RENT opens full throttle with the cast loudly singing to show us that they are intensely angry about something, though just what they are angry about or why they feel compelled to put it into song is never made clear. Indeed, as the film meanders along for over two hours, it never really goes anywhere beyond the usual contrived plot complications about lovers breaking up and getting back together.

It is obviously going for a slice-of-life quality, trying to recreate a time and a place, in this case AIDS-era New York, circa 1990. The multi-award winning play is based on Puccini's opera "La Boheme," but the film rather apparently seeks inspiration from the screen version of HAIR. Like HAIR, RENT features a rambling plot that only provides an excuse for the songs; but unlike Milos Foreman's underrated classic, RENT is saddled with rather mundane music and cursed with lackluster staging. Tony awards and a Pulitzer prize notwithstanding, RENT drones from one barely memorable song to the next, trying to be soulfully operatic but revealing its greatest weakness: it's faux operetta can't conceal that it is an utterly trivial story about utterly trivial people.

HAIR has the added advantage of being about an era with distinction; the late 1960s were utterly unique in style, attitude and relevancy. Other than taking place at the heart of the AIDS epidemic, there really isn't anything that lends distinction to the milieu that RENT desperately tries to document; 1990 being not that much different from, say, 1975, or for that matter 2005. RENT has the sort of timeless banality that is purposely built into TV sitcoms so that they can play eternally in reruns; if the dialogue didn't mention what year it takes place, it would be difficult to tell. It is certainly difficult to care.

The cast repeatedly breaks into one song or another that pointedly celebrates nonconformity, as if such a thing was a unique and original concept. Unfortunately, so much of what the film embraces as being bohemian, seems less shockingly radical than just plain shallow and trendy. What is set forth as originality comes off as cliché, warmed over beatnik and/or hippie counterculture posturing. Rather than being universal in nature, the film's call for freethinking seems strangely generic. If anything, RENT seems geared to do little more than to romanticize poverty and failure.

A good example is the character of Mark Cohen, a wannabe filmmaker played by Anthony Rapp. Mark is cursed with a caring, middle-class family and is obviously slumming; the great tragedy he suffers during the course of the story is that he lands a high paying job with a future. Throughout the movie, he is constantly filming some sort of vague documentary about his own life, which prompts him to prattle on about his artistic integrity. To this end he utilizes an old-fashioned, hand-cranked camera, eschewing opportunities to use state-of-the-art equipment, let alone get money to finance his project. The resulting film proves to be little more than an amateurish home movie. He is not an artist; he's a kid playing with a toy. RENT is an ambitious effort about people without ambition, merely kids at play.

The roles are tailor-made to safely conform to PC standards of diversity; a carefully balanced quota of blacks, whites, Jews, Latinos, straights, gays, AIDS sufferers, addicts, "yuppie scum" and the now almost mandatory free spirit cross-dresser. But it is the type of diversity that is only skin deep; none of the characters stand out as unique individuals; they are diverse for political correctness sake. The characters come together to keep their crumbling tenement building from being torn down, apparently so the characters themselves don't have to actually get on with their inert lives. RENT is a contradictory story that celebrates nonconformity through characters who conform to their common fear of change and growth.

The film's milquetoast radicalism extends to its production, which is no more bold or original than its call for nonconformity. Director Chris Columbus makes little effort to experiment in staging or editing the musical numbers; when he isn't obviously copying A CHORUS LINE or HAIR, Columbus gives us an endless array of static shots of characters standing and singing; so much so that the rare inventive moment, such as Rapp and Tracie Thoms nicely doing "The Maureen Tango," seem strangely out of place. Had the film brushed aside its lame story and been more of a musical revue of showstoppers, (like HAIR, or CHICAGO, or GODSPELL or anything by Busby Berkeley or Astaire and Rodgers) then the superficiality of the material would be irrelevant. RENT strives to be neither original nor traditional and ends up not being much of anything.


I will confess I never (though I lived in NYC at the time) saw this on Broadway--and despite quite a few protests that the stage version was better, while it certainly couldn't have been WORSE, I can't imagine much improvement with those craptacular songs.

Ironically, I would've been Bohemian-ish (at least somewhat) at the time this was set and I would've have nothing but contempt for a group of pretentious slacker junkies who couldn't be bothered to do SOMETHING to support themselves ethically. I also hung out in the East Village at the time...11th and Ave A was fully gentrified at least 6 or 7 years BEFORE this silliness even takes place. One of the first trendy restaurants, The Pharmacy (located at A and 9th) was well established by 1982, for crying out loud! Very few true struggling bohemians could afford the East Village by 1989.

I found nearly every character thoroughly loathsome and painfully dim, as well. The only one I could stomach was Joanne, probably because really, she was largely an outsider and she had an actual gasp job!!!! Which she did without issues!!!

Other things I found just repugnant: it was twice treated as completely hilarious that Angel killed a dog for $1,000. Akitas are LOVELY dogs, and animal abuse is sick and gross; Pseudo Bon Jovi was a recovering addict, yet everyone was overjoyed when he and perpetually jonsing Mimi become a couple--and given it was a previous girlfriend that had gotten him hooked in the first place--Maybe NOT such a good coupling; I noticed as they all patted themselves on the back at the bar (I frequented the real one, it looks nothing like that inside)for their avant garde status, they were completely loathsome to the wait staff...dudes, chances are the servers are boho, too---THEY just take responsibility for their lives. I bet all those %#@* don't tip, either.

I rented this movie, since the awful (and yet still too kind) reviews kept me from wasting my $$$ at the theater. I want my $3.79 rental fee back, though.

P.S. there was one OTHER character I did like, the homeless lady who told pompous, pretentious Mark and his junior high film project to %$&* off.


After seeing "Rent" I left the Loews theater with feelings of disappointment and regret; but as the film admonishes its audience to "forget regret," I found it fulfilling and ideologically consistent with the movie to switch to anger and resentment.

In spite of the lack of satisfaction, I did learn several things from Rent:

1. One needn't actually produce a work of Art (tm 2005, Rent Corporation) to be an Artist. Since all Life outside the Mainstream (tm) is Art, one need only record it (the medium and technique are irrelevant) and display it to have successfully avoided Selling Out.

2. Being Creative is better than being in the Mainstream, and the two are in fact mutually exclusive. Keeping It Real doesn't refer to the Mainstream.

3. Those in the Mainstream have surrendered Principle for a living death (because anything outside La Vie Boheme (tm) isn't living at all).

4. Intensity of emotion trumps its direction, effects, or meaning.

5. One needn't care enough about someone to change dangerous and/or hurtful behavior in any way, as long as one is Living outside the Mainstream; the resulting effervescence of Creative Love will redeem you in spite of illness, poverty, and their impact on your loved ones.

6. Your loved ones would rather love you Super-Intensely for a period of months than love you In The Mainstream for a lifetime; your impending sickness and death will enable further heights of emotion, creating an unending spiral cycle of Intense Love for generations to come.

7. It is far better to live for a short time as a Creative Archetype than to live a long time in the Mainstream as a Mere Human.

8. A political protest need be neither political, nor a protest; it needn't be coherent as long as it's Creative, since those viewing the goings-on will either be In Tune or are The Living-Dead Corporate Enemy, in which case they are irredeemably evil despite their support for anyone in La Vie Boheme.

9. Annoying Relatives in the Mainstream are so awful that they must be shunned, whatever value they might contribute or pain they might alleviate in La Vie Boheme; though Poverty is the main problem in La Vie Boheme, no amount of it is sufficient to warrant such extreme measures as Reliance On Family.

10. Change is bad. There's no reason to change an artistically unproductive life, especially to something in the Mainstream, because if you're living La Vie Boheme, life is Art; artistic contributions are irrelevant.

11. The rest of the world does owe you a living, on your terms, whatever they are. There's nothing one need do to merit such consideration, other than living La Vie Boheme; the Mainstream exists purely to support La Vie Boheme, though despite this reliance, the Mainstream deserves only scorn, derision, and contempt.

A brief summary of the characters:

Angel was a free-spirited, creative, ephemeral soul with colorful, outlandish mannerisms and a buoyant outlook uniquely identical to EVERY OTHER DRAG QUEEN STEREOTYPE EVER ON CELLULOID. See Priscilla Queen of the Desert for rich counterexamples.

Tom Collins was sensitive because he got beat up, smiled a lot at Angel, and is also brilliantly quirky because he stole from an ATM he re-wired, theft being so much more fulfilling than any larger sums derived from engineering jobs in the Mainstream.

Roger was a soulful Bon Jovi-ish artist minus the artistry and the soul. He at least contributed the worst song of the movie to resurrect his she's-not-quite-dead-yet love.

Mimi exhibited a deft and precise bikini-wax during her dance solo, and covered with sweat during her cold-turkey drug withdrawal, verged on the Fiona Apple-esquire.

Maureen contributed a delightful ass-shot, the spiritual zenith of the film. At that moment I wanted to go down on my knees and pray.

Joanne was a control freak - we know she was, because Maureen sang so. Somehow, despite Mainstream mannerisms and a Mainstream job, she was Bohemian, because the others wanted her to be.

Mark was the geeky filmmaker who decided to eschew Structure in favor of Passion. He completed his film (made by riding around on a bike, filming things) after quitting his horrific but seductive Mainstream job (driving around in a van, filming things). Evidently, the only obstacle to completing his film was developing raw unedited footage and shoving it on a projector reel.

Rent did have some good tunes and musical performances, like nice paintings afloat on a sea of lightweight bile.

Some things to which the word "Rent" applies:

- my soul after seeing the film

- my day after seeing the film

- my wallet after seeing the film

- what writing "Rent" earned plenty of for the creators

- what those who go see "Rent" often need to pay the old-fashioned way, in the Mainstream


Any coincidence between this apocalyptic version of Puccini's "La Boheme" and the original is purely a stratagem of the producers, attempting to bootstrap an agonizingly bad production on the fame of a classic.

Puccini wrote music; Jonathan Larson wrote screams. Puccini's librettists conceived an actual story that has transcended generational and societal boundaries; Larson's book will appeal principally to cross-dressing, drug-addicted failures on the lower east side of Manhattan who believe that having rent-free accommodations in one of the world's most expensive cities is a matter of right.

