Tag: Ron Perlman

The last time we got a Guillermo del Toro film is when he directed the one about fucking a fish.

Will someone fuck a different creature in Nightmare Alley? Hard to say based on the title alone. I did not know until a little bit before hand that Nightmare Alley was an older book, and also an older movie from 1947. So we are getting a remake. And honestly, this is the exact reason for remakes in my mind. Often remakes are made for successful film that they just want to try again because people liked the first one. They should do more remakes either based on films that failed, or at least just more unknown work to give them a new fresh light.

Not to insult those of you who know and love the original Nightmare Alley film, but honestly, it isn’t super well known now, regardless of how big it may have been in the past.

This new version promised to be closer to the book. Alright, whatever, I am just hear for the movies. Specifically, Guillermo del Toro movies.

No, this isn’t a screengrab from the next Indiana Jones flick…Who is that mysterious stranger, Stan Carlisle (Bradley Cooper)? The one with the smooth outfit, the clean face, the twinkle in his eyes, the hat? The one who burned down that house for some reason and is willing to just…drift.

Stan finds himself at a traveling show, a carnival, full of lies and deceit. But he sees a geek show, and agrees to help load up for the night for a small payment. And then he gets offered a job to stay along more, because he looks like someone who just needs to be there.

So he stays, he listens, and he learns. Quickly. He learns the tools of the trade. He has plans and ambitions. He has been kept quiet and hidden for so long, he thinks he can take some of these skills and become famous. A celebrity. But if he becomes a man who deals with deceit, eventually, he will be deceited right in the ass.

Also starring Cate Blanchett, Clifton Collins Jr., David Strathairn, Holt McCallany, Mary Steenburgen, Richard Jenkins, Ron Perlman, Rooney Mara, Tim Blake Nelson, Toni Collette, and Willem Dafoe.

I bet his eyes aren’t even closed under there. He is using those eyes and his blindfold eye. He is a phony!

Nightmare Alley is so damn aesthetically pleasing to look at. It is polished (some would even say, polished as fuck). I know it is getting harder and harder to really tell how much of a movie is made in front of green screens, but it feels as if this film was mostly main in real places and scenes, using fine cameras to make everything pop. That is what I truly hope and believe, especially since I know del Toro is a fan of using as many practical effects as possible, generally. But maybe most of it is CGI’d, who knows. It looks wonderful.

The big cast works really together. Some in much smaller roles than expected, but still bringing in their all to tell this strange story. It was good to see Perlman get some work in a non straight to video film. Blanchett is in particular quite a force, basically stealing the movie away from Cooper’s character after she walks into it. She is given a really strong role and one that is hard to top. Cooper also does a wonderful job. It takes awhile before his character starts to talk. I wondered if he would be a silent protagonist for the whole film (like Cage was recently in Wally’s Wonderland) but once he started to actual talk, getting him to stop was the harder part.

The actual story for the film is also a pretty good one, if not slightly familiar in some ways. The ending is the type of thing you can see miles away, because they foreshadow everything really hard. However, it is okay knowing how it ends up, because finding out the lengths someone can fall and also rise is often the most exciting part of a film.

Nightmare Alley, shockingly, has no puppet animals, or strange creatures, or any non humans getting fucked. Is this growth? Nah. That was a one time thing for del Toro. Until it isn’t.

3 out of 4.

The show Chuck had a magnificent run of five seasons. It is incredible, because it had piss poor live ratings, despite a thriving fan community. It was a nerdy action comedy, a genre that doesn’t get a whole lot of love, especially on the TV.

I am glad it didn’t end too soon, but it is good to see it finally getting a movie as an add on.

Oh wait, shit. This movie, Chuck, is about something completely unrelated. And it was originally called The Bleeder. Well fuck, that sounds like a better title, and a title that wont get me super pumped up on Zachary Levi first. And it is a true story.

Well, I assume whoever this Chuck guy is, he better not secretly also be a spy.

I wonder why it might have been called The Bleeder.

