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Pickin’ The Carcass: WOLVESBAYNE (2009)

Posted in 2011, Michael Arruda Reviews, Monsters, Pickin' the Carcass, Vampires, Werewolves with tags , , , , , , on August 31, 2011 by knifefighter

PICKIN’ THE CARCASS:  WOLVESBAYNE (2009)
By Michael Arruda

 

Welcome to another edition of PICKIN’ THE CARCASS, that column where I scour the juicy horror movie carcass looking for delectable morsels I missed the first time around.

Today’s feature, WOLVESBAYNE (2009), now available on DVD, is about as satisfying as a cookie crumb.

WOLVESBAYNE can be summed up in three words:  vampire –werewolf – feud.  Need I say more?

A realtor named Russell Bayne (Jeremy London), who starts out in the beginning of the movie as a greedy son of a bitch (but then later, when he becomes a werewolf, enjoys an even more stunning transformation into a nice guy), unsuccessfully tries to convince a woman Alex Layton (Christy Romano) to sell her store to him.  How many times have we seen this plot point?  Fortunately this movie doesn’t spend much time on this cliché.  Alex, who says she “sees” things, warns Russell that he’s in danger, and since he’s still in SOB mode at this point, he takes her words as a threat and tells her what she can do with her warning.

Should have listened to Alex, Russell.  Later that night, he’s attacked by a werewolf, and when he himself becomes a werewolf—and a nice guy— Alex decides to help him.  Why?  Well, it turns out that Alex used to be a werewolf, and so she knows that as a werewolf, Russell is now a target of the vampires, who are in the middle of a feud with the werewolves.  The evil leader of the vampires, Von Griem (Mark Dacascos) is hell-bent on resurrecting the ultimate vampire leader, a female vampire named Lilith (Yancy Butler), and to do this he has to collect a bunch of artifacts and other cool items that Indiana Jones would be interested in.  Following this?  There’s more.

To help Russell fight back the vampires, Alex enlists the aid of famed vampire hunter Jacob Van Helsing (Rhett Giles) and his followers.  Just why the vampires are so interested in Russell is never clearly explained, or maybe I was just daydreaming at that point, since this plot was oh-so-compelling!

WOLVESBAYNE is a ridiculously silly and unrealistic movie that is totally unsatisfying as a horror movie, which is too bad, because the film looks good, and the actors do a fairly good job with what they have to work with.

The story is just flat out awful.  Whatever happened to the days when werewolves and vampires were scary?  Since when did they start acting like elves and hobbits?  What’s next?  Vampires and werewolves go to Congress?  Romeo and Juliet as a vampires vs. werewolves story?

Leigh Scott wrote the screenplay, and it’s full of one unrealistic conversation after another.  When the characters interact about normal everyday things, the story works, but as soon as the dialogue shifts to vampire/werewolf feuds, vampire/werewolf treaties and talisman treasures, all bets are off, and it loses me.

Scott also wrote FRANKENSTEIN REBORN (2005), another film I didn’t like.

If just one person involved in this movie had said, “we want our audience to believe what’s going on in our story,” there’d be hope for this movie.  It’s as if the people who made WOLVESBAYNE assumed people will never believe this so let’s not even go for believability.  Wrong assumption.  The best horror, no matter how outlandish it seems on the surface, must be believed for it to work.

The werewolf make-up here, what little we see of it, isn’t bad, and Russell Bayne’s initial transformation scene is pretty good, but WOLVESBAYNE doesn’t even come close to being a decent werewolf movie.  The werewolves here, especially Bayne, do absolutely nothing.  No Larry Talbot angst, no werewolf ferocity, just a feud with vampires.  Boring.

The acting’s not bad.  Jeremy London is pretty good as main character Russell Bayne, though I don’t understand why it is that he starts out like a jerk, and by the end of the movie he’s a nice leading man.  Maybe turning into a werewolf actually helped his disposition!  London has a “Brendan Fraser” thing going in this movie, though he never matches Fraser’s leading man charisma or physical presence.

London also has the misfortune of saying the most ridiculous line in the whole movie.  When he meets Jacob Van Helsing, he says with a straight face, “Van Helsing?  I’ve heard that name before.”

Christy Romano is actually pretty hot as Alex Layton, and better yet, she’s a pretty good actor and does a nice job with the role.  Mark Dacascos looks good as the evil vampire Von Griem, and his performance is pretty good too, but sadly, he doesn’t get to do all that much in terms of evil vampire stuff.  Yancy Butler as the queen vampire Lilith— Lilith? Didn’t she used to be on FRASIER? —is okay, but she didn’t really make much of an impression.

As famed vampire hunter Jacob Van Helsing, Rhett Giles is good-looking and sufficiently dashing, but his performance is simply standard.  He does have a cool name though.  In fact, Rhett Giles is a much cooler name than Jacob Van Helsing!  Giles has experience playing Van Helsing.  He also played Jacob Van Helsing in DRACULA’S CURSE (2006), and he played Abraham Van Helsing in WAY OF THE VAMPIRE (2005).  Giles also played Dr. Victor Frank in FRANKENSTEIN REBORN (2005), a silly modernization of the Frankenstein tale.

WOLVESBAYNE was directed by Griff Furst, and as silly and forgettable as this movie is, I wouldn’t say it’s because of the director.  The movie looks polished, and some of the scenes are handled well, like the initial attack scene where Bayne is bitten by a werewolf, but so little happens in this movie, and later, when the action involves werewolves feuding with vampires, I just didn’t care.

A weak and ridiculous story is the fatal flaw of WOLVESBAYNE, not the director.

If you like fantasy tales about werewolf gangs fighting vampire gangs, you might find WOLVESBAYNE slightly interesting.  But if you’re like me, and you like werewolf horror movies, WOLVESBAYNE is anything but and should be avoided like wolfs’ bane on a full moon.

—END—

© Copyright 2011 by Michael Arruda

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Friday Night Knife Fights: TWILIGHT vs. SAW vs. SCREAM – Part 2

Posted in 2011, Friday Night Knife Fights, Garbage, Psycho killer, Sequels, Slasher Movies, Vampires, Werewolves with tags , , , , , , , on May 27, 2011 by knifefighter

FRIDAY NIGHT KNIFE FIGHTS- Free-for-all Cage Match
TWILIGHT vs. SAW vs. SCREAM:   Which one of the three is the WORST series? Part 2 (Conclusion)
By Michael Arruda and L.L.  Soares

 …..Previously, on FRIDAY NIGHT KNIFE FIGHTS:

 (the camera buzzes as the film rewinds, then starts again)

MICHAEL ARRUDA:  Moving onto our next question, if you were allowed to improve one of these franchises, which one would you like to improve, and just how would you improve it?

L.L. SOARES:  The way to improve these movies is to simply stop making them.

(A gargantuan cheer erupts from the audience, and suddenly LS is receiving a standing ovation.  Even MA stands to give him a hand.)

MA:  I couldn’t have said it better myself.

LS:  I know.

(film fades to black)

And now the conclusion to FRIDAY NIGHT KNIFE FIGHTS:

(The camera starts again. The audience’s ovation finally dies down)

MA:  Welcome back to FRIDAY NIGHT KNIFE FIGHTS.  L.L. and I are continuing our discussion of TWILIGHT vs. SAW vs. SCREAM, attempting to determine which one of the three is the worst series overall.