What should have been, and what is promoted as being, a synthesis of "Angels in America" and "Hair" sadly turns out to be little more than an overly long, boring story of some wingless, bald, sexually-confused people. And they yell a lot. For a long, long time.


In short, save the $9 ticket price, and buy the Broadway Cast Album instead. It will bring you much more joy and will give you a vastly better perspective on the composer's original vision.

I consider the film to be an unsuccessful translation of the show, which I have seen in New York eight (8) times as of 11/23/05. I appreciate that making a film of a play must be very difficult, and I don't fault Mr. Columbus or Mr Chbosky for being unsuccessful, but I think that some of the choices made in altering the original, Pulitzer Prize winning, book were unfortunate.

In general, I thought that the film was tedious and disjoint, but the most severe problem was that I felt no empathy with the characters in the film, whereas I do in the play.

The film was stripped of most of the original book's wit and edge. Where was Mark's mom singing on the answering machine? Where was Alexi Darling's message from the Hamptons? And Mimi's dance at the Cat Scratch Club, like many other aspects of the film, was sanitized to ensure the film's PC-13 rating. Can you imagine Quentin Tarintino sanitizing Salma Hayek's dance in From Dusk Till Dawn to get a PG-13 rating? A correctly made film would have received an "R" or "NC-17" rating.

If you can imagine how interesting Pulp Fiction would be without profanity or violence, you can imagine how interesting the film Rent is.


This movie really isn't good. I honestly don't see how so many people like it. The story is pretty shallow, the "lessons learned" are cliché, and the music is boring. There I said it. Also, It's laced with fake "edginess", almost to the point of being unbearable. It's only saving grace Is the actors, who understandably still work well together after all those years, even newcomers Rosario Dawson and whoever plays Joanne fit in nicely. But everything else, and I mean everything, is generic and tiring.

P.S. I understand that some people will say the anyone who doesn't like this movie is homophobic. They're wrong.


Although it fails as a film in multiple ways (e.g. boredom, repetitions, predictability, ..) I think it is a total failure because it is a political agitprop piece and not an actual movie.

A fascist-catholic law&order government somewhere along the lines of Franquist Spain which eliminated all Muslims, the Labor Party and homosexuals runs Britain in 2020. Yea, right, ..., that's what is to fear judging from the last decades of British politics. Cameron is Hitler and Bush' war made it possible.

I expected a deep study on contemporary authoritarian tendencies (which hold a grip on all(!) parties all across the political spectrum) but was treated to a partisan Liberal agitprop vehicle. Thanks a lot, I'd like to make my own conclusions. It's not like it was the Labour party which holds the reigns since 1997 which has enacted all current anti-Terror laws and has greatly enhanced the power of the state and reduced privacy and freedom of the individual.

Iraq anyone? Nah, people, fear a Catholic-Conservative dictator ...

I'd like my movies thought-provoking and free of at least blunt in your face partisanship. V for Vendetta is lousy.


Nothing fresh about this movie: conservatives are bad. Christians are bad, republicans are all fascists, blah blah blah.

If I wanted to get beat over the head with fanatic left-wing views I can just watch the Daily Show for free which like this movie says the same thing ad nauseum.

For all the rah rah talk about revolution against the state (with huge allusions, blatant actually, to the democratically elected Bush Administration) it really boils down to a message tailor-made for people who will just revel in the idea of seeing Bush compared to Hitler, Fox News compared to(ironically) state propaganda, Christians portrayed as oppressive bigots.

So if you hate republicans and enjoy liberal cliché, this movie is for you. For those who can see through the bullshat on both sides, avoid this steaming pile.


I wasn't sure what to expect when I went to see this film. I liked the graphic novel and was interested to see what kind of film would result from it.

Considering that the script for this movie was already written in comic book form by Alan Moore all those years ago I would have expected the Wachowski's to retain a lot of his work in their script as the story contains some very well-written parts. However, even parts of Alan Moore's original plot have been poorly re-written by the Wachowskis; for which there seems to be no good reason. The Wachowski's writing is very, very poor in place of it. I cite V's first speech as a striking example.

Secondly, Natalie Portman's poor accent skills. I read in an interview that she spent a month with a dialogue coach in order to get it right. Who've it was, she should be asking for her money back. Eventually, after swinging through Australian and South African she manages to settle into an impersonation of Keira Knightly. It really grated on my nerves.

I would say that this is one film to avoid if possible, unless you want to spend next bonfire night burning effigies of the Wachowski brothers.


This flicker is badly acted, with hammy dialog and horrible alterations to the comic. If you liked the comic, don't watch this movie. If you like movies, don't watch this movie. All I ask as a viewer is that the movie respect its viewers and itself. This movie is vile, which is a real pity, because it could have been really interesting. The source material certainly is and, no, I don't expect movie adaptations to stick 100% to their source material (like Sin City, which, let's face it, was wooden). I don't expect to be written down to, though. Though I should have expected that Hollywood would remove all the sophistication and cleverness they could lay their hands on. Gah. The dialog. The dialog. Lord help me, the dialog.

Oh, yeah: the costume was cool.


I was so excited to see this movie. Original idea in the plot summary, great cover art. The costumes and the characters interested me from the front.

But BLAM the dullness of the movie hit me Sooooo hard that it demolished all hope to enjoy this poorly made effort. The characters had zero development beyond them being introduced. I really didn't give a damn about any of them surviving, they were strangers through the whole thing. The "babe"(Mercedes) was not really a babe at all, I was almost glad that I couldn't see the rest of her face. Ulysses was so flat I could use his character as a coaster, and thats really a problem when he's supposed to be the hero. What was with his lame clothes. A Mexican wrestler would never wear anything so dull, especially a true hero. Think back to the BLUE DEMON & SANTO, and all the great Mexican wrestling monster movies of the 70's. They could really rip apart zombies and look good doing it, not the group of reject uggos in this waste of time. Half way through, I really wanted it to end. The story and characters were not progressing any further after the first 20 min, and the movie just kept eating up my time... The one redeeming character was Tiki, I almost wanted to know more about him, he was the only character who seemed to have any passions or emotions at all. But the makers were ridiculously trying to up-sell Ulysses the whole damn movie, and he was very very bland. I hope the makers all have day jobs. The guy at subway who made my sandwich contributes more to the world than this project.


'EnterPlaga Zombie 1.5' could be an alternate title since it could almost be a missing higher no-budgeted spin-off from that series. Actually, the 2nd Plaga Zombie movie was better than this. Ughwill someone please stop this sub-genre! Did people learn nothing from the Santo film series? I'm sure there will be some people who love luchadores and may find camp humor here to enjoy, but it's a bad film that acts like its based off a non-existent comic book. I'm tired of watching luchador fanboys fawn over wrestlers in low budget zombie films; it gives me flashbacks to that John West theme song (Zombie completionists will know what I'm talking about).

Ulysses, the 'hero' of the film drives around in his car continuously spouting 'I'm in my freshman year of college' philosophy quotes to the audience in an attempt to lull us into sleep, which he hopes we will awaken from having dreamt that this was a good film. Another reviewer tried to compare it to Bruce Campbell's narration in Don Coscarelli's "Bubba Ho-Tep", but there's a bit of a difference in that Ho-Tep was a brilliant film and this is cheesy garbage. Then there's Tiki and his wrestling zombies, which may or may not have killed some local civilians. There are several other wrestlers including bad guys, but you probably won't care.

Being a luchador film, we get to see these idiots running around with their masks constantly on (as is the luchador fashion rage) in an attempt to save on film-making down time due to hair and makeup crew and to save the 'actors' from having to actually emote. I wasn't sure if the acting was bad and the dialogue delivery was stilted intentionally to reinforce the cheese factor or if that was a lack of ability on the part of those cast in the roles. Looking through the credits, several of the cast members names seemed to be aliases, making me wonder if they didn't want anyone to know that they were in this film.

There were some nods to other horror films and filmmakers including: Ulysses at one point holds onto a book entitled 'Zombies: An Authoritative Study  Collected Edition compiled by Dr. G. Andrew Romero and Dr. Clifford Ruttle'. There's also a dialogue reference to Tod Browning's "Freaks" (take a wild guess what 3 word phrase a crowd shouts repeatedly).

THE PLOT: To bore me to death and cure insomnia once and for all (wait, that was the filmmakers plot). The film's plot is: Our fearless wrestling heroes have to stop a plot involving genetically engineered zombies and a zombie breeding scheme involving human incubators in Zombie King and friends' bid to take over the world -- all while running around looking like bargain basement trick-or-treaters.

MAKEUP: basic low-budget zombie makeup with decent low-budget gore fx.

FEASTING: Yeah kinda DE-ANIMATION METHODS: cabesa removal CONTAGION LEVEL: I couldn't exactly tell if the victims turned into zombies themselves, but at least one did. There was mention of a way to turn people into zombies by forcing them to drink zombie blood.

The reported budget for this film according to IMDb, makes it about 9 times the budget of "Clerks", thereby proving that having a good script can do things for the quality of a low budget film that throwing a little more money onto the screen and watching it burn could not do for this film. I have seen several dozen zombie films and EZK rates pretty low.

This film is recommended only for zombie completionists and for devotees of the fake and annoying sport known as pro wrestling.


Boy, can Jules Delorme turn crap into uber-crud or what? I'm guessing they cast him as a zombie on the misunderstanding he was acting, and when they swapped him to Ulysses and realised it wasn't an act... it was too late, the budget was blown.

The film itself has a bunch of funny nods to the zombie flick tradition and with a decent lead it might have stood a chance. If you're tempted to see this film, just bang your head against a wall for ten minutes instead. You'll end up with that same ache behind the eyes and unanswered 'WHY LORD?!' and it'll have taken far less of your time to get there.

Be warned.

Mark


What do you get when you cross a low-budget zombie movie with a story about a team of masked wrestlers? The answer is apparently something called "Enter... Zombie King."

