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user\n\"Ashes of Time\" was an audacious project but ended up being a pretentious movie. This film is a good example of how to tell a simple story in a complex manner. The plot of \"Ashes of Time\" is fairly simple and comes down to two words: \"love triangle\". Because of those \"love triangles\" crossing stories, jealousy, hate and love are the main dynamics displayed by the characters. The narrative part is seen through Ou-yang Feng's eyes (Leslie Cheung). Ou-yang Feng lives in the desert, where he acts as middleman to various swordsmen and becomes the tool of Destiny through which vengeance is achieved. Unfortunately \"Ashes of Time\" fails in telling these simple stories of love and hate. Wong Kar-wai lost himself driven by a desire to make each frame of the film a painting and an aesthetic experience. In fact beside the casting of beautiful actors (men and women) everything else is a failure in this movie. Dialogs are minimalists and not original at all. Picture's quality is very much unequal, the editing is one of the worst ever seen (at least by me) in the \"swordplay\" genre and finally the filming of the rare sword fight is very confusing and unappealing. Even the attempt of building artistic scenes is not always achieved: the so call erotic \"women on a horse\" scene is ridiculous, not erotic and useless. Wong Kar-wai wanted to deliver 100 minutes of pure aesthetic experience and forgot that a film is first about how a plot is told. By forgetting that he delivers an awkward movie that doesn't even fulfill its artistic objective.
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user\nDisclaimer: During my ventures into foreign cinema, I have taken a liking to a wide variety of movies that span different genres that include horror, action, drama, comedy, and romance, to name a few. Thus, I have enjoyed the thoughtful, serious tone of dramas as well as the mindless, popcorn fun of action films. With a wide array of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean movies under my belt, I am confident in my ability to recognize bright spots in movies to appreciate and complement. Unfortunately, Ashes of Time has nothing to recognize. It is one of the worst Chinese movies I have ever seen.
To start off, this overrated swordplay epic showcases the infamous \"slideshow\" action sequence throughout, which is nothing more than an ultra-cheap and pathetic form of action choreography. One simply needs to show a series of close-up pictures of grimising faces, swords, legs and/or arms, and then a dead body. Bravissimo! You now have an action sequence for Ashes of Time. The problem lies not only in its poor quality but also in the fact that the scenes are so chaotic and disjointed that the viewer has no idea what the hell is going on.
The dramatic element of this film is nonexistent, as it relies on the characters telling the viewer that they love someone or hate someone instead of actually developing and showing such elements on screen, which renders all characters generic and colorless, leaving the viewer completely indifferent to their actions. In fact, the storyline itself is an absolute disaster, introducing way too many characters way too quickly with way too many plot devices. Plot complexities in films can be used very advantageously (i.e., A Tale of Two Sisters), but Ashes of Time becomes exploitative trash when it does nothing more than convolute a very simple plot for no apparently good reason.
In fact, this entire movie acts like a series of smokescreens to cover up its deficiencies. Horrible action choreography is covered up by \"slideshow\" tricks and chaotic camera movements. Non-existent character development is covered up by the characters overtly saying how they feel. And a thoughtless storyline is covered up by confusing the viewer with convolution.
As if this weren't bad enough, this movie was extremely boring, seeming more like 150 minutes instead of the actual 95.
Rating = A rarely given 0/5 Stars.
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user\nThe direction by Wong is perhaps the all time worst in film history I've ever seen. This film makes my all time worst film of 2000, Dungeons and Dragons by Courtney Soloman looked like an Oscar winner. The flaws in this movie is beyond explanation. The biggest one is the lack of depth. Every scene does not develop fully as if the editing room doesn't know how to do their job correctly. Its a shame that with such an all-star cast of talents and a famous popular traditional story can be destroyed by this lack of vision.
I am so disgusted and hope that some great director like John Woo or Ang Lee, decide to remake this film and do some justice. I'm not even sure if I can rate 0/10??
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user\nYour ability to enjoy The Ashes of Time may depend on our expectations before stepping into the theater. Even its most strident supporters seem to agree that audiences can be split right up the middle in their appreciation of this unique film.
Unlike most HK actioners, the battle scenes are curiously kept at a distance. When they do happen, they're rendered in a jerky style in which it's difficult to make out exactly what's occurring on screen. The dramatic scenes can be extravagantly beautiful, with the of Maggie Cheung, Brigitte Lin, and a roll-call of HK's top acting talent chewing up the scenery. As with some of Wong Kar-wai's early work, the dialog could be more precise.
