PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Friday Night Movies 887

Alien Private Eye 1989 Written and directed by Vik Rubenfeld, he was also the casting director and film editor. It's his only movie, the IMDb lists him as one of the creators of the TV show Early Edition, he's credited with writing one episode. I never watched that show more than a handful of times, so it's doubtful that I saw his episode. Up until right now the movie has only been available on VHS. You can see a poor copy on YouTube, see link above. The movie looks much better on the Severin Blu-ray.

The story revolves around the possession of a special disc that fell to Earth. A crook figured out it was a drug dispenser and he's been selling the highly addictive product in LA. An alien private eye is on Earth, he helps a woman being mistreated by some thugs and winds up in the middle of a mess. She's got one half the disc and the crooks have the other half.

There's plenty of chasing about with a few punch up and gun fights. Sadly they're so ludicrously staged. The car chase and subsequent crashes? Embarrassing. The whole movie is like that. Clumsy script and inept cast. Makes a combo for laughter. Sadly Vik's intended humor isn't cutting it. All in all a good film to have seen but one that wasn't as enjoyable as one might have hoped. Not going on my To Buy List.

Tokyo 10+01 2003 Written and directed by Higuchinsky. Another one that I won't be adding to my To Buy List. It's a comical sort of parody that people doing IMDb reviews think is of Battle Royale but it seems more like it's parodying The Running Man. The filmmakers make references to BR in the beginning of the film but that soon falls by the wayside as the contestants start running about. Was The Running Man released to long ago for the commenters to know about. Could be but who knows. Hopefully, I'll have forgotten about the film be tomorrow.

Eleven criminals are drugged and fitted with a poison timer bracelet. They wake up in a warehouse in a shitty part of town. They have 11 hours to get to the Baron's mansion. Then they'll be safe, they'll win a cash prize, get their record wiped clean and the poison dispensing tracker bracelet will be deactivated. A lot to play for.

Most of the contestants are pretty annoying and I didn't care much for them. In fact it was nice to see them get picked off one by one or in a small group. There's plenty of running about and yelling but not much else going on of interest. The poor DVD mastering didn't help either. Ultimately it was disappointing and not one I need to see again.

Cor, Blimey! 2000

Cor, Blimey! 2000 Director Terry Johnson adapted his 1998 play Cleo, Camping, Emmanuelle and Dick. Geoffrey Hutchings and Samantha Spiro played Sid James and Barbara Windsor in both the play and the film.

It's a TV movie about the romance between Sid and Barbara, they meet in 1964 on the set of Carry On Spying and Sid chased her for years, their 3 year affair started in 1973, in 1976 Barbara broke it off, Sid started drinking heavily, he died the same year, passing away from a heart attack on opening night of The Mating Season.

Some of the real incidents in Sid and Barbara's lives have been altered in the film, the Wikipedia page for the film lists several changes or inaccuracies. Like any biopic it needs to be taken with a pinch of salt.

Sid started acting in 1947, appearing in a good number of films before moving into TV, his sitcom Bless This House, always a favorite in our place back then, had 6 series under it's belt when he died.

Barbara's first film is a favorite of mine, the 1954 comedy The Belles Of St Trinians. She made a name for herself in the Carry On series, appearing in 9 of the films, and she had a great run on the popular soap EastEnders. She stopped acting at 80 and died 3 years later in 2020. Her life makes good reading, plenty of interesting things happened to our Babs.

I think I first started seeing Sid in the Carry On films, he appeared in 19 of the 31 films. They were on Canadian TV when I was a kid and I would have watched them, they had a certain adult level of humor even though they're fairly innocent by today's standards. The films through 1962 were written by Norman Hudis and the ones after were written by Talbot Rothwell, the wholes series was directed by Gerald Thomas.

There's a wealth of comic talent on screen, beside Sid and Barbara there's some of my favorite British character actors: Kenneth Williams, Joan Sims, Charles Hawtrey, Kenneth Connor, Peter Butterworth, Hattie Jacques, Bernard Bresslaw, Jim Dale and Leslie Phillips.

I've always enjoyed Sid as an actor but I think I wouldn't care that much for him in real life. This is true of so many of the interesting writers, artists and film makers who's work I've liked.

