second film…

Overall 1/10

Beneath The Planet of the Apes Review

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I’ve never liked the Planet of the Apes franchise. It wasn’t terrible, but the films just weren’t for me. I mean, a series where the main villains are Apes? This will inevitably lead to humans shooting apes and apes shooting people so the films were doomed from the start. Even the new Dawn of the Planet of the Apes looks pretty bad if you ask me. However, even I was not expecting this film to be quite as bad as it was. It actually ranks up there with Sucker Punch…and that’s definitely not a good thing!

The plot takes place shortly after the first film. Taylor and Nova are still aimlessly wandering about. One day, Taylor sees a big fire so he jumps into a mountain, but the mountain wasn’t actually there and he must have met a sad end. Nova moves on with her life and treks across the planet until she finds a guy by the name of Brent. Brent crash landed on this planet along with another guy, but the futureshock was too much for him. (That’s what Judge Dredd calls it anyway) He quickly dies so Brent decides to go with Nova to find out what’s going on. Unfortunately, the Apes still want to conquer the world so Brent runs away, but he’s quickly captures. His only chance is to get off of this planet or to find some more humans who have a mind. The sad thing is…Brent’s doomed either way!!

It’s hard to know where to begin describing this “film.” We may as well go in a semi chronological order. The first scene that you’ll have to wince at is when Brent’s partner wakes up. We get several minutes of Brent telling him to stay alive as he tries to help the poor guy. The guy won’t hear any of it and he loudly exclaims that everyone he knew is dead. That’s pretty obvious since they’ve time traveled 2000 years into the future and Brent doesn’t seem to care. The guy just dies and you have to wonder why he was so weak willed. He was a pretty sad character.

We aren’t given a break either as the next scene involves Nova coming to help. This scene was pretty terrible since it feels like 20 minutes of Brent trying to talk to her. The problem is that Nova doesn’t believe in showing emotion and since she can’t talk and only has limited hearing…it makes discussion difficult. The two of them just stare at each other in awe as they can’t communicate and Brent finally jumps on the horse. The horse looked exhausted after a few steps and I felt bad for him.

Things don’t really get any better as the Ape scenes were pretty boring. Skipping along, the next sad moment was when the Horses started to get shot. This occurs throughout the movie and it was pretty awful. Classic animal violence is something that is common in the Ape films and that’s just too bad. The Apes themselves look so fake that I don’t really count them for the most part, but the horses are definitely enough!

After that, SPOILER ALERT……………………………………………They find a human colony and some more wince worthy scenes follow. The humans have advanced ESP and they attempt to force Brent to drown Nova. After a terrible scene, Brent regains control and heads into the enemy base. They beat him up using their mind abilities while telling him that they are peaceful. In particular, a guy by the name of Ongaro seems to despise humans as he continues to blast Brent. They use their mind abilities to try and make Brent destroy Taylor as well and the two of them have a boring fight. The film wasn’t even two hours and it felt like a millenia.

Another factor of the film that didn’t help was the random violence that jumped out towards the end. It was pretty over the top towards the end as someone gets violently impaled and another one gets shot to death in a graphic fashion. We see live apes burning to death in one scene and even though it is an illusion, it is a realistic one. The statue also begins to bleed a lot and we can’t forget Brent and Taylor’s fight as they keep throwing each other into the spikes. (Well, Brent was getting pummeled the whole time so he didn’t really get a chance) I dare say that this film is much more violent than the two newest Ape films in theaters partially due to the effects. This amount of blood usually doesn’t pore out so quickly and it’s due to the difference in special effects.

Brent is the new main character of the film and I can’t say that he’s very likable. Maybe for the first few minutes, but he died once Nova came along. He is very weak willed as shown when the telepathy people came along. Brent isn’t much of a fighter as he got pummeled a lot and he just seems to be very rude whenever he talks to anyone.

Nova isn’t any better than the first film. It would be good if she could at least react when someone was talking to her or a sound was made, but she’s just lifeless the whole time. Her scenes just aren’t fun to watch and while she does get a big “hero” moment, it’s not very cool and it’s a little too expected.

Taylor is from the first film, but he doesn’t get a huge role and he basically goes out while begging for help. He made an interesting call as he fell down and that was cool, but I can’t really forget how he was weak against mind control as well. Jumping into the mountain was also pretty risky and he had a gun with him so he should have had the edge against any opponent.

Ongaro is the antagonistic human who likes to mess with the primitive humans. He blasts them with his mind for fun and he likes to watch them destroy each other. He claims to be a peaceful person, but you can tell that it’s all fake. He’s just lying to them because he finds it to be fun.