Chuck Wepner (Liev Schreiber) from Bayonne, New Jersey, was a boxer, but it didn’t pay the bills. He had odd jobs, and selling liquor. But he was still a boxer first, he was known for surviving a long time in fights. He could really take a punch to the head. He was also nicknamed the Bayonne Bleeder, on account of how easy it was for his head to bleed, but he hated that nickname. He had fought against George Foreman and other notables, but he was finally getting on a hot streak.

Another person getting on a hot streak was Muhammad Ali (Pooch Hall), who just won the heavyweight champion title against the odds. And against even more odds, Don King wanted Ali to fight a white man, and Wepner was the highest ranked white heavyweight white man, so he got the gig. He was getting paid a lot less than Ali, but it was a lot of money from a bloke from Jersey, and he finally got to train full time.

But his bout with Ali was just the beginning. After that, he became a pseudo celebrity. And he even had a movie made about him. You may have heard about it? It was called Rocky, don’t cha know.

Ron Perlman played his manager/trainer, Elisabeth Moss was Wepner’s wife, Jim Gaffigan was his best friend, and Naomi Watts was his life. Also Jason Jones as another friend and Morgan Spector as young Sylvester Stallone.

“Eeyyy yo, Chuckie! I made some money!”

Chuck Wepner seems like a really interesting person. You gotta be built a certain way to just take a lot of punches and he used that to his advantage. He has a good story, and the story we were given broke the mold a bit. Because this is a boxing movie with arguably, not a lot of boxing. The fight with Ali was done with about 2/3 of the movie left to go, and the fight wasn’t done to showcase the excitement of boxing. It was just another part of the film.

No the real story of the movie is his life before and after the fight. And it got a little bit meta feeling, which I understand is the wrong word, when Rocky came out and how that changed Wepner’s life. I mean, we had a guy playing Stallone in this film, the production of Rocky 2 and more. We got to see his hard times, his bad personal life, and more. So it was bio drama first, then boxing movie second.

The first third of the movie was great, if not pretty standard. I will note after the Ali fight the film seemed to drag a bit more and I had no idea where it was going throughout it. Some okay moments, but they harped on a few of them just way too long. But the acting was fine, and they did a good job of trying to make everyone uglier to better represent New Jersey.

And overall, seeing Schreiber in this role felt really good. But what this movie really made me wonder is when the fuck will Goon: Last of the Enforcers come to America?

2 out of 4.

It has been five years since Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 hit our theater screens and ended the Snape is great series. Seven books, eight films, and honestly, it ended it a bit lamer thanks to the split in my mind. But I am over there.

But what if there were more books out there to milk the franchise? I remember when I was a kid when the books were only four volumes deep. My parent gave me Christmas presents, and in them included Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them and Quidditch Through The Ages. Two strange Harry Potter spin off books, one basically just talking about made up creatures, the other talking about a made up sports history. I read them, forgot about them, and moved on with my life.

And now look. Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them is now a movie, a movie based on a book of just made up creatures with no plot whatsoever. Not only that, but it will be FIVE films. And I am okay with it. Mostly because it basically can be whatever it wants to be without getting in anyone’s way. People who read the bestiary won’t get angry that it doesn’t match the book, because there is nothing to match. We can get more magic, without going about it in a weird way, and not involving Potter at all. Awesome. Well done.

Ah, there is a beast right there! I found it!

FBaWtFT is set in the mid 1920’s and in America! Yay America! Our hero is Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne), a slightly weird looking wizard with a weirder suitcase. It keeps coming undone, has a broken lock, and of course it is magical. Inside that briefcase he has a large collections of, well, fantastic beasts. They are creatures he has saved or is studying. He has gotten to America in order to bring one of his biggest specimens to Arizona, for its wide open skies and climate.

But things immediately go wrong when one of his creatures gets out. This leads him to bumping into Jacob Kowalski (Dan Fogler), a Non-Maj (non magic user, american wizard term for muggle). A guy who just wants to get a loan to become a baker. Their suitcases get mixed up, and Kowalski unknowingly lets some more beasts into NYC. They are followed by Tina Goldstein (Katherine Waterson), a government magic employee who wants to bring Scamander in for his suitcase and for being undocumented. Needless to say in the mix up, she ends up helping Scamander and Kowalski get the beasts back, along with her sister Queenie (Alison Sudol).

