Our Labor Day Trip: Post-Ernesto, The Shits, Dolby Fuckin' and Fuck Right Aid!

The Morning Before

Don't let it be said that our Labor Day trip to North Carolina was not exciting. The night before we were supposed to leave, me, the girlfriend person and her mom were up all night gettin' totally wasted. I musta got up around 5 AM and we were supposed to leave around 7 AM or something, but the women wanted to sleep. I even woke up the girlfriend person and she sits up with sleep-encrusted eyes and groggily says, "I'm up. Okay." Then she fell back to sleep. We were late. But I can safely say, I woke up on time.

On the road

Now that was something altogether. Before we left I made the mistake of drinking half a gallon of Strawberry Quick milk and a couple of Nilla Wafers. Dude, all the way down there, that milk was turning my bowels into a liquid dessert. Hell. It was bad enough that the girlfriend person was sliding all over the seat because she was having her monthly female moment. Finally, we holed up in some bathroom in West Virginia where the toilet didn't flush. Stinkaroo! Then we ate some burgers.

Post-Ernesto

Apparently, some punk-bitch storm called Ernesto flooded the Hell outta everything and we arrive post-flood. The road to our house was totally fucked over. We stalled out two cars, trekked through diseased flood water and finally settled into the joint… and to notice that our big-ass bottle of rum didn't survive the trip. Keep in mind, this is Labor Day. Shit's fuckin' closed.

Dolby Porn

We musta spent like two days there before we were totally re-routed to another joint for the remainder of the trip. Surprisingly, we didn't do a whole lot. I watched Judge Joe Brown, played on the beach and me and the girlfriend person did some nasty up in the big bedroom. So it seems that our bedroom is a conduit to the rest of the peace of the house. Yes. Can you say Dolby Surround porn?

Fuck Right Aid! Fuck 'Em Right in the Mouth!

Anyway, we took a few pix. Many of them turned out like shit. I suppose it didn't help that motherfuckin' Rite Aid reversed some of the pictures. Aw, fuck! That's another story. First, they said they weren't gonna have our pictures in an hour because their machine was broken. They told us to come in the next day. AND they still expected us to pay a one hour photo price! Shitfucks. So we went to another Rite Aid and not only did they fuck up some of the pictures, but they didn't even give us the picture CD that we ordered and paid for. Now, this was TWO different Right Aid stores! Next time, we're goin' to Target.

Can you say, Griswolds?

I'm the one takin' pictures.


I'm the tall one kissin' Orville


Me and the Girlfriend Person. Except the dude in the T-shirt. That's her dad. Ineteresting, there was was a black family next door.

Oh, and if youre ever in Kitty Hawk, stop by Dirty Dick's Crab House and tell me what it's like. When we were driving to the Wright Brothers Musuem we found this joint and snapped a pic.

ULTRAVIOLET

Ultraviolet (3 1/2 out of Four)

PG-13, 2006, 88 minutes, Screen Gems.Milla Jovovich, Cameron Bright, Nick Chinlund, William Fichtner, Music by Klaus Badelt, Produced by John Baldecchi, Lucas Foster, Written and Directed by Kurt Wimmer.

So, I went and saw myself some of that there Ultraviolet. Kinda fun for a sci-fi popcorn flick. A little hard to understand the physics though. The whole thing has this weird post-filter applied to like every shot as if it was manipulated with simple Photoshop techniques. And I can tell on a second viewing some of the shots will get annoying. Like there's this one scene where she's surrounded by these Chinese dudes and since everyone's cool they all wear shades. Since she's a vampire she has these strange powers that allow her to hear people's heart palpitations and the rattling of the rings against the metal of the guns. The camera swoops into her eye where she sees the reflection of one guy, then homes in on the reflection of another guy through the reflection in his eye so she can see another reflection of another person and on down the line. When the action finally does start, it pretty much kicks ass in all its Klaus Badelt scored glory.