Actually, "low-budget" is an inappropriate description, since that might imply there WAS a budget for this crap. I think instead what happened is the would-be director found some change when he was vacuuming under his couch cushions and thought, "What the hell, I'm calling my pals and we're gonna make a movie."

Then, after getting together and drinking six cases of beer, they came up with the idea to combine zombies with wrestlers. The result: A bunch of Canadians pretending to be Mexican wrestlers from the United States (I didn't get it either) must fight a former wrestler who's become the Zombie King and is trying to take over the world with an army of the living dead. Or something.

Yeah, it's dumb.


You can see the great ideas here that made the Seinfeld show a treasure. But this show has two huge problems. First, Larry David is awful as a performer. Second, they insist on an "improv" feel to the show. Folks--actors really aren't good at improv. So, the dialog is stilted and awkward, the pacing of the script is poor. The good ideas go to waste with no one to execute them. It would be nice if we took all these ideas and ressurected Seinfeld--then they'd have competent people actually doing the scripts and performing!


A big hit in '54 (3-14-54, Varsity, Palo Alto CA, w/The Great Diam- ond Robbery, Red Skelton's last at MGM), due to the ongoing popularity of I Love Lucy, with which this film has more in common than its makers knew. Like Lucy Ricardo, the girl Ball plays here (Tacy) is a selfish bitch, with a low IQ and a Me First attitude. Her childish insistence on loading their trailer with rocks after being told not to do so, puts her and her husband's lives in imminent danger. Stupid doesn't begin to cover it. One thing's for sure, very little of this is funny. Disaster comedy has a brief shelf life, and Tacy's moronic antics go sour in a hurry. Robert Surtees, a master with the camera, has captured some beautiful Technicolor images of America in his near perfect location work, which is easily the film's greatest asset. By the way, The Great Diamond Robbery's a lot funnier.


So that was essentially the worst, least enjoyable movie I have ever seen. It was the least satisfying, and as the horribleness continued I wanted to walk out. I decided that wasn't a viable option, so I stayed. Once I was resolute in my continuing to sit through the most dissatisfying film I'd ever seen I was less fidgety and distressed; I had resigned to how much the movie frustrated me. From the very beginning the complete disregard for Nicky was totally frustrating to me. Over and over he tried to do the right thing, and even tried to stand up for himself but everyone in the entire movie just walked all over him. Nothing could go right, and the movie continued without any redemption for all of the bad things that were happening, leaving me completely frustrated and unsatisfied.

Tacy acts like a child throughout the entire movie, as perhaps only Lucille Ball can do (even that name seems like a child's nickname for "Tracy" after they couldn't pronounce the "r"). The tantrum she throws at the Trailer Show completely reminded me of a child (maybe me when I was younger?) getting very excited about some crazy plastic toy that had lots of bells and whistles, then begging their mother to buy it for them and explaining how many amazing ways they'll use it and how this specific G.I. Joe with Kung Fu hitting action will be able to help her chop vegetables if they put a knife in it's hand. She rationalizes it in so many ways that seem artificial, and Nicky, as he does throughout the movie, gives in and listens to her, though he knows it's a bad idea. She is thus spoiled by her poor husband, trying to be nice and give her what she wants while knowing that things he gives into will be bad in the end.

Even when he puts his foot down, like a mischievous child she circumvents and tricks him, which inevitably turns out badly because the thing he was standing for indeed held disastrous consequences. Much like so many comedies we can see the set up that will lead to some sort of disaster and/or pratfall, except that in this film I didn't feel like the punchline was funny. Any time the irony came to light of how Tacy had screwed up and caused harm to Nicky, it wasn't like some silly prank, but more of a blow to his manhood and the destruction and ungrateful treatment of something he had done to try to make her happy.

The ending didn't satisfy me after being tortured for an hour and a half by destruction, ungratefulness, deception, and bad luck. I think the movie was supposed to be cute and funny (one awkward duet does not a cute film make), but the conflict seemed too deep and destructive for me to ever let it slide by. The entire movie I was exasperated by the frustrating situations that were never funny and never redeemed. This was one of the most, probably the most, intolerable movies I have ever seen.


Old men tend to make art that is shallow, imitative of their earlier, better works, and which would never garner an ounce of praise were it not for their backlog of greater works somehow letting their patina still rub off. In America, the best proof of this nostrum is the awarding of the lifetime Academy Award to a film director, or actor. Apparently, Europe is not immune to such worthless laurels either, for, in 1987, Federico Fellini's disastrously bad film Intervista won the Cannes Film Festival's Fortieth Anniversary Award and the Grand Prize at the Moscow Film Festival. In it, one can see many pastiches from earlier Fellini films, much as Ingmar Bergman cribbed ideas and scenes from his earlier masterpieces for his disastrously bad last film Saraband, the way Akira Kurosawa tossed random ideas together for Dreams, and the way Woody Allen has constantly reworked themes from his 1970s and 1980s great films into his last decade's worth of mostly mediocrities. That said, even the worst of Allen's recent films, like The Curse Of The Jade Scorpion, were better than Intervista. Fellini might take some solace in the fact that Intervista is a better film than Bergman's incest-ridden Saraband, but it's a minor comfort, at best, and this shoddy film still falls well shy of even Dreams.


There aren't too many slasher movies I enjoy. Striking a balance between too childish and too wrapped up in your own irony is a tough gig and I think Freak Out just sails wide of the bullseye. That said, it's a very respectable effort for something created with such a small budget over such a large time frame and hints that there is some real writing and editing talent waiting for a better-funded opportunity to present itself.

I would have liked to have seen more tits and the odd clunge shot thrown in, if only in the bonus features as this would have given the film a higher mark when it comes to production values.


...to watch this movie. Well to start watching this movie anyway, I couldn't bear more than 20 Min's. Really was the biggest pile of sweaty sack to be given the title of a "movie" I know it's supposed to be a spoof but it's just not in anyway funny, it's shockingly childish. The acting is not even worthy of a children's TV programme. For the majority of the

20 Min's my boyfriend and I just stared at each other in disbelief that some complete twot agreed to fund this! Please save yourself the time. Unless you are 10 years old or younger, then you might find yourself mildly entertained!


The film makers try to go for an early Peter Jackson/Troma vibe here, and fall flat on their faces. I was shocked at how unfunny, unoriginal, poorly acted, poorly shot, poorly written, and poorly directed this film is. I know there was little to no budget for this dud, but I've seen better films at student film shows at our local University. I'm baffled by the press this dog has gotten. It's possible (though highly unlikely) that I just didn't get it. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone. I'm asking the dude at the video store for a free rental, and I'm sure he'll give it to me. I'll get Shaun of the Dead again, which is a thousand times better than this turkey.


Anchor Bay have in the past given us some delights on DVD for example Hellraiser, Halloween and Phantasm. Then one day a film arrived on the shelves called "Freak Out". With the Anchor Bay logo on the case cover I was optimistic about the content of the film. Until I pressed play. For the next 98 minutes i was subjected to an exercise in mind numbing tedium that will never be equalled. I cant stress enough that this film should be avoided at all costs. I don't understand where all the positive buzz has come from? and all the posts must be from relatives or best friends. It is not funny, it has little or no production value, it has a ridiculous story.

Extremely amateurish in every department..this is one to avoid. Awful.


watchable movie not really unless watch most of it in fast forward.The opening erotic lovemaking scene tells you already forget the sci-fi it's just coating for some rather strange actions that the main character played by Grieco does.He is a pretty boy for the women viewers and that's it For the guys you get to see a lot of Maryam D'abo's body[it's nice] and some of Natalie Radfords body[also nice]So i give it two stars just for the nice bodies on the female leads.If you are looking for plot,acting good script etc Stay Away.


The idea of splicing the cat's genetic material with Grieco is an interesting idea (similar to Cronenberg's Fly remake), but it just isn't carried off real well here. What could've been a nice little exploration into the psyche of a human who is picking up the traits of a cat, is instead just boring.


This is one of the most unintentionally funny movies I've ever seen. I think that while Richard Grieco might be good looking, he's still pretty much a cheese-puff! The movie is about a man who is dying of a genetic illness, and a doctor (Jackie) who randomly falls in love with him and in order to save him decides to mix cat DNA with his. How this actually works I don't know, maybe they explained it, but honestly you won't find yourself hanging on the edge of your seat to find out.

Anyway, like all unneutered male cats he goes off in search of another cat in heat, which is how we meet Imogene, a half woman/ half bird dancer. This leads to the worst dance scene in any movie ever.

Eventually it all becomes a game of cat and mouse (or cat and bird woman), which leads to an ending that makes no sense whatsoever! If you get a chance to see it, please do. It's well worth the time to watch the horrible acting and terrible storyline! Enjoy!


"Maniac Cop" is made with enough skill to be watchable, but don't look for anything even remotely original or creative here. It's formulaic stuff, just another pretty basic slice-and-dice entry. It probably had been a quite ambitious project, with an indestructible killer in the Michael Myers - Freddy Krueger tradition, but the result is thoroughly routine. (*1/2)


When I was a boy I thrilled to the exploits of Steve Reeves and his cohorts with the massive pectoral muscles performing feats of strength and derring-do in ancient times, but as an adult I found it a lot slower going. There are all sorts of legendary characters here--Herc himself, Ulysses, Jason, the Amazons--and a classic story about the pursuit of the Golden Fleece, but I found it hard to follow and worse than that, just plain dull. It's amazing, though, how much more interesting I found Sylva Koscina this time around than I did when I was a kid.


It's amazing that this first 1950s Hercules film was the stimulus that led to bazillions of Hercules and Maciste films over the next 15 years. Why is this so hard to believe? Well, you'd expect that this film would be really, really good since it was such an important film--and you'd be 100% wrong. This mish-mash film was just as bad as many of the later films and is only marginally watchable. Not surprisingly, it has passed into the public domain--after all, who would want to renew rights to this film?!

