Good reviews pizzaboy. You should do this more often. How about those Rourke flicks we were talking about earlier? ;-)

I won't say it, but think it through olivant. Stallone made ROCKY BALBOA as the only true proper sequel to the first movie, and its about cyclical history. Now what happened to Rocky in the match in numero uno?

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Oh and Capo...I seem to agree with you on the satisfying ROCKY BALBOA, the enjoyable if nothing remarkable SUPERMAN RETURNS, the overrated THE ILLUSIONIST(folks, stick to THE PRESTIGE), and the very very very blandly safe WORLD TRADE CENTER.

If anything Capo, I think you abolishing your star-rating has helped your reviews out. The words, not your stars, define the reviews.

If only I was that confident enough in MY words....

Forbidden Planet *
(First Viewing)

An expedition is sent from Earth to Altair in the constellation of Aquilae (some 17 light years from Earth) to discover what happened to a colony of settlers on its fourth planet, Altair-4. What they discover is how and why an alien race of geniuses destroyed itself overnight while leaving their technology intact at some point in the distant, distant past.

Not the cheesy sci-fi movie I was hoping for. I was hoping for something along the lines of the original The Time Machine. However, it was quite a site to see Leslie Nielsen without white hair

GET SHORTY (1995)

John Travolta in his initial go around as Chili Palmer, the Miami Beach, by way of Brooklyn, loan shark with dreams of making it big in Hollywood. Gene Hackman steals the film as Harry Zimm, the small time movie producer in big time debt to Delroy Lindo's Bo Catlett. It co-stars Rene Russo, as beautiful as ever, as Chili's love interest and a young James Gandolfini as Bear, Bo's bodyguard. David Paymer is hysterical as Leo, the dry cleaner who Chili tracks down in Vegas to collect a debt. It's adapted from the Elmore Leonard novel, whose books normally don't adapt very well, BIG BOUNCE anyone ? However, director Barry Sonnenfeld nailed it with this one, by sticking to the story and keeping with the deadpan dialogue. I loved it.

GET SHORTY is a movie that was made in a unique time, when the concept of a brutal gangster/movie-buff taking over Hollywood was a unique idea. Now in the decade and several years after Quentin Tarantino and Kevin Smith and other pop culture-referening directors have laid their seed, I doubt GET SHORTY wouldn't be as unique....especially with that surprise little cameo in the movie's end that I got a kick out of.

Good review pizzaboy.

GET SHORTY (1995) - ***1/2

Hey Ronnie, your compliments are gonna blow up my head and turn me into a frustrated movie reviewer, just like you.

Well, I need someone to share the scotch with at the local watering hole.

How you like yours? ;-)

J&B, rocks, soda back.

*Cue iZac robot from FUTURAMA*

You Got it!

Keep your car away from Charlize's garage Ronnie. She's mine!

Yeah but she doesn't have your name on the garade door...

Wait, this JUST in....I have the latest lewd Paparrazi photos..

She does have YOUR name on her garage. Damn, I apologize Pizzaboy...she's yours to park in, and then reverse, in, reverse, in, until you run out of fuel. Apologies.

The Good Shepherd ** 1/2
(Second Viewing)

Edward Wilson, the only witness to his father's suicide and member of the Skull and Bones Society while a student at Yale, is a morally upright young man who values honor and discretion, qualities that help him to be recruited for a career in the newly founded Office of Strategic Services (OSS, the predecessor of the Central Intelligence Agency). While working there, his ideals gradually turn to suspicion influenced by the Cold War paranoia present within the office. Eventually, he becomes an influential veteran operative, while his distrust of everyone around him increases to no end. His dedication to his work does not come without a price though, leading him to sacrifice his ideals and eventually his family.

