The Prophecy

31 Days of Horror

Whoa!  A new Skid Row single?!?  What an ...awesomely odd way to get people to watch your movie...or buy your movie soundtrack...or whatever B-movies judge as a sign of success.  Because let's face it, The Prophecy is a B-movie.  If you look at the cast, or the fact that it has four sequels, you might think this was a fully fleshed-out piece of cinema.  It's not, but that doesn't mean this movie is bad, even though it has every right to be awful.

The plot to The Prophecy is a little tangled, thanks in part to some unfortunate storytelling choices.  Do you like prologues?  Good, because you're getting a double dose with The Prophecy!  The first is the voice-over from the angel Simon (Eric Stoltz), who explains that angels are fighting an epic battle for Heaven, and have been for some time.

Mistake #1: casting a soulless ginger as an angel

Okay, fine.  That explains the hot angel-on-angel action we see later in the film.  The movie then cuts to Thomas (Elias Koteas) preparing to take his final vows to join the Catholic priesthood, only for him to be struck by visions of angels fighting.  Flash forward a few years and Thomas has become a cop without faith; you would think having visions of angels would strengthen your convictions, but no, you go cop.  It's a natural progression.  Well, maybe we need this background information because Thomas is the main character in the film and he will be the one making The Prophecy.

"I saw it prophesied that Casey Jones would want his nipple tweaked by Aragorn"

Or maybe not.  The titular prophecy actually refers to a line in the 23rd chapter of The Book of Revelations, which doesn't exist in your average Gideon copy.  It tells of a second war in Heaven, where one side refuses to acknowledge God's elevation of man over His other creations.  How is that different than the first war in Heaven?  I'm not a Biblical scholar, so...timing?  Anyway, it has been prophesied that the soul of an evil man will be used as a powerful weapon in the war.  So Simon comes to Earth to hide the soul, while Gabriel (Christopher Walken) comes to Earth to weaponize it.  That sounds simple enough, right?  So...what does it have to do with Officer Thomas?  About as much as it has to do with a little girl and her schoolteacher, Katherine (Virginia Madsen).  Luckily, the script gives each character ample screen time, so that pesky straightforward Gabriel vs. Simon plot has plenty of time to simmer.

All I can think of now is Christopher Walken telling me repeatedly to "simmer down"

The reason why The Prophecy is an overachieving B-movie is because the script is awful, the special effects are poor, and the plot is a jumbled mess.  "So are the Transformers movies."  True, but somebody took the time to polish those turds; there is no layer of gloss to hide the shitty nature of The Prophecy.  What it does have in spades, though, is an improbably talented cast.  Elias Koteas might not be the sexiest option for a leading man role, but he's a solid character actor who can play policemen (or deranged criminals) in his sleep; as luck would have it, the movie fakes out viewers with Koteas as a leading role --- he's actually supporting, which is where he functions best.  Virginia Madsen's character makes even less sense as an interested party; I don't care how good of a teacher you are, there is a line in the sand where you do not court supernatural beatdowns over someone you are not related to/want to marry.  Madsen played her ridiculous character fairly straight (which emphasized how unlikely her choices were), but she managed to squeeze some terror and emotion from a pretty dull part.  Eric Stoltz might have played an angel, but that doesn't mean he gave up on being creepy.  His character kisses a dead man and an elementary schoolgirl on the mouth --- don't be dirty, it's only because he was sucking the soul out of one and putting in in the other --- and he still manages to act holier than thou, which is impressive.  Viggo Mortensen pops up for a few minutes as Lucifer and he was actually pretty excellent.  Do you realize how good you have to be to distract viewers from Walken hamming it up?  It's a tiny part, but Mortensen nailed it.  It is odd, though, that there are so many screencaps of Viggo in this movie if you do a Google image search, but almost none of the rest of this non-Walken cast.  Part of that has to do with the poor quality of the DVD print, I'm sure, but I was able to find multiple websites that break down Viggo's scenes by the second.  Why is that?

"The heir of Isildur has a fanbase"

Adam Goldberg clearly enjoyed his role of unwilling evil henchman, and he should have --- this is one of his more amusing early roles.  Amanda Plummer played a similar part, but was whinier, which was far less amusing.  None of that truly matters, though, because this is Christopher Walken's movie, and he owns it completely.  In the hands of almost any other actor, Gabriel would have been quite sinister, and Walken did have moments where he got worked up.

