Written by John Farman Art By Will Pickering
Wednesday, 27 September 2017
Tales Of The Damned: The Hounds Of Love Part 2 By John Farman & Will Pickering
Written by John Farman Art By Will Pickering
Monday, 25 September 2017
The Mummy Review By Steve 'Sandwich' Hanisch
The Mummy
Year: 2017
Directed By: Alex Kurtzman
Starring: Tom Cruise, Annabelle Wallis, Russell Crowe and
Jake Johnson
Tagline: “An ancient Egyptian princess is awakened from her
crypt beneath the desert, bringing with her malevolence grown over millennia,
and terrors that defy human comprehension.”
RottenTomatoes Score: 16%
IMDb Rating: 5.6/10
This one hurts. A big fan of the
Universal Monster films and the potential for a “Dark Universe”, I immediately
got excited for this one when it was announced. Then Tom Cruise was the star of
it. I had mixed emotions. I’m a Tom Cruise fan, unlike most people these days,
say what you will, but the man is an action star and a box office draw. Which
is why the four-hundred million dollar raking in worldwide was a bit of a
shock. After seeing the film, I can now see why.
If I had to choose one word to
describe this film, I would use a word that comes up too often in a lot of big
picture productions these days. Empty. Part of what made the late nineties
Mummy films so fun was their charm, emotion and the ability to land a joke.
They rode on the coattails of Brendan Fraser and honored the mythology of the
story. Now, I understand these are not great films, but they’re films that have
survived a long time in a business that will bury the films that don’t have any
blood, sweat and tears poured into them. Enter Tom Cruise’s version of The
Mummy.
Now, look, I don’t know what to
really think about the rest of the Dark Universe films. I am absolutely going
to watch them. No doubt. The Bride of Frankenstein is supposed to be the next
one and Javier Bardem is supposed to be Frankenstein’s Monster. There is hope.
And, if I did my research correctly, what I read is suggesting that Tom Cruise
had way too much control on the set and in the editing bay and that his
influences severely altered the course of this film. I believe it and I can see
if that is true, a bright future remains for this Dark Universe. It’s too rich
with such a long history to not have a couple of successful entries. Plus, who
wouldn’t want to see a Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde-Wolfman-Creature from the
Black Lagoon-Frankenstein crossover?! WHO I ASK?!
Oh, you want reviews of this
actual film not just the Dark Universe? Well, my friends, the life of the Dark
Universe is teetering on the edge of existence right now, so I took that as the
more important option. Watch the film, go ahead. You won’t. If you do, you
won’t hate it. You won’t love it. You really won’t feel anything about it in
anyway at all which is probably the most indicative thing I can say about it.
That’s the lasting impression I get. As I write this, The Mummy is fresh in my
head. I imagine that in twenty-four hours or less I will have no memory of this
movie as it is already fading fast back into the subconscious of my dark mind.
Sandwich Dark Mind Universe. I literally remember more scenes from the 1999
version than a film I just saw.
The worst part of this film is
Tom Cruise’s attempt to be charismatic and hokey. It just doesn’t work. And
that pains me to say it, because I am a Tom Cruise lover. As in I’m a fan. I’d
be lucky to be a Tom Cruise lover. But he has to know when to step off. I love
Jake Johnson, if he was the lead in this film (and minus the Tom Cruises
influence during production) I bet this film would have been better off. I
would fight the Rotten Tomatoes review just because I want the Dark Universe to
exist and pump out films. But they’re not wrong. “Lacking the campy fun of the
franchise's most recent entries and failing to deliver many monster-movie
thrills, The Mummy suggests a speedy unraveling for the Dark Universe.” In the
immortal words of Darth Vader, “NOOOoOoooOOOoOOOoOOO!”
Thursday, 21 September 2017
Tales Of The Damned: The Hounds Of Love By John Farman & Will Pickering
Written By John Farman & Art By Will Pickering
Rough Night Review By Steve 'Sandwich' Hanisch
Rough Night
Year: 2017
Directed By: Lucia Aniello
Starring: Scarlett Johansson, Kate McKinnon, Zoë Kravitz,
Jillian Bell and Ilana Glazer
Tagline: “Things go terribly wrong for a group of
girlfriends who hire a male stripper for a bachelorette party in Miami.”
RottenTomatoesScore: 46%
IMDbRating: 5.2/10
When a movie is tagged with the
description of “the female Hangover” you’re immediately going to one of two
places. One, that’s bullshit. Or two, wasn’t that Bridesmaids? Either way, take
it easy with The Hangover references people. That was a perfect storm of a
comedy movie, they couldn't even replicate the magic in two sequels and they
made the original!