Both Sid and Barbara were married at the time of their affair. Being married never stopped Sid from chasing women. His passion fruit seduction technique is depicted in the film. Don't know if it's true or just a joke so they can wrangle the word cunnilingus in there. It's the sort of thing some of his characters on the Carry On films might do.

Sid seems to be homophobic in the film, he picks on Kenneth Williams, something Kenneth recounts in his diaries. I haven't read the book that came out with pieces of Kenneth's diaries so I don't have much to go on. Some say Sid was a man of a different age and in England being queer was a jailable offense before they got rid of that law in 1965. I have downloaded a TV movie about Kenneth, with Micheal Sheen as Kenneth, the clips I looked at make him seem rather sad and bitter. Cor, Blimey! is similar in it's take of Kenneth. Kenneth wasn't friends with Sid but he was friends of many show people including Babs.

Interesting movie but more for those that have an interest in Sid and the Carry On films. Another series I should dig out and watch again.

Friday Night Movies 851

Wooshi: The Demon Slayer 2009 Written and directed by Choi Dong-hoon. A Korean fantasy comedy with plenty of action and effects.

The movie mixes events from the modern day and 500 in the past. Some of the characters are immortal beings, others have magical powers. Back in the past the goblins have taken the Flute Of the Prophecy. The Immortal Taoist Wizards band together with The Master and Hwadam and banish the goblins from our world. They retrieve the Flute, break it in two, and in trust half to The Master and Hwadam. When The Master is murdered his student Wooshi is blamed for the crime and imprisoned in a painting. We know it's really Hwadam what done the dirty deed. He's a real monster.

In modern day the Immortal Taoist Wizards find the goblins are escaping their imprisonment and hiding among the humans. They can transform, only their green blood gives them away. The Immortal Taoist Wizards get Wooshi and his dog pal Chorangyi out of the painting and they have a smashing time fighting the goblins. On top of that it turns out Hwadam has gotten even more evil.

It's action packed and the magical effects are top notch. The story has a nice sense of humor and the baddie gets put down. I was glad to have picked up the Shout Factory Blu-ray from Hamilton Books for a fiver. I'll watch it again.

Crumbs 2015 Written and directed by Miguel Llansó. A rather surreal Spanish-Ethiopian science fiction story set some centuries after a big collapse. Candy is a deformed man who lives with a woman in an abandoned bowling alley. He scavenges for ancient artifacts, there's some sort of economy left over that allows a trade in collectibles. Above the landscape, floating in the sky, is a dormant spaceship. It's been there since before the big collapse.

There's a rumor going around that it's coming back to life and Candy thinks they should be on the ship if it leaves. He sets off an a quest for tickets, wondering through the landscape, following the train tracks. Eventually he finds a guy running a cinema showing the Turkish Superman film.Candy throws his Superman top into the river and the movie is over.

It's such a personal story that I can't tell you what it's all about. It was sort of interesting to watch, wondering what was going to come next, but the message is so lost in the medium that Marshall McLuhan would just tell me to go to bed and not think about it.

Friday Night Movies 848

Saturday Morning Mystery 2012 Story by Kat Chandler, Jonny Mars and Jason Wehling, screenplay by Joey Balsimo, Aron Leggett and Jason Wehling, directed by Spencer Parsons.

Some paranormal investigators are broke and useless at finding ghosts. They have a paid gig at a haunted mansion, then they arrive they find there's something in the house but it ain't a ghost.

This Scooby gang parody starts off fairly well, then drifts into a poorly written second act where all the characters open up about their personal problems. That really killed my interest in the characters and their story. The third act ramps up the violence but by the end I was glad it was over. I thought it was below average and I wouldn't want to see it again.

Netherbeast Incorporated 2007 Written by Bruce Dellis and directed by Dean Matthew Ronalds.

Steve Burns is an office worker called Otto Granberry, and he works at Berm-Tech Industries, Darrel Hammond is his boss Turner. Steve gets called into Turner's office only to find Mike staked through the heart. Turner tells Otto he's got to rewrite Mike's report by Tuesday and he didn't kill Mike because of the poor report, he killed Mike because he was a vampire. Turner wants Otto to dispose of the body and get on that report.

