Through IMDb, I just discovered that Cannonball! was directed by Paul Bartel one year after Death Race 2000, which I was going to compare this film to, seeing as how they're both 70's carsploitation (I just made that word up.) flicks, starring David Carradine. It's been a few years since I've seen Death Race 2000, but I think it did everything right where Cannonball! did everything wrong. Race is funny, gory, sexy and endlessly entertaining; while Cannonball! is sloppy, boring and dull. Yeah, boring and dull are the same thing, but I couldn't come up with any more adjectives to describe this cinematic turd. There is no way I should be bored by an exploitation flick, it totally defeats the purpose.

David Carradine is Coy "Cannonball" Buckman, an ex-con and ex-professional race car driver, who wants to race his flame orange Firebird in in the illegal Cannonball Run across the country. Unwillingly along for the ride is his parole officer and girlfriend, one in the same. Since he's the favorite to win, he's got everybody gunning for him, including a gangster who's laid a big bet on another driver. It's a pretty basic set-up, that should provide for some fun, mindless entertainment. There's a couple of good scenes, which I'll post below, but that's about it. The rest of the film is incredibly dull, the racing scenes are mostly uninspired, the acting hovers between good and bad, so you can't get into the characters, but you can't laugh at the actors ineptitude. The score is an earful of awful, it sounds like it was ripped straight from a 70's porn movie that the composer was working on at the same time.

Don't bother in the least. Watch Death Race 2000 again, or one of the other 100 better 70's car-chase films, like Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry, The Vanishing Point, or Bullit. Or if you're in the mood for an 80's comedy version of the Cannonball Run, than check out the ultimate guilty-pleasure film, Cannonball Run, featuring Burt Reynolds in his charismatic prime. - Grade: D

In this scene David Carradine uses some of his Kung Fu skills to beat down a fake cop, sent to take him out of the race. I love the way Carradine pauses for a second before unleashing a fury of kicks.



Here Carradine's had enough of his main rival in the race, Cade Redman, and decides to dispatch him. He jumps an unfinished bridge 20 years before Speed. It's easily the best put together scene in the film, if all the chase scenes in this film had this kind of energy, it'd be a cult-classic.



This has got to be the most ridiculous car crash scene in the history of cinema. It just goes on and on, with cars crashing into each other long after everyone should have stopped. Each collision ending in a huge fireball. It's cheesily entertaining though, I'll admit.

If I told you that John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd made a film together one year after the classic film Blues Brothers, each still at the height of their comical powers, you’d probably rack your mind for a moment, trying to come up with a comedy masterpiece that you’d somehow misplaced in your brain. Yet, I don’t think most people have seen, or even heard, of the film Neighbors. And you certainly couldn’t call it a comedy classic. Belushi and Aykroyd try their damnedest to save the film, creating a few funny moments, but the script is so dead it's impossible to revive.

The problem starts with Belushi playing the straight-man as homeowner Earl Keese and Aykroyd playing the over-the-top obnoxious, new neighbor Vic. I usually appreciate films that try something new, but Aykroyd, who can definitely play weird, is known as a classic straight-man. (See Ghostbusters, Trading Places or Spies Like Us.) While Belushi always shined as the goofy outcast. Each are so funny in their own right that they do a decent job with their roles, but ultimately it’s a bit off-putting that they’re playing the wrong characters.

The film starts off decently enough, with Belushi and wife sitting around the house, it's another boring night after work. But something different is happening, with the long abandoned house across from them getting moved into by an odd looking couple. The doorbell rings and Belushi answers the door to Cathy Moriarty, who plays the femme fatale, sexpot Ramona to a tee, who leads Belushi into quite a few sexually awkward scenes. Soon her husband, Aykroyd, is on the scene, demanding that Belushi act the host and treat them to dinner. It’s a fairly good set-up for a comedy, but ultimately Neighbors never goes anywhere. The film takes place all in one night, with Belushi constantly being foiled by Vic or Ramona, while his wife thinks the new couple is the cat’s pajamas.

Belushi is repeatedly put into ridiculous situations, each only slightly more awkward than the last, with the film never building to any worthwhile climax. And the way each situation is set-up, the conclusion is telegraphed from a mile off, robbing most moments of its laughs. The line delivery, facial expressions and comic timing of Belushi and Aykryod keep the film from becoming a complete mess; if the film had starred two lesser comedians, it never would have seen the light of day. Director John Avildsen tries his best to dress up the story, with wacky camera angles and some other fun filmmaking tricks, but he’s completely unable to save it as well. If the script had been anywhere near decent, if it had any sense about how to build a story or set a scene, the actors may have been enough to make it a fun comedy. But as it is, Neighbors is far too big of a mess for anyone to bother, and it remains a forgotten piece in two comedy legends filmographies. – Grade: D (Seen on 6/26/08)

Best scene in the film, Belushi gets ready for a date to "Staying Alive":

This film is an incredibly ridiculous supernatural thriller, that falls apart the minute it’s over, as you start to fill in the badly done pieces. It works okay for a while, good enough to keep you watching and wanting to know how it ends. But once some of the film’s mysteries start to unravel, you feel dumber for continuing to watch it. The film only works because of some blatant plot-holes and leaps in logic, that don’t make sense even in a world where Sandra Bullock’s life jumps back and forth between days of the week.