While all this is happening? There is a bad wizard out there, Gellert Grindelwald (Johnny Depp) and causing problems. There is also a magical bad creature wrecking havoc occasionally on NYC, who the magic president (Carmen Ejogo) is going to go and blame on Scamander too.

There is also a relevant plot of a anti-witch woman (Samantha Morton) who is using her orphans or real kids (not sure) to spread witch hysteria. She is also mean to the kids, including the oldest and most emo looking (Ezra Miller). Also there is a littler girl who is important (Faith Wood-Blagrove).

Also featuring Colin Farrell and a heavily CGI’d Ron Perlman!

Heavily CGI’d because Ron Perlman plays that suitcase!

Fantastic Beasts has a lot riding on it. It is the first film of a franchise they want to start, and if it bombs or fails to set up the world they aren’t going to get filthy rich! Also, thankfully, Harry Potter fans eat up anything world related regardless of quality, which is why some shitty book like Harry Potter and the Cursed Child* can somehow win best fantasy book on Goodreads.

With that introduction, Fantastic Beasts wasn’t terrible, it just wasn’t amazing either.

The cast was eclectic, but also felt over stuffed. We had four protagonists really, of which Queenie didn’t seem to do a whole lot. Our Non-Maj was funny, but even he didn’t help with the final encounter (despite a conversation with Queenie about how they were all in it together). They didn’t even show him at the same scene, so I am not sure what the point was. Tina was a character that had her backstory eluded to and explained, but she really had the personality of a wet noodle. It isn’t a bunch of exciting leads like it was with Harry Potter.

In terms of twists, there are technically two of them. The one more important to the plot I didn’t see coming, but the other one by the end felt extremely obvious from one of the first real scenes. It was an annoying reveal, given the circumstances. The ending had a few deus ex machina moments, and was extremely rushed given the overall pace of the film. Editing was surely an issue, given that it was over two hours but still felt like it didn’t give all the important details.

On all of those notes, I did enjoy Redmayne as the lead. His character felt different but not over the top. The beasts shown were diverse and fantastic looking. But I don’t appreciate that the answer to “where to find them” is apparently in his brief case. There is no hunting of beasts in their natural habitat at all. Well, maybe one. The visuals were fun, the briefcase gag was used well, and there were a few cute moments.

Overall, I have no idea where this franchise is going, but I am certain soon it will eventually give us a young Dumbledore, so that is fun.

2 out of 4.

* – I haven’t read this one yet. I am assuming it is bad though. Judging a book by its cover. I can do that for books, just never movies!

When I first saw a trailer for The Book Of Life, I was taken aback with the animation styling. And the story line. And everything about it. Well, everything but one thing.

Guillermo del Toro‘s name was attached to the picture. Really? I like del Toro, so I found that surprising because it didn’t seem like something that he heavily influenced. Outside of the Mexican influence, it just didn’t seem like his work. But I decided to give it a benefit of the doubt. There is reasoning behind the animation style, there is some cultural significance to the whole picture, and damn it. It might be excellent.

If you didn’t know, this movie has something to do with the Day of the Dead, which takes place from Halloween to Nov 2. In particular, they call Nov 2 the Day of the Dead, as that is the day that they celebrate the gravestones of their family members and party in their remembrance, the central theme to the story.

The non central theme hopefully is searching for this mythical Book of Life that gives everyone super powers. I hope.

Oh shit, those kids found it! Run! Chaos everywhere! Ahh!