Now, LL, you were just saying that the best way to improve these movies would be to simply stop making them.

LS:  Why continue making crap?  End these things and put us out of our misery.

At least the SAW franchise claims to have done this. A new SAW movie always came out around Halloween time for years, but that’s gladly over with. Instead, we’ll get a new PARANORMAL ACTIVITY movie every October.

How about something new and different, instead of retreads?

MA:  Unfortunately, that’s the Hollywood formula.  As long as the retreads keep making money, Hollywood will keep churning them out.

I definitely agree with you on this point, that the best way to improve these franchises is to stop making them. However, if I had to choose one I’d want to improve, I’d choose SCREAM.  I’m not interested in touching either TWILIGHT or SAW.

To improve the SCREAM movies I would tweak the SCREAM formula by having the hip in-the-know-about-horror movies banter spoken only by characters whose lives aren’t in danger.  As soon as these characters are threatened by the masked menace, I’d have them react realistically, meaning they’d be scared to death, and they certainly wouldn’t be making wisecracks about horror movies.  That’s how it is now, and it kills any authenticity these stories might otherwise have.

And that’s all I have to say on the subject.  I’m not really all that interested in improving these series.  I’d prefer they’d just go away.


We’re getting closer to our goal of choosing the worst of the three.  Of the three series, which one has been the most painful to sit through?

I’ll go first this time and answer my own question, and I’m going to cheat a little bit here, as I’m choosing two.  See, for me it’s a tie between TWILIGHT and SAW.

By far, TWILIGHT has been the most boring series to sit through.  Never in my life have I experienced boredom at the movie like this.  It’s awful!  I would pay someone to stop making these films, they’re so dreadfully slow and painful.

But as horribly boring as TWILIGHT has been, SAW has been just as painful, but for different reasons.  For me, it comes down to the subject matter of these movies.  I just don’t enjoy horror tales built around torture.  Seeing people suffer agonizing tortures just because, and the films really don’t justify Jigsaw’s actions, is not my thing.  How can you justify Jigsaw’s actions anyway?  Even if he had just cause, what he does is indefensible.   Jigsaw and his antics are about as fun as the flu, and as realistic as DYLAN DOG.

LS: See, this is where I have a problem with your argument, because, as far as I know, you haven’t seen that many of the SAW movies. I know I’ve had to review them alone for years. I’m guessing you only saw one or two of them. So it’s not really fair that you judge all of them if you haven’t seen them. On the other hand, I’ve had to sit through all of the movies we’re talking about.

MA:  Not fair?  What, are we on the playground?  You’re right.  I haven’t seen as many of the SAW movies as you have, but I’ve seen enough.  Are you telling me that in the later films things get better?

LS:  I’m saying that Jigsaw does have a justification for his actions—however lame—and that is he’s trying to put bad people in a life-and-death situation in order to wake them up and make them change their lives.

MA:  What a thoughtful guy!  And I already knew this, as this plot point was in the films I saw.

LS:  I admit, this gets tired fast, but it is how he justifies his actions. I don’t think it’s any more stupid than every character in a SCREAM movie suddenly being an expert movie critic or Taylor Lautner taking off his shirt every five minutes in the TWILIGHT movies.

To be honest, the SAW movies just don’t bother me as much as the other two series do. I find the movies brainless, but entertaining. And they don’t repulse me like the SCREAM or the TWILIGHT movies do. The SAW movies may not be great, but I don’t mind them that much.

MA: At least SCREAM, for all its faults, has a set of recurring characters I enjoy watching, and the first movie had a good sense of humor and some decent thrills.  I can’t find anything redeeming about TWILIGHT or SAW.

LS: Who needs “redeeming?” I just want to be entertained. The SAW movies are the only ones that even come close to doing this. So they’re the lesser of three evils. And while you enjoy watching the recurring characters in the SCREAM movies, I despise them all and wish they’d just die already. So not everyone shares your affection for those dumb-ass characters.

As for me, I’d say the worst of the bunch is a draw too, but between two different movies.

The SCREAM movies because they irritate the hell out of me, and the TWILIGHT movies because it’s torture trying to stay awake while watching them.

MA:  And now for the big question, the final question of the night, when we decide the winner— or loser— of tonight’s competition:  which one of the three- TWILIGHT, SAW, or SCREAM— is the worst series?

LS:  The worst of the three is a tie between the SCREAM movies and the TWILIGHT movies.

MA:  There seems to be a lot of ties tonight.

LS:  They are bad in different ways. The SCREAM movies feature annoying, self-aware dialogue that doesn’t sound natural and thinks it is much cleverer than it is. Also, with each sequel they become more and more like the lame sequels they make fun of.

MA:  True.

LS:  The TWILIGHT movies, in comparison, don’t even try to be scary, because they’re not horror movies at all. They’re romance films playing dress up. And they’re abysmally boring.

MA:  Also true.

Okay, my turn to pick the worst.

I’m going to go with the SAW movies as the worst of the three because they have so little to offer.  Mindless violence, gruesome pointless tortures, and no story or decent characters whatsoever, the SAW films rely solely on the gross-out for their horror points, and this just doesn’t cut it—heh, heh— for me.

As much as I abhor the TWILIGHT movies, they don’t turn me off like the SAW movies.  They just put me to sleep.

With SCREAM – I actually like the characters, and the story in the first one was a good one.  Even though they’ve gone downhill since the first movie, the SCREAM films are still not as twisted and sick as SAW or as boring and dull as TWILIGHT.

So, my pick as the worst of the three is SAW.

It looks like then, since I picked SAW, and you picked both TWILIGHT and SCREAM, that we have a three way tie.

LS:  Let’s be honest here. They all suck.

MA:  I guess that’s apropos, that they each received a vote for The Worst Series.

With just the two of us here tonight, it would have been difficult to pick just one worst series anyway, unless that rarity of rarities occurred, and you and I agreed, and we both chose the same movie.  Maybe we’ll do this again sometime with some guest panelists.

LS:  I hope not.  I really don’t want to talk about these movies again anytime soon.

MA:  I agree with you there.  Still, there may have to be a rematch at some point.

So, hopefully nobody out there is disappointed, but tonight’s results reveal a stalemate.  Which one is the worst series?  It’s a draw, as TWILIGHT, SAW, and SCREAM all received one vote, meaning, they’re all horrible!

There are no winners here tonight, only losers.

LS: I guess I need to get off the stage then.

MA:  My prayers have finally been answered.

Well that wraps things up from here.  This has been FRIDAY NIGHT KNIFE FIGHTS.  I’m Michael Arruda, and on behalf of L.L. Soares and myself, thanks for joining us tonight.  Good night, everybody!

—-END—

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CARL KOLCHAK!

Posted in 2011, LL Soares Reviews, Monsters, Special Columns, Television, TV Shows, Vampires, Werewolves, Zombies with tags , , , on May 8, 2011 by knifefighter

It’s no surprise that we here at Cinema Knife Fight love horror. My all time favorite TV show was KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER – a classic horror series that only aired for one season (1974 to 1975). And yet, it still has a strong cult audience, it has spawned a comic book series, and it influenced tons of people who came later, including Chris Carter, who often sighted NIGHT STALKER as an inspiration for THE X-FILES.