We soon find out that Berm-Tech Industries is a very old company and all the workers are immortal netherbeasts that are often called vampires. They all live in Arizona, on the top of the Berm-Tech office block, they hardly ever go outside, living people don't get past the receptionist. The netherbeasts don't care to be called vampires, they have their own backstory and their problem is caused by a growth on their hearts. They drink human blood and eat human flesh but they don't murder to get their food anymore, they have a system in place to get fresh bodies.

Turner creates two issues, he hires a living woman to replace Mike and he's hired Judd Nelson to study the company's work habits and report. On top of that mess, some employees are murdered by an unseen person. Otto, office manager Dave Foley and Mike's replacement team up to try to figure out what's going on.

I'd seen this last week on Amazon Prime and liked it so much that I immediately ordered the DVD. I enjoyed it as much the second time through. It's a good solid comedy with a good script that's got funny jokes. There's a bit of romance, a murder mystery, a hostile take over and plenty of fresh blood. I'll be glad to see this down the road sometime.

Friday Night Movies 838

The Racetrack Murder 1964 German movie called Das Siebente Opfer, based on the novel by Brian Edgar Wallace, screenplay and direction by Franz Josef Gottlieb. One of several films made from Edgar Wallace's son's novels by a rival German film company, they were not usually as good as the superior Edgar Wallace films from Rialto. The movie is on a DVD with a second film. 

The story is set in the world of horse racing and involves a rich family and the people who work for them. First someone tries to dope the horse, then someone is killed. Scotland Yard are called in and soon after there's another murder. It plods along and the detectives do their best to catch the killer. It's a bit slow moving and sometimes I lost interest. Not as much fun as many of the Edgar Wallace films are. It's about average to me. Glad to have seen it but wish it was more entertaining.

The House In The Woods 1957 Based on a short story called Prelude To Murder by Walter C Brown, screenplay and direction by Maxwell Munden. I had the Network DVD but watched the version on the DVD with The Racetrack Murders. I'll compare the two when I have a chance to dig out that DVD.

Michael Gough is a moody writer who wants to go somewhere nice and quiet. Patricia Roc plays his wife. They find a nice cottage in the country. Ronald Howard plays the owner, he wants to go off traveling and will rent them the place for a pittance. He talks them into staying that very night, so they can see if they like the place.

Ronald's a gracious host and they have a nice time until Michael starts to believe there's something sinister behind all that bonhomie. It takes a while to figure it out and Patricia doesn't believe Michael until it's too late. Now they're in a pickle and it's touch and go for a while.

I enjoyed it quite a bit, it's only an hour and there's a good bit going on. You can watch a copy here.

Cruise Of The Gods 2002  Written by Tim Firth, Michael Marshall Smith and Peter Baynham, directed by Declan Lowney.A made for TV movie for the BBC.

Rob Brydon has been producing his own short interview program from home over the lock down periods in the UK. When he interviewed Steve Coogan they talked about Cruise Of The Gods and it seemed like I would like it. Steve and Rob appeared together in The Trip and all the sequels to that.

Twenty years before the movie starts Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan were in a cheaply produced SF TV show called The Children Of Castor. Steve went on to bigger and better things and Rob is a porter at a hotel. The show has a following and Rob gets hired to appear on a cruise ship for the fans of his show.

The ship is also host to a Jack Jones appreciation get together and a third do for someone else. These are really small gatherings. Jack plays himself in the film and he's great. He's another of the people who pass some sage advice to Rob. Jack sings a number of songs through the movie and he's still in fine voice.

David Walliams plays the head of the fan group and James Corden is his hapless lackey. The lady in the picture above is Helen Coker, she plays a fan of the series and she's another of the people that give Rob a bit of a life lesson. Rob's character is a needy failure who's only fans are the sort of people he hates. He acts like he's still as active actor but his roles are few and far between. Steve's character is a nice guy who's had some breaks, he's currently staring in Sherlock Holmes in Miami, it's a street smart version of Holmes with a black Watson. We're lucky to see some of the movie being made because Steve hires Rob to play the part of Scumbag #3 out of pity.

