Hulkkk Hogan

If you've lived throughout the 80's and 90's you are familiar with the Hulk Hogan. In case your eight years old, or younger, Hulk Hogan was the main star and champion of the WWF. As a young lad growing up in front of a television, I contracted a mild case of "Hulkamania" in the Spring 1989. For a couple of months, I wore yellow and called people brother, until I was cured by a doctor who told me wrestling is fake.

Aside from being a professional wrestler, Hulk Hogan was an amateur actor. The only thing worse than watching a man pretend that he's wrestling, is watching a wrestler pretend that he's acting. Hulk Hogan's movie career is like a crappier version of Arnold Schwarzenegger 's. Both Hogan and Schwarzenegger were cast according to their physique. In action movies they played super big and super strong characters and in comedies they played super big and super strong characters in ironic roles, such as a Nanny or a kindergarten teacher (Neither were ever in a drama). Hogan was in several movies, such as Mr. Nanny, Suburban Commando and, the crème de le crème of shitty movies, No Holds Barred.

You know its going to be a shitty movie when the cover of the case looks more like an Atari game.
I could imagine this being an awesome video game though.

No Holds Barred is not only a shitty movie, it's a shitty racist movie. No Holds Barred is the story of Rip (Hogan) a fake wrestler who shows devotion to his fans and the company he wrestles for. After Rip refuses to wrestle for Brell (Kurt Fuller), the leader of another wrestling company, Brell discoverers a charismatic performer with whom Brell may destroy Rip. The antagonist in this movie and is African American. He is depicted as being physically powerful, mentally weak and morally bankrupt. He is used by the Brell, who represents white capitalists, to get more money.

Oh what you don't believe that this movie is racist what this: Click here

John Williams Inaugural Score

Today the 44th President was inaugurated. It is a historic day and therefore saturated with ceremony and grandeur. You may be asking, why discuss this on a blog devoted to movies? Because John Williams did the score. I guess The Star Spangled Banner isn't patriotic enough. When the announcer said John Williams, I didn't believe at first. I mean it's not like the inauguration was directed by Steven Spielberg.

The song was called Air and Simple Gifts, which is based on the Shaker hymn, Simple Gifts, of the nineteenth century. The piece was performed by Itzhak Perlman (violin) , Yo-Yo Ma (Cello), Anthony McGill (clarinet) and Gabriela Montero (piano). It was fucking awful. Just look at the reactions:

Sorry for the blurryness, but you can clearly see the boy in blue covering his ears


One young woman shakes with laughter at Williams' sorry excuse for an arrangment

What I don't understand why they chose Williams to make the music for the innaugural ceremony. As if it isn't historic unless it has an Oscar winning sound track. And why this stupid song? Williams has composed a plethora of great scores that would suit the occasion better.
This is what I would have submitted, if I were Williams:

Martin Luther King Jr. Day Celebration Special

Merry MLK Day, readers! Out of respect for Dr. King and his dream of peace, I'm review Malcolm X. Malcolm X is, retrospectivley, an intersting watch, because it was a biopic before biopics were popular. I guess it's just one more example of whitey stealing the black man's style. Malcolm X is the story of Malcolm X, the famous civil rights activist during the 50's and until his death in 1965. Unlike most biopics, which deal mainly with the subjects life during their most notable accomplishment, Malcolm X portrays the entire man's life even giving brief exposition about Mr. X's parents.

Malcolm X clearly about to tell say "Fuck"

Malcolm X is a testament to the skills of it's director Spike Lee. Spike Lee also served as a screenwriter for this film. Lee gives this story a great amount of scope. For example, it shows the life of a young Malcolm in a rural school. It shows 4Malcolm later living as criminal in the city of Boston and it shows how he traveled the world towards the end of his life. TO me this shows that Malcolm X wasn't a static figure to be remembered only for his speeches, but instead a dynamic man who evolved with the places and circumstances he encountered. The narraticve of the story also depicts this. Lee jumps back and forth through time early in the film, which shows how Malcolm X became the figure we learn about in school. This is an important thing to do with such a figure. Whereas Martin Luthor King Jr. advocated for an end to segragation, Malcolm X advocated seperate societies for different races and the depiction of his youth shows why.

Speke Lee (left) tells Micheal Jordan (right) how fabulous he looks in brown

The scene I will always remember from this movie is the scene where Malcolm is in prison. It is there that he first learns about the nation of Islam and the evils of the white man. I was awed when Malcolm was shown a dictionary and read the definaitions of white and black. This scene shows that there is an inherent rascism in a our language. Spike Lee uses light in these scenes as a symbol for knowledge. Sunlight is shown streaming in a window as he prays for the first time in prison. Even though white people, and therefore myself, are called the devil, the growth Malcolm X goes through is inspiring.