So, the premise is, Milla Jovovich's a vampire of a dying society of vampires, who hunts humans. Turns out that the vampire biology is being used to further advance technology and make these super soldiers, but there's this highly contagious pathogen that turns people into hemophages--that's the flick's way of calling them vampires. But then during this huge opening heist that defies all laws of physics, she escapes and delivers a package that's about the size of a Milton Bradley board game and inside there's a full-grown human child swirling around in a blue nebula. It's treated like it's an everyday thing and then she escapes with the child with all sorts of people in her ass. Now the humans and the vampires are out to get her because the kid's got some sort of virus in him that can kill either all humans or all vampires.

The flick asks a lot to believe that these people can do all these things, but if you can surrender your disbelief and accept this is some strange lucid dream, then I think the emotional beats and action pay offs will work. It's directed by Kurt Wimmer who wrote and directed the supposed Matrix clone, Equilibrium, (and what film hasn't The Matrix ripped off?). But Equilibrium pretty much came into its own and found its audience. Ultraviolet's action is probably what Equilibrium woulda been if he had the budget. I think with this movie is pretty much his bid for a huge big budget superhero flick, but I doubt Ultraviolet will make Spider-man money.

Oh, the flick's PG-13, but she does find a way to take off her clothes and show off her naked ass. And the flick is pretty graphic, but you can tell they muted some of the extreme violent shots and cut away.

The quote of the flick: "You got hemo-blood on me. It's on."

All About Kickin-Ass and Lookin' Hot Doin' It:

Equilibrium, Black Moon Rising, The Matrix, Underworld, Blade, Space Truckers, Johnny Mnemonic, Barbarella, The Hidden, The Island, Species...

The DVD comes out June 27, 2006

Bloody Mallory (3 ½ out of Four)
NR, 2002, 94 min., Lions Gate Home Entertainment.

Olivia Bonamy, Adria Collado Papillon, Laurent Speilvogel, Julien Boisselier, Tylda Bares, Thierry-Perkins Lyautey, Olivier Hemon, Ludovic Berthillot, Valentina Vargas, Music by Kenji Kawaï, Produced by Oliver Delbosc, Eric Jehelmann and Marc Missonnier, Written by Julien Magnat and Stéphane Kazandjian and Directed by Julien Magnat.

Pack up the pink hearse, rehydrate the holy water, reload the silver bullet mags, check your hair and strap on that tight, tight leather outfit none of us can fit into but everyone else looks good in, and fight, fight, fight that evil into another oblivion.

On her wedding night Mallory chops up her husband with a big-ass ax after finding out that hes a red-eyed, blood-sucking soldier of the undead.

Now, Mallory's the leader of an elite commando squad dedicated to the eradication of ghoulish beasties that are taking over the world. This time she faces off with the evil Popethats right The Popewhos plotting to release a gang of pissed off fallen angels into our dimension where they will chow down on some humans for an eternity or something to that effect.

Do you have to wear lipstick to be part of the team?

Mallory's crack squad is made up of an ass-kicking transvestite, Vena Cava, with a knack for blowing stuff up and machineguns sprouting out of her platform shoes. And of course theres Talking Tina, a 12-year-old teleporting mute who can occupy several hosts by throwing her soul into peoples (and animals) bodies at will. Then theres the young priest who looks more like a male stripper that could make Ricky Martin his bitch with the word hello. While the story is thin and the pacing a little slow for horror, Bloody Mallory makes it up with humor, incredible leaps of reality, and hyper-real color schemes that might have some people remembering Dario Argentos Suspiria. The characters are well drawn out and have their funny lines and antics, while still maneuvering out of booby traps, evading demonic gimps, arms busting out of brick walls, black cats occupying the road and a paranormal arsenal sanctioned by the evil Pope.

