empathielabs/imdb_v0 huggingface dataset:
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user\nAfter seeing the low-budget shittier versions of the \"Universal Soldier\" franchise, I hoped and prayed that Van Damme reprised his role as Luc Devoreaux in a second Unisol movie. Well, it seemed this prayer was answered, but not the way I hoped. Universial Soldier 2 is just intense as poetry reading at your local library. No, even that would be more intriguing . The fight sequences are top-notch, Bruce Lee quality, which is the only redeeming factor in this entire pathetic excuse for a motion picture. That and having former WCW tough-guy legend \"Goldberg\" playing the villain. However, placing Goldberg as Seth's sidekick lieutenant would've been better.
We offended me the most was the setting of the movie itself. It's like some film school students slapped it together. The plot holes are that bigger than Kanye West's ego is what really did this movie in. For example: Luc's daughter, Hillary looks like she's at least 11-13 years old and the first movie was filmed only seven years ago. How is that possible? Tell me that! The part in which Luc's partner was killed off and turned into a Unisol is just re-goddamn diculous! You mean to tell me that there was an experimental Unisol exposed naked in the basement of the research complex at the beginning of the movie. C'mon. The director could've spent more time with this movie like the first one and sewn all the plot holes shut. But oooh nooo!
Speaking of the plot, IT SUCKS! Compared to the first movie, Universal Soldier 2's plot watered down and worthless. Where's the gritty thrills in which a Unisol goes berserk an re-enacts his last memories in a supermarket rampage thinking its Desert Storm or something ? This was the dawn of the Millennium, you would attracted more of an audience if this had taken place in a dystopia/Orwellian type of future cesspit. Corny is the correct adjective to describe this sad, sad, sad sequel.
From what I seen: Double Impact, Under Siege 2, Robocop 3, and hell, even the cheap-ass/no class Terminator knock-off \"Class of 1999\" is more entertaining than this!
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user\nThis was an atrocious waste of my time. No plot. The acting was so far below par, it should be used as an exemplar in acting classes of what NOT to do. It is merely a commercial rip-off of the earlier Universal Soldier, which also scrapes the bottom of the acting barrel. Its sad that VD needs to assert his ego every few years, and sadder still that people will pay good money to sit thru it. This kind of schlock gives Martial Arts movies a bad name. By comparison, it makes Segall, Norris, and Arnold look almost talented.
Perhaps VD should take the Leslie Nielson track and do send-ups of his genre. At least then we could be laughing with him instead of at him.
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user\nThis time the hero from the first film has become human and this time uses fist and foot combos against super universal soldiers and a computer which has gone awry and is prepared to take over the world. I'm pretty sure it was Double Team, which convinced everyone that Jean-Claude Van Damme was no longer credible in providing watchable action flicks. However it was this that tarnished his credibility forever. While Universal Soldier:The Return isn't as dull as Double Team or The Quest,it's still pretty awful indeed, with none of the style and flair of the original and no star pairing. This sequel is made simply for kids who enjoy professional wrestling. As I look back, not even the action sequences were all that exciting and therefore this movie is a worthless dud. In other words another clunker in Van Damme's assembly line.
* out of 4(Bad)
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user\nI tried to watch this movie twice and both times I still couldn't make it to the end credits. First time I managed to sit through the first fight sequence then lost interest. Second time I managed to force myself to digest over an hours worth of shoddy acting, lame SFX and extremely poor direction. Pales in comparison to the original.
Anyone ever hear about the old ET Atari 2600 fiasco? For those who haven't let me fill you in. It's 1982...ET is one of the biggest box office smashes of all time...Atari decides to release a movie tie-in game on their 2600 home console system. To cut a long and financially painful story short the game flopped big time and resulted in thousands upon thousands of Atari 2600 ET games to be dumped in landfills because they couldn't even give them away let alone sell them.
What does Universal Soldier: The Return have to do with this story? Look at the 3.2 rating and figure it out for yourself.
Awful film...IMDb forced me to give it a 1 out of 10 because their rating systems doesn't go as low as 0 let alone into the negatives.
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user\nThis movie is mostly crap and the only reason this movie is worth watching is because Jean-Claud Vam Damme stars in this movie.There are some good action scenes in this movie and the best ones are at the end of the movie.
The acting in this movie is so bad and its the worst acting i have ever seen and the 2 actors Bill Goldberg and Michael Jai White Can not act at ALL.And this movie by far has to be one of Jean-Claud Vam Dammes worst movies he has done and if u what to watch him in one of his great movies u should watch Blood sport,KickBoxer or Sudden Death.