In short, The Ashes of Time requires a forgiving attitude. Released around the same time as Wong Kar-wai's spectacularly successful Chungking Express, it's clear that the director isn't as confident working with the elements of the martial arts film. Anyone looking for tense action is likely to be disappointed. But those intrigued by the director's aesthetic will likely find this a unique experience at the very least.
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user\nThe trailers for this movie promised and this movie delivered exactly what was promised: Good campy fun with lots of very good looking naked broads! If you were expecting a major Hollywood movie with major stars, stellar budgets, and MPAA tamed money shots, you will be *very* disappointed.
However, if you are a fan of the old \"B\" movies with unknown, but very good looking young stars that act amazingly well, given the material, some hokey, but surprisingly well done special effects, and very tight naked nubile bodies, this movie is almost heaven!
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user\nThis is one of those movies where the acting, set location, direction, and effects were so bad you need to rent a copy get 5 or 6 buddies, a keg of beer, sit down and watch it. To borrow from the late Douglas Adams, \"Watching this movie will be like having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon... wrapped around a large gold brick.\".
What is wrong? Everything. British actors posing as Americans, there have been many that can pull it off like Bob Hoskins but he isn't in this one. It wasn't even necessary to choose North America as a location why not say it took place in England or something? The director seemed to like taking shots of girls tits and asses more than actually coming up with some kind of character motivation. So at this point you drunken buddies will be saying, \"ALL RIGHT! Another T&A shot!\". There isn't much dialog so feel free to skip off to the kitchen and make those sandwiches. What did I like about this movie? After my friends passed out, I managed to collect $185 off of them and told them they spent it at the strip bar after we finished watching the awful movie.
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user\nI've read other hacks' reviews of this movie, and while it certainly isn't the best movie ever made in the sci-fi / horror genre, it isn't THAT bad if you accept it for what it is - low-budget, b-movie fare that (shall we say) \"borrows heavily\" from the likes of 'Alien' (nasty extraterrestrial monster that cocoons its victims) 'Species' (gorgeous and confused \"space girl\") and 'Incubus' (the beastie-breeding-with-captive-girls angle). This is one seriously cheesy movie, and the whole thing was obviously done on a shoestring budget, although the alien isn't too bad (I've seen far less convincing men-in-rubber-suits at any rate). None of the acting is Oscar material and the Isle Of Man doesn't really double for Boston Massachussetts very convincingly. The plot is fairly predictable too and the premise that an alien craft would travel squillions of miles and crash land smack bang in the middle of an all-girls college campus - thus conveniently providing a rich source of perfect breeding victims - is utterly laughable. However, the movie does have its suspenseful moments, there's a few helpings of nudity and semi-nudity and the film does feature one of the few movie appearances by the beautiful and tragic model / actress Kadamba Simmons (as the \"Space Girl\") who, at the age of only 24, was murdered in London by her jealous boyfriend shortly after making this film.
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user\nOf all the movies in the history of movies I can't imagine someone sitting down and saying, I want to spend X amount of dollars (or pounds sterling) to remake that flawed classic film called \"Breeders.\" Lots of stories have been turned into films about meteors coming to Earth with something sinister lurking inside. Why not put your money into making a spectacular 3D remake of \"It Came from Outer Space\" instead? Why look for a dingy nudie flick that existed only for the purpose of showing off a rubbery set of monsters and some naked coeds? Was the script for the 1986 version of \"Breeders\" so inspiring that these producers felt it had to be done again and this time done correctly? When you come down to it, the only reason this film exists is to show off Britcom cutie pie Samantha Janus. But if you're gonna make a skin flick and exploit Sam Janus in it, you'd better have her more naked than this and naked more often than this if you want to succeed.
Meteor lands ... monster escapes ... coeds duff their clothes ... monster eats people ... and another \"what if?\" ending ensues.
Honestly, I never thought I would ever recommend the original \"Breeders\" over any other film but this would be the one to come in 2nd Place to it.
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user\nDire beyond belief. Obviously set on the Isle of Man masquerading as the US - very badly - and full of cut-rate British actors who can't do American accents. A monster that looks like an unarticulated promotional cut-out for Alien from a movie store, with the most inflexible feet ever seen. Girls in the shower, undressing, catfighting, blah, blah, blah. You get the idea. Don't watch it, run away, hide, AVOID.
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user\nImagine the most cliche ridden b-movie horror plot you can. Add more plot holes than plot. Have it scripted by a 10 year old. Have the acting done by A-Level drama students faking really bad US accents (in the Isle of Man!) Add monster special effects that the lovers of B&W Dr Who shows will appreciate. Result: duff film. Throw in Samantha Janus taking her clothes off (make a point of this on the cover) and you'll probably sell enough copies to make a profit anyway!
