Category Archives: 6 Star Movies

The Legend of Zorro Review

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When you watch a Zorro film, ordinarily you’re expecting the hero to look pretty good. Unfortunately that is not the case here as Zorro has his worst film appearance yet. The film itself isn’t bad but yeah it’s going to be a bit hard to get around that and the romance is absolutely abysmal here. Definitely one of the worst romances you will have seen in quite a while here. None of the characters look even remotely decent by the end of it.

The story starts with Zorro taking names and saving the day as per usual. Unfortunately his wife Elena is not happy with how much time Zorro spends away from the family. So they end up divorcing and Zorro gets super depressed. Fast forward to some time later and Elena has quickly rebounded with the wealthy Armand. She can now live a life of luxury with a man who will devote all of his time to her. Zorro is very jealous about this but it’s hard to defeat this guy. Zorro has become a bit of a drunk and Armand seems to be good at everything. Hopefully Armand turns out to be evil or something…or Zorro might be doomed.

I should also mention that Zorro and Elena had a kid which makes the divorce that much worse. The kid gets quite a bit of screentime and tends to be rather annoying. You have to try and watch his scenes as though the film is a complete comedy like his opening action scene where he defeats his teacher in a fencing battle. He straight up takes down a full adult and it’s meant to be real impressive. It’s more of a groanworthy scene. The fact that the kid can fight automatically makes him better than the average kid but he didn’t really need to be here.

Outside of the opening action scene which is admittedly very solid, don’t expect much from Zorro either here. The whole middle part of the film is him making a fool out of himself. Getting dunked on by Armand, allowing himself to be the butt of the joke like in the maid scene, and generally just looking very petty. He didn’t really give Elena any good reasons to go back to him. We finally get some fun Zorro action in the climax and even Elena gets a fight but it feels really late for that.

Part of the problem here is that the film has a number of plot twists to unveil but you immediately know that none of them are going to salvage Zorro’s character. Even if he doesn’t exactly know how things escalated with him and Elen so much, he should have been the bigger man and done some digging. Confront her and get to the bottom of the issue/find out if the problem is really that he is Zorro. As for Elena, the twists don’t help her at all. Lets just say it involves blackmail and then she has plans of her own but none of them really excuse her deciding to just leave Zorro in the dark.

In a perfect world they could have been teaming up the whole time. There would need to be significant changes to the plan of course but it could have worked and made both of them look good. Instead they just look really bad and Armand ends up looking a lot better. There’s a particularly embarrassing scene where Zorro is hiding behind some vegetables and thinks he has an opening so he walks over to Elena. Naturally he was not subtle and Armand caught him.

You’re going to be cringing really hard on Zorro’s behalf here. It’s crazy character assassination and I don’t think I need to go into detail on why this makes the romance really bad. Zorro and Elena’s bond was apparently weaker than you ever could have imagined for this whole story to take place. I also think to an extent the whole romance drama was added because the main plot wasn’t going to be enough to hold people’s attention. You have some drama over the states and the civil war approaching but it’s all rather boring. The villains are fairly generic and the plot just doesn’t have much life to it.

So I don’t blame the movie for putting the romance as the main focus but it absolutely could have given the characters some more dignity in the process. The film’s fight scenes are good enough where you feel like the movie should have leaned into that a whole lot more. With all of the big fight scenes this could have been an absolutely great film. Maybe actually build up to Zorro being too obsessive with sopping criminals to make Elena’s problem appear to be more valid. It’s always going to be a tough sell because he is saving lives throughout but it can be done. Maybe he starts to go too far or something.

As for the villains, well you’ve got a classic heel with Armand here. Whether he ends up being evil or not, play him up as the big antagonist. Someone who is a total jerk and taking everything that Zorro wants but without giving Zorro a way to take him down. He keeps his hands clean on the surface which makes Zorro more and more frustrated. The building blocks were all there to make this a really fun film. Then just write the kid out and you’re really all set.

Overall, The Legend of Zorro is a film that is fun to watch but you can definitely tell that it should have been a lot better. At times it does aim a little too young and goes with the easy jokes. The pacing is good though and the movie does feel like it really flies by. So you can see that there was a lot of effort put into this one, the priorities just weren’t always where they should have been. I’d still recommend checking the movie out but if you really like Zorro as a character…be warned that his appearance here is a bit diferent.

Overall 6/10

Road House (2024) Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

I saw the original Road House not too long ago so now it was time to see if the remake could win. You never really know with these things but in this case I can safely say that it wasn’t even all that close. This one was just the better film all around. It’s certainly not amazing or anything like that but just had a better time, a more fun atmosphere, and certainly a more satisfying ending.

The movie starts off by showing us how Dalton is such a feared fighter that nobody wants to battle against him. Well, it seems to be part of an elaborate scam as well but the point is that he’s good at what he does. At this point he has hit rock bottom though thanks to some dicey moments in his past. Just when he’s about to end it all, he gets invited to be a bouncer at the most dangerous club in America. Dalton agrees to take on the job but it turns out to be even more dangerous than he would have guessed. He is outnumbered and the rowdy folks have guns. Can he really protect everyone?

Now make no mistake, Dalton would be dead in 5 minutes if the villains were serious. They constantly run up to him in close quarters so he can slap away their guns or get sloppy from long range. In a hand to hand fight he can certainly mess them up but these guys have the cops in their pocket and have a ton of clout. Enough where they could have easily just made him disappear in a night instead of going through the whole show. So we’ve got a whole lot of plot armor here but it doesn’t take away from the film being pretty fun.