At the beginning of the film Sandra’s told that her husband has died, obviously it’s a horrendous day for her family and she goes to bed much worse for the wear. However the following day, she wakes up to her husband being alive again, and thinks her memories are nothing but a bad dream. But again she wakes up to a dead husband, and suddenly she’s going off the deep end, winding up the day by being committed to a mental hospital. Again she wakes up to her husband being alive. She starts to unravel the mystery of what’s going on, hoping that she can save her husband from dying.

She learns that she has a couple more days to figure out how to stop it all from happening. There’s one unintentionally funny scene where she ponders if he’s worth keeping alive, after she learns about his affair. Which pales in unintentional hilarity, to when she first confronts the fact of her husband being dead, sending his beheaded noggin rolling into the street; my favorite scene in the film. I’ll admit I was a bit interested in how it would come to an end, if it was in fact a self-fulfilling prophecy, something that’s always intrigued me. But once the groaner of an ending played out, and the credits started to roll, the film destroyed any sense of logic.

Premonition is a thriller for those who’ve never unraveled a mystery, and don’t want to spend a second past the end of a film, thinking about what they’ve just seen. Sandra Bullock dramatically over-acts her way through the whole film, ranging from hysterical tears to hysterical terror; her husband played by Julian McMahon, never sells himself as a real guy, I kept thinking he was going to jump into maniacal villain role. The filmmaking is typical Hollywood slickness, but with no real artistic or intelligent touches. But it’s the script that truly fails, with ridiculous scenes full of unrealistic dialog and actions, ending with a huge cheat. (Which I’ll discuss below) – Grade: D (Seen on 6/19/08)

(Full spoiler mode.) So the film ends with Sandra crazily driving after her husband, trying to get him to stop his car before the spot where he’s hit by a truck. She ends up stopping him at the exact place where he was killed and as he tries to pull a u-turn, his brand new car breaks down in the middle of the road, leading to a truck driving straight through him and then nonsensically exploding. Those ridiculous events aren’t even the problems I had with it, because at the beginning of the film, she’s told by a cop that her husband has died. Yet she’s on scene when it happens. Why doesn’t the cop know that or even recognize her? Time is only mixed up for her. They also blatantly cheat another thing in the time-line. There’s a “shocking” shot where her daughter’s face is suddenly mangled. They show later that she accidentally ran through a sliding-glass-door, but in the time-line which they set for the movie, it happens before they learn that daddy is dead, in fact daddy shows up at the hospital. But at the very beginning of the film, when they find out he’s dead, her face is perfectly normal. They should have found another way around this, by shooting her only from the back or something, instead they simply cheat. Not that it would have made this crappy movie any better.

I recently reviewed a pair of French comedies, complaining about the lack of good American comedies lately. These two films here are exactly what I'm talking about. I won't even bother to separate them as they both have all the same problems. In the completely unnecessary remake of The Pink Panther, Steve Martin puts on a ridiculous French accent to play the role of Inspector Jacques Clouseau. Originally made famous and a thousand times funnier, by the comedy-genius Peter Sellers. You can practically smell the desperation in the filmmakers attempts to make us laugh. Steve Martin, who himself once was an incredibly funny man, making stupid comedy seem brilliant, in films like The Jerk. Seems lost in how to make a joke work as Clouseau. He simply pumps everything up to 11; the stupidity of his character is so far out there, it's no longer funny.

I felt the exact same way about Robin Williams in License to Wed. This often intensely hilarious actor, seems out of his depth. I didn't find myself laughing once at his portrayal as Reverend Frank. His nonsensical ideas on how to bring Mandy Moore and John Krasinski together as a couple, didn't once seem genuine. There has to be at least a certain sense of reality, when trying to make us laugh. Krasinski, who I find very funny and charismatic on the great show The Office, seems demeaned to be playing this guy set to be married to the ultra-bland Moore. He does the cliche' romantic-comedy thing, of constantly lying to his partner, performing ridiculous often illegal acts, getting himself deeper into trouble, when a moment of truth would resolve everything.

