SKYLINE (2010) **

I’m planning on watching Beyond Skyline in the near future, mostly because Iko Uwais is in it.  I don't want to be completely lost when that time comes, so I watched Skyline to get myself up to speed.  Sigh… the things I do for Iko Uwais.

I initially didn't want to see this because The Brothers Strause directed it.  If you don’t remember (and I wish I could), they’re the duo who directed the abysmal Alien vs. Predator:  Requiem.  Fortunately for me, Skyline is a heck of a lot better that that flick, although that's not saying much. 

Eric (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake) Balfour goes to visit his friend (Donald Faison) in L.A.  with his girlfriend (Scottie Thompson) in tow.  That night, blue lights rain down on the city and it doesn’t take the group long to realize they're in the midst of an alien invasion.  They do their best to survive as the aliens fly around and try to take over their minds and bodies.

Skyline plays sort of like a west coast version of War of the Worlds.  That’s right.  You guessed it.  This is another one of those Hide-from-the-Blue-Glowing-Tentacle-Alien-Robot movie. 

Most of the action is confined to one building which helps conceal the tiny budget.  I also liked that Faison’s character has two girlfriends and no one makes a big deal about their polyamorous relationship.  That’s about the only novel touch though. 

All of this is watchable, although it’s never engrossing.  You’ve seen it all before, and done better, I might add.  The aliens themselves are competently done, but like the movie itself, they’re derivative and forgettable. 

The Strause Brothers are in the FX business, so we know they have a handle the alien stuff.  When it comes to the characters, they pretty much drop the ball.  At least they’re more likable than the ones found in AVP:  R.  Then again, that covers just about every other movie on the planet.  

READY PLAYER ONE (2018) ****

Ready Player One sounds like it can’t miss, but properly making it come alive on screen is infinitely trickier than you’d think.  Only someone with the gifted touch of Steven Spielberg could’ve pulled it off.  What’s intriguing about the film is that it features only a handful of Spielberg’s directorial touches as his style is largely invisible throughout most of the movie.  Instead, he just lets his imagination loose and invites the audience along for the ride.

In the near future, most of the world’s population is plugged into the Oasis, a Virtual Reality simulator.  Its creator (Mark Rylance) has placed three Easter Eggs in the game and players spend most of their time trying to find them.  Wade (Tye Sheridan) is a loner who thinks he has a line on at least one of the Eggs.  The evil CEO of tech conglomerate (Ben Mendelsohn) wants the Eggs for himself and will stop at nothing to get them.

Based on the novel by Ernie Cline, Ready Player One relies heavily on pop culture nostalgia and video game references.  Even if Spielberg wasn’t able to secure the rights to the scores of characters that pop up in cameos during the games, it would’ve still been a treat.  Having them all fighting side by side is just the icing on the cake.  

I could make a running list of cameos, but I would not dream of spoiling the fun.  Imagine Who Framed Roger Rabbit combined with The LEGO Movie and that should give you an idea of how the various characters are integrated into the narrative.  Some are relegated to mere background players.  Others get jaw-dropping, fist-pumping, and/or standing-ovation-worthy moments to shine.  

This is guaranteed to be the most freeze-framed movie of all time once it hits home video.  The massive battle scenes feature hundreds of your favorite characters from video games, movies, and TV shows.  I watched it once and enjoyed it for the acting, plot, and sheer spectacle of it all.  Now I want to go back and just spot all the cameos lurking in the background.

The young cast is great, but the credit really goes to Mendelsohn for his turn as the slimy corporate villain.  He gives off a distinct Paul Gleason vibe and it’s a wonder they just didn’t use him for Mendelsohn’s avatar within the Oasis.  Without a formidable flesh and blood menace in the “real” world, the stuff inside the Oasis wouldn’t mean nearly as much.

Spielberg has made a lot of “grown-up” movies lately.  This one finds him back in his wheelhouse doing what he does best.  Even though he’s getting up there in age, this very much feels like a young man’s movie, and I’m not saying that because of all the pop culture stuff.  There are sequences here that crackle like some of his earliest, best stuff.  It is without a doubt one of the best films of the year.

BAD MATCH (2017) ** ½

I hate the term “guilty pleasure”, because like Keith Richards always said, “If something gives you pleasure, you shouldn’t feel guilty”.  However, I do have an affinity for cheesy From Hell movies.  Nowadays, these kinds of films wind up as filler on the Lifetime Channel, but it’s good to know you can still find new ones while perusing Netflix.  