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user\nAfter a meteorite lands in \"Boston\" (really somewhere in the Isle of Man), a hideous, fanged alien monster is released and is on the loose in a local girl's school, causing mayhem and turning the students into zombie-like creatures. This film is apparently a loose (and I stress loose) remake of the 1986 film with the same name, as it features the same monster but a different plot. Both films are terrible, but to the credit of the 1986 version, it was watchable. This isn't. Let's start with all the problemsthe acting, especially from the lead professor, was very, very bad. This film is supposed to take place in Boston (we know this because the film makers had the ingenious idea of putting \"Boston police\" or \"Boston gas company\" on everything), yet everyone seems to have rather muddled British accents (At least they didn't try using Boston accents, thank God). The script is a big flawed mess. The best example of how dumb the writing is when it's established that you can turn the zombie-students back into humans by removing a necklace containing a piece of the meteorite. Is that what our brave heroes do? No, they run around SHOOTING the zombie-students instead. Nice. Director Paul Matthews, who also wrote/directed the weak 1995 monster movie \"Grim\", clearly doesn't know how to pace his films. The movie is terribly boring in places. The lighting is awful. The film looks cheap and bland. One of the most disappointing aspects is the lack of notable gore. 99% of the death scenes involve the creature popping out of a dark corner and dragging someone away, while we hear they're \"horrified\" screams off in the distance. This convention never worked well in the past, and certainly doesn't work here. The visual effects were AWFUL. The CG opening sequence in space looked like it could have been created on Microsoft Slideshow for God's sake! The \"explosion\" of the Gas tanks at the end was just as awful. Okay, I like to consider myself a fair critic, so I'll give credit where credit's due--the creature effects were actually pretty cool. Gotta love those close-ups of slimy, drooling teeth!
To sum the film up, \"Breeders\" is a terrible, cheaply made horror movie that should be avoided like the Ebola virus. Not recommended.
1.5/10.
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user\nThis was a pathetic movie. The Alien was decent, but the movie itself gave a new meaning to pitiful. The plot is something that's been done over and over again! However, this one does it the worst! The acting was c**p, the scenes were often too dark to get what was going on. No one developed any concern for the main character. The movie was far too slow paced, and the murder scenes that there were were foolishly crafted and ended up looking no more interesting than the rest of the movie. There are some movies which \"suck\" but can still be enjoyed because of there total outrageousness, but this doesn't even have that!! Whoever made this film thought that they could make something good and they failed miserably. There is nothing this movie has to offer except a headache. Avoid it!
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user\nCollege students (who are actually in their late 20's) on campus in Boston (which looks strangely like the Isle Of Man) are menaced by a fierce monster (assembled during a Blue Peter episode). The new teacher must save the day (Even though he is really... Oh, who cares?)
I'll start with the positives... there is a nice shot of Eastenders new gal Samantha Janus's can in the obligatory campus shower scene with her best mate Katy Lawrence. A bit of side trivia: Katy was hired when she arrived at auditions with her sister, just as moral support to her sibling but ended up landing a part. Oh, joy. Picked from obscurity to... flash her pert buttocks in a meaningless scene added for titillation, then getting killed 30 minutes in for her troubles. Her latest (and only other credited role) is as Probationary Nurse #5 in Atonement. I wonder if she snuck a look at Keira Knightly (if extras and stars are allowed to mix) and wondered: where did it all go wrong?!
I'll give a few hints Katy: If all the other British cast members are asked to speak with American accents in a doomed attempt at mass-marketing, and the only person who can manage it is the B-movie veteran USA native Todd Jensen, you know you're in trouble. If you look at your wage slip and it'll only just about cover your lunch and your bus ride home, you ain't starring in a movie with a trillion dollar budget. If the premiere is attended by loads of family members of the fourth assistant director and provokes gales of laughter when the Stickyback tape monster rampages through the sewers, it should dawn on you that this isn't exactly Alien. Or even a Critters IV, come to think of it. So Katy, in your next life (I'm a Buddhist, you see) perhaps you'll be a bit more selective in your choice of debut feature rather than impulsively jumping at the first pile of crap that heads your way. Flashing skin in your first movie does not guarantee long lasting success. Unless you're Sylvester Stallone. And he had the script to Rocky to back him up.
To all intents and purposes this is as 0/10 a movie as I've ever seen. However, for sheer unintentional laughs and pure camp value, it gets a 1. Well done ;)
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user\nJust to let everyone know, this is possibly the WORST movie I have ever seen, and I've seen pretty much everything. If you're thinking of renting it, DON'T!!! It's not worth the cardboard container that it came in....