Dalton is one of those supremely confident fighters who always has a smirk on his face. He tries to pretend that he isn’t a big shot but it’s a rather half hearted attempt where he keeps just enough of a smirk to know that he’s not serious. He’s probably not someone you can count on as a reliable friend but he does a good job of protecting the bar. You just can’t expect him to essentially be taking on an entire town’s worth of villains trying to break the doors down.

The one time you will probably think he sold out on the heroes is when he is having a drink near the end while everyone is getting absolutely destroyed by the villains. One guy gets his head slammed into a counter, another is getting his arm broken, etc. All the while Dalton is just watching. That part didn’t really make any sense. His counterpart, Knox is on the other side beating everyone up and Dalton is just watching?

When you have a battle between two forces and each one has one alpha fighter, they have to take each other out of the equation. If one has their top fighter going up against the middle ones, then of course it is going to end very badly. I otherwise didn’t blame Dalton for wanting to leave midway because this did seem like a never ending fight that was not going to go his way.

In this film, Dalton also doesn’t have any real backup. He has to handle everything himself which isn’t easy. At first when Knox showed up I thought he was going to be the ally but it turns out that he is the most twisted out of all the villains. I suppose that first scene should have clued me in right away but I figured it was just to show how intense he was. Knox does make for a really good villain though. His accent can feel super exaggerated at times but it’s possible that he really sounds like that.

The guy is an absolute beast in battle and he can really hang with Dalton in a fight. Dalton is probably just a tad more skilled one on one but it’s close enough where the fight could go either way. No other villain is on Knox’s level here just like none of the heroes are on Dalton’s. The main villain is technically Ben but the guy is out of his depth the entire time. He comes across as really spoiled and whiny. He’s certainly not the mastermind type here.

For the heroes, unfortunately none of them really get big roles. At one point Dalton hires a guy who likes to fight a lot so I figured he would be really tough but instead he ends up getting an absolutely tiny role and never gets the big wins you would have been expecting out of him. I suppose he can still defeat the basic enemies but that’s not going to make a big difference here.

There is also the owner of the bar, Frankie but she doesn’t do much either. She talks tough and you figure she may find a way to back Dalton up but nah she just watches the whole time. I was really hoping she had some kind of trump card to show why she was so confident. Without one, it feels like she just got lucky since the villains could have bumped her off at any time. She seems to live at the bar so it’s not like it would be tough to find her.

There is also Charlie but she’s mainly just around to give Dalton a motive to keep on fighting. I don’t think it was smart to try and fight a bunch of armed adults. I know it was supposed to show how brave she was but that is definitely a point where you’re just being dumb. Her father had the right idea in escaping for that specific circumstance.

Then there is the heroine Ellie. Can’t say I was a big fan of hers. She doesn’t like violence but still decides to get with Dalton and moves so fast even he points out that this doesn’t make any sense. She is helpful in getting him to escape from the corrupt cops but I would have liked her to have been a little more helpful in the end. The romance was ultimately not all that goo and she should have had a role beyond that.

The fight scenes are interesting because the camera angles are really crazy. It felt like all of the fights were digitally altered or something with how the characters appeared. Maybe an odd frame rate? Either way there was something surreal about the fights. They were still pretty good but you didn’t really feel any of the impacts between the characters. The fights could still get rather bloody but weren’t super intense.

I’d still give the film a thumbs up for the action though. The film is very fast paced so there is always something going on. The violence can be a little over the top at times so you should keep that in mind. This is definitely not a film for younger audiences. The film’s light hearted tone can certainly make it feel that way at times but you can bet there are some violent deaths in this one.

Overall, Road House is significantly better than the original film. If you’re up for a film with a lot of action then this will be right up your alley. The deck is stacked incredibly well against the main character so you will have to expect some plot armor though. Realistically Dalton would have been dead early on in this adventure. There just isn’t anything he can do when even the cops are on the villains’ side. Still, he fights hard and does his best. The film also does show that he is rather crazy so that helps to show why he won’t just back down even when he is outnumbered. Dalton will continue fighting on til the end and I’ll be curious how the sequel plays out.

Overall 6/10

M3gan 2.0 Review

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This movie is pretty interesting because it has a downright excellent premise but executes it in one of the weakest ways I could have imagined. The script tends to need a lot of work, the fight is basically just teased for 90% of the movie, and the final climax/ending aren’t as good as they should have been. So in that sense the movie left a lot of meat on the table, but on the other hand…I still had a good time with it. I would say it is still a good movie even if it’s not amazing.

The movie starts off by introducing us to a new robot named Amelia. She is essentially a weaponized version of M3gan who can be sent into active war zones or other places that could be dangerous. At first this looks promising but then she goes rogue and appears to want to end humanity. This forces the government to locate M3gan’s creator, Gemma. M3gan shows up beforehand to warn her that this will happen but the government shows up with threats anyway. Gemma knows she will have to stop this new threat but doesn’t want to rebuild M3gan. Will she be able to stop the new android or will she be forced to turn to her old enemy?

Naturally I like a good hero/villain teamup. It tends to make for an exciting plot and that’s the benefit of being a sequel. Long time horror fans may be dismayed to learn that the horror is mostly gone though. The intro scenes with Amelia temporarily bring back the horror with a few jump scares and vicious murders but after that this becomes a full on action movie. Fortunately I love action movies so that worked for me. This has that classic summer blockbuster feel to it.

