LUCKY NUMBER SLEVIN (2006) **

Lucky Number Slevin is yet another one of those Tarantino knockoffs that somehow were still being made long after their expiration date.  This one at least has Pulp Fiction’s Bruce Willis on board playing a soft-spoken hitman named “Mr. Goodkat”.  While it’s good seeing Bruce alongside such name actors like Morgan Freeman and Ben Kingsley, their talents largely go untapped. 

This is one of those crime comedies that feature hitmen, gangsters, and hoods that have names like “The Boss” and “The Rabbi” and characters that make pop culture references during casual conversation (Columbo, James Bond, and Hitchcock among them).  Tarantino had a knack for making this kind of stuff seem effortlessly hip.  In director Paul (Push) McGuigan’s hands, it seems forced and unfunny. 

The film feels more like a string of vignettes in search of a plot than anything.  Some of them work better than others, but the longwinded flashbacks that feature unnecessary slow motion are pretty annoying.  The final plot twist is predictable, although it might not have been so bad if it wasn’t for the constant back-and-forth with all the flashbacks. 

Star Josh Hartnett doesn’t do a bad job when he’s just hanging around in a bath towel and trying to convince everyone he isn’t a hitman.  When he’s actually called upon to do some assassinating, he’s rather unconvincing.  He does have a nice rapport with Lucy Liu and their scenes together are easily the best thing about the film.  Their chemistry helps keep you interested, even when the movie is contently spinning its wheels. 

AKA:  The Wrong Man.  AKA:  Slevin.

RED ZONE CUBA (1966) ½ *

Red Zone Cuba features all of writer/director/star Coleman Francis’s hallmarks:  Long scenes of people sitting around drinking coffee, people flying airplanes, a hero being gunned down in cold blood in the finale, and confusing editing.  I’m all for auteurs indulging their creative instincts, but this is Coleman Francis we’re talking about here.  If you thought The Skydivers or The Beast of Yucca Flats was bad, wait ‘til you get a load of this. 

Francis really outdid himself on this one.  He takes the incoherence he pioneered in Beast and doubles down.  You know the editing is bad when we don’t even know what country our heroes are in.  There’s a scene where Francis’s escaped convict character and his buddies flee from their Cuban prison and return to the States within the span of a jump cut.  Maybe it would be easier to figure out if Arizona didn’t look exactly like Cuba. 

The plot is an exercise in delirium.  Francis joins up with a band of freedom fighters to evade capture by the police.  He and his team storm the beaches of Cuba (they look like kids filming a war movie in their mom’s backyard), are captured, and get imprisoned.  While they await execution, Coleman and his cohorts escape and return home seeking to fleece the widow of one of their cellmates.  

The only thing saving Red Zone Cuba from being a No Stars movie is the presence of John Carradine.  His brief cameo doesn’t add much to the film, but the fact that he sings the theme song (“Night Train to Mundo Fine”) definitely makes it memorable.  Too bad the 90 minutes that follows the song it is thoroughly dreadful. 

AKA:  Night Train to Mundo Fine.

REACH ME (2014) *

Writer/director John Herzfeld’s 2 Days in the Valley was one of the best of the Tarantino knockoffs of the ‘90s.  Herzfeld’s Reach Me sometimes plays like a companion piece to that film as it features an assorted bunch of underworld thugs clashing with a gaggle of oddballs while Danny Aiello bitches about a dog.  The multi-character narrative is actually closer to something like Magnolia, except it sucks.  In fact, this might be Herzfeld’s worst movie, which is really something when you consider he also directed Two of a Kind. 

The plot is a slipshod of vignettes that revolve around a self-help book written by mysterious anonymous author.  Sylvester Stallone plays an editor who sends a naïve journalist to find the author.  I know Stallone and Herzfeld are friends and all (Herzfeld had a bit part in Cobra and directed the behind-the-scenes documentary for The Expendables), but Sly should stop doing Herzfeld favors.  This might be Sly’s worst performance and his worst movie, which is really something when you consider he also starred in Party at Kitty and Stud's. 

Sly can’t do much with his indifferently written character.  There’s one odd scene where he tries to give the journalist a pep talk, but it winds up sounding like a speech from out of a Rambo movie.  We also get a perplexing scene where he gives the journalist a severe dressing-down while painting.  You see, because it’s supposed to be funny that a tough guy like Sly would be talking about colors and textures and mood. 