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user\nI was shocked there were 18 pages of good reviews. This has to be one of the worst movies especially considering it was recommended. Must admit that comedies are not my favorite genre, but this movie made it worst in that it tried so hard to be clever that it made me squirm to watch it.
The concept of the movie is comparable to audition week on American Idol. You watch because people are so blind to their shortcomings. But we knew this movie didn't have bad actors. So how funny would it be to have good singers try to convince they shouldn't get anywhere near an American Idol tryout? It would be pointless as this movie was.
The use of improv is over-rated. We've all been in that setting where a group of friends get on a roll and everyone is cracking up with tears in the their eyes. I feel that is improv. Improv can't be turned on just because the camera is rolling as this film proves. If you like that Drew Carey hosted show of improv, you'll probably like this film.
Overall the jokes were poor, the improv was sophomoric, and the over-acting by Guest and company was campy...and those are my compliments of this drivel. If a guy playing a trumpet AND the kettle drum at the same time is funny to you, fine. For me, I prefer more heady stuff like \"I Love Lucy\" or \"Hee-Haw\".
But remember, I think SNL lost its humor in the 1980's, so maybe you'll like this G-rated humor. I kept waiting for a person to identify himself as the zoo keeper and then tell us there was no zoo in town. That's the humor you can expect.
My only wish was that I could give this a minus rating.
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user\nGrosse Pointe Blank was really quite a below average film. Its hit man theme is very dry and is more like a romantic comedy than a hit man thriller. The acting is very normal. The performances are extremely embarrassing at times with many characters seeming very 'eccentric' and that really annoyed me. The whole reunion and the 'Wow, I haven't seen you in 10 years!' element is extremely cheesy and many scenes just drag on, especially nearer the end when they are at the actual reunion party and the characters are going through each of their former classmates one by one greeting them. It just all seemed very tacky, pointless and was poorly executed.
Dan Akroyd's role as a 'rival' assassin is very sparse. He only seems to appear once at the very beginning and right at the very end in a 'final show down' which is hugely hyped up but doesn't deliver at all.
The soundtrack is also very mediocre. The bulk of the songs that are in this film are straight out of the 1980's and with the exception of two or three, are very bad. Hearing duff songs over quite a duff film just adds to the negativity that surrounds this film.
I could go on and on about how little things were annoying and were just very bad such as the very few action sequences that came and went very quickly, the lack of character development and how poorly the whole thing was constructed in that department, the way that half the time you forget that Cusak's character is even a hit man at all as the element is so non-existent.
Even the way the comedy thinks it's funny; but it isn't. I didn't laugh once during this movie. Sure, maybe I smirked now and again but my only REAL feel good point was when I realised the movie was nearly over!
Please, don't waste your time with 'Grosse Pointe Blank' despite the relatively high (but badly incorrect) IMDb rating. I've seen films that are better than this film that have lower rating on this site which tells you that there ARE better films out there. Just don't bother with this one.
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user\nIt seems at least vaguely possible that this movie provided a bit of inspiration for \"The Sopranos,\" as its main character, Martin Blank (John Cusack) is a hit man who has so many issues from his past and his profession that he's in therapy trying to deal with it all. Everything finally comes to a head at his 10-year high school reunion. The problem was that by the time Blank got to the reunion I had stopped caring. Frankly, I found this movie a drag from start to finish.
It had potential. There was a reasonably good cast, headed by Cusack and Dan Aykroyd, playing Grocer, his arch-rival in the hit-man business, along with Minnie Driver as Debi, Blank's high school sweetheart who he stood up on prom night, and a limited role for Alan Arkin as Dr. Oatman, Blank's psychologist. That fairly talented cast never really seemed to come together, though. The drama lacked intensity and the comedy lacked real humour. What I thought had the most potential to be a comedic storyline was Grocer's proposal for a hit man's union, but aside from becoming a bit of a running joke, the idea never really got developed. As for the romance, one wondered why Debi would even think of letting this guy back into her life.
There were a handful of chuckles, but nothing really caught me and held me and I spent most of the movie wondering whether this thing was ever going to start to click. It never did - not for me, at least. 2/10
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user\nThe title doesn't make much sense to me. I'm not sure what door in the movie shouldn't have been opened.
The movie starts uneventfully, with a conversation between a man and a woman in a room that looks like a richly furnished train car, complete with the sound of the train traveling. In fact, the man's house is a train car, and he has a cassette of train sounds. The woman leaves, and calls a young woman. The young woman tells her boyfriend, a doctor, that she's been told her grandmother is ill, and she needs to return to her home town. She hasn't been there in thirteen years.