Over all this movie is crap/OK and my rating is 4 out of 10.
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user\nThis is the official sequel to the '92 sci-fi action thriller. In the original, Van Damme was among several dead Vietnam War vets revived to be the perfect soldiers (Unisols). In this one, it's, I guess, about a dozen years later, since Van Damme has a daughter about that age. Now he's working with the government in a classified installation to train the latest Unisols - codenamed Unisol 2500, for some reason. As usual, something goes wrong: the on-site super-computer (named Seth - like the snake in \"King Cobra\" the same year) goes power-crazy, takes command of the Unisols, and even downloads its computer brain into a new super-Unisol body (Jai White). We're lookin' at the next step in evolution, folks! Most of Van Damme's fights are with one particularly mean Unisol (pro wrestler Goldberg) who just keeps on comin': drop him off a building - no good; run him down with a truck - no go! Shoot him, burn him - forgetaboutit! Much of the humor is traced to how Van Damme is now outmoded and out-classed(he's even going grey around the edges). But, though he takes a lickin', he keeps on kickin'! Most sequels of this sort are pretty lame - pale imitations of the originals, and while this one is certainly no stroke of genius, it manages to be consistently entertaining, especially if you're a pro-wrestling fan.
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user\nI'll be honest. The only reason I watched this one on TV is that it's in the IMDb bottom 100. And right now, I'm wondering if the hour and a half of my life really was worth another 'check' on that same list.
Van Damme is Luc Deveraux, who finds himself on a huge fight with the Universal Soldiers after the main computer pulled a 'HAL' to defend itself. And yes, after all the obligate explosions, shoot-outs and chases he is the last one standing. Combined with terrible acting and a bit of a boring set-up it makes sure it's place in the infamous list is just.
Only for the idiots like me who want to watch that full list. 2/10.
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user\n** HERE BE SPOILERS **
The government has continued to develop the UniversalSoldier program, now called UniSol. The soldiers are now stronger and are able to take more damage than before. However the government is downsizing, the project endangered and the supercomputer that is in the middle of all feel threatened, so he takes steps to ensure his own safety. He activates and controls the UniSols and start to run mayhem. The only one who can stop them is Deveraux (Van Damme).
This movie is about one thing. Choreographed fighting. The story is bad, and is soon drowned in all fights. Whatever happens, and wherever they go, they fight. Unfortunately for this movie, it is no fun watching a fight where you know one part of it is indestructible. Normally you're pretty sure the hero will win, but you still want to feel the fights are between two somewhat equal combatants. Not where one is indestructible and can't lose. Then the fights just become a tool to stretch time. You wait until the final fight when Deveraux miraculously finds a way to beat his unbeatable foes. To further lower my opinion, a desperate and sure sign of a bad movie is how much scantily clad women there are. Well, there aren't really that lot of them, because the characters are most men (there are at least one woman UniSol though), but almost every woman is needlessly shown with at least just a bra once. The female leads get by with this, but we also pass through a strip-club (to use a computer no less) with much more undressed women. These moments do not give anything to the story and is just there to try to please the adolescent-minded male audience.
So, in conclusion, boring fights. No more, no less. Well, maybe less...
2/10
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user\nthis is a piece of s--t!! this looks worse than a made for t.v. movie. and i shutter to think that a sequel was even concieved and the results... war is prettier than this. jean claude van shame has done it again and he wonders why his career is where it is now. no script, no story and no time should be wasted on this. i mean that. 1 out of 10 is too high, way too high. goldberg should be jackhammered for this. van shame is no actor.
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user\nThis movie was absolutly awful. I can't think of one thing good about it. The plot holes were so huge you could drive a Hummer through them. The acting was soo stuningly bad that even Jean Claude should be ashamed, and that is saying alot!!! And dialogue, What dialogue???To think that I was a fan of the first one (I use that comment loosely, its more like a guilty pleasure, than anything else). This movie had Goldberg in it for crying out loud!!!! Nothing good can come of this movie. What makes this film even worse is that it is soo bad you can't even watch it with a bunch of friends to make fun of!!! This has got to be in my top five worst movies of all time. 2/10 because it is soo hard for me to give a 1.
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user\nVan Damme. What else can I say? Bill Goldberg. THERE WE GO. NOW we know this movie is going to be really horrible.
I saw the first five minutes of this movie on TBS, knowing it would be bad. But not even I thought it would be THIS bad. The plot is awful, Van Damme is getting old (finally), but unlike Arnold, his movies are as well.
