CITY RATS (1986) **

A guy takes his kid to the amusement park and afterwards, while getting a snack from a roadside stand, an undercover cop hits the boy with his car.  Since the cop is well-connected, no charges are filed.  Outraged, the father slugs him and winds up going to jail for a long time.  Meanwhile, his now homeless kid joins up with a bunch of sewer-dwelling killer children who roam the streets in packs and stab hapless passersby for their money.  When his father is released from prison, he sets out to find his long-lost son.

This is a really weird movie.  It partly plays like a killer kid movie while another aspect tackles the corrupt Mexican police and prison systems.  Don’t be fooled by the fact that this flick makes your typical Mexican prison look like an ordinary parking garage.  Looks can be deceiving, especially when said prison is filled with guards who can’t wait to hook car batteries up to your gonads. 

The scenes where the killer sewer-dwelling children accost and murder innocent people are hit-and-miss.  Luckily, there are plenty of explosions in the third act to keep you awake.  When something blows up, it blows up good.  Unfortunately, the sound was so poor that most of the dialogue is unintelligible. I'm willing to give it a mulligan though based on the explosions alone.  Even then, you have to put up with a lot of long, dull stretches in between the good stuff.

SAVAGE DOG (2017) ***

Scott Adkins is a prisoner in ‘50s Indochina who fights in jungle boxing matches for the warden’s amusement.  When he is paroled, he goes to work at Keith David’s bar as a bouncer.  Eventually, he gets roped back into fighting for money.  When David loses a bet, the thugs kill him and take his bar.  They also come THIS CLOSE to killing Adkins’ girlfriend.  That of course sends Scott on a bloody warpath for revenge.

From the outset, there’s nothing really remarkable about Jesse V. Johnson’s Savage Dog.  I mean you’ve seen this type of scenario played out hundreds of times before and Johnson does little to distinguish it from the various other actioners.  The first half is unimaginatively ordinary in just about every way and I found myself sinking into my seat in dismay at around the halfway mark.

That all changed once Adkins rose from his grave and set out to get revenge.  It’s here where Savage Dog turns into something truly special. The scene where Adkins hacks off a guy's head with a machete, strolls into a bar, and nonchalantly places the head on the bar is some of the best badass acting he's ever done. From then on, things get even gorier. Hands are lopped off and faces get blown off in a hail of gunfire and grenade shrapnel. 

By the time Adkins ditches the machete in favor of his fists, things really get into gear.  The scene where Adkins goes toe to toe with Cung Le is solid, but the finale where Scott squares off against Marko Zaror is incredible.  I was literally standing and cheering by the end.  This fight might be even better than their brawl in Undisputed 3, which is about as high of praise as one can get.

So, if you can get past the first forty-five minutes, you'll be treated to some kickass fun.  Even the usually magnetic Keith has trouble carrying the clunky first half.  Just stay with it though.  Once Savage Dog gets savage, it’s savage af.

MY SUCKY TEEN ROMANCE (2011) **

A bunch of dorky teens gather at a science fiction convention.  Paul (Patrick Delgado) is a meek grocery store clerk who was recently bitten by a vampire.  He thinks the convention will be the perfect place to blend in while he waits to bite his first potential victim.  Paul meets the adorkable Kate (Elaine Hurt) and they instantly hit it off.  When he leans in for a goodnight kiss, he accidentally bites her on the neck.  (Awkward!)  Kate then calls on her geeky friends, who are all fans of horror movies, to help her find a way to reverse her vampire curse.

My Sucky Teen Romance makes a lot of easy jokes at Twilight’s expense.  It also takes a lot of jabs at geek culture and the sci-fi convention set.  These aren’t exactly pointed observations to be sure, and they aren’t especially funny either.

All of this was done on an obviously low budget with a lot of non-professionals, which is admirable I guess.  However, the convention scenes suffer from the small budget as it looks more like a birthday party than a sci-fi convention.  The amateurish special effects also hinder the horror aspects of the story, making it feel cheap and sloppy.  I could’ve also done without the Scott Pilgrimesque video game sequences.

The actors do what they can, but they just aren’t quite strong enough to carry the film.  It doesn’t help when they are stuck playing cliched nerdy characters.  Seeing disgraced Ain’t It Cool News founder Harry Knowles turning up as a so-called vampire expert who calls bloodsuckers “sexy things that are predatory” is a bit odd too.

Hurt gets the best line of the movie when she sums up why she can’t talk to guys:  “Bad things happen when I say words.”

JACK’S BACK (1988) ***

Rowdy Herrington made this a year before his magnum opus Road House.  It’s a twisty little thriller that relies on springing several surprises on the audience, most of which occur before the end of the first act.  Because of that, giving a plot description is a bit of a precarious task.  Just know that Herrington isn’t above using the Kitchen Sink theory of moviemaking.  He uses every plot device from identical twins to psychic links to hypnotism and grafts them onto a solid Jack the Ripper thriller storyline.  

