Review: House of Wax (2005)

It’s always dangerous to go back and watch a movie you enjoyed when you were younger. You always run the risk of realizing just how dumb you were as a youth.

                But danger’s my middle name and so I threw caution to the wind and all sorts of other clichés when I sat down and rewatched “House of Wax” for the first time in a few years.

                Granted, the movie is only eight years old, so it’s hardly a lifetime ago that I last saw this thing, but still, I’m a relatively young man and eight years is a pretty decent-sized gap.

                Well, folks, I’m happy to say that for the most part, I still enjoyed “House of Wax.” It’s a mostly inoffensive, hokey, but fun horror movie. The acting is kind of meh at times, but the writing is mostly solid and it’s got some cool --- at least by 2005 standards --- effects thrown in for good measure.

                In the movie, a group of friends are making their way to some sort of big football game that only one of them, Blake (Robert Ri’chard) is really excited to see. And boy is he excited. Super, needlessly excited.

                The rest of the group, not so much. Wade (Jared Padalecki) is a country boy only there so he can spend some quality time with his gal Carly (Elisha Cuthbert) before she heads to the big city for an internship. Paige (Paris Hilton) is there for the sole purpose of having lots and lots of sex with Blake. Nick (Chad Michael Murray) wanted a change of pace from his usual routine of brooding and pretending to be a badass at home. And finally, Dalton (Jon Abrahams) is there because every group needs a goofy friend for the others to rag on.

Acting is mostly fair, characters make too many bad choices, and it's WAY too long, but I'll gladly watch it again in a year or two

                Of course, things don’t go smoothly for our crew and soon they end up in a seemingly abandoned town with a really snazzy wax museum which is just full of amazingly lifelike sculptures. Unfortunately for most of them, they also get to meet the museum’s psychotic  curator and learn the horrifying secret of what makes the sculptures look so real!!! Dun dun dun!

                I saw horrifying, but not really. “House of Wax” is too paint-by-numbers horror to really be scary. There’s some good gore here and there, but it’s pretty obvious who’s going to live and die, there’s not a ton of tension of suspense at all. It’s not bad, just predictable. If you’ve never seen a slasher before though, this will definitely scare the pants off of you.

                I’ve said it before: Paris Hilton is not an actor. She wasn’t a musician either. She was just a celebrity trying to justify her fame. She’s pretty clunky here. She doesn’t really manage to convey any sort of emotion and her character is just window dressing.

                The rest of the cast has their moments. I love Padalecki so very, very much. He too isn’t given a whole lot to do though, which is sad. Chad Michael Murray is nice, but he’s more of a whiny kid than a true bad ass. Again, he’s got his moments.

                The biggest problem with “House of Wax” is that, at just under two hours, it is way too long to the point where it gets hard to watch at times. There’s no reason this movie should be a second over 90 minutes.

                There’s way too much time spent driving in cars, drinking in the woods, prattling on endlessly about who might be pregnant with who’s baby. Get rid of it. We don’t need it.

                The movie’s most memorable scene is --- spoiler alert --- Paris’ death scene. The girl takes a giant metal pole right to the head and then the killer whips out a camera and films the aftermath, a not-so-subtle nod to a certain sex tape perhaps?

                There’s some good stuff here and I certainly don’t hate “House of Wax.” I’ll watch it again in a few years. Don’t want to push my luck.

You can definitely have some fun watching this in a group and laughing at the characters and all their mindless decisions. There’s enough “We should split up and cover more ground” in this to fill eight “Friday the 13^th” movies.

The good this is, other than the runtime, “House of Wax” doesn’t try to do too much or take itself too seriously. It’s a mindless, somewhat disposable slasher you can have some fun with and then resume your life.

Just that runtime. Ugh.

Worst of the Worst

So Paris’ character may or may not be preggers with Blake’s baby. He doesn’t know this, of course. She wanted to wait to tell him until after the big game that he’s been going on about for at least the entire movie and probably months before then.

Eventually, she just decides “Ah fork it, I’ll tell him now.” So she tries to tell him, right after performing a highly seductive striptease and right before they have sex. She’s mostly naked and she picked that moment to try to share potentially life-altering news with the man.

After a striptease! That’s just cruel. Logically, the scene doesn’t make any sense, but it also just feels like more filler in a movie that is already way too bloated anyway. Take the shears to it!

So there you go, “House of Wax.” Bullet dodged and bumblebee tuna.     

News: 'Godzilla' goes classy?

drewminh.net

Excuse me while I do my best “dopey NFL analyst” impression:  “When you’re talking about cheesy movies, you’re talking about ‘Godzilla!’”

                Sure that’s a hacky way of putting it, but it’s also hard to argue with I mean, bad dubbing, guys in monster suits stepping on model buildings, it’s all pretty cheesy. Even the original, as smart as it is, is totally guilty.

                But then along comes all this talk about a remake. A remake written by Frank Darabont, the guy who helped bring “The Walking Dead” to the small screen and who also made a little thing called “The Shawshank Redemption.” That’s what we in the business call a heavy hitter.