The reason KOLCHAK was such a great series, hands down, was becuase of actor Darren McGavin. He played the title character, Carl Kolchak, a frumpy reporter who always wore the same white, seersucker suit, who drove a Ford Mustang, and who was pretty much on his own fighting a different monster every week. The monsters were great – even if the budget kept them all looking pretty hokey – but the truth is, even without the monsters, this would have been one of my favorite shows. Kolchak was the reason to watch. And Darren McGavin played a lot of roles before and after that (including another much-loved role, as the father in 1983′s A CHRISTMAS STORY), but to me, he’ll always be good ol’ Carl Kolchak.

Today is McGavin’s birthday. He was born on May 7, 1922.  He died in 2006, but if we ever want to hang out with Carl again, all we gotta do is pop in a DVD of the NIGHT STALKER series and the two great TV-movies that proceeded it.

Happy Birthday, Carl (and Darren)!

~L.L. Soares

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DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT

Posted in 2011, Campy Movies, Cinema Knife Fights, Horror-Comedies, Michael Arruda Reviews, Vampires, Werewolves, Zombies with tags , , , , , , , , on May 2, 2011 by knifefighter

CINEMA KNIFE FIGHT: DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT (2011)
By Michael Arruda

 

(The Scene: The interior of a private detective’s office. MICHAEL ARRUDA sits behind a desk, his shirtsleeves rolled up, sweat dribbling from his forehead. It’ sweltering hot, a fan atop a file cabinet blows humid air, and the round neon light on the ceiling only adds to the discomfort. There is a knock at the door, and a WOMAN enters, frantic and scared.)

WOMAN: Are you Michael Arruda, the private detective?

MA: Last time I checked, that was the name on my apartment mailbox.

WOMAN: Help me, Mr. Arruda! You just have to take my case!

MA: Not so fast, sweetheart. I usually like to hear what I’m getting into first before I take a case. Why don’t you have a seat and tell me what it is you want me to do.

WOMAN: There’s no time to sit down!

MA: Then stand up then. It makes no difference to me.

(The woman walks nervously to the window and peers outside, as if she expects to see someone following her.)

MA: Or look out the window. Whatever works for you. As long as you tell me what it is you want me to do it doesn’t matter.

WOMAN: Well, it’s my husband—.

MA: Oh yes, there’s always a husband.

WOMAN: He’s— (she looks besides MA’s desk and sees a large dog lying in a dog bed). What’s that?

MA: Well, that’s a dog. Don’t tell me you’ve never seen a dog before, Ms.—-?

WOMAN: Astor. Marie Astor. I know it’s a dog. What’s it doing here?

MA: Ms. Astor, meet Max. Max, meet Ms. Astor. Max is my partner.

WOMAN: Your partner’s a dog? Isn’t that a bit strange?

MA: Not if you met my last partner. He talked too much. Max here is more to my liking. He’s the silent type.

WOMAN: Are you serious?

MA: Dead serious, and don’t you go knocking Max. He’s sensitive, you know. One word from him, and I’ll drop your case in a heartbeat.

WOMAN: He talks?

MA: Well, barking is more like it, but if you’ve ever spent much time with dogs, you realize they’re pretty good at communicating. Don’t believe me? See for yourself. Max, what do you think of Ms. Astor? Should we take her case?

(MAX looks up at Ms. Astor and then puts his head back down.)

MA: That means he likes you. Had he barked I would have asked you to leave.

WOMAN: You expect me to put my faith in a man who talks to dogs?

MA: I don’t expect you to do anything, except pay the bills if I take your case.

WOMAN: Well, I think I’m changing my mind. I don’t even like dogs, and I’m supposed to hire someone who talks to them, especially a mutt like that one, who’s about as—.

MA: Careful, Ms. Astor.

WOMAN: — as ugly as a horse’s ass!

(MAX barks.)

MA: Sorry, Ms. Astor. You shouldn’t have said that. (Presses button on desk, and a trap door opens beneath Ms. Astor, and she falls screaming into a pit below. Trap door slides shut.)

Well, now that we don’t have to deal with her, we can get on with our review of today’s movie, DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT (2011) the new horror comedy about a detective who battles vampires, werewolves, and zombies.

And no, Dylan Dog is not a dog. He’s just a private detective, played by Brandon Routh. I have to say at the outset that one strike against this movie is its title. DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT sounds like an animated kids’ movie about an adventurous dog.

(MAX barks.)

MA: Yes, I know you would have liked that.

But the fact is it’s not an animated movie about a dog, but an action/adventure/horror/comedy smorgasbord that’s aimed at teens and adults. But you wouldn’t know it by its title.

(Phone rings, and MA answers it.)

Hello? No, L.L. Soares isn’t here today. He’s on vacation. He’ll be back next week. I’ll tell him you called. Oh, I’m having a blast. I get to play a Humphrey Bogart-style gumshoe while covering this movie solo. It’s a hoot.

(MAX barks)

MA: Well, almost solo. Okay, Max, I’ll let you get your two cents in. But promise to keep it brief. I don’t think many of our readers are dogs. (Speaks back into the phone). Well, thanks for calling. Catch you later. (Hangs up phone and speaks to Max). That was Hellboy looking for some free beer.

Anyway, I wasn’t really expecting much from DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT, so I wasn’t overly disappointed by its being a very mediocre film. The best thing I can say about it is it wasn’t worse than I expected.

It’s one silly movie, mildly entertaining, not funny enough to be a successful comedy, not quirky enough to be campy, not scary at all, and one that tells a VERY farfetched story that’s hard to swallow, but yet, when all is said and done, it somehow manages to entertain.

(MAX barks)

MA: Max agrees, although he was disappointed there weren’t any dogs in this movie, especially since the name of the movie was DYLAN DOG.

Dylan Dog (Brandon Routh) is a private detective in New Orleans who enjoys a special relationship with the city’s undead. Years before, he had been hired to be their human protector. He would help keep the peace amongst the vampires and werewolves living in New Orleans. I’m not sure exactly why these creatures needed a human to do this, but that’s the arrangement they had set up, until one day, Dylan’s girlfriend was murdered, and Dylan retaliated by killing the group of elder vampires. As a result, Dylan no longer enjoys a nice working relationship with the undead.

Poor Dylan.

When a prominent importer is murdered by a werewolf, the man’s daughter Elizabeth (Anita Briem) hires Dylan to solve the case. Dylan initially declines, but when his partner Marcus (Sam Huntington) is also murdered, apparently by the same creature, Dylan changes his mind and decides to take the case.

The investigation reunites Dylan with some of his old pals, including the elder statesman of the werewolves, Gabriel (Peter Stormare) and his son Wolfgang (Kurt Angle), who run a local meat packing company, both of whom belong to a long line of werewolves, and the leader of the vampires, Vargas (Taye Diggs). Vargas runs a hip vampire nightclub, popular because he markets vampire blood for humans, blood they pay a lot of money for just to get their “fix.” Vargas says he’s grateful to Dylan, because Dylan is responsible for killing the previous vampire leaders, which set the stage for his rise to the top, but Vargas is a smooth operator and Dylan clearly doesn’t believe him.

The investigation leads Dylan to a cross-like object known as “the heart,” an object which Elizabeth’s dad had illegally smuggled into the country. It seems both the vampires and werewolves are after this object because of the power it contains. Whoever owns the “heart” can tap into the power of a great demon of ancient times.

