"The Racketeer" stars Carol (deprived of the "e" that usually appeared at the end of her first name) Lombard as a woman thrown out of society because she left her husband for a concert violinist (Roland Drew) who has since become a down-and-out alcoholic, and torn between her love for him and the interest of New York crime kingpin Robert Armstrong (top-billed). It's virtually a compendium of what was wrong with the earliest talkies: stiff direction, immobile cameras, stagy acting and ridiculously slow-paced delivery of lines. At the time the sound crews were telling the directors to have their actors speak every line s-l-o-w-l-y and not to start speaking their own line until after the previous actor had finished theirs. Done about five years later, this could have been an interesting movie, but director Howard Higgin faithfully follows his sound recorder's dictates and systematically undercuts the talents we know Lombard and Armstrong had from watching their later movies. "The Racketeer" was made in 1929, a year that despite the transition problems from silent to sound nonetheless gave us some legitimate masterpieces  Vidor's "Hallelujah!," Mamoulian's "Applause," Wyler's "Hell's Heroes," Capra's "Ladies of Leisure"  all from directors with strong enough wills to tell the soundboard dictators to get stuffed and let their actors talk and act naturalistically. Too bad Howard Higgin wasn't that strong; as it is, watching a naturally rapid-paced actor like Armstrong slog through the part in the ridiculous way he's been told to speak, one can't help but wonder where that 50-foot gorilla is when Armstrong needs him.


Time has not been kind to this film from the transition days of sound from silent. The plot has a gangster falling for a socialite who wants to help the down on his luck violinist she loves. There are of course complications. The problem with the film for me is that it hasn't aged well. Performances are all over the place with some emotional scenes seeming so over the top as to be laughable. One late exchange where Carol Lombard throws someone out of her room had me howling with its sing song delivery. There are other times when the film becomes static, a sign of the limitations of the microphones. Its not a bad film, its just that the technical limitations of the film get in the way of real enjoyment. Normally I'm forgiving, but this time out I just couldn't go with the flow (Then again the copy I saw was absolutely horrible). Worth a shot in a forgiving mood (and to be reminded that Robert Armstrong actually did more than play Carl Denham in King Kong)


Carole Lombard stars in this transition period film. This film is a typical example of a very early "talkie" (First practical sound film was "The Jazz Singer", 1927). Overall, the acting in this film tends to be extremely broad and very melodramatic.

The viewer may easily note that the actors are still "acting" for a silent film, and this combined with the overly pronounced, overly earnest dialog (It seems most likely a diction-elocution-drama coach was employed extensively to teach the "silent" actors to speak lines), creates some rather comical scenes which were not at all intended to be comical.

Carole Lombard's later great acting ability is all but unrecognizable underneath all the broad gestures, melodrama, and eager earnestness.

Mainly interesting as an historical curiosity of the period, and for it's completely unintended comedy-camp value.


Wow, was this version of THE RACKETEER tough to watch! While none of the other reviews have mentioned this, the public domain version I watched was seriously flawed. The sound track was off by about 10 seconds--meaning the dialog and action never came close to matching. So, you'd hear something occur well before you saw it--a very confusing proposition! The worst is where you hear a gun shot and only later doe the guy get hit and slump to his death in a taxi.

While this seriously marred the film, it also made concentrating on the dialog easier--and showed the serious shortcomings of it as well. The dialog was simply awful--often delivered with almost no inflection or feeling. As one review said, it was like watching a high school play. Part of this is understandable, as sound was a new medium, but this film's dialog was bad even compared to other 1929 films--really bad. And, like many of these early sound films, the film was just too talky--with sappy and overly melodramatic language and just not much action. And you'd THINK with a title like "The Racketeer" that there would be some action!! However, it's really a sappy romance--with very little action.

The film finds Carol Lombard straddled with an alcoholic musician. She herself ends up stealing to try to take care of him--and the crook, Robert Armstrong, comes to her assistance. When Armstrong catches her cheating at cards, he covers for her and then helps the drunk brother to get on his feet--and naturally he falls for her in the process. The problem is that once the drunk sobers up, he, too, wants Lombard and she needs to choose between them. Wow...a recovering drunk or a mobster...talk about a couple great prospects! Overall, it's a bit hard to rate considering the lousy print I saw. However, even if you ignore this, the film has a lot of problems due to its poor use of dialog and excessively talky nature. And...it was sappy too boot.


I think my summary says it all. This MTV-ish answer to the classic Candid Camera TV show features a Gen X (or is that Gen Y) type putting in false choppers and wearing various hats and wigs and glasses, and setting people up in fairly outlandish although often not very interesting situations. Example: Kennedy has a guy invite his parents to his "wedding." Kennedy is the bride, done up in a full bridal gown and long wig. The "joke" is that the parents immediately understand their son is marrying a man who claims to no longer have his "bits and pieces." Problem is, this schtick goes on way too long, obviously to fill out time. And Kennedy is about as funny as a dead cod lying in the sun. Candid Camera would have run three or four scenarios in the time it took Kennedy to get through this one, running around, constantly asking "Do I look fat?" I recognize the show was not made for me. It was made for 12-year-old pinheads who think JACKASS is the height of comedy today. So let them laugh. Thank God the show was short-lived.


I am the sort of person who never, ever watches animated movies, but I make an exception for Thumbelina and the Swan Princess. Being absolutely in love with the first installment of the series, I bought this and sat down to watch it with a very biased mind, determined to love it because I'd spent money buying it. I finished the movie, and all I can think is THE HORROR!!! I wanted to like it, I really did. I tried very, VERY hard to like it. But I couldn't enjoy a second of this grueling film. The songs made me feel like ripping my ears out of my head. The dialogue was so lame I felt myself twitching with frustration and irritation every time someone opened his or her mouth. The villain was laughable and I felt myself wanting Derek and Odette to die in the end... and I was absolutely in love with them from the first film.

I am going to try repress the memory of this movie, because it almost destroyed the first one for me. There is one song in the movie in which there are a series of flashbacks to the first film. The difference in animation between the two is made very obvious, and I began yearning for the first one and wishing I'd never set eyes on the third.

Do yourself and favor and don't waste your time.


I had to rent a couple of movies for my little cousin for New Year's and she picked out The Swan Princess: The Mystery of the Enchanted Kingdom and The Little Mermaid 2 and we just watched both films, while she's sleeping, I figured I could get a couple comments in. :) While this is a very cheesy cartoon, it really wasn't that bad. You have to admit that for children, these plots are new to them and it could be a great introduction of these stories to them.

Odette finds out that Derek has been secretly keeping the magic secrets of Rosthoe and she tells Derek to destroy them immediately, but him being a guy, typically he does not do so and tells her that no on could achieve the magics without his help. When a witch named Zelda gets her hands on them, she finds out that Derek tore off the last words of a spell she wants to use to destroy everything, and she kidnaps Odette in order to retrieve this information.

The Swan Princess: The Mystery of the Enchanted Kingdom is silly and predictable, but for the kids I would honestly say it's a go. It's so rare we have these clean cut cartoons now a days, so I'm going to cut the film some slack. It was just weird seeing all the voices change all of a sudden, I grew up with the first one, so I guess it was just stuck in my head.

4/10


I loved the first movie, the second one was okay, disappointed John Cleese wasn't jean bob anymore as hes my favorite character. But the third one...what happened to the animation??? it looks low budget like a sat morning cartoon! except for the flashback which was taken from the first movie. They really should have stopped after number 2, this just makes the rest look bad!! Derek's voice has changed but its not as recognizable as jean bob..Rogers also looks very strange. I also don't understand where Rothbart came from. I thought he died! This movie made me want to turn it off, as much as i love the first one, i was very disappointed with this installment. They will never beat the original!:)


Also titled--> The Magical Castle--> This one is a stretch. Why bother? Why create another rockbart and then add another story line that has nearly nothing to do with the play nor swan lake. Only some girlfriend of rockbart, the stolen book of forbidden arts and the original characters (not voices remain). Stripped to to its bares this is a continuation by a thread. Next thing you know some bird will have memorized the "forbidden arts" and Swan Princess 4: the magical bird will be born. Thankfully though the chapters are supposedly closed and this will beginning but bad ended trilogy will come to a close.


HOW MANY MOVIES ARE THERE GOING TO BE IN WHICH AGAINST ALL ODDS, A RAGTAG TEAM BEATS THE BIG GUYS WITH ALL THE MONEY?!!!!!!!! There's nothing new in "The Big Green". If anything, you want them to lose. Steve Guttenberg used to have such a good resume ("The Boys from Brazil", "Police Academy", "Cocoon"). Why, OH WHY, did he have to do these sorts of movies during the 1990s and beyond?! So, just avoid this movie. There are plenty of good movies out there, so there's no reason to waste your time and money on this junk. Obviously, the "green" on their minds was money, because there's no creativity here. At least in recent years, Disney has produced some clever movies with Pixar.


This is one of the most unoriginal, cliche-ridden movies I have ever seen. Even if you didn't like this film's antecedents, 'The Bad News Bears' and 'The Mighty Ducks,' they are bound to have done a better job than this one. From the moment the new teacher greets her class and they tell her, "Don't bother with us, we're all losers," you can see everything that's coming twenty miles away for the rest of the film.

All the usual suspects are here. Besides the spunky teacher, we have a group of what are supposed to be endearingly bratty kids (they're brats, yes, but no so endearing), a slow-witted small town sheriff that they love to torment, an arrogant head coach of the winning rival team, etc., ad nauseum. Only Olivia d'Abo as the new teacher displays any likabilty. I never cared much for Steve Guttenberg before and his performance as the sheriff doesn't change things. Jay O. Sanders is a capable actor but his character, the rival coach, leaves him nothing to work with. Let's hope that writer/director Holly Goldberg Sloan comes up with something better next time out.


Nothing more than a soccer knock-off of The Mighty Ducks, this film proved to be annoying in most aspects. This was one of those times where you're parents ask you to take your younger siblings just so they don't have to deal with them for a few hours. To say the least, my younger sisters liked it, but it proved to be too much like the far superior Mighty Ducks. Oh well, at least Olivia d'Abo was hot and Steve Guttenberg still had a job at that point in time.