Mexico in this case is the center of the universe, not only that, but the center of Mexico is a place that looks like a guitar surrounded by water, in San Angel. That is where a lot of shenanigans take place, given its central location. I guess I should explain the afterlife. Get ready for some facts. Everyone knows that once people die, their spirits go to a really sexy place where they party all day and all night and live with their families and friends! La Muerte (Kate del Castillo) rules the Land of the Remembered and it is totally fetch. But there is another afterlife place. The Land of the Forgotten, ruled by Xibalba (Ron Perlman). That is not a fun place. You see, if people in the Land of the Forgotten ever forget about someone that has died, the spirit gets moved to the Land of the Forgotten for the rest of eternity. Not a fun time at all. 🙁 🙁 🙁

Xibalba of course doesn’t like his job and wants to rule the cool place, so they make bets and wages all the time over the lives of humans to determine who rules what.

So they see these three kids running around. Manolo (Diego Luga) with his guitar and sensitivity, Joaquin (Channing Tatum) who likes to sword fight and wants to be a soldier, and of course, sweet sweet Maria (Zoe Saldana) the object of their affection and daughter of the general.

Bets! They place them. Xibalba picks Joaquin to eventually marry Maria, and La Muerte picks Manolo. If Xibalba wins, he gets to rule the Land of the Remembered, but if La Muete wins, Xibalba has to stop interfering with the lives of humans. Oh golly.

The fate of so much on such a little arrangement. And who is to say the girl will marry either boy? Pfft. Gods.

Also featuring the voice acting talent of Christina Applegate, Ice Cube, Carlos Alazraqui, Danny Trejo, and Hector Elizondo.

Not to be weird, but that is the sexiest hair I have seen on a CGI wooden puppet ever.

Turns out, del Toro didn’t have a lot to do with this movie. Sure, he was involved on some level as a producer, but he wasn’t even the executive producer. He probably provided some nice funding and helped design the Land of the Remembered, because it was vibrant and unique, but not sure what else he might have done.

A lot of music in this movie, and about half of it (or more) were actual songs but with a lot more mariachi feel to them. We got Creep and I Will Wait and much more. I think there is also unique music, but I just might not be hip enough on the music scene to get the references.

I think this is a hard movies for kids to follow. A lot is going on, a lot of characters are good and just misunderstood. After all, Xibalba isn’t a bad guy, just looks bad. Joaquin isn’t a bad guy either. The only bad guy is a bandito who doesn’t show up til the end, and I will say, he had very entertaining fight scenes.

The movie has a lot of spirit and energy, but I just found it hard to really relate to anyone. Or the story itself. It just ended up on the “okay” spectrum, which was disappointing, as I figured this one would be one of the best films of the year. Maybe I made a mistake in picking The Book Of Life over The Boxtrolls. I hope not!

2 out of 4.

Giant Robots Fighting Giant Monsters.

That should be a good enough review for this movie.

If you are like me, the first time you heard about Pacific Rim (Trailer) you bounced around with joy. Sure, some of you maybe bounced on the subject matter alone, which is fine. But I was even more excited about the fact that Guillermo del Toro was set to direct the film. Guillermo means quality in Spanish, I am pretty sure. Just examine the last two films he directed! Hellboy II? Pan’s Labyrinth? This guy knows how to tell a story, while also kicking major ass.

Spoilers: These robots are here to fuck shit up. Monster shit. In the year 2025, we are currently in the twelfth year of fighting the Kaiju. Kaiju are larger than life mythical beasts that come from a dimensional portal at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. The first one to appear took over five days to kill while it rampaged the California coast. The world realized it would have to stop fighting and work together to stop this threat from taking over completely, which started the Jaeger program.

The Jaegers are giant robots equal to the size of the Kaiju that can be deployed to fight the beasts before they cause more harm. Initially they prove to be quite successful, but the Kaiju have started to appear in increasingly shorter intervals, bigger and badder than before.

Raleigh Becket (Charlie Hunnam) used to be a great pilot with his brother. Five years prior, a Kaiju took his brother’s life, so he left the program to become a drifter. Shockingly, the UN is thinking of abandoning their Jaeger program due to the amount of Jaegers that are now getting destroyed. Their idea is to build a giant coastal wall to keep them out (very dumb). With only few months left of funding, Marshall Stacker Pentecost (Idris Elba) brings Raleigh back in to the fold to attempt one last shot at ending this thing once and for all.