Things grow even more complicated when Dylan discovers it’s not just the vampires and werewolves who are after the heart, but also zombies and “monster hunters,” humans who are compared to religious fanatics, who stop at nothing to destroy the undead, which Dylan says is morally wrong since most undead live as law abiding citizens and do not harm humans. What a softy!

(Phone rings)

Hello? (covers receiver and speaks to Max) It’s the Fat Man! (speaks back into phone) No, I don’t know where the bird is. No, L.L. is not in Mexico looking for the Falcon. I told you— (sighs exasperatedly)—you want a clue as to how to find the bird? Okay, I’ll give you one. Make a fist. Now, stick out your middle finger. There. You found it. (hangs up) That takes care of him.

Back to the movie.

It turns out Dylan’s partner Marcus was killed by a zombie, which means he comes back to life as a zombie. But rather than being a brainless flesh eating machine, he becomes the main comic relief of the film since at first he still thinks he’s human, and it takes some dramatic convincing on Dylan’s part— such as shooting Marcus in the chest and letting him realize he’s still alive— to finally convince Marcus that he’s a zombie. Marcus retains his human consciousness and continues to provide comic moments throughout the movie as he deals with his zombie state.

So, Dylan must find the “heart” as well as the person/monster responsible for the murders, while doing his best to keep the peace between vampires, werewolves, zombies, and humans.

As you can tell, DYLAN DOG is not going to win any awards for realistic fiction. It’s WAY out there, and from the get-go you have to suspend disbelief with this one in a big way. As much as I like monster movies and tales of the supernatural, I prefer my stories based on truth, or at least handled in such a way that I believe in what’s going on. I didn’t believe in anything I saw in the world of DYLAN DOG. It didn’t resonate with me at all, and I felt like I was watching a kid’s movie.

I will say that the monsters looked pretty cool, especially the giant zombie creature which appears midway through the film. By far, he was the best looking creature in the movie. I also enjoyed the devil monster which shows up at the end of the movie, but he’s in it much too briefly. These two creatures were a step above the usual CGI fare we so often see in today’s movies.

I also liked the way the werewolves looked in this one, but the problem here was, we don’t see the werewolves all that much. The same can be said for the vampires. They’re not in the movie much either. I mean, there are plenty of vampire and werewolf characters in the movie, but they spend most of their time being civil talking to Dylan Dog.

The best part of DYLAN DOG was Dylan’s sidekick Marcus, played by Sam Huntington. Marcus was clearly the best-written role in a story that had most of its characters underwritten. He gets the most laughs as the newly undead zombie, and most of the gags in the movie revolve around him, such as when they go to the “body shop” to replace his severed arm.

Huntington delivers a very good performance as Marcus. He also starred with Brandon Routh in SUPERMAN RETURNS (2006), where he played Jimmy Olsen. Marcus’s scenes reminded me a lot of the scenes with Griffin Dunne in AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON (1981) but Dunne’s scenes were much darker, the humor more biting, and all in all they were just better. Marcus is funny here, but his scenes are watered down compared to the greater comic scenes Dunne enjoyed in AMERICAN WEREWOLF. Also, it didn’t help that most of Marcus’s funny bits were shown in the trailers.

(There is a knock at the door. GRIFFIN DUNNE in undead make-up steps into the office.)

DUNNE: I’m looking for an American werewolf in London. Could you help me?

MA: Have you tried London?

DUNNE: Good one. I’ve been there, done that.

MA: Well, I’m reviewing a movie right now. Come back in about an hour, and I’ll see what I can do.

DUNNE: Sure. What are you reviewing?

MA: DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT. You should see it. You might like it.

DUNNE: See it? I’m living it! And it’s no picnic, let me tell you! Being dead sucks! It’s all so boring! Well, I’ll let you get back to your movie. See you in an hour. (EXITS)

MA: Funny guy. Too bad he didn’t write DYLAN DOG.

No, that honor goes to Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer, who wrote the mediocre screenplay. The humor just isn’t that sharp, and there are zero scares and no suspense, which really hurts the film. It sorely needed some intensity to keep the audience awake.

The story is so convoluted it’s too much to swallow and believe. It presents a world full of vampires, werewolves, and zombies, who for the most part are pretty nice folks, and so the story plays out like a plot from an old Saturday morning cartoon. Now, DYLAN DOG is based on an Italian comic book, one I haven’t read, but I’d wager to guess that it’s not the most adult comic. The story here really needed to have an edge, both to its comedy and its horror. Never for one moment did I ever believe that Dylan and his friends were in any kind of danger. It plays as safe as a Scooby Doo cartoon.

DYLAN DOG was directed by Kevin Munroe, and he doesn’t do much to distinguish himself here. While the film looks good, there aren’t any memorable scenes or battle sequences. The fight scenes are all pretty standard and ordinary. It’s nothing that needs to be seen on the big screen.

The acting runs hot and cold, and it starts with the lead, Brandon Routh as Dylan Dog. Sometimes, I found myself enjoying his performance, and other times I found him dull and boring. Frankly, I expected more from Routh. He wasn’t funny, and he wasn’t tough. In short, he wasn’t much of a private eye.

The answers come to him so easily, the mystery could have been solved by Huckleberry Hound. A typical moment would have Dylan saying in his voice-over narration, “I wanted to check out the warehouse,” and then as he enters the building his voice-over says something like “I got lucky. The body was on the floor.” There’s no difficulty, no conflict, and ultimately, no excitement.

As I already said, Sam Huntington delivered the best performance in the movie as Marcus, the newly undead zombie. At least he’s funny and likeable.

Anita Briem as the femme fatale Elizabeth certainly looked good—.

(MAX howls)

MA: Max liked her, but her performance was rather wooden. She wasn’t passionate at all, and this seemed odd for a woman whose father had been murdered. In many of her scenes with Dylan, you could have substituted a beautiful mannequin for her, and it would have been just as effective.

Taye Diggs made for a cool vampire baddie, Vargas, but he acted more like a bad guy in an action movie than an evil vampire, so he wasn’t as memorable as he could have been.

The rest of the cast was just OK.

There were some creative bits worth mentioning. I liked the idea of marketing the vampire blood in little vials so people could use it to get a “vampire high.” That was one idea that had some semblance of truth behind it. I could easily see people wanting to do this, since we’re such a drug dependent culture. I also liked the various weapons at Dylan’s disposal, such as wooden bullets for the vampires and silver knuckles for the werewolves.

DYLAN DOG provides mild entertainment. There’s simply too much to swallow to buy into this story completely, and there’s not enough biting humor, scary moments, suspenseful scenes, or exciting bits of action to make this movie work at a higher level.

As a result, it’s one mediocre movie. I give it two knives.

(MAX barks once)

MA: And Max gives it one knife.

(MAX barks again)

MA: I’m sorry. Max gives it one bone. Well, that about wraps things up. How about we go for that walk, Max?

(MAX barks.)

MA: And pick up a few beers? Has LL been taking you for walks again when I’m not around? Actually, that’s not such a bad idea. Well, folks, we’ll see you next week with a review of another new movie.

Until then, have a doggone good week!

—END—

© Copyright 2011 by Michael Arruda

Michael Arruda gives DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT – 2 knives!