Because Steve nearly ran over Rob with his yacht he finds out that there's a fan cruise for the show. He's only too happy to put in an appearance and he's happy once he gets there. He's just generally an all around nice person. The lessons continue for poor Rob and eventually there's a happy ending. I laughed a fair bit and there's some good life lessons to learn. I'd certainly recommend it. Sadly, there's only the British DVD out, you need a region free player or VLC Player to play it. I got a copy from Amazon and was glad I picked it up.

Friday Night Movies 833

A Woman, A Gun and A Noodle Shop 2009 Screenplay by Shi Jianquan and Xue Jianchao, directed by Zhang Yimou. It's a remake of the Coen Brother's film Blood Simple.

Everything centers around the noodle shop in the middle of nowhere. The desert is beautiful, with rows of brilliant pastel colored hills. The people in the noodle house aren't quite so beautiful. The old man is the owner, his wife buys a gun, her lover is worried. The lover works at the noodle shop, the owner pays a soldier to kill the lovers. Of course, it all goes wrong, quite nicely, and it was fun getting there.

It's a nice adaptation and I liked the more humorous take. Glad I took a chance and bought the DVD, I'll hopefully get to watch it again someday.

Dog Eat Dog 2016 Based on the Edward Bunker novel of the same name, screenplay by Matthew Wilder, directed by Paul Schrader.

Nicolas Cage is a crook out of jail, he hooks up with William Defoe and Christopher Matthew Cook. They are absolute scum. They get hired to kidnap a kid, they screw it all up and everyone dies. Since it's a Paul Schrader film there's some onscreen jiggery pokery. The last several minutes are annoying. What am I supposed to make of that. Paul's inner brain and I don't get along.

It looked pretty good for a fairly low budget film. It was shot in Cleveland over 25 days with a crew of recently graduated film students. It didn't do well at the BO. Critics were mixed and it has yet to break 5 on the IMDb. I kind of feel 5ish, if it had been more original, I might have liked it a bit more but these aren't interesting individuals and I've seen their story over and over. I'll still keep the DVD, I might want to watch Nicolas and William chew some scenery.

Immortal Demon Slayer 2017 Director Derek Kwok co-wrote the screenplay with Hai Huang, Hezai Jin, Fan Wenwen and Henri Wong, they adapted Jin's book Wukong Biography. The movie is called The Tales Of Wu Kong in China and it's another Monkey King movie. It's supposedly set 500 years before Sun Wu Kong goes to war with the Heavenly Kingdom.

There's a long complicated plot involving a lot of people, some of them have powers of one sort or another, hardly any of them are on the same page. There's plenty of action, romance and murder. Good reminder, humans and gods don't mix, someone always winds up dead, and it isn't that immortal guy.

I enjoyed it for the most part and would watch it again. I suppose I could have a Monkey King marathon. That would take a while, I know I've got six Monkey King films, I think there's at least another. Oh, well, some other day. 

Science Fiction Sunday 624

Deep In The Valley 2009 Written and directed by Christian Forte, the son of pop singer and teen icon Fabian.

Chris Pratt is a porn hound who works in a liquor store, Brendan Hines is his roommate. Brendan is about to marry his ball breaking fiancée and he's decided to quit his job at her dad's company. She says no, that's final. Later Chris and Brendan are sitting around the house having a beer when a giant package is delivered. It's a vintage porno booth from famous porn producer DJ, it was a prize in a radio call in show and Chris won.

The pair get in and are transferred to the porn version of their world, all the women they see are porn actresses from our world playing the characters they played in their movies. Chris knows all their names. They meet DJ and he tells them they are on a quest and the quest must be completed before they can leave.

The pair have encounter after encounter with busty young ladies but we never see anything. No nudity here. A romantic subplot develops between Brendan and one of the porn stars. Chris finds out who his daddy is and daddy's rich. Things work out well enough for both guys.

It's not a great film but I had a few laughs. I wouldn't need to see it again. I'd buy the DVD if it was at the Dollar Tree for a buck. As it is I spent a minute bit of my Amazon Prime annual fee to watch it, same with the following.