Flash back to thirteen years ago. A shadowy figure enters a house. He caresses a sleeping young girl, then goes into another room and stabs the girl's mother. The girl wakes up and enters her mother's room and finds her dead with a knife in her. She screams, and an arm comes out of nowhere and claps a hand over her mouth. She looks up in fear. That early scene in the movie of the killer muffling her scream, and the girl's look is one of the few effective shots in the movie.
It doesn't have much going for it in the visuals department. Occasionally there's some strange use of sound, and there's some weird lighting in an attic scene where many of the panes of glass are red and blue.
Back to the present day. The young woman arrives in her grandmother's house. An old doctor is there, who she doesn't trust, along with the man from the opening scene \"Judge\" and Kearn, the town's museum operator. She doesn't trust any of them, and it's true they don't inspire any trust. She's rather crabby throughout the whole movie. She wants to check her grandmother into a hospital. The men in the town want her house, and the museum operator wants the things in it (his museum is already filled with many of the grandmother's things). Inexplicably, the woman wants to keep the house.
The young woman starts getting phone calls from a man speaking in a sinister whisper. He makes various threats, and wants her to do things to arouse him. Such scenes recur often. Unfortunately, there are so few characters in the movie, that the possibilities of who it could be are limited. Worse still, we see right from the beginning who is making the phone calls. So, while the young woman doesn't know (even though the caller occasionally drops into his normal voice), the audience always knows: no suspense. Each call rattles her more and more.
The ending was unexpected for me, so maybe gets points for not going with the obvious, but I'm not sure I cared for it.
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user\nI find it disconcerting that in an era when satisfying and fulfilling spirituality is unknown and we are all scattered across the whole spectrum of possible beliefs, that a charlatan and fraud of Gurdjieff's caliber (as a charlatan, he is exceptional; there is no denying he had a special gift. It's a pity he misused it, though, for the aggrandizement of his wounded ego, feeding on the adulation of unwary sheep who were at his beck and call and in awe of him) can inspire such extreme adherence and credulity. This movie presents an idealized version of Gurdjieff's own largely fictional and fantastic account of his formation and \"awakening\" (which I would rather describe as his discovery of how much he could sway the minds and wills of certain types of sadly disoriented people). See it, if you dare to have a disagreeable eye-opening about how sadly deprived we are of true religious leaders, to the extent that a clown like Gurdjieff could inspire such devotion - and be careful to have your blood pressure medicine at hand if you are one of those who still hope for a healthy religion to emerge from the ruins of Christianity, as a supreme example of cinematography at the entire service of the premises and pretenses of a dysfunctional cult.
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user\nOh, Yawn. Not another chick flick where the men are all pigs and the women will get even for the abuse they suffered. The only difference is that, in this film, everybody's a pig or has mush for brains. I hated this film for the moral issue of why it's right to send a man to prison for life for a murder he didn't commit. Is that a more immoral act than his abuse and deviousness. This movie shows all the situational ethics of bad writing. I saw it on the CBC's \"Best of Britain\" series. If this is Britain's best, no wonder the British film industry is in trouble.
The only bright spot in this film was David Tennant, He plays his character as so despicable that I'm likely to spit on the next person who speaks with a Scottish accent. Kate Ashfield tries to play the victim but comes off in the end as immorally devious as David Tennant's character. They deserve each other.
In the mush for brains category are the parents who see nothing wrong with the obviously psychotic Brendan. English policemen are made out to be so incompetent that they're unfit to give out traffic tickets. The British Policeman's Union should sue the makers of this film for defamation.
This film isn't worth the electricity it takes to run your DVD to watch it.
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user\nI haven't read the book of this and based on this adaptation, will not bother. I hated every character in this show - Miranda was slutty, selfish and mumbled miserably through the appalling dialogue, her sister was a total wimp, and this was the worst depiction of manic-depression I have ever seen. I have a degree in Psychology, and this was not accurate. In fact, until it was mentioned, I did not realise Troy was supposed to be bipolar - I thought he was a normal, slightly grumpy teenager.
The only saving grace in this stupid show was David Tennant, whose brilliantly psychotic performance was the only thing that got me to watch the second half.
Clearly the writers and producers of this show have not done any research - Troy's mental problems are not remotely accurate, nor are the forensics involved in the \"twist\" ending (and if you did not spot that a mile off, you are a big ole dummy!)
Utter garbage.
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user\nOK, this 'horror' film was meant to be a joke, right? Please tell me it was supposed to be a joke, then I'll understand.
