YEAR:

DIRECTOR: Adamo P. Cultraro

on the last episode of the Watch It television podcast i was talking about new fall shows and specifically Persons Of Interest. in that discussion i mentioned that, not only did the program have an interesting premise, but it actually lived up to it. i bring that up because that is exactly what Tactical Force doesn't do.

so, without knowing anything about the film and who directed it or stared in it, etc... what would you think if you read this synopsis:

A training exercise for the LAPD SWAT Team goes terribly wrong when they find themselves pitted against two rival gangs while trapped in an abandoned Hangar, armed with nothing but blanks. (thank you imdb)

not bad right? i mean, it sounds pretty simple - but that can be good if you got yourself some good writing and acting and directing. and for me it was the whole "armed with nothing but blanks" part that got me. that could be interesting to see how they are able to maneuver and out smart the bad guys without weapons. but alas, no.

the movie takes 35 minutes to get to the point where the swat team is huddled in a room with the bad guys after them, knowing they are unarmed. at the 45 minute mark the team leader has sneaked out, beat up a guy in the s.w.a.t truck the bad guys had taken over and taken his gun (loaded with real bullets).

10 MINUTES!! really? that's all they are going to give me of the most possibly interesting thing about the film? and even those 10 minutes were lame: listen at the big door, sneak out when bad guys are outside planning next move, run to truck, beat up lone bad guy on said truck, take his gun, shoot him.

as uninteresting, unoriginal, unintelligent and unenjoyable as those 10 minutes were, the other 78 were pretty much the same.

okay, so i wasn't expecting great things from a, i think, straight-to-video action movie staring steve austin. but that still doesn't make it right!

YEAR:

DIRECTOR: Antti Jokinen

so here we are, almost half way through the year and i have yet to see a movie that even has a chance of being atop my "best of the year list" come the end of 2011. however, the top of my "worst of the year" list looks to be filling up rather nicely. there was The Roommate which looked to be campaigning for one of the top spots... and then i saw The Resident! where to begin with this piece of junk?!... i guess we can start at the beginning.

everything starts off as expected with your basic suspense/thriller. we meet our main character (hilary swank) and we learn that she has just broken up with her boyfriend and is looking for a place of her own. she finds a great place (too good to be true) and moves on in. so far so good right?

then the film tries to pull the ol' distraction game on us. like when a magician makes you watch one hand, when the actual trick is taking place in the other. the film does it by presenting us with a creepy character that looks like he will be the source of the suspense/thrills, etc. but, actually it is the other guy.

this is actually a smart, and somewhat original, tactic that i can appreciate looking back at it. the problem is they give up on it too soon. all of a sudden the real "bad guy" is brought to light and it is all downhill from there (not that it was way up the hill at that point anyway).

the film makes a very brief and ridiculous attempt to explain why the "crazy" guy is crazy, but it feels really tacked on and doesn't make much sense - and not too long after that you are basically just waiting for the film to go through its predictable thriller progressions, get to the violent climax and end already! which is exactly what happened.

given that swank not only starred in the film, but was also an executive producer i can't help but think the film was better at one point. maybe the original script got slashed over time and what ended up on the screen wasn't what she initially read? or maybe the director or the studio ruined it? or maybe, it was always a horrible film and they just decided to make it anyway? whatever the reason, you can, and should, make the decision not to see it!

YEAR:

DIRECTOR: Christian E. Christiansen

have you ever seen the movie Single White Female? well, if you have, than that means you have also seen The Roommate. the only difference is that, while Single White Female was somewhat original and suspenseful, The Roommate felt redundant, predictable, laughable and whatever the opposite of suspenseful is!

now, i haven't seen SWF in a long time, so i can't point out every single similarity between the two films, but i remember enough that i wouldn't be surprised to hear that the guy who wrote The Roommate, sonny mallhi, had watched SWF right before writing his script. actually, i wouldn't be surprised if he also had it on in the background while he wrote. and it also looks like he was on a tight schedule based on how quickly the film moves forward from opening credits/everything is fine to crazy!

then, in a little break from the predictable path, the "crazy" is briefly explained away as mental illness (cause they need to quickly explain what we have been seeing up to that point), then back on the path we go - but now the main character can finally see what we, the audience, have been seeing for over an hour and here we go towards the over the top, uninteresting climax...

at first i was trying to be a little careful about mentioning any spoilers in this discussion, but then i realized that there really are no spoilers, because you can see everything coming from a mile away in this movie. as various characters are introduced it is almost like the film is putting a big flashing arrow over their heads with a sign that says "the crazy roommate will hurt or kill this person at some point during this sucky movie."

having said all that, The Roommate isn't even the worst film i have seen all year. that honor, at this point, goes to The Resident...