Forget this movie. Don't see it. Ever. I wouldn't even be paid to see this film.
1/5 stars - at its heart lies a wonderful, action-packed thrill ride.
Well, maybe not, but the marketers would sure like us to think so, wouldn't they?
John Ulmer
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user\nI'm sorry for Jean, after having such a good original movie to be followed up by perhaps his worst movie in is career. This movie was shot down terribly by horrible acting jobs by Goldbeg(Romeo) and whatever that computers name was. Also, some scenes may have been just a little unnesicary. Truly, bad movie.
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user\nI was very skeptical about sacrificing my precious time to watch this film. I didn't enjoy the first one at all, and the last Jean Claude Van Damme film I liked was Blood Sports! After managing to sit through it all? Avoid, avoid, avoid!!
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user\nThe infamous Ed Wood \"classic\" Plan 9 From Outer Space features an indignant alien calling the human race, \"...stupid! Stupid, stupid stupid!\" I'd have to say exhibit A in that trial would probably this movie, a ridiculously silly sci-fi film.
Falling action star Jean Claude Van Damme returns to a hit role for him from the original movie, Luke, a former Universal Soldier who now works making really good universal soldiers. While Van Damme was too big to reprise the role in the first two sequels, he was too small to do much of anything else by the time the fourth film in the Universal Soldier series came around. So, probably cursing under his breath the whole way, he kicks and grunts and scowls through ninety minutes of explosions and karate kicks. You'll find plenty of mindless violence, but I'd advise you get a coat check for your brain at the door when you start watching this thing. Otherwise, you are liable to forget where you left it by the time it's over.
Luke is called into action against more Universal Soldiers after a really really REALLY evil computer named Seth (makes HAL look like Ghandi) turns all the other universal soldiers into evil, remorseless killers. Of course this is what these things are programmed to do, but in this case they are killing their creators, not \"the enemy\" so that's a problem.
I love the dumb logic of this movie. Logic that believes that a supercomputer would create a body for itself that looks as ashamed as Michael Jai White does to be in this movie. Logic that dictates that the creator of Seth be a blue-haired cyber-stereotype geek who spouts cliches more regularly than Old Faithful does steam. Logic that has a climactic karate fight feature two characters kicking each other though ten separate panes of shattering glass in the span of three minutes of screen time.
The film also features a daughter in peril character, wrestler Bill Goldberg as a wrestler disguised as a Universal Soldier, and a romance so tacked on, I have to think the writers thought tacked on romances were actually a GOOD thing. And when this movie ends, it ends. Not a minute after a gigantic towering finale-style explosion are the credits running. No epilogue, no where are they now, no final kiss, just explosion, hug, over. Even the creators want to get out of this thing as soon as possible.
While it's no Plan 9, US:TR is a silly little trifle of an action movie that would be fun at parties full of rowdy Van Damme fans who enjoy seeing their hero really reaching new depths. Not to be seen on a serious stomach.
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user\nI first heard of Unisol 2 when I drove past a cinema when I was on holiday in America. I really did not take much notice of it until I bought the original on DVD which led me to find out about its three sequels. I subsequently started to read about The Return on the IMDB and asked friends what they thought of it. Despite their horrific criticisms of it, I still went out of my way to see it and was on the brink of buying it until I saw it for hire on DVD. I wasn't expecting much but thought that it must have been half decent to get a theatrical release in the US, after all, how often is it that you see Van Damme on the big screen? Well, nothing could have prepared me for this. It is so bad I almost cried. What a total waste of 80 minutes and £2.50. It is hard to explain how bad this move is. Honestly. This is idiotic film making. No, it's more than idiotic. I just cannot believe how this got made. I cannot believe that someone out there has not murdered Mic Rogers. How stupid can people possibly be - firstly, Van Damme actually thinking the script and finished film was good. Secondly, the fact that Xander Berkley, of Terminator 2 and Air Force One status, commited himself to this film. I simply cannot believe the stupidity of this movie. It takes itself so seriously but comes across to the audience like a spoof. Here is an example: JCVD's daughter (yes, Luc is now a human again)- \"I want my Daddy\", SETH- \"So do I\". Oh yeah, and some guy tries to shut down SETH by pulling three huge levers with - wait for it - ON and OFF written on them. The acting all round is like playschool acting. I'm sure Mr Director modelled Luc's reporter girlfriend on April O'Neil from the cartoon Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles - she refuses to go because she '...needs her story'. I mean come on - how many cliches can a film possibly use? Please listen to me fellow IMDB users - don't touch this with a barge pole. To conclude, Universal Soldier: The Return has no relation whatsoever to the first movie. In fact, if they weren't called UniSols then you would never know it was a sequel. Luc is now a human again - what the hell!?! The only place in which he can access the internet is in a stripclub. All the new Uni Sols look like they were dragged off the street, they are that unconvincing. This is pure torture to watch, so do yourself a favour - don't torture yourself. P.S - Best part of the movie: Romeo jumps off a building and shouts 'Oh sh*t'.