Alien Invasion 2018 Written and directed by Marc Carreté. He's from Barcelona, the film was made there but set in the Rocky Mountains. The original title is After The Lethargy, some reviews use that title. It's AI on the IMDb.

That lady on the DVD box is a journalist who wants to investigate a strange abandoned instillation in the woods by the Rock Mountains. The woods no one has been allowed into for 40 years. Supposedly there's dangerous bears there but it soon becomes apparent to our reporter that there's something else going on here.

If you guessed aliens, nil poi, it's mentioned in the title, and there's that picture on the DVD. The journalist meets up with a ranger, he's going to guide her through the woods. Right off they run into bears but manage to hide in the old abandoned building. One bad thing after another happens to the journalist who should have listened to her mother and stayed home.

It's somewhat familiar and predictable and not really better than average. There's fair CGI for the alien and the location is nice. The acting is alright, other than the occasional off accent. I wouldn't need to bother with this one again but it was watchable.

Science Fiction Sunday 617

Toomorrow 1970 Written and directed by Val Guest. Val wrote and directed a lot of TV and feature films, his next film after this was the fan favorite When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth.Producer Harry Saltzman had a three picture deal with Don Kirshner and they wound up loathing each other during the production. The write up in the Wikipedia details the problems and why the film was shelved for 40 years. I read online that there was a poor quality DVD out but I watched a copy off of YouTube. The DVD came out after Kirshner died in 2011.

It's a science fiction musical with Olivia Newton-John, she's in a band with the other three guys in the pictures above. According to the IMDb Trivia page Olivia was so "disenchanted with filmmaking that it took a lot of coaxing to get her to agree to star in Grease (1978)." Val didn't have that good a time either, he never got paid, even after he sued the production company. In a way it's not surprising, the film biz is cut throat and there are a lot of scumbags out there.

Benny Thomas, Vic Cooper and Karl Chambers play the guys in the band Toomorrow. Vic has invented a new sort of music synthesizer. Roy Dotrice plays an alien who's been studying the Earth people for 3000 years and today his boss tells him that they've discovered at there's magical healing power in Toomorrow's music. It's all about Vic's invention, the Tonalizer, the aliens want it and the band, it's Roy's job to figure out how to make that work.

The band plays several times in the film and I can't say I much liked the pop music, not because it's awful, it's just bland melody. There's plenty of running about as the band members try to get through their day at college. Roy pops up and offers a place to practice, he lives in a big old mansion and the band takes him up on the offer. Now Roy has to get them on the space ship. Some of it doesn't make a whole lot of sense but I don't suppose anyone really cared. I didn't but I still don't think it's anything other than about average. Nothing notable about it really. I got a laugh or two and I might watch it again someday.

Mutant Swinger From Mars 20o9 Written and directed by Michael Kallio. It's another one of those "lost 50s science fiction films" that people make these days. Martians have come to Earth for women. One of them impersonates a suave guy who picks up chicks 4 at a time. It's sort of like the 50s but not quite. There are way too many in jokes. It gets tedious. It was on AP and I don't think I'd watch it again anytime.

Disney Dogs Collection Volume 1

Disney Dogs Collection Volume 1 collects 4 previously released DVDs of dog related films and puts them in a cheap 4 pack. I got Dogs V1 and 4 other four movie collections in 2018 and they were $7.49 each. A quick visit to Amazon for the set's cover tells me that Dogs V1 is currently $9.99, which is still a pretty good bargain, if you like these sorts of movies. I mostly got this for The Shaggy Dog. I'd seen it and The Ugly Dachshund back when they were relatively new. I was 6 when The Shaggy Dog came out so I'm guessing that I saw when it was aired on Walt Disney Presents 1958-1961 or Walt Disney's Wonderful World Of Color 1961-1969. I know I saw The Ugly Dachshund at the Bronx Park Community Center in Winnipeg sometime after it was in the theaters. In the 60s the center would play a kids movie every Saturday. It was a quarter to get in. They screened a lot of Disney movies in 16MM and it was well attended. I would go every Saturday. At some point the guy running the thing started asking me to run across to the Safeway and get him some quarters. He would let me in for free.