What Walken brought to the table was his trademark awkward charm and bizarre choices.  To give you an idea of how wide-ranging this character is, he describes a human soul as being "bigger than a breadbasket," but he also says this:

I'm an angel. I kill firstborns while their mamas watch. I turn cities into salt. I even, when I feel like it, rip the souls from little girls, and from now till kingdom come, the only thing you can count on in your existence is never understanding why. 

Any role that lets Christopher Walken monologue I am A-OK with.  It's also worth noting that Walken is on the top of his game here, as far as making inappropriate faces goes.  On the one hand, he's a great, scary villain.  On the other hand, he's absolutely hilarious to watch.  Really, if I can't get Walken in a movie with great dialogue, I at least want to be able to enjoy his oddness.

What would have made this scene better: Walken explaining to the audience why angels perch.

The Prophecy was written and directed by Gregory Widen, who you might remember as the writer of Highlander.  Knowing his history, you can safely assume that there is a solid core idea here, but the execution is lacking.  The Prophecy is Widen's only film directing credit to date, so a lot of the things you might take for granted with experienced directors --- editing, pacing, etc. --- are missing here.  From a technical standpoint, Widen only barely directed this movie; the only thing that keeps it watchable is the cast that is far too good for this film.  Surprisingly, Widen's writing was worse than his direction.  Even if you ignore the fact that he makes the hero angel --- as in, angel from Heaven --- seem kind of like a pedophile, there are still plenty of issues with this script.

"In Widen's defense, I only take roles where I can be creepy"

Let's say that you are the two normal human beings in this movie, okay?  Each of you has been independently following some truly unbelievable supernatural stuff over the last few days, and now you've found someone who has some of the missing pieces to your puzzle.  As you Scooby-Doo-Jinkies your way toward the truth of this plot, do you:

A) Comment on how weird this has all been
B) Freak the fuck out because, you know, angels are smiting folks
C) Calmly recap for each other and show plain-faced acceptance

A) could happen, but anyone who doesn't pick B) is lying to themselves.  Of course, The Prophecy picks C) because these characters obviously don't have anything resembling human emotions.  That isn't even one of the worse moments in the film; that was just extraordinarily unlikely.  There is a lot of inconsistency from scene to scene.  One angel dies one way, another dies another way.  Angels that can do fantastic things allow mere humans to engage them in fisticuffs, instead of lighting them on fire or turning them into salt (which would have been awesome).

"Fire is reserved for corpses making Christ poses"

Gabriel needs someone to drive him around, because he doesn't know how to operate cars, but at times it seems like he teleports.  So much of this script feels lazy, like it didn't get proof-read.  I love the core idea of angels doing battle on Earth, but does there have to be this level of stupidity?

How does it all stack up?  Does the relatively high quality of the cast, along with an opportunity for Christopher Walken to do whatever the hell he wanted in his scenes, make up for the amateurish script and direction?  I think so.  We're not talking about a movie with cool special effects or an intelligent idea that can distract an audience --- this is a movie that needs every character to be appealing if it is going to work.  The Prophecy succeeds more than it fails, thanks to its cast of angels (fallen or otherwise) and a few solid actors who were willing to play the straight parts.  It is certainly no masterpiece, but The Prophecy is far better than it has any right to be.

Sorority House Massacre

31 Days of Horror

While (figuratively) thumbing through my movie queue, I realized that I have not reviewed any "Massacre" movies.  There's no real rhyme or reason for that; I love the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre and taintpunch-hate the 2003 remake, but there are still a couple dozen other "massacre" movies I could waste a few hours watching.  I opted for Sorority House Massacre, primarily because I was in the mood for something from the 80s, but also because I assumed that a sorority house would make for a high body count and amusingly broad characters.  So how did that work out for me?

In case the trailer didn't clue you in, the opening credits make it pretty plain: Sorority House Massacre is going to be pretty cheap and cheesy.  The credits are just an exterior shot of the sorority house in question, with a moody 80s synthesizer for the soundtrack.  Even better, the entire story is told by the Last Girl, Beth (Angela O'Neill), in a flashback as she recovers in a psychiatric ward.  Beth was pledging a sorority, I guess; I didn't see any sorority sisters taking her under their wing or anything, but the other girls talked about her joining, so...maybe this is the ultra-chill sorority that doesn't make a big deal out of pledge drives.  Also: I thought pledges only joined sororities during pledge week --- this seemed like Beth was the only new girl around.