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user\nWe open with Colonel Luc Deveraux (Van Damme), the original Universal Soldier and his buxom Asian friend being chased down a river by what appear to be Universal Soldiers. They almost kill the two, then oh wait, it was just a field test. Deveraux we come to find is now part of a government funded company that designs the new level of Universal Soldiers. Why he would want to be involved in this (if you know anything about the original) is never explained and well beyond me.
It's after this flimsy set piece that the real story gets going. The United States government has cut the Universal Soldier's project budget and in the process angered SETH (the large artificial mainframe computer that controls the Universal Soldiers). Naturally he won't be shut down without a fight. So that means Van Damme has to go around and take all the new breed of Universal Soldiers out. Which sounds like a fun idea for an action movie and a take on a sequel, but that doesn't stop it from becoming stupid as hell.
For instance, one of the new Universal Soldiers is played by Bill Goldberg. Seems you can't go wrong casting a wrestler in an action movie. He's big, he's tough, right? Wrong. Van Damme doesn't seem to have a problem wiping the floor with him... once ... twice ... three times. The point here lost on me. Then there's the breaking of glass. A rudimentary part of any action movie, but someone involved must have a glass fetish. You have to see the fight scenes in particular. Let's not talk about how nobody cuts themselves or at the very least slips. Then to put the cherry on top of this train wreck, they have SETH (the computer) secure a human body for himself and how appropriate it is when they make the villain black (Michael Jai White). Nothing works better than a white good guy fighting a black bad guy it would seem. Potentially offensive and just downright lame. He's no replacement for Dolph, either.
Universal Soldier 2 is a lousy sequel. It's loud, it's dumb and it doesn't care. The original wasn't anything poetic, but it made a simple sort of sense with a science fiction element and it entertained on a basic level. The sequel doesn't. They do however keep the running time under ninety minutes and somehow found a way to squeeze in a strip club sequence. So give credit where credit is due.
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user\nThis is a worthless sequel to a great action movie. Cheap looking, and worst of all, BORING ACTION SCENES! The only decent thing about the movie is the last fight sequence. Only 82 minutes, but it feels like it goes on forever! Even die-hard Van Damme fans(like myself) should avoid this one!
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user\nUniversal Soldier: The Return is not the worst movie ever made. No, that honor would have to go to a film that attempted to make some sort of statement or accomplish some artistic feat but failed in a pathetic or offensive manner. However, perhaps no movie I have ever seen has tried for so little and succeeded so completely as did Universal Soldier: The Return.
This film is a sci-fi/action travesty that has virtually nothing to recommend it. The acting is as bad as any movie I've ever seen. The plot is terrible and predictable. The special effects are pathetic. In short, anyone even remotely connected to this film should be ashamed of themselves. US: The Return makes previous Van Damme fare seem like groundbreaking cinematic masterpieces. Some movies are so bad, they're good. Believe me when I tell you that this is not one of them. I'm really not sure what else to say here. I doubt many people were considering seeing this movie if they hadn't already, but just in case: don't.
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user\nThis movie was so bad that my i.q. went down about 40 points after seeing it. It made me wonder who could sit through the weeks it took to make it and think that it was worth it. It must of been some kind of personal favor to Van Damme.
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user\nThere seems to be an overwhelming response to this movie yet no one with the insight to critique its methodology, which is extremely flawed. It simply continues to propogate journalistic style analysis, which is that it plays off of the audiences lack of knowledge and prejudice in order to evoke an emotional decry and outburst of negative diatribe.