The Shaggy Dog 1959 Based on the novel The Hound Of Florence by Felix Salten. He was the same guy that wrote the novel Bambi. Bill Walsh and Lillie Hayward wrote the screenplay and Charles Barton directed. Bill wrote a lot of Disney films and TV shows, including The Absent Minded Professor, Mary Poppins, That Darn Cat!, Blackbeard's Ghost, The Love Bug and Bedknobs And Broomsticks. I've seen all of those and really enjoyed them as a kid. Most of them are still fairly entertaining but I have a deeply rooted streak of nostalgia when it comes to Disney.

Lillie wrote a large number of films and TV episodes in a career that started in 1924 with Janice Meredith and ended with Smoky in 1966. I didn't recognize much in her early work but I've seen the 1936 film The Walking Dead with Boris Karloff, in 1943 she wrote My Friend Flicka and Black Beauty in 1946, Tarzan And the Lost Safari in 1957. After that she penned The New Adventures Of Spin And Marty, the Annette TV series, plus several other Disney programs and films.

In the commentary with Tommy Kirk and Tim Considine they both are very complementary to director Charles Barton. His career started in 1934 with Wagon Wheels, a Randolph Scott movie I've seen and enjoyed. After that I don't think I'd seen any of his films until the 1940s, when he started directing films for Abbott and Costello. I know I've seen all of those. In the 1950s he moved into TV directing episodes of shows like Amos And Andy, The Great Gildersleeve and Disney's Zorro. He kept directing TV until 1971 when he retired.

Fred McMurray and Jean Hagen are the mom and dad to Tommy Kirk and Kevin Corcoran. Tim Considine is Tommy's pal and Annette Funicello is the gal that Tim and Tommy are both interested in. Cecil Kellaway is a professor at a museum and he's the source of the Borgia ring that turns people into dogs. Tim's natural clumsiness acquires the ring and reading the writing on the ring turns Tim into the big sheepdog in the house next door. For some reason the ring doesn't turn people into their own dog but merges their body with a nearby dog.

The new neighbor with the dog is played by Alexander Scourby, he's a scientist who's also a spy. He plans to steal some plans from a local military site. Tim and the gang of kids help put a stop to that.

There's plenty of silly stuff and slapstick. Good cast with Alexander Scourby, Roberta Shore, James Westerfield, Strother Martin and Paul Frees. I'd last seen this in 2009 and wound up enjoying it again.

The Shaggy DA 1978 Based on the same novel by Felix Salten, screenplay by Don Tait and direction by Robert Stevenson.

The sequel has Tommy Kirk all grown up, now he's played by Dean Jones. Dean's married to Suzanne Pleshette and they have a little boy. Keenan Wynne is the town's District Attorney and the bad guy. He played that role in several previous Disney movies.

Tim Conway is the comic relief machine, he has the dog that Dean turns into, an ice cream truck with more than 39 flavors, and Jo Anne Worley as his girlfriend. She's in the roller derby. Some criminals are working the city pretty hard and Keenan is doing next to nothing. In fact, he's getting a cut from local fence Vic Tayback. Dick Van Patten is Keenan's henchman. Luckily they are all bunglers.

After his house is cleaned out Dean decides to run for DA and clean up the town. The crooks steal the ring and it starts working it's mojo while Dean is trying to get his campaign on. The sequel isn't as charming as the first movie, but it's still OK. I was still entertained and would watch the pair of them again.

The Ugly Dachshund 1966 Adapted from the novel of the same name by GB Stern, screenplay is by Albert Alley, direction by Norman Tokar. Albert wrote a whole lot of 60s and 70s TV, shows like Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, The Rifleman, Have Gun - Will Travel, Laramie, Rawhide, and The Magical World Of Disney. Norman started directing in TV with shows like The Bob Cummings Show, Leave It To Beaver and The Donna Reed Show. He started directing feature films for Disney with Big Red in 1963 and went on to direct over a dozen films for them. He directed 31 episodes of The Magical World Of Disney.