Take a cliché story and insert Steve Guttenberg.Need i say anymore?This truly is as bad as you would expect. Sheriff Tom Palmer(Guttenberg)and Anna Montgormery attempt to transform a group of useless,inept kids into a winning soccer team.Lacking originality and direction from the offset it's quite a struggle to maintain any form of interest in this film. Despite my reservations about Guttenbergs acting ability i can safely say that the acting of the rival teams coach is actually worse than Guttenbergs.Previously unimaginable i thought. This type of story of underdogs battling all the way to the top has been done before and better every time than this so called 'film'


This movie appears to have made for the sole purpose of annoying me. Everything I hate about films is present: fake sentimentality, extreme corniness, bad child actors and more feature abundantly. That's ignoring the fact that it depicts the extreme ignorance of American sports fans, with many of the cast professing that a football is shaped like a lemon. What?! That's a Rugby ball. The story follows a group of no hopers that get a new teacher that they like (who, coincidently, teaches the class in a short skirt) and gets them interested in football. Naturally, they're all rubbish (don't forget, they're no hopers) except for one kid who has moved from El Paso. Blah Blah, etc etc and the kids still don't become good footballers, but good heart ensues and the no hopers are turned into a bunch of well-rounded kids. Hell, even the adults start to come round; drunks are turned into caring parents, illegal immigrants are let off the hook...groan.

This movie stars Steve Guttenberg. Now, before you go rushing off down your local video store to grab yourself a copy, hold up a minute. Guttenberg is rubbish. No, no; come on let's face it, how did this guy ever get to be in a movie? I have absolutely no idea, and there is nothing in this movie to give me an idea. Olivia d'Abo stars along side Steve and doesn't impress either. She merely seems to be going through the motions and looking nice while doing it. Although I have no problems with the latter part; her performance does the movie no credit. The child actors that make up the rest of the cast are just as bad as you would expect from a movie like this. Most of them are disgusting and/or annoying and it doesn't make for pleasant viewing at all. There's a goat in the film who plays the mascot and he does a good job; but you wouldn't see a movie for a goat, so don't bother seeing this movie.


Walt was particularly fond of quality. So how come the producers at Disney would release such a terribly edited, roughly acted (even for family fare!) mess of a movie? THE BIG GREEN had a good concept. And, since it is Disney, you know how the movie is going to turn out obviously. But THE BIG GREEN is horrible. The jokes are lame. And Steve Guttenburg, still alive, pulls in another terrible performance on his resume.

Kids with too much time on their hands in small town Elma are offered an opportunity by their new teacher to play soccer. The kids don't know a thing though. And, gracious for us, we get to see Steve Guttenburg try to hit on the teacher from beginning to end.

The speed up camera work does not work. THE BIG GREEN is full of speeding the pace of characters to move the movie along. Kids are not idiots. They will catch on if you give them enough of a hint without showing all that garbage. Guttenburg, for once in his life, should have turned down an offer to join this movie. Also the pretty Olivia d'Abo should have called this one off too. THE BIG GREEN can be known as 'The Big Bomb.'


Now I'm a big animation fan -- love Svankmeyer and usually am into all applications of stop motion so I had high hopes for this one. Then I came on IMDb and paused --- I'm always real suspicious of films with a bimodal distribution of votes on IMDb. Here we've got another --- a bunch of 10s (shill anyone) and then some real low ones. I'm also suspicious of 10s with the word "visionary" in them.

Sure there are visionaries but this character isn't one of them. Despite my misgivings, I saw this film and have to side with the ones. The stop motion animation was okay but the plots were banal and overall it seemed amateurish. Treat yourself to the real deal get some Svankmeyer and leave this also ran on the shelf.


I found the first bit of stop motion animation intriguing and the mostly live action short with the girl going about in whatever country it was kept my interest, but the other 11 odd shorts really didn't pique my interest or make me think of anything at all. The music and 8mm footage all seemed to be so random that it all just seemed random. I would not recommend this to any one unless you get to see it free.

As for the music being so in step that didn't come across either. I rented the DVD because I thought it was all stop motion animation or SMA mixed with live action and only the first short was SMA, the second had a little stop motion mixed with mostly live action. There was paper cut-out stuff in one, and the rest was outdoor shots from an 8mm camera with the music bed. Just didn't have any meaning to it I could see.


Over the GW is a near failure of a debut feature, and not because it's not without trying...Actually, it is. It's a shamble all the more because it's writer/director/technical everyman Nick Gaglia went through the same rehab cult that he depicts in the film. Sometimes a first time filmmaker, full of the vigor that comes with getting a thumbs up or two from fellow film students, goes headlong into style that is way too disjointed, unsure, and dramatically frustrating that the personal side of the story, the extremely personal side, gets smudged in the purpose of telling a good story. Gaglia, who was 13 when put into a horrid program that basically tortured and brainwashed their "patients" with crazy group scare tactics, psychological mind-f*** sessions that could go on for days, and attitudes from the rehab leaders that would make most Nazis cringe, escaped finally when he was 15. I'm glad he got out, though it might help if he now goes into a real rehab for his film-making skills, if only for a couple of days, to learn things like, say, structure, proper lighting, fluid camera movement, subtlety with actors, and other basics that are perpetually lost here.

It's all the more frustrating because Gaglia is dealing with a subject that should be shown more to the public (there was recently a Newsweek article referring to a similar AA cult-rehab). Many times one wonders if certain personal character studies might work better as documentaries as opposed to narrative dramas. This is an ever-nagging sensation throughout Over the GW, where it almost feels like Gaglia wants to tell the truth but doesn't know how to communicate it properly through his characters. The character that one would think is closest to him, Bronx teen Tony Serra (Gallagher), who is taken by his mother to a rehab in New Jersey, would be closest to Gaglia, is actually much more of a one-dimensional being, where there is very little back-story (we see a brief freak-out, in black and white, in his old home) and little connection to his mother (Moriarty), who has more potential that is never tapped aside from a cold stone who passes her kids off to another. But there is a story to go with his two-year crisis, I guess.

Right off the bat things get rough (a nude cavity search in the first five minutes), and soon it's clear that instead of medical care it's more like a cross between anger management and some bizarre religious sect, where the head doctor Hiller (Insinnia) is a total over-controlling loon. But soon Tony's sister Sofia (Donohue) gets thrown in to the program, and as opposed to Tony's repeated moments of outrage and supposed non-compliance, she goes head-on through the whacked-out three step program and once released becoming a runaway. At times there are bits in this fractured nightmare, where there's one woman, a 22 year old mother who has been in the program a year and a half finds she's become a prisoner not allowed to leave, and when the father of the main siblings comes and pays an enraged visit to Hiller when Sofia finally returns to them, that do contain some raw power, very brief glimpses of Gaglia being able to at least garner some leverage in pure melodrama.

But these are moments few and far between. It's not just the unsuccessful characters, who are mostly reduced to stereotypes that veer into being like hysterical D.A.R.E. rip-offs (maybe some of them, like an angry black youth, the passive-aggressive counselors, or even Serra's older sister who is ratted out by the siblings as having taken a hit off a joint and almost thrown into the program, would resonate more if there was more time given to develop any of them). It's that Gaglia is so unfocused in his multiple roles on his tiny $30,000 budget that not one side of whatever potential talent he has can come through. He over-uses tints, mostly with a shade that looks urine-coated), he jiggles his hand-held DVX camera as if it's supposed to be intense ala City of God, occasionally a character will just shoot into frame randomly, his choices of music are like the worst selections possible from pseudo-indie soft-rockers, and there's even inane fake interview scenes with Nicholas Serra (inspiration ?) and Krakowsky that feel about as false as possible.

Could Gaglia just not get any interviews with the real victims he was with and resort to would-be artistically cathartic plan B? Bottom line, no matter how much from-the-heart true life stories may appeal to you, don't bother seeing it in the theater, or even on rental, unless you love a final scene with two kids staring off into the digital-hued Hudson river sunset with the final words reading: Dedicated to the Kids. Oy.


By Randolph Scott standards of the 1950s, this is a disappointing and heavy-handed star western. Two or three of the characters could be dispensed with, while two or three other characters could be given more prominence. (The humour needs to be completely rewritten.) De Toth handles the action well - as always - but his grasp of the overall narrative is weak.


This formulaic film (hero's girlfriend marries the villain) just didn't move along fast enough given some of the circumstances of the story. Scott seems too old in this one, and too many times his character turns away from decisive action, deflating the scenes. He responds to the deaths of some of his hands weakly; he escapes from Knox's gang by hiding in a full rain barrel; his escape to the high country and pursuit by John Russell seem superfluous, as does much of the film. The plot could have been tightened.

High points of the film: seeing "Tennessee" Ernie Ford without a mustache singing "Man in the Saddle"; Alfonso Bedoya's too brief scenes as a cook; the color photography of the high country, and the fight scene there with John Russell.


ALERT: This review contains major SPOILERS. Do not read on if you plan to see this film.

Judging from the amount of votes this got (my vote was the fifth one) very few people know or care who Mimi Lesseos is. Well, back in the late 1980s, professional wrestling was pretty decent. An all-woman's federation called the Ladies Professional Wrestling Association opened. It was a great league, and Mimi Lesseos was one of the names on the roster. I always thought she was one of the best people the LPWA had in terms of ring skill and acting ability. Unfortunately, the LPWA closed down in the early 90s, so it only seemed natural for someone with as much talent as Mimi to start an acting career, right? But surely there was an alternative to stuff like this? This movie is really bad. As it was going along, I kept comparing it to an underrated movie called `Survivor Quest,' only this film lacks everything that made `Survivor Quest' enjoyable.