Some of the film's problems may or may not exist in the original Italian print. I don't know, as I have only just watched one of the English dubbed versions. The biggest and most obvious problem are the voice actors--their voices are too mechanical and bigger than life--so much so that they seem nothing like real people at times. The original Italian voices might be a lot better. Another problem (mostly for history freaks like myself) is that the films are a bizarre melange of both Greek AND Roman mythology--with Roman and Greek names interspersed throughout the film and the stories often bear little semblance to the originals. This is very sloppy but could also be the fault of the dubbers--perhaps the original film was based only on Greek or Roman characters--not both. Maybe in the original Italian it all made more sense.

However, despite the sloppy dubbing, another major problem is that the film has too much in the way of plot. There are enough stories for two films. Why they chose to combine the story of Jason and the Argonauts seeking the golden fleece (a Greek tale) AND Hercules (Roman) dealing with an annoying king and his really annoying son is beyond me--especially because both characters could easily have several films of just their own adventures. In fact, with the story of Jason, huge portions of the tale are missing (such as the most important part--his relationship with Medea and her father) and the Hercules one simply doesn't look anything like the classical tales--nothing.

The film has a few fun moments, but overall it looks cheap and sloppy--like most Hercules films. Some of the characters make no sense at all (such as the princess who loves Hercules but fights with him when Herc sets out to do EXACTLY what she'd asked him to do) and some are so one-dimensional they looked like they were written by a 3rd grader. If you LIKE cheap and sloppy films (I know I sure do), then this is definitely for you. If not, then see the Disney version. It's also very bad history and bastardizes the story terribly, but is still much closer to the original source material than this silly film.


I watched this movie because of the fond memory I had kept of it when I watched it when I was 12 and that peplum movies were my favorite genre.

Needless to say, it did not look quite as good today than it did 40 years ago. It is still quite watchable, with plenty of heroics deeds, good production values and adequate acting for the genre. Steve Reeves is actually quite good in the title role and he outmuscles Arnold any time.


Hercules  hybrid of greek mythology and cheesed dubbing. It does add to the campiness of the film, but I'm biased having already seen Hercules Unchained.

Herc randomly comes to aid the luscious Iole (RAWRRR). Steve was born to throw freshly torn-from-the-ground trees. He runs around with greek guys (played by beefy Italian guys) and does battle, rows. Herc won't even sing good old-fashioned oar songs! There's your typical dark side in this epic schlock, but time starts to drag at scenes when you'd rather see the Herc bending iron bars across his skull.

I used to think Hercules Unchained was plain goofy and dumb. It's actually much less of a yawner than the original. What is with Hercules and the lions in both movies? Where was PETA when this happened?

`YO-LAY!!!'


This picture is impossible to defend. I saw it for the first time when I was 11 and I must say I liked it. But then I saw it again as an adult and the awful truth came out: 1) it is impossible for Steve Reeves to even try to act; 2) it is impossible for the supporting cast to act; 3) the sort of monster the argonauts face when they find the golden fleece is definitely funny (though he probably puts on the best acting of all); 4) Reeves's hairdo is unthinkable in ancient Greece; 5) any other ingredient you may think of.

But then, why did I vote with a 3 mark? 1) the film is supposed to be a mythological fantasy film and it was quite original back in 1958; 2) without any doubt it is the best movie ever made in its genre; 3) Sylva Koscina (the woman, not the actress).

Just terrible !!!


I'll start with the history since no one else did. Marilyn Kentz & Caryl Kristensen were two comediennes who performed together. Part of their routine on-stage was to do a piece called "The Mommies" in which they would portray two women folding clothes at a table and complaining about their husbands and children. Not my cup of tea but it was cute... clearly they were better writing jokes in a dialogue than in stand-up monologue style, and as two actual mothers they certainly drew from real-life experience. Enter Hollywood.

Let's turn "The Mommies" into a network sitcom! On stage it was funny to hear about the nuisance of invisible children and complaints about off-screen husbands... on a TV show you have to actually cast real people to play these roles. Suddenly Dad 'n the brats are human, sympathetic characters and the jokes about them become mean-spirited and the women become b- how do I say this nicely? Mean women.

They still did a segment every episode in which they folded laundry and traded one-liners... but now they were just miserable whining pigs. The jokes had become bitter complaints and their once-weary persona was now downright hostile. Clearly something was lost in development. The show started out nasty and never got on track. I remember comedians and friends at the time making jokes about "The Mommies," always with the implication that it was the type of show- and they the type of women- that would send men screaming in the opposite direction.

They weren't wrong.

GRADE: D-


This Canadian short is okay, but it fell far short of my expectations for it. There are a few cute lines, and the main character does a few amusing things, but for the most part, it's only mediocre at best. Do yourself a favor, and instead of watching this film by Richard Condie, try to find his masterpiece "The Big Snit"...THAT is a funny film.


Apart from how boring this was, it was also historically inaccurate (apart from Kennedy's assassination), but even still, setting this during that time frame is somewhat distracting.

The main plot is generic, recycled and unrealistic to say the least. What are the chances of this kid actually coming across all the events that happen in this story? Not bloody likely.

Still, though, there were a couple good scenes (the ending was surprisingly good), but just not enough to save a mediocre film. Mediocre, but watchable at least. I'd be more willing to give this a three and a half, but unfortunately I have to pick either three or four here on IMDb...so I'm leaning more towards a three.


OMG! The CIA whacked Jack! Come back to reality. The movie has great actors (Noah Wyle, James Rebhorn, Gretchen Mol, among others); however, the Libtards in Hollywood simply cannot tell a story without their crazed anti-American, Anti-CIA, anti-whatever being the core of the story.

JFK was murdered by Oswald (with perhaps the aid of Sam Giancana). Bobby Kennedy was a ruthless and LAWLESS man. JFK had many flaws but was a great leader surrounded by lousy advisers! The movie is still worth watching as every 14 year old boy's fantasy comes to life and love is not what it is all cracked up to be! Had Jack lived he most likely would NOT have been re-elected as Goldwater was way ahead in the polls and the American public was still quite angry at the poor handling of Cuba and Kruschev!


I was hoping that "10 Dead Men" was going to be as good as "Rise of the Foot Soldier." The premise/plot is a decent yet typical tale of revenge while the fight choreographing is superb. The acting, dialog, cinematography and editing are horrible (i.e. terrible directing).

The small budget excuses the poor cinematography and editing however it doesn't excuse the bad acting, dialog and overall horrible directing.

The film seems more a vehicle for sadistic homo-erotica than serious story-telling with lots of violent BDSM, torture, transvestites, and big burly men.

As a Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fan I was offended by the film's portrayal of MMA competitors as brutal, blood-thirsty, mindless goons.

The entire film is summed up in one scene halfway though the movie. Two of the main characters are mindlessly watching TV on the couch. The supporting actor channel surfs past an MMA fight to a porn channel which bores and annoys Ryan (the main character). Ryan then takes the remote and returns to watching the MMA fight and is visibly excited by the action.

If you're looking for a film featuring homo-erotica, BDSM and MMA to watch with your guy buddies then this is the flick for you. However if you are looking for a good action film like "Rise of the Foot Soldier" look somewhere else.

Don't be fooled by a high IMDb rating of this film. I watched it as it had an IMDb rating of 8.1/10 with 156 votes. After watching the film I am very certain that the entire cast and everyone they know voted a 10 for this movie.

I rated it a 4/10 as the fight choreographing is superb.


I never give up on a film, but I jacked this one in after only 20 Min's just now. Bad camera shots, equally bad editing and sound post production. The score is one of the worst I've ever heard. I really could knock up up better one right now (even the instruments/sounds used are cheap ass midi tacky rubbish).

And to cap it all, (bearing in mind this is meant to be a hard bloke sorta film), it's only got Lee Latchford-Evans from a crappy British Village People-esquire pop band called 'Steps' that destroyed the airwaves for a good ten years or so.. trying to act hard/gangster. Even if your not British and don't know who he is, it's still not gonna sit right.

I get the feeling the whole thing is devised and made by inexperienced, retired cage fighters still high on after show testosterone fuelled steroid binges.


I could only get about 3 minutes into this video. Most of the reason for this is because it is, in fact, a video and not a film. This is an important distinguishing feature, because the use of a video camera here has made the piece look amateurish despite some decent camera work and far above average editing. Everything is there to make this a mediocre film... except the film. A better camera and an actual professional sound crew would have made this video something worthy of the video rental vending machine I got it from. Unless you are a film student and want to view this from the point of view of a director/ editor, then I strongly recommend that you avoid spending any money on this at all.


Ten Dead Men is one of 2 low budget films I watched recently.The other was Jack Says.The 2 have quite a bit in common- they start with someone being tortured by gangsters, girlfriend is murdered,revenge etc.

Whereas Jack Says tries to be cleverer, 10DM just charges in like a Bull in a China Shop and uses the plot as an excuse to shoehorn some brutal fight scenes into the story.

Brendan Carr is the lead..playing a proper psycho he is believable and ( unlike Jack in Jack Says) quite intimidating.All the heavies in this film seem more than capable of damaging someone.

We only see his girlfriend briefly but she seems very sweet..just the type to take him out of his criminal life.

Production values are rubbish..at times this looks like it was filmed on a mobile phone.There is little dialogue and the story is driven forward by a narrator..Pinhead from Hellraiser.( He must need the money badly). He is the wrong choice to play the voice over of the lead character....he is far too posh.

This is not a great film by any means but it is the sort of thing you might enjoy with a few beers


Ross Boyask & Phil Hobden have created, in this movie, a work so awful that it is utterly compelling.

If you remember the dreadful photo stories from the girly teen comics of the 80's, (so brilliantly parodied in UK adult comic Viz) then imagine a moving picture version with violence, and you will be most of the way toward understanding the feel and presentation of this film.

The storyline itself, is a poor version of The Crow, without all the coolness of course, and without the exceptional feeling of empathy for the main character. Where The Crow had dark, brooding, Gothic brilliance, with a classic and memorable score, this movie failed at everything... except at being bad, that is. If revenge story lines were drinks, The Crow would be a fine vintage Champagne, whereas 10 Dead Men would be p*ss flavoured water.

Where it fails in the storyline department, it fails equally as spectacularly in the action genre department. The fight scenes are patently contrived and badly executed, and the gore effects brilliantly poor.