Journalism 101: tell the viewer some fact only in order to predispose them into drawing conclusions which are predictable. for instance, the idea of civil war, chaos, looting, etc were all supposedly unexpected responses to the collapse of governmental infrastructure following Hussein's demise: were these not all symptomatic of an already destitute culture? doctrinal infighting as symptomatic of these veins of Islam itself, rather than a failure in police force to restrain and secure? would they rather the US have declared marshall law? i'm sure the papers here would've exploded with accusations of a police state and fascist force.
aside from the analytical idiocy of the film, it takes a few sideliners and leaves the rest out claiming \"so-and-so refused to be interviewed...\" yet the questions they would've asked are no doubt already answered by the hundred inquisitions those individuals have already received. would you, as vice president, deign to be interviewed by a first time writer/producer which was most certainly already amped to twist your words. they couldn't roll tape of Condi to actually show her opinion and answer some of the logistics of the questions, perhaps they never watched her hearing.
this is far from a neutral glimpse of the situation on the ground there. this is another biased, asinine approach by journalists - which are, by and large, unthinking herds.
anyone wanting to comment on war ought at least have based their ideas on things a little more reliable than NBC coverage and CNN commentary. these interpretations smack of the same vitriol which simply creates a further bipartisanism of those who want to think and those who want to be told by the media what to think.
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user\nThis is a well made informative film in the vein of PBS Frontline. The problem is, Frontline already did this piece and managed to bring L. Paul Bremer in to tell his side of the story. More troubling is the fact that the director of the film, Charles Ferguson--a former think tank wonk, was a war supporter until the occupation went south. What did he think would happen?
The invasion of Poland went really well too until it was messed up by those pesky Nazis.And that is what this film feels like--an apology for occupation rather than a deconstruction of the act of war itself.
Ferguson seems to suggest that the war could have been run better--as if any war can be better.
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user\nEarly, heavy, war-time propaganda short urging people to be careful with their spending practices, in effort to prevent any runaway inflation.
Using scare, guilt and patriotic jingoistic rhetoric, which was normal for the time, the government was concern that the sudden war-time production and therefore wage increase and subsequent spending practices if not checked could cause serious problems during and after the war.
It truly is a window into the past, historically and culturally.
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user\nThe only redeeming quality of this movie is that it was bad enough to be comedic. Everyone in this movie looks like a porn industry drop out. I have actually seen better acting in low budget porn. I though I had actually rented some kind of gay porn after this classic scene: Jim: Watch your ass Nick: You watch yours (together): I wont leave you behind!
The first action sequence shows how awful the production is, but its really kind of funny: Good guys have transformer weapons! In one scene, they all have fake HK MP5 sub-machine guns. Next scene, AK-47 replicas! And then, to top it all off, they do some weapon swapping between scenes with a couple of M-16s!! I think they had a budget shortage for guns, not enough to go around between the good guys and bad guys. Fight scenes are poorly coordinated and fake as all hell. You have to remove the pin/spoon from a grenade for it to explode on its own. You can't fire a shoulder launched missile of any kind while riding inside a helicopter. Weapons that you throw away don't suddenly re-appear. When a gun is out of bullets, throwing it away is still pretty stupid. Unless you have no idea how to reload them.. Big slow trucks driving around in first gear make for awkward action scenes. I really cant believe movies like this are actually produced. This movie would be hilarious on nitrous oxide or maybe just drunk.
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user\nI'm sorry to say this, but the acting in this film is horrible. The dialogue sounds as if they are reading their lines for the first time ever. Perhaps I got the \"dress rehearsal\" version by mistake. The director over-uses slow motion during special effects perhaps as an attempt to compensate for the poor performance of the actors themselves. The story is pretty well written, and the fight sequences are actually better than I have seen in many action films. The fights seem pretty real. But all of this happens while to two leading actors time and time again miraculously survive incredible amounts of point-blank automatic weapon fire, grenades, morter rounds, and bazookas. The enemy soldiers are definitely some of the worst shots I have ever seen, especially when they have the escaping truck in their sights from about 30 yards, and every bazooka shot is wide by at least 50 feet. Those bazookas need serious site calibration.
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user\nAt first I was convinced that this was a made-for-TV movie that wasn't worthy of primetime. But after a few minutes of dumb-struck awe, I realized that there was at least comic value in the over-the-top stunts and c-movie acting. This movie would have gotten a 1 if my wife and I hadn't laughed so hard as we watched it in wonder that the actors could keep a straight face. It was like a less-funny spy version of The Big Hit (I laughed so much I actually bought the Big Hit DVD) with even-worse acting. We were disappointed that Nick chose to marry Elena, and not Jim, after all of the hugging and high-fives. A few rum and cokes will definitely help it go down easier.