Lets get into the negatives right away though. You are looking forward to M3gan fighting Amelia. That is pretty much the core point of this film’s plot. Despite that, they don’t really fight until the very end of the film. The first time they meet, M3gan is in the wrong body. After that, Amelia is in the wrong body and they are interrupted before they can fight. Finally we get a battle near the end but M3gan was already super weakened so it still wasn’t an even fight. They made a massive mistake here if you ask me.

We should have gotten a big fight in act 1, then the rematch down the line. It felt like that was the obvious play right? I would also say another weakness is that the writing is generally pretty weak. Lots of lines that will just make you wince or even worse, cringe. They try to write M3gan as being very direct and without shame so she tends to get more of these lines. It’s a tough balance because she also has the best lines but some of them are just being crude for no real reason. I’m hoping they can strike a better balance in the next film.

Finally one more negative would probably be the long singing sequence we get from M3gan. It’s clear this was meant as a funny joke but it’s another example of the film’s poor execution since it drags on for too long. I think it would have been funny if it was just at half the length that it was. Unfortunately that didn’t happen.

On the character side, Gemma is okay I suppose. She seems a bit passive the whole time and it feels like she isn’t properly recognizing the incoming threat here. Amelia is certainly dangerous and a bunch of government fighters even broke into her house. Deciding not to rebuild M3gan is one thing, but she should be telling Cady what is going on and getting a plan together with all of them. That would at least allow them to prep. Otherwise it feels like she is setting them up for a loss here.

At least she does get some action later on. Those fight scenes were fun and hopefully if we were to get more films, she would remain as one of the fighters. We could get a nice tag team with her and M3gan eventually. If you like Gemma’s sidekicks though, they don’t do a whole lot here. A few scenes sprinkled in but yeah I wouldn’t expect much out of them. This is not the humans’ show. In general most of the humans just look bad. We get the rich entrepreneur character who is easily seduced by Amelia.

In general the romance in the film is pretty weak. The classic villain getting seduced trick never ends up being convincing. Then we have Gemma going out with Christian but apparently, he’s not even really her type? M3gan gets some incriminating details on her searches and yeah that’s rough. Sounds an awful lot like settling and that’s a recipe for disaster. It’s not a big part of the film so I’m hardly going to dwell on it, but yeah that was a rough look for the heroine.

As for M3gan, she definitely dominates throughout her screentime. She is the most prepared out of all the characters by fault and also has way more charisma than the others. That really goes a long way here. Additionally, she can fight so at least the heroes have someone who is ready. I also thought Amelia made for a good villain. We didn’t need any grand speeches or motivations besides ending humanity. Amelia just does what she wants and that works well for an evil A.I.

The special effects are pretty good and the soundtrack was generally solid. The movie has good pacing and really flies by. I also enjoyed the tone as this movie is really just trying to give you a fun time throughout. I can always respect that. That’s why I’d ultimately say this was a good title. It just feels like a wasted opportunity since it could have easily been great.

Overall, M3gan 2.0 is what happens when you land an amazing premise but forget that you still have to execute it with care. That said, I still recommend it. You don’t get horror films that turn action like this too often. I imagine it feels like Terminator 2’s initial premise when that film was coming out. It’s a lot of fun and I would definitely check out a third film. As a franchise M3gan may not have lasted very long but I definitely will remember the character so in a way you could say that she did become a true horror icon.

Overall 6/10

It! Review

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It’s not time for that clown horror film, instead it’s time to look at a lesser known one involving a golem. It was a little better than I was expecting to be honest. The characters aren’t the best but I would say that in a way the film had a subtle sense of humor about it. It may have been unintentional but it still worked and the film ends up being one that you won’t be forgetting about anytime soon.

The movie introduces us to a disturbed man named Arthur. There’s always been something really off about him and the film doesn’t need to go into detail on this to assure you that he is someone to stay away from. He looks forward to getting a big promotion as the curator eventually but the process is taking a while. One day there is a huge fire where everything in a nearby storage area burns down except for a single golem. Arthur’s boss asks him for something to read it better with but Arthur is slow to move and the golem ends up crushing the guy.

Now Arthur can get his promotion right? Well, instead the board goes with someone else which is definitely upsetting. Arthur decides to actively use the golem as a weapon of destruction in order to clear out the competitors as well as impress his crush Ellen. Ellen seems to feel bad for Arthur and humors him to an extent but she actually likes the fancy guy from New York named Jim. Jim will definitely need to watch out now, but what can he do against a golem?

There are some parts of the film that don’t fully seem to make sense but I suppose you can fill in the blanks. For example the Golem initially seems to do whatever it wants like when it murders the curator by crushing him but then after Arthur actually activates it, the golem begins to work for him. So in the initial scenes, was the Golem working on past programming or something? Additionally, Arthur picked up the trick to controlling it rather quickly when you’d expect that he would have just been another victim.

The film tries to show that perhaps insulting the golem is what makes it made but it’s not like the original curator did that. So it’s going to be a little hard to really understand the golem’s motives. I suppose they aren’t that important. It has a fairly decent design and is definitely very powerful as shown in the bridge incident. He makes for a decent villain but of course is very slow so any fighter who is paying attention should be able to dodge the attacks.

Then we have Arthur who really looks bad here. Aside from being crazy and all, he is desperately going after a lady who is clearly not interested in him. She makes it rather obvious and while I think she could have been sterner, he’s got to take a hint. Arthur is just so desperate and controlling a golem could have easily made him rich and successful if he used it the right away. Then perhaps she would have been more interested in him.