Malcolm X is a story about a man's personal growth. And as he matured as a person our nation has matured as a...nation? Four decades after Malcolm X's death, America has elected the first black president. And while Mr. X said that one black man playing in major league baseball did not make up for the greatest crime in human history (I'm paraphrasing here), I'm sure he would say a black president does. So now that racism is over, is the white man still the devil?

A 94 Minute Movie

he Neverending Story, or Die Unendliche Geschichte as it's known on IMDB.COM, is one of the magical movies I grew up with. In case you've never seen it, The Neverending Story is about a boy who magically becomes a part of the book he is reading. The book he is reading is the story of Fantasia, a world filled with magic and puppets and other gay shit, which is being consumed by The Nothing.

People who grew up with The Neverending Story give this movie much more credit than it deserves. I know I loved this movie when I was kid, but that's because of Falcore, the luck dragon. What kid wouldn't want a flying dog that beats up bullies for them?

I asked my parents thousands of times for this kind of dog. I never got one.

When I recently watched The Neverending Story, I realized how gay it is. Any grown man that tells you they're a fan of this movie probably tivos E and has picture of Joshua Jackson they stroke to. Case in point: Bastian tries to declare his homosexuality in the first scene.

This movie is not a good story and I wouldn't even recommend it to a child. Firstly, It's about reading and if you've ever read one of my posts before, you know I despise the written word. More importantly though, it's a bad story about fantasy. I realized this when I compared it to Pans Labyrinth, which is a great story about fantasy. In Pans Labyrinth the girl is told repeatedly by the adults in her life, that she needs to grow up and stop living in dream worlds, much the way Bastian is told in the beginning of this movie. At the climax of Pans Labyrinth the main character is able to sacrifice herself, because she is inspired by the fairytales she reads. She stifles an evil man not by using magic, but rather the morals that stories about magic have given her. In the Neverending Story, the opposite is true. Bastian over comes his bullies with the aid of a make believe dragon, not knowledge or morals acquired through fairytales, but by use of a fairytale bullshit. This conveys a terrible message to children: by dreaming your problems will be solved they will be solved. If that were true than if I simply hoped hard enough, Than I could ride giant dog into my creditors office and he would erase my debt. Then I'de ride a luck dragon into a local bar and lucky.

The Furious Case of Tony Colorado

I just saw The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button. This movie tells the tale of Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt), who mysteriously ages backward, as he lives through most of the 20th century. I would elaborate more, but it's unnecessary, just watch Forrest Gump, Seriously the plot is almost exactly the same, just switch a retard for a guy who ages backwards and a drug addict for a ballerina. Screenwriter Eric Roth penned both Gump and Button. Somebody on IMDB actually made a list of the similarities, you can check it out here.

Even as an old man Brad Pitt is better looking than I'll ever be.

I'll tell you one thing, unlike Benjamin Button, I didn't get any younger watching this movie. Button clocks in at an epic 166 mins. Now, I don't know how many hours that is, but it seemed to go on forever. A lot of people said they cried during this movie. I cried when halfway through the film, I realized I was only halfway through the film.

The first thing that pissed me off about this movie is that it's a story with in a story. The life of Benjamin Button is told through a women reading his journal to her dying mother. I hate reading, so you can imagine how angry I was to find out this movie was about somebody reading. Also what do I care if some old biddy is dying, I came to see a movie about a dude that ages backwards

The message that The Curious Case of Benjamin Button seemed to be communicating was that life is a miracle that should not be taken for granted. Most people who saw the movie appear to have been touched by this message. I was too at first. Then I realized that by spending three hours watching this movie I was taking my miraculous life for granted. In reality, I am amazed by life like once a week and I don't need a movie to show me this.

I think I had such a bad reaction to this movie because there was so much hype about it. I blame this on movie critics. For example, Bob Grimm of the Tucson Weekly wrote "The year's best looking movie." That doesn't say anything about the movie. That's not even a complete sentence. One review said, "a curiosity, you might say". When you say that your just fucking with people. Another review was "a terrific film". I heard this stuff and I thought "I have to see this movie". It's partially my fault for not realizing this is just some assholes opinion, but it's also the critics fault for presenting their opinions as undeniable facts.

So critics, let me show you how it's done. I think Benjamin Button was mediocre. While the special effects that showed how Button aged were interesting, they didn't blow me away. Like Gump, Button examines and communicates the universal experience of human life profoundly, but I thought those profound moments were few and far between in an almost three hour long movie. There were times I found myself engrossed in the movie. These were times when they showed a geriatric playing with toys, or an adolescent suffering dementia. I wished the movie had more of that type of Irony. I think this movie was almost great, but in my opinion it was the worst collaboration of director David Fincher and Brad Pitt to date.