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MONSTROUS QUESTION: WHAT’S WRONG WITH WEREWOLVES? (ANSWER #4)

Posted in 2011, Michael Arruda Reviews, Monstrous Question, Philisophical Discussions, Werewolf Movies, Werewolves on April 29, 2011 by knifefighter

MONSTROUS QUESTION- WHAT’S WRONG WITH WEREWOLVES? – ANSWER # 4 – MICHAEL ARRUDA

(MONSROUS QUESTIONS provided by Michael Arruda)

What’s wrong with the werewolf as a movie monster?  Why hasn’t he ever been as popular as other monsters, such as vampires and zombies?

****

FROM MICHAEL ARRUDA:

I wish there wasn’t anything wrong with the werewolf as a movie monster, because I’ve always found them to be the scariest of the classic monsters, scarier than Frankenstein’s Monster, Dracula, the Mummy and the Creature from the Black Lagoon, for instance.

So, what’s the problem?  Why aren’t werewolves the smashing success its monster cousins are?

I think there are multiple reasons here as to why werewolves aren’t as popular.  Let’s seek out these reasons by looking at what makes the other monsters popular.

Take vampires, for instance, probably the most popular movie monster in history.  They’re popular for many reasons, but the one I seem to hear the most, is that vampires— for whatever reason— are sexy.  They’re sexy because they’re sensual.  They attack by biting victims on the neck, and most of the time before the bite on the neck there’s some kissing involved, and since kissing is sensual, so are vampires.

Werewolves are not sensual.  They kill by tearing out the throats of their victims and ripping them apart.  Yep, I can see how that would be less appealing than making out with a handsome or voluptuous vampire.

Vampires in the movies also tend to be good looking.  Women loved Bela Lugosi and Christopher Lee as Dracula, and today, as much as I hate to mention his name, girls do go ga-ga over Edward in the TWILIGHT movies.

Werewolves are not good looking.  They’re furry with very sharp teeth.  They’re frightening as hell to look at.

Movie vampires also tend to be evil.  For some reason, people love evil characters in the movies.  It’s why villains are so popular.  We don’t want “evil” for a neighbor, but we love him on the big screen.

Werewolves aren’t evil.  They’re just ferocious, like the vicious dog down the street that’s going to bite your ass off if he gets out of that fenced in yard.

Let’s move on to the Frankenstein Monster.  Usually, the Frankenstein Monster is sympathetic. You feel bad for him.  It’s not his fault he’s a monster. It’s Dr. Frankenstein’s fault for stitching his body together from other bodies and then giving him life.  As scary as the Monster is, we feel bad for him.

Werewolves are sympathetic too.  Who doesn’t feel bad for Larry Talbot?  So, mark this down as a plus for werewolves.

But the Frankenstein Monster is also unstoppable.  He can’t be killed, which certainly makes him incredibly scary.

Werewolves are not unstoppable.  You only have to shoot them with a silver bullet.

But what about zombies?  They’re not evil, nor sensuous, and they’re certainly not good-looking.  They’re also neither sympathetic nor unstoppable.  You only have to put a bullet in their heads, yet they’re much more popular than werewolves. Aah, but zombies attack in immense numbers.  They’re an infestation like roaches, and when they appear, it’s an epidemic as entire armies of zombies cover the countryside.

Werewolves don’t attack in immense numbers.  They’re usually just one or two per movie, not counting the shirtless buff boys from TWILIGHT.

So, what’s wrong with werewolves?

They don’t resonate with audiences because they’re not sensual, they’re not evil, they’re not unstoppable, and they’re not terrorizing the countryside in massive numbers.  Yes, they’re frightening, and they’re sympathetic, but sympathy isn’t always the best trait to have when you’re trying to be a successful movie monster.

If I had to choose a main reason why werewolves aren’t as popular, I’d have to say, it’s the “evil” factor.  Werewolves just aren’t that evil.  I think it’s time we had an evil movie werewolf.   I want to see a werewolf that everybody loves to hate, a real genuine evil bastard, a villain for the ages, the antithesis of likable Larry Talbot.  In short, the scariest creature you can imagine, and when he comes out at night, he’s going to do some awful things to people, things we’re not likely to forget.

Anyway, here’s hoping that there are plenty of werewolf movies in our future, and that the best are still ahead.

—END—

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MONSTROUS QUESTION: WHAT’S WRONG WITH WEREWOLVES? (ANSWER # 1)

Posted in 2011, Monstrous Question, Nick Cato Reviews, Philisophical Discussions, Werewolf Movies, Werewolves with tags , , , , , on April 26, 2011 by knifefighter

MONSTROUS QUESTION: WHAT’S WRONG WITH WEREWOLVES? – ANSWER # 1 – NICK CATO

(Monstrous Question provided by Michael Arruda)

We’re going to get deep and philosophical on tonight’s MONSTROUS QUESTION.  Ready?

While watching the recent RED RIDING HOOD (2011), a movie about a werewolf, it got me to thinking:  why is it that werewolves just haven’t made it big in the movies?

Sure, we’ve had the classics like THE WOLF MAN (1941) starring Lon Chaney Jr., followed by Chaney’s numerous appearances as Larry Talbot aka the Wolf Man in the Universal sequels, but what else have we had?

Hammer Films made only one werewolf movie THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF (1961). We saw AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON and THE HOWLING series in the 1980s, and recently we had the well-received remake of THE WOLFMAN (2010), but compared to vampires, and now zombies, werewolves just haven’t taken off.  Why?

That’s tonight’s MONSTROUS QUESTION:  What’s wrong with the werewolf as a movie monster?  Why hasn’t he ever been as popular as other monsters, such as vampires and zombies?

***

FROM NICK CATO:

 I think people identify more easily with vampires than with werewolves.  With vampires, who wouldn’t want the power to seduce your prey and have super-human strength?  And when the night’s over, you don’t have to worry about waking up naked in the middle of the woods with your clothes torn to shreds.  Vampires are also usually cool and in control, something werewolves are not.

And while I doubt anyone would want to be a zombie, zombies are a nightmarish version of what may be waiting beyond the grave, and despite the goofiness of most zombie films, the whole concept is terrifying (whether we want to admit it or not).  They are us in a new, permanent, decaying state.  Whereas vampires are the creatures horror fans fantasize about being, zombies are the things we fear becoming.  They’re the ultimately loved and ultimately feared creatures.

Werewolves are somewhere in the middle of this: while it’d be cool to be able to transform at will, traditional werewolves are at the mercy of a full moon (almost like being the employee of an annoying boss), and as mentioned, have very little control over their situation.   Perhaps werewolves have never received the love vamps and zombies have due to our own control issues.

—END—

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VAMPIRES SUCK

Posted in 2010, Colleen Wanglund Reviews, Parodies, Vampires, Werewolves with tags , , , , , , , , , on August 24, 2010 by knifefighter

VAMPIRES SUCK (AND SO DOES THIS MOVIE)
Review by Colleen Wanglund

Written and directed by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, who also gave us DISASTER MOVIE (2008), MEET THE SPARTANS (2008), and SCARY MOVIE (2000) (and all of its sequels), VAMPIRES SUCK is a movie spoof of TWILIGHT (2008) and NEW MOON (2009).  I’m not usually one for spoof movies (although I thought AIRPLANE! {1980} was hysterical) but I was apparently the only one brave enough here at CinemaKnifeFight.com to see it.  I decided to take my daughter Darlene with me because, unlike me, she has seen the movies it spoofs.  Needless to say, each of us came away with a different take on VAMPIRES SUCK.  She liked it more than I did.