"Stop picking my life apart!"

*Ahem* Anyway, Beth is pledging, so she goes to the sorority house for the weekend.  Of course, that weekend happens to be the one non-holiday weekend when next to none of the sisters are staying there.  Man!  This premise is like a scab that I can't stop picking, and I haven't even gotten to the good stuff yet!  Okay, let's try that one more time.  Beth is staying at the fairly deserted sorority house for the weekend with three other sorority girls.   During her time in the house, Beth starts to have visions and she has a nightmare during that first night.  What kind of visions/dreams, you ask?

Why are all small girls creepy, even if they're well-behaved in your dreams?

The normal stuff: blood dripping from the ceiling, a mannequin family at the dinner table, marbles spilling on the floor, and images of a mad killer.  Beth's soon-to-be-besties pick up on her moodiness and know exactly what she needs --- a man and a crazy night, sorority style!

Both of which were obviously underwhelming

Meanwhile, ever since Beth walked into the sorority house, Bobby (John C. Russell) has been acting very strangely at the maximum security psychiatric hospital, which doesn't at all look like the upper floor in a typical suburban house.  How strangely?  Well, he's started speaking after many years of being basically comatose.  Oh, and he killed his way out of the hospital, destined for parts unknown.  But we know where he's going, don't we?  After all, this movie needs to earn its title!

First up: the acting.  There isn't any in Sorority House Massacre.  Most of this cast made only a handful of movies, and a few of the main players never acted before or after.  That's the talent level we're working with here, and it definitely shows.  Do you like thoughtful inflection, realistic reactions, and likable characters?  Then you might not want to focus on the actors in this movie.

"I'm, like, probably dying and stuff.  Blarg!  That sounds like a death rattle, right?"

Despite the obviously exploitative subject matter, it turns out that Sorority House Massacre was written and directed by a woman, Carol Frank.  I don't want to be sexist, but I normally assume that a man would make a semi-sleazy horror knockoff like this; I hereby offer my apologies to womankind for thinking that exploitation was not an equal-opportunity film genre.  This was the only movie Frank wrote or directed, and I think I know why.  Take this scene:

This character's line is "You wouldn't happen to have a sweater to go with this, would you?"  And the answer is surprisingly not "What are the fucking odds of that?"  Even worse, another character finds a sweater to go along with it!  Guess what it looked like.  Go on, I dare you.  That's right, tropical puke Hawaiian nightmare a crotch-length pink cardigan, of course! 

It does look good, though, when you compare it to sack-shaped dresses

The script for Sorority House Massacre is hilariously bad.  Aside from gems like the sweater line, when Beth has her nightmare, each one of the girls goes to class the next day (I thought this was a weekend...?) and each of their classes has something that deals, directly or indirectly, with interpreting Beth's dream.  Is that not bad enough for you?  How about this: the slutty girl and her boyfriend, who have only three other girls in the sorority house, go off to be alone for some sexy time...in a teepee they set up in the back yard.  Really?  Is it that hard to get the killer inside to kill those two?  They have to look for privacy in a practically vacant building by going outside?

Perhaps shadow puppets are part of their foreplay?

Frank's direction is not much better.  I think my favorite moments were when the camera is moving around, like it's a point-of-view shot, and then the killer just walks out in front of the camera.  So...it's not a POV shot...the cameraman is just skulking two paces behind the killer, and one to the side?

Okay, fine.  Nobody is going to watch Sorority House Massacre for the acting and directing.  What about the all-important horror quality-gauges, violence and nudity?  Well, the violence isn't too impressive.  The body count is only six or seven, and there weren't any cool gore scenes.  It was mostly "STAB!  Now, stay dead!"  There wasn't a whole lot of nudity, either, but there also weren't very many characters in this movie; given that handicap, I think it's safe to say that at least half of the female cast with speaking lines flashed the camera.  There was also a decent amount of man-ass, too:

It's like shirts and skins playing Capture the Flag.  Only instead of a flag, it's a corpse.

If you keep a careful eye on those scenes, you can occasionally see the top of Mr. Chilly Feet's underwear because the editing in this movie is completely awesome.

If you look at this movie objectively, Sorority House Massacre is an unadulterated mess.  But subjectively, it was a surprisingly good time (with liquor).  I mean, come on!  It's not every day you come across an unapologetic Halloween ripoff that manages to fail in almost every conceivable way.