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user\nThere was not one original idea in this story. Themes were pulled from various sources; a few being The Ninth Gate, In the Mouth of Madness (another Carpenter film), and The Ring. It even went as far as featuring the same damn glowing circle from The Ring and using it as the film's namesake. The soundtrack by Cody Carpenter was all but lifted from Suspiria. Hopefully no one will oppose this comment by spewing the word HOMAGE around. Yes, I saw that the theater was playing Argento's Deep Red. Claiming an homage would be a bullshit cop-out. This was bottom-of-the-barrel. Throwing gore and \"disturbing\" imagery into the pot does not make a good horror film. Carpenter used to know that. He should fade into obscurity or acquire a time machine.
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user\nI saw this last week after picking up the DVD cheap. I had wanted to see it for ages, finding the plot outline very intriguing. So my disappointment was great, to say the least. I thought the lead actor was very flat. This kind of part required a performance like Johny Depp's in The Ninth Gate (of which this is almost a complete rip-off), but I guess TV budgets don't always stretch to this kind of acting ability.
I also the thought the direction was confused and dull, serving only to remind me that Carpenter hasn't done a decent movie since In the Mouth of Madness. As for the story - well, I was disappointed there as well! There was no way it could meet my expectation I guess, but I thought the payoff and explanation was poor, and the way he finally got the film anti-climactic to say the least.
This was written by one of the main contributors to AICN, and you can tell he does love his cinema, but I would have liked a better result from such a good initial premise.
I took the DVD back to the store the same day!
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user\nHorror fans (I'm speaking to the over 12's, although if you're under 12 I apologise for what you might deem an insult): In short, if you appreciate having your imagination disturbed by well written, original storytelling, punctuated by unpredictable well planted scares, and delivered via convincing performances, then I can heartily recommend - AVOIDING THESE STEAMERS - made by directors who have apparently long since past their sell by date. It's no accident that almost every episode feels as if it were made in the 1980's. Not to put blame squarely on the shoulders of some of these old boys (or indeed the 80's) because where would we be without certain movies from the likes of Argento, Carpenter, Landis, Dante and Barker (Actually Clive, WTF are you doing in there?! Glad to see Romero had the good sense to give it a miss as I'm sure he was asked to partake...). More perhaps we should point the finger at creator Mick Garris whose credentials include the logic defying and depressingly ill-advised TV remake of Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece 'The Shining'.
Perhaps it is an indication of the state of television today. Are we so starved of good TV horror that we applaud any old sloppy schlock that the networks excrete onto our sets? Sadly, maybe so.
Normally I wouldn't see the point of adding a comment that doesn't argue the faults and merits of a production, I'd just rate it accordingly. However, as this series is woefully lacking in any merit (with perhaps the sole exception of the theme tune) I write this as more of a warning than a review: DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME AND MONEY. If you disagree with me then it's more than likely that you haven't seen enough decent horror. Perhaps the earlier films of some of these directors would be a much better place to start, but if these 'Masters' of Horror were being assessed on these works alone, they'd never have been allowed to graduate with even their Bachelor's degree. Unless of course they were studying for a degree from the University Of S**t.
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user\nSome of the filmmakers who are participating in this series have made some really great films but they sure as heck are not showing much skill with this series. Particularly the writing. OK, the first season was somewhat better but these new episodes they are creating just stink. I'm a huge fan of horror and in my opinion the vast majority of these episodes are total garbage. Nothing new or genuinely interesting. Few of them are visually creative. It's just typical fabricated Hollywood crap, uninteresting, childish, poorly conceived and in some cases, flat out laughable. Much like Tales from the Crypt the only good thing this series has been offering is great nudity! Other then that this series blows hard. I get the impression sometimes that they hired a bunch of eighth-graders to write the episodes. Maybe they did.
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user\nI was very excited when this series premiered in 2005. The premise was very simple and appealing: each episode would be a one-hour mini movie directed by a famous, noteworthy horror director. Then, when I finally watched them it was a bit of a letdown. Some good episodes emerged from that first season, but all in all it was a mixed bag. I attributed it to the learning curve, and figured that season 2 would be a whole lot better.
Boy, was I in for a shock. At least season one had a few good stories here and there. Season 2 (with the exception of \"The Black Cat\" starring the excellent Jeffrey Combs) was a complete and total loss to me. The episode \"Sounds Like\" may very well be the worst thing I have watched on TV in the last 10 years, and most of the other episodes aren't much better. I really hope that season 3 turns this around next year, but I'm not holding my breath.
