Regret Holidaze Watch: The Munsters' Scary Little Christmas (1996)

he doesn't even have make-up on his arms in the promo pic

Watched:  12/13/2024

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  First

Director:  Ian Emes

As a kid, I liked The Munsters better than The Addams Family.  I even have a core memory of running from our family kitchen to the living room around age 3 because I heard The Munsters' theme song on TV, and I didn't want to miss the show.  But as a high schooler, thanks to the Addams Family movie, I watched the Addam's Family TV show and converted.

Because both feature characters rather than, say, trying to replace Dick Van Dyke on his eponymous show, both shows have seen swings to return to glory from their initial runs by re-casting or bringing back the same actors.  Munsters, in particular, usually looks cheap, off and wrong.  Somehow, Addams Family has landed two great live action films, one good animated film, and a musical popular with families and amorous politicos.  Munsters got a universally derided feature film in 2022 that no one saw.

If you don't remember, The Munsters was a very 1960's comedy show that borrowed some of Universal Monsters concepts, rejiggered them, and asked "what if they were a family unit living in Southern California?"  Like most 1960's shows, it only lasted about three seasons, but that doesn't mean it didn't survive in reruns, a favorite of kids.  Somehow, those reruns had an outsized influence on pop culture, and sixty years later, we still know Herman and Lily Munster better than almost every other 1965 show except maybe I Dream of Jeannie.  

90's Regret Watch: Armageddon (1998)

this @#$%ing pile of *&^%

Watched:  11/16/2024

Format:  Hulu

Viewing:  First

Director:  Michael Bay

I write this post from beyond the grave.  

I'm not sure what it was that, specifically, convinced my soul to abandon my body during Armageddon (1998).  There were so, so many options - from Ben Affleck leading the cast in singing "Leaving on a Jet Plane" to Bruce Willis shooting up a functioning oil rig with a shotgun to Liv Tyler disrupting everything in NASA Mission Command screaming about her "daddy".  Or maybe just the premise of the film altogether.  But with 30 extremely loud and stupid minutes left to go, I realized I had passed on to the blogging platform in the sky.

This movie is essentially the redneck fever dream of people furious at other people who paid attention in school or watch PBS because that shit ain't cool.  Michael Bay and Bruckheimer are convinced only nerds care how things work and what the movie needs to do is think of funny and rad things to show - but are neither funny nor that rad.

I'm not averse to anything about the movie on paper.  A ragtag crew is called in to save the world and blow up an asteroid aimed at Earth.  Sure.  Why not?  The actors lined up are *good* to *great*.  So the challenges arrive in every writing, directing, editing and other creative decision that went into the film. 

Robo Crampton Watch: Robot Wars (1993)

Watched:  10/26/2024

Format:  Amazon 

Viewing:  First

Director:  Albert Band

Some time back in the early 90's, I remember renting Robot Jox, and kind of liking it well enough, while absolutely understanding I was watching a very silly movie.  It was only in recent years that I figured out that Robot Jox and Robot Wars (1993) were not the same movie.  But I didn't at all care.

But that was before I decided Barbara Crampton is a good idea, and I was looking to see what else she's in that's on Prime.  And, lo and behold.

A trim 72 minutes of movie later, I have now seen Robot Wars.  

This movie is not super good.  It's the kind of stuff made for the rental market and then dumped onto USA Up All Night by 1996.  I'm becoming more familiar with Full Moon Features and its output, and I'm not mad at it.  It's utterly lacking in pretention, and I imagine these shoots were kind of fun.  

Robot Wars takes place in 2041, I believe, after wars and disasters have changed the world.  I'm not sure if it's a sequel to Robot Jox, shares a universe, or whatever.  But there's only one giant, scorpion-shaped robot left in the world, and it's used to both defend the civilized world and transport folks across wastelands full of hostile forces - touristy!

There's a *lot* of plot.  Because they can't really afford a lot of action.  After all, when the robots are in motion, it's Stop-Motion (Jurassic Park is this same year).  And the laser-gun action is mostly... perfunctory.  But there's a lousy guy running the free world, trying to be friends with China.  So, we get two "that guy!" Asian actors having what seems to be a good time.  Two dopey dudes stand in for the hunky hero and his pal, and there's two lovely women running around as our actual heroes.

Anyway, a pre-surgery Lisa Rinna plays a reporter whose pal, Leda (Barbara Crampton) is checking out the wastelands and find out if the toxic-spill areas are safe or not.  