No, instead he just thinks destroying a bridge will impress her for some reason. Ellen is rather naive though like when she gets a call from Arthur late at night saying how he desperately needs to see her. Ellen seriously considers going even if Jim was encouraging this before the twist that he would go in her place. That should have been a notion that would be impossible to her. It’s an extremely bad idea to meet anyone alone at night, particularly someone who has a big one sided crush on you.

Jim is a fun character though, albeit he could be a little overconfident at times. Meeting up with Arthur when he started to have suspicions of wrongdoing was very risky. In fact, there were several times where Arthur came close to destroying Jim. The whole thing could have gone sideways for him in an instant. I do like confidence though and that does help keep Jim higher than he would be otherwise.

There is definitely a body count in this film although the kills aren’t as violet as in other horror titles. There is a level of violence to be sure but you can tell the film is more interested in the overall premise than being a splattershow. So I appreciated the restraint there. As a result the film can actually be a good bit of fun at times. While crazy, it is fun to see Arthur dropping veiled threats and outmaneuvering everybody even when he’s rather sloppy.

The whole hiding the key in the bookshelf idea for example was so risky since someone could have checked there before and realized that the key had suddenly appeared out of nowhere. He also takes super unnecessary risks in stealing artifacts from the museum before returning them. This guy is definitely not a mastermind and without the golem he would have been taken down a lot sooner. The climax is also a whole lot more explosive than I would have guessed.

Overall, It! was a little better than I expected. I do think part of the charm is in a cheesy/camp kind of way though. The film takes itself moderately serious but as long as you can have fun with it then you’ll be okay. If you are looking for a really scary film then this will not be the one for you though. Also if you’re hoping for a real romance, the movie doesn’t have much time for that either. No, it’s more about the reverse romance of figuring out if the golem is actually alive and who is controlling it. As the viewer you have all the answers and are waiting for the others to figure it out. The execution was key and ultimately it was good enough here. I have a feeling that the clown movies would not be able to compete.

Overall 6/10

Karate Kid: Legends Review

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It’s time to look at the next Karate Kid film. It was always a bit sad when we learned that LaRusso wasn’t going to be the main character this time around because that would have really helped to make the stakes higher an ever. That being said, the film is still good. It can be a little all over the place at times but still captures the spirit of the series and makes for a film that is easy to watch.

The movie starts with Li having to move all the way from Beijing to New York. He isn’t happy about this but his mother has wanted to put some distance from the world of kung fu after something tragic happened to Li’s brother. Li doesn’t really want to fight anymore, but he does like to keep up with his training. Well, he won’t have much of a choice now that he is in New York since a bully named Conor shows up and just starts whaling on him. The guy has a chip on his soldier because the girl he likes is the pizza girl at the shop that Li frequents and the two became quick friends. Li is going to have to defeat this guy physically in order to end this but the problem is that Conor is more powerful. Li will have to train hard.

This probably would have been enough as the main plot but you’ve also got Mia’s father, Victor who is trying to win a boxing match to pay off some loan sharks. Victor really made sure to owe money to the worst people he could have picked and now that is coming back to bite him. So you have the flip of what usually happens in these films as Li is the one teaching someone how to fight. Although the second half goes back to normal on this.

I would say what the film lacked here was more fights. For a film with karate in the title, there aren’t a ton of fight scenes here. The climax has a bunch of quick fights and one real one but before that you will just get a pair of skirmishes and that’s it. The film was definitely trying to set up a lot of character dynamics and everything but it would have been best to have embraced the action roots a little more. Not that the first films were necessarily heavy on action but you would just expect more.

The film also made a mistake on making Li a little too weak initially. I understand him not being the most powerful out there as it wouldn’t make for much of a film but Conor thoroughly dismantled him the whole time. Even in the climax of the film it felt like Li was a little out of his league. So they could have stood to make this a bit more even so the climax could be more believable. At least that’s the way I see it.

As a main character Li isn’t bad. I do think it takes him a little too long to get with the program though. It was a real rough look to see him falter in the flashback of what happened to his brother and for that to happen again in the present with another character was terrible. He also overreacted pretty hard at the San Genaro festival. Now, I do think the scene made Mia look bad regardless of her explanations later because it’s true that she looked a little too happy, but jumping to conclusions was pretty childish.

Particularly since Li knew they were just friends at that point. He really just needed to talk things out or at the very least not be petty about it. I definitely gotta take Daniel La Russo over him. As for Mia, she wasn’t bad but also on the very emotional side here. Definitely a lot of drama here like when she decides to give Li the silent treatment. I guess for a Karate Kid film you want some drama, but I was always looking forward to getting back to the man plot. I’ll give her credit for not being a jerk when Li wanted to order a stuffed crust pizza. I never knew that scene was from this movie as it tends to make the rounds with memes about how stuffed crust isn’t a real pizza.

Conor make for a fairly weak villain. He’s just way too petty the whole time. So I’m saying weak in terms of personality, he’s technically rather powerful. The guy was dominating most of his opponents. He knows how to fight hard and how to fight dirty which is a really impressive combination. You’re just not going to be able to beat someone like that. Even by the end of the film you feel like he was the best fighter of the next generation.