For those of you who have never seen TWILIGHT (2008) or NEW MOON (2009), they’re basically teen angst/romance stories with vampires and werewolves thrown in.  Bella Swan moves to Forks, Washington where she meets Edward Cullen, the vampire and Jacob Black, the werewolf.  She falls in love with Edward who later decides they can’t be together and Jacob falls in love with her and Bella basically says sorry but no.  Bella is attacked by a vampire in TWILIGHT and Edward saves her.  Bella is attacked by another vampire in NEW MOON and Jacob saves her.  Bella starts to pursue some self-destructive behavior to get Edward’s attention, after he leaves her.  At some point, Edward thinks Bella has died and so he decides he doesn’t want to live anymore.  He goes to Italy to “expose” himself to the world, so the other vampires will kill him.  Bella shows up at the last minute to save him.  There you go—two movies’ worth of teen angst and romance trying to also pass itself off as horror—in a nutshell.  Did I mention that I wouldn’t even give the original movies (or books) a peek?

Now for the movie I actually saw.

In VAMPIRES SUCK, Becca Crane moves to Sporks, Washington where she meets Edward Sullen and Jacob White.  Becca falls in love with Edward, but then decides they can’t be together.  Jacob falls in love with Becca, but she tells him sorry but no.  Basically the same as above, but full of jokes—mostly lame ones.  There are the obvious jokes about how Edward looks—the white skin, the hair, the clothes—with Becca referring to Edward’s look at one point as “heroin chic”.  When we first see Edward he’s got a powder compact in his hands.  There are also the obvious jokes about Jacob being a werewolf—he chases cats, has a tail hanging out of his jeans, and a very hairy chest.  The more mature members of Jacob’s pack show up to help him save Becca and do a song and dance number that reminded me of the old Chippendale dancers.  No one actually changes into a werewolf.  The scenes with Becca’s father Frank were not funny and almost uncomfortable to watch.  Upon bringing Becca home from the airport Frank tells her he kept her room the same as she left it (she lived with her mother in Nevada).  He opens the door and there is a crib and the bedroom is full of all kinds of dolls including Dad’s blow-up sex doll.  That scene came after her father commented on how grown up Becca is by pointing out her breast size.  Other lame jokes include Frank (the sheriff) using Jacob as a bloodhound to track a killer through the woods after a fisherman ends up dead, and Becca’s paper cut turning into a full on bleeder in front of Edward’s family (also vampires).  I believe the line was “I think I hit an artery.”  There’s also a scene where Becca is walking to her truck parked by “dangerous” bikers and she imagines Edward telling her that they’re dangerous, and she gets an empty beer can to the head…boring.  There’s also a very tasteless scene where Becca takes off her nightgown and is wearing a black pleather light-up bra and panties, complete with garters and black stockings.

What I liked about VAMPIRES SUCK are the three young stars.  Jenn Proske plays Becca Crane and plays her exactly like Kristin Stewart’s character Bella in the TWILIGHT films.  She had her mannerisms down to a tee; all of the ticks, over-blinking eyes, fluttery lips, and constantly pushing her hair behind her ear.  Jenn Proske didn’t need to exaggerate anything.  She was completely annoying and she was great at it!  Matt Lanter was quite funny as the sparkly Edward, exaggerating his Emo style without going too overboard.  The scenes where he’s riding a Segway were quite amusing. Chris Riggi was just as funny as Jacob, who is somewhat serious in the TWILIGHT movies but played it off here with the right amount comedy.  I found myself actually laughing the first time Jacob saw a cat and darted after it.  The writers had him as more of a dog than a werewolf….almost like a cute little puppy.  I also enjoyed seeing the tweens wearing Team Edward or Team Jacob tee shirts beating the crap out of each other with shovels and two by fours during the high school prom, which is where the climax of the spoof takes place.  The prom’s theme is vampires, and it’s meant to mimic the Saint Salvatore festival in Italy where the actual NEW MOON climax takes place.  There’s a song that Becca listens to on her iPod that is basically an Emo teen’s mantra—“my life is awful, I’m so depressed, why can’t I have an alternative boyfriend?—“it was so good they should put it on iTunes.

Darlene’s take on VAMPIRES SUCK was a bit different than mine.  I heard her laughing a bit more than I did.  She thought it was pretty funny, but not hilarious.  Darlene thinks you should see TWILIGHT and NEW MOON to really get the jokes in this spoof.  She points out a quote by Becca early in the movie that Darlene says describes Bella, the original character exactly—“I’m boring, have no real personality and yet every hot guy loves me.”  As far as the actors go, Darlene agrees with me about Jenn Proske—thinks she’s even better than Kristen Stewart.  She thought Matt Lanter was just like Edward with the comedic twist, and that Chris Riggi as Jacob “was cute.”  My other daughter Erica said the only purpose for Jacob in the original movies WAS to be cute.  My girls were on opposite sides of the “Edward or Jacob” argument at one time.

This was not a movie I would have gone to see on my own.  I really did take a bullet for the team on this one.  As Darlene said, you should probably have seen the TWILIGHT movies to get all of the jokes in VAMPIRES SUCK.  I didn’t see them (thankfully) and thought the movie overall was pretty lame.  I will say, though that I’m very picky when it comes to comedy.  I grew up on Monty Python, the Three Stooges, the Marx Brothers, Abbott and Costello, and Mel Brooks films, so I can be pretty hard to please.   One big plus for me, however was seeing Dave Foley from the old KIDS IN THE HALL comedy sketch show as the school’s principal.  Did I mention that the school’s sports teams were the Bloodsuckers?  Eh, it wasn’t that funny.  I thought the young kids sitting a few rows behind me were funnier.  They were just giggling their asses off through the whole movie.  I was surprised that there were young kids there.  Between some of the jokes and the final words of the film (involving the F word) I’m at a loss to explain how VAMPIRE SUCKS got a PG-13 rating.  At least I only paid the matinee price—although nowadays it isn’t all that much cheaper, is it?  I’ll remember this one guys.

This is one movie you can skip.

© Copyright 2010 by Colleen Wanglund

6 Comments »

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE

Posted in 2010, Cinema Knife Fights, Garbage, Sequels, Vampires, Werewolves with tags , , , , , , , , , , , on July 5, 2010 by knifefighter

CINEMA KNIFE FIGHT: THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE
By Michael Arruda and L.L. Soares

(THE SCENE: a river by a forest. Wolves are howling in the distance. LL SOARES and MICHAEL ARRUDA enter a clearing by the river, and stop to take a drink. Behind them, a young GIRL appears skipping along the river singing to herself.)

GIRL: Looking for my true love, my true love, my true love. Oh where shall I find my true love?—- aaahhh! (SPLASH as GIRL falls into the water)

LS: The river’s a good place to start. Try there.

MA (shaking his head): That’s really too bad that she, er— slipped.

GIRL: Help me! I’m drowning!

MA: We can’t help you. You’re on the wrong side of the river. That’s werewolf territory.

(Big phony CGI wolves appear, wearing ribbons and bows around their necks. They jump into the river.)

MA: Ready to start this week’s review of THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE?

LS: I’d rather eat broken glass.

MA: Let’s just get this over with.