All you need to know is this is a movie with some robot fighting, 1993 LA doubling for a city abandoned in 1993, many steam tunnels, basements, AV equipment doubling for robot command consoles, and the most attention of anything paid to Rinna and Crampton's hair.  They both look 1993-fabulous.

The movie is the equivalent of cotton candy.  You'll know you consumed it, but just be left with a blue tongue and a slightly upset stomach, and then want to have some more.

Anyway, if the goal was to see robots (in general), robots fighting (specifically), actors you recognize and are surprised to see in this...  sign yourself up. 

Regretful HalloWatch: Casper (1995)

ugh

Watched:  10/25/2024

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  Second

Director:  Brad Siberling

selection:  Jamie.  She made me watch this.

@#$%ing Casper (1995).  

I hated this movie in 1995 when I saw it, and, here, nearly 30 years later, I remember exactly why.  This movie is the culmination of so many bad ideas from the 90's, it's almost a wee bit magical.  It's a kid's movie where they made it 35% for adults and 50% for kids and 15% for a peculiar audience of people who want things to suck real bad.

I have no doubt Millennials Space Jam Fallacy the crap out of this movie (ie: believe this movie is good because they liked it when they were young and their brains were spongey and "good" meant mommy would let you play it over and over on the VHS while she drank wine with the pool boy), but this movie is a parade of 90's excess.  It's also proof that you can drop $55 million (> $110 million adjusted) on a movie, pack it with faces, meta references and other 90's tricks - and it's no better than, say, Bailey Saves Christmas.  

I'm old enough that Casper cartoons were still running on TV when I was a very little kid.*  As a young reader, I was given Harvey Comics starring Casper, Hot Stuff, Wendy the Witch, Ritchie Rich, et al... .  Flash forward to the mid-90's, we were exploiting IP in interesting ways at the movies - making live action Flintstones.  Addams Family.  I'd also seen Dennis the Menace.  And I am sure other things.  So why not a live action Casper?  

Crampton Hallo-Watch: Castle Freak (1995)

One poster shows the villain, which is a spoiler, and one is a teenager in a bra, so you get Crampton

Watched:  10/24/2024

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  First

Director:  Stuart Gordon

I am not always in-line with all of the thinking that goes into being a hard-core horror film fan, but I love how much they celebrate the work of their favorite actors - and keep them employed for decades.  One such fave I've been aware of for some time has been Barbara Crampton, and I'm on board.  Sign me up for the Crampton fan club.  

So, we'll be digging a bit more into the Crampton-filmography over time.

When I saw that Castle Freak (1995) re-teamed director Stuart Gordon with actor Jeffrey Combs and Crampton, and I saw some notes about "this is a horror movie with a kind of grown-up storyline" I was curious.  I like a good "whoops, the robots have flipped out at the shopping mall" movie as much as the next guy, but I wanted to know what this team looked like doing a bit more drama and little less in the way of re-animated corpses running about.  

Combs and Crampton play a couple on the rocks following the blinding of their daughter (Jessica Dollarhide) and death of their young son after Combs drove them off the road, drunk.  Clearly Crampton can't forgive and forget, and Combs is maybe too much of an egoist to really accept what he did.  But a mysterious relative has just passed, and when that occurs, Combs learns that he's inherited a castle in Italy.  Apparently he was Italian nobility.

Well, wouldn't you know it - there's a freak living chained up in the basement of the castle.  And by freak, we mean a hideously deformed, savage human, that for some reason, someone decided it was best they keep in a cage in the basement.  

The arrival of the fractured family leads to the "freak" flipping out and escaping, where he hides in the many hidey-holes of the castle and occasionally popping out to harass and then murder.  There is a housekeeper, who is aware of the freak (who is named Giorgio, so I can stop calling a fictional disabled person a "freak") but has been complicit in Giorgio's horrible life.

The family fractures all the more, and Combs goes out where he picks up a bottle again and accidentally picks up a hooker.  Things go sideways as the hooker leaves - and it brings things to a head, as police want to look into the castle.

As a stand-alone story about a family trying to move past trauma, you do get the idea that Combs and Crampton would have been interesting in a straight drama about loss.  The Crossing Guard, which is @#$%ing great but depressing, comes to mind.  We're nowhere near that - after all, we have a dude running around murdering people with his bare hands to contend with - but we do get to use that as a sort of investigation of the secrets families keep, our own weaknesses and what we can do to make amends.  