Damn, that was a really good plot description. But there are many more people who have important roles in this movie. Rinko Kikuchi is Raleigh’s new partner once he returns to the Jaeger program. Max Martini and Robert Kazinsky play a father/son pilot team who run the fabled Striker Eureka, the fastest Jaeger made. Charlie Day and Burn Gorman are the main two scientists working on solving the Kaiju problem, a biologist and a mathematician respectfully. Finally, Clifton Collins Jr. is the main control room operator for the operation, and Ron Perlman a black market Kaiju flesh dealer.

Spoilers: There is no giant version of this monster unfortunately. If you don’t like the idea of giant robots fighting giant monsters then I really don’t think you will enjoy this movie. Because the movie gives you exactly that, and just a little bit more.

First off, if you are going to see Pacific Rim (Which you should!), you should watch it in 3D. The fight scenes were so incredible, I thought my eyes would melt. The second fight scene in Hong Kong is probably the sexiest thing I have seen in film this year. They were filmed with 3D cameras, so you don’t have to worry about blurriness mucking up the great action.

The Hong Kong fight is actually better than the fight at the climax of the film. Some would consider that to be a big problem, but I can easily forgive it. The final fight gets points for taking place in a different environment from the rest of the film.

I love the casting choices in the film, in that most of the people are not big named stars. This really allowed the viewer to get involved with the story and not get distracted by the eyes of someone like Brad Pitt.

Sure, there are a few weak plot points, and the acting isn’t always top notch, but the stunning visuals, well choreographed fights, and complete bad-assery from start to finish well make up for it. My biggest plot complaints really come from what was NOT said by a few characters. I was disappointed that the movie didn’t delve deeper into some of the ethical implications brought upon by certain actions, but really, that just allows a sequel/prequel to ask those questions later.

Please. Give Guillermo del Toro your money. Go see Pacific Rim.

3 out of 4.

Hellboy II: The Golden Army made one of the worst mistakes ever. The worst being releasing your movie the same date as The Dark Knight.

So instead it id the second or third worst mistake ever. It released in theaters the week before The Dark Knight. Sure, all the fanboys would go to see both. But people who only watch once a month, or random viewers who had to choose between two “comic book movies” meant Hellboy II would lose every time.

This is a shame, because Hellboy II ended up being better than Hellboy in every way. (If I had to review Hellboy, I’d probably give it a 2 out of 4. Interesting, but not my favorite. Cool concept, falls short.)

That outfit? All make up, no CGI. What!?

Hellboy (Ron Perlman) is up to his same antics. He hates being locked away, wants to be free. Liz Sherman (Selma Blair), who can ignite herself and other objects on fire, is now his “girlfriend”, but they are fighting as they live together. Why? Because she is pregnant (awkward). It is causing things in the B.P.R.D. to be quite a mess. Abe (Doug Jones), the fish man and Tom (Jeffrey Tambor), the director, are worried the antics will cost them jobs.

Well Prince Nuada (Luke Goss), an ancient elf is pissed off. He wants to return to the surface world, reignite the golden army of indestructible robots, and kill all humans. His race disagrees, so he kills a bunch of them. Not his twin sister, Princess Nuala (Anna Walton) though, because if one of them gets hurt, so does the other. So he causes problems and Hellboy uses this opportunity to join the world!

This causes a new director to come in, Johann Krauss (Voiced by Seth MacFarlane), an old being who is now all gaseous and shit. And German. Now they have to run things by the book, and figure out how to find out whats going on with the elves.

More fights happen, unexpected love between fish and elf, giant plant beasts, close deaths, certain destruction, and golden armies.

And probably the best version of “Can’t Smile Without You” of all time!

As expected, I loved this movie. As I said, the action is better, the story is better (general rule in the sequel, since you don’t have to waste as much time with origins), it is funnier, and introduces great new characters.