No, this is not even close to a
‘Female Hangover’, however it is not without its moments. It’s got a talented
cast and Jillian Bell and Kate McKinnon are by far and away the funniest ones
of the bunch. I love Broad City and Ilana Glazer is phenomenal in that show,
but just didn’t shine through in this one. Zoë Kravitz, to me, is nothing more
than a could-have-been rock star’s daughter. Scarlett Johansson does her best
to hang, but the obvious nature of an A-list star in a genre that’s not usually
in her wheelhouse was too great to overcome. See, John Cusack in Hot Tub Time
Machine. Also, holy run-on-sentence Batman.
As I said, there were some funny
gags and cool castings throughout the film. I’m happy with the R-rating, more
comedies need to go that route these days. A lot of scenes just weren’t as
funny as they could have been. I do not understand the casting of Zoë Kravitz
and Scarlett Johansson. If they casted stand-ups or comedic personalities in
those roles, this movie could have really shined through and chemistry could
have actually worked and they could have cut together scenes that weren’t
stagnant. I’ll never understand that. If you have a movie based around friends
reuniting, perhaps you should have friends or at least acquaintances reunite.
Not this mismatch of talent. The funniest scenes in the films were the other
side of the coin with the men’s “bachelor party” starring Paul W. Downs along
with some very funny dudes. The problem with this movie, well one of the, is
their B-storyline was funnier than their main storyline. That’s an issue. Eric
Andre and the other bachelor’s created a great atmosphere and change-up to the
mains storyline and that’s what you’re supposed to have happen. It’s a great
joke and one of the few that work to its full potential. Actually, maybe the
only joke that works to its full potential. Unfortunately. There are funny moments
and if you got in expecting nothing, you’ll get a little something in return.
But expect literally nothing.
I’d have to agree with Rotten
Tomatoes on this one, although I’m surprised at the rating. I agree more with
the tag than the actual percentage of forty-six, “Rough Night’s gifted stars
are certainly good for some laughs, but their talents aren't properly utilized
in a scattered comedy that suffers from too many missed opportunities.” #Preach
Review and General Shenanigans Written By: Steve “Sandwich”
Hanisch Thursday, 14 September 2017
Monday, 11 September 2017
Logan Review By Steve 'Sandwich' Hanisch
Logan
Year: 2017
Directed By: James Mangold
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Dafne Keen, Boyd
Holbrook and Stephen Merchant
Tagline: “In the near future, a weary Logan cares for an
ailing Professor X, somewhere on the Mexican border. However, Logan's attempts
to hide from the world, and his legacy, are upended when a young mutant
arrives, pursued by dark forces.” Rotten Tomatoes Score: 93%
IMDb Rating: 8.2/10
This is the Wolverine movie the world needed. The movie I
needed. From the opening scene, they may as well have said, “This ain’t your
daddy’s Wolverine movie”. Fuck genre conventions, fuck standard PG-13 ratings
for superhero films, fuck tidy-looking heroes and exalt the anti-heroes, Logan
is the cream of the crop film Hugh Jackman and James Mangold wanted and needed
to make to be able to leave this character behind with no stone unturned and no
bit of movie effort left untouched and unscathed.
The first time you see Logan,
he’s muttering “fuck” under his breath. Not two minutes later he’s decapitating
some cholos and slicing their legs off. This for sure is the Wolverine movie
the world needed. It’s dark, it’s gritty, it’s violent, it’s heart-warming,
it’s cold, it’s heartfelt, it’s bloody, it’s sad, it’s depressing, it’s
genre-defying and genre-creating. It’s perfect. It rewrote what “superhero”
films should be. They should be based in reality with storylines and real emotions
with some underlying mythos. Not the formulaic Marvel films now that are all
PG-13 and colorful and cheerful. That’s just unrealistic and unrelatable. Logan
is the anti-superhero film. It’s not even my favorite X-Men movie, because it
doesn’t classify as an X-Men movie. If you want to get technical, it exists in
that universe but it’s an offshoot of the Old Man Logan comics and quite
frankly, I’m not even talking about that. I’m saying, Hugh Jackman wanted to
make one more Wolverine movie. May as well make it the best one yet. It took
many years, but we finally have the formula for what a Mutant/Superhero film
should be. And Logan is i-t it.
When Marvel writes in character
“flaws” it’s one thing. It’s one thing that gets exploited to make the
superheroes human. It’s still incredibly unrealistic and unrelatable, hence the
empty feeling you’re left with when you’re done watching those films. In Logan,
he’s getting poisoned by his adamantium skeleton, he still hates everyone and
loves no one until he’s forced to. Oh, and he’s suicidal too. Every character
has multiple human flaws and that only aides the film forward and allows you to
dive into the characters and they dive into each other.
There’s nothing I hate about this
film. From the casting to the story to the visuals and easter eggs, this is a
great movie for fans of the character and the X-Men comics. Couldn’t agree more
with Rotten Tomatoes this time around, “Hugh Jackman makes the most of his
final outing as Wolverine with a gritty, nuanced performance in a violent but
surprisingly thoughtful superhero action film that defies genre conventions.”