That doesn't look anything remotely like a William Shatner mask

This doesn't even try to rip off Halloween.  It goes for Halloween II, with a touch of early A Nightmare on Elm Street.  The entire premise is so ludicrous that it could only make it into a bad horror movie --- and it still stands out for its stupidity!  I'm not talking about the whole "massacre in the sorority house" thing, either.  Do I need to put up a SPOILER ALERT?  No, but I will because I'm considerate.  The reason the killer is after Beth is because they share a psychic bond that appears to be triggered by her GPS location; she walks in the house, and he goes nuts.  Why?  Because they're brother and sister, duh.  Oh, and Bobby murdered their entire family when Beth was five.  Oh, and the dirty deed took place in the sorority house.  Because it used to be their non-sorority house.  In other words, Beth forgot that her family was murdered, forgot her brother, and forgot the house she grew up in, and that exact house wound up being rented by her possible-but-not-probable-at-this-point sorority.  And, on top of that, we have the psychic link thing going on.  That is some gloriously unlikely shit right there, my friends.

Not diving-headfirst-though-a-2nd-story-window unlikely, but still...

So, if you want to get picky about it, Sorority House Massacre would get a standard rating of

...and even that might be generous.  However, in terms of Lefty Gold, this is one entertaining movie.  I recommend watching it with an intoxicated friend and try to logically explain everything you see.  That might sound boring, but once you start building on your earlier logic and expanding it, you'll thank me.

Lawless

John Hillcoat has made some gritty movies.  This is not a filmmaker given to sentimentality, and he's not afraid of capturing ugliness on film.  His last two films have impressed me, but fell just shy of being great; if there was just a little bit of spectacle added to spice up the bleakness, The Proposition and The Road would have been radically different.  Hillcoat's newest film, Lawless, prominently features Shia LaBeouf, which isn't necessarily a sign of quality or grittiness.  Lawless does have Tom Hardy, who I am quickly becoming a fan of, and the great Gary Oldman, who I love.  Adding Shia (which is Hebrew for "fluffy") to those two masters of transformation (as in acting, not turning into cars) and a frequently depressing director sounds like something worth watching.

Lawless is the true(-ish) story of the Bondurant boys, a family of moonshine makers/bootleggers in Prohibition-era America.  In Franklin County, Virginia, though, that was nothing special --- just about everyone either made their own moonshine or bought it from their neighbors.  Heck, even the police buy moonshine.  The Bondurants were different thanks to their reputation for toughness.  Well, thanks to Forrest (Tom Hardy) and Howard's (Jason Clarke) reputation, that is.  While those two have defied death and done things like punching Godzilla in the taint (I'm paraphrasing), their little brother, Jack (Shia LaBeouf) hasn't done much of anything.  With his brothers being local legends, that means that little Jack has a chip on his shoulder and big shoes to fill.  When the film begins, Jack's biggest problem is impressing a local girl and trying to make moonshine on his own.

The secret ingredient is urine

Things get significantly worse when a hot-shot Special Agent from Chicago rolls into town.  For the record, Charlie Rakes (Guy Pearce) might have a badge, but he is not a good man or a lawful one.  He is brutal and his game is extortion.

But he looks so nice...!

Rakes and his boss want to run the moonshine business in Franklin County; if the moonshiners give Rakes money, then he won't have the police harass them.  Forrest isn't the type to lay down for anyone, though, and refuses to pay.  Cue the violence!

Shia competes in the 200M Outdoor Shootout

The acting in Lawless was uniformly good.  Shia LaBeouf was the point of view character, but he was clearly not the most important character.  Still, even though his character was kind of annoying and remarkably stupid at times, I thought LaBeouf handled the part well.  All his actions made sense (for him) and LaBeouf's comic timing lightened up the film considerably.  Tom Hardy was the true star, though.  Hardy has great physical presence on the screen and his crazy eyes are some of the best in Hollywood right now.  When you give him a part where he is supposed to intimidate people, he slips into it with ease.  They even try to make him less threatening by having him wear sweaters all the time and speak in grunts, but he is still magnetic on the screen.  It's rare to have a clearly violent character portrayed as a patient man, but Hardy manages to pulls it off.