Definitely better with a second viewing but still very long. A great cast of characters round up Robert De Niro's 2nd directoral duty, including Matt Damon (he's beginning to become like Edward Norton in that they don't do many bad movies. Name a bad Edward Norton or Matt Damon movie), Angelina Jolie, William Hurt, Alec Baldwin, Joe Pesci (back after an 8 year hiatus), Michael Gambon, John Turturro, and the man himself Mr. Robert De Niro. I wouldn't consider it the best spy movie ever but it's up there. Give it a shot pizzaboy on Tuesday if you haven't seen it already (or give it another shot)

Uh-O, break out the crucifix because ronnie made a boo boo

Die Hard *
This is one of those movies that everyone in the world except me seems to have watched. Well I saw it finally. I can understand the reviews of other action movies now which always refer to this movie as some sort of trend setter. Quite predictable, but managed to hold my attention throughout. You have all the action you want - gunfights, explosions, hostage drama etc etc. Not a movie of my liking though.

Have you seen Die Hard With A Vengence? My favorite of the trilogy

No Irish, yet to watch.

DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE is really good, but better than DIE HARD? no.

DIE HARD is the best because it could have been another retarded Joel Silver/Lawrence Gordon-produced action flick that was expected of the Arnold/Stallone era. Yet instead, elements brought in gave the movie such an incredible fresh taste that revitalized the action genre(which in fashion Hollywood did what was expected, copying DIE HARD instead of being inspired by it.)

In fact, the only post-DIE HARD-inspired-yet-fresh Hollywood action movie was SPEED in 1994...but that was directed by Jan DeBont, who was the DP of DIE HARD.

Elements include...

(1) "REGULAR JOE" PROTAGONIST - Even that new release SHOOTER had to make sure that its hero is common like the inbred rednecks in the midwest, south, and the white trash up in New England and in California. Yet everyone forgot that while they're condenscending normal people with such contrived nonsense, Bruce Willis himself was the regular joe. Former bartender-turned actor, he could have become another Jersey truck driver.

And he basically plays himself, a New Jersey middle-aged guy that took his shoes off, only wearing his wife-beater shirt, when terrorists open fire. Hell, who can even say he actually ever had fired any of those automatic weapons?

As a cop, maybe he only as training for his service revolver, and hes having to improvise like hell on the fly(which explains why he overdoes the explosives when he detonates the plastic bomb). He is a guerilla warefare action character, not an one-man exterminating genocide force.

(2) THE PAIN - Which is when his character had to face dangers that Arnold and Sly would have solved without a scratch, we actually feel Willis' pain. John McClane is human, and hes as easy to wreck as the rest of us. A gunshot rips his shoulder, blood flies on the wall, and we wence. He has to walk through a floor of broken glass, and his feet are mauled. Ouch.

But its even a simple scene like Willis falling down the shafts when his gunstrap snaps. It scares the hell out of him, and we don't blame him. Its especially funny when he ties that firehose to his waist, about to jump from a roof about to explode....him praying to God that he'll never go up another tall building ever.

Few action movies afterwards made us this concerned for a action hero's concern. A few exceptions occur when the audience actually go "ohhhh!" like SIN CITY when a certain character gets his "second weapon" taken from him.

(3) TERRORIST MOTIVATION - The 1970s inspired Hollywood for YEARS that such terrorists fought only for ideology, yet with DIE HARD, we have baddies that simply want the damn money.

"You think they'll really release them?"
"Who cares."

Its stale now, but at the time it was fresh.

(4) SMARTASS - Willis was a sitcom star before DIE HARD with MOONLIGHTING, and he was a comedian. This made him a natural smartass in the dialogue.

"You listen to me asshole-"
"Asshole? I wasn't the one that got butt fucked on live TV, DWAYNE!"

(5) BASTARD - I've written about this before, but John McClaine in DH and in DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE is in reality a bastard in peacetime. His wife hates him, his co-workers can't stand him, his boss has him on suspension, and while he is charming and decent in short doses....surely all his friends don't want to bother with his alcoholic asshole personality in the long term.

Yet shit hits the fan, he goes Jack Bauer on ya immediately. Hell, DHWAV was funny when he's having to do all that insanity while having a hangover.

Wow rra, you have found so much hidden profound stuff the movie didn't even have Just joking.

I should blame this on Capo.

Blame it on me, blame it all on me.

Die Hard is fantastic. As much about corporate America and outright fucking annoying and inadequate red-tape procedure as it is about kicking foreign terrorist ass.