I would have liked to have seen more of Daniel in this film but it was good to see him get a quick fight scene. Having him get to fight Conor’s teacher would have been more satisfying though. We’d see that he still has the fighting abilities that are needed to win at the top level. Han is also solid although he’s definitely no Mr. Miyagi. He does his best to make sure that Li is ready to fight and doesn’t back down. If anything you just feel bad for Li’s mother who has some valid points about why he shouldn’t fight anymore but gets overruled throughout the whole film. I don’t feel like the characters ever really tried to hear her out.

Although she was unreasonable with spouting platitudes about not resorting to violence when Li was actively being bullied. She took a very old fashioned black and white approach to fighting when that’s just not going to cut it here. You should never be blamed for defending yourself when you’re being attacked. It also feels like the referees are a bit underpowered in this one. The villains just ignore them and go for cheap shots with the ref literally being shoved out of the way more than once. If you defeat someone using exclusively illegal moves, shouldn’t the opponent win by technical penalty victory? Maybe that’s not how it is in real life but I’d be surprised when it is to this extent.

I’d probably have cut out Victor’s plot here with the loan sharks to focus a bit more on Li. I think that would have worked out better although the boxing fight was still pretty fun. As a whole the movie is fun due to the good writing and solid pacing so it has a good amount of replay value. At the same time, it does feel like this film could have been a lot more ambitious. The way it plays out, this may as well have been made a reboot since the previous films didn’t matter a whole lot. The credits scene is also a bit weak. Not bad but I would have liked something that was a whole lot more hype. Also, you know that the two characters got serious food poisoning afterwards.

Overall, Karate Kid: Legends has a good sense of humor and is a fun action film to check out. You’ll definitely be able to feel Li’s frustration as he is surrounded by cheaters and thugs with nobody wanting to do anything about it. The pressure is on him and it’s quite intense. Still, he manages to get the job done and the ending certainly leaves room for more sequels should they want to pursue that. If you like the Karate Kid series then you definitely owe it to yourself to check this one out. You’ll probably find it to be nostalgic.

Overall 6/10

Hard Times Review

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It’s time for a film about boxing that is not Rocky. Rocky will always be the definitive film of this kind of genre but of course there are others that also throw their hat into the ring. Hard Times is definitely more of an underground kind of fighting film though and so it doesn’t have the classic glamour and sportsmanship of the tournament battles. In these fights, you can always expect things to get ugly.

The film starts off with Speed hoping his fighter will win a match but the guy is crushed again. That’s when a man named Chaney shows up and declares that he can win a few fights. Speed watches him demolish his first opponent and realizes that this guy is the real deal. So they make a deal to be partners and Chaney gets Speed to agree to his terms of 50/50. Things are going well at first as they win some fights but Speed quickly gets greedy and starts betting more and more money. He takes loans from some dangerous sources and also keeps up his gambling habits. It will all catch up to him soon, but will he bring Chaney down with him?

Now of course gambling is a serious addiction and not something that is easy to turn away from. So I’m not saying it would have been easy but Speed definitely needed to have had some level of restraint. He was already in a rough spot before the event started and then after that he should have been feeling really lucky that Chaney won the super high bet. Instead by wasting it, he has a run in with the mafia and things only get worse from there.

I wouldn’t have blamed Chaney if had just left Speed to the mess that he created and skipped town. It was absolutely not Chaney’s fault that things went that way but of course Speed would have been murdered and it’s hard to just leave knowing that is going to happen. So Chaney takes the high road and risks his life once again. Fighting is never a joke, things can escalate in an instant and so you don’t want to do it unless you had to. Chaney is good at what he does and fight in order to make some money to get to his next destination but he’s not just fighting anybody.

Also he got very fortunate that his opponent was a class act and refused to cheat. In a battle with the mafia present, that is certainly far from a guarantee. So I give his final opponent some respect there, I don’t think any of the other villains would have held back in the same circumstance. They would cheat as much as they could in order to win any fight.

Outside of the fights, it’s not like Chaney was a super good guy though. He has an affair with a lady named Lucy for a good chunk of the film and the whole romance is as shallow as possible. Definitely not the kind where you’re rooting for the pairing. There’s no love there, only convenience on both sides and hopefully Chaney can go a bit slower when he starts fresh in the next town.

I get the feeling that Speed and his doctor Poe are going to be continuing to get into more and more trouble on their side though. Poe never kicked his drinking problems and Speed is still gambling. Chaney has given them a true fighting chance though so hopefully they can keep themselves on track. The underground circuit will always exist but you definitely don’t have to be a part of it once you have all of the money.

The fights themselves are pretty solid as well. You definitely feel the power in some of those blows and it’s not like Chaney was blowing through his opponents. He was clearly the best fighter in the movie but still had to use a lot of good strategy to win. It’s always more impressive that way as opposed to coming in and winning with a single punch which feels less realistic when you’re battling other pros.

The dialogue and writing as also pretty solid. It’s one of those films where there are certainly a lot of threats being flung around but they generally still have the villains putting on the pretense of being polite. I also liked that while Chaney may not be as book smart as some of the others, he is extremely street smart and wasn’t being pushed around by anyone. The scene where he is ready to walk away from the deal when Speed is immediately trying to scam was a good moment for example.

I think to boost the film up a little, I would have either made Chaney more likable or the doctor. So instead of all 3 characters having their vices and not making the best decisions, have one of them actually be a true professional. That character would walk away midway through the film while the other two get greedy. For Chaney you could also just get rid of the romance angle or for Poe, not introducing him as an alcoholic from the start. I think it would have worked to have made the film not quite as grim since all of the leads ere gray at best.

