Tagged: Movie
Herve Villechaize: The Pop Star?!
I’ve loved the show Fantasy Island when I was a kid, it always managed to scare the shit out of me! You know I’ve recently watched several episodes of the show again and it still totally holds up. A super cool concept and a killer cast-which brings me to one of it’s legendary characters “Tattoo” played by Herve Villachaize. He etched the phrase “Ze plane, ze plane” into people’s minds for all of eternity!
But a little known fact about Herve was that back in 1980 he had a small musical career too! Yep in the middle of his incredible success with Fantasy Island he recorded a single for Epic Records. Turns out Herve was also quite a crooner with some seriously rad style.
The single featured two tracks “Why” & “When a Child is Born” unfortunately the songs didn’t catapult Herve to arena tours with Michael Jackson and the song ‘Why’ was released again and included on the Epic records compilation “Children of the World”. Here’s some live footage of Herve gettin’ down with his attempted pop hit ‘Why’!
After that as the popularity of Fantasy Island continued to grow Herve’s ego also reportedly began to grow too. He was said to be quite demanding and difficult to work with insisting that he be paid equally with Ricardo Montalban’s salary. He ended up getting fired from the show and his star power proved quite relevant as the show’s following dwindled during a final season with no Tattoo. Hunt down his Epic single if you dare!
Still haven’t had enough? Well here’s some more Herve killin’ it live again!!
Comic Book Cover of the Week: Don’t Fear The Man-Thing!
I’ve gotta say I just fucking love The Man-Thing! So here’s a great comic book cover, an oldie but goodie! This rad cover features a truly frightening scenario of our favorite swamp dwelling superhero as some unsuspecting couple from the 70’s stumble upon The Man-Thing! Damn I mean can you imagine opening the door and seeing that guy standing there! I’m still hoping we’ll get to see a kick ass version of Man-Thing in a Marvel movie. They attempted it once with less than stellar results, but get the right FX team behind the Man-Thing and you could have one amazing creepy ass horror hero! Check this rad classic cover by Gil Kane!
5 Reasons Why Netflix Marvel is Better Than Movie Marvel!
I’m really enjoying the latest Marvel Netflix original series ‘Jessica Jones’ and I totally loved Daredevil. It really got me thinking about why these shows seem so far (at least to me) so much better than the Marvel cinematic experience!
After a little thought I decided to nail down my five reasons Marvel should send some of their more popular characters down the same path as Jessica & Matt Murdok!
1.Better Character Development:
It’s clear one of the main reasons why I’ve liked the tv shows more so than the movies is simply because we have so much more time to really get to know the characters inside and out. It can be tough sometimes within only a couple hours to really get a character to the point where you actually understand them and their true motivations without everything feeling a bit rushed.
Netflix gives us the time we need without boring us to really fall in love with the characters. It plays out much more like a comic book taking the time it needs to tell a great story. Some of the Marvel movies simply try and pack way too much shit into too small a time. Not only that but Marvel movies are so concerned with tying everything together between franchises that sometimes you get lost in a big sloppy plot. Imagine for a minute if Captain America would have been a tv series, how much more it would have meant to see Bucky come back as the Winter Soldier after spending a whole season with him and Cap in World Ward II?!
2. Believable Special Effects:
Sometimes when I’m watching a Marvel movie I feel like I’m watching a frikin’ cartoon. There’s soooo much CG and special FX work that it ends up a bit feeling like I’m watching ‘Roger Rabbit’. The Netflix shows have really done a spectacular job with the special effects and they flow nicely alongside the story and the action sequences.
They haven’t required the amount of CG that say The Avengers used but sometimes I really wonder if these big bloated shiny CG stuffed spectacles really need to be telling stories that need that much in the way of FX. More is NOT always better folks and some of these Marvel movies just have NOT aged well and it hasn’t even been that long.
3.Better Villains:
One thing the Marvel movies do NOT have going for them are good villains. The Netflix series works hard at giving us reasons to love and at times really hate the villains. We never really get much in the way of character development for the bad guys in a Marvel movie. Usually they’re just merely there as a reason to see some crazy ass battle go down.
The Netflix series give us the time with the bad guys that we need to really understand them or just really wanna see them get their asses served up. I haven’t once given two shits about any villain in a Marvel movie. And folks your superheroes are only as good as their evil counterparts. So if you ain’t got a good bad guy you ain’t got shit.