As far as special features go, you can jump all over the Kenji Kawaï featurette as he rattles on about his experience coming up with a Japanese theme for a French body-chopping movie about the undead. Theres a behind-the-scenes for those that care, which include interviews with the actors and filmmakers. Its a bit thin on special features unless you like the three trailers so much that you can watch them over and over and all over again. Beware, one trailers in Japanese.Oh, by the way, the flick is bloody, bloody, bloody.

Special Features:

Three trailers (one in Japanese), a featurette on Kenji Kawaï and a Behind the Scenes Featurette.

Fighting the Evil Forces of Whatever:

Hellboy, Bubba Ho-Tep, Van Helsing, Army of Darkness (Directors Cut), Highway to Hell, Phantom Rider, Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat, Scooby-Doo, Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, Blade, Blade II, Blade III, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Ghostbusters, Ghostbusters II, Men In Black, Men In Black II, The Mummy, The Mummy Returns, Junk, Big Trouble In Little China, 2002 (Hong Kong), An American Werewolf in Paris, Kindred: The Embraced, Devil Hunter Yohko, John Carpenters Vampires, Vampires: Los Muertos...

WILD ZERO: The Ramones Live Life Again

Wild Zero (Uncut Version) (3 out of Four)
NR, 2000, 98 min., One World Entertainment.

Originally posted at Nighttimes.com on July 14, 2003.

Guitar Wolf, Drum Wolf, Bass Wolf, Masashi Endo, Makoto Inamiya, Masao Sato, Shiro Namiki, Kwancharu Shitichai, Naruka Nakajo, Yoshiyuki Morishita, Music by Guitar Wolf, Produced by Kaichiro Furata and Katswaki Takemoto, Written Satoshi Takagi and Directed by Tetsuro Takeuchi.

Imagine they exhumed the bodies of Joey and Dee Dee Ramone reincarnated as a gun-toting supernatural Japanese vigilante punk band fighting zombies and for the freedom of rock n roll and dubbed themselves Guitar Wolf. Now imagine Guitar Wolf trapped in a tall building full of limb-snacking zombies. He leaps out of a window as it bursts into a heaving blaze of pyro-jiz and yells, Rock n roll! while strumming his guitar. Well, imagine no longer, you foolish monkeys. The rock n roll jet movie is here and daring you to experience it. A flick with fucking balls.

After playing a sweat-drenched set of punk rock, Guitar Wolf find themselves in the club owners office telling them that rock is dead and so are they. Guns sprout about forcing everyone into a Mexican stand-off. And just before Guitar Wolf is about to buy it, a rabid fan by the name of Ace busts in screaming, Rock n roll will never die! Blam, blamity, blam! Ace saves Guitar Wolf and hes given a special one-way distress signal only Guitar Wolf can hear. Guitar Wolf speed off into the blackened highway of the night leaving tire streaks of flames. Ace whips out his mamas fine tooth comb, slicks back his pompadour, hops on to his scooter like the 5-foot manly man he is and putters down the road. But then a mysterious meteor crashes close by turning people into a lumbering gang of flesh-eating zombies.

While the zombies start devouring innocent bystanders Ace finds some hot, young fox who turns out to be a dude. Ace freaks and runs off like a scared, little girl, but then the ghost of Guitar Wolf pops up in front of him yelling, Ace! Love has no nationalities, borders or genders! Fight for the one you love! With that, he combs back his hair and little Ace runs off screaming after his beloved before he/she gets eaten up. And its all uphill from there.There arent many special features here, but what else do you need? You can always buy into the Guitar Wolf hype and get all their CDs. Theres some still galleries and some lame [practically stick figure drawings] if you're into that.

Special Features:

Still and Art Galleries, Trailers: Audition, DOA: Dead or Alive, Pornostar, Sonatine, Wild Zero: Rock n Roll Jet Movie.