The world's deadliest cardigan fan, after Bill Cosby

Jason Clarke was also pretty good; his part largely consisted of him looking haggard and wordlessly communicating with Hardy, but he still felt dangerous.  Having Guy Pearce play the villain was an interesting choice, because he doesn't really stack up well against Tom Hardy.  Thankfully, they opted to make him weird, creepy and condescending --- thoroughly unlikable, in other words, and very much Hardy's opposite.  And in case you're wondering, yes, he did shave the part into his hairline.  Jessica Chastain was solid as Hardy's romantic interest, although her character's choices pointed to some of the film's weaknesses.  Mia Wasikowska played Shia's love interest, and she was fine in an uncomplicated part.  Dane DeHaan had a solid supporting role as Cricket, the Bondurant friend who survived rickets.  It wasn't a flashy part, but a solid supporting role in an ensemble drama; if he keeps picking roles like this, DeHaan might wind up being a big deal.  Speaking of big deals, I was excited to see Gary Oldman's first scene, where he calmly shoots the hell out of a pursuing car with a tommy gun.  He didn't say a word, he just winked.  And it was awesome. 

You had me at "tommy gun"

After that, though, he has maybe three more minutes of screen time.  What a waste!  Gary Oldman --- one of this generation's greatest actors and over-actors --- playing a bad-ass gangster that follows murders with winks, and he's barely in the story at all?!?  Lawless, you're a wicked tease.

I've mentioned that John Hillcoat is known for his less than optimistic films.  Part of that has something to do with him getting Nick Cave to write two of his films (including this one), but it is also a very deliberate choice on the part of Hillcoat.  He has never been one for sentiment when depressing realism is available.  That is what makes Lawless such a departure for him; it doesn't try to sear your soul.  In fact, Hillcoat actually tries to play to the humor in the script.

Ha ha!  Jokes!

Most of the film's levity comes from the awkwardness of Shia LaBeouf's character, but the best bits come from Tom Hardy's minimal reactions to Jessica Chastain.  These aren't supposed to be thigh-slapping gags, mind you, but those lighter moments are a lot more amusing in the otherwise grim context of this story.  Hillcoat is not going to impress you with his cinematography --- although the man knows how to frame a landscape shot --- instead, he opts for capturing unpleasantness.  His primary tool is a willing cast, and I thought he did a great job directing them.  He also managed to make a graphically violent film that does not feel exploitative.  We get to see several characters serve as blood-puking punching bags, but the focus is more on the horror of the violence than on how awesome the aggressor is.  If anything, this movie is about how you rebound from violence, instead of how you actually fight.

Two out of three brothers agree: rebound with alcohol

Thanks to that attitude, we are not forced to witness any explicit violence toward women, even though there are opportunities in the story.  For that matter, the gratuitous sex scene would have been pretty tasteful, too, if it didn't have Jessica Chastain getting naked about half a scene too early.  Oh, well.  All in all, I think this was a nice step forward for Hillcoat as an artist, since he has stretched his style a bit with (more or less) success.

Lawless is definitely a violent film, which naturally means that there are plenty of action scenes.  The movie trailer makes it seem as if this is going to be a movie filled with gunfire, but the focus is instead on hand-to-hand combat.  The most gruesome scenes involve knives, boots, and brass knuckles.  For fans of gore, there are more than a few scenes where it looks like the fellow getting beat up will be picking his own teeth out of his crap over the next few days.  The gunplay is fairly anticlimactic by comparison.  Aside from Gary Oldman's tommy gun scene and Guy Pearce's powerful revolver, nothing cool ever happens with guns.  That fits the tone of the film just fine, mind you.  If you're looking for something that basks in gunfire like Tombstone or a John Woo movie, though, this may not be for you.

Taking care of boo-boos is much easier than gunshot wounds

The biggest problem with Lawless is the story itself.  Hillcoat does a pretty good job, given the script, and Nick Cave's script is pretty engaging for being based on a true story.  The focus is all wrong, though.  At its core, Lawless is about greed and power (personified by Guy Pearce) infringing on freedom and principle (personified by Tom Hardy).  Unfortunately, the main character was Shia LaBeouf's, and too much of the film centered on his attempts at romance and manhood. 

"You staring blankly reminds me of my last girlfriend.  Do you know Megan Fox?"

Due to that focus, the filmmakers never get around to addressing the motivations of Jessica Chastain's character; I think there was an opportunity for a great supporting actress role here, but it gets buried because it does not directly impact Shia.  His character isn't strong enough to carry a "fill the shoes of my brother" sort of story, and that becomes obvious as the plot ticks on.  I like the way this movie looks and feels, and I enjoy the acting.  The story is the unfortunate weak point.  For fans of Tom Hardy and bloody face punching, though, it is definitely worth a watch.