Most of the all-star cast don’t fare much better.  Tom Sizemore just kind of Tom Sizemores around as a loudmouth gangster.  (The jury is still out on whether or not his is his worst movie though.)  Tom Berenger is thoroughly wasted as the reclusive author and Cary Elwes isn’t given enough screen time to make his jerk character click.   

The only actors who flirt with rising above the material are Kyra Sedgwick as a jailbird who wants to be a fashion designer and Thomas Jane as a cop who guns down people Wild West style.  Jane’s scenes could’ve been fleshed out and made for a decent DTV action flick.  I especially liked the scenes where he confesses his crimes to a priest (Aiello) and asks forgiveness.  However, since his character is shoehorned in with the rest of the bunch, his arc is rushed and is resolved unsatisfyingly.  One thing you can say for Jane:  At least this isn’t his worst movie.  (That would be The Mutant Chronicles.)   

AKA:  Bad Luck.  AKA:  Out of Sight.  AKA:  Collection.

FREE FIRE (2017) ** ½

You know that scene in every action movie where the good guy gets winged by the villain’s bullet and he hides behind a corner and taunts his enemy?  Free Fire is like a feature length version of that scene.  It features an assorted group of oddballs coming to a dilapidated warehouse to do an arms deal.  Two of the men get to fighting, words are exchanged, and pretty soon, everyone has their guns drawn.  They get off a couple shots and everyone winds up shot and ducking for cover.  The rest of the film is nothing more than the characters angling for position, firing off shots, and trying to worm their way out of the situation. 

This is a rather audacious idea, but unfortunately director Ben (High Rise) Wheatley allows things to run on much too long for it to be entirely successful.  In many ways, it feels like someone’s first movie, given the single location, the fair amount of black comedy, and the sometimes-cheesy tough guy banter.  You’d think someone as seasoned as Wheatley would be able to make it work though.  While there are some funny stretches and an occasional clever gag, the whole thing never quite clicks. 

This must have been an interesting and challenging concept for Wheatley.  How do you make a shootout last for virtually an entire hour?  Although Wheatley doesn’t quite pull it off, in retrospect, it’s amazing just how much mileage Wheatley and his cast got out of the premise.    

On the outset, Free Fire looks like one of those ‘90s inspired Tarantino crime comedies (right down to the cheesy ‘70s fashions).  Really, it’s more like a DTV action movie with a slightly better pedigree.  It has a single location, claustrophobic action, and an eclectic cast.  I can’t quite pull the trigger and call it a “good” film, but it’s definitely a near-miss.

THE IRON FIST ADVENTURES (1972) **

No, this doesn’t have anything to do with that Marvel Comics guy.  It’s actually a ho-hum Jimmy Wang Yu movie.  Yu of course is most famous for playing The One-Armed Swordsman.  I guess this flick proves two arms aren’t necessarily better than one. 

Jimmy goes riding around with his loyal band of followers looking for the men who killed his brothers in battle.  Along the way, he gets framed for the death of a beloved leader and is arrested and put on trial.  After finally proving his innocence, he goes toe to toe with the crooked warlord who imprisoned him. 

You know, for a movie called The Iron Fist Adventures, Jimmy doesn't get to use his fists a whole lot.  Actually, the film features more gunplay than anything as nearly all the action starts with Yu and his enemy shooting at each other.  Then, when they run out of bullets, they draw swords and duel.  Then, when they knock their swords away, they fight hand to hand.  All of this gets repetitive after a while. 

Yu does what he can to salvage the movie.  When the film does work, it’s because of his cool charisma more than the middling fight scenes.  The other guys who make up his ragtag army are annoying though.  Their only purpose is to provide exposition and hammer home plot points.  It’s enough to make you wish Jimmy went on this mission solo. 

AKA:  The Adventure.  AKA:  The Cyclone.