Far-out Flicks:

A Boy and His Dog, Six String Samurai, Freaked, Volcano High, The Frightners, Dead-Alive, Repo Man, That Darn Punk, Highway to Hell, Straight to Hell, 2002, A Chinese Ghost Story, The Adventures of Buckaroo Bonzai: Across the 8th Dimension, The Toxic Avenger, Real Men, Dead Heat, Class of 1984, Class of 1999, Brazil, Time Bandits, The Horror of Party Beach, Psycho Beach Party, Innocent Blood...

THE SPECIALS: Bad-ass Motherfuckin' Superheroes

The Specials (3.5 out of Four)
R, 2000, 81 min., Pioneer Entertainment.

www.thespecials-movie.com

Rob Lowe, Jamie Kennedy, Thomas Haden Church, Paget Brewster, Kelly Coffield, Judy Greer, James Gunn, Sean Gunn, Jordan Ladd, John Doe, Melissa Joan Hart, Music by Brian Langsbard, Produced by Dan Bates, Mark A. Altman and Rick Mischel, Written by James Gunn and Directed by Craig Mazin.

Not familiar with the superhero clan, The Specials? Here's an introduction to the cast of characters:

The Strobe - The father figure of an elite group of gifted mutants with assorted powers calling themselves "The Specials" and of course, married to the beautiful Ms. Indestructable.

Ms. Indestructible - The mother of the Specials with the amazing gift of having indestructible skin and taking Nightbird under her wing.

Nightbird - The ambitious, young hottie (naked in Club Dread) who desperately wants to join the Specials with her amazing power of laying eggs of sulfuric acid.

Amok - A reformed agent of evil who has suffered a cataclysmic air-brushing accident giving him powers of foul language and blue skin. Now he works with the Specials to fight the asshole forces of evil.

The Weevil - A weevil-powered superhero with the amazing ability to be liked but is falling under the bad influence of Amok. He also screws Ms. Indestructible whenever possible which causes a chain reaction that threatens the union of the Specials. He is now considering a career with a cooler superhero team: The Crusaders.

Power Chick - She's gay, Alien Orphan's guardian and can morph into anything that bad CGI can dictate.

Deadly Girl - A goth chick (naked in What Planet Do You Come From) with collection of demons at bay and is pursuing a career with the Femme Five for which there is already eight of them headed up my Melissa Joan hart (nearly naked in Rent Control).

Mr. Smart - The gadgeteer who has suffered a horrible olfactory accident and spends a bulk of the story with a bloody Maxi pad stuck to his face.

Eight - One mind trapped in eight separate bodies and has the gift of giving advice. One of the bodies comes in the form of X's John Doe.

Minute Man - Not Min-it Man, but Mine-noot Man, who has the power to shrink himself down to about a foot. He also has the amazing gift for writing Scooby-Doo movies and Dawn of the Dead remakes.

Alien Orphan - Nothing more than a gelatinous ball of mucus who can morph into any shape--particularly a green, gangly, vomiting dancing machine with a hankering for bloody marys.

U.S. Bill - Oh, I almost forgot about him. Who? What was I talking about? Oh, well.

After all the great battles are fought and before the next one is about to begin, this is the story of the elite Specials (the world's sixth or seventh favorite superhero team) on a normal day. Don't be fooled. This isn't a movie about superheroes or fighting off a demonic madman bent on taking over the universe. This is actually about a family of misfits who are about to come apart at the seams. Their whole family structure is threatened by each other's dysfunctional relationships. Their morals and ethics are gray despite how heroic the media makes them look. You might have to look at this movie as an independent film rather than a superhero parody. A lot of things are funny and deal with some superhero goofiness, but the emotions that run through the movie are real and complex as if you were watching One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Mystery Men at the same time. The levels of comedy are genius. There's an unspoken running gag sneaking in from scene to scene that takes a certain keen eye to catch. Heed the pig button.

The deleted scenes are terrific and consistent with the theme of the movie. The commentary is about as funny as you can guess, although it would?ve been funnier if Jamie Kennedy was on it. The commentary reveals plenty of big, fat juicy gossip, trivia and filmmaking techniques. There's an uncut version of the toy commercial featured in the film, but won't make any sense unless you have seen the flick. There's the uncut Ms. Indestructible and The Strobe's wedding video (no, not the Jenna Lewis one). A red band trailer of the flick and a cheesy picture gallery.