It might be closer to the comics too, but I still haven’t read them. I am anxiously waiting an ending to the saga with a Hellboy III. It might be a few years from now, but they keep claiming he will eventually destroy the world, as that is why he was summoned in the first place, so that shit needs to almost happen.

Oh yeah, and I am pretty sure Hellboy is how Ron Perlman normally looks, and every other time is him in make up.

4 out of 4.

From everything I heard about Drive, what I heard the most was how good the “cinematography” was. Camera choices were brilliant, chase and driving scenes sexy, and all of that. Well damn, I thought to myself, I have to see this on Blu-Ray then! Well unfortunately this is a DVD review. I know, I know, lame sauce.

Don’t worry. My website is still in HD quality.

Ryan Gosling plays the Driver! I like writing that because that is his cast name. So mysterious eh? Gosling works as a mechanic, and a stunt driver for movies, but also as a get away driver for criminals. He tells them the same thing every time, that he will wait for five minutes, and then get them to safety, then never talk again. He also works for Bryan Cranston for the mechanic/stunt work (not sure on the Criminal parts. Maybe). But they are looking to expand, possibly into real racing because man, Gosling is a Driver.

Cranston gets a 300k loan from some shady Albert Brooks fella to invest in a stock car to get them the monies. Also going on is that the Driver has a neighbor, Carey Mulligan, who he assumes is a single mom. TURNS OUT NO. Her husband / ex husband is still there, Oscar Isaac (named Standard wtf?). Turns out he is just gonna die possibly, and since Driver might like the neighbor, doesn’t want to see them all sad over that.

Driver agrees to help him get away from another crime that will pay off all of his debts, for Ron Perlman. Simple enough. And hey, Christina Hendricks is there too. What could go wrong?

“Fear/panic” face. Ignore stuff in the background. (cough).

Things go wrong, people die, can he save himself and the ones he might now care for?

It was a very interesting story, that really let the use of silence carry the story forward at points. Long scenes, that were yes, well shot were a great bonus. A little excessive violence never really hurt anyone either. I also loved the soundtrack. Full of weird electro synth pop stuff mostly.

I can also see why this movie could be polarizing. I think the ending was lacking, they could have done something more there. That is a common complaint you will hear. Other people may call it boring or not action-y enough. But eh, opinions are opinions. Mine is that this was pretty good but not top of the plateau.

3 out of 4.

Heck yes. Straight to video, Scorpion King 3: Battle For Redemption. This is clearly the movie you have been looking for.

In fact, here is a real piece of “Trivia” on IMDB about it, and possibly the best trivia I have ever read for a movie:

This film is a sequel to the second film The Scorpion King: Rise of a Warrior. So this is a sequel of a prequel The Scorpion King, which is a prequel to The Mummy Returns, which is a sequel to The Mummy which is a remake of 1932’s The Mummy.

Get all of that? I linked to the links they provided. So don’t worry, I didn’t miss one.

The last picture on page 1 for SK3 is this, and the first one of the actual main characters. Go figure.

I wish I could say the guy on the left (Bostin Christopher) is there for comic relief. I mean. He is. But to me it seems that everyone is there for comic relief. I don’t think I single character is really that serious in the movie. Not campy, like a lot of The Mummy’s characters, but mostly just dumb. The main guy is played by Victor Webster, and for some reason he is a mercenary.

Ron Perlman! A king of some blah place hires them to go and fuck up another guys place. That other guy being Billy Zane with hair. Probably a Tyrant. Also is getting the Book of the Dead to cast some spells, get some ghost warriors, and become a god. Something like that. And they have to stop him!

Ron Perlman just wants the area to rule though. So he also might be bad.

He also has crazy hair!

So, this movie is a mess. Not only does it never grasp your attention (since everything seems like a Joke, despite the “Serious tone”) but it is also boring (Reader: “Didn’t you imply that with never grasping your attention?” No. No I did not). Plot is stupid, no one acts good, and not even funny.

WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME RON PERLMAN? YOU CAN DO GREAT THINGS. YOU WERE HELLBOY!

But he must have money problems or something. Because he seems to take every movie that comes his way.