There's a 2020 version of this film for reasons I cannot fathom, which sounds like it's much more Lovecraftian in nature and changes all the major details that make this one different and/ or interesting.  What it does do is say "maybe we shouldn't make a wretched human an actual monster" which plays very oddly now, as I know it probably did in 1995 - but which arrived in a period full of serial killer movies, so who knows?

I find it interesting that this was poster-girl Jessica Dollarhide's last movie.  Maybe she went to college and was done.  I can't say.  She's certainly not bad in the movie.

Anyway, I don't want to oversell it, but it *is* different.  The same sort of lived-in, real-world problems, like, say, in The Shining, are an interesting refraction against the part that makes the film "horror".  

HalloWatch: Death Becomes Her (1992)

Watched:  10/12/2024

Format:  Peacock

Viewing: First

Director:  Robert Zemeckis

Selection:  Jamie

No, I'd never seen Death Becomes Her (1992).  My guess is that I didn't think this would be actually funny, and - as it turns out - I was wrong about that.  This movie is funny as hell.

I guess maybe 1992 me couldn't process that Meryl Streep is funny, too, on top of everything else.  I also used to avoid movies where I thought people were working outside their lane in general, and that's a dumb, dumb thing to do.  But, give me a break, I was 17.  I thought this was going to be one of those movies polite adults in the 1980's and 90's laughed at, but wasn't actually laugh-out-loud good.  But - I admit I laughed a lot finally seeing it.

The movie has a long, but terrific set-up that lets the leads all play it to the hilt - and that's really what's so fun about the movie.  It's a small cast, but getting to see Goldie Hawn at the height of her comedic powers play the many versions of her character, and Meryl Streep playing the hot platinum blonde terrified of aging is a delight.  And while I read Kevin Kline was considered for Bruce Willis' part (and I can imagine him in it, very easily), Willis was good.

The plot is windy, involves actual magic, and Isabella Rossellini as a sort of mystic who can provide people with a potion to make them young and beautiful forever.  Half of the movie is about setting up a scenario in which we understand how and why Streep would do this - a plastic surgery addict terrified of what's happening to her.  And Hawn as a woman bent on romantic revenge for Streep stealing all of her men - leading up to stealing and marrying her fiance, Willis.

The gag, then, is that this potion doesn't just grant eternal youth and beauty, it makes you the undead, essentially.  You can't feel pain.  You can't die, no matter what happens to your body.  

It's a wicked critique of Hollywood/ society's obsession with youthful appearances - especially in women, and the insanity that many people in the public eye will go through in order to delay the time when they can't play the young sex bomb and move into other roles.  But, also, familiar to all of us (I say as I near 50, looking like 10 miles of bad road).  Still - I know the pinch is harder for women, and can't imagine the pressure on women in the spotlight.  

What I thought was going to just be a goofy movie about people physically abusing each other because they can't die becomes something else entirely, about how we're tied together, what it means to age gracefully, and the insanity of trying to remain relevant, and the inevitable self-destruction we do trying to fight nature.  

Would I have gotten the gags at 17?  I mean, on paper... yes.  In reality, it lands a whole lot better now.  It's not an abstraction.  And, the actresses I crushed on as a youth are now in their 60's and 70's and watching that curve is.. curious.  Let alone watching actresses more in line with my own generation occasionally just defy youth, Lisa Kudrow.

At the time the movie came out, the FX were considered mind-boggling, and - you know what?  They hold up really, really well for 1992.  There's bits I really don't know how they did them in the era - and because they were done with such care and to fit in with the look of movies of the time, they hold up just shockingly well, not hidden behind darkness or anything, and with no obvious matte-ing or anything.  Today's FX folks could stand to look at this wonder from the era - including how they use practical make-up for lots of bits.

As a Halloween movie, it works as it does involve the undead and horror of what they've done to themselves, but played for laughs.  It's hard not to look at Streep and Hawn in the last scene and think of some Golden Age actresses and their final years in film - and that they really did depend on each other even as they were ready to start slugging each other.

not for nothing, but I will never get how Isabella Rossellini was not a major sex symbol of the 80's and 90's

Hallowatch: Ghostwatch (1992)

Watched:  10/04/2024

Format:  Amazon

Viewing;  Second

Director:  Lesley Manning

I'd already seen this movie back in April of this year, and you can read my thoughts from 5.5 months ago here.

I basically wanted to make Jamie, Dug and K watch it, and I have no idea what anyone thought at the end.  It's also not the "The Dog Who Saved Halloween" suckage we usually put on if we're going to do a watch party.  