A big cawing bird with giant claws - or one claw, anyway - swoops down on unsuspecting folks on the ground and gobbles them up. Mara Corday and Jeff Morrow sufficiently overact in order to keep things interesting, but at least you'll enjoy a hearty snicker when you see the 'monster'. It looks like a cross between a deranged chicken and Mortimer Snerd.
Either director Fred Sears just made this picture in a hurry and knew the bird looked utterly ridiculous, or he really thought his film and creature were genuinely frightening. I prefer to think - and hope - it was the former.
P.S. The bird needs a haircut.
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user\nI love old \"monster movies\" for the pure camp value. This one does not disappoint if you find that sort of thing amusing.
The acting is pure 1950s stilted crap. You do get used to it when you've seen enough of these... the dialogue is very silly and ultimately forgettable. You're just there for the giant bird.
The \"science\" in this movie is hilarious. A monstrous otherworldly avian that can manipulate anti-matter... intent on wreaking havoc and eating people... an alien who has come to Earth to nest. Some of the best scenes in the movie (that don't have the bird in them) include the \"scientists\" explaining what is going on.
A lot has been said about the ridiculous bird marionette. It looks like a new baby bird... bald and ugly with ruffled feathers. It even caws like a hungry, angry fledgling. However, the bird scared the crap out of my three year old, who had big scary bird nightmares for the evening. It's a bit creepy.
I was very sad about the scene where they shoot the egg. (Somehow the egg is not protected by an antimatter shield.) But I'm a bird lover, what can I say?
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user\nPilot Mitch MacAfee (Jeff Morrow) sees a UFO while test flying a plane--but nothing shows up on radar. Then planes and ships start disappearing and reports of a UFO increase. It turns out it's a giant monster bird that is attacking and killing. But what is it and why is it here?
This has all the right elements for a classic. It has an actually pretty entertaining script--I was never really bored. The acting is good (for a 1950s monster movie). Morrow doesn't overdo the macho hero act and Mara Corday is quite good as the requisite female love interest. She's also strong and takes care of herself--even though she IS off getting food and coffee for everyone all during the movie. The problem here is the monster. Dear God--it's TERRIBLE! It looks like a deranged turkey! It has a long neck, a hilariously stupid BEAK, some teeth, a few strands of hair on its head and claws. And--oh yes--it squawks! Not roaring--squawking! The actors had no idea what it looked like--it was added after production. Actors Morrow and Corday were horrified when they finally saw it in a theatre. Morrow said his audience burst out laughing and he left the theatre quickly before the movie ended! Producer Sam Katzman was responsible for this. He wanted to save money and gave the world the stupidest monster ever. And you can SEE the wires moving it too! This gets 4 stars only because Morrow and Corday are so good and the script is well done. It gets no stars for the pathetic monster--wait till you see it attack what is obviously a toy train! Worth a look if you're a horror fan to see what has to be the stupidest monster ever.
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user\nThis is almost Ed Wood territory. Yeah, that ridiculous wreck of a flying monster looks like a cross between a turkey buzzard and a bad day at the dentist's office. And that sound effect screech makes fingernails across a blackboard sound like Mozart. And why The Giant Claw when the goofy critter gobbles its victims with a mechanical jaw. We get big close-ups of the ugly chicken foot, but nothing more. I guess the producers thought a more appropriately titled Big Mouth might suggest a Jerry Lewis comedy. And speaking of comedies, all that \"anti-matter\" gobbledy-gook is funnier than anything in a Lewis movie. I guess the scripters were stuck for a reason why an ordinary duck hunter couldn't take care of a 1950's flying menace, so they concocted a real whopper-- anti-matter from another galaxy. Yup, this fugitive from KFC is supposed to have flown in from another galaxy behind a shield of anti- matter as explained in excruciating detail by one of the film's resident geniuses. In this case, it's Jeff Morrow a pilot who I gather in his off-hours advises Einstein on the secrets of the universe.
Unfortunately, it's also Morrow who keeps the ridiculous proceedings out of the bad-movie Hall of Shame since he actually delivers his lines with a straight face. What's more, he even sounds as if he believes them. This is a movie acting triumph of the first order. To heck with the Oscars, Morrow deserves a combat medal for performing above and beyond the call of duty under the most extreme bad movie circumstances. Watch leading lady Corday, then you can gauge his fortitude under fire. She looks like she just woke up inside a bad dream and maybe if she stands stock-still, no one will notice her. I barely did. Oh well, the first time I saw this drive-in disaster was through a beery haze in the back row of what's now a housing development. I should have learned my lesson and broken out another 12-pack this second time around.
