PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Friday Night Movies 897

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore 2022 Based on a screenplay by J K Rowling, screenplay by J K Rowling and Steve Kloves, directed by David Yates.

Second viewing in a few days gave me a chance to notice more of whats going on in the background, little things that I missed the first time. It's a busy movie, plenty going on. I enjoyed it all over again.

One Million BC 1940 Written by Mickell Novack, George Baker and Joseph Frickert, directed by Hall Roach and Hall Roach Jr.

Some hikers seek shelter in a cave during a rain storm. They find a man studying the cave paintings. He starts to tell them the story on wall and the film turns into a flashback of the story. Victor Mature is a caveman in the rock tribe, after an altercation with his father, played by Lon Chaney Jr, he winds up in the river. Victor floats down the rive and eventually winds up in the territory of the Shell tribe.

Victor meets Carole Landis and the rest of the tribe. The Shell people are much more civilized, sharing food and providing care to the young and old alike. There's plenty of danger as the area is packed with dinosaurs. When the volcano erupts the two tribes are brought together and the movie ends with them staying together. Probably best for safety and breeding.

I'm sure I've seen it but my watched movie list doesn't have anything listed. Some parts were familiar. I did enjoy it, there's usually something going on. The VCI Blu-ray looks pretty darn good. I'm tempting myself by putting a copy in my Wishlist. I'm thinking I'd watch it again someday.

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore 2022

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore 2022 Based on a screenplay by J K Rowling, screenplay by J K Rowling and Steve Kloves, directed by David Yates.

I picked up the Blu-ray at Target today, not something I'm prone to do very often with new releases. I watched it when I got home and enjoyed it. There's plenty of magical business and Mads Mikkelsen does a great job replacing Johnny Depp as Gellert Grindelwald. The rest of the cast does a great job.

The story is complex and there are plenty of characters to follow as they go about their business. The film jumps around the planet and there's lots of nice scenery, most of it not real. The CGI is fine and so are the costumes and props.

I was happy to finally see it. Looking forward to the next two. We're still waiting to hear if the film made enough money for the other two to get green lite. This was the worse preforming of the films in the HP series, a $405 mil return on $200 mil spent to get it to the screen.

Friday Night Movies 894

Scared To Death 1980 Story by William Malone and Robert Short, screenplay and direction by William Malone. Malone started doing makeup and costuming for Don Post Studios. This is his first picture, he'd go on to direct Creature in 1985 and 5 other pictures including the 1999 remake of House On Haunted Hill. He hasn't made a film since 2008.

There's a serial killer stalking the streets of Los Angeles. When we drop into the story about the time of victim number 12's murder. The police aren't getting any good clues from the crime scenes, the mayor and the newspapers are hounding the Chief. Detective Lou Capell gets some pressure from his boss. Lou wants to bring an ex-cop into the mix but the Chief is against it. The ex-cop is a guy called Ted, he had a drinking problem and now writes novels.

In a clumsy, poorly written scene we meet Jennifer, she's Ted's romantic interest. They get involved with each other as the movie progresses, eventually they join Lou in the search for the killer. Sometime along the way we learn that it's some sort of humanoid monster doing the killing. They get a substantial bit of help from one of the scientist's at a bio-lab and it's revealed that the creature is a bio-engineered thing called a Syngenor. It's one of those hard to kill warrior beasts scientist's are always making in movies and it takes a bit to put the creature down.

It would be an OK monster movie except for two big stumbling blocks, the script and the music. The script is poor and the actors can't do much with it. The actors aren't a stellar lot but they get their lines out. The music is annoying and way too loud some of the time. The Syngenor creature is a fairly well made suit. Ten years later another producer used the suit for his picture Syngenor. Like Scared To Death it's kind of a poor film. Both films have a score of 4.2 on the IMDb. I gave Syngenor a 3 some years ago and I gave Scared To Death a 4 last night. I must be getting soft headed in my old age. You can check them both out on YouTube, links above.

Last Night In Soho 2021 Story by Edgar Wright, screenplay by Edgar Wright and Krysty Wilson-Caims, directed by Edgar Wright. It was the last film for Diana Rigg and Margaret Nolan, both of whom passed away in 2020. Margaret played the gold covered woman in the credits to Goldfinger and Diana played Mrs Peel.

Ellie Turner leaves Cornwall for London to attend the London College Of Fashion. She wants to be a clothing designer. She's heavily into 60s style and music. Her roommate is a jerk so she leaves the dorm and takes a small flat on the top of an old house owned by Ms Collins, played by Diana Rigg. Ms Collins is old enough to have lived in the 60s.