Personally, knowing what's coming, I enjoyed seeing all the pieces come together.  If you're going to do this kind of thing - where you try to make something look "real" - filmmakers really need to review Ghostwatch (1992).  Which really does benefit from not trying to be a period piece, but reflect the idea that "it's happening now".

On a second viewing, I liked seeing how they set some things up, leaving a trail of breadcrumbs that does work - but on a first viewing seems like random stuff you're hearing as you go along - which totally makes sense.  Visually - it absolutely works.  It's all practical, so there's no reason to ever get taken out of what you're watching (see: Late Night With The Devil for a counter example) and maybe that's a lesson to horror movie makers?  I know one of the scariest, to me, movies is The Haunting, and there's approximately zero FX of any kind in it.

Anyhoo... a fun Halloween viewing.  Now on Amazon for, like, $2.00.

  

Raimi Watch: Darkman (1990)

Watched:  09/27/2024

Format:  Amazon Prime

Viewing:  Unknown

Director:  Sam Raimi

Darkman (1990) was released just days after I moved from Austin to North Houston.  I was 15.  I'd never heard of Sam Raimi or seen Evil Dead.  It was the end of the 1980's, when we had movie ratings, but nobody really cared about using them for keeping kids out - it was more of a promise of what a movie could contain.  R meant a chance for gore, violence and boobs.  Maybe a few F-bombs.  

Mostly, I was interested in what was sold as a superhero movie, of an all-new character who had an edge to him.  And then a very weird, very cool movie unspooled in front of me.  

Darkman was thus, I think, my introduction to Sam Raimi, Liam Neeson and Frances McDormand.*  My memory is that I thought the camera work and editing were insane, Neeson had fully thrown himself into the role - which seemed like a lot, and McDormand made for a great love interest as a brainier-than-average "the girl" role in one of these movies.   

90's Watch: Bowfinger (1999)

Watched:  09/21/2024

Format:  Max?  I don't know.

Viewing:  Third

Director:  Frank Oz

Selection:  Jamie

Two things to begin with:  (1) This movie doesn't get discussed enough.  It's really funny.  (2) I have zero idea why they didn't call this movie "Chubby Rain".  It's the funnier, better title.

There were a lot of movies about movie-making in the go-go 90's.  Indie filmmakers couldn't get enough of themselves in the 90's indie boom, and most of those movies were not good.  But at the end of the 1990's, Steve Martin and Frank Oz put together a genuinely funny movie about making movies and the people who scrape by at the bottom of the Hollywood machine of the day.  And while it's silly and I doubt has anything to do with reality, it's good stuff.

Bowfinger (1999) has a great cast, with Steve Martin, Eddie Murphy playing two roles, Terence Stamp, Heather Graham, Christine Baranski, Jamie Kennedy and a shockingly sober 1999 Robert Downey Jr.  I hope filming was as fun as it looks like it was, because it seems like everyone is just dicking around having a good time.  

It Blew Watch: Dante's Peak (1998)

Watched:  09/08/2024

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  First

Director:  Roger Donaldson

Selection:  Jamie

Here's the thing about writers freaking out about AI.  Studios have been trying to crush the artistry of scripts into predictable, soulless little packages since there was a great train robbery and someone said "yes, but what if it was a great carriage robbery?".  After all, studios are a business, not a local playhouse laboring under the idea that letting the local veterinarian have the solo in Pippin is "art".  And studios want as much guarantee of profit on an investment as possible.  

To this end, producers have routinely beaten writers until those writers produce a script that hits all the same points as the movie that made a ga-jillion dollars, maybe even a decade prior, essentially not understanding how Find/ Replace works in Word, if that's all they want to do.  AI can't take the abuse studios want to dole out, so maybe writers ARE safe- even as AI could produce a pitch that sounds convincingly real.  And would absolutely write this script without blinking a digital eyeball.

But in the 1990's, AI was limited to fantasy in Terminator movies.  And so it was in the 1990's that we received an endless roster of disaster, monster and other movies that were all basically The Abyss's lovechild with 70's disaster movies.  This is how we get scrappy, quirky travelling teams of misfits looking up to our normal, handsomer leader.  We get corporate meddlers who won't listen to pure-hearted scientists/ roughnecks, and then a finale with 45 minutes of consequences of not listening to Ed Harris/ Roy Scheider/ etc... at the start.  

Richard Simmons Merges With The Infinite

Richard Simmons has passed at the age of 76.