Overall, Hard Times does a good job of showing how dangerous boxing can be. It’s definitely not a profession that most people choose for the joy of it. You’re either poor enough where you have to take a gamble, or one of the rare few who just enjoys fighting to such an extent that the risk is worth it. Chaney likes his lifestyle of travelling the country and not having to work a standard job so to him it makes sense. Win a few fights, then leave and restart. Still not something I’d advise, but to each their own. It’s a good film and doesn’t make any big mistakes but I’d also say it’s just not the most fun title out there. It’s a bit on the dreary side even if the ending does lean as positive as it can be.

Overall 6/10

Next of Kin Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

It’s time for a classic revenge thriller. You can bet that this’ll make for a pretty intense film but the whole time you are hoping that the main character will make a move. He spends way too long just being absolutely persistent in wanting proof before making a move. The problem is that when you’re dealing with really experienced villains, getting proof is not always going to be possible.

The movie starts with introducing us to Truman who is a cop but isn’t always respected by the rest of the unit. They consider him to be a guy from the mountains who doesn’t really fit in but he does his best to overlook this and just do his job. He has a pregnant wife to think about after all. Unfortunately the town is on the corrupt side with a very active mob presence and they end up murdering one of Truman’s brothers. Truman goes to the funeral where the rest of the family swear vengeance. Truman pleads with them to let the law solve this but his other brother Briar decides to tackle this himself. Now Truman has to try and arrest the mobster responsible before vigilante justice comes through.

Now of course it is best to go through the law here but we’re talking about a big member of the mafia. You’re not going to see him just show up and bring him to jail. The mafia will fight you to the death on that and odds are that they’ve got someone on the payroll within the cops. Truman basically tries the entire film to do this by the book and it feels futile at every turn. He would have really been better off helping Briar get this over with right away.

Now Briar also wasn’t very smart about this. At one point he gets all of the villains alone in a room and has the drop on them. He decides to threaten them all a bit instead of finishing them off and that was a mistake. While his main beef was with the killer and he didn’t know which of them it was, they’re all gangsters. Why not just destroy them? He could have ended the film right there. Of course they would still have other people try to get revenge and the feud would continue but I wasn’t convinced at the reasoning for sparing them. Briar is outnumbered and in enemy territory so letting them go was not a good idea.

Meanwhile Truman’s wife Jessie was unfortunately a bit on the annoying side here. She knows all about how dangerous his job is and yet she starts complaining almost immediately when the going gets tough. I thought she would be on his side and try to stay calm but she panics so much. Additionally when she is attacked, she decides the thing to do is hide in the shower with the faucet on so she can’t even hear when Truman gets into the house and is yelling for her. That means if the attackers had gotten in, she would have been completely defenseless. Not a smart move.

Like I said in the intro though, Truman is just way too passive here. Sure, he threatens the villains from time to time but they know he isn’t going to do anything. It takes several murders for him to finally take action and by then we’re in the climax of the film. It’s a better late than never kind of story here when Truman should have been taking bigger strides to avenge his brother’s murder. That is what would have really helped him to have been better here.

As for the villains, they’re fairly generic. You’ve got Joey who is quick to violence and fits right in as the gang’s number two. He gets upset when John’s son threatens to replace him on the totem pole but that guy isn’t very smart. He is completely oblivious to how much Joey dislikes him and walks into every trap. You’re basically counting the minutes until he’s doomed. John is the actual leader of the mafia and is a much more reasonable guy but also takes too long to act.

If he was more in touch with what was going on then perhaps he could have prevented any of this from happening. Instead he talks about bonds and trust but didn’t do anything to solidify them Truman certainly gave him a lot of advance warning to try and stop this and John did not make use of any of it. At that point there just isn’t much more you can do about the situation.

While Briar didn’t handle the situation too smartly at times, he was still the most enjoyable character in the film. At least he was trying to serve up justice. This is definitely the kind of film where you end up rooting for the vigilante since nobody else is really able to get results. In general though you just don’t want to be in any city where the mafia have a lot of power.

The film can be fairly violent so just a heads up on that. The kills can be rather intense, particularly the first brother who died near the beginning of the film. The overall tone is more like a classic thriller so it’s not overly dark. Especially since all of the characters know what side the others are on. There is even a comic relief character who owns the apartment that Briar rents. He gets quite a bit of screentime here to also help prevent things from getting too crazy.

Overall, Next of Kin is a good thriller but a film that can also be a bit annoying for most of its run. The main character is too passive and then the aggressive brother decides not to finish off the villains at the last second. Definitely a rough combination there. Meanwhile the villains aren’t exactly subtle here because they don’t need to be. They just run in and shoot people whenever they want to with complete immunity. When the law fails so completely like this, it’s no wonder that some characters will jump in to complete the job themselves. It’s simply inevitable.

Overall 6/10

Riders of Destiny Review

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It’s time for one of those westerns where the main character has a reputation already. His name is Singing Sandy and I have to say that it leads up to one of the best western scenes. We have Sandy start singing as he walks towards his opponent and it felt like a Baki meme moment where everyone suddenly starts putting together who he is. The singing is just that distinctive and it was a nice touch to the film. I feel like this one would have otherwise been a lot more forgettable.