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user\nHonestly,the concept behind \"Masters of Horror\" had something going for it. Big-time horror directors that are now left aside by the industry being given a chance to direct horror again, I was all for it from the start. That is, until I watched some episodes... Oh boy, it's really bad TV. Not only does it seem like the directors are being given very little budgets to direct their skits, but there seems to be guidelines as well, like shooting in HD for example. To make a long story short, it's bad both for artistic and reasons financial reasons. I cannot help but compare to the \"Tales From The Crypt\", and the M.o.H. episodes really don't stand the comparison. TFTC was good, MOH is bad; according to me here are a few keys to explain it: TFTC was shorter (around 25 minutes for each episode) than MOH (50 minutes per episode), I believe it allowed denser screenplays, with good ideas reoccurring more often, better overview of an episode, less chances to let the plot be confusing or boring. Duration might have been also the reason why the budget was better spent on TFTC: directors got to have REAL film music composers (composers on MOH are if inexistent, very bad), REAL actors (whereas on MOH it's nothing but unknown actor after unknown actor!), REAL directors of photography and, it can help sometimes, REAL film cameras (while MOH is shot on HD cameras with very wrongly chosen lens-pieces), the result of which being that the episodes of TFTC looked and felt \"cinematographic\" in the sense that there was real actors being casted, ranging from Michael J. Fox to Tim Roth to Kyle McLachlan to Kirk Douglas, but there were also film composers behind it, of the range of Alan Silvestri, great directors of photography like Dean Cundey, high-end screenplay writers, and in that sense each \"Tale\" was a little movie of its own true kind. Compared to TFTC, the \"Masters of Horrors\" is quite a lame approach to TV horror. It's very hard to stand looking at it if your standards regarding cinematography are just a little above average, because it looks the same as any ugly TV serial, if not worse. It gets boring and even annoying incredibly fast, within the first 10 minutes usually. The actors are never-heard before wannabes (except for Fairuza Balk, Robert Englund, Angela Bettis and a few, but even there, they are the only famous actors of their episodes). The director base for MoH was good in the beginning, but it's getting worst and worst with every episode: now if even the directors are unknown to the world, what remains? Nothing! And it's funny how they are starting to have complete unknown directors while they haven't even had, say, Stan Winston, Dick Maas, William Lustig, Sam Raimi, Eric Red, Robert Harmon, William Friedkin, Jim Muro, Stuart Gordon, Russell Mulcahy... If even \"Masters of Horror\" cannot bring dead directors back to life, who will? Maybe a rerun of Tales from the Crypt will.
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user\nWith the exception of FAMILY, this new season is worse than Season One. I can't imagine what they are thinking. As a fan of horror, can tolerate a lot of gore and mindless mayhem, but this series gets worse with each outing. I can't imagine how disheartening it must be for the actors and crew to go to work each day, toiling to churn out such crap. STORY! Is that too much to ask for? CHARACTER! How can we give damn about the fate of ANYONE in these stories? If we are not engaged, who cares if they get carved up or whatever? Almost every episode ends with mindless blood letting, going for gross out shock without any sense of revelation or conclusion or REASON why we have been subjected to an hour of bloodletting. Even Dante's effort this season had some disturbing sexist violence and wandered off to a pointless conclusion. Ironically, the production values and performances tend to be up to speed, while the content is utter crap. I have great hopes for Exec Producer's Garris's VALARIE UNDER THE STAIRS, but we shall see.
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user\nI had been subjected to this movie for a relationship class in my school. As figured it was nothing captivating and nothing new. Though it tries to be original by focusing on the teen father instead of the mother showing the problems that the dad would go through. It had an interesting side to it but it just doesn't live up to its originality due to the fact nothing else in this movie was original. We have the main character who has the older sister who like in every other movie like this has a thing against him, we have the stay at home mother who expects too much and when he gives more she feels offended and leaves him in the dust, then we have the father who is always gone. Then the girls side we have the parents who want everything and expect her to be perfect at all she does. On to the story like I said it was interesting but the lack of good acting from the entire cast and the lack of any good writing or storytelling. Everything about this fell into cliché the little nerd kid in school starts studying with girl, they get together, have sex and then boom we have a little kid. Perhaps it could've been better had the writing been well better and had the acting been improved I've seriously gotten more emotion out of Leatherface and his chainsaw than I did out of any actor in this film and that's pretty bad seeing as the Leatherface movies are crap and horridly acted. So far the only interesting teen pregnancy movie I've seen was Juno. So far the comical side of this serious situation has proved more entertaining while still giving the same message. Like I said the idea was original most of these films focus on the teen mother but this one chose not to instead it focuses on the drama of the father but again the originality does not save this movie from mediocrity. I really hope someone decides to either re-make this movie with a better cast and a better writer or just make another similar film because this one was wasted potential.