As I started the tape, I went to fast forward through the preview to get to the meat of the tape. At first, I wasn't paying much attention, but then I realized that the preview was for a movie starring Mimi Lesseos. `Oh,' I thought, `here's another movie featuring Mimi to look for.' But as the preview dragged on, I became aware that is was a preview for.'Beyond Fear!' You know you're in trouble when the only preview at the beginning features the movie you are about to watch! The plot of this thing is pretty standard. Lesseos plays an ex-kickboxer that is living with the guilt of injuring an opponent/friend, so she focuses herself on her second career which she shares with her friend Sammy: being a wilderness guide. On this particular occasion, she gets a troop of three couples. Two of the couples are just there to take up space. You think that one couple, a Caucasian husband and a Korean wife, will be explored, as an issue appears between them halfway through the film, but it is ignored in favor of repeated jokes about bears in the woods, which consistently scares the Korean wife. The joke is funny the first time you hear it, but it certainly isn't by the ninth time they do it. The third couple is just painful to watch: it consists of Mr. and Mrs. Page. They trade insults back and forth, and Mr. Page uses his video camera for the art of voyeurism when he's not busy playing cruel jokes on his portly wife.just like your typical American couple! Before the hike, Mr. Page is spying on two stupid guys and their prostitute. One of them accidentally kills the prostitute and finds out Mr. Page taped it. So begins the peril, as the two guys track the group on their trip, and we wait.and wait.and wait.and wait for them to finally do something. When they do, it's a fiasco.

You can't blame the cast. They try as hard as they can with the material they have to work with. The main culprit is director Robert F. Lyons, who needs to go back to playing bit parts and stay out of the director's chair. Lyons starts and stops scenes in such a sloppy, sudden matter that you start to think he was suffering from dyspepsia throughout the entire shoot. There's even one incompetent moment when a broad daylight scene with the thugs is slipped between some nighttime scenes. Then there is the sound department. The music and background noise completely overpower the dialogue so that you have to move your ear right next to your television's speaker. Don't bump your head on the screen! It isn't worth it to hear the poorly written lines. Speaking of poor writing, Lesseos gets some of the credit there as co-writer. The few interesting developments between characters are often abandoned for shots of the thugs or bad practical jokes. Early on, Lesseos knocks out a thug with a switchblade knife, so not once do you think they are in any danger from the two stupid thugs. When the crooks finally get their rear ends kicked by Lesseos in a well done and long fight, our cast all have a huge laugh together, despite the fact that one of them has been shot and is bleeding everywhere. Yes, everyone is happy in the end. Everyone except the poor souls witnessing the film, wishing for the good old glory days when Mimi performed in the wrestling ring. Zantara's score: 4 out of 10


I really should give this stinker more credit that 1 star, because the film has so many eye-rolling lines that it's almost worth the price of the rental.

The acting, if you want to call it that, is so stilted and contrived that it makes Ed Wood's actors appear life like. "Sammy," the lone black character, must be Mimi's husband in real life because he appears in her other films, but he has zero acting ability. His lines are priceless due to his absurd delivery, though I suspect the intention was to create a sympathetic character. His old man make up in her other turkey ("Pushed To The Limit") is no-budget, junior high school quality, with cotton ball eyebrows and white spray painted hair.

I cannot fathom anyone actually buying this video, unless people like to throw their own Mystery Science Theater parties and need a copy of something like this on hand. It really is Beyond Fear-- it's actually Beyond Funny.


Mind you, it's not supposed to be, but it is. As a wee tot, I watched this movie in the theatre (Being a huge wrestling and Hulk Hogan fan). All I remember from the night is we were the only ones in the theater, and that I didn't really like it very much. I blacked the rest out, and for good reason.

A poor film on par with the greats like "Gymkata" and "The Pumaman," "No Holds Barred" is a movie set in the high stakes world of pro wrestling. Well maybe the stakes aren't all that high...and quite frankly I feel dirty just calling these people "professionals" at anything. And really, except for the first scene, there's no wrestling to speak of. So I guess movie is about the marginally low stakes world of amateurish beating-the-c***-out-of-people. Sounds good, right?

Hulk Hogan plays Rip, the champion of the WWF (Never let it be said that Hulk Hogan was typecast, this and movies like Thunder in Paradise showed how he challenged himself with deep roles that really pushed the limits of his talents). Essentially he's playing himself, but with a wardrobe that's more black and blue than the Hulkster's red and yellow. He also has this hand gesture he does. It's kinda like the ozzy devil sign people make at rock concerts, except you stick your thumb in the air, and you curl your index finger in. My friend claimed that it was supposed to look like an "R." Try and see for yourself. If that looks like an "R," well, then, Mars needs women. But anyway.

Kurt Fuller, with his overacting detector obviously on the fritz, plays a TV exec with his slightly homoerotic heart set on getting Rip, who's evidentally bigger than Elvis, on his network. He won't have any of it (And exits the office with a triumphant hand gesture to no one but the camera), and so the movie follows Fuller trying to boost ratings and get back at Rip. He does so when he creates his brilliantly titled "Battle of the Tough Guys." Marketing genius, this guy.

From the numerous hand gestures, to the rather idiotic fight scenes (All played as if wrestling is very real and deadly serious) to the overacting, to the far too frequent shots of Hulk in nothing but undies, this movie has everything you'd ever want in a dumb movie. It's frivolous, not too taxing on the mind, violent, and includes the phrase "What's that smell?" "DOOKIE!" "Dookie?"

A classic for all time.


A new wrestling show paves way for the most feared wrestler ever imaginable, the giant Zeus. Network President Brell does everything in his power to draw WWF champion Rip into the squared circle to face off against Zeus for the championship of the 'Battle of the Tough Guys'. But Zeus is unlike any competitor Rip has ever faced.

Normally I would give Hogan some leeway as a wrestler crossing over into a movie role, however this film didn't ask the Hulkster to make very much of a stretch, it simply asked Hogan to play himself, which he failed at miserably. 'Tiny' Lister made a good effort as the mighty Zeus, but even his work left the film lacking something, namely acting!

Watch this movie, if you so desire, with a grain of salt and a sense of humor, otherwise you will probably have to turn it off a little over ten minutes in.


Hulk Hogan stars as a champion wrestler (A real acting stretch...) named Rip, who is forced to defend his honor, his title and his girlfriend from a greedy corporation that wanted him to sign for their network (Because wrestling sells!) however when Rip declines, the network gets a circuit fighting championship called (and i'm totally serious) "Battle of the tough guys" who's champion Zeus (Played by Tiny Lister Jr) maybe the deadliest man alive. Rip refuses to fight, until his brother is attacked and put in a hospital. No Holds Barred is pretty much what I expected from Vince McMahon production starring the least versatile actor in the action genre (Hogan) it is basically lots of unintentional humor, tons of awkward sequences, a couple okay action sequences and tons of stupidity. In other words it's not unlike wrestling itself, so I give it a fair rating mainly because anyone renting this knows what they're getting. The movie is cheap but well made enough for what it is and really wrestling fans will probably enjoy this. I myself found this to be ultimately hilarious. They're are moments of such absurdity that you only chuckle to yourself. (Such as the way Hogan jumps 20 feet in the air after being stuck in a limo, how he forces a guy to crap himself and of course the way Hogan recites from his cuecard. (I.E:"I'm not going to be around when this check clears!") No Holds Barred is a lot of fun, true, though it's mainly because of how ridiculous it is. Fans of camp should really enjoy this clever clinker.

* * out of 4-(Fair)


Being a wrestling fan, movies about wrestling generally suck (Backyard Dogs, Bodyslam, Jesse Ventura story) but this one isn't the worst I've ever seen. Yes its bad but its better than some of the others I've mentioned.

Hulk Hogan stars as basically himself and for some reason, a rival network wants to beat him up because he doesn't want to be on that network. Let me explain it so everyone can understand....picture USA Network having Rip...and TNT will go to any lengths to get him.

Does this make sense...no? Well don't feel bad because it doesn't make sense. Nor does it make sense to have a legit ex con have a REAL fight with Rip at the end of the movie.

None of this movie makes much sense but compared to other wrestling movies and later Hogan films its not so bad.

4 out of 10


In 1989 here in NZ wrestling was somewhat of a mega-hype phenom, and who was steering starship at the pinnacle was the orange goblin himself, HULK HOGAN (one of my uber-heroes at this time), so it seems obvious to me now why I adored this movie in 1989-90 when it came out here. HULK HOGAN A.K.A Terry Bollea is a shockingly bad actor and Zeus A.K.A Tiny Lister is worse!!! The story line follows a standard WWE (then WWF) circa 88-91 story line culminating in the standard good guy beat down, hulk up and then get beaten down again story line only to follow that the good guy calls on all his inner strength( gained from eating vitamins, saying prayers etc etc ) to mount the epic come back..... Pretty standard formula here. Worth watching if only for reminiscing your youth!!!!


Ignoring Rocky 3, this is easily Hulk Hogan's best film, and it still rates as one of the worst films ever. Hulk Hogan essentially plays Hulk Hogan, bringing his wrestling buddies in for a film, with all the cliches to go along with it - the crooked promoter, the unstoppable monster, the injured kid, the sexy woman and... "dookie".


No Holds Barred is a movie that should in no way ever be taken seriously. It sucks hardcore as a serious movie. Look at it more in the way that you should Plan 9 From Outer Space. They are one in the same in that they are both so bad they are funny. The funny moments in No Holds Barred are usually the ones that aren't supposed to be. When Rip (played by Hulk Hogan as only he can play them) grabs the limo driver out of the front after his first meeting with Brell (Kurt Fuller) hilarity ensues and it is one part of the movie that every person should see. It might be the funniest scene ever, I swear.

Anyway, how someone thought this movie would make money I'll never know and that person should probably be beaten into submission. I hope they at least got fired. This movie earns a 1 out of 5 on my scale and that one is just for the unintentionally funny parts.


I worked on this atrocity ten years ago. Luckily for me, no one knows it because I didn't make the final cut. And when I saw the movie in the theaters, I was glad! My agents were driven nuts by the (apparently first-time) filmmakers, rewriting the script daily and changing their arrangements with the agencies just as often. They later told me that, once back in California (we shot in Atlanta), these "professionals" had 4 1/2 hours worth of footage! Even edited down to 90 minutes, it's at least twice as long as it needs to be. I found Hulk Hogan surprisingly charming, but otherwise -- what a waste of film!