This is one of those titles where the villains are the mustache twirling types. They’re not subtle at all and basically just run over the town because there is nobody around who is actually ready to fight back. They probably should have been taken out a long time ago if the townsfolk were actually prepared for a battle and were willing to move forward. Instead they’re all doormats until Sandy shows up. I know sometimes all you need is one hero to come in and turn the tides but it does make the town look rather weak the whole time. You get the feeling that they would lose to the next gang that strolls by if Sandy ever leaves. Maybe he could teach a bunch of them about better quick draw techniques or something.

The film does make a key mistake that I haven’t seen in a minute though which is that the villains go after a horse early on and end up murdering it. You don’t really see this much beyond the horse falling but it still adds a negative vibe to the movie. They could have easily skipped that and then things would have worked out a bit better. I also think Sandy should have just taken the two crooks out at that point instead of running off. Sandy’s one of the best shots in the west and we see this in action later on. So why not just finish them off there? Would have made way more sense and saved him a lot of time.

The film has a good amount of action going on so you won’t be bored. Another solid byproduct of the runtime is that the pacing is always really good because the film is so quick. Not like there is much time for the film to drag on when it’s less than an hour long right? The romance still feels a bit rushed but that’s par for the course in these kinds of movie. The westerns always gotta squeeze in a romance somewhere even if it has no business being in the film. I guess it just works towards the wholesome ending.

Singing Sandy certainly gets to enjoy a lot of banter with the villains using his passive aggressive nature so that’s always fun. So while I would prefer an active approach, it can always be entertaining. You just have to consider the circumstance which is that the main villain owns all of the water except for the well that the heroine’s dad owns. He is trying to get that land for a full monopoly and in the meantime is ripping off all the townsfolk. Why bother playing nice with the villains at that point?

Just take them out and the town will be happy. The farmers grumble a whole lot the whole film but don’t do anything about it. This guy is going to drain them dry and eventually they’d die while being homeless. The tolerance just goes too far to crazy proportions.

It’s also different from other westerns in that the power gap doesn’t feel crazy. There are a ton of farmers running around and only a few villains in comparison. So it seems to me that it would be an easy thing for the farmers to band together instead of their daily meetings waiting for the government to send someone to help.

In short, most of the side characters almost feel like NPCs here. Even the main heroine randomly asks her father if he’s going to give into the villain’s demands after a speech and he just reminders her that (like he said about 10 minutes ago) they will be fighting against the villain to the very end.

I’ll end on a positive though that the duel between Sandy and the main villain’s top hired gun was actually really good. The singing was handled perfectly like I mentioned in the intro and there was a lot of drama here and then the lethal gunfight. Sandy’s confidence also shone through which is part of what made him a great main character. The only character who was really a good fighter.

Overall, This film probably ends up blending in with a lot of the other western titles but ultimately I would say it’s not bad. The singing angle does at least help to make it stand out a little bit. I wouldn’t say the songs/music are all that good to be honest but they do fit in with the genre at least. You hear the song and immediately think of a western film so that part is effective. Now if the film could have just had some better villains we would really be set.

Overall 6/10

Big Fish Review

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It’s time for a film about how tall tales can eventually cause people to fall apart. Too many of those do wreck your chances of really getting to connect with people after all. When it’s overdone it can even seem like you’re just lying all of the time. That said, the stories tend to be the most interesting part of the film and you don’t want to go back to the real world for the drama parts. They just don’t work out quite as well as the fantastical stories.

The movie starts with showing us how William’s big celebratory wedding gets taken over by his father Edward who begins talking about the day William was born. The lead doesn’t like this story, not just because it isn’t true but because he wanted the day to really be his. He feels like his father has always been an overwhelming presence in his life and so he breaks off ties with him for several years. Well, now his father is dying and so it is time for William to try and reconnect the relationship. Edward is still committed to his stories to the very end though so William will have to learn to accept this or not.

I suppose my biggest problem with William is the fact that this just doesn’t feel like a big deal. Stories are how his father talks and so William just needs to accept that. He comes across as extremely ungrateful considering all that his father has done for him over the years. He seems like he was a really good person and so William should have embraced the stories. Even to the very end of the film he spends most of his time complaining and so he will quickly become your least favorite character in the movie. There just isn’t any saving him.

Fortunately his wife Josephine is a lot more understanding and has the compassion to hear Edward’s stories with a good amount of enthusiasm. This gives him a chance to tell all of the stories one last time. She knows that they all carry a lot of exaggertions but the guy is dying so why not let him have a little fun on the way out right? She’s realistic the whole time while William just can’t get himself to understand this. It’s not a tough concept either.

Edward’s wife Sandra doesn’t get a whole lot to do in this film but she was important through the stories as we see how hard Edward worked to get to her. He really had to go through a whole lot of adventures and put his best foot forward. While Edward was never one to face reality, I don’t see why he should need to. Real life can be rather boring at times so spicing up your memories is the way to go. The way the film handles this is to show us the actual stories which makes for a fun subplot.

I suppose if you are really looking forward to the real-life confrontations then this might hurt a bit but the stories are the best part like I said before. It’s fun to see Edward bravely stand up to every challenge and show why he is the most powerful fighter around. He gets a lot of great lines throughout and you can really feel his determination. He is definitely not the kind of guy to go down without a fight, that’s for sure. Now with the romance angle, it is a bit iffy to go after someone who is already engaged. It’s not at the same level as someone who is married of course but while this one has a happy ending, that would usually not be a good idea. He got off rather easy on this one.

As the film starts to come to a close, we learn a bit about how true some of the stories were. Most of the lies are fairly easy to see based on how supernatural they are but Edward did a good job of keeping the message straight in each situation. Additionally, he was a good family man to the end and never let himself get tempted into going down a dark path. Now that was a really good look for him since other characters would have definitely faltered at one point or another.