Dr. Zaius isn’t really likable either. He refuses to help the main characters because they cause a lot of destruction as he helps the Apes murder everyone in sight. He doesn’t like to oppose authority and he believes that everything should stay the same. He doesn’t have any ambition in him and he’s pretty weak willed.

Mendez is basically a joke the entire time. He has a nuclear weapon at his disposal and he’s ready to use it against the Apes. The problem is that he waits until they enter his room so they shoot him down before he has time to use it. That’s extremely sloppy and he basically died for no good reason. He didn’t really have a point in the story since he was just going to stand there and die.

Ursus is the leader of the Ape military and he doesn’t really have a point in this film as well. He talks tough and he wants to help end a famine before it begins so he goes into the forbidden zone. There was not any food to be found so you could say that it was a wasted effort anyway. He may be the leader, but he is very interchangeable. He only got a handful of lines and he bit the big one in a very quick fight.

Zira is mostly there to rebel against the government, but she never does anything about it. She’s really all talk and gets written out of the film very quickly. It’s good to talk to the government and try to change them, but she has absolutely no political power so her efforts were doomed from the start. Her husband tries to talk her out of her plans as well, but Zira does get a chance to be leader for a few hours so we’ll see what she does about it…or not.

The soundtrack is nonexistent in this film. It’s too bad since that could have ever so slightly helped the film, but we can’t even have that I suppose. The special effects are pretty bad as well, but this film is ancient so one can overlook that. The photoshopped fire…..it burrrrrns!

Another thing that hurts the film is the fact that the characters aren’t likable. It’s a classic tale of how everyone has been corrupted. The Apes worship their idols and the humans have forgotten God and they now worship a rocket. The humans are completely evil and likewise with the Apes so it’s a lose/lose situation. It’s why the ending was one of the only ways that could have helped the film. It was a good ending (Last 2 seconds anyway) but it couldn’t really help in the end. (Too bad this film got a sequel eh?) I can’t say that I expected the humans to look That bad. Their scenes are also pretty unnecessarily gross as their faces are rotted and they all look like a pile of veins. It’s not pretty and you almost have to exit the room when they appear on screen.

I’m also not crazy about the setting. It’s basically a big desert and the landscape is primitive. Because of this, the heroes don’t wear much and they’re barefoot. Personally, that kind of thing has always bothered me and the acting is horrendous for everyone as well. Every character is constantly grinning, but their face looks like they’re in pain. I’m guessing that the actors were told to grin and squint as if the sun was shining very brightly upon them. It definitely didn’t help from a viewer’s perspective as it just made the scenes that much harder to watch.

Overall, This is easily one of the worst films that I have ever seen. There is not a single redeemable quality about the film and it was painful from start to finish. None of the characters were likable, The Setting was bad, The action was boring, and the violence was really there for no reason. I highly recommend avoiding this film and don’t let the G rating fool you. This is easily PG-13 stuff by the end and the 90 or so minutes of the film actually ends up feeling like a Lord of The Rings movie. This is just one of those films that you should just take a pass on. If you want a good future story, then check out Yugioh 3D Bonds Beyond Time. That film has heart and passion…two qualities that this film could have used. At the very least, I’m sure that the rest of the Apes films cannot be as bad as this one.

Overall 1/10

The Lone Ranger Review

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Ah, the Lone Ranger…..this was a franchise that I could never get into. Despite the fact that the comics tend to get good reviews, they always looked pretty bad to me. The movie didn’t really look any better as it mixes the things that I don’t like in films together. The fact that it’s a wild west film and that there are no likable characters (Yes, I can tell when there were no likable characters from the trailers!) were not signs of hope for me. The only viewable entertainment that was able to pull off the whole “Wild West” aspect was Trigon and the best parts of that show don’t even take place in that setting. (Ex: Final battle is in a garden…a Garden!!!!!)

Anyway, back to the movie. Before I reveal that Spoiler Alert the whole thing is actually a fairy tale told by an old man who hangs out at a museum, I need to mention that the Lone Ranger is fake in this film. The real main character is a little kid who buys peanuts for sale and then goes to the museum to check out the exhibits. Sooooooo…….the whole movie is a story that may or may not be real, but let’s ignore that and just enjoy the story for what it is. End Spoiler

The Lone Ranger starts off his “epic” film debut by throwing a poor girl’s toy out the window. It’s not the greatest start and was probably the tipping point of the film. It all went downhill from there as he ran after the crooks while a lot of happenstance took place. Believe it or not….but the cops had arrested a villain for a change, but they tied him up right over a gun and his hands are barely cuffed so he was able to put it in his coat. Now, we know that there are traitors everywhere because according to this movie, everyone is basically evil until proven innocent. The army is able to be bought off with silver. I can’t even….

Even if you consider the fact that the traitor put the gun there and set him up, how did they manage to put him right over it? That’s some serious coincidence and the traitor putting him on that seat is still a little iffy. If the cops weren’t so drunk on power and beer, they would have stopped him as he was opening the floorboard. Still, we mustn’t get distracted just yet! I’ve barely mentioned the plot within the plot. One thing leads to another and the Lone Ranger dies. Tonto saves him and they decide to have a blast and beat people up as they head off to their destiny and avenge the Lone Ranger’s bro.

It’s not much of a plot description, but I hadn’t the heart to keep on going. Just think of a really generic plot and you’ll have figured this movie out. Honestly, I’d compare it to the likes or Pirates of the Carrabean and Sucker Punch which is a really (really) sad thing. This is probably Disney’s worst film of all time and easily one of the worst films that I’ve seen. It made the mistake of having the three big Vs. Animal Violence, (Every other minute it felt like. Horses, Rabbits, and a lot of other animals die as the film goes on) Gross Violence, (One of the characters is a cannibal….yeah, Disney went there) and Excessive Violence. (Back to the cannibal and every other fighting scene. Nearly every fight would have a scene or two that is not necessary and just makes the whole scene a lot more violent and unwatchable. Seriously, the film has absolutely no replay value and I deeply hope that they don’t make a sequel)

It’s hard to think of the film without wincing. It’s like the film was mocking the very essence of my being as I sat there and winced through the 2+ hour film that was incinerating every piece of morale that films had. I can’t think of anything that it did right. The main character is pretty weak, generic, and unheroic. The girl that he likes was married to his brother and he basically starts flirting with her (Right in front of his bro btw) as soon as he sees her. I knew that he would be an unlikable character right at that moment.

Let’s not forget his partner, Tonto. Tonto is pretty annoying as well and he has quite a few moments that will make you grimace. The “steralized” arrow comes to mind and you may need a barf bag for this film. The film isn’t as gross as the humor in Pirates, but there are times when it comes very close. There is also a lot of jumping in this film as we go to the “future” and the “past” and then back to the “present” Quotations must be used because we must remember that this is not as it appears. (See, spoiler paragraph for details)

Writing about this film is easy since everything is a negative, but that’s also why it’s tough for me to stay on one topic for long. My review may seem a little scattered as I jump from one point to another, but there’s so much to cover that I just don’t want to miss anything. Needless to say, there isn’t anything redeemable about this film.

Need I go on? The characters are all bad, the film is excessively violent, this film is not suitable for…anyone since I highly do not recommend the film. If you want to see something even remotely cool or fun, go watch an episode of Blues Clues. At least you’ll likely learn something in the process. All that you can learn in this film is what not to do. Seriously, someone jumps off of a very fast train at least 10+ feet to another train and he lands on a bunch of Silver Rocks. Not only is the character okay, but he’s not hurt in the slightest. I usually would have taken a step back for something like that, but I expected no less from the film.

I’m not sure how much more I can really say. Just…do not watch it. Spare yourself and just watch anything else. Maybe take a stroll in your backyard and play with your Dog. You can also go check out the 1 star reviews for the film on various sites and you can have a good laugh. It’s something that I enjoy doing as well! I hope that I’ve reached you all in time before you got to see the film. Who knows, maybe some of you would like it….but don’t count on it! This is the worst film that I’ve seen since Sucker Punch and that’s saying something. Hollywood is truly going downhill. (I refer to any Live Action Film as a “Hollywood” product if it’s from America…just saiyan)

Overall 1/10

Psycho Review

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Psycho is a pretty famous movie from Hitchcock and it’s pretty legendary. Unfortunately, it’s one of those films where the hype is definitely more intense than the film. This is essentially a horror/slasher film that plays out as you would expect most of those too go. The only difference is that there is no twist ending involved, which probably wouldn’t have hurt. I’ve never watched a good slasher film and I doubt that there is such a thing, but this is definitely Hitchcock’s worst film. He should stick to the murder mysteries, but let’s jump to the plot!

