Blog Archives
The Iron Giant
The Iron Giant 1999
I don’t remember the first time I found out about the Iron Giant. I know it wasn’t in theaters, I wasn’t one of those lucky few that caught it during its brief and relatively unsuccessful theatrical run. I don’t remember if I went back to it after watching Brad Bird’s later feature the Incredibles or if I just happened across it on TV or a random video rental trip. I always thought it was an interesting look that called up the retro 50’s style and the film itself is actually set during that time as well. It was also a movie that I didn’t initially consider as a superhero movie, but when I did my final poll for the 100 Essential Superhero Movies I included it and it nabbed the second spot, which is likely more a testament to the quality of the movie than to its place as a superhero movie. There are definitely superhero elements; this is an origin story of sorts, the Iron Giant himself has more than enough super powers, and at the end of the day he uses Superman himself as inspiration to save an entire town. I will do my best for this to not just be a gush fest, but it will be tough as this is one of my favorite movies and it’s a shame that it has taken me this long to get around to reviewing it here.
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The Amazing Spider-Man 2
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 2014
There’s one thing that I’ve been enjoying about 2014 that I did not enjoy about 2013. Even though there have been roughly the same number of superhero and comic book movies, last year they were all packed into the 3 or 4 months of summer, while this year they have been spread out to mostly 1 or 2 a month. August has been the biggest month with three theatrical movies, and the rest of the year is pretty wide open with only the limited release Birdman, the graphic novel adaptation The Scribbler, and the first Disney/Marvel animated collaboration Big Hero 6. To date, I have only missed a couple theatrical movies including this one. It’s actually surprising because if you would have asked me last year, this would have probably been number two on my most anticipated list behind X-Men: Days of Future Past. But as I learned more about the movie from the trailers and the early reviews I decided not to take the time out of my busy schedule to go see it and instead waited until I could watch it at home. Ultimately, I think that was the best decision for me to make because when all was said and done, this is my second disappointment of the year next to Sin City: A Dame to Kill For. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t nearly on the same level as that movie, there is still plenty of fun to be had here, and some great action beats. The problem is that it tried to combine too many characters and interconnected sub plots that just made it too confusing. It isn’t a Spider-Man 3 debacle, but it’s a far cry from the other movies. And finally I will give a quick spoiler warning as I will be mentioning a significant plot point from the end of the movie.
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Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer 2007
I can honestly say that I don’t remember much about the release of this movie. I was a fan of the first Fantastic Four and I was looking forward to seeing what happened with the sequel. I was glad that they were bringing in the Silver Surfer and Galactus even though I had heard that they had turned him into a giant cloud. I don’t remember if I knew about the minor controversy with Doug Jones doing the motion capture and speaking role during production, but replaced by Laurence Fishburne’s voice afterwards. It came after a middle of the road movie and featured one of the most popular characters from the Fantastic Four, but it failed to generate enough interest and barely cleared its budget domestically. I still consider the first movie to be a guilty pleasure of mine and I expected more of the same out of the sequel. And while there is still some of that fun charm that I enjoyed in the first movie, it ends up working against itself more often than not. And on top of everything else, it fails at way too many of the necessary superhero tropes. There’s a weak villain, a weak climax, and a sacrifice that neither had weight nor real impact.
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Sin City: A Dame To Kill For
Sin City: A Dame To Kill For 2014
I think more than any movie before it, this had the quickest drop from being a movie that I had been looking forward to the most to being a movie that I was dreading watching. All after I started hearing all the negative reviews coming in from many of my fellow reviewers who were watching early screenings. It warned me away so much that I avoided seeing this movie opening weekend. Although I wouldn’t have had to worry about my other usual concern when seeing a movie opening weekend as the crowds wouldn’t have been an issue with the tepid $6 million opening. Maybe it was the poor marketing, maybe it was the fact that it’s been ten years since the first Sin City, maybe it was because the second 300 movie also came out earlier this year, but nobody went to see this movie. This movie is still a far cry from The Spirit, that pseudo Sin City directed by a lone Frank Miller with all of the elements of Sin City but not in the right amounts. There are plenty of great moments in this movie, but none of those moments ever added up to a cohesive whole and in the end I was left wanting.
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Orgazmo
Orgazmo 1997
This is one of the very few movies that I included in my 100 Essential Superhero Movies that I hadn’t seen before, but enough people voted for it in the poll that I included it sight unseen. It came from Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creative types behind the juggernaut that is South Park which I was a fan of. I say was not because I no longer like it, but I just haven’t watched it in years. So with the recommendation of my readers and my enjoyment of South Park I went in expecting to really enjoy this movie. Unfortunately, most of the comedy did not make me laugh at all, and when you take the humor away from this movie, there’s not a whole lot left to grasp onto. Not to mention that it’s a somewhat of a movie about the porn industry without any female nudity aside from the occasional sideboob though I suppose that’s supposed to be part of the joke and I knew about that wrinkle going into the movie as well. And underlying the plot line about this clean cut Mormon entering into the seedy porn underworld is the side story about him actually becoming this crimefighter Orgazmo. It just never added up for me.