Ellie starts having visions of a young woman from the 60s called Sandie who wanted to be a singer but wound up in the clutches of a creep called Jack. Matt Smith plays Jack and he makes a good spiv. In his first scenes Jack seems like a nice guy who likes a bit of fun, soon his darker exploitative side takes control. Next thing you know Sophie is a prostitute working for Jack and his pals.

Ellie follows Sandie's life and finds that she lived int he flat Ellie is in now. She sees Jack murder Sandie there but can't find anything about the murder in the newspapers. She does find there have been a lot of missing men in the Soho area. We'll find out where they've gone soon enough. Ellie's a poor detective, she misreads what's presented to her, at one point she accuses an old bar fly of being Jack but she soon finds out he was a copper who tried to help some of the local gals. If only she had talked to more people about what was going on, she might not have gotten so far off the track.

The story is jazzed up with flashy camera work and musical numbers. I did like the old 60s songs in the soundtrack. I knew most of them from my youth. I didn't care for the noisy music when the movie thought something was happening. It seems overly long, repetitive and kind of self indulgent. There's a decent twisty bit at the end and things work out for Ellie at fashion school.

I still enjoyed it, gave it a 7 on the IMDb and have put the Blu-ray on my Wishlist. It's hard to know if you would like it, it did poorly at the box office, raising $23 mil on a $43 mil budget.

Friday Night Movies 881

Greed In The Sun 1964 Original story by Claude Veillot, written by Michel Audiard, directed by Henri Verneuil. A French and Italian production set in the Sahara Desert.

Jean-Paul Belmondo is a truck driver working for Gert Förbe in Morocco. Lino Ventura and Bernard Blier are also truck drivers in the same company. Gert buys a new tractor trailer and he plans to let his new driver Reginald Kernan take it out on a trip to Nigeria. Next morning Jean-Paul takes the truck and runs off with the cargo. He's got a pretty lady with him. She turns out to be the instigator of the robbery.

Gert sends Lino after Jean-Paul and Bernard after Lino. Reginald joins Lino at the edge of town, Gert had fired him for being tricked by Jean-Paul. The guys chase each other across the desert with Lino catching up with Jean-Paul on occasion. Jean-Paul uses any trick he can, he tells the owner of the gas pump and bar along the way that Lino and Reginald are gay and not to sell them any gas because it would upset Gert. That doesn't go down well with Gert and Reginald, they bust up the owner and his bar, they get gas but don't pay.

Their trucks have trouble and eventually Jean-Paul has to hi-jack Lino's truck. Lino and Reginald get to the city where the deal is supposed to take place and they split up. Lino finds Jean-Paul among some prostitutes and they have a punch up. Jean-Paul admits to being hi-jacked by his girl friend. They have a big laugh and join the prostitutes in the brothel.

It's no Hell Drivers but it was entertaining enough for me to spend $2.95 for the Blu-ray over at Hamilton Books. It's fairly comic and scenes in the desert are a good reminder I'm glad I'm not there. None of those trucks seem to have air conditioning. I wouldn't like that much.

God Raiga Vs King Ohga 2021 Written and directed by Shinpei Hayashiya. The third of his films featuring Reiga or Raiga.

I really didn't care for this at all and won't waste any  more of my time on it.

Friday Night Movies 879

Ghostbusters Afterlife 2021 Written by Gil Kenan and Jason Reitman, directed by Jason Reitman.

Egon Spengler lives as a recluse on a farm in a small town in Oklahoma. Small towns in Alberta are used for filming. Egon goes up against a spirit from the Ivo Shandor mine nearby. It's a good reminder that everyone needs to be watching the rich, not because they're comically creating portals to evil in another dimension, they're creating much human misery in their greed grab.

Egon dies battling the spirits and his daughter Callie inherits the farm. Lucky for her, she's just been evicted from her apartment. Mom takes her two kids, Phoebe and Trevor to Oklahoma only to find there's no cash, just the farm and some debt. Callie's been estranged from her reclusive father for years and years. Her children don't know anything about him.

Egon's ghost helps reveal some of his Ghostbuster past and Paul Rudd, a local teacher and seismologist, brings the rest to Phoebe and Trevor via the internet. Egon's got the Ghostbuster car in his barn and it pretty much starts up ready to go fight the supernatural. The first attempt to catch a ghost goes badly, there's much rushing around and considerable collateral damage to the town.

Undaunted, Phoebe and her growing gang soldier on in the battle against evil. They discover the Shandor mine and the evidence that Egon had been working to keep the maelstrom of evil in the shaft. Eventually they trap Gozer and meet the original Ghostbusters.

It's a nice looking film with all sorts of flashy special effects, some family melodrama and a few laughs. I enjoyed it though I was a bit slow to get involved during the first act. I bought the Blu-ray and will want to watch it again. I should have a marathon of the three films and the 2016 reboot. It's been several years since I watched the first two films.