The film can run a bit long at times and probably could have done well with cutting out some moments. You could probably shorten the circus if you needed to as one example. It was a good way of showing Edward’s determination, but it was the most expendable. We also didn’t need the Werewolf plot in general which came out of nowhere. I mean a lot of the dreams/stories came out of nowhere but yeah that didn’t do anything to enhance the plot at all and if anything would only hurt since the film did reference the werewolf eating several animals. At the end of the day, it’s a solid title though and so I would recommend it to anyone looking for a good time. The main character is annoying but aside from him the rest of the characters are pretty good. It’s a solid title about remembering to treasure your connections while you can because everyone dies eventually. You may think you have a lot of time left to talk with someone and then they’re gone in the blink of an eye.

Overall, Big Fish is a film that does well in balancing the fictional and the real. If I would make a change here it would be to never really show any of the real world parts. Don’t actually let the lead find any evidence and just have him learn to trust that at least part of his father’s stories were true. Or have him decide that it just doesn’t matter in the end and he becomes a good sport either way. I would say that either option would end up working out just fine so you don’t have to do anything crazy. That would probably bump it up a star. Either way this isn’t really the kind of story that’s meant to have a lot of replay value but it works as an initial watch.

Overall 6/10

Stranger on the Run Review

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It’s time for a western that I can’t say I had heard of before. It’s a pretty interesting tale about what happens when you go into the wrong town. You’ve probably watched or at least read some stories with a similar premise but usually it’s more for a short adventure and not the full length movie. You have a bit of a mystery going on here as well and then eventually the chase starts. It’s a good film although I do think the main character could have been a lot more solid.

The film starts off with Ben arriving in a own looking for a lady. Nobody wants to talk about her though and it’s clear that something shady happened. Ben isn’t super quick on the uptake about this though and keeps on asking questions to the point where he is beat up. He eventually gets someone to spill the beans and so now the whole town’s posse is after him. Can he manage to stay alive and take them to justice or is he doomed? Fortunately he will not be alone on this adventure.

Ben is a nice enough guy but the fact that he shows up drunk does not put him in the best shape to fight these guys off. He is too quick to go into the beer bottle and it also seems to make him not really notice the danger of his situation at times. These villains aren’t exactly subtle after all, they act extremely shady right out of the gate. Ben has to be prepared to take them all down if he wants to get his answers because otherwise he will be the one in a messy grave.

I’d say something the film does really well with the long runtime is developing the characters. You actually get to know just about everyone in the town rather well. You have the Sheriff who initially seems rather reasonable compared to the others but definitely has a dark side and really likes the power that he possesses. You’ve got his deputy who is on the older side but wants to still prove that he can fight with the best of them. There’s a kid who looks up to the posse and wants to be like them when he grows up, which always causes his mother to worry a lot.

The mother is mainly kept out of the loop on things but tries her best to keep her son on the straight and narrow. Then you have a few other members of the posse who are basically just thugs that really like to abuse their power. Long story short, you really don’t want to come to this town. The lady who went missing certainly didn’t pick a great place to go. The story doesn’t portray her as the nicest character around either but even so that’s no excuse for the other brutes going after her.

In a rough town like this it feels like you either make friends with the strongest one and stay relatively safe or you have to get out of there fast. It’s one of the scarier parts about the olden days since you couldn’t just drive out of there in your car. Walking would likely not be a good idea either so in the end while you’re waiting for the train anything can happen. Particularly when you have no friends to help you.

We do get the obligatory gunfight near the end in a rather prolonged gunfight. I’d say we mainly have two pretty long gunfights here and as always you do wonder how they don’t hit each other a bit sooner. There are times where the characters have no cover and still manage to come out on top. I suppose accuracy wasn’t all that back in the day so I can cut that a bit of slack. I tend to enjoy gunfights either way even when there isn’t a lot of connecting. It’s just fun to watch.

The action is on point here. I would say the only thing holding the film back is that it can feel a bit long at times. The mystery isn’t super captivating because you basically know how it’ll play out from the start and you’re just waiting for Ben to find out. The movie actually tricked me in that sense as I thought someone was dead from the start when that wasn’t the case. Ultimately it doesn’t really change things though. A better main character would make a world of difference since he wouldn’t just be running the whole time.

The title is appropriate since the second half is all about Ben running. Even by that point he’s asking for why he won’t be put on trial and that’s why I say he’s slow on the uptake. It’s pretty obvious that even if there was a trial, it wouldn’t be a fair one. At least he is a good shot and can fight once the dust is finally settled and he knows what is going on. It took some time but at least it did end up happening.

The most annoying character was the kid though. He froze up during the first gunfight, never really knew how to make his own decisions, and was easily manipulated. When you think about an annoying kid in any form of media, this is the kind of kid you’re thinking about. He thinks that he’s a man but doesn’t have the skills to back it up.

Overall, Stranger on the Run is a good film. It’s not the best western that I’ve seen but it certainly does beat a lot of others. It gets more right than wrong which is always the most important thing. It would be nice if Ben could have been a bit stronger and able to hold his own here against all of the thugs but realistically the numbers were not exactly in his favor. If he played his cards right he could have bumped them off a few at a time but of course that would be risky and ultimately he would be known as an outlaw. Ensuring there were 0 survivors and 0 witnesses would be really tough.

Overall 6/10