The Movie Bar 4.0
29Jul/090

Saw VI Motion Poster

These are cool. They did one for Terminator: Salvation too.

14Jul/090

Bonus M.O.T.W. – What Do You Say to a Naked Lady?

I couldn't resist, this was too funny. Allen Funt hosts a rather naughty, feature length version of Candid Camera called What Do You Say to a Naked Lady. The title gives it all away: people are confronted with full frontal nudity in public with a hidden camera rolling. Hilarity ensues. Enjoy!

Poster for "What Do You Say to a Naked Lady?"

Poster for What Do You Say to a Naked Lady?

On a side note, this movie was originally rated X. Now it's easily available online for anybody to see. MAN times have changed.

14Jul/091

Movie of the Week – Strangeland

Dee Sinder's 1998 thriller Strangeland is one of those polarizing, love-it-or-hate-it movies. I, for one, like it a lot, and seeing it on Hulu actually made me say "Oh shit!" out loud. While it didn't come anywhere near Fangoria's claim that the film's antagonist Captain Howdy was a "horror icon for the next millennium," the film was definitely way ahead of it's time. It capitalized on the "online hook up turned deadly" thing years before the scenario became commonplace in reality with the advent of social networking and Craigslist, amongst other things.

Check it out on our Movie of the Week page.

Cover Art for Dee Snider's "Strangeland"

Cover Art for Dee Snider's "Strangeland"

13Jul/090

“Karate Kid” Remake Starts Shooting

I am late to the party on this one, but The Karate Kid remake starring Jackie Chan and Jaden Smith has started shooting.

Ummmm.... what? Jackie Chan is a goofball, Jaden Smith is 11, they are calling it Kung Fu Kid for some stupid reason (at least according to the article linked to above), and the director is responsible for crap like One Night at McCool's. This doesn't add up. At last check, The Karate Kid was a commercial successful ($90,815,558), Oscar nominated (Pat Morita, Best Supporting Actor, 1984) classic that spawned a 4 film franchise. Doesn't it deserve a little more respect than a name change and a shitty director?

I am not thrilled.

13Jul/090

Bruno Takes Number One

The Box Office Numbers:

  1. Bruno $30.4M
  2. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs $28.5M
  3. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen $24.2M
  4. Public Enemies $14.1M
  5. The Proposal $10.5M
  6. The Hangover $9.9M
  7. I Love You, Beth Cooper $5.0M
  8. Up $4.6M
  9. My Sister's Keeper $4.1M
  10. The Taking of Pelham 123 $1.6M

Not really a surprise considering how wildly popular Borat was, however it's reign at the top will be short due to Harry Potter coming out this week. Speaking of which...

Out This Week:

Smart move on the part of all studios not called Warner Bros. refraining from releasing anything this week. Personally, despite the fact I know it's going to be terrible and that an endorsement of it pretty much means I can be ridiculed for having terrible taste, I am interested in seeing Homecoming more than anything else this week, although A Woman in Berlin is probably the honest-to-goodness best release of the week. But all that aside, Harry Potter 6 will probably make $150 million over the weekend.

6Jul/090

Movie of the Week (7/6/09): Session 9

Poster Art for Brad Anderson's ghost story/psychological thriller underrated opus

Poster Art for Brad Anderson's ghost story/psychological thriller/underrated opus

Brad Anderson's genuinely scary film about strange happenings in an abandoned, asbestos-filled psychiatric ward is an obscure, shot on DV horror film starring David Caruso and Josh Lucas (amongst others) and is worth a watch. Jaded horror fans will be pleasantly surprised by the unforced scares and creepiness prevalent throughout, although gorehounds will be disappointed. My favorite aspects of the whole thing are the story itself and how the asylum is used as an actual character as opposed to just spooky backdrop. I highly recommend this.