                And now there’s this tidbit: Bryan Cranston, star of TV’s “Breaking Bad” and Elizabeth Olsen, or as you may know her, “The Good Olsen,” are currently in talks to star in this thing.

                Nothings official yet, but holy hell! The “Godzilla” remake is shaping up to be pretty f’n awesome. I’m not sure how to handle all this. My head’s spinning.

                I mean the studio’s got to hire Michael Bay to direct this thing, right? Just to balance it all out. There’s simply way too much class.

                Hell, at least put a guy in a rubber monster suit for old time’s sake, what do you say?

                After all, if you can’t count on “Godzilla” to be cheesy, then my god, what can you count on? We’ll see how this whole thing plays out. The remake hits theaters May 16, 2014, just in time for yours truly’s birthday, by the by.

                Info: Arrow in the Head

News: 'Big Ass' trailer

hitfix.com

Sometimes all it takes to convince me to see a movie is the title. “Snakes on a Plane,” Piranha 3DD,” for example.

                Sometimes I get burned and the movie turns out to be less awesome than I expected (“Piranha 3DD”), but whatever I’m a sucker for a good title. I make no apologies about that.

                With that said you can only imagine how excited I get when I hear a title like “Big Ass Spider!” Yup, the exclamation mark is an actual part of the title.

                Here’s the trailer.

                The effects look horrible, the acting seems clunky, but my god does this look like absolute Cheese List fodder or what?

                In case you couldn’t tell, the movie is about a giant alien spider that escapes from a military installation and goes on a rampage in downtown LA. Naturally, the army isn’t enough to rein the beast in, so a team of scientists and an exterminator are called in to finish the job and save the city.

                I’m so game.

                “Big Ass Spider!” hits the South by Southwest film festival on March 8.

                Info: Arrow in the Head                  

News: 'Anchorman 2' casting news

yahoo.com

It’s ironic that this news would break on the same day that photos surfaced of Joaquin Phoenix once again looking like a homeless person.

                If you’ll remember, the last time Phoenix looked like a crazy person, he gave birth to the “Joaquin Phoenix sigh,” which is basically a mix of frustration and the sound of your soul trying to escape your body.

                Anyway, I let out a heavy Joaquin Phoenix sigh when I first heard rumblings of this news a few months back. And now here we are. It’s official. Kristen Wiig is going to be in “Anchorman: The Legend Continues.”

                The film’s director, Adam McKay confirmed it. There’s no going back. We’re stuck with her.

                No word yet on what sort of character Wiig will play. Rumor-mongers seem to think she may play a lady friend for Steve Carell’s lovable dimwit Brick Tamland.

                Ugh. Well, they say nothing’s perfect. And now “Anchorman 2” is no longer perfect. I just don’t understand the appeal of this woman. I just … sigh … I just don’t.

                Info: MTV

Cheese List preview

photos.denverpost.com

So how about that Puppy Bowl this weekend? God it was so adorable, I just can’t even process it all right now.

I have to say though, it saddens me how corporate the whole even has gotten --- what with the Icebreakers-sponsored stoppages in play and Animal Planet trying to force-feed the rest of their shows down America’s throats. It used to just be about the puppies, man. Well, the puppies, the kitties and whatever other small, cuddly creatures that happened to be laying around.

Yeah, but it was still awesome and way more interesting than the Super Bowl until god intervened and struck the stadium with a lightning bolt or whatever happened.  

I decided to honor of this weekend’s other big game, the one that didn’t feature cuddly critters, by picking a movie with lots and lots of football action.

Well, that’s not exactly true. There’s actually very little football action to be found in this movie. But there is plenty of talk about going to watch a big football game.

In it, a group of friends are road-tripping their way across country to watch their college team toss the old pigskin around with another college team.

Unfortunately, on route they run into some car problems right smack in the middle of nowhere. The only town within miles seems mostly abandoned, expect for a hearty few individuals, but the kids are really into this college football thing for some reason, so they head there to hopefully get the parts they need to fix their car and get back on the road.

It just so happens this town also has a museum. A special kind of museum with lots of figures in it, figures that look really real, but aren’t … and are made from … wax.

In fact, the museum actually kind of looks like somebody’s house, so I guess you could call it a:

Yes! “House of Wax (2005)” starring Elisha Cuthbert, Jared Padaleck, Chad Michael Murray and Paris Hilton.

Credentials: 25%, Certified Rotten (Rottentomatoes.com) // 5.2 out of 10 (Imdb.com) //41 out of 100 (Metacritic.com) // Nominated for three Razzies at the 2006 Golden Raspberry Awards, (Worst Picture, Worst Remake or Sequel and Worst Supporting Actress --- Paris Hilton), Paris won the Worst Supporting Actress award // Hilton was also won the Razzie for Worst Actress of the Decade at the 2010 Golden Raspberry Awards for her work on this film among others

As I said a few weeks ago, you could call this a guilty pleasure of mine, but that wouldn’t be accurate because I feel no guilt whatsoever about loving this movie. Now, I haven’t seen it in a few years, so let’s see how it holds up to the memory I have of it in my mind.

Yeah, I know. More horror. I’m kind of a one-trick pony.