YEAR:

DIRECTOR: Joseph Kosinski

i went to see this film on imax 3d the friday it was released. i saw it the way, i would think, it was meant to be seen. i gave it every opportunity to be good - or at least decent. and it failed!!!

i hadn't seen the first Tron movie in probably 15-20 years. i remember it being kinda cool when i was a kid, but i had no strong allegiance to the original story that this new one had to live up to. and i have to admit that i thought the trailers looked good. so they had me giving them the benefit of the doubt heading into the theatre. but, then the movie started...

the story for Tron: Legacy isn't anything new or original. it is a classic tale that felt like it was decided on by a bunch of producers who decided they wanted to do a Tron sequel, but needed a story. so, rather then do anything really different they went with a simple and classic mythology (good v. evil in the computer and the good guy's son trying to fight and free his dad, yada yada yada...) - probably with the idea that there was going to be so many special effects and cool visuals that the story didn't need to be anything more than a tool to get into the good stuff.

and you know what. that's ok. i mean, there is a reason we see so many of the same basic story lines. ok, two reasons. one: because hollywood is lazy. but two: because they often work. they have some basic universal appeal and speak to something that we can all understand... in this case, the problem wasn't the obvious storyline. it was how poorly it was executed.

the script was poor: the film was basically action sequences followed by long drawn out conversation pieces used to tell me everything and explain what happened between the times of the two films. i guess the writers don't believe in the idea of "show, don't tell."

this film is more like "show and tell." they will show us some really cool action sequence with cool special effects (the lightbike sequence looked pretty awesome i must say) and then they will tell us everything they think we need to know to follow and care at all about the characters. not only that, but it was just mediocre writing as well - full of clichés and dialogue that often felt forced and sometimes laughable.

the Tron world provided a real opportunity to the film makers to make something really good. something that pleased the visual senses, yet still had a script that made me want to keep watching the great visuals past the first 30-40 minutes.

but, instead they settled on a mediocre, poorly written piece that ends up being a waste of much of the $300 million budget, because, after a while, one can barely enjoy even how good the film looks since the script itself has given us nothing intelligent and nothing to really be that interested in (besides, maybe what we are going to do after the movie is over).

Year:

Year: 2008, Director: Roland Emmerich

i mentioned it briefly on an episode of the podcast a while back, that i actually enjoyed the film 2012. i thought it was a good big summer disaster film with crazy special effects and a story that took a somewhat interesting look at the decisions that mankind would have to make if such an event were to occur. unlike the last disaster film from director roland emmerich, The Day After Tomorrow which is didn't like at all.

anyway, i bring that up, because as i walked out of the film i started to think about mister emmerich and taking a look at some of his lesser known films and if this hit and miss film maker (mostly miss) had some hidden gems out there. and, given that i am writing about these two films on Not Good Movies rather than on Filmed But Not Forgotten, i assume you figured out whether they are hits or misses.

in picking the two films to watch i first went back and found one of his earliest films that i could get my hands on. that was Moon 44. then i checked out his films since the huge success of Independence Day and noticed that 10,000 BC was the only film of his last five that didn't make a profit at the box office and made less than $100 million. so, those seemed like to good ones to check out. or at least they did till i had to sit down and watch them... especially Moon 44.

wow, this is a bad movie. the story takes place in the year 2038 when all resources have been depleted on earth and humans must rely on the mining of other satellites and planets. but when the mining vessels start to disappear an undercover agent is sent to one of the last controlled satellite, Moon 44, to see what is going on.

where to begin with this one? the special effects are passable, the acting is bad (except for the great malcolm mcdowell), the dialogue is forced and so very corny and the characters are caricatures: you have the cool undercover guy, the bad guy prisoners (oh ya, did i mention they are getting prisoners to fly the dangerous helicopter missions on Moon 44 in order to get out of their prison sentences) who are pretty much always angry and bullying the computer nerds (these young guys are the ones that control the helicopters from the main ship).

the movie is boring, corny, predictable and laughable. i think if Mystery Science Theatre 3000 were still on the air they could have a great time with this one. but, otherwise there is no reason for anyone to spend an hour and half of their lives watching this thing. Now as for 10,000 BC my feelings aren't as harsh...

my initial reaction was to jump all over the movie for its complete lack of historical accuracy. i mean, the film is called 10,000 BC, yet the final third of the film takes place during the building of the great pyramids (which weren't built til around 2500 BC from what I read). also, there is a whole melange of american and european accents, horses are domesticated (which i read somewhere wasn't true for the time) and much, much more... but, then i decided to let that go.

first off, maybe my facts are wrong. and second, i assume that the film makers knew that they didn't have their facts straight, which would mean that was the whole point. so, if that was done intentionally, then how is the film beyond those things? well, its still not good.

and you know what. thinking about it - and this also kind of hit me as i watched it - while the film is grand in its idea. and if you were to tell someone the story it would seem pretty vast. watching the movie it didn't have that epicness that it should have.

the heart of the film is one mammoth hunters quest to save the women he loves from the hands of a tribe of horsemen who attacked their clan and kidnapped her and some other tribe members. he chases them through forests, mountains and deserts. fights off large wild animals, befriends other tribes and organizes a slave rebellion against the pharaoh during the building of the pyramids. that all sounds like the makings of a fun blockbuster to me (i actually did want to see this in the theatres when it was released).

but, in the end it is kind of plain and seems unsure of itself - is it a somewhat thoughtful grand action drama or is a big, dont-think-about-it-too-much-and-just-have-fun blockbuster. it looks to try and be both. but, unlike 2012, which did it successfully, 10,000 BC doesn't end up working as either one.