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user\nSpreading panic from Broadway to Bombay, 1957's The Giant Claw boasts perhaps the ultimate flying monster in movie history. Described by one terrified Quebecois witness as \"La Carcagne  she's de devil in de storm with de face of de wolf and de body of de woman with wings, bigger than I can tell,\" it doesn't say much for Canadian women since when we finally see it in focus it's a cross between an overgrown buzzard, a chickenhawk and Gonzo the Great. But this isn't just any old giant turkey  impervious to rockets, invisible to radar and with a taste for swallowing parachutists whole and pecking away at the United Nations Building, it's an extraterrestrial giant turkey from an anti-matter galaxy millions of miles from Earth that's come here to build a nest: \"No other explanation is possible.\" Luckily for humanity Jeff Morrow, test pilot and \"chief cook and bottle washer in a one-man birdwatching society,\" invents a weapon to disable its impenetrable shield so they can hit it with everything but the kitchen sink  but don't worry: Morris Ankrum's general assures him \"We've got kitchen sinks to spare, son.\"  just in time for a last-minute clinch with co-star Mara Corday. Some of the dialogue has dated rather unfortunately  \"I admire your spunk, and you keep climbing on our backs whenever we've messed up\"  and strangely enough it's nowhere near as much fun as a film with a giant flying turkey should be, but the beast itself is such a truly memorable creation for all the wrong reasons that it's hard to dislike even if you are liking it for all the wrong reasons. And full marks to the cast for delivering gem after gem of direlogue with a straight face: \"Honest to Pete, I'll never call my mother-in-law an old crow again!,\" \"The only trouble is that the last time I talked to a chaplain there wasn't any telephone line to the one and only place where we can get the kind of help we need\" and the immortal \"There it is now, attacking the United Nations Building!\"
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user\nThis one's as cheesy as they come  the concept of a massive and indestructible extraterrestrial bird is already too loopy for words, but wait till you get a load of the goofy creature as it appears on screen! I tell you I laughed so hard through this thing that I missed out on some of the expository dialogue  then again, the latter is often so heavy on scientific jargon and laws of Physics and such (at which I've never been any good, in spite of my love of sci-fi movies) that it didn't really matter anyway! The bird  first depicted as a mere blurred form whizzing through the skies but subsequently shown in all its dopey glory  is so sublimely silly that it wouldn't be amiss in a Looney Tunes cartoon (witness the series of intermittently-taken photographs that start with the creature in the distance and end on a side-splitting extreme close-up of its face)!
Director Sears had fared much better with his other film about UFOs, the fine EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS (1956)  with special effects provided by a master, Ray Harryhausen (speaking of which, I've just given away my copy of the latter in anticipation of acquiring Columbia's recently-released SE DVD); also, it seems to me that some of the footage illustrating the bird's rampage in New York here were lifted from the destruction of Washington seen in that earlier sci-fi classic! Again, the leads are played by genre regulars  namely Jeff Morrow (from THIS ISLAND EARTH [1955]) and Mara Corday (from TARANTULA [1955]); as with the afore-mentioned FLYING SAUCERS, these titles are highly-regarded and beloved by fans  consequently, they are vastly superior to this lamentable addition to the alien/monster animal cycle prevalent during the sci-fi heyday and beyond (incidentally, other flying menaces were featured in THE FLYING SERPENT [1946], which I haven't watched, and Larry Cohen's tongue-in-cheek updating of same in Q: THE WINGED SERPENT [1982]).
Unfortunately, THE GIANT CLAW can't even rise to a decent climax  which is so rushed as to be \"a wash-out\", to quote a jet pilot from the film itself whose assault with rockets on the bird proves completely ineffective (that is, before Morrow realizes that it's shielded by an invisible barrier and then has to figure out a way how to be able to penetrate it). Ultimately, apart from the intractable (and frankly tedious) technical asides, one gets a feeling of \"so bad, it's good\" watching this: after all, it only lasts for 74 minutes  and, in any case, the bird is such an unforgettably daft creation as to put a huge smile on your face every time it turns up!
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user\nPersonally, I have no problem with the acting, nor the script. I do have a problem with the giant bird. It was simply AWFUL. Plain and simple.
One's first impulse is the roll around laughing when one sees it. What were they thinking!? Budget be damned. The monster bird was a monstrous joke.
Of course, in my opinion if the producers could obtain actors such as Ankrum, Corday and Morrow, then they would have the special effect people come up with a much better beast. Oh well. What is done is done. This will be the case of the eternal joke on them that was unintended.