A CURE FOR WELLNESS (2017) *

Dane DeHaan goes to a bizarro health spa in the middle of nowhere to get his boss to sign some important documents.  Inside of a minute, we know this place is bad news, but Dane hangs around for like an eternity before he figures out that the main doctor (Jason Isaacs from Soldier) has a screw loose.  It all drags on and on for the better part of two and a half hours until the big confrontation between DeHaan and Isaacs and even then, it plays out like a poor man’s version of a Guillermo del Toro Dr. Phibes remake or something. 

A Cure for Wellness?  More like a cure for insomnia.  Am I right?  

With this film, Gore Verbinski proves once again he has no business making horror movies.  Like his sorry Ring remake, there’s a lot of focus on a little girl with messy hair.  At least The Ring wasn't two and a half hours.  Heck, there’s not enough plot here for a half hour Twilight Zone episode, let alone a two-and-a-half-hour movie.  Gore, I’m telling you as a friend:  Stick to those big-budget Johnny Depp movies, buddy. 

The movie, in all fairness, looks like a million bucks.  However, the slick cinematography can’t hide the fact that there’s not a whole lot going on here.  Whatever plot “twists” we do get are predictable and incredibly drawn-out.   

I did however, find a cure for badness:  Take a shot of your favorite alcoholic beverage every time someone says the word “well”.  It’ll be just what the doctor ordered.  

BOYKA: UNDISPUTED (2017) ****

Scott Adkins returns to the ring for his third (and so far, best) outing as Yuri Boyka, the World’s Most Complete Fighter.  This time out, he’s out of prison and looking to make a name for himself on the fighting circuit.  After he accidentally kills an opponent in the ring, Boyka puts his bid for glory on hold in order to make amends with the man’s widow.  When he learns that she is basically an indentured servant to a local gangster, Boyka agrees to fight a series of increasingly difficult matches in order to secure her freedom. 

Boyka:  Undisputed plays out sort of like an MMA version of Diggstown as our hero finds himself fighting a number of opponents as part of a bet with the crooked owner of a small town.  There's even a last-minute twist where he is tricked into fighting an extra bout with a notorious prison brawler.  This guy is known as ‘The Nightmare" and he looks like a cross between Hannibal Lecter and Master Blaster from Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome and he gives Boyka a run for his money.  

The fights are all crisply photographed and competently shot, but like the best sports movies, Boyka:  Undisputed gives you moments that make you cheer outside of the ring too.  I can honestly say that I got a little choked up when the fighter’s widow tells Boyka that she doesn’t need him to save her and he responds, “I’m doing this to save myself!”  Part of that is thanks to Adkins’ terrific performance.  He played a great villain in Undisputed 2 and made for a gruff, but likeable hero in Part 3.   Here, he excels as the brooding Boyka.  His internal struggle to be the best, but to also do the right thing is surprisingly touching. 

In Undisputed 2 and 3, Boyka fought in a prison.  Even though he’s a free man in this one, he finds himself in a prison of another kind:  The prison of his own expectations.  When you’re fighting to be the best, the only enemy you’ll truly face is yourself.  While the fact that he now fights for forgiveness as well as his own personal redemption might make it sound like the character has softened, let me tell you, this new, matured Boyka is just as vicious as ever.  

I don’t want to spoil the ending.  All I will say is that the character comes full circle and his emotional journey is one of the most touching you’ll see all year.  (The final shot gave me goosebumps.)  While I'd love to see Adkins continue to kick ass in more Undisputed sequels, the film ends on such a perfect note that it's going to be hard to top. Then again, I thought Rocky Balboa was the final word on Rocky until Creed came around, so anything is possible.

This is definitely one of the best movies of the year and probably the best Direct to DVD sequel ever made.

AKA:  Boyka:  Undisputed 4.  AKA:  Undisputed 4:  Boyka is Back.

GANG WAR (1958) **

Gang War gives Charles Bronson one of his earliest starring roles and plays kind of like a prototypical Bronson vehicle.  He stars as a meek schoolteacher who witnesses some gangsters kill a man.  When he reluctantly puts the finger on them, their boss (John Doucette) has his punch-drunk enforcer whack his pregnant wife.  This sends Chuck’s character, a Korean vet, on a quest for vengeance. 

All of this sounds like it can't miss, but it does.  It’s painfully slow moving and there’s not a whole lot of action.  Even though Bronson is top billed, he's not given much to do.  Mostly, it’s just scenes of Doucette sitting around and plotting.  