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance

Ghost Rider has never interested me as a character.  Yes, his flaming skull looks pretty cool, but that's where the intrigue ends for me.  When Ghost Rider was released in theaters back in 2007, I thought it looked terrible, so I never watched it.  Despite some harsh reviews, the movie managed to make over $200 million worldwide.  You would think a sequel would be a no-brainer --- and it is, no matter how dumb the first film looked --- but Columbia Pictures was hesitant.  They ended up giving the go-ahead, but only after the budget had been cut to less than half of the first movie.  Normally, I would take that as a sign to stay the hell away from Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance.  But then I noticed that Neveldine/Taylor were directing.  The directors of Crank and Nic Cage, working together at last?  That is a recipe for some serious Lefty Gold.

...and the flamethrower urine scene clinched it.  Let's get Ghost Ridden!  Wait...that came out wrong...

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance does not, in fact, begin with the title character.  Instead, Moreau (Idris Elba) has arrived at a monastery to warn the monks of the dangers they face.  The monks are providing shelter to Danny Ketch (Fergus Riordan) and his mother, Nadya (Violante Placido --- a wonderful action movie name).  Well, they were.  Some bad dudes showed up and killed the monks; though Danny and Nadya escaped, Moreau knows that they will be caught before the solstice, unless something drastic is done.  Naturally, his first thoughts went to the Ghost Rider.

Ghost Rider: when "drastic" isn't drastic enough

Moreau tracks down Johnny Blaze (Nicolas Cage) and offers to have his priest buddies remove the Ghost Rider curse from Blaze if he manages to keep Danny and Nadya safe.  What's the deal with them?  Well, the devil (Ciarán Hinds) wants Danny for some nefarious purpose.  Do you need more of a reason than that?  It really shouldn't matter, as long as it gives us an excuse to see Ghost Rider puking metal on a bad guy.

Flaming pee is great, but molten puke is almost as good

The acting in Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is about what you should expect from the people behind this movie.  Nic Cage is predictably ridiculous, so your enjoyment will rely heavily on how much Crayzee Cage you can handle.  I thought he was actually fairly solid, balancing some lightweight angst with unintentionally funny scenes where he is fighting to keep the Rider from taking over his body.

I wish this shot made the final cut

Was he actually good?  God, no.  He was suitably silly enough for the script; there is a big difference.  Violante Placido doesn't really do much.  She whines about her son and wonders why bad things happen to characters who have the devil's baby.  In other words, her character is in the film to add a pair of boobs to the cast, and in that, she succeeded.

...AND booze?  Double success!

Idris Elba was okay.  He handled a French accent well enough, and his character's love of wine added some cute moments.  Little Fergus Riordan was decent as a child actor, which can be translated as "he wasn't irritating."  Ciarán Hinds was a solid choice to play the villain, but I would have liked to see him be more obviously bad.  His devil was a pretty sorry-ass lord of darkness.  His lead henchman wasn't any better, either.  Blackout (Johnny Whitworth) starts out as a none-too-terrifying thug, but he is transformed into this:

Johnny Winter?

He now had the power of decay and the ability to do some sort of thing where people can't see him and I guess he moves fast or something.  I didn't quite get that bit, but I caught enough to reconfirm my belief that albinos are too powerful and evil to not register as lethal weapons with the government.  Anthony Head appears at the beginning of the movie and almost immediately dies off-screen.  Rounding out the notable cast is the always peculiar Christopher Lambert, who allegedly underwent several months of sword training to prepare for his role as the guy who fell asleep at the frat party.

It was a very literate fraternity, apparently

Why would Lambert need months of sword training for only a few minutes of screen time?  That's a good question.  A better question, though, is "Why would Lambert need sword training after all those godawful Highlander movies?"

The direction of Neveldine/Taylor fit surprisingly well with the script for Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance.  They kept the pace going pretty quickly, and most of the downtime was filled with unintentional humor:

Example: the devil smelling a fart

...or intentional humor, like Ghost Rider pissing flames or enjoying Kajagoogoo.  I don't always like the work of Neveldine/Taylor, but they did about as much as they could to make this movie entertaining, given the script.  Granted, making it "entertaining" doesn't negate the fact that this is a stupid, stupid movie, but at least it doesn't take itself seriously.  The script, though, is pretty wretched.  David S. Goyer wrote the story and co-wrote the script, but he didn't do either very well.  This screenplay is either littered with holes, or the editing process was wretched.  When you consider some of the odder moments in the script --- A punk rocker with a hippie van?  The devil can't get enough followers to fill more than a few rows in a stadium? --- I think it's pretty obvious that the writing is at fault.