The acting itself is so appallingly bad, that the viewer is forced to consider the possibility that Boyask abandoned the traditional auditioning route, and instead opted for the less orthodox method of approaching likely looking characters in bars, and asking them if they wanted to be in his movie. Seriously, the acting is so bad, that at times even the walking looks strained and put-on.

Doug Bradley's narration seals the deal. It comes across as a badly written afterthought; an addition to the moving picture storyboard. It's almost as if the director realised that the acting talent within the cast pool was utterly incapable of putting the rather tired storyline across, and threw it in as a necessary evil. The movie is however, all the better for it.

And therein lies the brilliance in this movie. It is so unintentionally bad, that it compels you to keep watching, right up to the rather predictable and clichéd ending. One needs to look to the deliberately awful genius of Peter Jackson's 1987 movie "Bad Taste" to see this sort of dreadful. Where movies deliberately made this bad miss the mark of awful by the very act of trying to be such, this movie succeeds in spades entirely by accident... It is that which makes this movie worth watching.

I would have loved to have given this movie a 10 vote, if for no other reason than the maker's sheer lack of shame for releasing it. In the end, I gave it one star, because awful REALLY IS the best description for it... and that's why you should watch it.


This film is so utterly dreadful that I couldn't finish it. It's obvious that the "actors" were just martial artists plucked from a gym and had no acting ability whatsoever. There's been no story development past whatever gangster films the writer/director and producer decided to use elements of and lastly there's a voice-over ... which made me cringe every time I heard it, and insisted on telegraphing the story.

The story is not so much conveyed to us, but dictated to us which is just sloppy. Didactic films are not the way to go here.

It's at that point I stopped the DVD and checked out the IMDb. Guys, you proudly proclaim that this is your 40th film together. Did you actually bother learning anything from the previous 39? Things that are essential in film-making such as story, character, frame composition, lighting, sound design, music and directing? It's obvious that while you have the talent (or luck) to get projects off the ground, you've no idea about how to execute a film.

In summation, either watch a bunch of really good films and learn to see how they work ... or just stop now and let other people have a go. I really hope this isn't representative of your body of work but i've an odd feeling it is.


This is absolute tripe!! Terrible acting by most, if not all of the cast. I watched this for about half an hour thinking it couldn't get any worse....but it did. I only watched it because Terry Stone is in it and I thought Rise of the Footsoldier was excellent. Avoid this film....it is 90 minutes of your life you won't be able to get back. BAD BAD BAD BAD. I do wonder what people think of when they are making garbage like this? Do they honestly think this is a good piece of film making? I would love to hear what the director/producer have to say about it. It makes it into my all time worst 5 films. It is years since I saw something as bad as this. I love this type of film but this one falls way short on so many levels. The acting is rubbish, the sound is rubbish, the directing is rubbish.....and did I mention the acting???


John Badham ("Stakeout", "Bird on a Wire", "The Hard Way", Short Circuit", "Blue Thunder" and "War Games"), yes John Badham, directed this semi-cult film about disco king Tony Manero (John Travolta), a hardware man by day, at night (especially Saturday night) a guru on the dance floor who can boogie down like no other.

Travolta sure can dance, and his smooth moves will either bring back fond memories, or leave you laughing in the aisles. So too the fashions, with the silky shirts, bell bottoms and platforms all looking hilariously ridiculous. There are, however, few other positives, except perhaps the Bee Gees' groovy soundtrack, with such hits as "Stayin' Alive" and "More Than a Woman".

Backdrop to this 70's hype is a drama involving Tony's gang, family traumas and his pursuit of a beautiful and sophisticated dancer named Stephanie (Karen Lynn Gorney). All this remains in the background as John Badham does not allow Norman Wexler's script to develop in any way, and some very interesting characters, who appear to be real people, are not allowed to come to life. A real shame, as "Saturday Night Fever" could have been a strong melodrama, with some potentially solid performances just crying out to be given equal time.

Badham decided that disco fever would carry the movie alone, and at the time, it was a most shrewd decision. Sixteen years on, the same is not true, and most audiences will find "Saturday Night Fever" a bit silly, drab and even somewhat crass.

Saturday, September 17, 1994 - Valhalla Cinema


I just don't get it. Most Jules Verne books, which I adore, are written like movie scripts. It is just so easy to figure out what a film faithful to a Verne book would look like. Just get a few good actors and a good director, a few special effects and there you go.

But not with this and most adaptations from Jules Verne books. 2 long books are utterly betrayed. Everything is changed, from the type of aircraft, from what happens to it, from the characters that end up in it, from why people decided to get into such a canon ball in the first place when, in the original story, nobody was supposed to fly in it. The witty and amusing Michel Ardan is gone and replaced by a woman stowaway...

Utter drivel. Just read the original and do the film in your head, it is so much better.


Dull, dull, dull. Did I mention it was dull?

I've seen many an old science fiction movie made in the 50s and 60s, and I can't remember one more boring than this. Bad acting, bad plot, bad effects, bad music, horrid science. Hard to believe this was made years after "The War of the Worlds" and "Forbidden Planet." In fact, the only SF movie I can recall that was comparable in deathly dullness was "Quatermass and the Pit" aka "Five Million Years to Earth." This was RKO Picture Corporation's last release, and if it wasn't solely responsible for RKO's demise, it was the final nail (and a big one) in RKO's coffin. What a difference from the miniseries of the same name released in 1998. Even 1964's "First Men in the Moon," based on a similar H.G. Wells story, was far superior. That, at least, tried to inject a bit of fun and humor into the story here and there, not to mention having good, old-fashioned Ray Harryhausen special effects.

Jules Verne must have been spinning in his grave faster than the supposed astronauts here in their acceleration tubes. SF movies have come a long way since this, and we should thank the stars.


This 1959 movie adaptation of Jules Verne's "From the Earth to the Moon" is the graveyard of declining actors. Joseph Cotton and George Sanders were at the end of fairly successful film careers and about to be relegated to guest appearances on a variety of television shows; the most notable being Sander's Mr. Freeze on "Batman". Debra Paget was in her late twenties; she had lost her glow and was used up by Hollywood standards. The change to an unflattering "strawberry" blonde look exacerbated the problem as few actresses have ever been less suited to a light hair color.

On the plus side, the movie itself is a fairly accurate adaptation of Verne's story; at least the book's illustrations appear to have been used as models for the rocket and the cannon. Verne's 19th century take on space travel turned out to be more accurate than most of the speculation during the first half of the 20th century.

The adaptation's biggest problem was altering Verne's story by inserting a topical theme about the post WWII arms race. In Verne's 1865 novel, the Baltimore Gun Club itself set about building a rocket to go to the Moon. In the adaptation a munitions manufacturer (think "Destination Moon") concocts the scheme to demonstrate his powerful new explosive. With a lot of discussion about science, weapons, and peace the movie dances around the subject extensively yet never makes a coherent point about its position (regarding the nuclear arms race), as if simply inserting the theme is somehow sufficient.

The movie is a cross between "Destination Moon" and "Rocketship X-M", combining the former's good science and bad political message with the latter's dismal sets and comical special effects. The acting in all three films is equally sad.

The premise has munitions manufacturer Victor Barbicane (Cotton) discovering an explosive (Power X) capable of firing a shell-like projectile to the moon. His plan is opposed for philosophical/religious reasons by Stuyvesant Nicholl (Sanders), another manufacturer. Although these philosophical differences play an important part in the story, they are never convincingly elaborated on, which undermines the basic storyline.

President Grant orders Barbicane to abandon the project because it is considered an act of war by other nations. While this is unconvincing it does serve as Barbicane's inspiration to change the project to a manned space flight. Nicholl then agrees to manufacture the ceramic coating needed for re-entry and to accompany Barbicane on a flight to the moon. Paget plays Nicholl's daughter who hides inside the rocket just prior to take-off.

"From the Earth to the Moon" is often confused with "First Men in the Moon" which was made five years later. Probably because both are set in the 19th century and both feature a female stowaway (played by Martha Hyer in the later film). "First Men in the Moon" (while not a great film) is superior in virtually every detail to "From the Earth to the Moon". Rather ironically it was adapted from a story by "H.G. Wells", an early science fiction writer often compared to Verne.

Movie adaptations of Verne's books were a big thing in the 1950's and early 1960's. Among the good ones were "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" (1954), "Around the World in 80 Days" (1956), "Journey to the Center of the Earth"(1959), "Mysterious Island" (1961), and "Master of the World" (1961). Unfortunately "From the Earth to the Moon" is simply not in the same league as these examples.

Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.


As a longtime science fiction fan, I thought watching a movie version of "From the Earth to the Moon" would be entertaining. My mistake, at least in this instance. This is a long-drawn-out, story-weak exercise in patience. The director seemed to be stuck on establishing shots and irrelevant scenes, to the point where I began fast-forwarding past any scene that didn't appear to be advancing the story. This got me through the second half-hour in about five minutes. What story there is has only a vague resemblance to Verne's original, and one waits forever for the rocket to finally take off.

Even minor matters like the background music become annoying: instead of an original score, for the most part what plays in the background are snippets of patriotic American music, and often one wonders what this has to do with the scene.

All in all, if you want to see a screen adaption of Jules Verne, watch the classic Disney "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" or "Around the World in 80 Days", and avoid this outing.


Awful awful awful.

I kept wondering if this movie wasn't made in 1928, not 1958.

War of the Worlds was made in 1953 and is like Star Wars compared to this movie.

I could make this movie in my backyard with a camcorder and a $1000 budget. Okay, maybe not.

Sound editing was crappy, special effects (if you can call them that) were bad, acting was pretty bland. The storyline was bad.

The costumes were okay, that's about it.

I saw it on Turner Classic Movies, but I still want my money back.


If it weren't for the busty blonde this film stock would have better served as toilet paper for death row inmates. This film has absolutely nothing to offer the viewer in terms of a watchable cohesive story. The science is so stupid you can't muster enough suspension of disbelief to elevate this drek to the realm of nonsense. The special effects are so dismal they become insulting. The one bright spot is that you should easily recognize the "electronic tonalities" produced for the film FORBIDDEN PLANET, at least you're reminded for a few minutes of a truly great sci fi classic and for that brief moment you can forget that you're actually watching the very worst sci fi movie ever produced. This makes PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE seem a contender for an academy award.