Poor Kevin Kline and Jean Reno, both great performers in their own rights, couldn't have been more obvious in their lackadaisical approaches to their characters. They both seemed embarrassed to be part of the mess that is The Pink Pather. Emily Mortimer, who plays Clouseau's love interest, is the only one that had any realistic attachment to her character, but she's in the film so briefly that she can't help. Beyonce, once again does her, "look Mom, I'm acting!", thing that I can't stand. The only performances with any life to be found in License to Wed, were done by some of the bit roles. I like young Josh Flitter as the Reverend's aid, he brings some life to his character, and out funnies Williams. Brian Baumgartner, Kevin from The Office, is maniacally over-the-top as another finance going through Reverend Frank's trials, but he at least seems to be trying to get some laughs.

The filmmakers behind these two extremely lame attempts at comedic filmmaking should be embarrassed by these movies. They are sloppily put together, with no real sense of zest, horribly acted by reliable performers, and worse beyond anything, not funny. I think between these two films, I had three slight chuckles, but countless groans at the pathetic attempts at humor. Not once was I drawn into the film or made to care about anyone in the least, I remained a distant viewer throughout each. The only worthwhile moment in either film is the opening credits animation in The Pink Panther, because it reminded me of the better versions of the film. - Grade: C- (Seen on 6/4/08) License to Wed plain sucked throughout. - Grade: D- (Seen on 6/15/08)

Is there anything worse than a horror movie that isn't scary? Or in the case of Crazy Eights, doesn't even want to try? Maybe that's not what the filmmakers were going for, maybe they were trying to create some sort of psychological drama? Which is what it felt like at times, but which in that case, doesn't work either. But silly me, when I watch a movie from the horror series Eight Movies to Die For, I expect to at least have some attempts at horror. And honestly, there are a few moments that have some horror elements, but the filmmakers seem to be trying to create the opposite of suspense. Any time anything even remotely dark or freaky started to happen, they get it over with as quick as possible and cut to the next scene. I'm sorry, but that's not how horror films work.

When I originally heard about the Eight Movies to Die For concept, I was excited. Here were some folks really trying to scare us, or at least that's what they promised. Their intention was to bring us eight films, that we hadn't yet had a chance to see, eight films that supposedly lived on the edge. If they had had their first festival anywhere near me, I would have gone. Luckily, I had to wait till DVD. I believe I watched seven out of eight from the first series. One, The Abandoned, was actually good and somewhat creepy, two or three were okay, like Reincarnation, the rest sucked badly. So it was with trepidation that I went again to the well for their 2007 series, hopefully I started off with the worst one of the bunch, because if they get any worse than Crazy Eights, my confidence has been completely destroyed.

Crazy Eights, is about a group of people brought together for a funeral of a friend. It comes out that they all spent time in a mental institution together when they were children. There's a mystery surrounding their friend's death, so the alive seven make the trek back to the institution to find out what really happened. Their first stop is a time capsule they left for themselves to find, inside they find the bones of a little girl, who was at the institution with them. Being too stupid to call the police, they investigate further. And before you know it they find themselves locked in the basement of this long abandoned institution, with what appears to be the ghost of the little girl stalking them.

They continue to make the stupidest, most cliche´d horror mistakes possible. With each character insisting on setting off on their own, no matter how many of them get knocked off. They're constantly saying things like, "Oh no, that's our 4th friend to die in the last fifteen minutes, I'm going to explore this creepy hallway where I just saw something ghost like moving about in. You guys stay here." These are literally about the dumbest characters you could find in a modern horror film. So you can't possibly care when the obvious happens and they get killed.

The set-up isn't that bad, I can go along with them trying to figure out their past in this crumbling shell of a hospital. The set design is moody, the lighting appropriately dim, they even do a decent job of setting up the ghost. Unfortunately past that, they seem completely clueless on how to scare anyone. As soon as anything creepy starts to happen, they try to get it over with as quickly as possible, a hand jumps out of the dark, they cut to another room and we hear a muffled scream. That's how nearly everyone dies in this sorry excuse for a horror film. There's no drawn out suspense, there aren't even any good deaths. Everyone dies by editing.

By the end I'd lost all interest in the film, I honestly don't remember how it ended, I just didn't care. The acting is all pretty bad. Dina Meyer and Traci Lords are the lead actresses, neither has ever turned in a convincing performance, the filmmakers were simply going for some recognizable faces. They also got Gabrielle Anwar, who has made some decent films in the past, but she's pretty much wasted here, one of the first to die. Frank Whaley does his typical whiny role, he's phoning it in, and still creates the most realistic character. They try to create some drama about the horrible past these friends have gone through, but the writing and acting aren't good enough to pull it off. The little creepiness they have going for them, they almost deliberately avoid. A real waste of a film. - Grade: D-

After a fairly inspired opening, with an Empire State Building window washer getting his head bit off, and some funny sarcastic remarks by David Carradine playing a New York City detective who cleans up the mess; I thought I was in for some good cheesy fun. But unfortunately the film quickly devolves into a boring mess. About every 15 to 20 twenty minutes the ancient bird-monster Q shows up and carries some poor soul off to eat, and those moments are decent, but they're too few and far apart.