The film opens up with an awful scene involving Marion and Sam which should quickly start the warning bells in your head. Once she leaves, Marion goes to her nice ole job where people throw lots of money around. One look at that money is enough to corrupt Marion and she quickly gets out of town and decides to head to a private island. This is obviously the only course of action for her by this point and she makes it a point to act as suspicious as she can. She even falls asleep at the road and quickly starts to act like a criminal. She decides to stop at an abandoned motel to spend the night. At least the landlord seems nice and he’s got a nice mother…what could possibly go wrong!?

If you’ve seen any sort of slasher film, then you can probably guess where the film will go from here. Norman Bates is the main villain of this story and the fact that he believes in animal violence should have helped the main character realize this. Unlike Jason or Freddy, Norman isn’t much of a fighter and he relies on the fact that his opponents are either kids or people who are not ready to fight or have any experience in it. He also takes any opportunity to land a cheap shot in. There are no likable characters in this film so don’t hold your breath for one of them to make a solid decision!

One of the main problems with this film is the fact that there doesn’t seem to be a point to the whole thing. The villain murders people and the heroes don’t know what to do. The cycle repeats and repeats until it’s about time for the climax. There was an unnecessarily long shower scene that was really awful and the opening scene did no wonders for the romance section. If you cut out both of those scenes, then the film is a lot better, but it still would have been doomed in the long run.

We’ve already established why Marion and Norman were both pretty bad characters. Marion got corrupted very easily which wasn’t a good thing. Norman made the mistake of being a psycho and he wasn’t a likable character while he was acting either. He’s just your average mass murderer, just take away the part where he’s actually tough. Lila wasn’t much better as she talked tough, but froze up when the going got tough. I disliked Sam from the start and he never turned out to be a good character.

The police officer could have been a solid character, but he failed in the end. I was actually liking him until he just stopped appearing. He just got written out of the script and vanished. The Sherrif wasn’t very smart and the guy whose money was stolen in the first place was pretty bad as well. Let’s skip the rest of the characters and just remember that they’re pretty bad.

Long story short, this is definitely not a film that I recommend. It was very close to getting a 1/10 for a while, but by the end, the detective was so awful that I had to raise it to a 2. The scene was just so inaccurate that it raised the score. As I mentioned earlier, the film just didn’t have any point to it and it was like watching paint dry. What’s the point in the end? This is a film that has 0 replay value as well. If you want to watch a true film, then check out Yugioh 3D Bonds Beyond Time!

Overall 2/10

Whatever Happened To Baby Jane Review

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Whatever Happened To Baby Jane is an old movie that got plenty of good reviews. Upon checking it out, the only question I have is..What!? This has got to be one of the worst movies that I’ve ever seen. (It still beats Sucker Punch….barely) I can’t even….well, let’s talk about the plot first.

Jane was a pretty popular actor when she was a kid and stole the spotlight. She was pretty mean to the rest of the family let the fame go to her head. Her sister Blanche was pretty sad about this, but she got her chance for fame in the upcoming years. While Jane was forgotten, Blanche became a really popular actress. Eventually, they both retired and Blanche was in a car “accident” that caused her to lose the ability to walk. Now, Jane has decided to make Blanche’s life miserable and that’s the plot of the film.

This could have worked as a 5 minute short, but as a whole movie, it just couldn’t last. The cast of the film was pretty awful and there aren’t any decent characters in the film. They’re all really slow on the ball and can’t seem to piece two and two together. Jane is pretty psychotic and Blanche isn’t smart enough to call for help. Elvira lets the main villain get a hold of a hammer and the neighbors never get to help. Edwin gets drunk and is far too slow to be of any real help.

Now, the film was definitely going to get a pretty negative score as it dragged on, but the unnecessary animal violence was going too far. The film didn’t have many points left to lose, but that helped the film drop to rock bottom. There is a plot twist at the end of the film that doesn’t help matters. Also, one of the characters literally gets away with murder. The villain isn’t even arrested at the end. (I like to think that she was, but it’s never shown which isn’t very fulfilling)

In the end, films are meant to make you have a good time. They’re a form of entertainment, so if you aren’t entertained, then the film is failing. This film won’t have any scenes that will make you smile, or even any scenes that will make you care for the characters. It’s supposed to be a pretty tragic film, but there just wasn’t any point in the end. It’s like watching paint dry on the wall. Even Twilight has the occasional fight scene or trash talking scene.

Overall, this is a film that I strongly don’t recommend. It’s very long and not that exciting. Animal lovers should also beware and if you’re looking to rent this film to watch, it won’t be a very enjoyable experience. If you’re looking to find out which classics are overrated, then check it out, but make sure that you have a video game or book with you. On the bright side, anything that you watch afterwards will seem exciting in comparison!

Overall 1/10