Let’s take a gander at what the critics had to say about “House of Wax”

Mike Clark from USA Today said: “When the cast starts wondering where the roadkill is, someone says, 'Follow the smell.' Good tip: That's how you'll know where ‘Wax’ is playing.”

“A stupid, brainless, and pointless horror installment with all the usual characters, and pretty bad acting all around ... ” said Felix Vasquez Jr. from Cinema Crazed.

Things weren’t all bad though, Desson Thomson from The Washington Post raved “You’ll be rooting for these people to get slaughtered out of sheer boredom.”

There you go: “House of Wax (2005).” Look for my review on Friday and if you want to track it down and watch it, go right ahead. You just might enjoy yourself.

Bumblebee tuna.

Review: Cursed

So, “Cursed.”

                You know, the tendency when you have success with something is to push it as far as you possibly can. Perhaps horror director guy Wes Craven and his screenwriter pal Kevin Williamson should have just quit after “Scream.”

                After all, it’s sort of hard to top defining an entire genre of movies --- for better or worse --- for an entire decade.

                But they didn’t quit. The duo churned out two sequels to “Scream,” where a killer in a mask stalks sexy youths, then a werewolf movie, where a werewolf stalks sexy youths and then they went ahead and made another “Scream” just for good measure.

                And “Cursed” is a weird movie. Williamson and Craven clearly seem to be going for the same sort of wink-wink, nod-nod humor that worked so well for most of the first “Scream” movie.

                Only, instead of slasher conventions, this time their focus is on Hollywood culture. Which I guess is pretty funny to two guys who work in Hollywood, but not so much for the rest of us.

Clunky acting, bad script, lame visuals make for a movie I'd like to steer clear of watching again.

                I’m going to go ahead and spoil a lot of this movie, so if you haven’t seen it run! And don’t stop running until you find a place on the internet that talks about new movies.

                Christina Ricci and Jesse Eisenberg play a brother and sister, still sort of grappling (but not too much) with the deaths of their parents. Ricci is a producer or something on “The Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn,” while Eisenberg plays a nerd. Shocking.

                One night, while driving back from the city, the pair get in a car accident after a massive wolf hits their car. They careen into another car, driven by Shannon Elizabeth, who’s sporting some very unfortunate bangs. Long story short, the wolf eats Shannon and bites Eisenberg and Ricci, cursing them to become werewolves. Unless they can find a way to break said curse.

                Oh yeah, there’s also a few useless subplots thrown in the mix for luck, I guess: Joshua Jackson trys to open up the least night-clubiest night club in the history of night clubs (lots of wax sculptures, no bar?), a high school bully who turns out to be gay for some reason, etc., etc.   

                Any way, the sort of main werewolf here is a crazy, back-stabbing publicist. With the right kind of ears, you can almost hear Williamson saying “Geez, publicists, amirite?” and then high-fiving Craven off screen.

                Towards the end of the movie, after her treachery has been revealed, the publicist narrowly escapes being shot to death by an entire squad of cops. Now, Christina Ricci’s character won’t stand for that. For one, she never liked the publicist to begin with, (because publicists, amirite?) but also because Ricci thinks she needs the publicist dead to break her werewolf curse.

                  She lures the publicist --- who’s now completely in werewolf form, by the way --- back by talking about how she has bad skin and a fat ass. Being a super-vain resident of LA, the wolf-publicist can’t stand for this and comes back to flip off Ricci, only to be promptly gunned down by the army of waiting police officers.     

                I didn’t get the movie’s humor and I’m not totally sure Williamson knew what to do with it either. He has characters deliver all sorts of painfully flat lines like:

• "That's enough with the biting!"
• Ricci: "All the good things in my life keep going away," to which Josh Jackson replied in a manly fashion: "I'm not going anywhere."

                And the thing is, he’s got a pretty talented cast. He just ends up making them all look pretty bad. Well, that’s not entirely true. Eisenberg makes himself look pretty awful with his half-assed scream during the carwreck scene and Milo Ventimiglia is the least convincing high school bully of all time.

                Eventually, we get the usual twists, turns and monologues during the climax that we’ve all come to expect from Williamson and Craven. Turns out the publicist wasn’t the main, main werewolf, but that’s only a surprise to the characters. The movie telegraphs pretty clearly who the real one is going to be, and even if it didn’t there are only so many characters it could be anyway. Personally, I was pulling for Kilborn, but alas, no.

                Once revealed,the real big wolf on campus predictably spends the finale sorta trying to kill Ricci and Eisenberg and sorta just trying to talk their ears off. I have no idea why our filmmakers are so fond of this plot device, but they must be head-over-heels for it because they’ve used it five times now.

                Mostly though, “Cursed” was just pretty yawn-inducing. The plot wound its way down a familiar path, never doing anything even close to the fun and clever stuff we got early on in “Scream.”

On top of that, I didn’t get the humor, the performances were clunky and the writing made them look even worse.   

Worst of the worst

See: Christina Ricci tells werewolf she has a fat ass. 

There it is kiddies, “Cursed.” Don’t blink or you might miss a mustache-less Ron Swanson early on as a helpful cop. Definitely the highlight.

Bumblebee tuna.