He was one of the first people I remember recognizing on TV, and knowing their name as a real person and not a character.  The Richard Simmons Show encouraged clean living, healthy lifestyles and sensible eating.  I don't remember much more than it existed and was something I'd see on TV in the summer.

Once the show was over in about 1985, Simmons was just sort of omnipresent on television through, like, my 30's.  I remember tears from people talking about their struggles with weightloss, and Simmons, in workout duds, holding their hand and listening, absolutely sincerely.  Sure, at first you'd laugh like a snarky kid, but eventually, you had to say to yourself "this guy does this all the time.  He never breaks.  He maintains eye contact.  He listens and tries to help."  Like, you realizes he might be goofy in some ways, but at least that part was real.

He was also on celebrity gameshows, did guest appearances, was a late night TV staple, and sold millions and millions of VHS tapes to folks who didn't want to start working out at the gym or a Jazzercise class, they wanted to try it at home.  

In 1992-93, my high school drama class agreed to do "Sweatin' to the Oldies" once a week, as my drama instructor rightfully noticed, we were not the most active kids.  At the time it was the most notorious of Simmons' offerings, constantly advertised during daytime TV, playing music from the 60's as an army of, indeed, very sweaty people danced behind Richard in the background.  So, initially it was ironic.  But we all agreed - there was something to the videos.  Just enough to get you moving, but it wasn't like the Jane Fonda tapes that were a strenuous workout.  After that, I felt like I got his niche and what he was doing - providing a realistic lifeline for people to at least try to get moving, and make it fun.

Simmons retreated from public life around a decade ago, and after a lifetime of public engagement, eventually speculation about what he was up to begin to swirl.  But almost all allegations were denied or dismissed.  

I suspect we'll likely learn much more about Simmons' private life now that he's passed.

I don't know how much Simmons will be remembered by folks younger than myself.  He did have an online presence, but was fading for a decade before he officially disappeared.  And I don't know how many people will come forward with remembrances.  

Say what you will, and, yes, he made a lot of money selling tapes to people who probably watched them once, but he did offer some help and some hope, and he can't be at your house to get you to use your Deal-a-Meal cards, or find the 30 minutes for a workout.  I think he was probably an okay dude.

 I do still wonder if he owned any long pants.

JLC Neo-Noir Watch: Blue Steel (1990)

Watched:  07/06/2024

Format:  Criterion

Viewing:  First

Director:  Kathryn Bigelow

Criterion Channel is showcasing Neo-Noir films this month, and I absolutely remember this coming out and not understanding what it was at the time, and then never hearing from anyone who ever saw it.

But here at The Signal Watch, JLC is one of our patron saints, and I was curious.

The movie is a curious mix of genres - certainly an homme fatale noir, but 100% a thriller.  And sets itself in the New York of the late 1980's where finance-dudes were of interest to audiences, as were blue-collar types.

Jamie Lee Curtis plays a young woman literally right out of the police academy who, on day 1, stumbles onto a hold-up occurring at a grocery, where she's forced to shoot the gunman.  Which she does in 1980's style, emptying her gun and sending the guy reeling through the front window.

Unfortunately for her, the gun the guy had goes missing, and no witnesses say they saw a gun.  And there's no tape?  In 1990 in New York?  But ok.  

She's on administrative leave when she meets a commodities exchange fellow who woos her.

But, uh-oh, he was at the scene of the crime, took the gun, and is now murdering people with the gun after carving her full name into the casings, that he leaves behind after killing innocent people.

One good cop (Clancy Brown) believes her while everyone else just wants to fire her or make her go away, but Eugene (Ron Silver) ups the ante, and eventually she figures it out just pre-coitus.  And then things get really nuts as she fights for anyone to believe her and he lawyers up while also murdering her friend (Elizabeth Pena, RIP) in front of her.  

On the whole - my take is this: 

Adventure Horror Watch: The Mummy (1999)

Watched:  06/12/2024

Format:  Peacock

Viewing:  third?

Director:  Stephen Sommers

Okay.  I am aware that this movie is a favorite of many-a-folk.  I think it played really well with people of a certain age as a cable-rewatch or DVD favorite.  I was 24 when this came out, just out of film school, and spent 1997 learning about the Universal Monster films, so I came in with *opinions*.   I saw this once in the theater, saw the sequel somewhere along the line, and skipped all the subsequent Stephen Sommers output until Van Helsing.  And Simon and I discussed that movie at length.    

If you want to go on with your life not listening to someone who is going to not spend a review effusing about this movie, I get it.  Do what you have to do.

