September, Widescreen, and DVD Reviews

I spent most of my high school days working at a movie theater and summer was always busy and booming in the summer and winter, but there were a couple of times when it was dead; one of those times was the month of September. yes, September may be le last month of summer but as far as your local theater is concerned it is a month of hibernation and waiting. September is a dumping ground for either A.) Movies that did not have enough pull to draw in the summer audience. or B.) not quite the drama or family draw that they want for the holiday season. There are some exceptions to these rules but you're looking at about 90% crap.

Okay, off-topic rant number 2. there is a rather silent struggle among DVD that i think should have been lost in the transition from VHS to DVD. I'm talking about the existence of the Full screen DVD release. Full screen is the biggest sin among most serious movie fans, depending on the type of wide screen (there's letterbox, wide screen, 16:9) which are all some what different, you can lose up to 40% of your screen image. take a look at this image from Disney's Sleeping Beauty:

The full screen format completely destroys the existence of the 2 characters on the end of the screen. while it might not be so bad from this example (why are those 2 important? they probably aren't) there are times when it cuts off very important plot elements and that's just no good. "But those black bars on the top and bottom of the screen are annoying" this is a stupid complaint, how are they annoying? they are just blank parts of the screen they are only something you need to get used to, and that usually takes one or two movies to get rid of that feeling. most newer TVs, Monitors, and screens come exclusively in widescreen, TV shows are made in wide screen, and DVD should no longer offer Full screen as an option, not even if it includes both the wide screen and full screen options. Full screen should have gone the way of VHS and the 8-track. its current existence baffles me.

September and its lack of theater options does not mean its a movie desert, now is the time when your favorite summer releases come out on DVD for you to rent and own. so in that spirit im gonna review a couple of movies that came out before i started this blog.

First up: Iron man.

Iron man was a surprisingly good movie that may lead into a first rate movie franchise. Robert Downy Jr. gives a superb performance as a drunken rich weapons dealer, so basically himself minus the weapons. (or maybe he does that kinda thing, I can not be certain) It has a terrific performance from Jeff bridges, who i couldn't help but think of as "The Dude" from "Big Lebowski". but al together its a great mix of humor and action, not your Oscar-worthy art piece, nor the utter bore of Superman Returns. so its deserves a solid 9, which makes it worth at least a rental.

Number 2: Speed Racer

Now i am aware that a lot of critics panned speed racer as stupid and needless. they complained about the colours and the speed at which it moved. but i thought that these were the things that made the movie wonderful. the bright colors and CGI worked for this movie. The movie is highly stylized as are all of the Wachowski brothers projects, this is a movie for children, but does not dumb things down for them. Speed Racer is a movie that is fast and fun, if you can find the child inside you bring that child out and enjoy. (I paticualrly enjoyed the stunt racing, it was like hot wheels cars come to life!) So fast-paced and colorful Speed Racer deserves a solid 8.5 don't listen to the critics on this one.

Finally we have Kung Fu Panda.

I imagine that Kung fu Panda is like the CGI version of Beverly Hills Ninja. its not a bad movie but in the vast scheme of CGI childrens movies it is unfortunatly somewhat forgettable. not nearly as forgettable as say, Hoodwinked or Happily N'ever After. (yeah you don't even rember those, do you? oh really well, whatever) So in the case of the Kung Fu Panda I award a 6.5 go ahead and rent this one, or do one of them on demand things, that way you dont need to bother returning it.

SO theres a brief rundown of summer Movies along with rants and fun, sorry i don't update that often, but click the ads and i might get some money to head to the movies once and a while.

Death Race has death and racing *spoilers....as if it matters*

To say that 2008's Death Race is based on the classic 70's B-Movie Death Race 2000 is a bit of a fallacy. Sure both had death, and both did indeed have a race in them, but this summer's version lacks the... charm (I don't really mean charm, it’s just the best word for this situation) but enough about that this is about today's Death Race

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This is the basic premise of the prison death race of the future. The year is 2012 and the economy collapse, crime rates are out of control and prisons become privatized. To profit off of this dystopian future, Warden Hennessy has created the Death Race. The death race is a highly planned race where prisoners are given the privilege of driving heavily armored, yes some extremely fast and maneuverable vehicles (seems like a good idea to me). Hennessy frames the verbally challenged Jensen Ames for the murder of his wife. He signs on to race as the now deceased, Frankenstein, a man so scared he had to wear a mask. Ames is perfect for the job seeing as he is a former steel worker... well, they claim he was a driver in some sort of motor sport but the audience only sees him steel working. He puts on the mask and races against such races as "Machine Gun Joe”, "Grimm" (wasn't he in Twisted Metal?), and "14K". There’s some back handed deals with Hennessy and the other prisoners but in the end Ames earns his freedom and his daughter back.

So Death Race starts off pretty slow, I guess the felt they needed some character development, and after the first third I felt that it deserved a 4 for being rather uninteresting and lacking of good ol' explosions. Once they get that out of the way the movie really picks up. There were major things that boosted this closer and closer to that glorious 1, and here's a list:

No. 1: Power Ups.
Yes, like any given Mario Kart title this race has power ups. In a stroke of genius plot repair, the cars have their weapons deactivated until they drive over manhole covers emblazoned with either a sword or a shield; the shield activates defenses (i.e. smoke screen). I was waiting the entire movie for someone to pick up the blue shell and take out that first placer, I was disappointed.

No. 2: Support cast.
So on Ames pit crew...at least I think they are a pit crew you never really see any of them do much... you have Coach, played by the much ranged Ian McShane, it is never disclosed why he was put in prison, all we know is that he doesn't like the collapsed economy outside so he chooses prison, go figure. There's also Gunner who seems to me a mechanic, I think, he does not do much. Finally, the most confusing member is Lists. I had to look up his character name, I referred to him as Samwise do to his resemblance to a hobbit. He wears a prison issue sweater and seems to have encyclopedic knowledge of cars and weapons. It is never explained why he is in prison, but he seems like the kinda guy who would deliver the welcome wagon to your new home in the suburbs, not a prisoner. *shrugs* finally there is the overly smug security guard Ulrich who is more than happy to abuse prisoners. He gets like three lines and seems like he might just be Hennesy's nephew.

No. 3: Hennessy
before Death Race I was unaware of the wonderful non-acting of Joan Allen. It must take a lot to get such a lackluster nonsense performance from an Oscar nominated actress, but these are the powers of Roger Corman. Allen spends 90% of the movie looking like an audio-animatronics version of Hillary Clinton. When she finally does show some sort of facial expressions it’s a shift from mild bemusement to slight surprise, the kind you get when you discover that yes, you still have a fiver in your wallet. Her lack of a performance amused me to no end.

No. 4: Misc.
Statham's command of the English language is as masterful as Stallone's was in 2000. Neither of them so much speaks the language as chew on it and spit it out. Statham sounds like a British Batman with his gruff teeth gritted performance. There are plenty of plot holes such as the mysterious Brotherhood, mysterious in that we never find out what they are and why no one messes with them. The biggest hole is that according to the premise of the movie the economy has collapsed, but clearly there is still internet, Hennessy makes billions of dollars off the death race, dollars still exist, there seems to be industry around the country, law and order still reign. Yes, it’s not so much that the economy has collapsed as it is tough times for the steel industry and crime rates are up, but Mexico continues to thrive.

All in all the last few parts of the movie contain enough violence, blood, gore, explosions, and goofiness to make the audience thoroughly amused and comfortably resting completely in their seats.

On The Parabolic Movie Scale this movie ranks in at a fantastic 1.5!

Yes, Death Race is a meaningless menagerie of action and things getting blowed up real good!