I remember when they made a big deal about this when it was coming out. They showed clips every week on WWF TV and everyone was excited. It debuted opening weekend at number two behind Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Then it did a nosedive. Critics HATED this film. I don't remember seeing one good review. Everyone agreed it was bad and sometimes grotesque. I didn't know they meant back then but now I do since the movie makes references to gay bars, women getting slapped hard and nearly raped and a disgusting looking bar restroom with overflowing urinals lol. When I was younger, I didnt care for that. It was Hulkamania, brother!!!

Now I find this pretty bad, but still fun to watch once in a while when its paired with Bodyslam (which has a better storyline). First off, Hulk Hogan's acting skills just aren't great. he is one dimensional like the character he plays in the wrestling ring. And actually, Rip and Hulk are not to far off from each other. Kurt Fuller is a good actor, but he is not good at playing the bad guy. He is better at comedy and nervous drama characters. He is just not believable as Brell. There isn't much character development in this film and the ones that suffer are the characters of Randy, Rip's brother and Charlie the trainer (In wrestling its unheard of a trainer escourting a wrestler to the ring lol). Tiny Lister plays Zeus the way its supposed to be played, so there isnt any problem there. Joan Severence is passable and for all you softcore hounds, she does have a lingerie scene lol. By the end, you figure, what's the point?

For this one (as with other wrestling films or films that feature wrestlers as the main star), turn your brain off. You'll enjoy it more if you do.


No Holds Barred is that movie that when you were nine or ten was the coolest movie this side of arnold schwarzenegger. But then when you grow up and watch it you feel embarrassed that you were so gullible to have liked it. You feel cheated, embarrassed, and stupid. If you have a little brother and you show him this and he tells you it's gay, give him a high five and take him to the strip bar for his eleventh birthday.


A thinly veiled attempt to push Hulkamania to the film going non-wrestling fan. What could be worse than Hogan in the movies? Bad actors in the wrestling ring, and this film produced both, as Tiny Lester made his way to the WWE that summer in the mother of all promotional blunders. See the dictionary under Oops. As a card carrying member of the stupid kids of the world paid to see this in theaters and when I came out I immediately checked into H.A. - Hulkamaniacs Annoynimous. I am proud to say I have been off the Hulk for 17 years now and have never had a craving since. Since this was made to bring in more fans to the juggernaut that was the WWE in Hogans hey day one has to wonder if there weren't more fans like me who turned to other past times that did not poison ones mind like this offense to celluloid did, such as huffing gas or Russian Roulette.


Hulk Hogan plays Rip a professional wrestler who has a big heart but is pushed to the limit when his girlfriend(Joan Severence) is kidnapped by thugs who are forcing him to take on another wrestler(Tiny Lister Jr.)Bottom of the barrel actioner is such a failure that even Hogan looks ashamed to be in it, and with the evidence portrayed, he should be.


Hulk Hogan and Zeus are horrible wrestlers and horrible actors. Hogan for some reason was popular enough to get a movie deal I'll never know why. If not for vince Mcmahon's money this stupid film would have never been made. Maybe someday someone will make a good movie about pro wrestling. No Holds Barred is not that movie.


... in search of the cheesiest "so bad it's good" movie, I've repeatedly laughed at the first fifteen minutes of various films, only to be left disappointed and bored at the end. Not this time!!! My eyes teared up, my belly and my cheeks ached from laughing so hard throughout the movie. Sure, Hulk Hogan is a subpar actor and the plot is utterly predictable, but everyone dives into this movie knowing all this - all anyone wants to see when renting this is Hogan breaking out a can of whoopass, with a bunch of "YEAH BROTHER"s and "WHATCHUGONNADO"s flying from his infamously goateed mouth. And while the Hulkster on the screen pales a bit in comparison to the Hulkster in the ring, seekers of the ultimate cheese will certainly not be disappointed by this backhand gem of a flick. A laugh riot.


This movie changed my life! Hogan's performance was nothing short of incredible, and I still haven't recovered from his exclusion from the 1990 Oscar nominations. And as brightly as the Hulkster shines in this movie, you can't discount the brilliant writing and direction that vaults this masterpiece in to the highest strata of achievement in film. If you haven't seen this movie, drop what your doing right now and get yourself a copy. I guarantee it will blow your mind. And if you don't like it, then I just have one question for you.... Watcha gonna do when the 24 inch pythons and Hulkamania runs wild on you!!!!


I watched Gomeda on movie theater at my city. My friend took away me and I was really curious what would be it looked like. Well, I must say This movie was not a horror,may be we can say that is 'Fantsastic experimentation'...OK here I go anyway... But there was a lot of shooting,acting,dramatic,theatrical and storytelling problems.I can understand because of director is very young and Gomeda is his first feature film.OK Directing of this film was not pretty bad,I see.Unfortunately, due to the restraints placed on the film by its extremely low budget, the visuals are often as murky as the storyline.And there is no powerful Gothic scenes.As a horror movie it really fails, no scares at all and it is quite muddled and boring. Some people say 'Gomeda' is an art movie, but I could not see a laughable,terrible and breoken off art movie like that.So, how can we say it is an art movie!Just funny!


One of the worst films I have ever seen! After watching it i walk out like, what happened? I am confused to this day, can someone explain that movie to me please? both the acting and picture quality are so bad ,you'll think you're watching someone's school project made with a home camcorder. First,I can not believe that how some people could give 10 star to this movie.Because,.it's unbelievably bad movie! This movie isn't scary at all! There is even no Typical horror clichés,too. The plot and acting of This movie was terrible. It's not,fantastic,surrealistic or horror,It's just hideously bad Turkish feature film.And finally there were a lot of unnecessary scenes and unnecessary characters. When I watch 'Gomeda' I fell into so hopeless,so sad for young Turkish movie maker.Please,please don't make 'cinema' like this!


Unfortunately, I went to this movie for entertainment purposes based on the limited information I had seen on Fandango. Since I am a sci-fi buff the notion of a movie about UFOs interested me.

Instead, this movie quickly revealed itself as an evangelical Christian propaganda flick. Appropriate for an audience of like-minded individuals but very un-Christian like to exploit the movie mall scene and preach to an unsuspecting audience, especially considering the costs of tickets and concessions. Shame on you! At least the Da Vinci Code did not hold back its wild-eyed craziness.

So, this B-grade movie (and I am being kind) production will be appreciated in those churches with similar beliefs, probably shown to Wednesday and Sunday evening youth groups. But if you are a mainline Christian or non-Christian you will not be comfortable.


Calling this a "Sunday School" movie might be generous, because, even as a Christian, I found the religious message so one-dimensional that I wouldn't want to see it at my church. The message is, "Read your Bible, go to church and sign up for fire insurance, so you won't get left behind at the rapture." There was no love. I guess when you get right down to it, I don't believe in the god portrayed in this film. The guy who was supposed to have all of the spiritual answers came across like Count Dracula.

Aside from the spiritual/religious element, the script was tedious--saying the same thing over and over. That might have been to make up for some of the acting, which was unable to deliver a convincing line the first time, so they just said the same thing over and over.

I did enjoy the final scenes. I thought it made a point without hitting someone over the head or stooping to a Sunday School formula. The movie wasn't all bad, just most of it.

I am in favor of more clean movies that are well-done and that present truth in a non-preachy way. This wasn't one of those, I am sorry to say. I took my family to this film, wanting to support that kind of movie. Now I'd like my money back.


This movie was terrible. It is not something that people should have to pay to see. It looks like some Christian group made it to convert people. I don't understand why it was released to theaters and not to TV.

It started out like an old fashioned B movie sci-fi film from the 50s, but quickly changed. About 30 minutes into the movie the characters start talking about "God" and "Do you believe in Jesus?" It quickly moves into pure religion territory.

I thought I was going to a Sci-Fi movie. The film has poor acting; bad camera angles and is amateurish.

AVOID IT!


How awful is it? Let me count the ways: 1) It is a bait-and-switch movie that starts out being about a UFO investigation, then turns into a high-pressure sales job for Christianity. C'mon! If the makers of this movie felt so strongly about their message, why disguise it? It annoys non-believers and pushes fence-sitters in the opposite direction. 2) It's not even a good sales pitch! If the characters in this flick asked me to go to church with them, I'd run like Hell in the opposite direction. They're scary! 3) The acting is terrible. They all behave as if they were in an educational film about etiquette in the workplace. 4) The cinematography is home-movie bad. Wait, actually its not even that good. 5) Script bad, bad, bad. All dialogue, no action. Like a tennis match, they bounce back and forth between the "talking head" close ups. 6) Direction... what direction? Oh, there must have been a director there somewhere. I challenge you to figure out where.

Believe it or not, I have some positive comments about this movie. The editing seemed professional, but couldn't make a difference. A good edit of bad material is still a bad movie. The opening theme music was actually very good! Very scary and UFO-ish. Too bad the movie wasn't about UFOs.

If you can't tell already, here's the bottom line. I wasted my money seeing this movie, and it made me angry. If they had not disguised what this movie was really about, I could say it was my fault.


This movie was poorly conceived, poorly written and poorly acted. All of the characters were two-dimensional. It was a real amateur attempt. The movie was fundamentalist Christian propaganda. The Christian characters are holier-than-thou and they are without a shred of compassion for the skeptic or the undecided characters. The movie was a real "gotcha" for both the skeptic character and myself as a viewer, putting us in a very uncomfortable situation. I complained to the theater management and was given a free pass to another movie. I remember another movie on a similar subject, "The Rapture," starring Mimi Rogers, that was much better and professionally done. I think I'll watch "The Rapture" again. If you attend "Unidentified" and don't like it, don't say I haven't warned you.