Jarmusch Watch: Night on Earth (1991)

Watched:  05/09/2024

Format:  Criterion

Viewing:  First

Director:  Jim Jarmusch

This is one I remember seeing advertised via trailers on VHS tapes of indie movies you'd rent in the early 90's.  But somehow I never got to it back then, and I think, having had now seen the movie, that's okay.  I think I would have gotten the vibe back then, but as a suburban kid from Texas, I would have missed the experience of riding in cabs, which I had not really done back then, and wouldn't do until the end of college.  

Generally, I'm not sure how much I support "auteur" as a concept.  Film is a collaborative medium, full stop.  But I do get it a bit more when you look at a writer/ director like Jim Jarmusch.  Small, talky indie movies that rely almost entirely on actors handling the scripts Jarmusch puts in their hands.  And the rest is the vibe he creates around those actors.  

Night on Earth (1991) is an interesting but of what became the explosion of indie film that carried the decade (not that we didn't have huge blockbusters, too).  Essentially five, unrelated stories, but all with the similar points of taking place in a cab, between sunset and sunrise, somewhere on the planet (LA, New York, Paris, Rome and Helsinki).  It's short vignettes, in rough real-time as cabs pick up a client and the interaction that ensues.  

Horror Watch: Ghostwatch (1992)

Watched:  04/28/2024

Format:  AMC+/ Shudder trial

Viewing:  First

Director:  Lesley Manning

So, I was watching the Half In the Bag guys discuss Late Night With the Devil, and they brought up a BBC TV special (that for our purposes I'm calling a movie) from 1992.   I'd heard of Ghostwatch and seen it cited multiple places over the years, but I couldn't say exactly where or when.  What I recalled was that, much like the Mercury Theatre's famed War of the Worlds Halloween radio play that emulated a real broadcast, Ghostwatch did same on BBC, but with video, presaging both found footage movies like The Blair Witch Project, and the frenzy for supernatural investigation reality TV shows that I feel started with Ghost Hunters (which I watched, and there's a whole arc there).  

If I took Late Night With the Devil to task for not sticking with the bit, and it making things not work as a movie (and keep it from ever feeling scary) I'm doubling down on that idea.  Ghostwatch is clearly staged - the line delivery is too smooth, things are happening quickly and conveniently, etc...  But, dammit, they commit to the bit.  And they hired presenters instead of actors in key roles.

A few things that make this work:  the show originally ran on BBC on Halloween night 1992.  We were only a few years away from TV stunts like Al Capone's Vault at this time, wherein cameras would go live to some extraordinary event (although as someone who watched the vault business live, I can say - it could be a tremendous bust).  The show was hosted by Michael Parkinson, a legitimate television presenter.  This would have been a bit like having Barbara Walters host your made up Halloween special here in the US.  And they also have real presenters Mike Smith in studio and Sarah Greene as their reporter in the field - and Smith and Greene were well known TV presenters/ personalities already in 1992. 

G Watch: Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II (1993)

Watched:  02/29/2024

Format:  BluRay

Viewing:  Second?

Director:  Takao Okawara & Kazuki Ômori

Selection:  Jamie

So, Jamie had a medical procedure earlier in the day, and when it came time to figure out what she felt like doing that evening, she said "I can't do anything but watch a Godzilla".  And what was up next in our Heisei-era viewing was this little gem.  

You can definitely tell:  this movie was at least in part for kids.  The hero, Aoki, is an engineer whose hobby is pterodactyls.  He's been working on a sort of flying ship cannon dingus, but is sent over to the new MechaGodzilla project.   

By the way, the sequel title is sort of factual, but this movie - and all Heisei-era movies, ignore the movies after 1954's Gojira, so it's a weird bit of titling.  It is not the second movie with MechaGodzilla in it, and it's the first with an all-new take on MechaGodzilla in this era.  But no one asked me in 1993 what to name it, so here we are.

Based on wreckage from the mechanical head left by the re-furbished King Ghidorah from the prior film, this MechaGodzilla is armed to the teeth, and should be able to take down Big G.  It turns out fighting a living nuclear reactor doesn't go well all the time, tho, and MechaG is taken down.

Oh, but the BIG plot point is that a group of scientists find a gigantic egg (like 2 meters long and 1.5 meters tall on its side) on a radioactive island with a Rodan and Godzilla.  The scientists decide to (a) take the egg despite the fact it GLOWS from time-to-time (b) they then put it in a lab in the middle of the city (c) in a lab the size of an actual university lab, which is like, an apartment living room and (d) they never x-ray it for some reason to see what they have?  They just assume:  oh, yeah, it's a Rodan.  

