The Litany of Failure
Mar. 3rd, 2008 11:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kilroySo, Brigid and Nesko came down this weekend for their "honeymoon," and we watched parts and wholes of a lot of bad movies to sort out some films for NormalView. It was a whole day of bad, which I feel the need to document.
20 Million Miles to Earth -- Effects by Ray Harryhausen are actually pretty good on this one; fortunately the movie is still 50s classic. There's a monster from Venus, an obvious love interest, terrible Italian accents, and a light dose of improbable science. Genially heckleable.
Crash and Burn -- I actually had watched this one previously, but it was many years ago and I needed to make sure that it was usable for the festival. It is. Mecha, murderers, and bikers who really want to be Patrick Swayze in a post-apocalyptic television station with no air conditioning. Mild suggestivity (it's so HOT, let's sleep in our BRAS). Completely usable.
Fall of the Louse of Usher -- Uhhh... there's a lot of Edgar Allen Poe references. And bondage gear. And blow-up dolls. And badly shot music videos. And bad teeth. Potentially, there's a plot in there somewhere. We didn't stick around long enough to find it. If you just want raw bad, this was probably the worst one this weekend. Rent it if you're a masochist, it ain't showing up at the festival.
Forbidden Zone -- You remember the midget from Fantasy Island and The Man With the Golden Gun? Yeah. He's Fausto the King of the Sixth Dimension and his butler has the head of a frog. Danny Elfman starred in the movie and his brother directed it. Surreal, but vastly too far out to actually show. It makes fun of itself.
For Your Height Only -- Filipino midget secret agent sounds like a winner, but it's the wrong kind of movie for the festival. This is a carnival freak show-- you watch it to gawk, not to heckle.
The Giant Claw -- Mysterious flying bird thing messes with Air Force experiments which use radars (their plural). Slow even for a 50s movie and not ridiculous enough to make up for it. Potentially salvageable if the latter half of the film is good, but not high on my list of candidates.
Humanoids from the Deep -- Sea monsters rise from the deep to rape women on camera. No.
Hundra -- Disappointingly, the movie that looks like a female rip-off of Conan actually is competently constructed and portrays women in a mostly reasonable way. This one is probably worth watching over an alcoholic beverage on its own merits; it won't win any awards, but it's certainly not deserving of the mockery I thought it would be.
Species II -- I think this film can be best summarized as "things burst out of people's organs and children are creepy." Any tentacle-nipples are too many in my book. Too gross and badly sexed to be usable-- but terrible on many, many levels.
Vampire's Kiss -- The worst acting Nicolas Cage has ever done, bar none (and yes, I realize what I'm saying). As Brigid put it, the first 2/3 of the movie are boring as anything, but the last third is fairly hilarious. Imagine Nic Cage with big plastic vampire teeth windmilling his arms and lisping "I'M A VAMPIRE! I'M A VAMPIRE!" at top volume and you've pretty much got the picture. Terrible, but not hecklable. Edited highlights would be excellent filler.
So to summarize: not a lot of luck. But we're getting there, slowly.
20 Million Miles to Earth -- Effects by Ray Harryhausen are actually pretty good on this one; fortunately the movie is still 50s classic. There's a monster from Venus, an obvious love interest, terrible Italian accents, and a light dose of improbable science. Genially heckleable.
Crash and Burn -- I actually had watched this one previously, but it was many years ago and I needed to make sure that it was usable for the festival. It is. Mecha, murderers, and bikers who really want to be Patrick Swayze in a post-apocalyptic television station with no air conditioning. Mild suggestivity (it's so HOT, let's sleep in our BRAS). Completely usable.
Fall of the Louse of Usher -- Uhhh... there's a lot of Edgar Allen Poe references. And bondage gear. And blow-up dolls. And badly shot music videos. And bad teeth. Potentially, there's a plot in there somewhere. We didn't stick around long enough to find it. If you just want raw bad, this was probably the worst one this weekend. Rent it if you're a masochist, it ain't showing up at the festival.
Forbidden Zone -- You remember the midget from Fantasy Island and The Man With the Golden Gun? Yeah. He's Fausto the King of the Sixth Dimension and his butler has the head of a frog. Danny Elfman starred in the movie and his brother directed it. Surreal, but vastly too far out to actually show. It makes fun of itself.
For Your Height Only -- Filipino midget secret agent sounds like a winner, but it's the wrong kind of movie for the festival. This is a carnival freak show-- you watch it to gawk, not to heckle.
The Giant Claw -- Mysterious flying bird thing messes with Air Force experiments which use radars (their plural). Slow even for a 50s movie and not ridiculous enough to make up for it. Potentially salvageable if the latter half of the film is good, but not high on my list of candidates.
Humanoids from the Deep -- Sea monsters rise from the deep to rape women on camera. No.
Hundra -- Disappointingly, the movie that looks like a female rip-off of Conan actually is competently constructed and portrays women in a mostly reasonable way. This one is probably worth watching over an alcoholic beverage on its own merits; it won't win any awards, but it's certainly not deserving of the mockery I thought it would be.
Species II -- I think this film can be best summarized as "things burst out of people's organs and children are creepy." Any tentacle-nipples are too many in my book. Too gross and badly sexed to be usable-- but terrible on many, many levels.
Vampire's Kiss -- The worst acting Nicolas Cage has ever done, bar none (and yes, I realize what I'm saying). As Brigid put it, the first 2/3 of the movie are boring as anything, but the last third is fairly hilarious. Imagine Nic Cage with big plastic vampire teeth windmilling his arms and lisping "I'M A VAMPIRE! I'M A VAMPIRE!" at top volume and you've pretty much got the picture. Terrible, but not hecklable. Edited highlights would be excellent filler.
So to summarize: not a lot of luck. But we're getting there, slowly.