Now, there were plenty of Jack the Ripper movies in the mid ‘80s that capitalized on the hundredth anniversary of The Ripper’s murders.  In addition to Jack’s Back, we also had Terror at London Bridge and The Ripper.  This one is easily the best of the lot.  Whereas those films had a lot of supernatural trappings that made them feel hokey, Jack’s Back concentrates on the psychological aspects on not only the murderer, but the victims as well.

Harrington uses a few cribs from Hitchcock, but adds his own brand of cinematic panache, which makes the old chestnuts feel fresh.  Sure, there’s a few ideas that don’t quite pop like so many kernels in a bag of popcorn.  The climax is a bit needlessly drawn out to boot.  Still, it’s stylish and engrossing enough to keep you entertained.

James Spader is excellent in the lead.  He’s clearly having a ball playing a dual role.  What’s great about his work in this film is it never feels like a casting stunt.  He’s able to develop two distinct characters in a relatively short span of time, each with their own faults, quirks, and ambitions.  So, if you’re a Spader fan like I am, you’re in for a real treat.  The interesting supporting cast includes Cynthia Gibb, Robert Picardo, and Chris Mulkey; all of whom make a memorable impression given their limited screen time.

AKA:  The Ripper.

FOUND FOOTAGE 3D (2016) **

An independent film crew are about to start production on a found footage horror movie called “The Spectre of Death”.  At the last minute, the producer decides to make it in 3-D, which confounds just about everyone.  They go on location to a supposedly haunted house in the middle of nowhere where a gruesome murder occurred years ago.  Before long, weird shit that echoes the supernatural events in the script starts happening.

I give Found Footage 3D props for addressing the silliness in making a found footage movie in 3-D right from the get-go.  It also has fun sending up the genre and the inherent stupidity of most found footage horror films.  The behind-the-scenes problems that plague the production make the early scenes feel like a horror version of This is Spinal Tap.  After about a half hour or so, the film starts to become less a clever send-up of the genre and more of an anemic example of it.  

The 3-D works best when the actors are being filmed with lots of available light and the camera is being held perfectly still.  Since this is a found footage movie, the camera is shaky a lot of the time and most of the scenes take place in pitch black.  That is to say, they pretty much abandon the gimmick as soon as it’s introduced, which is a shame.

The final nail in the movie’s coffin is the bloated running time of 100 minutes.  There’s no reason to have a Found Footage movie running that length.  I could have also done without the self-congratulatory cameo by horror journalist Scott Weinberg (who also produced) playing himself.  It’s just a bit too cheeky for its own good and adds nothing to the movie.

THE BLOODSTAINED SHADOW (1978) **

A priest (Craig Hill) witnesses a murder, but is unable to make out the assailant.  When he begins to investigate the crime, the killer starts leaving him threatening notes warning him to back off.  The priest’s brother (Lino Capolicchio) comes to stay with him and soon takes it upon himself to solve the murders.

The Bloodstained Shadow is a middling and overlong giallo, but the great score by Stelvio Cipriani keeps you from dozing off.  It’s easily the best thing about the movie.  Cipriani's score is all over the place, which gives him plenty of opportunity to dabble in different musical styles.  This anything-goes approach makes even the smallest scene interesting.  Not only that, but it’s just plain groovy!  You’re guaranteed to be tapping your toes throughout the inflated running time.

The murder set pieces leave something to be desired though.  Most of the deaths are strangulations, which offers up little variation.  The one standout murder involves a woman’s face being shoved into a fireplace, but that’s about as gruesome as it gets.  

Although the film fails as a straight thriller, it works as sort of a warped soap opera.  As Hill investigates the murders, he pulls back the curtain of his shady neighborhood.  Since he is their priest and has listened to all his neighbors’ confessions, he knows all their seedy secrets.  I just wish there was more done with this aspect of the picture.  

The ending is predictable and drawn out.  There are just too many flashbacks and red herrings here that spoil the fun.  It’s also way too long.  At 110 minutes, there’s so much filler that it drags the whole movie down.  

AKA:  Only Blackness.

STAR WARS: EPISODE VIII: THE LAST JEDI (2017) ****

You know a movie is special when a father and daughter are simultaneously on the edge of their seat during the final minutes.  The fact that the film in question is the latest installment of the Star Wars saga makes it even more special.  I still remember the feeling of awe I had as a child when I saw the speeder bike chase from Return of the Jedi in the theater for the first time in 1983.  I can only hope my daughter feels the same way thirty years from now when she looks back on The Last Jedi.  

I think it’s safe to say that she will.  When we got home from the theater, she emulated Rey by sitting in the floor and shutting her eyes.  Concentrating, she reached out her hand and tried to make a book move by using The Force.  If that isn’t a testament to the magic of Star Wars, I don’t know what is.

Rian Johnson’s The Last Jedi is the best Star Wars movie since 1983.  It takes what George Lucas, and later, J.J. Abrams did, subverts it, and makes it feel fresh and new.  Yes, after the fan service-heavy likes of The Force Awakens and Rogue One, I thought the spark of originality was almost lost in the franchise.  Johnson protects that spark and ignites it into something much bigger.