(Behind them the wolves are attacking the GIRL in the river. MA and LS ignore the screams and continue talking.)

LS: Okay. ECLIPSE is the third movie in the TWILIGHT series, based on the books by Stephenie Meyer. It is basically a love triangle between three people: Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart), a teenage girl just about to graduate from high school; Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), a vampire who Bella is in love with; and Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner), a Native American boy about Bella’s age, who also happens to be a werewolf.

As we saw in the previous movies, TWILIGHT and NEW MOON, the three of them have gone through high school together. Bella’s love affair with Edward has only grown more intense as they approach graduation. She desperately wants to consummate her relationship with Edward, but, as a vampire, he’s afraid he may hurt her or even kill her in the throes of passion. So she has made a deal with him. She wants to become a vampire, too, so that they can make love without fear of danger. In return, he asks that she marry him first, because he’s “old school” and wants a commitment. She has agreed to marry him after graduation.

MA: There’s a part of me who wants to applaud Edward’s sense of honor towards Bella, that he doesn’t want to sleep with her until they’re married. But the problem I have with this, is the same problem I have with the rest of the movie, and that is, it’ s not realistically portrayed.

LS: Personally, I wish they’d just screw and get it over with.

MA: Okay, Edward’s this noble male. Great. But when do we get to see how he’s handling this? It’s clear that Bella has the hots for him, but doesn’t he have needs too? What’s he doing about them? He’s just so icy cold. Whatever happened to the classic vampires like Lugosi and Lee who had a sexual energy about them that was obviously very attractive to women?

(Vampires holding signs are picketing the area. They include Bela Lugosi in his Dracula cape, Christopher Lee, and Gary Oldman. Their signs read things like “Real Vampires Don’t Sparkle” and “I Want My Fangs Back.”)

MA: We don’t see Edward suffering from not being able to make love to Bella. The guy’s gotta be suffering, right?

LS: I think he’s a eunuch.

MA: To me, this is all a not-so-subtle message about chastity and virginity, two subjects I don’t have a problem with…

LS: I do! They make for BORING movies.

MA: …But I do have a problem when the message is delivered in a way that isn’t realistic. I’m sorry, but if you love someone the way Edward is supposed to love Bella, you’re going to be feeling certain things that if you repress, you’re going to be affected by it, and we just don’t see that. The passion is missing.

LS: “The passion is missing.” That’s the entire TWILIGHT series in a nutshell. Can I go home now?

MA: No. We owe it to our readers to explain WHY ECLIPSE is such a bad movie.

LS (sighs and continues): Everyone else in the movie thinks that Bella is moving too fast. That she wants to give up her mortal life (because in order to become a vampire, she has to die first) before she has even had a chance to experience it. Among the people who think she is making a mistake is Jacob, a pal since childhood who also loves Bella. In the last movie, NEW MOON, Bella admitted that she loved Jacob, but “not in that way.” In this movie, Jacob finally gets Bella to admit that she does love him in “that way,” but the problem is, she loves Edward more.

MA: The bigger problem is why should we care?

LS (snoring and MA nudges him): Wha-wha-what happened? I wasn’t asleep!

MA: Sure you weren’t.

LS: Should she go with Jacob, who is a werewolf, but who is also alive, and she would not have to change herself to be with him (in this series lycanthropy seems to be a genetic condition, rather than the result of a wolf bite)? Or should she give up her life to become a vampire and spend eternity with her soul mate Edward?

The whole thing is incredibly silly to me. If she’s that desperate to get laid, and will even commit what is essentially suicide to get a chance to sleep with Edward, then her priorities are really screwed up. She could at least have a fling with Jacob first and see what sex is like, before she gives up everything for Edward. But the fact that the central argument of the movie is “should Bella have sex or not” makes me also realize that there is not one adult emotion in the TWILIGHT movies. These are childish dilemmas written for an immature audience.

MA: Bella wants to have sex because she’s in love with Edward. To me, it’s obviously clear that she doesn’t love Mr. Buff Werewolf Jacob the same way she loves Edward, and so all this angst comes off to me as phony and a waste of time. It’s there for the sake of having a love triangle, which is yet another reason I didn’t like this movie, because I didn’t buy its love triangle. She loves Edward. End of story.

LS: Bella wants to have sex. Edward wants to wait until marriage. Jacob pines for Bella on the sidelines. It’s all very juvenile. Yes, I know it’s geared toward teenage girls. But what about the middle-aged women in the audience? I have to admit, their interest in this series baffles me.

MA: There were more adults in the packed theater with me than teens, and a lot of them were couples, so it wasn’t just a girl’s night out. The hubbies were there, too.

And when all the shirtless werewolf males sprinted onto the screen for the first time, the adult women behind me started “oohing,” and “aahing” and giggling. I immediately wanted to scream my favorite Charlton Heston line from PLANET OF THE APES (1968), “It’s a madhouse!!”

LS: Of course, the central romance can’t be the only storyline. There also have to be some genre trappings so that ECLIPSE can at least superficially claim it is a horror movie. So we get the plotline that Victoria (Bryce Dallas Howard), the red-haired vampire from the last movie, wants revenge on Edward for killing her mate, James. So, because he took what she loved the most, she plans to take was Edward loves the most —Bella.

MA: Hey, here’s a message for Victoria- Get over it, girl!

LS: Since Victoria can’t take on the whole Cullen clan (Edward’s vampire “family”) by herself, she creates an army of vampires by “turning” as many people as she can. It turns out vampires are their strongest (and most out of control) the first three months after they become bloodsuckers, because they are slaves to their thirst for blood and have not yet acquired the knowledge and discipline to control it.

MA (opens mouth wide): YAWN!!!

LS: Victoria’s army seems almost like an afterthought. When they finally reach Forks, Washington, for the big showdown with the good guys, the movie is almost over. There is one big climactic battle—

MA: That was a battle? I thought it was a ballet.

LS: — between Victoria’s vampires and the Cullens (and the werewolves, who have joined forces with them to protect Bella) but it’s not much of a fight and this subplot adds nothing to the movie. I guess they just needed more to the story than just “Who loves Bella more?” but it doesn’t work.

MA: If you at home want to find out who loves Bella more, you should go see ECLIPSE. Isn’t that a compelling reason to see a movie?

LS: There’s also a council of the Volturi, the vampire overlords we last saw in NEW MOON, who are keeping tabs on the growing vampire army But they do nothing and are pretty much there to waste more screen time. Even Dakota Fanning, suitably spooky as the leader of the Volturi contingent, can’t make them interesting.

MA: The Volturi are even more boring than the Jedi councils we had to suffer through during the last three installments of the STAR WARS movies. Those Jedis were so horrible it’s no wonder Anakin Skywalker left them to follow the Dark Side! These folks are even worse! They really could have used some help from YODA.

(YODA suddenly appears.)

YODA: Help vampires I will, the force they should follow, dark side leave they must.

MA: English you should learn.

LS: Hey, Yoda, go jump in the river. Don’t make this review any longer than it needs to be.

YODA: Rude you men are (YODA exits with a SPLASH)

LS: As usual, the acting in this series is atrocious. Kristen Stewart as Bella continues to say her lines with a strange hesitation, as if she’s reading them as she goes along. This is especially confusing because I just saw Stewart as Joan Jett in the biopic THE RUNAWAYS (also with Dakota Fanning, strangely enough), and thought she was quite good in it. Which means Stewart can act when she wants to. She just chooses not to when she portrays Bella.