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user\nLargely forgettable monster film from the 50s features truly awful special effects -- the \"claw\" in question is a giant puppet that would make Jim Henson want to kill himself. I just saw the movie last Thursday and I can't even tell you who was in it. That's a bad sign. I'm told that when the movie premiered audiences laughed it off the screen.... and that was in the 50s when standards in special effects were much lower. Basically I should have walked out of the theater as soon as the words \"produced by Sam Katzman\" came on the screen if I knew what was good for me, but then I sat through \"Harum Scarum\" also so I guess I deserve it.
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user\nThis is one awful movie!! Some people told me that it was not that bad actually but I sure disagree! The monster is amazingly cheap (and funny) looking but this is something we all knew I guess. In addition to that, the dialogs are awful and the writing is just plain terrible.
As bad as it is, this movie as the quality of being entertaining. Not always for the good reasons but it's a good \"so bad that it's fun\" flick.
By the way, there's no such thing as \"La Castagne\". According to a secondary character in the film named Pierre (described in the movie as a French Canadian), there's a legend among French Canadians about a giant bird know as \"La Castagne\". As a French Canadian myself, I can assure you that I never heard of such a legend. It sure made me laugh though... :))
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user\nI wish I could have voted this movie a ten, it's that funny. If they had intended for it to be that funny I would have given it a ten. I have to give it a 1, but it's the funniest darn 1 you'll ever want to watch. See the giant blur flash across the screen! Where did it come from? What is it? It flies, it terrifies, it's electrifying, it's on strings! This bird has real personality. I was about ten when I saw it for the first time, and when Big Bird appeared on Sesame Street, I was sure they were one and the same!
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user\nI saw this movie when I was about 12 when it came out. I recall the scariest scene was the big bird eating men dangling helplessly from parachutes right out of the air. The horror. The horror.
As a young kid going to these cheesy B films on Saturday afternoons, I still was tired of the formula for these monster type movies that usually included the hero, a beautiful woman who might be the daughter of a professor and a happy resolution when the monster died in the end. I didn't care much for the romantic angle as a 12 year old and the predictable plots. I love them now for the unintentional humor.
But, about a year or so later, I saw Psycho when it came out and I loved that the star, Janet Leigh, was bumped off early in the film. I sat up and took notice at that point. Since screenwriters are making up the story, make it up to be as scary as possible and not from a well-worn formula. There are no rules.
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user\nThe Giant Claw is in fierce competition with films like, 'Robot Monster' and 'Plan 9 From Outer Space' for worst film of all time. A phony looking giant vulture attacks 'Lionel Trains' in this completely unconscious film. The script is so bad that everything the characters say to one another is ridiculous. It's no wonder that this film is a prime target in the movie, \"It Came From Hollywood,\" where this gem is hammered for the line, 'A Bird As Big As A Battleship', with gleeful, endless needling. The line pops up relentlessly through the course of the film, so there's no escaping it. There are several shots from, 'The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms' and 'Earth vs. The Flying Saucers' among other sci-fi films from the 50's to beef up the scraggly vulture's attacks. At one point the big vulture is responsible for a few deaths, so the military puts the entire world under martial law and no one is allowed to go out of their homes. Of course, the huge buzzard is mainly concerned with pursuing the stars of this classic, Jeff Morrow & Mara Corday, wherever they might be. Yet the director is so lame that he doesn't even provide for a few honey shots of pretty Mara in a decent dress and black heels for a little relief from the tedium of this zero star thriller. That's the second time this blunder has been made. In 'Tarantula', Mara Corday struts around in hot dresses for the whole film, but is relegated to pants throughout, 'The Giant Scorpion'. The budget for this film must have been not more than thirty or forty thousand dollars and I doubt whether Morrow or Corday got more than three thousand to make it. It looks like the whole thing was shot right out of somebody's garage.
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user\nBefore we start, may I say I hope you've already eaten when you're reading this. Why? Because, after I'd seen this film for the first time, the bird's look and sound made me want to eat chicken after the words 'The End' had appeared on the screen. So don't say you weren't warned.
Fred Sears might have directed \"Earth vs. the Flying Saucers\" (an okay film and one of the bigger examples for Tim Burton's \"Mars Attacks\"), but \"The Giant Claw\" is not that giant a film. Yes, it's a prehistoric monster that flies in the air, attacks planes and cities and occasionally treats itself to a man on a parachute. The beast is giant except in the scenes where it's considerably smaller, but who needs consistent proportions in a movie? Scary? It could have been, but not if the plot is hopelessly silly and the monster looks like like a puppet that ran away from Sesame Street.
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