This movie should have come with a disclaimer that it was akin to the Left Behind series. I did not know it would be a Bible-thumping movie. I expected it to truly be a movie about UFOs and alien abduction for entertainment's sake. As previous reviewer comments, it would be fine to show at a church, but not at a public theater, at least not without the consumer's prior knowledge of what the premise of the movie is about. I felt deceived out of my $$ spent for this movie, as nothing in the summary refers to its religious overtones. If you go to church, it'll probably be shown there for free some time. Other than the cover-up of its true subject matter, the movie was fine as far as acting and script were concerned. But I have to say I walked out an hour into the movie when I saw what direction it was headed and that I was not going to be entertained, but preached to.


Christian Propaganda...Lots of fear mongering...

This is not SciFi, this is ChriFi (Christian fiction).The movie started out OK but took a sharp Christian right turn. From then on it was all about god, jc, the holy bible and the devil . The ufo's are really just demonic deception to fool people in to believing that there is other intelligent life in the universe. Satan's idea is to trick you in to thinking that there could be more to life than what is in the bible.

The abductions could be used to explain away the rapture. The people left behind would believe it was a mass alien abduction, instead of god taking all the Christians to heaven. No reason to repent if its aliens. The deeper message in the movie is that if you don't believe in god and have jc in your life than you believe in nothing and your life has no purpose.


I just happened to stumble to this film and checked IMDb for more information: Score 6,7, well... not so bad. Genre: scifi...good I like scifi. So I got the movie and I was looking forward to have a relaxing Sunday evening watching it. But but...NO.

As in summary, this isn't a movie at all. It is a religious advertisement, including: preatching about Jesus, god, devil, end of the world etc. Movie starts with a epic abduction story: Driving at night, car stops, bright light and so on... Well, actually that was the film. Last of this ..ummm... frankly I don't know what to call it...was dialogue about end of the world and last judgement. Quite a same stuff what these TV-preachers tell you, but they are "good" at it.

Honestly, if you wan't to see a scifi movie or something with UFOs, please stay far away from this "thing". It has nothing to do with them. If you want to hear some cuckoo head's opinion what the bible has to say and what you should do. Then go ahead and watch this "thing", but I still prefer going to the church at Sunday.

This is complete bull. (and evangelical Christian propaganda, as another users said= Well... I should have red another users comments before I got the movie.

(27% of voters have rated this "thing" as 10. Yeah, right. Please, go somewhere else to do your propaganda)


I thought I was going to see a UFO movie. Instead, I saw a movie that was trying to make the audience (me) make the decision to accept Christ in my life, or risk going to Hell. The whole UFO thing was one big red herring!!! The acting in it was pretty pathetic. In fact, it looked as though some people from an Evangelic Church just got got together and decided they wanted to make a movie. All the characters talked as though they were in church conversing with other church members. It wasn't real-life dialog at all. I wish I had read some reviews before seeing this movie so I wouldn't have wasted my money on it. If, on the other hand, you are into the whole church scene in a big way, and want to see a demonstration of how to push your views (no matter how limiting) onto other people, then by all means, go see it.


After a good start, it turned out to be the worst piece of holier than thou propaganda i've ever seen. This movie is an open insult designed to make you feel bad about not reading the "holy bible".

To resume the...OK let's call it a plot... Basically alien don't abduct people (that we already know..). No, in fact its demonic forces abducting people which are in new age stuff or witchcraft, or read porno magazine (as one protagonist does).

It's complete with the little emotional piano music when the lead character realize he must blindly follow Christ to be saved.

a quote sums it all , imagine a subtle piano music in the background : "You can't let others, even those you love, stop you from following the Lord.."

and we are supposed to live in an enlightened age...still work to do. Boycott this piece of crap


This movie was a major bait and switch. I rented it because of Rebecca St. James, a popular Christian singer. I have met her and wondered what she would be doing in a UFO movie. Well.......

I think that she starred in this movie to help out a friend, or a friend of a friend. My first clue that this movie wasn't what it was supposed to be was when I witnessed the special effects of the UFO encounters. Cheesy! As the movie progressed, I noticed how plastic the actors were. It was funny how almost everyone in the movie wore solid colors. (There are a few exceptions).

Rebecca was verrryyy disappointing. She is always found in the house and doesn't show the realistic facial expressions of one whose husband has return to the fold. Doesn't she ever leave the house?

I had to turn off the movie several times in order to finish it. I hope that Rebecca doesn't believe the message of this movie - believe in what we believe or suffer and go to hell. Jesus spread a message of love and hope. His message inspired others to change OUT OF LOVE, NOT FEAR.


This is the worst movie I have seen to date. 85 minutes of utterly bad acting,(half the cast seem to be suffering from Asperger's syndrome) ghastly wigs, strange make-up (including tide lines around wig areas) and holier than thou characters with holier than thou dialogue that makes you want to puke. One comical aspect of this film, if you have the patience to watch it, is the sheer overwhelming number of costume changes the unfortunate cast appear in from scene to scene - was this film backed by a catalogue manufacturer of desperately dodgy pastel casual wear? Were the cast paid in clothes for their efforts? They certainly did not deserve paying with anything else! This appalling effort of a film delivers a rambling plot in the first half, blending into an equally confused arch Christian biblefest in the latter. The entire cast and production team should be burnt at the stake, or at the very least crucified!


Im warning you people out there, this is just a waste of your time. I am being honest when I'm saying that this is the worst movie I've ever seen. Its just a move about Christian propaganda! Don't throw away your life, don't see it!

I think they made the movie so more people will believe in Jesus or something, but it works in the opposite way. The actors are all newbies, the story is just fuzzy!

I think this movie is a work of the devil.

This movie is just not worth seeing, so please take my advice and don't!


My mom and I, rented this movie. I mean, we love those type of Sci-Fi flicks, whether they be big Hollywood flicks or Indy flicks.

But oh, we were fooled!! Two journalists are investigating a UFO abduction in a small city in Texas. Halfway through, all the sudden things get all christain on us. My mom and I believe in god and Jesus and the Devil, but the way this movie was preaching it, made it annoying. All I really have to say, is that we are Christian, but even we like to have fun. So don't blame christians as a whole, just blame the christians who need to suck the fun out of this movie.

In fact you can clearly understand the directors stance on UFO's, and that is that he believes it is all demonic. Now, i could say some words, but I will not. All I will say is, that DO NOT WATCH this movie, unless you feel like being preached. In fact many times it states that we must be perfect in order to enter heaven. Well, last time I checked, the only perfect person died on a cross.


Movies about U.F.O.'s are always a nice way to kill some time, so on a rainy Sunday evening I picked up this flick, expecting what can be expected from a direct-to-DVD U.F.O. mystery.

Boy, was I wrong! At about halfway in the movie it becomes very apparent that the U.F.O. theme is just a deceptive way of attracting unsuspecting viewers to this Christian propaganda. And this is not just a Christan movie from an average Christian. No, this is Christianity of the extremist fundamentalist kind. The scary kind.

In the end of this movie, the non-believing lead is tricked by their colleagues using a practical joke in thinking that the Rapture has started (which is believed by Christians to be the happening in the end of time where true believers are going to heaven and non-believers are left behind).

When the joke is explained, it is suggested that it is always better to become a true believer, 'just in case we Christians are right'. Now that's a lamest excuse ever to become a Christian if you ask me!

This movie still tries to convert non-believers using scare tactics. "Believe in God or you will go to Hell!" is the message here. Simple, but quite offensive, really. Especially because this movie is being sold as something completely different.

Now let's assume you're a Christian fundamentalist yourself and you're not likely to be offended by the themes in this movie, is this a good movie? I'm afraid it isn't. No actually I'm lying: I'm GLAD it isn't! The acting is horrible, the pacing is horrible, the plot is horrible, especially the ending is laughably bad. As soon as the movie starts, you immediately sense that this is going to be worse than you expected, and you will be right.

In the first half hour, it seems to at least attempt to set up a passable U.F.O. mystery, but then suddenly they bring in this Count Dracula look-alike that starts babbling about the devil. At first you just think this dude is just a crazy maniac, but as it turns out, he actually represents the real views of the makers of this movie. As soon as you start realizing this, you know how this is going to end up. But actually it ends up worse.

Avoid.


I happened across this movie while channel-surfing and it seemed to be yet another poorly- made Christian film about The End Times (which I find rather entertaining because they take themselves so seriously). To be fair, I only saw the last 30 minutes, so I missed the part about UFOs and the Sci-Fi stuff. But it was long enough for me to categorize it as an embarrassing and appalling representation of the Christian faith, as well as a rather pathetic film in any artistic sense.

As a film, the script was terrible, the acting was mediocre, and the pacing was poor. The cinematography and direction were sub-par: no interesting visuals, no layered plot line, no creativity. Don't just blame it on the budget- films can still be interesting without special effects. This wasn't. Christian films cannot excuse their mediocrity and unoriginality in the artistic sphere just because of their message. And the message here was hardly "Christian."

**Disclaimer: The rest of this comment is targeted towards Christians**

First off, it is unethical in any business to bait-and-switch your customers. I don't like being told I can win a free iPod only to realize I have to spend $300 at participating stores first. Nonchristians don't like being told they're watching a Sci-Fi film and then get bombarded with Christian propaganda that has all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Hidden agendas don't win you any friends, much less converts.

Secondly, you should not use overt threats to convince people your beliefs are true. The actors who represented Christians came off as callous, smug bullies when dealing with the skeptical "unbeliever"-- they even go so far as to stage the rapture in order to scare him into believing. Representational dialogue: "Turn to Jesus- OR GO TO HELL!" "Fine, don't believe me- BUT YOU'LL BE SORRY!" "The day you die, I can guarantee you'll wish you paid more attention to this Jesus stuff- WHEN YOU LAND IN THE BELLY OF HELL!" OK, I may be exaggerating, but it certainly came off in the same manner. If you think this is a "clear message for Christ," you're wrong. I don't recall Jesus using threats and coercion. And I don't think people can make an authentic decision to believe in him out of fear. So Christians, please don't use this as a "witnessing tool" for your "unsaved" friends. It is heavy-handed, offensive, and inaccurate in portraying a true Christian message.