If you ever have the chance to not watch this, take it. You'll thank me.


I had vague memories of watching this film on television with my parents when I was about ten years old. At that time I eagerly watched and enjoyed any sci-fi film that turned up on the three broadcast channels we received. Even to my uncritical ten-year-old self, this film seemed a bit "off." I particularly remembered the exterior shots of the projectile and how it obviously wasn't moving, and the ridiculous "meteors" that were just balls with flares attached to them.

I reacquainted myself with this film when TCM broadcast it recently. Like a lot of things from my childhood, it was worse than I remembered. Much of the film looks okay, and there are some interesting production design elements; the spaceship's period interior is intriguing. However, the film suffered from some mid-production budget cuts that drastically affected the special effects, which are Ed Wood-level quality. The film's abrupt ending also screams "sorry, we ran out of money."

Although other IMDb reviewers have criticized the film's storyline and acting, I found them tolerable. The "Power X" premise is a rather obvious reference to the Cold War arms race, but that was pretty typical of science fiction movies at the time; it's no more heavy-handed than "The Day the Earth Stood Still." Joseph Cotten and George Sanders were entering the last decades of their careers, but they are both competent and energetic here (although it is painful to see Sanders submitting to the indignity of being crammed into a plastic tube). Byron Haskin directs competently, as always.

It would be interesting to see a version of this film with updated special effects. CGI could be used to replace the effects shots and bring them up to the standards of the late 1950s. I think the film would be far more enjoyable that way; it has potential, but the dreadful special effects simply drag the entire movie down. Given the limited interest in the film, it probably won't happen, but it's fun to think about.


Normally, I try to find some good in every film I watch. In the case of FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON, I would have to say the cinematography and lighting were very nice and I liked some of the music score. However, when you make a movie called FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON, it's not unreasonable for audiences to expect to get at least what is promised in the title.

*SPOILER ALERT*

Now, I have read about this movie for about the last 40 years of my life and I saw it today. Not only is this movie as bad as they say it is, it's worse. I had read that this film was shot in Mexico and someone said it was shot at a location in Mexico formed from fairly recent volcanic activity. They said that scenes on the moon in this movie were shot there. Well, the location actually appears to have been used for scenes on Earth - not the moon and also, here's the part that makes this whole movie feel like you completely wasted your time watching it - you NEVER see anyone land on the moon. Sure, I guess it happens as viewed by someone else but it never seems to happen for me. Adding insult to injury, this climax (or lack thereof) is following 90 minutes of boring talk. The "special" effects are so bad as to defy belief. I'd read that you could see the bar holding up the spaceship in flight or that it flies against a blue sky while from the inside of the ship, space looks black. I suppose they ran out of money because it looks like it began as a fairly well-budgeted movie but perhaps the budget got cut. Regardless of the reason for it, the special effects, except for Lee Zavitz's full-scale explosions and other effects are so bad they wouldn't do in an Ed Wood movie. Sadly, the complaints lodged against this movie are all true.

One of the stories is that this was the last movie made by RKO. The print I saw shows a Warner Brothers logo on front while there is an RKO emblem at the end of the movie. As early as 1984, this movie was released by VCI on videotape. Obviously, even Warner Brothers saw no reason to hang on to this. I watched it out of curiosity but I finally concluded I should have listened to the warnings I'd read in books telling me to avoid this boring trash like the plague. I think it's now in public domain, assuming anyone would ever care to seek out this film that is so dull and lacking of anything that might make it worth watching. Just remember if you are curious about this movie that it's not as bad as they say it is - It's worse!


Forgetting that this film version of From The Earth To The Moon is nowhere near the spirit of the original tale Jules Verne was trying to tell, usually his work requires a big budget and a ton of good special effects. This film got neither.

Looking at the credits tonight I noted it was an RKO production released by Warner Brothers. My guess is that the film was finished and in the can when RKO went under and was sold to Warner Brothers to distribute. Also the fact that it was produced by Benedict Bogeaus who was a producer of B films of varying quality tells me why it did not get the budget for decent special effects.

Bogeaus was not the guy for this kind of film. Take a look at his list of credits. He did several westerns with John Payne, noir films with George Raft and some of them pretty good. He was out of his element doing science fiction.

Verne's original novel had a bit of humor in it. But someone at RKO drained every bit of it. They even added a stowaway love interest in Debra Paget who does not make the trip in the book. She's paired opposite Don Dubbins who is scientist Joseph Cotten's assistant in creating the rocket.

So instead of humor we get a lot of high falutin' claptrap coming from the mouths of Joseph Cotten and George Sanders the armaments manufacturer who is jealous of Cotten. Sanders especially looked ill at some of the dialog he was required to speak. He came across as a pouty kid and George knew it.

I do wonder if Jack Warner looked at this thing before he bought it for Warner Brothers.


Something about this movie just screams "low budget". And it's not merely the lack of fancy special effects or the soundstage-bound nature of what is supposed to be a sci-fi/adventure film. It's mostly the disjointed feel of the scenes, the amateurish editing and the poor pacing. Dullsville.

The acting doesn't help, since it doesn't look like they're trying at all - well, maybe George Sanders, as much as he can with an underwritten part, and Henry Daniell has a spark of life that makes him stand out - but if I hadn't seen Joseph Cotten before, I'd never suspect him of being a competent actor, judging by this performance. Tired and uninspired. I never have seen Debra Paget in anything else, so I'm going to have to say...not much of an actress.

She'd have to be *terrific* to make something of the awful dialogue she's given. The love scenes are laughable. The movie's pretty sexist too...with a condescending remark about including women in future space travels...to provide hope (eh?) and prepare the meals (hey!).

The characters' motivations are unclear, plot holes and inconsistencies make for a weak script and hurts this movie far more than the lack of budget required to take us sightseeing on the Moon... but I suppose other bad scripts with bland acting, have been saved by cool visuals, and this one might've been too.

The late great producer, Irving Thalberg, once said he had no desire to take credit and splash his name all over his films (very commendable modesty), and those were some of the greatest movies ever made. His name became well-known anyway, on the strength of his work and admiration of his peers. When I watched the opening credits of far-from-great "From The Earth To The Moon", I couldn't help noticing the name of the producer...who I've never heard of...kept popping up repeatedly. You can draw your own conclusions.


One commentator below remarked that if you wanted to see every SF movie ever made, sit through this once and never see it again.

Well, my objectives were a little less grandiose, but when I got a chance to see this on TCM, I was excited that I would be able to view this, and mark one movie off the IL'IMDb list.

Then the movie came on. At first I thought that all the talk and set up would shortly be followed by the blast off. I waited through scene after incomprehensible scene, as cannons are fired, arms dealers jibe, and former Pres. Ulysses S. Grant shows up.I don't mind talky sf pictures when the talk means something (The Day the Earth Stood Still is great), but this is just drivel. By the time the rocket is launch I can't even say whats going on.

Once finally in space, the audience is subject to an excruciatingly predictable, and poorly rendered, make-plot about one of the passengers sabotaging the rocket, a pretty girl stowaway and the usual stuff that was done much better in "The Woman in the Moon" or "Rocketship X-M"

But what really is the nail in the coffin in this is the romance between the stowaway and the young, blond pilot. It is so obviously contrived, with dialog seemingly taken directly out of mainstream romance movies of that day, that one finds himself yelling WTF?! out loud.

An example "Oh, Whatsyourname, all I know is that when the rocket does explode, please hold me. I want to die in your arms" Might have worked for the complete lack of chemistry between actors.

The movies one saving grace is its FX. Big budget, color, space movies from this period are actually quite rare, and this is a chance to see some fair eye candy from a relatively early date.

Oh, and another quote (Father to girl, after discussing their inevitable death on the rocket) "Well all that matters right now is that you have cooked us a good meal"


I haven't even seen it, and it's bad. I have read the comments and the summary though. For those people who believe that I can't comment on this because I haven't seen it or that it is actually a good movie, or that I've been brainwashed by action movies, think about the author who originally wrote the story. From what I have read from comments and summaries, and from the novel From the Earth to the Moon, it has terrible graphics, a bad story-line, bad acting, and poor special effects. I wanted to cry when I read the summary, as it had absolutely nothing to do with the book. I wonder if the producer had even read a summary of the book. They should be ashamed to say they based the movie off of his book, and ashamed to even name the movie after it. For those of you who liked the movie, or those that didn't read the book, read it, as it is a lot better way to spend your time.


First of all, this is a bad film. Its only redeeming quality is Eugene Levy. Other than Mr. Levy, this is a very bad copy of Weird Science. The guys in this film are the type of people I would like to see killed in the next university shooting. They are obnoxious, sexist and stupid. The dialog is painful. The cinematography is like an after school TV special as is the acting. Oh the acting! Check out Kate's entrance when she is first created! Embarrassing... possibly the most embarrassing performance by any amateur actress ever! It is also the reason we have never seen Ali Landry again in a major film. It is not the worst film ever made but it is bad. It is best viewed when drinking or sick so that the pain can be numbed a little. You have been warned. Oh, yes I forgot to mention the "special effects"... it looks like they couldn't afford a smoke machine so smoke is created by a guy with a cigar off-screen. Other special effects include "sparks" which look like they were made by a kid's birthday cake sparkler. Combine this bad film making with bad acting and you have something almost as bad as Tom Cats or Sin City.


My God. This is an awful film. How anyone thought this would be a success is beyond me. Landry looks like a fish out of water (a fish with a good body, I'll have you, but a fish nonetheless), and the direction and script are frankly laughable. A definate no-go for anyone who does not wish to undergo the same horrible experience as yours truly. 0/10


Fans of Louise Brooks will want to see her in this, her talkie debut, but be forewarned: "Windy Riley Goes Hollywood" is a sorry excuse for a movie, a primitive comedy without any laughs featuring one of the most unappealing leading men imaginable. Our hero Windy Riley is a clueless, pompous, cigar-chomping jerk who messes up everything he touches and never realizes that everyone thinks he's a fool. He's played by a comedian named Jack Shutta whose performance won't leave you begging for more, but Shutta himself can't be blamed: who could have done any better with this feeble script, or with such a deeply exasperating character? The Windy Riley persona was originally created for a comic strip, and perhaps the strip was funny, I don't know, but based on the evidence at hand I have my doubts.