Director Gene Fowler, Jr. has a nice eye for detail.  He brings the same visual flair that he brought to I Was a Teenage Werewolf and I Married a Monster from Outer Space as the film often looks like a ‘40s film noir.  Too bad the sluggish pacing, low budget, and flimsy script pretty much undoes all his hard work. 

Although Bronson kind of gets the short end of the stick, he does have at least one memorable badass moment.  After he learns his wife and unborn child have been killed, he breaks open his dead kid’s piggy back with a hammer and uses the money to buy a gun.  Too bad his eventual clash with the villains is so lackluster. 

SONG TO SONG (2017) **

I always find Terrence Malick’s movies fascinating, even if they do have a tendency to leave me cold.  He has always had an eye for capturing beautiful landscapes, but his best films, Badlands, The Tree of Life, and The Thin Red Line, work because we can connect emotionally to the characters too.  Song to Song is for me, his worst film because not only are none of the characters likeable, the world they inhabit is kind of drab.

That’s not entirely correct.  The film is set against the backdrop of the music industry and several musicians (from Johnny Rotten to Iggy Pop to Patti Smith) cameo playing themselves.  A great movie could have been made set in this world, but it’s clear from the outset that Malick isn’t very interested in the cameos, or the various love triangles, or much of anything.

The plot follows a handful of characters (Ryan Gosling, Michael Fassbender, Natalie Portman, etc.) who fall in and out of love while attending industry parties and hanging out backstage at concerts.  Malick uses the same kind of set-up he used for To the Wonder.  Most scenes are fragmented, contain dialogue that often feels improvised, and it hops around quite a bit.  This worked well in To the Wonder because it felt like memories of a loved one looking back to a simpler time.  This just feels like snippets of what people do before they hook up/cheat on/break up with their partners.

You know you’re getting bored by a movie when you start counting how many Batmans its director has worked with.  As dull as much of the film is, Val Kilmer has a great cameo as an erratic musician that goes nuts on stage.  Since Malick has worked with George Clooney in The Thin Red Line, Christian Bale in The New World, and Ben Affleck in To the Wonder, all he has to do is find a role for Michael Keaton in his next flick and he'll be five-for-five as far as Batmans go.

Overall, Song to Song isn’t very good, but if you ever wanted to see Magneto bone Thor’s girlfriend, I guess you might want to see it.

PATERSON (2016) ****

Adam Driver stars a bus driver named Paterson who lives in Paterson, New Jersey.  This seems like the premise for a really bad movie, but it’s actually one of the more quietly powerful films I’ve seen in a long time.  When he’s not driving the bus and eavesdropping on the strange conversations the commuters make, he’s writing poems in his “secret” notebook.  Paterson is also quite supportive of his girlfriend who is always busy making quaint art projects and baking cupcakes (not to mention those around him who create their own unique brands of artistic expression) while never really having the confidence to share his own work. 

Paterson is required viewing for anyone who juggles producing independent art with having a "real" job.  Since the character of Paterson is such a creature of habit, the first half of the film is a bit of a slog to get through.  That’s mostly because writer/director Jim Jarmusch does such an accurate job at portraying his boring, mundane everyday existence.  We need to experience the unchanging routine of Paterson’s life to fully appreciate him.  That way, when something outside of his routine happens, it feels almost catastrophic.  The last act of the picture may feel slight when compared to most films.  Since we’ve been so firmly placed in his shoes, we are devastated when something bad finally occurs.   

This is the kind of movie that flummoxes the Star Rating.  I was pretty bored with the deliberate first hour and actually turned the movie off halfway through because I started falling asleep.  I finished it the next day and was just about in tears by the end.  Despite the fact that I was bored by the first half, you really need that deliberate pace to sell the finale.  Without it, the ending doesn’t mean nearly as much.   

I watched this movie about a week ago and put off immediately writing about it.  I’m glad I did too because I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.  The more I think about it, the more it affects me on a deeper personal level.  I see a lot of myself in the main character and that is something that can often be hard to handle.  I have also dealt with setbacks similar to what he endures, which is both painful and exhilarating at the same time.  Paterson is a unique and haunting movie and one of Jarmusch’s best.