Thirdly, the theology was bad. Apart from characterizing Jesus as a means of hell-insurance, it gave no room for debate or discussion and didn't attempt to engage the issue of whether UFOs or alien life could exist. Instead, it offered one pat answer: "UFOs are the devil's scheme to deceive people when the rapture happens," which is neither biblical nor widely-accepted by most Christians. As the Bible doesn't mention UFOs or aliens, you can't use it as a source to draw conclusions one way or the other. The rapture isn't necessarily even a widely-accepted, sound biblical concept, though nowadays most evangelical Christians seem to believe it because of a popular book series. If you do your research (as so many of the supportive reviewers are suggesting), the idea of two comings of Christ (the first as the rapture) is a relatively new phenomena in Church tradition, popularized by some traveling evangelists around the turn of the 20th century. The majority of orthodox Christians will probably find this film's message to be a pretty big stretch that rests on a lot of unsupported presuppositions.

Basically, this film misses the mark both as a worthwhile piece of entertainment and as an accurate representation of Christianity and its beliefs. I wouldn't recommend it.


Wow... just... wow. There are a lot of reviews on this movie already but I wanted to add some comments of my own. I agree with most reviewers who have said this movie has terrible acting, writing, and directing - whoo boy does it ever. However, I think there is some other problems here.

1. Why is Christian belief and the allowance for extraterrestrial life mutually exclusive? The film acts as though you just can't be a Christian and also allow for the possibility? Why? They ever-so-briefly touch on this in the film (i.e. "The Bible doesn't say there is aliens." "Well, the Bible doesn't say there isn't.), but the actual rebuttal is never answered. The Bible really doesn't say there isn't. So how about dealing with the question instead of dismissing it out of hand? Or better yet, acknowledge that this is an infinite universe we live in and if we believe in an infinite God there is the possibility that he made some other life somewhere and has his own plans for them.

2. How come the ONLY two explanations for the abductions that are valid are demons and hoax? What about sleep paralysis and night terrors which have been linked to abduction experiences? What if it's something else entirely? Too bad the film makers already have their minds made up.

3. The film makers claim that all who have had abduction experiences have had ties to the occult. That's a pretty big claim to make without any factual evidence to present. I'm not necessarily arguing that they don't, but if you're going to say something so asinine you'd better have the facts to back it up.

4. Why does the other reporter (not the Greasy Haired Blonde Guy, the other one) always have his hands in his pockets? It's hard to take someone seriously when they're constantly playing pocket pool.

I WISH this had been an exploration of Christian faith and UFO phenomena, but unfortunately the film makers were too concerned with their "Faith Message" to care much about make a thought provoking movie. As a Christian myself, this saddens me.


The only reason I gave this movie a 2 and not a 1 was because for some reason I felt compelled to finish it out! Basically, I wanted to see if there were going to be any aliens, any UFO's, anything at all suggested by the title of the movie, the cover of the movie and the beginning of the movie! I was very disappointed to see religion being thrown into the mix the way that it was. This could have been used to the movie's advantage, but I felt, instead, that the movie was trying to send subliminal messages to me! Finally, how big was this cast's wardrobe!? I became so distracted by the number of different, and extremely bright, shirts each character had on in every new scene that I began to wonder if this movie wasn't really supposed to be classified under "poor comedy".

toe thumbs down!


This is the third movie in a month I have watched that did not go the way I expected. The first two being The Black Dahlia and Hollywoodland, neither of which gave any new ideas of who committed the crimes.

I have always had a fascination with UFOs and was so excited to see a new movie on the subject of UFO investigation that was not a comedy. But after about 30 minutes, it all went horribly wrong.

I could have stood for the acting, the camera angles, the stereotypes if only there was a good story about chasing UFOs, but none here. I am not saying there was anything wrong with the subject matter, but Netflix pushed this movie as a UFO skeptic and a UFO believer investigating multiple sitings.

I stopped watching about half way thru. Can't believe I wasted that much time with this one. Please don't make the same mistake I did.


Supposedly, a movie about a magazine sending journalists to investigate reports of UFOs with one being more or less tolerant or agnostic about the whole affair and the other an Aussie, a hardened skeptic who laughs at the UFO nonsense. It's all a crock, some kind of money making racket.

Turns out this movie is actually a deceit, and a trap to actually promulgate Christian teachings and the Christian explanation of UFOs, one I've heard before. This is an ad hoc explanation that is itself not at all biblical but invented by certain modern theologians who can fit anything and everything into their mythology. The paranormal? It's real, just demonic, unless it takes place in a Christian context, then of course, it is of God. Simple, if it isn't of God, it's the of the Devil, stupid! So I suppose since Beethoven's 9th symphony wasn't inspired by God, it must have been written under demonic influence. Or so would the logic lead ad absurdum.

We are informed that since the Bible does not tell of life on other planets in the Universe, therefore there is none (a version of the Ad Ignorantium fallacy) and that God created the Universe so huge, so grand to show us his almighty power. I think of Carl Sagan's remark that if God created such a huge Universe and stuck life only on Earth it'd have been a tremendous waste of space.

So what are UFOs? They are Demonic activity and concern the soon to be earthshaking Christian event, the rupture...I mean Rapture. Before the tribulation, the true Christians will disappear from the face of the earth en masse causing mass panic, confusion, car and plane crashes...whatever. Therefore Satan knowing this is sending his demons to basically create an illusion of alien spacecraft and alien abduction which can then be used to explain away this otherwise inexplicable event. All part of Satan's plan which will of course keep people from looking to God or Jesus and fall for the lies of the AntiChrist.

This ad hoc explanation also typifies theological mishmash by explaining away one mystery with another, in opposition to the scientific method of explaining the unknown, the strange, and the mysterious in as much as possible, first by the known, if not solely by the known.

It's like jumping straight to an alien abduction whenever a child is missing and unaccounted for. I think I'd look first at more mundane explanations like the child has run away, gotten lost, or been kidnapped for ransom or abducted by a predatory pedophile before invoking aliens, or the supernatural or Satan or some such.

This kind of deceit or trap on the part of fundamentalists is nothing new, as young people are often lured to Free Rock Concerts, that may start out with something innocuous then suddenly switch to overt Christian music, followed by a sermon and an altar call. This kind of blatant deception one might think would be more Satan's ballgame. But maybe because the Christian faith is soon to be in its death throes, these guys feel that anything goes, any deception or trickery or scare tactics are acceptable to try to keep the faith alive, which is facing serious opposition from both secularists as well as competing faiths like Islam, the world's fastest growing religion which may well replace Christianity, as Islam is far more cohesive and unified, and logically more tenable than Christian fundamentalism. Although this should offer little advantage to mankind, as it would be replacing one intolerant thought system with another.

And of course the movie ends more or less with a variant of Pascal's wager. The atheistic Aussie who is skeptical about just about everything is told. Well, if you are right about there being no afterlife and death is nothing but rotting in the grave, no worry...but what if you're wrong?

Basically, statements implying that reality is going to conform to nothing but an atheistic viewpoint or Christian fantasy, is a false dilemma or Black and White fallacy. Even if the atheists are wrong would not necessarily make Christianity correct by default, nor if Christianity turns out to be full of holes in its theology, that the materialistic atheists are therefore correct by default.

For all we know, Native American spirituality might turn out to be the best description of ultimate reality and we might all of use have wished we treated the Earth and its creatures a wee bit better.

This movie should be stamped right on the box: Caution: Contains religious Propaganda and not meant for informative or entertainment purposes.


First of all, i have nothing against Christianity. i believe, every person has the right to believe what he or she chooses. But i cannot imagine how dumb a person has to be to believe this! What a waste of believers' money. They'd better use it to feed some starving families in the third world countries. I don't want to talk about talk acting or plot of this "movie", because I couldn't find any of those in this. Story's simple - two reporters, one (A) is atheist, the other (B) for some sake has abandoned religion. B regains his confidence in religion and teaches A a lesson - believe in Christ or go to hell. This message appears after like ten minutes and keeps repeating to the end of the movie. People, do not believe the rating of this "movie", read reviews first. I didn't and wasted an hour of my life :( PS: Why is it classified as sci-fi? Because of those few weird sounds and a bit of bright light from the sky? PPS: U.F.O. = Satan's evil doings? That's a new one :)


My wife spotted this film on the aisle at a local video store. From the cover it looked like a science-fiction film, but upon turning it over my wife saw Rebecca St. James was in the film, realized it was a Christian movie, and suggested we watch it. We are conservative evangelicals but we also know that "Christian" films have a poor reputation in the mainstream. Nevertheless, we decided to give it a screening.

To be fair, there were a few things I liked about the film. The musical score - much of which was orchestrated - was quite good. The cinematography was also pretty good considering it was a lower-budget movie.

Unfortunately, any virtue in this film's production work was lost on a regrettable script. The film begins with an interesting premise - UFO abductions - but by midway through the feature the storyline veers wildly into an evangelistic crusade spearheaded by the movie's two main characters... which then veers wildly into a treatise on the Rapture. At least the Frank Peretti-inspired "The Visitation" (which was itself a deeply flawed film) had an endgame that tied together the movie's premise. "Unidentified" ends nowhere even close to where it started, which is a huge letdown.

As for the acting? The supporting acting ranges from decent to awful. (Rebecca St. James plays a bit part and is passable.) For their part, a few of the main characters are manned capably enough. Sadly, their talents are wasted on characters so one-dimensional in their personalities so as to be unbelievable. The "protagonists" are anything but; you know it's bad when two Christian viewers find the most vocal Christian character in the film to be the most annoying.

A final note on the evangelistic tone of this movie, which will be of more interest to Christian than non-Christian readers. In a word, it is embarrassing. Other Christian films like Carmen's "The Champion" and Peretti's "The Hangman's Curse" have managed to communicate a genuinely uncompromising portrait of the Christian faith without sounding preachy or oppressive. This film, by contrast, is a sledgehammer that feels so heavy-handed and lacking in tact that a non-Christian would have a hard time taking it seriously.