It isn't.  Out pops a baby Godzillasaurus, because these are movies for children. 

Anyway, the plot gets very hazy very fast with characters yelling what is happening with absolutely zero supporting evidence to back up their claims.  "Rodan is his nest brother!"  IS HE?  WHY?  HOW?  No one seems concerned about WHO laid the Godzilla-egg.  Or the fact they have a baby Godzilla that maybe they should kill now while the killing is good.  The Japanese government seems convinced the baby Godzilla is an asset, but never says how or why.  

Anyway, baby Godzilla becomes a MacGuffin as Godzilla either wants to kill the baby or take the baby or something...  it's not clear.  Rodan same.  MechaG gets an upgrade to have the flying dingus attach like a backpack.  

And then there's a really pretty solid fight at the end.  

Miki is also in this movie, just kind of appearing here and there.  Oh, and this movie posits Godzilla has a second brain in his butt, a bit like we were taught as kids about the anklyosaur, but which isn't, apparently, true.  But that doesn't mean Miki the Psychic doesn't find Godzilla's second brain with her ESP.

It's important to note that Godzilla in this and the prior films is a walking natural disaster and not seen as a balancing force, etc...  He's just a straight up unsolvable problem and no one knows what he'll do next or why.  It breaks a lot of Western (or at least American) screen writing rules, and can feel messy - but that's kind of missing the point.  Godzilla DOES have motivations, he just isn't monologuing and by the time our heroes figure it out, we've usually lost part of a major sea port.  

This movie does suggest he's not a complete jerk as, via Miki, he understands he needs to take care of the baby rather than eat it, I guess.  So off they swim.

I can't say I love the hero in this movie - but the scientist is pretty good.  And I enjoy the very 1.0 attempt at MechaGodzilla in the Heisei design, which becomes cooler in the Millennium movies.  This is also my favorite era of G's design, but that's by a fraction of a point.  Rodan is just a weird, big bird - and I have no real complaints.  I think I like him better here than the Monsterverse, but less than I like his OG look.  Miki's bangs are still a lot.

But the Kaiju battles in this are really pretty solid, and the FX on top of the kaiju costumes are well done, especially for the era.  Some money got tossed at this one.

G Watch: Godzilla and Mothra - The Battle for Earth (1992)

Watched:  02/25/2024

Format:  BluRay

Viewing:  Second

Director: Takao Okawara

Selection:  Me

We decided to keep on our path of rewatching Heisei-era Godzilla movies in order.  We last watched this one about four years ago during our "hunker down and watch Godzilla because it's COVID-times" erratic sprint through Toho's G-output.  

Honestly, I didn't really remember this one at all until a scene would start.  There was a lot of "oh, yeahhhh..." as the movie unspooled.  And I attribute that to the fact the middle of movie is a mess.  The beginning is interesting enough, and the end is good Kaiju Kombat, but the middle feels like they're trying to make a point about stealing and environmentalism, but it's a little confusing as to how that's tying into our Kaiju problem.  And to further muddy the film, Godzilla - now a heel after the time-warp stuff of the prior film - isn't here to restore balance.  He's just... sorta... rampaging.  

What's funny is how it looks like the new Monsterverse stuff is taking cues from these movies.  This is the first of the Heisei movies to suggest ancient cultures knew of the Kaiju, and there was a balance to the world brought by the Titans.  But here they do it as an exposition dump *after* introducing The Cosmos (our faerie friends).  And the Monsterverse can't bear the thought of either the Cosmos or Mothra in her larval form - so I guess we're just stuck with the window dressing.

Curiously, one of the supporting actors looked so familiar I mentioned it to Jamie who figured out he was recast in Godzilla 2000 as a totally different character, but he had facial hair and a very different demeanor.  But I did feel less crazy (and he's actually in like four of these movies).  And that's just one of those things - I think everyone acting in Japan gets to be in 2-4 Godzilla movies if they play their cards right.

Sports Watch: The Sandlot (1993)

Watched:  02/21/2024

Format:  Disney+

Viewing:  First

Director:  David Mickey Evans

Selection:  Jamie

I was wrapping up my senior year of high school when The Sandlot (1993) hit.  At the time, I was more interested in adult-oriented movies, and not at all into baseball, so the movie came and went without much notice on my part.  I'd have forgotten about it completely, but it's since become an inter-generational favorite, especially with baseball fans (which is by far the best sport to put in a movie), and has become a meme-generating perennial.  "You're killing me, Smalls" has escaped the fandom of the film and made it's way into pop culture.