Bad Match plays like a version of Fatal Attraction that’s been updated for the Tinder generation.  Fatal Attraction was of course, the Girlfriend from Hell.  Bad Match is the Internet Hook-Up from Hell.

Harris (Jack Cutmore-Scott) is a serial dater who uses dating apps for quick hook-ups.  His latest conquest, Riley (Lili Simmons) winds up falling hard for him.  When he spurns her affections, she concocts an elaborate fake suicide to get back at him.  Soon after, Harris’ Twitter feed gets hacked, and he gets fired for sending obscene Tweets.  Harris thinks she’s gone too far, but when a bunch of child porn is downloaded onto his computer, he gets in trouble with the cops.  He then goes to stop Riley once and for all.

Bad Match is not a comedy, but it is often very funny.  It has a knowing sense of humor, or at the very least knows the plot ain’t Shakespeare.  Some of the dialogue is good for a laugh.  My favorite line was when Harris tries to sneak out of bed after sleeping with an internet conquest.  When she asks him why he’s leaving, he says, “Yeah, I have undiagnosed restless-leg syndrome…”

All of this is more or less fun for about an hour or so, but the third act where Harris tries to turn the tables on Riley just goes on far too long.  Maybe it would’ve worked if the big twist at the end wasn’t so predictable.  Since we know what’s coming at the end, it makes the conclusion feel more like a twisted shaggy dog story than anything else.

Cutmore-Scott gives a winning performance.  Even though his character is a player, he is often quite funny and charming, even when he’s being a complete dick.  He’s kind of like an asshole version of Chris Pratt.  Cutmore-Scott’s so charismatic that he makes Bad Match fun to watch, even when it starts heading into heavily cliched territory.  Simmons isn’t quite as good, but she goes through all the psycho motions well enough.  One thing is for sure, I wouldn’t mind seeing them reunited in a Craigslist-centered remake of Single White Female.

SATANIC (2016) **

Four friends go on a Satanic sightseeing tour on their way to Coachella.  They visit Sharon Tate’s house and even stay in a hotel room where a woman apparently committed suicide in a Satanic ritual.  When they follow a Satanic book store owner to his home, they witness him and his followers participating in a bizarre ritual.  They stop him from sacrificing a young girl and take her back to their hotel room.  That's when all hell breaks loose.  Literally.

The girl gets drunk, draws a pentagram on the wall, vomits and pees on the floor, and then slashes her throat.  This is a decent horror set piece, all things considered.  It's even scarier when you realize the teens definitely aren’t going to get their security deposit back.

Satanic is competently made.  The acting isn’t bad and there are a handful of mildly effective moments.  (I liked the black and white pre-title sequence of old timey and/or cartoon footage of the devil mixed in with a home movie of a Satanic wedding presided over by none other than Anton LeVay.)  That doesn’t disguise the fact that it feels more like a short film that was expanded to feature length than an actual movie.  The fact that the twist ending is like something out of a bad Twilight Zone episode cements that feeling.  (The scene where our heroes get the 411 on the Satanic chick from the book shop owner is priceless though.)

The cast, especially Sarah Hyland as the Final Girl, is certainly capable.  I just don’t think the budget was there to make the horror come to life.  It will be interesting to see what director Jeffrey Hunt could do with a little bit more money at his disposal.  

THIS NUDE WORLD (1933) **

This Nude World is considered the first nudist colony movie.  It follows the exploits that go on in nudist camps in New York, Paris, and Berlin.  To give the audience a little taste of the local color, we see a bit of the night life each city has to offer before going into the camps.  Then of course, we have to sit and listen to some old academic telling us about the health benefits of nudism before we finally see a little skin.

And I do mean a little.  Even though we see plenty of butts in the early going, no one is shown naked from the front during the first forty minutes or so.  (If a guy is shown from the front, it’s only because he’s wearing a pair of tiny shorts.)  Once we get to Berlin, the filmmakers finally start tossing in a lot of gratuitous boob shots.  It’s not enough to save the movie or anything, but it keeps it from being a total rip-off.