King Solomon's Mines 1950 Screenplay by Helen Deutsch, directed by Compton Bennett and Andrew Marton. According to the Wikipedia Bennet was replaced by Marton because he was ill but there are rumors that Bennet had a falling out with cast members.

Stewart Granger is Alan Quatermain, Deborah Kerr is a rich woman looking for her husband, Richard Carlson is Deborah's brother. Deborah offers Stewart £5000 for taking her on the expedition, that's about £684,587.82 in today's cash. His normal fee is £200. Reluctantly he takes Deborah and Richard on.

There's plenty of trekking through the African countryside. Much of the film was filmed on location. Some of the scenery is rather nice. The underground scenes were filmed in Carlsbad Caverns. They encounter quite a few wild animals and some danger. Along the way they lose some of their bearers and pick up Umbopo. His part as the son of a murdered king is somewhat reduced in the film when compared to the novel or the 1937 film we watched a couple of weeks ago.

Weeks and weeks pass before they get to the Watusi tribe and Umbopo fights the king. A romance develops between Stewart and Deborah, lucky for them her hubby is already dead in the mine. Unlike the book or the 1937 movie they escape without any uncut diamonds. At least they have their lives.

I'm sure I'd seen this before but not in decades. I enjoyed it but not quite as much as the 1937 version. The Technicolor is alright. I picked up the DVD and I hope to watch it again sometime.

Friday Night Movies 875

Prisoners Of The Ghostland 2021 Written by Aaron Hendry and Reza Sixo Safai, directed by Sion Sono.

Post apocalypse world after a nuclear waste accident. It's all stylized and noisy and colorful. The story is nothing more than Nick Cage being forced to rescue a woman for a warlord. There's plenty of staring into the middle distance and some fights. Nick gets one of his nuts blown off. Sucks to be him.

It was entertaining sometimes, dull sometimes, funny sometimes, annoying sometimes. Glad to have seen it but doubt I would pick one up.

Frankenstein's Daughter 1958 Written by H E Barrie, directed by Richard E Cunha. We watched the new Blu-ray from The Film Detective. It looks quite nice.

 

A sad old scientist works in his home lab with an assistant. Felix Maurice Locher plays the old scientist and Donald Murphy plays Oliver Frank, the assistant, who turns out to be a direct descendant of the original Dr Frankenstein. Dr Frank has a secret room off the lab and he's building his own creature. He's also experimenting with a serum that makes people ugly, he's given it to the old scientist's daughter. She escapes the house and after running about the street scaring people she returns home to pass out on her bed. She only has hazy memories of the night.

 

Sandra Knight plays the daughter and John Ashley plays her boyfriend. Wolfe Barzell plays the Igor character and Harry Wilson plays the monster. They call the monster a woman because they used a woman's brain. Sadly, the makeup man didn't know the creature was supposed to be female. There wasn't any more money to redo the make up but they did put some lipstick on the lips. Same say that Cunha saw the mask and cried. I don't blame him.

The creature gets out and terrorizes the town. The police come and things don't go well for several people. It's entertaining while being below average. I'm not sure I'll buy the FD disc, I might not want to see it that often. I'll put it on my Wishlist. Who knows.

Friday Night Movies 873

The Awakening 2011 Director Nick Murphy co-wrote the script with Stephen Volk.

Rebecca Hall plays a woman ghost debunker in post WWI London, she doesn't believe in them and she finds out the hard way that she's wrong. Dominic West is a teacher in a boy's boarding school, he asks Rebecca to come to his school and find out if they really have a ghost. They do.

There's a few scares but some of the nasty activity is man made, the young boy who died off screen was really killed when a disturbing teacher, who shouldn't be teaching anyone, locked him outside to toughen him up, the kid had a fatal asthma attack. Much of the staff seems messed up, the grounds keeper is a mentally deficient cowardly rapist who tries to kill Rebecca. The school's head housekeeper is played by Imelda Staunton, she's one of the most disturbed of the lot.

Sadly they ruin a good ghost story with all sorts of personal melodrama, not much happens while they spend a lot of time on figuring out what's behind Rebecca's miserable life. Not something that appealed to me that much. I wouldn't need to see it again.

The Day Of Destruction 2020 Written and directed by Toshiaki Toyoda. The movie is a scant 57 mins so we watched the even shorter prequel Wolf's Calling from 2019. There's a third short in the Resurrection Trilogy, Go Seppuku Yourselves from 2021. We didn't see that.

A monster lives in a old coal mine and it's created some mental issues in the people who live there. The story is told in a disjointed way with little by way of clues as to what's going on. Think art film with a noisy annoying soundtrack.