For some reason a movie called Q: The Winged Serpent, is more about some low life scum named Jimmy Quinn, played by Michael Moriarty (also in the much better Troll). Quinn is an unemployed alcoholic with a shady side; he has hopes to be a better man, mostly for his long-suffering girlfriend, but with no job offers, he takes up with a couple of jewelery robbers as a getaway driver. When they force him to come into the store with them, the robbery goes wrong, and he escapes with the jewels and runs for his life; eventually he makes his way up into the top of the Chrysler Building, where he finds a giant nest full of human skeletons.

Meanwhile, David Carradine and Richard Roundtree, great B-Movie casting, but sadly wasted, are detective partners looking for a serial killer with an Aztec twist. It seems an Aztec Priest, who's been sacrificing people by carving their skin off, has invoked the god Quetzlcoatl, a giant bird monster who has a penchant for rooftop sunbathers. Not a bad idea, but it's not too deeply explored. Again, they spend way too much time with Quinn. The guy's a total drag, he's constantly whining about how horrible his life is, and wondering why he can't be a better person. I wanted to see some people get eaten by a flying monster, not a lamely done drama about a guy with a conscience problem.

Quinn proves that he's a real scumbag when he holds the city hostage by not revealing the location of the bird's nest. He insists on a million dollars and some respect, or the killings won't stop. The last five minutes of Q are by far the best part of the film. We finally get to see more than a beak or a claw of the monster, as they show all of Q in glorious stop-motion animation, flying around the Chrysler Building as Carradine and his crew of cops shoot her down; the poor thing only wanted to collect some food for her soon to be hatched egg. So what if some heads had to be removed, she's an endangered species and should be protected.

If the movie had been about Q attacking New Yorkers, and Carradine and Roundtree investigating, it could have been a fun B-Movie; when those elements were on screen, it is an entertaining film. But they let what should have been a minor character take over the film; I didn't care about Quinn in the least, he could have found the bird, and that would have been enough. I didn't care about his feelings or his relationship with his girlfriend. His unredeemable character drags the film down so far, that it's not worth sitting through for the few good scenes of Q swooping in to grab people. It's unbearable for even those that love bad movies. - Grade: D

Did we really need another movie narrated by Morgan Freeman? I got sick of it about ten films ago. I can't even watch The Shawshank Redemption anymore, one of my favorite films, because I'm so tired of hearing Morgan's sweet voice explaining the meaning of it all. It's one of the thousands of lazy choices made in the making of The Bucket List.

It was a good idea to put Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson together in a film. They're two of the finest actors around, and they should have been great bouncing dialogue off of each other. Unfortunately they're both in paycheck mode, coasting through on their long established charms, not offering anything new or challenging. Their characters are supposed to be dying, but both look as healthy as a horse, fatter than ever really. Jack shaves his head, but he's so bald already, what does it matter?

I'm not going to bother with their character names here, because they didn't bother getting into character. - Jack's a rich, powerful womanizer of a man (what a stretch for him), who's found out he's dying of cancer. Morgan's a good man, a good husband, who always played everything straight (Also what a stretch!), who too has learned he's dying of cancer. And because the predictable script says so, they're put in a room together in the hospital that Jack owns. At first there's some cutesy "man" bickering. Then they become great friends, because neither has really ever had a great friend.

Morgan mentions this Bucket List idea, of doing all the things you wanted to do before you die, and Jack being extremely rich, funds them to go on a bunch of adventures together. We're supposed to find it highly hilarious, the sight of these two old guys jumping out of planes and driving cars really fast. Except that all the gags are so horribly executed that nothing drags out more than a slight chuckle.

There's this scene where Jack and Morgan are sitting on top of an Egyptian pyramid during sunset, of course, pouring their guts out, begging the audience to cry, but they're so obviously sitting in a studio, with an extremely fake backdrop of the pyramids behind them, probably thinking about taking a nap in their trailers; that you can't even begin to take it seriously. It would have been a thousand times more powerful, if they'd actually shot at the pyramids. And everywhere they go it looks like this. It could have been a great travelogue of a film, if they could have bothered to leave L.A., while also making their performances more believable.

This could have been a good film. It's a nice idea, two guys sharing their last few months alive together, doing all the things that they want to do. It could have been funny and bittersweet. I'm sure they were all thinking Oscar gold when they went into this, but everything about this film is so damn lazy. These legends; Jack, Morgan and director Rob Reiner are riding along in cruise control, hoping their combined greatness would give us something special, but ending up with poorly executed schlock instead. - Grade: D