Special Features:

Commentary Track with: Craig Mazin, James Gunn, Mark A. Altman and Mojo, 10 Deleted Scenes, The Specials Toy Commercial, Wedding Video, Trailer and Picture Gallery.

Heroes at Large For Better or Worse:

Bloody Mallory, Mystery Men, Batman: The Movie, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Scooby-Doo, Excel Saga, FLCL, The Return of Swamp Thing, Big Trouble in Little China, Hudson Hawk, Ghostbusters, Suburban Commando, Orgasmo, Dick Tracy, Evolution, Josie and the Pussycats, Hero At Large...

THE CONVENT: The Best Evil Nun Movie of All Time!

The Convent (4 out of 4)
R, (2000), 79 min, Lions Gate Entertainment.

Joanna Canton, Megahn Perry, Richard Trapp, Jason Dax Miller, Kelly Mantle, Liam Kyle Sullivan, David Gunn, Jim Golden, Chaton Itae, Renee Graham, Coolio, Adrienne Barbeau and Bill Moseley, Music by Joseph Bishara, Produced by Jed Nolan, Written by Chaton Anderson and Directed by Mike Mendez.

Adrienne Barbeau straddles a broken down piece of shit motorcycle while wielding a machete and looks up to Heaven, "Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name, please start this fuckin bike or were all gonna bite the big one."

Yes, this is the 79-minute epic about demonic nuns inhabiting the bodies of pot-smoking frat boys and debbies for the ultimate Apocalypse in day glow. It starts off in 1960 as young Christine garbed in her Catholic school girl outfit and a leather jacket ambling toward the convent with a can of gas-o-line and a baseball bat. She kicks in the door, swigs some whiskey and starts goin' Barry Bonds on some bitches. Then she douses them bitch-ass nuns with gas and sets them on fire. And to make sure they're nice and dead, she pulls out a shotgun and starts blowin's 'em away 80's macho man style. Fuck, man. Genius.

40 years later, the facts are reduced to a mere urban legend and some dopey college kids decide to check out the haunted convent and then start smoking pot and to awaken some demon-ass nuns that ooze day glow blood through day glow veins. In short, the 'shroomin' Frijole and his friends all get turned into demons and Clarissa escapes with her life. Her only hope is to track down the nun-buster, Christine, to help save her virgin brother who could still be alive. Christine swigs her whiskey, racks her shotgun, "All right, you motherfuckers! This time I'm taking you to Hell myself!"

But like all genius flicks there's wall to wall characters. Sure, ya got the stoned Frijole about to get a blowjob from his demon beaver, Mo, (who was saving herself for Marilyn Manson) and quips, "Damn, girl, you're like all demonic and shit." Then Sol, the self-proclaimed Son of Satan (who works at the local Dairy Cream) who's about as flamingly British as his West Hollywood minion of evil, who somehow can't find it in his heart to kill his virgin sacrifices. Then there's the two-face courrupt campus po-lice, Coolio and Bill Moseley, who are trying to scare off kids from the dilapidated convent.

I only wish this flick had more extras, but, hell, the flick is worth it alone. What're ya waitin' for damn you! Get it!

Scared Stoopit:

Freeway, Modern Vampires, Army of Darkness, Dead-Alive, Undead, The Frighteners, Wild Zero, Junk, Shaun of the Dead, Cemetery Man, Triple-B Header, Bloody Mallory, Bubba Ho-Tep...

Scared Stoopit:

Freeway, Modern Vampires, Army of Darkness, Dead-Alive, Undead, The Frighteners, Wild Zero, Junk, Shaun of the Dead, Cemetery Man, Triple-B Header, Bloody Mallory, Bubba Ho-Tep