I did like how the narrator goes out of his way to stress these are normal everyday people.  On more than one occasion, he tells us the nudists come from all walks of life.  (“They’re doctors, lawyers, and stenographers!”)  Even though the filmmakers spend the first two-thirds of the movie jerking the audience around, the scenes of nude javelin, shotput, tightrope walking, and tug of war almost make it worth it. 

This Nude World isn't a great nudist movie.  You had to wait until the ‘50s and ‘60s before you get some truly great ones.  Despite that, it’s worth a look since it was the first of its kind.  You know, for purely historical purposes. 

AKA:  This Naked Age.  AKA:  Back to Nature.  AKA:  The Nudist World.  AKA:  This Naked World.

INVADERS OF THE LOST GOLD (1982) * ½

Invaders of the Lost Gold is a frustrating film, mostly because it gathers together a great cast and then doesn’t do anything with them.  If you ever wanted to see Stuart Whitman, Woody Strode, Edmund Purdom, Harold “Odd Job” Sakata, and Laura Gemser walk endlessly around the jungle while sweating and complaining, then you’re sure to love it.  For any other sane person, it’ll be tough going.

Whitman stars as an alcoholic adventurer who gets hired by an old rich dude to find a cache of hidden treasure.  They get a team together, much to the chagrin of Purdom, who knows that the more people you take on an expedition, the smaller the shares will be.  As the excursion wears on, people start dying off one by one.  That’ll help raise your bottom line!

Directed by Alan (Killer’s Moon) Birkinshaw, Invaders of the Lost Gold is a slow moving and boring affair.  The dull opening WWII flashback in which some Japanese soldiers hide the gold gets the movie off on the wrong foot.  It’s overlong and clunky and gets in the way of Whitman’s storyline.  The scenes of the team being put together are equally sluggish, and by the time they finally head off into the jungle, you’ll already be checking your watch.  The jungle sequences themselves are repetitive and aren’t too far removed from your typical jungle movie from the ‘30s. 

It’s not all bad though.  If you always wanted to see Woody Strode fight Odd Job from Goldfinger, then Invaders of the Lost Gold has you covered.  Gemser also gets a lengthy nude swim, which helps perk things up.  Not even that marvelous piece of filmmaking can save the movie.

AKA:  Horror Safari.  AKA:  Greed.

DAUGHTER OF DEATH (1983) ***

Director Paul Nicholas made this the same year he directed the immortal Chained Heat.  Hey, when you’re hot, you’re hot.  Like that film, it features the sexy Sybil Danning.  In fact, both movies would make a good double feature, even if they are as different as night and day.

Dr. Wilding (Tony Franciosa) has a precocious daughter named Julie (Isabelle Mejias) who loves freaking people out with her pet snake.  Instead of being interested in boys, she’d rather be out hunting with her daddy.  When she witnesses her mother raped and killed by an intruder, Julie doesn’t lift a finger to help her because she thinks this will be her chance to be with her daddy forever.  However, daddy moves his mistress (Danning) in almost immediately, which sets Julie down the path of revenge.

Nicholas gives us several sequences that play with our expectations and/or just plain gross us out.  The scene where Julie witnesses her mother’s death is truly shocking, mostly because it’s our first inkling of how twisted Julie (and the movie) can be.  The part where she plays a game of hide and seek with her new stepbrother and locks him in an empty refrigerator is genuinely suspenseful too, and the scene where Julie catches her father in bed with her stepmother and imagines it's her he's making love to is appropriately icky. 

Danning is great as the likeable stepmother who becomes the de facto Final Girl in the end.  Not only does she deliver a strong performance, she also gets a terrific topless scene.  Franciosa does a fine job as well as Julie’s clueless father.  Mejias makes for a good psycho too.  A Killer Kid movie is only as good as its Killer Kid and Mejias is a memorable one.

For an hour or so, Nicholas creates a gonzo anything-goes atmosphere that puts you on the edge of your seat.  Once Julie tracks down the rapist who killed her mother and hires him to knock off her stepmother, things start to get a bit farfetched.  The final reel is so entertaining that it makes up for some of the lapses in the third act.

Nicholas didn’t do a whole lot after ’83.  He only directed three movies after that sterling year, his last being Luckytown in 2000.  All I’ve got to say is come back, Paul.  We miss you.

AKA:  Julie Darling.  AKA:  Bad Blood.  AKA:  Julie.