4.No Ratings:
Yep, the Marvel movies are all about money and selling boatloads of shit to the kids. Making a killing with merchandise means the movies can never go too dark. However the Netflix Marvel stuff doesn’t have to worry about that, they can cuss, draw blood and have tons of sex if they want to.
The Marvel movies don’t dare go too dark or violent, perhaps that’s one reason why their villains just suck so bad? They’re not allowed to really get all of their evil out onscreen, now imagine the what the Red Skull would have been like in a Netflix series…
5.They Don’t Follow the Marvel Movie Formula:
Let’s all face it, the Marvel movies most definitely have a bit of a tired and predictable formula. I really liked Ant-man but it really felt so “2008”, while watching it’s plot unfold I thought “man we’re really doing this whole thing again?” It felt pretty interchangeable with any other Marvel movies I’ve seen. Good guy gets powers, boring bad guy who has similar powers, cute love interest in danger, big CG fight at end. Blah blah blah..
Or if you’re The Avengers movies you have them all fight a super blah bad guy and then at the end of the movie a big CG slugfest, in a big city, fighting a bunch of similar looking CG clones. The second Avengers movies was really just a retelling of the first, instead of Loki you had Ultron and instead of the hordes of CG Chituari Warriors you had the horde of CG Ultron clones fight at the end in Sokovia instead of New York.
The Netflix shows have broken away from the usual mold at least for the moment and that’s god damn refreshing. Hmm….But then again there is this now:
VHS Verdict: ‘Thunder Run’ Proves That in the 80’s Old Guys Kick Ass!
I dusted off a VHS copy of ‘Thunder Run’ from 1986 last night and we got to see a hotshot 67 year old action star kickin’ major ass in his souped up semi truck! Yeeehaw! Yep this one was a total blast, if you’re looking for some seriously over the top action and crazy car chase trucker mayhem then you just won the fuckin’ lottery!
Forrest Tucker is the man here, a retired truck driver named Charlie who’s asked by an old friend/ Gov’t operative to drive a load of plutonium across a barren Arizona highway to lure out some psychotic terrorists and take them out once and for all. Sounds like a fool proof plan huh?
Nope this one doesn’t give us Jean Claude Van Damme or a Chuck Norris type kicking ass, instead you get an elderly bad ass geezer who tricks out his rig with a bunch deadly secret weapons he can activate via dashboard flip switches. We’ve got some classic bad guys too, their leader, a poor man’s Michael Ironside look alike with a nasty attitude and of course naturally a nasty facial scar (because we all know evil people sport nasty facial scars) does his best to be the perfect evil 80’s villain. The best part of the flick though is when the actual dangerous drive cross country begins and Charlie discovers his grandson is hiding in the cab and is fully ready for duo tag team terrorist ass whoopin!
So once the action kicks into high gear it really just does not let up. Nope this one has crazy terrorists coming after the big rig from every direction on motorcycles, fake cop cars, weaponized Volkswagon Beetles & rival semi trucks. Charlie and his grandson get down and dirty roasting terrorists with flame throwers that they’ve installed into the sides of the semi, battering rams and some truly outrageous big rig road antics.
This is the type of flick where it don’t take much more than a scratch to blow the fuck out of car with huge amounts of fire shit flying everywhere. It’s nice to actually see real explosions again in a damn movie that’s for sure. One scene in particular where they jump the 18 wheeler (with plutonium in back mind you) over a moving train! Oh and the finale through the ridiculous laser tunnel is a total blast as well. So check this one out if you’re jonesin’ for a different type of action flick and action hero as ‘Thunder Run’ will deliver the goods on all cylinders and then some! This one’s worth hunting down!
Thor ROCKS Portland Oregon With His New Documentary and Live Show!!
This week I had the great pleasure to see the legendary Jon Mikl Thor live right here in Portland Oregon! But that wasn’t all, before he hit the stage he gave us all a screening of the new documentary “I am Thor”!!
Some of you might not even know who Thor is but if you like 80’s metal and 80’s horror flicks then there’s a good chance you’ve heard of this guy. To me, my first introduction to him was in the cult favorite flick ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll Nightmare’ and this one really has got to be seen to be believed. It’s one of the best cheezy 80’s flicks of all time. Don’t believe me check this shit out:
Anyway to make a long story short, Jon Mikl Thor was a successful body builder who fronted the band Thor way back in 1973. He looked like a real life version of the Marvel Comics character or heck he could easily have passed as He-Man as well!
He really never achieved the success he’d always wanted and spent most of the 70’s and 80’s touring the world. He had a short career in B-movies as well and in 1997 he decided to pick up the hammer again and rock the world as Thor one more time.
The documentary covers this and so much more and is filled the heart and determination of a man who’s willing to defy the odds for the sheer love of Rock & Roll. It follows his rise and fall as well as his quest to return to the stage years later. In many ways it’s quite similar to another excellent documentary about another Canadian metal band called Anvil. If you want a dynamic double feature I highly recommend “I Am Thor” and “Anvil: The Story of Anvil” they will inspire you to never give up on your dreams.
Thor at Dante’s, Portland Oregon
We get a lot of great info on Jon Mikl Thor as well, one interesting thing was learning that he was originally asked by Jerry Only from the Misfits to front the 90’s version of the band before eventually getting Michale Graves to replace Danzig. Man, how awesome would a Thor fronted version of The Misfits have been?!! Well to me it sounds awesome.
If you get a chance check this movie out, it’s a lot of fun and by the end of it you’ll feel like you really know the guy personally. I guess that’s one reason why I had such a good time at the show, after the movie we got to see Thor rock again with a full band. Though he doesn’t have the long hair or ultra ripped body that he used to he’s still got the pipes and at age 62 he’s got a ton of great energy. It was a real treat seeing a band playing that style of metal and while not fully familiar with all of his music (mainly because I didn’t own any of it personally yet), when I attended the show by the end of his set I couldn’t get his power metal anthems out of my head.
I knew I had to go much deeper into the music and film career of John Mikl Thor! He’s a true character who never gave up on his dreams and though his shows don’t sell out you can see how much this guy truly appreciates every person in attendance. It was a night that still has me smiling days later. It takes a very special person to make you feel that in this day and age. Long live Thor, you’re still the number one Warrior of the Universe in my opinion…
Thor on the left, my buddy Jeff in the center and me on the right!
VHS Verdict: Shock ‘Em Dead Will Make Your Colon Spastic!
I recently was lucky enough to catch one the best Rock n’ Roll horror flicks of the 90’s: “Shock ‘Em Dead”! To be exact this one came out in 1990 and man was it a good time. This one is the perfect party flick and a good amount of booze is recommended in conjunction to get the ultimate enjoyment out of this giant ball of cheez. Shock ‘Em Dead is one of Traci Lords’ legitimate Hollywood movies and that’s not saying much in this case! To be fair though I think she was the only woman in this movie that actually didn’t get naked! So at least she was really trying to make it a point to distance herself from her well known controversial racy porn career.
However Shock ‘Em Dead is far from a good horror movie per say, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a total riot to watch! We’ve got a movie that’d fit quite nicely next to “Rock & Roll Nightmare” for a double feature. Yep you get it all here folks hot babes, hot dudes, heavy metal & of course Satan!! The story follows Martin, a lone nerd pizza boy / terrible guitarist, who’s sick and tired of being made fun of by everyone in town. Well things get worse for Martin after he decides to try out for the local rising rockstar band “Spastic Colon” as lead guitarist.
After being humiliated for sucking so bad on guitar he’s off to make a deal with the devil with a Miss Cleo look-alike voodoo lady. Soon Martin is transformed into a super over the top glam rock god, who sizzles on a double necked B.C. Rich Warlock guitar and returns to wow Spastic Colon with his hyper doodling chops! But man you’d think if you made a deal with the devil you’d go try and join Iron Maiden or Van Halen instead?!
Anyway Martin, now going by the name Angel Martin decides he wants Spastic Colon’s manager Traci Lords (because I’m thinking he might have seen a few of her previous film work)?! Well now that Martin joined the band and is sporting a totally fucking over the top ridiculous glam rocker style with a full on spazzed out gigantic black wig it seems that indeed Traci is beginning to fall some how for this dipshit!
Not only that but as the band’s popularity seems to skyrocket, some weird deaths begin to occur at their shows all at the hands of the devilishly dark Angel Martin . This flick delivers on all cylinders, giving you a totally laughable plot, incredible late 80’s early 90’s glam rocker style, unbelievable dialog & some totally awesomely idiotic songs like Spastic Colon’s big hit “Virgin” Girl!
Did I mention you’ll also get the insanely flashy guitar noodling of Nitro’s very own Michael Angelo Batio too? Yep they hired him to double as Angel Martin’s hand’s when he’s fucking shredding on the double edge axe guitar.
There are so many awesome things about this movie that will have you laughing your ass off and if you’re ok with some pretty un PC humor this one will seriously get the party started and then if anything else you get to watch Traci Lords for an hour and a half-seek this one out, I saw it on VHS but I think it was released this year on special edition dvd!
Halloween Horror Movie Pick: ‘Deathgasm’ Will Rock Your Socks Off!
Looking for a cool new Halloween Horror flick to watch this year and are all out of new ideas?! Well I’ve got a fun one for you, ‘Deathgasm’ will deliver the mayhem and then some as the perfect Halloween party flick this year. This new movie, straight out of New Zealand delivers the blood and guts in the same vein as Peter Jackson’s classic splatter flick ‘Dead Alive’. Yep what you’ll get here is a full on black metal gore fest brimming with comedy and heart. This one would play quite nicely next to the 1986 classic “Trick or Treat” as it’s quite similar actually in many ways. Which is always a good thing of course.
It’s the story of teenage metal head who’s mom goes crazy and he’s sent to live with his uncle in a small town. His new surrogate family thinks he’s a total freak and his meathead cousin has got in in for him big time. At school he’s picked on and develops a crush on his evil cousins preppy girlfriend. Totally down on his luck he finally meets a fellow metalhead and starts a metal band eventually leading them to playing an ancient song that awakens vicious demons that run rampant all over town. From here things get super crazy as the band must find a way to reverse the spell and send the pesky demons straight back to hell!
As you might guess this is no easy task and the band has to slaughter of fuck ton of demons in the process. There’s a ton of crazy gore, heads flying, bodies sliced in two, weaponized twenty sided dice, dildos and of course anal beads. Yeah you heard that correct. This is a party movie above and beyond being a gory ass horror flick and is really the perfect flick for a wild crowd at a Halloween party this year. The movie delivers some pretty excellent practical effects as well and doesn’t skimp on the laughs either. It’s really more of Comedy than anything else which might be my only real gripe with it.
I totally dig horror comedies but I think this one might have benefitted a bit more in playing it’s story a bit more heavy handed. Sometimes the modern horror comedies play a bit too heavily to keep the fans too in on the joke. However this is one of the stronger flicks of the genre I’ve seen recently.
It reminds me a bit of the awesome 2007 flick Jack Brooks Monster Slayer (another great choice of a movie for Halloween), especially a scene in Deathgasm that’s almost a total rip from Robert Englund’s amazing performance in ‘Jack Brooks’. Lastly any fans of true metal will likely dig the music and the references to many classic death, grindcore and black metal bands. So if you’re in the mood for the perfect movie to crowd around with your buddies and a bunch of weed and booze this Halloween make no mistake Deathgasm IS your flick!!
Kick Don Bluth in the Butt and Kickstart The DRAGON’S LAIR Movie!!!
Yes! It’s such a pleasure to do a blog post that I really am totally hyped about these days! This morning I got wind of the brand spankin’ new Kickstarter page for Dragon’s Lair: The Movie and this is something I’ve always wanted to see since the 1980’s.
First let me state that Don Bluth was responsible for my favorite animated movie of all time, The Secret of Nimh, a movie from 1982 that still easily holds up today against the mass produced CG animated movies which have flooded the market. If you’ve never seen it you’re missing out big time. Anyway a year later in 1983 we got quite a surprise in the Arcades, when Dragon’s Lair was released-it was the first hand drawn animated video on the scene and it was a true wonder to behold. Yes the 1980’s were a wonderful era.
I know many people these days don’t even remember what a video game really arcade is, but back in the 80’s it was the place to be. We’d head off to the mall on a saturday afternoon and spend hours there playing video games and then maybe catch a movie afterwords. Ahh, yes, those were the days. I would spend hours watching my brother play Dragon’s Lair and besides it being a very difficult game it was, for me, just fun to watch the incredibly inventive action sequences & adventure unfold before my very eyes. Dragon’s Lair was total eye candy, I was never very good at it myself but I loved it.
So here we are in 2015 and (the now retired from animation) Don Bluth is being challenged by fans to make Dragon’s Lair into an old school style animated feature film via Kickstarter!! The good news is that Don Has officially accepted the invitation. Bluth started out working as an animator with Disney in 1971 having films like Robin Hood & The Rescuers under his belt, he later left and started his own animation company.