Title With Seventeen Syllables Seems Pretentious... To Me, At Least.

The assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is a movie that had everything going for it but isn't a good movie. The cast is great. Jesse James is played by Brad Pitt, who is, aside from being a dream boat, one of my favorite actors. I've yet to see Pitt in The curious case of Benjamen Button, but everything else he's been in has been good. It may be because he is in great movies rather than him being a great actor, but as ussual he is solid in this. The cast also has Casey Affleck who, unlike his big bro, doesn't suck and another of my favorite actors Sam Rockwell. You can ussually count on Rockwell delivering a hilarious character in any movie that he's in. That is except this one. That's not Rockwell's fault though. There just aren't any jokes in The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford. Can you believe that? Not one joke. I don't think I've ever seen a movie without a joke; even Schindlers List had a joke in it.

Even the poster for this movie is boring

Lack of humor is reason enough to hate anything, but there are other reasons why I hated The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford. For example, the title is way too long. Why couldn't they just call it the death of Jesse James. You may think I'm being Petty, but you don't have to type the mother fucker out over and over again and then re-type it because you misspelled assassination. And secondly don't tell me Robert Ford is a coward befor I even see the movie, that should be something I learn throughout the movie.

Titles and lack of humor aside, the main reason I hated this movie was the narration. If I ever meet the screen writer of this movie, I am going to kick him in the balls with everything I got. Here is an example of the stupid shit they have the narrator tell the audience:

"Narrator:...Bob remained at the cottage and slyly migrated from room to room. He walked into the Master bedroom and inventoried the clothes on the hangers and hooks. He sipped from the water glass on the vanity..."

For all you screenwriters reading this, you don't have to tell me a character is drinking water, I can see that, I am watching the movie. Half of this movie is the narrator telling the audience things they can see for themselves. The problem with this movie is that it has this great cast but it's like three hours of nothing happening. Tony Colorado gives this movie Two thumbs down.

City of God damn this is a great movie

One of my favorite movies of all time is City of God. Ironically, this piece of cinematic awesomeness has nothing to do with God, but there's plenty of drugs and murder. The movie follows the story of two boys from the City of God, not to be confused with the village of God, which has less violence and way better schools, as they choose opposite paths through a vicious world. If there is a hero in this movie it must be Rocket, who opts to become a photographer rather than take part in the violent life of Rio de Janero's most notorious slum. The villain, one of the best ever I might add, Lil' Ze, not to be confused with lil' Kim, chooses to live a life of pure violence and rule the city of God through its drug trade.

I didn't know before I first watched it, that it was in a different language, Which meant that I had unknowingly sat down for a couple of hours of reading. If your like me, then you hate to read, that's why you watch movies, right? But in the case of City of God I suggest suffering through it, because this movie is badass. It's hard to describe in words how badass this movie. This formula should explain it though:

Sorry for the blurryness. I had to write this on a napkin because I can't do it in Word. But if you click on the image you can see it in hi-def

Despite being choc-full of guns, drugs and all other breeds of cool shit, City of God is a serious movie that warrants deeper analysis. This movie shows how violence precipitates through generations. The movie opens with the tale of, what I dub the first generation, the Tender Trio. These are three teenagers who rob motels and gas trucks. They do this for personal gain and they also give back to the community. Kind of a Robin hood thing. The second Genration consists mainly of Lil' Ze and his attempt to seize power by killing off his competition and cornering the cocaine market. Shrewd. He uses killing strictly as a means of increasing his power. The only manner in which he gives back to the community is by implementing draconian punishments on those who do not follow his orders. By the end of the film the third generation, composed of tweens, is forming plans to kill those who they simply don't like. The audience is shown how over time a society that governs itself by violence decomposes into a people that can do nothing but kill each other.

Here we see lil' dice excelling at his favorite extra curricular activity, Murder in the second degree!

Here's the kicker this whole story, based on a true story. Thats righ,t some place in a country called South America was a ghetto where children roamed with no other goal than to kill one another. Badass. This movie makes me reflect upon my own upbringing. When I was seven I wasn't like these kids. I had a roof over my head, hot meal in my stomach and I never got shot at. It just lets me know how much of a pussy I really am.

To illustrate my point I've included this picture from my childhood. You'll notice that I have chubby cheaks, indicative of a ample nutrition, and in leui a gub I'm threatening someone with a Wolverine action figure