Windy is on an unexplained cross-country trip from New York to his hometown of San Francisco, but he winds up in Hollywood instead, and is soon working at a movie studio --as a messenger boy. He attempts to get ahead by boosting the career of movie star Betty Grey (Miss Brooks), something he tries to accomplish by means of a dangerous and genuinely idiotic publicity stunt. Instead of boosting Betty's career he nearly ruins it, and is ultimately chased out of the studio --and Hollywood-- before he can do any real damage.

Louise Brooks made this film after returning from Europe, where she'd appeared in the three movies that constitute her primary contribution to the cinema. She'd left Hollywood in 1929 on bad terms, having offended the Powers That Be at Paramount, and she came back with a reputation for being headstrong and uncooperative. On top of that, the talkie revolution was under way, plenty of old favorites were quickly falling by the wayside and all bets were off. None of the big studios wanted to deal with Brooks, so she wound up making her talkie debut here, in a low-budget two-reeler cranked out at Educational Pictures under the direction of another fallen star: Roscoe Arbuckle. The former top comedian had been banned from the screen almost ten years earlier but was making a decent living directing comedies for other performers under the name of William Goodrich. When he was inspired Arbuckle was a gifted director of comedy, but it's obvious from the opening scenes that the director found no inspiration in "Windy Riley Goes Hollywood." Roscoe phoned this one in.

So all we're left with is the sight of the leading lady, earnestly trying to play her part and deliver her clunky lines. It's a disheartening thing to experience. She gets to dance briefly, but of course her dance is quickly interrupted by the unstoppable Windy Riley. In her best silent films Louise Brooks was (and is) almost ethereal, but here the shoddy material makes her look and sound all too human. In her first scene as movie star Betty Grey, Brooks is presented with a publicity poster of herself and delivers her first line in a talkie: "Oh Mr. Snell, I think it's great! A photograph like that oughta do me a lotta good, doncha think?" That sound you hear is an ex-goddess, crashing to earth with a dull thud . . .


This poorly scripted short adds nothing positive to Roscoe Arbuckle's career. There are a few good moments, but the storyline is weak, and the direction uninspired. Arbuckle uses the same presentational style he employed more than a decade before, but without the inventive comedy of those years. The character of Windy Riley, an obnoxious buffoon who endlessly boasts, earns no sympathy. One of the few grace notes is Louise Brooks, who all-too-briefly gets to show off her smooth speaking voice and winning dance talent. But she is frustratingly underused and even her face is often hidden by poor blocking. It's too bad that fallen stars like Arbuckle who ended up at the lower-grade Educational Pictures didn't do--or weren't able to do--more with what they had left.


The story is about a fellow who ends up in the wrong place, directed by someone (fatty Arbuckle) who was in the wrong place because he previously was in the wrong place. And the reason to watch it is Lousie Brooks of course. She had already had an amazing rise and fall in the US, then to Europe where she found her greatest roles. Then immediately back here in this meatball, this weedpatch.

Its her first talkie. She had been in a Philo Vance mystery that was horrid. (One of the subsequent ones is on my list of films you must see.) Like there, as here, she's charmless, which is darn interesting.

She's the same beauty, but its a different eye. This eye isn't looking for the afterglow, the savor of the lingering survey, the woman hidden beneath the woman who pretends she is seductively visible.

Wrong place. Its as interesting as being in the right place.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.


The best things about this lame little comedy are that you actually get to briefly hear Louise Brooks talk (she did mostly silent films) and that it is a short film, not full-length! It just isn't very funny and is a dud in so many ways--especially since the lead, Jack Shutta ("Windy Riley") is about as entertaining as Ebola! Plus, it really doesn't help that the script is pretty limp and poor Miss Brooks is given practically NOTHING to do in the film--she's just there! However, despite all the shortcomings, this is interesting because it's one of the very few times you get to hear Miss Brooks speak on film. Most of her famous films were either silents or poorly dubbed films that were originally silent (MISS EUROPE). However, this isn't a great film if you want to hear her talk because the film quality is very, very poor---which is the case with so many early nitrate films. This film is included with DIARY OF A LOST GIRL and the producers of the Kino video admit that the film quality is a mess but include it because of its significance. Interestingly enough, although you can't hear her perfectly, Miss Brooks appeared to possibly have either a speech defect or perhaps an odd accent--either way, her voice might just be the reason she retired soon after this film.


Had she been given a second chance in Hollywood, Louise Brooks might not have been so quickly dismissed into forgettable B-pictures that were the only thing she made after returning from Europe. But as is the case with performers who have either left the studio in a bad way, or were known for being erratic, disruptive, or plain uncooperative, or could not make the transition from one period of their career to the next (in this case, silents to talkies), they were immediately replaced with performers who could fill their shoes. The remarkable thing is how quickly Louise Brooks fell. Not three years before this little movie she was considered the hottest woman in Tinseltown -- the personification of the flapper and an icon of the times, a more sophisticated counterpart for the full-blooded carnality that was Clara Bow. However, her disdain for the Hollywood scene and her refusal to record the voice-over for her character for the movie THE CANARY MURDER CASE proved to be her undoing. Plus, her success in the European scene might have buried her even further down, since Hollwyood might not have taken too well to this occurrence in foreign lands. In any case, Louise Brooks was over, whether she knew it or not, and had she returned to Europe she might have continued her career as an actress. She didn't, and this is her entrance into talkies, awkward, stiff, with little to do but enunciate corny lines. WINDY RILEY GOES Hollywood exists in an extremely bad print, with truly grating sound and dirty images. A sad plunge into the void, hardly a way for an actress to enter a new phase in her career.


This potentially interesting film falls flat mainly due to a VERY leisurely pace that sucks the life out of the movie. Instead, we are left with a somewhat kinky, rarely entertaining movie that probably could have been much better with a few adjustments. This film may prove to be of some interest to those who have seen other films named "Venus In Furs", and it is a pleasant distraction for fans of the gorgeous Laura Antonelli, but it would prove to be of little interest to anyone else.


This feature film was originally released as the final episode of a 16-part radio serial, which may explain its weaknesses. Firstly, the fact that every character speaks in some distinctive, but unrealistic, fashion. Secondly, the incomprehensibly convoluted plot and unlikely coincidences that abound. A scene in which a jilted lover hurls himself off a cliff is unintentionally hilarious. After repeated viewings, I still can't remember whodunit, not because it is so cleverly hidden from the viewer, but because the solution makes no sense at all.


Candyman was a creative horror masterpiece with a fantastic premise, Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh had the stupidest, most overused and pathetic premise. It held the foul stench of cheap knock offs. Stealing plots from Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street and every other slasher film. It was so intolerable and stupid that it brings the term sequel to a new low.


Being nothing more than a retread of Bernard Rose's Candyman, this is all rather a pointless exercise in gory effects and lifeless acting. Taken from a short story in Clive Barker's Books of Blood, the tale of an urban myth-become-reality has transferred from Liverpool to New Orleans with no perceptible gain in atmosphere or vibrancy.

Look in the mirror and say his name five times, and the hook-handed anti-hero pops up to wreak gory havoc on the living. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Director Bill Condon has nothing more to offer than did Rose, whose original movie at least had the excuse that it was riding on the popularity of other murderous movie villains like Freddie and Jason.

The story staggers along with laughable predictability, telegraphing it's final "twist" in pantomimic fashion, with the hook-handed ghoul involved in a nonsensical showdown with the token dreadful leading lady.

Sequels invariably fail to live up to the standards of the original and this is no exception. Unfortunately, when the original is a load of blah, you're always going to be on to a loser.


Many die-hard horror fans (myself included) absolutely worship the original "Candyman" because it's so genuinely scary and intelligently adapted from a Clive Barker story. This sequel (it looks more like a prequel, actually, with all those flashbacks) is not entirely unwatchable, it just immensely pales in comparison to the original, like so many other redundant sequels do. It seems like director Bill Condon and his army of crew members totally missed the point of Barker's tale and of the original film. "Candyman" isn't really about the killer himself! It's about the whole myth/urban legend behind his persona and how it scares superstitious people that believe in it. Is he real or are the bloody murders only committed in his name? "Farewell to the Flesh" pretty much takes away the entire mystery-aspect, as it extendedly reveals the origin of the Candyman character. Besides, we already heard the brief version of that story in the original. The rest of the film revolves on Annie Tarrant, who becomes dangerously close with the hook-handed bogeyman when she starts investigating her family history. The script suffers from too many tedious moments, there's almost no connection with the characters and the voice-over radio dude really annoyed the hell out of me. The violence is not that disturbing here as in the first film, but part two also definitely has its cruel and nasty moments. Tony Todd acts like he realizes that this is an inferior sequel and he doesn't really bother anymore to look (and sound) truly nightmarish. Judging by the other user-comments on this site, "Candyman 2: Farewell to the Flesh" appears to be reasonably successful and repeatedly referred to as a worthwhile sequel... Well, I disagree. I think it's a waste of time totally not worth of the Candyman-title.


Like most horror film sequels, Candy-man: Farewell To The Flesh is vastly inferior to the original film: Candy-man. Tony Todd returns as the candy-man again, and Philip Glass' hypnotic score is used, but that's where the similarities end between the two films. Kelly Rowan, currently from The O.C., stars as a descendant of the candy-man clan in this film. She's a school teacher, provoked by her students into invoking the candy-man curse. Shortly afterward, mayhem starts once again. She's drawn in by the candy-man, and we learn much more about his origins than we care to know in gruesome detail. There are several differences between this film and the first one that make it inferior. First, the pacing of this film is much slower and less taut than the original. This is due partly to the direction and partly to the very gradual revelation about the candy-man's origins. Creators of the first film were smart to realize that the audience didn't need all that exposition to make the story work. Second, the film is set in New Orleans during fat Tuesday, but Bill Condon, the director, does not use the locations effectively.