MA: I don’t mind Stewart’s acting, but I really have a problem with the character. There’s just something very annoying about Bella. I think it’s because she’s the center of all this attention and I just don’t get it. I mean everyone and their grandmother is out there trying to protect Bella. Why?

LS: I don’t get that either. What is so damned special about Bella anyway???

That must be a big reason why this series appeals to teenage girls so much. They want to be “special” and the center of all attention, just like Bella.

MA: To return to the STAR WARS analogy, not even Princess Leia had this much protection. And she was leading a rebel alliance against the evil galactic empire! What the hell is Bella doing? She’s waiting around to see who “loves her more!”

LS: You and those STAR WARS analogies. What are you, Joseph Campbell? Taylor Lautner as Jacob seems a little more confident this time around, but still has miniscule acting ability. His big thing seems to be walking around without a shirt and showing off his abs. In the audience I saw ECLIPSE with, the girls went nuts when we first see Jacob in the movie, leaning on a car with his shirt off. So it seems he doesn’t have to actually do any acting to get a favorable reaction, which is good because he is incredibly DULL.

(A horde of screaming women run by. “Where is he? Where is he?”)

MA: In the river. (The women jump in.)

LS: As for Edward, it’s hard to understand what Bella sees in him. All he ever does is either mope around or he is so overprotective of her, watching her every move, that he seems like more of her stalker than her lover.

ECLIPSE is just a snooze-fest. I looked at my watch and yawned constantly during this movie. And I was fidgeting in my uncomfortable seat a lot by the end.

MA: Just so there isn’t any misunderstanding on this point. What you just said is not an exaggeration. ECLIPSE is an excruciatingly boring movie.

LS: Last time, when NEW MOON first came out. I missed seeing it the first day it opened because all showings were immediately sold out. So this time, I got my ticket ahead of time. When I got there, I had to stand in a special line in order to be let in. I put up with all this in order to basically subject myself to a torture session for over two hours. It just doesn’t seem fair.

My main problem with the TWILIGHT movies is that, despite the presence of vampires and werewolves, these films are not HORROR MOVIES by any stretch of the imagination. They are romance movies. Everything revolves around declarations of love, not scares. There is not one moment in any of these movies that will elicit fear or outright terror.

MA: And I have to argue here that they’re not even very good romance movies. I’ve asked myself this question over and over: Is the fact that I’m not a huge fan of romance movies the reason I don’t like this franchise? My answer is no. Because if it were a good movie, I’d like it, or I’d at least recognize it as a good movie and then just say it wasn’t my cup of tea.

Last week I saw TOY STORY 3, a kid’s movie. There’s a scene near the end where Woody, Buzz Lightyear, and their toy friends face death, and while watching this scene, I told myself, it’s a Disney/Pixar movie, they’re probably not going to die, but the characters really believed they were going to die, and it was such a compelling moment, an emotional moment, that for a second, I really feared for them, and they’re toys!! It’s an example of good storytelling. There’s nothing like this in ECLIPSE, no moment where you go, “My God, what’s going to happen?” It’s dull and emotionless.

LS: I still think the CGI werewolves (which just look like giant wolves) are horrible. At one point, Jacob, in werewolf form, enters a scene and someone in the audience shouted “Awww, he’s so cute!” and the truth is, he was. He just looked like a big old puppy dog. And that is not how werewolves should be portrayed in horror films.

(A group of werewolves, including Lon Chaney Jr’s Larry Talbot, Paul Naschy and Benecio Del Toro are now holding picket signs that read things like “Real Werewolves Eat Human Flesh” and “Don’t Neuter Me.”)

In fact, everything about these movies is “cute.” And safe. And boring. The vampires may appear to have fangs, but the TWILIGHT series is ultimately toothless.

MA: Exactly. It’s as if these movies were produced by Disney. I half expect to see TWILIGHT dance numbers on parade at Disney World next year.

LS: Rumor had it that ECLIPSE might be the best movie of the series, but it’s not. I think it’s just slightly better than NEW MOON (2009), which was the worst.  The surprising part is that this one is directed by David Slade, who gave us the superior vampire flick 30 DAYS OF NIGHT (2007). Then again, his hands are tied by the awful script by Stephenie Meyer and her constant collaborator in these films, Melissa Rosenberg. The best TWILIGHT film remains the first one (2008), partly for Catherine Hardwicke’s directing, and partly because, back then, these characters and lame storylines hadn’t been done to death yet. But even the first TWILIGHT was no prize, and was hard to sit through.

I would like to make a pact with you now, Michael that this is the last TWILIGHT film we will review for Cinema Knife Fight. I’ve done my time, and I just can’t sit through another one. These are NOT horror movies, and there is no reason for us to continue reviewing them for CKF.

MA: You don’t need to twist my arm. No more TWILIGHT.

LS (doing a happy dance): This is our last TWILIGHT review! Hurray!

So, is there anything else you want to say, Michael?

MA: Watching this movie, I felt like I was trapped in the back seat of a car for a two-hour trip, while in the front seat sat Edward, Bella and Jacob, and they started talking about their relationship. I listened, and I was fairly interested at first. I was curious. But after about 15 minutes, I was ready to move on, only the conversation never ended! Bella loves Edward, but Jacob loves Bella, and he’s not going to give up. Okay, okay. I get it. Let’s move on. But we don’t move on, and the entire car ride is spent listening to the same arguments over and over and over. That’s what watching ECLIPSE was like for me.

Believe it or not, there were a couple of things I did like about the movie. I thought the chemistry between Bella and Edward was stronger in this movie than in NEW MOON. I also liked the scenes Edward and Jacob had with each other, as they make good adversaries. Edward even gets one of the better lines in the movie when he says about Jacob, “Doesn’t he own a shirt?”

I also liked a scene in the movie when Jacob learns that Bella is going to marry Edward, he tells her he’d rather she be dead than a vampire, the implication being that he’d actually kill her to save her from Edward. Of course, he’s just talking out of anger. This movie doesn’t come close to visiting a dark interesting place like that for real.

LS: I can’t believe you found ANYTHING to like about this movie!

MA: But, ultimately, ECLIPSE is about as engrossing as a Saltine cracker. Like the previous installment in the series, it’s talky and dull, and it’s so sanitized it’s nauseating! Everything is just so clean. I have to laugh, because in the movie the vampires complain about the werewolves smelling bad, and the werewolves complain about the vampire’s stink. Stink? This movie’s so clean it smells like window cleaner.

LS: The only thing that really stinks is this movie!

MA: If you like your vampire stories sterilized, stripped of passion and blood, and your werewolf tales all cutesy and buff, and your love stories superficial and immature, you’ll love ECLIPSE! Otherwise, stay away from this one. I give it one and a half knives.

LS: I give this movie no knives. I wish I could give it an even lower score.

MA: And to think, that of all the movies we’ve seen the past two years, the biggest audience has been for this series. There’s only one thing left for us to do.

(MA & LS jump into the river with a final SPLASH.)

-END-

© Copyright 2010 by Michael Arruda and L.L. Soares

MICHAEL ARRUDA gave THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE – ONE AND A HALF KNIVES

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L.L. SOARES gave TWILIGHT: ECLIPSE – NO KNIVES


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