I’ll add on to that, makes the genre conventions what it should be. Fuck that,
making a genre. Call it FuckMarvelFuckDCLetsJustMakeAGreatMovie. That works. Could
work as a hashtag too. #FuckMarvelFuckDCLetsJustMakeAGreatMovie. What do you
mean I don’t know anything about social media?
In short, if you haven’t seen
Logan, I would highly recommend you do so. If you don’t want to see Logan, then
go fuck yourself, I have nothing to say to the likes of you. Other than the
things that have already been said, of course.
Review and General Shenanigans Written By: Steve “Sandwich” Hanisch
Review and General Shenanigans Written By: Steve “Sandwich” Hanisch
Last Word “I did something. Something
unspeakable. I've remembered what happened in Westchester. This is not the
first time I've hurt people. Until today, I didn't know. You wouldn't tell me.
So we just kept on running away from it. I think I finally understand you.” -
Charles Xavier, Logan (2017)
Friday, 8 September 2017
Tuesday, 5 September 2017
Baywatch Review By Steve 'Sandwich' Hanisch
Baywatch
Year: 2017
Directed By: Seth Gordon
Starring: Dwayne Johnson and Zac Efron
Tagline: “Devoted lifeguard Mitch Buchannon butts heads
with a brash new recruit, as they uncover a criminal plot that threatens the
future of the bay.”
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 19%
IMDb Rating: 5.6/10
Call me crazy, but this is the
movie I chose to review. Yes, I know it’s a comedy on a horror network. What
can I say? After Raiders of the Lost Shark, I felt like nothing could be worse.
So, with my new-found cavalier attitude I pulled my FireTV remote out of its
holster and saw this bad boy sitting there. Bring it on I said. “Let the hate
flow through you,” Emperor Palpatine said. Unfortunately, the dark side will
not win today. Not taday!
I thoroughly enjoyed this film.
Yep, I said it. Look, it’s obviously a reboot/remake of the original TV show
with David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson. Are people sitting here pretending
that was a good show? Fuck no! You know why that was a good show? It showed
slow motion bouncing tits on network TV in the late 80s-90s. Before that was a
thing. So what did this film do? Showed plenty of that. A lot of cleavage. And,
hello, unlike most reboots and films today, they went with an R rating! That’s
a diamond in a rough these days. You do that and you have my attention. Dick
jokes, fuck words being thrown around, thank you! And the best part? The film
knew it was a comedy! It knew what it was and never tried to get really
sentimental, never tried to be anything it wasn’t. It honored the original
source material, even had the Hoff and Pammy come back for cameos. I mean, what
more do you want, people? What more do you actually want? I could have used a
couple more tits on screen, but maybe that’s just because I watch Game of
Thrones and Westworld so maybe I’m a little over-saturated.
I like The Rock, but at this
point I’ll take him or leave him. I mean seriously, how many films can he do a
year? Don’t even get me started on the Jumanji film. Zac Efron is really a
talented comedic actor. If you didn’t see either of the Neighbors films, do
yourself a favor. I don’t think anybody expected this to be a masterpiece.
Sure, some of the jokes could have been better. Some tweaks would have been
welcome, but this is a place where I staunchly disagree with Rotten Tomatoes.
“Baywatch takes its source material's jiggle factor to R-rated levels, but
lacks the original's campy charm -- and leaves its charming stars flailing in
the shallows.” Campy charm? That’s only something that exists in hindsight. How
can a recent film have campy charm? And aside from that, the pun about starts
flailing in the shallows is the worse than any joke that the film made. Go fuck
yourself. There could have been a couple jokes that were slight misses and
reoccurring some of them would have added to the laugh factor I think, but to
say this is a horrible comedy is just straight up wrong. Watch the original TV
show and then watch this and you’ll want to drown yourself in “campy charm”
rather than sit through the old Baywatch TV show.
The balls on people to give
comedy’s bad reviews like this just feed into the machine of comedy’s getting
disrespected at the box office, the oscars and golden globes alike. A comedy is
a comedy. I wanted to see a funny film with dick jokes, tits and Zac Efron and
guess what? That’s what I got. I didn’t want life lessons being forced down my
throat more than what was already there. Be a good person, be a team player,
don’t be selfish. Great, anymore than that and it turns into a dramedy or a
straight up drama. I implore you, watch this with no preconceived notions. I
watched expecting nothing and I got a nice little rated R comedy film that kept
me entertained throughout. But maybe that’s just because I’m a simpleton. Let’s
see what you think.
Review and General Shenanigans Written By: Steve
“Sandwich” Hanisch
P.S.: If you hate it, who cares? It’s not like Baywatch is
paying me to do this shit. Fuck me, I’m not even getting paid at all! Yeah!
So...so who’s the real moron here? That’s what I thought. Keep on walking.
Bitch.
Editor's note: Steve will be rewarded with his own film review show 'Sandwich & Chill' on the Terror Firma Network when we... you know.. win the lottery or rob a bank and can afford to break out into Cable Television lol.
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