Some guy, commenting on the IMDb, says the three films are an angry response to the pandemic and the government's handling of the situation. I couldn't tell that from what's on screen. The films we saw look good but it's not enough, I'm looking for a story I can get my head around. Enigmatic personal stories just don't cut it for me. I wouldn't need to see it again.

Mortal Combat 2021

Mortal Combat 2021 Story by Oren Uziel and Greg Russo, screenplay by Greg Russo and Dave Callaham, directed by Simon McQuoid. Simon's first film, he's been making commercials.

Bigged up, fancier version of the previous films. More CGI effects and the characters have much flashier costumes and powers. I liked the first Paul WS Anderson film from 1995, the followup film was directed by John R Leonetti and it's just not as good.

There's some backstory and plenty of action. The action goes on and on until all the baddies are finished for now. Mostly entertaining bu nothing special going on. I found a copy on the Internet Archive but it's long gone. That saves me buying a copy of the disc. I don't see re-watching this anytime soon.

Godzilla Vs Kong 2021

Godzilla Vs Kong 2021 Story by Terry Rossio, Michael Dougherty and Zach Shields, screenplay by Eric Pearson and Max Borenstein, directed by Adan Wingard.

Godzilla surfaces and attacks an Apex Cybernetics facility in Florida. A conspiracy theorist called Bernie thinks that's something is going on at that location. He's gotten a job there so he can spy on the company. He finds a dodgy shipping order in his search but isn't sure what it means. During the attack he stumbles onto a powerful device but has to leave because of Godzilla stomping about. Bernie joins up with one of his listeners and her pal to sneak into the Florida Alex location. They get shipped to Hong Kong in a secret underground transport system.

The Apex CEO hires Alexander Skarsgård to lead an expedition to the Hollow Earth. They take Kong along, he's sedated and lying on a barge. Godzilla attacks to convoy of ships, there's a massive punch up and big G puts Kong down. Alexander saves the ships from further attack by shutting down all the ships and pretending to be dead. The CEO believes Kong came from the HE. Turns out he was right. A good thing for the human's in their fancy high tech helicopters. Kong beats down some giant flying beasties that chomped on one of the fancy choppers. Lucky for us, the stars of the movie where in another chopper. It's dangerous working in corporate America.

CEO guy sent his daughter with the expedition to HE. She's a ruthless cold hearted type that comes to a bad end, at least from her POV, I was kind of digging the fire ball created by her chopper as it was crushed by Kong. Back in Hong Kong, the conspiracy trio have chanced upon a test of Mechagodzilla. Turns out that CEO guy is there and he's large and in charge. Godzilla pops up and opens a tunnel to the Hollow Earth. Kong and Godzilla yell at each other until Kong jumps into the hole and lands in Hong Kong. There's some big battle scenes and more people and places succumb to the monster mash. Eventually it's all sorted and Kong and his pals on on vacation until the next sequel.

Mostly entertaining but seems long winded even at 113 mins. There's a Blu-ray due in a couple of weeks, that should look better than the version I found online. I'll order one after the price falls a bit. I'd want to see it again.

Friday Night Movies 822

The Night Before 2015 Director Jonathan Levine wrote the story that he adapted into a screenplay with Kyle Hunter, Ariel Shaffir, and Evan Goldberg. A couple years before TNB Jonathan wrote and directed Warm Bodies. I saw that and liked it well enough. I haven't seen any of the other 5 movies he's directed.

Fifteen years after they started to look for the legendary Christmas Party, the Nutcracker Ball, three friends decide to quit the hunt after this one last try. Lucky for them Joseph Gordon-Levitt works in a hotel and he finds and steals three tickets to the secret event. Seth Rogan and Anthony Mackie are his pals, all three guys have their own issues, all of which are mostly resolved by the end of the movie.

It's kind of funny, not all the gags were to my liking, and kind of like a bunch of movies. It's still a bit better than average and I would watch it again sometime. I believe the DVD came from Dollar Tree. When they used to have DVDs for a buck. Haven't seen that for the last year or so, I rarely ever go there anymore.

Plan 9 2016 Written and directed by John Johnson. John adapted Ed Wood's  Plan 9 From Outer Space but made it as a modern zombie film. These zombies run fast and bite hard. There's plenty of gore and loose body parts. It's sadly sexed up with some nudity and sex scenes. It's better made than Ed's film, John had more money and a bit more talent. Brian Krause is the big name in the film, at least from the modern day, Wood fans will recognize Conrad Brooks from the original film. He's got a small part, mostly he sits in a chair. It's watchable, though my mind did wander at times, some scenes are not as good as others. On the whole below average, I'm leaning more to a 4 than a 5 on the IMDb. I was kind of wishing that John had made his own story, instead of fiddlin' with Ed's story.

Interestingly the votes on the IMDb look like this.