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Sheena: Queen of the Jungle
Sheena: Queen of the Jungle 1984
I often enjoy doing blogathons, especially when I am able to do them within the focus of this site, and so when my friend Todd over at Forgotten Films decided that he wanted to do a big 1984-a-thon in honor of the 30th anniversary of one of the greatest years in cinema history, I gladly jumped on the bandwagon. Unfortunately, 1984 wasn’t a huge year for superhero movies and the two that were made, Supergirl and the Toxic Avenger, I had already covered here. But there was one other film released that year that wasn’t quite a superhero movie, but it was a comic book adaptation of the first female to ever get her own comic book title four years before Wonder Woman. It began its way to the big screen in the 70’s and took over 10 years before it finally got its cast and went into production with Tanya Roberts who I knew as Donna’s mother Midge from that 70’s show and didn’t realize it until over halfway through the movie and not only that but love interest and journalist was played by Ted Wass who I best knew as the dad from Blossom. Anyway, when I chose this movie I knew it was going to be a campy movie right along the lines of Supergirl and Toxie and it really was. A silly plot, bad acting, and a lot more nudity than I was expecting for a PG-rated movie. But in the end, it was still quite a bit of 80’s fun.
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The Adventures of Tintin
The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn 2011
Since I’ve been running a few blogathons lately, I thought I would return the favor and join in some of the other blogathons that have been running by some of my favorite sites. So when I saw that It Rains… You Get Wet was helping to run his very first blogathon, I knew I wanted to be a part of it, and when I saw that it was a Spielbergathon, I was even more excited. Make sure you check out the other entries as well as the other sites hosting it: Citizen Screenings and Outspoken and Freckled. Of course, when you think of Steven Spielberg, you think of his many classic blockbusters like Jaws, Jurassic Park, Indiana Jones, and plenty more but while he has many iconic heroes to his name, he has never done a superhero movie. But he has actually been involved with a couple comic book adaptations, directing this adaptation of the long running, beloved French comic which has actually been adapted many different times in France but most Americans were unaware of it, and he was also the executive producer of the odd sci-fi western adaptation of Cowboys and Aliens. This was also a noted collaboration between himself and Peter Jackson who will hopefully still be directing the sequel once he’s done with the Hobbit films later this year. I didn’t see this movie in theaters, but I did enjoy it fairly well once I saw it on home video. I was unfamiliar with the details of Tintin outside of the absolute basics of his appearance and the fact that he was a comic character but knew nothing about what types of adventures he had or his personality before watching this.
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Antboy
Antboy 2014
I saw the Danish trailer for this movie last year and to my amazement, it was actually given a home video release here in the US and I happened to find it here through Redbox (and you can see if Antboy at Redbox is available near you) though the US distribution almost completely erases any mention of the fact that this is a Danish movie, filmed in Danish, and dubbed in English without even the option to watch in the original language with subtitles. Aside from that, I thought it was a fun family superhero movie that followed several superhero movie conventions while also bucking a couple of them. There are some fun little flourishes and it rarely takes itself seriously. I mean, what do you expect from a movie called Antboy? It’s interesting to see what slight differences pop up when it comes from Denmark, though there are surprisingly few things that aren’t really relatable as an American audience. I absolutely enjoyed it for what it was.
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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2014
I wasn’t really planning on seeing this movie in theaters, it had a lot of negative hype surrounding it as it was from (director Jonathan Leibsman) and producer Michael Bay, the early buzz around the movie was that they were going to be aliens, they weren’t going to go with the full Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles title, the turtles themselves had really weird noses, and it had the critic’s bane Megan Fox in a major role as April O’Neal. It didn’t help once the reviews started coming in either. Outside of a couple positive reviews, including one from Today, I Watched a Movie whose taste is often similar to mine, everything was coming back negative and further diminishing my desire to see this movie. But I was overruled by my family and to my surprise, it wasn’t the crapfest I was anticipating. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not an amazing achievement in cinematic history either but I wasn’t counting the seconds until the movie was over and I caught myself enjoying the moments between the turtles and other things here and there.
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Fantastic Four
Fantastic Four 2005
I recently talked briefly about this movie in my top 10 guilty pleasure superhero movies list even though it had been years since I had seen it last, I also think that it is one of the last few big superhero movies that I’ve yet to review here on this site along with its sequel, Elektra, TMNT, and just a couple others. While I did enjoy it the last time I saw it, I’ve had years of internet loathing to soak its way into my brain as well as years of quality cinema, superhero and otherwise to better allow me to see the flaws in this movie and boy did I ever. Of course, behind all the bad writing, dated special effects, and questionable casting choices there is still some fun to be had watching this movie and above all else, it’s still the Fantastic Four.
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Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights 