FROM THE ARCHIVES

Tag: 2 stars

Halloween 5 - Revenge of Michael Myers
Entertainment

Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers Review

William McPherson

The Halloween franchise, compared to Freddy and Jason’s series, is probably the most uneven of all the slasher series. Nothing will ever top the awful unconnected mess of Halloween III, which is why part four was such a welcome return to form, but this entry, while still at least a somewhat competent entry in the series has a whole crapton of WTF moments. The movie brings back the Jamie character, only now she is in a children’s hospital haunted by her previous experience being guarded by inept…

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Freddy vs Jason
Entertainment

Freddy vs. Jason Review

William McPherson

Notorious dream slayer Freddy Krueger has been dormant for years now in the little neighborhood of Elm Street. Business just ain’t what it used to be as teenagers just don’t really seem that afraid anymore, which, as the story goes greatly reduces his powers. Not one to take this lying down, he decides to lure old Hockey Puss himself out of hibernation to get the fear meter turned up a few amps so he can get back to what he does best. Only trouble is, once set loose, Jason Voorhees doesn’t…

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Friday the 13th Part 4
Entertainment

Friday The 13th Part 5: A New Beginning Review

William McPherson

That final chapter idea of part four thankfully was an empty threat. However, until ‘Jason Goes to Hell’ came out, Friday the 13th Part 5 was the closest thing this franchise had to a “Halloween III: Season of the Witch” type installment---basically, one that most fans of the series tend to purposefully ignore. If you only edited so that the killer actually was (spoiler alert again) Jason Voorhees, instead of lunatic ambulance driver Roy, then it’s really not that much different from the other…

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Friday the 13th Part 2
Entertainment

Friday The 13th Part 2 Review

William McPherson

If the first film in this series was “respectable schlock” this one was just pure schlock, and the series itself was still in the midst of finding its niche. Friday the 13th Part 2 is as straight of a by the numbers slasher flick as you could imagine. The introduction of the Jason Voorhees character (in unexplained grown up form) is the most historically relevant aspect of this movie, and of course, it is another direct rip-off from Halloween, perhaps even more direct this time out because adult…

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Dumb and Dumber To
Entertainment

Dumb and Dumber To Review

William McPherson

Watching this film is like going to a high school reunion and getting cornered by that guy who was the class clown twenty years ago, and discovering he has not changed his clothes, or bothered to learn any new material in the intervening decades. You find you are amused just by their appearance and the nostalgia factor for a bit, but you quickly make an excuse to split the scene as soon as you are able. Carrey and Daniels are both fine actors who have done great work and I hope will continue to…

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The Interview
Entertainment

The Interview Review

William McPherson2 Comments

Hey, North Korea, you really could have saved yourself a lot of time and trouble and just let this one pass. It likely would have fizzled out based on its’ own merit rather than having the help of an entire news cycle controversy to drive up sales. James Franco and Seth Rogen belong in better movies than the likes of this. They’re both fine actors, capable of fine performances, but with stuff like this they are powerless to overcome the material. This movie is basically Pineapple Express: North…

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Quantum of Solace
Entertainment

Quantum of Solace Review

William McPherson

James Bond is on a quest for revenge against the evil doers who blackmailed his former flame---Vesper Lynd, from Casino Royale, a pursuit which leads him to the discovery of one Dominic Greene, a guy with a private army capable of being nearly anywhere it seems, but who is bent on controlling the water resources of Bolivia because, hey, that was a trendy news story once upon a time. Quantum of Solace may be an okay, even good action movie, but it is far from a good James Bond movie. Daniel Craig…

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Entertainment

Tomorrow Never Dies Review

William McPherson

Peter Travers, in his review of “Tomorrow Never Dies” wrote “If Connery was Sexy Bond and George Lazenby was One-Shot Bond and Roger Moore was Geezer Bond and Timothy Dalton was Bored Bond, then Brosnan should be Posh Bond.” This kind of sums up my feelings on Brosnan as well, who was probably the most glittery of all the men to sport the 007 moniker. This movie is almost entirely paint by the numbers Bond, in a way that makes it more forgettable than most. Maybe it is because not enough time…

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Reindeer Games
Entertainment

Reindeer Games Review

William McPherson

This is one of my favorite horrible movies. It has every bad movie cliché in the book, a ton of gnarly character actors, questionable acting, awful writing, pointless plot twists galore etc, and is centered around a bunch of guys dressed like Santa trying to rob a casino. What’s not to like? To attempt to explain the plot in full with all the spoilers would be quite the pain in the arse, but here’s the short version. Ben Affleck’s character is a car thief named Rudy (yes, Rudy, in a movie called…

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The Gunman
Entertainment

The Gunman Review

William McPherson

This is strictly a matter of personal taste, but I prefer my shoot em’ up style action flicks to be light on the preachy politics and heavy on the ass kicking suspense. Now, I realize any movie starring Sean Penn is going to be heavy on the former. I found I could mostly ignore that though. Penn here plays a government assassin who has been put out to pasture after a big job down in the Congo. In the years since that job he has had to cut off all contact with his fiancée, who is now married…

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Revenge 1990
Entertainment

Revenge Review

William McPherson

I was up late the other night and caught this movie on TV and was surprised I had not heard of it before. Then while watching it, it occurred to me just how easy a movie this would have been to forget. 1990 was a very important year in Kevin Costner’s career for reasons that have nothing to do with this film. This was the year, as you will recall, that he released Dances with Wolves. This movie is certainly not on that level. For starters, it looks like they took the working or filming title of…

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Death Wish 4
Entertainment

Death Wish 4: The Crackdown Review

William McPherson

Paul Kersey is headed west, again for the fourth installment of the Death Wish series. This time around there is a bit more plot, but still just as much action including what is admittedly a pretty awesome finale involving a bazooka. That said, Bronson really started looking to old and worn out for the part by this time and obviously could not have given a shit about this movie. This movie tries to be like a 1980s version of “Fistful of Dollars” (or Yojimbo). Kersey (Charles Bronson), now a well…

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Death Wish 2
Entertainment

Death Wish 2 Review

William McPherson

Death Wish goes west is probably a more appropriate title to this sequel. As a kid in love with macho badasses Charles Bronson was, of course, one of my heroes. And in retrospect it is Bronson’s presence alone that saves this one from being a nearly complete dud, that and cheesy lines every now and then such as “Do you believe in Jesus? (Punk says yeah) Well, you’re gonna meet him (pow pow pow). The story is a direct ripoff of the original, which now living in a time when this genre has been…

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Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Entertainment

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty Review

William McPherson

There’s a fine line between inspirational and cloying, and this movie teeters dangerously on the brink the entire film. I found that half the time I went along for the ride, while the other half I had to distance myself from the main character. Walter Mitty is a really old character updated here as a writer for Life Magazine during the period when they were getting out of the print business. Mitty (Ben Stiller) is assigned to photograph for the final cover, but discovers the picture he needs has…

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Saving Mr Banks
Entertainment

Saving Mr. Banks Review

William McPherson

As a former employee of Walmart, watching this movie gave me vague flashbacks to those awful corporate brainwashing “orientation” videos we were forced to watch in our first few days on the job that basically informed us that A: unions are the devil and will kill your children, and B: Sam Walton was the greatest person to ever walk the face of the earth sans Jesus. If I had to re-write that sentence for this movie, the makers of this movie want you to remember two things, A: that P.L Travers was…

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The Dead Pool
Entertainment

The Dead Pool Review

William McPherson

It had completely escaped my memory that both Liam Neeson and Jim Carrey (in yes, their only movie together) appeared in the fifth and final installment of the Dirty Harry franchise known as “The Dead Pool”. Those are two of my favorite actors for very different reasons, and if any modern actor was going to take over the mantle of Dirty Harry right now Neeson would definitely be it, although at the time of this movie, he was a few decades away from becoming the future action star legend from the…

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3,000 Miles to Graceland
Entertainment

3,000 Miles to Graceland Review

William McPherson

This movie, while both a critical and box office failure, is to me a good hidden gem example of a fun “garbage movie”. Take the preposterous plot that involves a large group of Elvis impersonators robbing a Vegas casino and then wind up turning on each other (have mercy!) leaving the two alpha males to fight over the remaining prize. (They just could not go on together, with suspicious minds… Okay, I’ll stop) Kurt Russell and Kevin Costner are both huge Elvis fans so it’s easy to see the fun…

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Beyond The Law
Entertainment

Beyond The Law Review

William McPherson

Sometimes it’s best to leave childhood favorites in your childhood. This might have been one of those cases. I would have been around ten to twelve years old when I first saw “Beyond The Law”, which also would have been my first exposure to the idea of biker gangs and such, and at the time I thought it was just about the coolest film ever made. It’s filled with loud Harleys, wild bikers, tons of groovy rock music, and plenteous obscenities, violence, and nudity galore! (Yeah, my parents probably…

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Winter's Tale
Entertainment

Winter’s Tale Review

William McPherson

Here’s the main thing that bothered me at the end of Winter’s Tale. How in the hell did Russell Crowe and Colin Farrell get drawn into what is essentially Twilight for history buffs? This movie is helmed by Akiva Goldsman, an uneven director in the past who has given us both the wonderful ‘Cinderella Man’ and the ambulance chasing would be cash cow “The Da Vinci Code”… In this movie he is faced with the task of adapting a far less controversial novel, but one that is very beloved. I will note…

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Entertainment

Road To Paloma Review

William McPherson

First things first, fans of current day WWE will not be able to watch this movie without mistaking Jason Momoa for wrestler Roman Reigns. In fact there have been reports that when WWE showed the advertisement for this film during their live events, that many in the crowd assumed it was Reigns as well in the lead role, and with the way he is positioned in the company right now it would make sense for them to give him some outside exposure via a movie role quite like this one. That this is a WWE…

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