I do believe that the filmmaker's heart is in the right place, and I applaud efforts to create good Christian film. Unfortunately, this is not one of them. If your church is looking for a screening of a good Christian film, consider "Mercy Streets," the aforementioned "The Champion," or (if you're Pentecostal) Robert Duvall's provocative "The Apostle."

As for "Unidentified?" Rent it if you must, but screen it before you show it to a non-Christian or a larger audience.


This movie starts really good.

After half of the movie it wraps to a religious Christian crap.

Some really Christian with psycho problems are talking about good and believe in Christ - or you go to hell.

Don't watch it - it's pure propaganda and its pure wrong ...

This movie starts really good.

After half of the movie it wraps to a religious Christian crap.

Some really Christian with psycho problems are talking about good and believe in Christ - or you go to hell.

Don't watch it - it's pure propaganda and its pure wrong ...


This movie is nothing more than Christian propaganda. It started off like a good sci-fi movie and then works a syrupy sweet Christian theme into the story which is totally unrelated. I had to turn it off half way through because I felt tricked into renting it. The catholic church has officially announced that aliens do NOT contradict belief in God.

The movie is slightly entertaining despite this but the dialog is unbelievable, writing and acting is mostly rubbish and all in all, this movie is mostly a stinker to be avoided.

There was obviously some research done into the phenomenon by the filmmakers, but then you quickly realize that it is only for the purpose to debunk and inject their own paranoid religious views into a valid interesting subject. If you are a zealous religious fanatic who believes in demons and angels , you will love this movie.


OK, this movie, was the worst display I have seen in years. The actors weren't to bad (I figured it was a b-movie so they were doing b-movie acting). Anyways, I watched this movie, thinking, OH COOL a UFO Sci-Fi movie. WRONG. It was just an excuse for radical Christians to push a message onto people. The last scene was extremely messed up. That is a horrible thing to do to a person to make them believe in something. What someone believe in is a matter of opinion. This movie just shows how corrupted religion is, especially Christianity.

If you want to watch a b-movie, this ain't. If you want to watch a movie that is TRYING to brainwash the masses. Well this is the pick of the litter. go right for it. If you are going to convey a message, do it, don't force it. Ridiculous, that people would abuse the media to such a degree. Especially, Christians.


As you can read the only good comment about this movie is made by someone who actually watch it AT HIS CHURCH !

Anyway, movie had a good B movie sci-fi beginning, everything was there to make a good entertaining , easy to watch movie, then everything felt in this religious Jesus-will-save-everyone brainwashing mode.

story start with 2 main characters, 2 reporters but it fast give the first role to that Jesus freak who is there to save everyone's soul with this con-descendant attitude.

In a few words: this movie goes from entertaining to brainwashing in about 30 minutes

Waste of time, waste of money... AVOID IT


This movie was the biggest piece of garbage I've seen in a long time.

It's marketed as as Sci-Fi when in fact it's nothing more than a Christian recruiting tool.

It tells you quite a bit about the state of the Christian church, when they have to resort to deception just to get you to listen to their sales pitch. But then again what do you expect from an organization that would go through such great lengths to help protect such an enormous amount of child molesters in their organization.

Religion is full of nothing but sexual deviants, hypocrites, and war mongers. Let's not forget, our bumbling former President actually came out and said that "God told him" to invade Iraq. And nobody questioned if he was hearing voices, or seeing things?

Anyway, going of the subject here. No this movie has nothing to do with UFOs whatsoever, it's nothing more than a religious production.


Like a lot of the comments above me, also I though this was the average scifi movie, but unfortunately it was not. I found it rather patronizing, and indeed, preaching.

But that is not the only comment. The scenes are very 'artificial' (not as in scifi, as I will explain a in a few moments). (The next sentence is a small spoiler.) The movie more or less represents a discussion between two groups. The physical setting of a discussion typically involves two or three men standing next to each other, the middle one typically speaking. In the worst case, the other party is represented by one person.

Also the interviews the reporters have are very artificial, sometimes even unprofessional. For example sometimes the discussion is between the reporters (I mean, from a point of the interviewed, 'akward'). Moreover the interview persons always stay calm, they say everything without normal emotions. I.e. you cannot tell whether they lie or not, are mad or not. They show almost nothing.

This is also very unprofessional, the 'Christian' reporters always believe everything they are told by the people they interview.

Bottom line:

All conversations contain:

- facts

- pro/con arguments

There are no lies. Nobody lies. (The next sentence is a spoiler, ignore if you still plan to see the movie) The only lie happening is to demonstrate how 'bad' non-believers are.

This makes me conclude that the movie is a B-movie. It is very similar to 'Plan 9 from Outer Space' (from the 50's), but this movie also has an annoying, wrong set discussion about aliens and Christian belief.

NOTE: I have no intention to insult Christians, people who believe in aliens or whomever else. This is a thought I have about the movie, not about people.

Moreover I would like to note that I don't know whether the actors are bad or were just given terrible scripts.


This is without doubt the worst movie i have ever seen. And believe me, I have seen a lot of movies. The unbelievable twist the movie makes - going from an extremely bad "Alien lifeforms inhabit earth" movie with sickening bad acting, to a film that tries to spread an Archchristian "Judgement day is at hand, seek Jesus or though shall burn for all eternity in the fiery debts of hell" message - left me stunned after being tormented for 85 minutes. Even religious Christians must be ashamed or furious by watching their beliefs being posted like this. I didn't know what to do with myself when I watched the horrible acting that could have been performed by 7-year-olds. Simply disgusting. I am not a Christian nor very religious. But if I had been, I would no longer be afraid of Hell. Rich Christiano has shown be something much, much worse.


A antique shop-owner in NYC, played by Joanne Whalley(Valerie Alston)gets put on a US District Court jury, on a trial of a known Mafioso Armand Asante(Rusty Pirone), and most of this very slow-paced film revolves around attempts of Pirone attempting to get Whalley to acquit him of murder, by threatening to kill her son, and herself. Much action ensues, involving gruesome mob-rub outs, interspread with Willam Hurt as the go-between. Much of this silly, disjointed mess surrounds Hurt and Asante's obsession with Whalley, courtroom scenes that we've all seen time and again, and an ending that is unbelievable. 3/10 is probably going easy on this waste of time.


Two years after this movie was made, "The Juror" came out. Don't waste your time on this one. See "The Juror" instead. "The Juror" is essentially the same story as "Trial By Jury," with better acting, better directing and a far more gripping aura about it. William Hurt was not believable as a cop-gone-bad, and Armand Assante couldn't be more unlike a mob boss if they had dressed him in a clown outfit. You didn't become involved enough with Joann Whalley's character to be that upset by what was happening to her. Also, the way in which she interacted with the jury wasn't compelling or interesting in any way. Kathleen Quinlan's role as a hooker/killer wasn't fleshed out enough and quite frankly was unnecessary for to the plot.


It´s long time that I and my wife didn´t see such a boring thriller. It´s definitively NOT a gripping story and it is paced so slowly that we nearly fell asleep. This could be instead a very low budget TV crime series. There are some ridiculous scenes like the one where mafia boss Pirano wants to see the jury lady in a red clothes or another mafioso cannot stop to think about her and so on. Okay perhaps this should have been a romantic thriller but believe me you really don´t miss anything. We gave 4/10.


This review is for the UK DVD three-disc box set. Disc one is called Caught in the Act and contains Model Behavior, Chasing Jamie and Fast and Curious. Disc two is called Bedroom Fantasies and contains Blue Plate Special, Falling in Lust Again and Love Potion No. 10. The final disc is called Anything Goes and contains Chatroom, She's the Boss and Legally Yours. Why the other four episodes in the series are not included is a mystery because there is surely enough room on the discs for a lot more material.

Each episode opens with the hotel manager Chloe (Lauren Hayes) reading a letter from a satisfied customer. We then get to see the story unfolding as the guests check into the hotel. Blue Plate Special is the exception because this story is from a waitress. The writers should be given credit for coming up with a good variety of story lines. For instance, Model Behavior is about two models vying for the attention of the photo crew; Falling in Lust Again is about a man and woman who parted and rekindle their love when they meet up again at the hotel; She's the Boss is about a put-upon male secretary/dogsbody who shows that he is more of a man than his female boss realised - much to her pleasure. All the episodes lead up to lots of nudity and sex.

It should come as no surprise that all the characters in this hotel are beautiful women and handsome hunks. Even the geeky secretaries get transformed when they remove their spectacles and let their hair down. The sex action is plentiful but to me seems too frantic and false. The camera work could also have done with a bit of moderation, spending too much time close up and so moving about to capture everything, and as usual we get loud music during the sex action. Finally, the end credits mention the Palm Canopy Hotel, Singer Island, Florida although my map of Florida shows no Singer Island. The scenery certainly looks more like Florida than Utah or Las Vegas that some people have mentioned. This is quite a good effort and it is a pity that the second series is still awaiting a UK DVD release. 4 stars.


Watching this film today I got the feeling this thing was missing about 10 to 15 minutes or so from the beginning of the story. John Wayne rides up on this trading post/saloon out in the middle of nowhere to meet with the owner about some robberies. All he sees is the signs of a massacre, some dead bodies, signs of a fight and no one alive in sight. That's because the owner's daughter is hidden in a secret room, the kind you find in old English murder mysteries.

The reason you find those hidden rooms in those kind of stories is that they were formerly priestholes. Catholic families clinging to the old faith in 16th century England built these things to hide those on the run from royal authorities because of their faith. Not something you see in westerns, but a good gimmick.

Unfortunately because of bad editing or writing or both we never know exactly what brought Wayne to this place exactly. But this was a B western and not even a good one at that.

Gabby Hayes is in this and he's clean shaven and playing a mute part of the time. An unusual circumstance for the garrulous Gabby.

If you want to bother and find out what happens and see a whiskerless Gabby Hayes then see this film.