ATOMIC BLONDE (2017) **

Charlize Theron stars as a sexy British spy who beats the crap out of people in Berlin just before the fall of the Berlin Wall.  She’s great in it and she looks sexy as Hell while smashing, bashing, and Kung Fuing the bad guys.  Directed by David (John Wick) Leitch, the movie looks awesome.  The neon-lit atmosphere is cool and cinematography is crisp and eye-popping.  He also gives us a couple of inspired action sequences, including one that is done in a long continuous take (although the seams are easy enough to spot). 

So why does it all feel like such a dud?  Superficially, the movie works.  It’s just a shame that all the spy shit is so convoluted.  There are a lot of empty double, triple, and quadruple-crosses, but none of it really pulls you it or ultimately means very much.  Seriously, it’s hard to care when everything you just learned in the previous scene is immediately contradicted in the next. 

The ending(s) is the worst.  The script tries so damned hard to trick you that it eventually becomes annoying.  I know that movies like to try to pull the rug out from under you.  This one pulls the rug, the carpeting, and the floorboards.  By the time Theron has thrown her fourth agency under the bus, I was already looking for the exits.  Honestly, this might’ve gotten a ** ½ rating on style alone if it had ended four endings ago.  

Theron deserves better.  While she still gets to act like a badass and have a sexy Girl on Girl scene, the movie her character inhabits fails her at nearly every turn.  Leitch deserves better too.  Perhaps sensing the script’s shortcomings, he bombards you with his stylistic touches during the action while cranking the ‘80s music.  Unfortunately, all that does is turn most of the movie into one big music video.  If only they had a competent script at their disposal, Theron and Leitch could’ve made this one for the books.   

Sadly, Atomic Blonde never goes full blast.

THE DARK TOWER (2017) ***

I was a huge Stephen King fan growing up.  His novels instilled in me a love of reading that I still have to this day.  I pretty much stopped reading his books a decade or so ago, but that doesn’t stop me for seeing the new movies based on his work.  (Hell, I even liked Cell.)  The Dark Tower series, while not my favorites, have always been ripe with possibilities for a big screen adaptation.  The surprising thing is that this isn’t an adaptation.  It’s more of an extension/continuation of the novels, which to me is a much more interesting and unique approach.  Although the word of mouth was toxic, The Dark Tower has some cool stuff in it, features a couple of solid performances, and is a great deal of fun.   

He who thought this was bad has forgotten the face of his father.  

Now most King movies take a seven-page story and stretch it out to 90 minutes.  This one takes a seven-book series and puts it into 90 minutes.  Again, this isn’t a straight-up adaptation, but some of the stuff that happens will be familiar to King readers.   

I think people went into this one with a very clear idea of what a Dark Tower film should be.  You can’t review a movie that only exists in your head.  You can only react to what your eyes and ears give you.  While The Dark Tower itself isn’t perfect, the Stephen King fan in me was quite entertained. 

Matthew McConaughey radiates a quiet intensity as The Man in Black.  His steely gaze and nonchalant malevolence is a nice fit for the character.  If a big screen adaptation of The Stand ever happens, I hope he gets to play Flagg.   

Idris Elba also does a fine job as Roland the Gunslinger.  There’s one scene at a dinner table where he gives a speech that sort of nails who Roland is.  The world has moved on, and so has he.  Now all he has his quest for revenge.  However, his relationship with Jake (Tom Taylor) could be the thing that redeems him. 

Speaking of Jake, a lot of people seem to have a problem with him being the main character.  I actually thought it was a neat idea.  He mainly serves as the audience’s surrogate as he’s being introduced to this strange new world right along with you.  Some fans have balked at that, but it’s done rather well.  It’s hard to establish an entire mythology that consumed seven books in a 90-minute running time, so yes, some shortcuts have been made. 

I’m not going to lie, parts of the narrative feel rushed and some of the plot devices are a little clunky and/or too convenient.  Unlike most King works, there’s no filler and it has a definitive ending, so there's that.  Sure, some of the effects may look like they came out of a SYFY mini-series, but overall, The Dark Tower works.   