6Jul/090

I Was Wrong

Ice Age 3D was good enough to tie Transformers 3 with a $42,500,000 weekend and a $67,506,000 five day take. Nothing spectacular, however it was a ridiculous drop for Transformers 3, demolishing any chances it may have had to be this summer's Dark Knight. My big surprise for the weekend box office was Public Enemies pulling $26,172,000 over the weekend and $41,044,000 over 5 days. I don't expect to see those numbers continue because word-of-mouth is saying "okay, but boring and too long."

Box Office Report for July 4th Weekend:

  1. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs $42.5M
  2. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen $42.5M
  3. Public Enemies $26.1M
  4. The Proposal $12.7M
  5. The Hangover $10.4M
  6. Up $6.5M
  7. My Sister's Keeper $5.2M
  8. The Taking of Pelham 123 $2.5M
  9. Year One $2.1M
  10. Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian $2.1M

Out this weekend:

If I had to make a pick of the week, I'd say the mockumentary Humpday looks semi-promising, as it's hard not to make a good comedy about porno. As for top of the Box Office, I'll roll with Bruno.

30Jun/093

Funny MPAA Rating Explanations, Vol. 1

Rarely do people read the fine print in the rating box, however a close examination will reveal exactly why the MPAA decided to give a movie a particular rating:

The R-rating for "Hatchet" is for some juicy stuff

The R-rating for "Hatchet" is for some juicy stuff

So the MPAA keeps a searchable online database of movie ratings, complete with explanations and alternate titles. Needless to say, this is a source of a great deal of unintentional humor. Here are some that I found that gave me a good chuckle, usually at the expense of maturity. Some are better than others:

  • Twister (1996) - Rated PG-13 for intense depiction of very bad weather.
  • 3 Ninjas Knuckle Up (1995) - Rated PG-13 for non-stop ninja action.
  • Bog (2005) - Rated PG for monster action and language.
  • Charlie And The Chocolate Factory (2005) - Rated PG for quirky situations, action and mild language.
  • Tokyo Decadence (1993) - Rated NC-17 for strong, explicit, sado-masochistic sexuality.
  • Team America: World Police (2004) - Rated R for graphic crude and sexual humor, violent images and strong language - all involving puppets.
  • Braveheart (1995) - Rated R for brutal medieval warfare.
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (1992) - Rated PG for swashbuckling violence and mild language.
  • The Viking Sagas (1995) - Rated R for brutal and bloody Viking combat, and for some sexuality.
  • The Littlest Viking (1994) - Rated PG for Viking combat.
  • Shark (2000) - Rated PG-13 for shark-related violence.
  • Teenage Space Vampires (1999) - Rated PG for mild alien vampire violence.
  • Ghost Brigade (1993) - Rated R for satanic war violence.

The best are those that not even a copywriter could have done better. Like Ghost Brigade's "satanic war violence." I am going to actively seek this movie out now. It's not just war violence. It's satanic war violence. That has got to be a whole new level of war violence.

If you find any that are really funny, let me know and I will make a volume 2.

UPDATE: Ghost Brigade is also known as The Lost Brigade, The Killing Box, and most importantly Grey Knight, which it is known as on Netflix where it available for instant streaming. It stars the can't-miss-trio of Corbin Bernsen, Martin Sheen and Billy Bob Thornton. Why have I never heard of this? Satanic war violence and B.B.T.? How can this not be the greatest movie ever made?

29Jun/090

Good LORD That’s a Lot of Money!

So now that Transformers 2 has made $201,246,000, where is all of the "will it beat Titanic" talk? What about the "does it deserve a best picture nomination" bullshit? Hell, I haven't even seen it get props for spanking X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Terminator Salvation's totals in it's first five days.

Oh that's right, Megatron didn't off himself.

For the record (just in case all of that record breaking madness starts up when it makes another $100 million this week,) it's not going to touch Titantic. The new Harry Potter is coming July 15th and crashing that party.

Out this week:

I don't think Ice Age has the muscle to dethrone Transformers, but it'll definitely rake in some dough. Public Enemies is the one I want to see more than anything. Lion's Den looks to be the best of the bunch for the limited releases.