George Lucas had a knack for making science fiction stories that had personality, quirkiness, and a fierce independence.  Even though they were epics, they still felt like personal independent films.  Whereas The Force Awakens and Rogue One felt like products off an assembly line, this one feels like it could’ve only come from the mind of Johnson.

Coming from someone who had issues with The Force Awakens, it was a sheer delight to see how Johnson thumbed his nose at Abrams’ “safe” storytelling decisions.  I won’t spoil anything, but you pretty much get all the answers you wanted to know from The Force Awakens and then some.  Like a Jedi Mind Trick, Johnson resolves just about every lingering plot thread with the wave of a hand.  (He even answers a question fans have been asking since the original trilogy:  Just where does blue milk come from?)  In fact, the film almost feels like the conclusion to a trilogy in many ways.  

Speaking of trilogies, there’s enough stuff in here to fill an entire Star Wars trilogy.  Much has been made of the length of The Last Jedi.  What is so amazing is that it never feels long.  Could Johnson have trimmed some stuff here and there?  Maybe, but I was so engrossed over every second of it that I honestly didn’t want it to end.

The Last Jedi is what Star Wars, and movies in general are all about.  It’s moving, harrowing, hilarious, tragic, and exhilarating; sometimes all at the same time.  I laughed.  I cried.  I was literally on the edge of my seat multiple times.  Johnson really puts you through the wringer.  Few blockbusters nowadays truly move viewers.  If you walk away nonplussed by this one, you might be a droid.    

Even if you don’t like the directions Johnson is taking the franchise (and judging by the internet, there are some that don’t), you’re guaranteed to feel at least SOMETHING when you leave the theater.  At least Johnson is taking chances, ones that pay off big time in the finale.  After J.J.’s safe bet greatest-hits collection, this is a breath of fresh air.  

I felt cheated by the lack of Luke in the last episode.  He was always my favorite character, so I felt shortchanged to have him reduced to a mere cameo.  I mean I waited thirty-four years to know what happened to Luke after the Battle of Endor and Johnson doesn’t disappoint at all.  While Luke isn’t really front-and-center that much (there are a LOT of characters to juggle, which is fine because Johnson can juggle with the best of them), when he is… well… all I can say is that it’s 1983 and I’m five years old again and I’m clapping and cheering over a Star Wars movie. 

EVERYONE has a moment to shine.  Most poignant of course is Leia because of Carrie Fisher’s untimely passing.  There was only one cheesy bit of the movie, and that belonged to her, but everything else she did was beautiful.  From arguing with Poe Dameron to commanding the fleet, this is a grown and mature Leia that still has a heap of spunk to her.  It’s unfortunate Fisher’s no longer with us because her presence will be sorely missed in Episode IX.

I liked where Kylo Ren was at.  He’s still feels haunted by the murder of Han Solo.  Will the guilt of killing his father pull him towards the light, or set him off into a more extremely unstable path?  His arc is one of the more interesting and unpredictable in the movie.

Then there’s of course Rey, who spends most of the film begging to be taught the ways of The Force.  Her interactions with Luke (who is clearly relishing a chance to play a cantankerous mentor) are some of the funniest and most heartfelt in the entire series.  The fact that Luke pushes her away gives her something in common with Kylo, and their shared recognition of that (and possible allegiance to one another) is one of the gray areas the film has fun exploring.

As someone who’s favorite new character from The Force Awakens was BB-8, I was not disappointed.  I’m glad to report he has plenty of hilarious moments in this one.  He even got at least one big hero moment that made me cheer.  

Even the new characters, who arrive hitting the ground running, are likeable, fully realized, and feel fresh.  Vice Admiral Holdo, Rose, and DJ still follow motifs from previous episodes, but they are integrated with the older cast so seamlessly that it feels like they’ve been around forever.  I certainly hope to see more of them in episodes to come. 

Speaking of new characters:  Porgs.  They’re further proof that, like the Ewoks, Star Wars characters can be cute AND awesome at the same time.  I loved them.

The action is off the chain.  This is a Star Wars film, and Johnson brings the wars.  It often feels like a non-stop assault.  Like some of the best entries in the franchise, this is a Chase Movie in the best sense.  It almost feels like Stephen King’s The Long Walk, but with space ships.  On the ground, in outer space, and with the lightsabers, there are some all-time Star Wars moments to be had.  The Praetorian Guard scene melted my brain.  It was like watching a futuristic Shaw Brothers Venom Mob movie.  Although it’s still a little early to tell, I have a feeling these guys might be the new Boba Fett.  This sequence also contains one of the most crowd-pleasing moments in a Star Wars flick since Han swooped in on the Millennium Falcon in the original.  Yes, it’s that good.

The new planets are great too.  Canto Bight, the casino planet (which is basically like a Cantina version of Monte Carlo), gives us a glimpse of how the class system works in the Star Wars universe.  While some of this was a little on-the-nose, I wouldn’t change a moment, especially when it leads us to the stirring final shot.

I honestly have no idea where the series can go from here.  It’s like Johnson mic dropped the series back into J.J.’s lap.  One thing’s for sure, J.J. has some big shoes to fill.