I can’t say this is a home run, but there were parts of it that crackled.  The end, where the Gunslinger makes his final stand while reciting the Gunslinger Oath was some powerful stuff.  I also enjoyed the nods to other King works that suggest there’s a bigger world at play here.  Whether the filmmakers ever get to explore that world remains to be seen.  All I know is that this is a solid King flick and I for one hope we get to see more of the universe soon.

THE ROOM (2003) ****

I’ve heard so much about Tommy Wiseau’s The Room over the years, but I never really had any desire to watch it.  With all the buzz that The Disaster Artist has been getting, I figured I might as well check it out to see what the fuss is all about.  As a die-hard fan of So Bad It’s Good movies, I had my doubts that this could actually live up to the hype.  Well, I finally get it now.  The Room richly deserves its cult classic status.  If The Disaster Artist is being hailed as the new Ed Wood, then The Room is definitely this generation’s Plan 9 from Outer Space. 

Part Skinamax movie, part bad off-Broadway play (make that high school play), part ego-stroking vanity piece for its director/star, The Room is a wonderfully inept, misguided, and yet strangely heartfelt experience.  Like Ed Wood before him, Wiseau clearly has a vision.  Like Ed Wood, his shortcomings as a director actually enhance the overall experience. 

I just re-read that paragraph and I saw that I called The Room an “experience” not once, but twice.  That’s fairly accurate.  This isn’t necessarily a movie per se, this is a glimpse into the mind of a one-of-a-kind visionary. 

What I love is the way that just about everyone in the movie, with the obvious exception of his cheating girlfriend, treats Wiseau’s character like gold.  Everyone from his barista to a flower shop worker compliments him and/or comments what a great guy he is.  He stacks the deck in his character’s favor in such a childishly positive way that it becomes quite endearing. 

Speaking of endearing, I can’t tell you how funny it is to see four guys in tuxedoes tossing a football around.  Forget that the odds of actually seeing this take place is astronomical.  The unbridled joy in which Wiseau films it is a sight to behold. 

Wiseau acting is another sight to behold.  Never mind the fact that it’s almost impossible to interpret what he’s saying because of his thick accent.  When his excessive emotional acting jags take off, it’s like a rollercoaster of amateurish bravado.  The fact that he gives himself several gratuitous nude and/or love scenes (five inside of the first half-hour) is amazing in and of itself.  In more competent hands, this would’ve come off as narcissistic.  In Wiseau’s hands, it’s a work of goddamned bad movie genius. 

Yes, The Room is a bad movie.  However, like the “best” bad movies, it wears its heart on its sleeve.  Like Ed Wood before him, Wiseau is sincere about his subject matter and his sincerity is as entertaining as his ineptitude.    

THE EMOJI MOVIE (2017) **

Did you know that the Emojis that live in your phone have to go around making that same stupid face they’re known for all the time?  It’s true.  One Emoji, Meh (T.J. Miller) bucks the trend and tries to show the world a range of emotions.  However, when he makes the wrong face in the text window of the phone, it causes his user to think the phone is broken.  He then goes to get the phone erased and Meh and his friend Hi-5 (James Corden) have to try to upload themselves to “The Cloud” before they are deleted for good. 

As far as movies based on smiley faces go, The Emoji Movie isn’t as bad as it could’ve been.  It takes a barely-there premise and serves up a couple of laugh-out-loud moments along the way.  I admit that some parts were cleverer than I expected.  Then again, my expectations were already pretty low to begin with.  In Emoji speak, it’s more “meh” than “poop”, but there’s not a lot of “heart”. 

Then again, it’s hard to completely hate any movie in which the always awesome Steven Wright is perfectly cast as Meh’s father.  I also got a kick out of seeing Patrick Stewart playing “Poop”.  Too bad they didn’t give him any “Number One” jokes. 

It’s Hi-5 though who gets the best line when he says, “This is like that time Peace Sign only gave me one finger!”

ANDROID COP (2014) **

Michael Jai White stars as a badass cop who is saddled with a partly robotic partner.  As in any Buddy Cop Movie, they don’t get along.  The robot cop does things by the book (mostly because of his programming) while White refuses to play by the rules.  When an assignment takes them into a desolate wasteland, they soon come to realize that they are being set up to walk right into a trap.  They then must work together as a team in order to survive. 