Please tell me that the Rider will hunt Goyer down for his sins

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance was never going to be a legitimately good movie.  Never.  It could have been close, if it had been rated R and let these crazy co-directors do whatever random stuff popped into their heads, but this is about as much fun as I can imagine having with a Ghost Rider movie.  They fixed some of the small things from the first movie -- Cage's hair looks real this time and there's a lot less self-pity --- and also had fun with some ridiculously over-the-top additions (like the Ghost Rider construction vehicle).  The special effects looked pretty good, and that's even more impressive, given their slashed budget.  Even when you consider all that, this is still on the lower end of comic movie adaptations, thanks to some uninspired campiness and poor writing.

 ...but that's only if you take this movie seriously.  If you want something to enjoy after a few drinks, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is a solid choice.  It gets a Lefty Gold rating of

Prometheus

Typically, when I see a movie, I jot down some thoughts and will probably blog it within a few days.  Unless I'm being lazy, which has been known to happen from time to time.  With Prometheus, though, I had a different problem.  I just wasn't sure how I felt about it.  So, I pondered and pondered, making sure to stay off the interwebs and work it out in my noggin.  The more I thought about Ridley Scott's kinda-sorta-not-really prequel to Alien, though, the more I realized that my take on the movie didn't fit my traditional review format.  So, first up is this review.  My next post will be "Prometheus: What the Hell Was That?" and I will try to explain what confused me so much about this film.

Prometheus is, at its core, the story of Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace) and Charlie Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green), and their quest for answers.  Shaw and Holloway are romantically-entwined archaeologists, and they have found the same star constellation in the primitive artwork of several ancient civilizations, separated by thousands of years and thousands of miles. 

"Is that...somebody playing jai-alai?"

That wouldn't be a big deal if the constellation was the Big Dipper, but this particular constellation is not visible with the naked eye.  In fact, human technology had to expand to an advanced degree before discovering it.  That fact, coupled with the inexplicable coincidence of societies that had no contact sharing the same image in their artwork, leads them to conclude that the constellation is a map.  A map to where, you may ask?  A map to a planet where humanity's predecessors (dubbed "Engineers" by Shaw and Holloway) came from --- humanity's cradle, if you will.  Their theory intrigues the aging corporate magnate Peter Weyland (Guy Pearce) and he funds a space voyage (on the ship Prometheus) to investigate the planet.  Once the crew arrives, however, they find a barren world with only one empty base.  Well, maybe not exactly "empty."

Giant statue head with made-to-scale aspirin tablet statues

They also find a corpse of what they presume to be an Engineer.  But what could wipe out the Engineers?  Why did they come to Earth in the first place?  Can we still find out where humanity came from?  The last two questions, while good, are not nearly as important as the first. 

That looks vaguely familiar, doesn't it?

When you consider that question, the natural follow-up is this: how likely is the survival of a group who doesn't know what they are up against?  Hint: not very.  With every passing minute on this planet, it feels less and less like the cradle of humanity and more like a tomb.

Now, if you've seen the film and are wondering where all the buff Powder clones are, that's what I'm going to get into with "Prometheus: What the Hell Was That?"

While my synopsis may not indicate it, there are actually more than a couple of actors in Prometheus.  Noomi Rapace was good as the innocent who has to get tough, but she wasn't great.  I wanted to like her character more, but wound up being distracted by some other plot elements instead.  I will say that she conveyed pain and fear better than anyone else in the cast, at the very least.  Oh, and if you have any fears about pregnancy, she's in a scene that you may not want to watch.  Ever.

Logan Marshall-Green was a lot less sympathetic.  He did a fine job playing an overconfident prick, but I think that his character was intended for more, given the amount of quality screen time he had.  I did like Idris Elba as the captain of the Prometheus.  It was odd seeing a captain play such a passive role in a sci-fi flick, but I enjoyed his laid-back approach.  I would have liked to see more of his character, but he did a good job with what he had and his choices at the end of the film didn't feel completely out of left field.

The rest of his core crew --- Benedict Wong, Emun Elliott, and a few others --- were inconsequential to the overall acting quality of the film.  The character design for Sean Harris was a bit unusual for a geologist.  I expected him to be a guard or something, but he was a scientist.  So...there's that.