Die Hard 2 is still head and shoulders above most other action films being made at the time, but it's basically a retread of the first film's narrative template... which works only because Bruce Willis is great.

Die Hard with a Vengeance is very good, in general, but too much in the vain of the Lethal Weapon formula, bringing in bad ol' Samuel L. for some white-black racial tension... very formulaic, but very good at being formulaic; and Jeremy Irons is pretty good.

Die Hard 4.0 looks shit.

Capo, I think we share the same criticims on DIE HARD 2, where it has such stuff that hacks it like:

*WILLIS THE UNSCRATCHABLE - In the first and third movies, Willis gets the shit beaten out of him but #2, he falls off an airplane wing and shakes it off. I know this is status quo for action movies, but I liked the DIE HARD principle that the pain stays. Maybe I'm a masochist.

*BLAND VILLAINS - I always liked William Sadler, but he's given garbage to work with as some renegade Green Berets trying to reinstate an anti-commie leader. The only provacative interest is his APOCALYPSE NOW-like nude yoga in his hotel room, but otherwise Rambo eats these guys for breakfast.

*CONTRIVED RED TAPE - Sure parts of DIE HARD involves convenient red tape from the state tying up the hero's hands but in DH2...despite "dead" spooks getting gunned down years after their "death" in the airport terminal, explosions, and a known past-spook conveninently at the airport...nobody believes John McClane.

Nevermind this was the same hero that a year earlier that had his 15 minutes of fame.

Thing is, Dennis Franz has made a career of working the asshole part, but compare his cop part in Brian DePalma's DRESSED TO KILL: His character uses people, sometimes circumventing them, to get done what he wants.

DIE HARD 2 isn't a bad movie, its just...like every other action movie that came out after the first DH flick. So really, DIE HARD 2 not only ripped the original off, without the franchise moniker, it would be one of the best knock-offs of all-time.

My favorite part of DIE HARD 2 was John Amos, a perennial good guy, taking a turn as the ultimate two-faced bad guy. I thought he was the best part of the movie.

pizzaboy, yeah that was a good story-turn considering Amos...too bad the movie wasn't as cool as that though.

The Last King of Scotlan ** 1/2
(First Viewing)

In the early 1970s, Nicholas Garrigan, a young semi-idealistic Scottish doctor, comes to Uganda to assist in a rural hospital. Once there, he soon meets up with the new President, Idi Amin, who promise a golden age for the African nation. Garrigan hits it off immediately with the rabid Scotland fan, who soon offers him a senior position in the national health department and becomes one of Amin's closest advisers. However as the years pass, Garrigan cannot help but notice Amin's increasingly erratic behavior that grows beyond a legitimate fear of assassination into a murderous insanity that is driving Uganda into bloody ruin. Realizing his dire situation with the lunatic leader unwilling to let him go home, Garrigan must make some crucial decisions that could mean his death if the despot finds out.

Forest Whitaker did a great job and was glad to see him win an Oscar for this role. I had never heard of General Idi Amin Dada before this film but seems like an interesting man. James McAvoy did a good job as well as Dr. Nicholas Garrigan .

My dad has told me that he knew kids that had escaped Uganda and Idi Amin when he went to school with them.

He was a real humanitarian...

EASY MONEY (1983) ***

I stumbled across this little gem by accident tonight. Rodney Dangerfield stars as Monty Capuletti, a lifetime drinker and gambler, who has to stay sober for one year in order to inherit his mother in law's fortune. Joe Pesci is absolutely priceless as his best friend Nicky, "Who am I ? I'm the guy that put the bathrooms in this joint!". Jeffrey Jones, of FERRIS BUELLER fame, plays the ultimate foil, as Monty's brother in law, who is constantly trying to sideline Monty's attempts at sobriety in order to inherit the money himself. Is it great filmmaking ? Probably not, but for my money, it's one of the funniest movies ever made. I highly recommend it.

Yeah, after the movie they said he killed like 300,000 Ugandies. And from the beginning of the movie, he seemed like he was a likable guy (or maybe that was just Forest Whitaker)

I've only seen it once but I enjoyed it. But you gave it zero stars