I had read some of the early Jonah Hex comic stories when that was first come out in 1972. He started as the main story in All Star Western #10. That became Weird Western Tales soon after and Jonah would stay there until issue 38. In 1977 he got his own comic series whch lasted 92 issues. After that Jonah jumps to the 21st century in the 18 issue series Hex where he finds himself in a post apoc type of world. I had quit reading DC comics in 1978, selling off most of my comic 
books when I moved to Minneapolis, so I missed most of the Jonah Hex series and the Hex issues. No matter, reading the comic doesn't make any different, the movie goes it's own way. Josh Brolin plays Jonah and he looks and acts the part. John Malkovich plays the bad guy. He likes blowing things up and he's angry the south lost. Megan Fox plays the whore. The story is set several years after the Civil War ends and just days before the 100th Anniversay of the USA. John has stolen a giant super repeating cannon that fires some mighty powerful cannon balls very rapidly. They don't blow up until a special shell is detonated near them so you can drop a bunch of them and then make a huge explosion when they all let rip at once. John tests the cannon on a small town. We get a demo of that as the unlucky families are leaving church. That Johnny is a right bastard as we get to see repeatedly. Makes you want to kill his ass that's for sure. This Jonah has him a special power, one which I believe isn't in the comic, that lets him talk to the dead. If he holds on to them too long they burn up. That comes in handy since the dead can see all and such. Jonah chases John about and gets shot up a bit. There's plenty of gun fights and shooting going on plus all those explosions. Also exploding out of the movie is the heavy metal soundtrack. Not my favorite that's for sure.
It's directed by JImmy Hayward who was an animator for Pixar, then directed Horton Hears A Who! a couple of years ago. That scores a 7.2 on the IMDB and made more than double it's $75 million cost. Poor ol' Jonah hardly made $10 million back on it's $47 million cost. It scores a 4.6 on the IMDb. I might peg it a bit higher. It's ok but it isn't great. the script is by Neveldine and Taylor. They wrote and directed the Crank movies and Gamer. Those are better. Joe said he might buy Jonah if he saw the BluRay for 5 bucks and with the way the prices have been coming down that might not be too far away. I don't know that I need one, maybe the regular dvd for 4 bucks. Bet I see one used before too long.
Mike picked up a copy of Death Kappa. It's a 2010 Japanese film that tries to capture the older Japanese giant monster movie style by making most of the effects physical and not relying on the CGI. The movie starts with a young woman going home to the country. She's been a pop star but not so popular now. On the way from the station she sees her grandmother hit by a car driven by some jerky self absorbed youngsters. They drive off leaving grandma to die in the girl's arms. Grandma uses her last dying breath to pass along the guardianship of the village kappa to the young girl. The youngsters drive into a Kappa statue and knock it into the sea. It comes back to life and kills the youngsters. Haha on them. Then we join the daughter of a WWII era scientist who is continuing dad's experiments. Pop wanted some mutant supersoldiers to win the war but didn't get his wish. Lucky us, huh. Well, somehow or another an atom bomb goes off. I assume that everyone is killed since they aren't seen again. The kappa, who not only survived but has grown large, battles another giant monster. I guess he must have 
gotten some of that radioactivity on him. The kind that makes you grow real big. You see that in movies a lot, don't you. There's some building crushing and people stomping. Some of it was entertaining but the whole suffers. It drags a lot, I could hardly stay awake, and it put Mike into a coma. The director Tomoo Haraguchi was a special effects guy who worked on some other Japanese films like Uzamaki and Gamera 3. If only he had gotten some mad directing skills before he started work on this. Not a movie I think I would need to buy. Here's some monster pics from around the internet. Nice firey breath, huh. Like I said the giant monster parts were mostly ok.
Great place for picking up pictures sometimes. I couldn't find much about the movie but I did see some reviews that really sucked up to the movie. Some of the reviews on the IMDb thought it was a cinematic masterpiece. Yeah, I don't get it either. Fakes from the production company? Maybe, or maybe not, read the 5 pages of reviews by Lord Velvet Muffin Orifice, and shake in wonder. Reviewer Luke is My Hero only has one review. That might mean he's a fake. He compares the gore scenes to those in Saw and he's going to be surprised when it doesn't get an Oscar nod. All I can say it WTF is that guy thinkin'? Here's the 6 pages of reviews by OlavEisen_Twattle which leave me feeling the same way.
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