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user\n***SLIGHT SPOILERS***
A hunchback 15-year-old boy kisses a very cute 15-year-old girl and eventually he has sex for the first time. After the act, he lays in the bed with her not touching her. The next day he concludes that he does not like sex much and does not want to try it again for at least a few years.
This is seemingly a fine opening for a teleplay about a boy discovering his homosexuality, or perhaps a medical drama about a post-pubescent teen with a severe hormone deficiency.
However, as the plot develops what emerges is a story of a 15-year-old father who is supported and encouraged by his overbearing mother.
At one point, his mother preaches to her co-workers who are not as understanding as they might be, \"Every step of the way in this, my son has been amazing... I have never been more proud of him...\"
The young father's older sister, who otherwise is cold towards her brother, begins to show pride in her sibling, \"You have been cool about this,\" as she gives him an encouraging warm hug.
The 15-year-old father wants to be a father. He wants to be a parent.
Why not? We see the \"new\" baby a few minutes after birth -- it appears to be a healthy, happy 4-month-old infant. Just as babies were born on TV in the 1960's and 1970's.
Once the young father is a parent, he has found happiness. He insists he will be the one to change the dirty diaper. We see the 15-year-old father sincerely happy holding his baby while the teen's busy=body mother is peaking over his shoulder. Fade to black.
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user\nmy wife is a fanatic as regards this show. That being the case I bought her seasons one through three and season four is on order. I personally think the show is one big farce the cast is equally bad. Alyssa Milano should have stuck to the other trash movies she made such as Poison Ivy, Embrace of the Vampire to name a few, the other female supporting cast members are equally inept in their portrayals. I've seen better special effects in the old Republic Pictures serials I saw as a child. I can understand why the male leads remained on the show for such short periods of time even though I don't know if it was their own choosing or not. Please. please don't renew for another season as enough is enough, Bob
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user\nDont let the MPAA fool you with their \"Rated R for extreme violence\" there is definatly no extreme violence in this boring peice of s*t. I expected some cheap rambo 3 type action that the trailer promised, however its just boring boring nonsense with tons of lame slow mo flashbacks that make no sense. AVOID!
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user\nI tried to watch this movie in a military camp during an overseas mission, and let me tell you, you'll watch anything under those circumstances. Not this piece of sh*t though.
The first five minutes set the tone by weak porn-movie quality acting, weird out-of-the-blue plot twists and unbelievable situations and behavior. It gets worse after that. This movie does not have one single saving grace, and yet it is not bad in a way that would make it funny to watch. It's just horrible. I've seen quite many movies in my life and I'm not one of those snobby know-all critics, I mean I'll enjoy most movies to some extent even if they're bad. This one... man.
Steer _well_ clear of this one, my friend.
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user\nWow. I have seen some really bad movies in my time, but this one truly takes the cake. It's the worst movie I've seen in the past decade - no exaggeration.
As a US Army veteran of the war in Afghanistan, I found it nearly impossible to even finish watching this ridiculous film, not because it brought back memories - far from it - but because there was absolutely no attempt at \"authenticity\" to be found anywhere in the film. Not so much as the tiniest little shred. It seemed like it had been written by an 8 year-old child who got all his notions of war (and soldierly behavior) straight out of comic books. The film was made in Honduras, which should have been a clue, but even that can't fully explain the atrocious production values of this cliché-ridden piece of trash.
I could try to list all the endless technical flaws, but it would take virtually forever. From the ancient unit shoulder patches which have not been seen or worn since WWII, and the character's name tags, like \"ColCollins\" (worn by the character \"Colonel Collins\"), which was actually spelled using the reversed, mirror-image \"N\" of the Russian alphabet (not the US alphabet) the list just goes on and on. The uniforms, the equipment, the plot, and most especially the behavior of the characters themselves -- every single scene was just chock-full of ridiculous flaws, inaccuracies and utterly mindless clichés.
Neither the storyline itself nor the characters were the least bit credible or believable. It was all laughably childish, in the extreme. This was obviously a movie that was meant to appeal strictly to pre-pubescent boys, and I have little doubt that even they would find this film utterly absurd.
In short, this film has absolutely NO redeeming qualities at all. It's a total waste of time. I'd strongly advise anybody reading this to pass this garbage by; it's truly not worth wasting a single moment of your time for.
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