Jamie pitched it for our evening viewing, and wanting to know what the hubbub was about, we gave it a whirl.

Absolutely, I was reminded of the era, circa 1980-84, when my family lived near a cul-de-sac in Spring, Texas, in the halcyon summer days when kids were kicked out of the house after breakfast, drank out of hoses, and would set up games of baseball to play all afternoon.  We used the cul-de-sac as our diamond, and our certainty we were terrible at baseball ensured we weren't putting out any windows.  My neighborhood was chock full of kids around our age, so getting a handful together to play was never a big deal.  In some ways, I was primed.

G Watch: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Watched:  02/20/2024

Format:  BluRay

Viewing:  Third?

Director:  Kazuki Ômori, Koji Hashimoto, Katsumune Ishida

Selection:  Me

I'm finally trying to watch the Heisei movies in order-ish (we tried to watch Return of Godzilla and couldn't finish it.  It's a slog.), but after watching Godzilla vs. Biollante, we were ready to return to Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991), which is bananas in the best way, and which I remembered fondly.

Work has been busy, so I was also ready for some kaiju kollisions on my television, and this one absolutely delivers.

Re-reading my post on the film from 4 years ago, I agree with myself here, so I'll skip summaries and whatnot.  

The movie *does* jettison the idea that Ghidorah is from space, which even the Monstervese films picked up.  It also low-key implies the villains are white Americans who have traveled through time to show up the Japanese of the future and remake the world in their image - and, man...!  OUCH.  But fair!

*Not All White Guys* is represented by a white guy robot (Jamie theorizes was inspired by T2, which seems very possible, even if just based on trailers the Toho guys had seen), and a sea-faring scientist in the 3rd act.  

The appearance of the US Navy in 1944 is treated as an invading force that's being repelled, which is... true-ish.  As seems to so often be the case with finding anglo actors for Toho movies, the Captain of the US navy battleship is curiously cast, but seems to be having a grand time.  I would love to know what the story was there.

Japan's role in WWII happening is often left murky in Godzilla films, but the war is frequently referenced.  

And this is somewhat why I wanted to get to this movie.  I was maybe five minutes into Godzilla Minus One when I started pondering this movie.  The two have very little in common, but it's hard not to draw a comparison between the appearance of a pre-atomic Godzilla facing off with the military in both movies, and soldiers having life-changing experiences with the beast and then have to reconcile seeing the same dinosaur roaming about at 20 times the size they last saw.  I mean, Godzilla Minus One is pretty good, but you can say it lacked in robots with super-speed and iffy make-up FX.

I do want to say:  the time travel in this movie has no internal logic, and I found it a bit baffling.  Everyone seems pretty aware of Godzilla even though he's been removed from the timeline, and our hero - a rapscallionish journalist - plans to write a book on Godzilla, who no longer exists at one point in the movie.  And clearly Toho was just like "whatever, man.  That's how time travel works."

Anyway, fun times.  

U.S. G-Watch: Godzilla (1998)

the actual dick joke on the poster was probably the tell this movie was going to be straight garbage

Watched:  02/10/2024

Format:  Max

Viewing:  Fourth?

Director:  Roland Emerich

Selection:  I have only myself to blame

Back in 1998, I saw Godzilla opening day with Jamie.  I'd been pretty excited about what a US studio could do with the concept.   We were five years out from Jurassic Park, so CG was a thing.  And seeing some actors we liked (who were not Raymond Burr) getting involved with the big guy seemed like a neat idea. 

I'd argue that at the time of the film's release, it had been since the mid-80's that a Toho movie really landed in the US, so there was some context for Godzilla for your average US movie-goer, but not a lot.  Mostly spoofs and lightly racist parodies.  Everyone knew Godzilla, but it was like... everyone knew Superman had comic books, but no one had read an issue since elementary school.  You knew the general look and some details, but... that was about it.

Looking at the box office, it's crucial to recall the movie had an absolutely gigantic marketing campaign.  This was back when movies didn't just advertise, they did a half-dozen corporate tie-in's, so Godzilla was going to be inescapable no matter what.  Heck, I very much remember the omnipresent Taco Bell chihuahua selling Big G.  

Tri-Star was going to make sure you were going to see this movie whether it was good or not.