Most of the scenes are filmed on obvious set pieces, which greatly limit the ability of the film to build masterfully like the first one. Real locations helped pull viewers into the "myth" in the first film. Here, we are too aware that we are watching set pieces. Third, there are numerous red herring "boo" scenes, even Condon admits this, which greatly limit the fear factor after a while; because, we're just waiting for the next false alarm to "scare" us. This is a sign that there really isn't much here to scare us in the first place. The first film had little, if any of this; the story propelled its scares naturally by good plot development, not loud cue music. Fourth, the biggest reason why this is inferior to the first film is that Tony Todd appears much more frequently in this film than he does in the original. This, of course, demystifies him so much in our eyes that he becomes ineffective as a scary figure. There's so much posing and posturing by Todd that you can almost hear him getting direction. How often have we heard critics say "less is more?" Apparently not enough times. Veronica Cartwright, of Lost In Space fame, appears as Rowan's mother. It's hard to believe Condon went on to direct Gods & Monsters. * of 4 stars.


Completely pointless and unnecessary sequel to the moderately successful 1992 horror film "Candyman", which was both co-produced and loosely adapted from a semi-popular short story by Brit Clive Barker. The continuing story gets a drastic change in geography this time around as it is transferred from the bustling streets and skyscrapers of Chicago, Illinois to the muggy, bourbon soaked south of New Orleans, Louisiana where the towering hook-handed would-be-urban-legend character of "Candyman" decides to wreak havoc by slicing and dicing through the family of his unwitting and white great, great, granddaughter (I believe it was) who, much like the first film, makes the lame-brained mistake of repeating his name into a mirror five times on a dare. For the most part this film is pretty lousy as the acting is some of the worst I've seen in a flick with a budget as large as this films' is, the scares are also somewhat predictable as well as unoriginal---however though, when I think about it now how psychotically creative (for lack of a couple of better words) could one really be with a hook anyway? Not very I imagine---and in particular the plot itself tends to confuse the audience as it has virtually no connection to the first (which sequels really should have, though a number of them rarely do)! Apparently the screenwriters unwisely chose to base this one on a small section of dialog that was spoken between characters in the first film which most people --myself included-- didn't even bother to pay any real attention to at the time due mostly to the simple facts that it was just plain trivial, and not exactly pertinent to the plot. I'm talking mainly here about the scene where a professor friend of Virgina Madsen's character's husband regaled back to her in a smug, arrogant, know-it-all fashion over a big dinner at a fancy restaurant the origins of the Candyman character/myth that claimed he had sired a half-white child with the daughter of a man who commissioned him to paint his daughter's portrait as he was quite the artist, and as a result of this he was hunted down and basically butchered shortly thereafter by an angry racist mob led by the woman's enraged father. It was like I said a part of the first film that should really have been overlooked in the first place, and certainly not made into an entire feature-length film that wound up being both unintentionally laughable and pretty darn awful even by crappy horror-sequel standards! Overall, this flick doesn't exactly come highly recommended in my book unless you were a die-hard fan of the first film, and or need a good hearty laugh to cheer you up which this film, if nothing else, is sure to provide. Also what may be of some notice to a few audience members out there is that this flick was the first legitimate cinematic directorial debut by now-respected director Bill Condon, who later went on to great success with a couple of somewhat controversial, and rightfully Oscar-nominated if you've actually seen them, films entitled: "Gods and Monsters" (1998), and "Kinsey" (2005). (Turkey-Zero Stars)


More gore, more violence, more melodramatics, more of the Candyman yet everything else remains the same. Typical sequel for a horror, yet there is much more blood and guts than an investigation. Much of the acting is more sillier than the original. So is the dialogue (The Candyman himself steps up his silly one-liners a notch). Everything that there was to like in CANDYMAN stays in its sequel.

The Candyman is in New Orleans killing people and an innocent man claims he is the killer. Our innocent guy's sister, an elementary teacher is having none of this and does some investigating of her own to find the real killer.

The story of Candyman is taken deeper but that is just about all that FAREWELL TO THE FLESH has going for it. Everything is either boring or silly. It has the same sound track from the original. Learning more about the Candyman does not save this over done sequel from falling flat on its face. FAREWELL TO THE FLESH is for anyone who wanted more gruesome acts than the first. Less mind games and more senseless killing are abound.


Not as bleakly derivative and shoddy as one might expect, Candyman 2 is still not all that inventive, original, or good as well. This time around the Candyman haunts New Orleans and a young, pretty teacher played by Kelly Rowan. Rowan, proving to her class that some urban legends have no basis in fact, looks in a mirror and says Candyman five times. Ohhhhh! We know what happens after that, and this film does all the expected with style if nothing else. Rowan's family, friends, and associates meet the hooks of the Candyman, and a hidden family secret which ties into the Candyman's past is presented. We learn why the Candyman is the way he is, etc... Okay, some of this was interesting, but much was just silly. Tony Todd gives another creepy, over-the-top performance as the man of dreams and pain(alright even now I am sounding like some of that tripe he spews). In some ways I enjoyed this film more than its original. The New Orleans setting is effectively shot and some of the character acting is decent. I especially liked the opening scene and the actor playing the professor. The murders are executed with lots of gusto as well. Again, I am just not a big fan of the Barbara Cartland-type romance between the Candyman and the girl amidst murder and mayhem. It just bores me. Nonetheless, Candyman 2 is a decent sequel in many regards. I think it will keep those that liked the first entertained, though they will more than likely enjoy the original far more.


Dreary sequel, despite resetting the narrative to the tale's original location of New Orleans (with flashbacks to the Candyman's grisly fate). This time around, the heroine discovers she's related to the Candyman rather than being a re-incarnation of his white lover; that said, Kelly Rowan is no substitute for Viriginia Madsen! In fact, apart from Tony Todd's titular character (who's even less scary here but, at least, he's intelligible), Michael Culkin's ill-fated professor is the only link to the first film.

Other than the requisite gore (and Philip Glass score), again, we have a subplot involving a black child who lives in fear of the Candyman; additionally, however, we get a bit of irrelevant sleaze (this being conveniently set during Mardi Gras)! The presence of veterans Veronica Cartwright and Matt Clark is welcome; predictably, though, they both end up as meat for the Candyman's hook.

While director Condon may have started in horror (this is the only one I've watched, actually), he really came into his own when he branched out into other genres  and, quite frankly, I wouldn't have bothered watching this hadn't he been involved...


Candyman 2 is a very unworthy sequel to Candyman 1.The beginning scene where the fat guy gets slaughtered in the bathroom is basically the only good part of the movie because the way to destroy Candyman was very cheesy and stupid,and the end was crap.SPOILERS,they killed Candyman by breaking a mirror,that was bad.Most of the movie wasnt interesting like it can be lead to believe,and the whole thing where Candyman can only be destroyed by breaking a glass was very half assed.Seriously,the only thing that this movie can deliver is mediocre acting,and a straight gore fest from beginning to end.I tried to like this movie,I tried,but it just want good enough to surpass the first one.Its not scary or anything.A very bad,and very cheesy movie.4 out of 10.


Totally miscast - Emilia Fox is too confident, beautiful and elegant to play the plain, awkward, painfully shy second Mrs De Winter. Charles Dance is too old to play Max De Winter (he's supposed to be 15 - 20 years older then her, not 30) and he lacks any sense of darkness or anger. Even Manderley itself is dreadfully unimpressive. Only Diana Rigg, as Mrs Danvers comes anywhere near creating a character similar to the book.

The directing is of the 'point and shoot' variety, with no subtleties.The one trick, with Mrs Danvers and the light, is lifted straight from Hitchcock.

In fact the whole thing has no sense of mystery or doom or tragedy. There is no chemistry between the leads, despite the script showing them kissing passionately at a time in the book when he barely touches her. There's no romance between them, in fact their kisses seem awkward and forced, and a bit disgusting, given how much older than her he looks (not to mention his lack of sex appeal and passion) The script itself is terrible, deviating from the book, having her challenging him at a time when in the book, she can barely speak to him.

If you love the book, like I do, don't bother with this. Watch the Hitchcock version, with its great acting, sense of tragedy and doom, deep romance and a script practically lifted from the book, instead.


If Charles Dance hadn't been the perfect, slightly crotchety, dashingly attractive and aristocratic Maxim de Winter, I wouldn't have even given this 2 stars. Well, okay, the period sets and costumes *were* wonderful, Manderley *was* luscious, and the cold, crashing sea around Manderley gorgeous and ominous! But beyond that ...

I think my main problem is with the Emilia Fox as the second Mrs. de Winter. She seemed colorless, insipid and wimpy and lacked what I'd always believed was an essential sweetness which originally attracted Max. Occasionally the chemistry between Fox and Dance was good, especially the marriage bed scenes, but overall the direction and performance created a second Mrs. de Winter that made little sense to me.

Also, Diana Rigg's much-touted performance left me cold; although, to be fair, in both her case and Fox's, I suspect that a large part of the problem was in the script and direction, which tended to be cadenced and lingering to the point where it seemed contrived to me.

And, sigh, at a certain point Frith's villainy became a bit over the top, and he habitually hit the same note again and again, the same facial expressions, the same sneer, the same smarmy charm, all of which was very effective in his first scene, but didn't wear well with repetition.

Essentially, I spent most of the movie, a retelling of a favorite story of mine, checking my watch to see how much longer I needed to endure it.


Absolutely terrible, I read this novel when I was very young and although I didn't fully understand it, I was as haunted by Rebecca as everyone else in the novel was. When I found the Alfred Hitchcock version, I didn't agree at first with how harsh Maxim always seemed, but the movie really did the book justice, the setting and lighting. This movie however, was much to mushy and didn't follow the characters attitudes at all. Mrs. Van Hopper was portrayed all wrong, and Maxim wasn't handsome and debonair at all. Over all I'd say watch the Alfred Hitchcock version if you want beautiful settings and handsome actors that get to the core of the characters.