So fans we all need to support this venture, get a full on Don Bluth revival going on here, How amazing would it be to see a classic animated Dragon’s Lair feature movie? Who knows maybe if this happens we could get him to do a ‘Space Ace’ movie!!!
I’ve really been missing those classic hand drawn animated feature films, they had so much damn character, I think the world just might be a little better place if we could get this one made, check out the Kickstarter Page right HERE-let’s head into the Dragon’s Lair again!!
VHS Verdict: ‘The Kiss’ is Full of Campy Glamorous 80’s Horror!
I pulled out a pretty sweet VHS the other night called ‘The Kiss’ and it totally delivered the goods! This cool 1988 flick is not exactly what I’d call a great movie by any means but it definitely delivers the just right amount of inventive charming cheez to please any true fan of 80’s horror. I’d say this movie also gives us a genre I’d like to coin here as “glamour horror”. The movie follows a suburban family as they cope with the sudden and mysterious death of their mother. Soon on it’s clear some serious paranormal foul play is afoot as the flick opens with a bizarre scene on a train in the Belgian Congo set back in the 1960’s and involves you guessed it “a kiss” that seems to carry with it some sort of crazy ass occult voodoo charged curse.
Well things get weird after the mom dies her gruesome death and we see her truly odd but totally glamourous cover girl sister burst onto the scene seemingly out of nowhere. The motherless daughter played by total 80’s babe Meredith Salenger, whom you may recognize as the object of affection in “Dream a Little Dream” immediately gets a bad feeling from her new Auntie played by Joanna Pacula (the classic 80’s model-babe), while her father seems to be pretty down right away with her basically moving in and THEN some!
Yeah from that point it become a bit of a erotic thriller for a moment as she seduces the Dad and starts stalking the daughter and her new cool guy boyfriend. This one really could’ve been edited down about 15 minutes to keep the story moving a little quicker but if you hang in there ’til the half way point things really start cookin’.
Yep this one gets pretty damn awesome, jam packed with ridiculous voodoo, a crazy ass demonic cat and some good solid 80’s gore. The third act of the film is where this one really delivers, the final showdown is pretty awesome and action packed. It’s a great suburban family battle against the glamour gal, a over the top ferocious puppet cat and the ridiculously awesome creature behind or should I say “inside” it all.
This is one of those cheezy gems that make me love collecting vhs tapes, the 80’s was a great era for horror and this one seems to have slipped under the radar for many-so seek this out and get ready for some campy fun that was meant to be a serious affair!
Cool Comic Debut: Paper Girls #1 Brings us an ‘Amblin’ Style 80’s Mystery!
I just finished ‘Paper Girls’ #1 by hotshot writer Brian K. Vaughan and it’s one of best debut issues I’ve read in a long time. What’s even better is at it’s $2.99 cover price it’s a double sized issue filled with a great little story just waiting to burst into a retro ‘Amblin’ style adventure set way back in 1988. Not only do we get an intriguing story here but also some great artwork by Cliff Chiang. We follow twelve year old Erin as she heads out onto the streets to do her paper route in wee hours of the A.M. after a extremely peculiar dream, involving apples, aliens, winged astronauts and classroom demons speaking what seems to be gibberish. I love the way the dream sequence is played out in the pages here, with a ton of strange symbolism, conversations that seemingly make no sense and some frightening creatures, it really feels like an actual dream which is quite nice.
The setting in the morning is the night after Halloween, so as Erin hits the streets with her sack of papers she encounters some neighborhood bullies still roaming. Luckily three other paper girls arrive on rad bmx bikes to the scene to her defense. From this point Erin decides to ride with the girls on her route and discovers that the three of them too had been jumped by some strange “people” dressed as ghosts who stole one of their walkie talkies.
I don’t want to spoil any of the story as there are some cool surprises that develop along the way. But what I will say is this has the perfect setting for a lost 80’s flick and puts some cool supernatural elements in the mix that leave you longing for issue #2. A super solid debut and just the kind of comic book story that I love even if for some reason we get a bit of prominent product placement by the way of Apple computers. Check this one out, this issue gives you more bang for your buck too as it’s twice the normal size. A great scheme to get people to drop their hard earned cash these days on a comic book!
Universal Dork 