Android Cop is, obviously, The Asylum’s riff on the (now, mostly forgotten) Robocop remake.  As with that movie, the robot cop wears a cheesy faceplate that looks dorky.  The difference is that the focus is mostly on White as he is forced to put up with, and eventually rely on his odd new partner.  In that respect, it’s more like Alien Nation, but with robots.  (The film manages to steal bits from Escape from New York and Judge Dredd along the way.)   

While it’s nice seeing the ever-athletic White in a starring role, the filmmakers don’t make the best use of his talents.  He gets a few opportunities to show off his considerable Kung Fu skills, but unfortunately, the action is poorly framed and edited.  Probably aware that his talent is going to waste, White sometimes seems like he’s sleepwalking through some scenes.  Or maybe he was just on auto(maton)pilot.  Co-stars Kadeem Hardison and Charles S. Dutton (who looks like he filmed his scenes in a single day) are likewise limited thanks to their flimsily-written characters. 

Android Cop is also plagued with inconsistent continuity, ragged editing, shoddy effects, and inept production values.  I know this is an Asylum movie we’re talking about here, but even the Sharknado series has some semblance of basic competence.  I will say that it does have a decent plot twist in the third act; if you make it that far. 

As bad as most of the movie is, there was at least one scene that was legitimately funny.  It comes early on when White is negotiating with some terrorists.  They conclude their list of outlandish demands with a case of Mexican Coke.  This causes White to do a double-take and say, “Mexican Coke?  The kind with the real sugar?  I can’t do that!”  Since Mexican Coke is one of my few weaknesses, that scene alone was enough to earn the flick at least an extra Half Star from me. 

AKA:  Robotic Cop.

THE BOYS FROM BRAZIL (1978) ****

I kind of avoided The Boys from Brazil after all these years because the whole thing sounded cheesy.  Based on what I’d heard, I was picturing They Saved Hitler’s Brain, but with Oscar-winning actors.  That really isn’t too far off the mark, but that’s kind of what makes it so awesome.  I mean, The Boys from Brazil showed me sights I’d never thought I’d ever see in a movie, including: 

1.     The greatest actor of his generation, Sir Laurence Olivier avenging the death of the star of Police Academy, Steve Guttenberg. 

2.     Gregory Peck, who played the symbol of heroism and righteousness, Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird, playing the evil Nazi Dr. Josef Mengele performing despicable medical experiments on children.  

3.     Peck, giving a monologue about being in “a godforsaken place” that is basically plagiarized entirely from Ed Wood’s Bride of the Monster.    

Directed by Franklin J. (Planet of the Apes) Schaffner and based on the novel by Ira Levin, The Boys from Brazil is a hoot from start to finish.  It opens with a suspenseful extended sequence in which Steve Guttenberg goes hot on the trail of Nazis in Paraguay.  When the Nazis find him and murder him, it’s then up to Olivier to pick up where he left off.  He eventually uncovers an elaborate assassination plot involving dozens of seemingly unrelated targets.  Sir Larry O. does some more digging and learns the truth is crazier than he could’ve ever imagined. 

You know, whenever I saw the title of this movie, I always assumed “The Boys” was code for Nazis.  You know, like Hitler and the Boys are up to no good in Brazil.  Turns out, it’s a lot funnier than that.  The “Boys” are actually (SPOILER) HITLER CLONES (!!!) that are spread out all over the world.  While it sounds farfetched (and believe me, it is), the dead seriousness of which the material is handled makes it work on both levels.  Yes, the premise is ridiculous, but somehow, Schaffner and company pull it off.  I mean, the whole idea is so absurd that only a guy like Olivier could make you care about it.  

If you think about it though, this is the next logical step from a baby Antichrist.  The idea of an army of teenage Hitler clones, while absurd, is pretty scary.  Because of that, the film would work well as a double feature to either Rosemary’s Baby (which was also written by Levin) or The Omen (which also starred Peck). 

Speaking of Peck, he is great cast against type as the repulsive Mengele.  He chews scenery, but is never hammy and always remains imposing and intimidating.  Olivier, who memorably played a Nazi himself in Marathon Man, is just as much fun to watch here playing the other side of the coin as the frail, but crafty Nazi hunter. 

It’s the Hitler Clone Kid who gets the best line of the movie though when he calls Peck a “Freaked-out maniac!”