Dean Jones is an artist and Suzanne Pleshette is his wife, she's a stay at home wife and is totally fixated on her Dachshund. The dog they have is pregnant and  vet Charlie Ruggles delivers the trio of pups. Dean takes a liking to the runt of the litter of the Great Dane that Charles has. It's been rejected by the mother who has too many pups for he milk supply so Dean sneaks it into the house claiming it was later delivery. Susanne figures it out after a couple of weeks and reluctantly lets Dean keep the dog he's named Brutus.

The Dachshund's are naughty and Brutus often gets unfairly blamed. He's no angel, his large size and playful attitude brings about a lot of destruction. It's all very slapsticky and destructive but there isn't much story other than the day to day at the house. Eventually Brutus saves one of the Dachshunds and he's now Suzanne's pal too. It's not quite as entertaining as the other two and I might skip when I watch the set again.

The Shaggy Dog 2006 Five people wrote the script and Brian Robbins directed. Brian directed Good Burger back in 1997 and I enjoyed that movie more than this one. I liked Ready To Rumble with David Arquette but not so much Norbit. He's produced a lot of TV and films.

I'm no fan of Tim Allen and he made me less interested in this movie all the way through. He's the assistant DA to Danny Glover and Kristin Davis is his wife. Robert Downey Jr has a dog stolen from a Chinese monastery, the dog has been alive for 80 years and he wants to know why. He's been experimenting on a long life serum with his Partner Phillip Michael Hall and they are using animals.

A local teacher is being tried for trying to free the animals and setting fire to the lab. Tim is working the case and his daughter is mad at him for taking the case. Tim gets bitten by the 80 year old dog and he starts turning into a dog but unlike the other films he doesn't merge with the existing dog. The two dogs are mistaken for each other throughout the film. Eventually things get sorted out and the villains are revealed.

There's plenty of slapstick and some jokes but I didn't find it more than about average. I'd probably skip it when I watch the first two movies.

Friday Night Movies 796

Army Of The Dead is a 2008 zombie film of little originality. Joseph Conti directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Michael Ciccolini and Tom Woosley. A professor and some students take an archeology trip to the Baja Peninsula.

According to the movie, four centuries ago Coronado sent 1000 men to find El Dorado, they disappeared. Well, the professor thinks he knows where the city is and he's secretly made a deal with some scumbags to steal the gold. His students are clueless about his plan. The prof finds the city and of course releases the curse. It animates the 1000 lost skeletal conquistadors. They are totally bent on slaughtering the professor and his minions. 

Sadly the CGI is only fair, it's about the same for the rest of the movie. The actors are adequate but the script isn't that interesting. You've certainly heard it all before in any number of the other 'trapped by some evil force that's killing everyone' movie. There's nothing much exciting about the location, I've seen the desert before, and better photographed too. I wouldn't need to see it again, that's for sure.

Subferatu is a 2020 everything but the kitchen sink comedy that blends time travel, Nazis, vampires, submarines and Gilligan's Island. It's written and directed by Patrick Penta. I found it over at Amazon Prime, same as the previous movie.

A small pleasure craft is out for a 3 hour tour when a big storm comes up. Their ship is floundering when they are rescued by a submarine commander in the Nazi navy. There's only a small crew on board the sub and they don't realize the survivors came from the future. The ship was in the Bermuda Triangle and the skipper's name is Captain Gavin McCloud. That's him in the red shirt.

The Commander tells the Captain that it's the day after Hitler killed himself. The Commander wants to surrender his sub but only if he can sail it into New York harbor. The Captain doesn't know if he traveled back in time, or the sub came forward, but he knows it's going to be somewhat of an issue to show up in the harbor. On top of that possible trouble, there's a vampire on the sub.

It's definitely goofy, it made me laugh out loud 3 or 4 times and I snickered once in a while. It's pretty self aware, the Captain talks to the audience from the start, and while the jokes are not all top raters there are a lot of them. It's a cornucopia of genre movie references, so keep an eye, and and ear, open. The actors, the film was made in Seattle, are mostly OK, the characters are pretty broad so they have a lot of wiggle room in their roles. I wasn't sold from the start but the general goofiness won me over and I had a good laugh. Sadly it's not out on DVD, I might buy a copy if it was cheap enough.