Wednesday, March 27, 2013

LIE #80: Stoked for “Stoker”!




In a nutshell, Park Chan-wook’s first English-language film, Stoker, is right now at the top of my list for Best Movie of 2013.
This is the type of film that feels like it was made only for me, with complete disregard for what “popular taste” demands.
What can I say? I LOVED it!

Thursday, March 14, 2013

Cowboys, Noir & the Fabulous Raquel Welch: It’s Time for Another “Sergio Leone & the Infield Fly Rule” Quiz!!!


Mack Daddy Dennis C. over at Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule is at it again, with one of his patented super-duper quizerinos, and who is LERNER INTERNATIONAL to turn down a challenge like this?

The title of Denny the C.’s test this term is: “Miss Jean Brodie’s Modestly Magnificent, Matriarchally Manipulative Springtime-For-Mussolini Movie Quiz”—a tongue-twister for sure!

And no, I haven’t seen The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, but like all of his quiz titles, DC is referencing a character from a film who was a teacher.
I guess Denny liked school…Well, nobody’s perfect.

Answers Below!

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

LIE #78: There’s Something About “Aliens”—and the February 2012 Film Index!!!


Since most of the films screened at LERNER INTERNATIONAL HQ during February were of a political, if not “grown-up” nature [reviews below break], let’s start with something silly (that’ll also give us the opportunity to do some serious desk clearing regarding jpegs cluttering our files)—
Let’s take a brief look at
James Cameron’s Aliens (1986), specifically the people-to-xenomorph ratio—what was up with that?

It takes one human (or animal, as Alien3 showed us) to create a “xenomorph warrior” (the type of nasty critter that popped out of the unfortunate Kane’s chest), so with the 158 colonists captured and “infected,” that makes 158 alien warriors.

Okay, let’s say there were some farm animals and pets along (although we’re never given any indication of that), so we will be generous: add another 100 living beings to the list (although some of those will be smaller animals like chickens or cats; maybe a cow or a couple of pigs, but not many; it’s a “shake & bake” colony, remember?).

Therefore, there should only be about 250 aliens on the planet.
And we see the space-leathernecks kill a lot of them.
No, I’m not going through the movie and do a body count, but in reality, by the end, it really is one-on-one between Ripley and the Alien Queen.

Not that we’re ever given any indication of that: For drama and suspense, Cameron makes us believe there are thousands of the nasty critters on that inhospitable ball of rock, with plenty more creeping about the shadows.

And because Cameron is a master of action and suspense, it isn’t until seventeen damn years later that I get around to thinking about. Kudos, sir, well played!

Onto the reviews!