Or maybe he is just bored, and realizes life is short, why not make some (a lot of) shitty movies?

1 out of 4

When I heard the title, Season of the Witch, a naturally assumed some fantasy based film: knights, witches, magic, what not. I didn’t know it would try to be a “fictional historic movie”. I do love me some Ancient History too, but not that Medieval crap, so that wasn’t a good start.

The “Main Star” choice was also a bad start.

Nick Cage and Ron Perlman are Crusaders! Rawr! The beginning opens with them kicking ass seemingly all over Europe (thanks to different weather types and, you know, subtitles telling me place names). They are so bad ass, they can even make jokes during their melee-tastic frays! But once they end up having to kill innocent people and women, they leave the order, turning their back on the Crusades and Jesus.

Later, in another part of Europe, they are discovered to be deserters! So they are imprisoned. The local king though is all kinds of dying, thanks to that Plague thing. They think they found the witch that started it all (Claire Foy), so they need someone to take her to a Monastery far away,so they can determine if she is a witch and get rid of the plague. Also joining them? Head knight Ulrich Thomsen, Alter boy Robert Sheehan, Priest dude Stephen Campbell Moore, and criminal who knows the way Stephen Graham.

Yep. So they journey, and try to determine if she started the plague or not, if she is a witch or not, and you know, try not to die themselves. Also, figure out why God would do all this.

Oh what shenanigans is God up to now!?

Personally, I thought the movie really dragged. It was hard enough to accept the ending, but also I am expected to believe that Nick Cage is more bad ass than Ron Perlman? Never! Impossible! I definitely believe that people back then may have blamed witchcraft on something as horrible and deadful as the Plague.

But the movie went pretty much as expected. A twist near the end wasn’t really that much of a twist at all. The sometimes obvious fake scenery that a few scenes have also seemed to bug me. Fights / action sequences were okay. But most involved either dark scenes making them hard to understand, or felt way too long (the last one). It can be an okay film, I guess, if you just want some Medieval action, but found it pretty lacking in enjoyment.

1 out of 4

Conan the Barbarian! Another reboot of another movie that is commonly considered an original. As always, I won’t compare this to the “original Conan“, nor will I compare it to the Conan books, (because I never do. And because I’ve never read them). All I really know is that the Conan creator was good friends with HP Lovecraft, so if we could just get a Cthulhu in the movie, that’d be perfect.

“Dead by dawn! Dead by dawn!”

The story begins with Ron Perlman, running around on a battlefield. He finds a wife. Oh shit she just gave birth. ON A BATTLEFIELD. What can this mean? They call this baby…Conan.

Then some guy comes over like, 10 years later, and is trying to collect the pieces of a mask. Each chieftain has a piece of the mask. Conan is too weak to stop the army, and the chieftain kills everyone but him, and gets the last mask piece. The mask gives ultimate power….eventually. Because for some reason, another ~10 years later, the world is still not completely shit. The guy also has to kill a pure blood thing, in order to unlock its powers. Apparently it takes a LONG time to find one of these people. Because now Conan, older and more Jason Momoa, can stop them.

Pirates. Accidentally finding the pure blood woman (Rachel Nichols), fighting, vengeance. This is the rest of the plot. Rose McGowan also plays a super creepy looking sorceress chick. Like. Way too much forehead. Was very surprising to look at. Oh yeah, there is some narration done too, of course, by Morgan Freeman.

There is a lot of blood and gore in this movie. Nudity too. You’d expect both in a movie all about killin’ and fightin’ though. The music that went with it was pretty good, and the visuals were pretty decent. The overall plot was of course super weak, and I was getting bored by the end. So much that I started listening more to the music and replacing the bass lines with words like “Fight” and “Action” to enjoy myself more. What?

There was no Cthulu, but there was a weird octopus monster thing! So that is close. Also there was a very exceptional fight scene with this sand warrior thing that kicked so much ass, it is pretty much worth it, for at least that.

And for people who really like Rose McGowan’s head.

2 out of 4.