Randy Bowers (John Wayne) comes upon the Half Way House at just the right time to take a break from the trail, and discovers a slew of dead bodies inside, among them a man he was supposed to deliver a message to - Ed Rogers, proprietor of the establishment. He's observed by the dead man's niece Sally (Alberta Vaughn), from behind a hidden room, where she remained unobserved during the carnage.

"Randy Rides Alone" was directed by Harry Fraser. He uses a filming technique here as in other of his films, where he fast forwards the action from one location to another, usually involving a rider on a horse. It's pretty well done and appears quite innovative in these 1930's era Lone Star Westerns.

Pre-Gabby George Hayes is on hand, sans whiskers, and this is the first time I've seen him as a villain. In fact it took a few scenes to realize it was him in a dual role, first as hunchbacked businessman "Matt the Mute", communicating via pencil and paper, only to turn into Marvin Black, leader of a gang of outlaws. Black's gang was responsible for the murders at Half Way House, in an attempt to coerce Sally into selling out to Matt/Marvin. Another staple player is here as well, Yakima Canutt as a Black henchman named Spike. Interestingly, Yakima portrayed a villain named Sam Black in another Fraser/Wayne oater, "Neath the Arizona Skies".

There's a fair amount of time-killing horseback riding back and forth between Black's Gang and the Sheriff's posse, as John Wayne's character maneuvers to expose the bad guys. In the end, he saves the day by securing Sally Rogers' thirty thousand dollars, at the expense of destroying the Half Way House, where he exchanges some sticks of dynamite for the loot in a safe. Greedy Marvin Black attempts to open it with his six-shooter, and the explosion is a fitting end for the villain. In his best "Aw shucks" attitude, John Wayne falls under the spell of the pretty Sally Rogers, and alas, Randy rides alone no more!


John Wayne is without a doubt one of the most popular and loved actors of all time. His career stretched over forty years, and within that time he starred in films such as "Angel and the Badman", "The Green Berets", "Sands of Iwo Jima", "Rio Bravo", "North to Alaska", and "The Undefeated".

The film's listed above are hailed as some of his best, unlike this 1934 effort "Randy Rides Alone", which has been pretty much forgotten about as time's gone on, which is unsurprising, as it's nothing memorable apart from its very short running time of just 53 minutes.

A young John Wayne plays Randy Bowers, who for reasons never really explained, arrives at a saloon in the middle of nowhere and finds that everyone inside has been killed. While looking around, a posse arrives and finds Randy there and they arrest him, accusing him of being a gang member and demand to know where the rest of his gang is. He is put in jail accused of the murders. Sally Rogers, whose uncle owned the saloon and was murdered, arrives at the jail to see Randy in order to clarify that he was one of the gang members ( She was hiding in a secret room when the shooting took place ). Sally doesn't believe that Randy is a killer, and doesn't recognise him, so while the sheriff is out, she slips him the keys and Randy escapes. While running away from the sheriff and his posse, Randy conveniently stumbles into the gang's hideout in a cave who were responsible for the murders. Randy sets out to clear his name, and also to bring the gang to justice.

"Randy Rides Alone" can be a fun film to watch, especially if you're a John Wayne fan. But at the same time it has far too many flaws that are impossible to ignore. The film is also extremely dated, as you would expect; we have the terrible camera shooting which makes everyone look like they are moving in super-fast motion, and the dialogue is terrible. The acting isn't great either, and Wayne's character is very wooden and he, along with the rest of the cast, look like wooden puppets who are being conducted by someone ( In this case it's by director Harry Fraser ). Harry Fraser is at the helm, and does a good enough job but the story is paper-thin. One can't help but feel that about ten minutes is missing from the start of the film as Randy just arrives out of nowhere at the saloon and is looking to meet someone. An explanation on why Randy was there is giving later on, which turns out to be something like he is a P.I who was sent to investigate the claims that someone is trying to take over the town. To be honest I didn't really pick it up, most of the time I was hoping for the movie to end.

But that being said, I didn't find this film to be completely terrible. I enjoyed some of it and found it to be quite fun at times. But it really isn't a great film, and isn't really worth watching or tracking down.

Overall, "Randy Rides Alone" is incredibly dated and is a tiresome Western with very few redeeming qualities. Can be fun but overall it isn't a great movie and is certainly one of Wayne's weaker outings.


There were many 'spooky' westerns made in the 30s and early 40s, and although this has a strong beginning, it isn't one. Randy Bowers (John Wayne) stopping at a 'Halfway House' saloon, finds it to be full of dead bodies, the bartender's corpse draped over the bar holding a gun, eyes watching Randy from behind holes cut through eyes in a picture, and a player piano playing "The Loveliest Night of the Year."

It was the result of a robbery by the Marvin Black gang, to get Ed Rogers' $30,000. Randy is an investigator who "works alone," who wastes little time in getting arrested, escaping (with Ed's daughter Sally's help) and literally landing in the midst of the Black gang's hideout behind a waterfall. It all moves along fairly quickly. Only one too many chases after Randy slow it down.

We even get George Hayes, clean shaven and playing two parts-- Marvin Black, the vilest villain, as well as the Good Citizen, Matt the Mute, who communicates via handwritten messages. Having him play two opposite roles was a good idea, but the writing down of messages thing gets old real fast, even for him, as he finally gives up doing it near the end saying to Sally, "Ah, I'm fed up with this!" You can find George playing a vile, vile, double crossing villain in the serial "The Lost City" (1934).

I think this is the only 'Lone Star' film in which the title relates to, or is mentioned in the film! Sally offers her hand to Randy and says, "He's not alone anymore!" Then cut to their arms around each other as they look out facing a lake. Sally's running off with Randy seems too abrupt and not sufficiently prepared for. Too much time spent on horseback escaping the sheriff.

Not that bad considering everything, but not that great either. I'd really give it a 4 and a half.


Most of Wayne's B westerns are kind of fun in a naive way, but this one really stinks. The editing is terrible, and the direction and pacing is completely lethargic. Most of the cast stands around waiting for the mute guy to write down his thoughts on a pad of paper, and I was bored. Sorry, Duke, but this gets a 1.


I had seen this movie when I was a boy (Before WWII) and was surprised that the local library had a copy. Saw it again after some sixty years and forgot how bad it was. This is an example of a movie that was not a "A" movie. No editing, poor script, weak acting and not much directing. Should not even be as high as a "B" Had a laugh at how jaded I've become over the years. Seems to me I thought it was good when I originally saw it.


Okay, now I know where all those boring cop/homicide TV shows came from. I do believe they can be traced back to this movie. "Scene Of The Crime" feels more like a TV episode, or an episode of a serial. Complete with stock characters and situations - the hotshot cop who clashes with his superiors... the aging cop who doesn't want a desk job, despite failing eyesight... the reckless rookie... the double-crossing dame, etc.

I like many of the actors here, and they do a good job, but overall I found this movie dull as I'm not a fan of the genre. I kept tuning out when they were discussing the case ...something about bookies and informers. And oh yeah, there was a stripper, played by the previously wholesome Gloria DeHaven. What I want to know is: Why did she keep calling Van Johnson "Uncle Wiggly"? Wasn't Uncle Wiggly a rabbit? A character from a children's book? What the heck does that have to do with anything? I guess I just don't get tough-guy Film Noir-ish kinda jargon.

In fact, much of the dialogue made me mutter "nobody talks like that!" However, I could relate to one scene where the cop's wife (Arlene Dahl), who worries every time he goes to work, realizes that maybe she shouldn't have made her husband the center of her life. Yeah, I know that feeling of loving someone so much, being so dependent on them, that there's a constant fear for their safety. So there are moments of truth in this film, underneath the stylized dialogue and atmosphere which is trying so self-consciously to be gritty and REAL, that it actually seems unreal to me.

A little background: this movie was made when Dore Schary took over MGM from Louis B. Mayer, and began to put an end to the wholesome musicals that made MGM so great. Dore Schary was determined to bring more "realism" to movies. I kinda hate Dore Schary. Maybe we can blame him for all the pretentious, bleak movies being made today, wallowing in the ugly "truths" about life, focusing on (and, in my opinion, helping to perpetuate) the worst of humanity rather than the best. No longer uplifting us the way classic movies were designed to do - providing a necessary distraction during the Great Depression and World War II.

Well, damn it, we still need that kind of distraction today! There's still plenty of depression and plenty of war. And what are people turning to nowadays when they want to escape? Trashy, brain-deadening Reality TV. Thanks a lot, Dore!


This one's a doozy. Dating from 1949, Scene of the Crime often plays more like a Coen Bros. movie set in the 1940's and filmed in black and white, except that the writer's ear for pastiche here isn't quite so well-tuned -- maybe this can be seen instead as the forerunner to Oscar-baiting schlock like Road to Perdition. Frankly, it's a wonder that this film isn't considered a classic by film professors and critics everywhere, considering how much it offers in term of overly articulated mannerist thrills cloaked in false significance ( much like the grandaddy of all such "fake art" films, Citizen Kane, or anything by Murnau. )

MGM is usually a studio that can do no wrong in my eyes, and I think any story, any atmosphere, even "gritty realism," can only benefit from grotesque overaestheticization. You could say I'm a disciple of the Minnelli school. But it takes a certain light touch to write mannered tough-guy dialogue of the Dashiell Hammett stripe, a willingness, perhaps, to let maybe one or two scenes pass without a line like "Careful, Mr. Wiggly, or you'll have thirteen fish to fry and no little wormies to catch them with." I made most of that up -- "Mr. Wiggly," unfortunately, made the cut -- but believe me, the dialogue is just that loonily inflated and riddled with non sequiturs. Even the lead cop's wife played by Arlene Dahl speaks like she has a moon-shaped scar under one eye and the Christian name Rocco. By the time Van Johnson turns in his badge with the line, "I'm sick to death of death and homicide," you'll wonder how the writer's fixation with ornate literary devices -- in this case, zeugma -- could ever have been misconstrued as "street."

For those who have outgrown The Naked Gun series, this is the funniest cops-n-robbers film going.