Sometimes, even smart people get tattoos on their head

Rafe Spall's character was similarly odd.  He plays a biologist who shows zero interest in a dead alien and later acts like a complete jackass when encountering a new species.  Worst.  Biologist.  Ever.  I wasn't a big fan of either of those two.  Charlize Theron played a cold, calculating bitch in the background of scenes; I don't think Theron did a bad job acting here (her reaction post-flamethrower was pretty good), but her character felt like a waste of space to me, another bit of misdirection in a film jam-packed with it.  I have no idea why Guy Pearce was cast to play the elderly Peter Weyland; Pearce was fine and his makeup was good, but why cast a young man as an older man if you're not going to show him as a youth?  And, no, I don't count viral marketing as a good enough reason.  Maybe this means that Pearce will be showing up in a planned seuqel/prequel to Prometheus?  Whatever, it's not too important.  Similarly, I was surprised to see Patrick Wilson playing the incredibly bit part of Shaw's father in her dreams.  The most impressive actor in Prometheus, though, was definitely Michael Fassbender.  His work as the android David was fantastic.

Dare I say..."Fasstastic"?  No, probably not.

It takes a lot to play a character supposedly devoid of emotion and make him absolutely mesmerizing in every scene, but Fassbender accomplished it.  He was cold, manipulative and sneaky, but he didn't remind me of the other android characters from the Alien series; his character felt very unique.  He also had a viral ad that was pretty good, but it doesn't even hint at how much fun he was to watch as a quasi-villain.

The first thing I think of when I ponder Ridley Scott's direction in Prometheus is how incredibly gorgeous the movie looks.  The cinematography is sometimes breathtaking, the sets are impressive in both size and style, and the details of the Prometheus ship technology and the Engineer base are well beyond cool.  The imaginative visuals in this movie make it one of the most visually astounding science fiction films I have ever seen.

I'm not always an IMAX guy, but this looked amazing in IMAX

Scott obviously had a pretty good relationship with Noomi Rapace and Michael Fassbender, as they turned in good performances, but I was a little disappointed in the rest of the supporting cast.  There are a lot of characters in this film that make important decisions, but I felt that Scott made them seem more important to the overall story than they were, which made them feel overvalued and underdeveloped. 

Example number one

I wouldn't have minded that so terribly if the film wasn't so packed with subtext.  Prometheus is a dense movie that does not stop to explain itself to the likes of you, the audience, or hint at what details are going to be important later.  On the one hand, I respect that choice; more often than not, films err on the side of over-explaining themselves.  Prometheus, though, is absolutely unapologetically confusing.  Scott definitely gives enough hints to read into his intentions, but the fact that I feel compelled to write another blog post about those intentions should indicate that his storytelling is not as taut or clear as it could have been.

That's really the problem with Prometheus.  It has one truly impressive performance (Fassbender) and a good secondary performance (Rapace), a wonderfully developed universe, and an ambitious concept (humans seeking their makers).  What it doesn't have is good storytelling.  There are a few reveals in this film, but they are predictable and dull.  And then there is a twist, which is astounding because it appears to have no motivation.  For the first two-thirds of Prometheus, it is a slow-boiling sci-fi thriller with somewhat pretentious themes, and it looks like it's going to be great.  And then it suddenly becomes a horror movie, complete with psycho killers and monsters.  That just felt cheap to me.  I also didn't appreciate the bushels of questions (that is the proper term of measurement for questions, by the way) I was left with when the film finished.  Granted, it did get me to ponder the film for an entire week after seeing it --- which is quite a feat --- but I was left unsatisfied.  Prometheus is absolutely gorgeous and ambitious, it handles the creation of mankind so well that the existence of an alien Engineer race doesn't preclude the existence of God, and it is very, very impressive.  It is also purposefully obtuse and frustrating.  As much as I wanted to be blown away by this movie, the story and the unexplained subtext disappointed me.  Still, it is certainly worth seeing, if only for the spectacle and Fassbender.

By the by, I wanted to call out prometheus-movie.com as the source for all the cool pics I included in this post.  I don't know who's in charge of that site, but they are definitely the web's singular resource for all things --- pics, details, theories, whatever --- Prometheus.  And they appear to be pretty bright; after I jotted down my interpretations of what happened in this movie in my follow-up post, I went back to compare my take with theirs and I learned a few things.