Shmee.Me

May 24, 2013June 24, 2013

The Mother of All MST3Ks: Manos: The Hands of Fate!

“Manos” The Hands of Fate is considered among the worst movies of all time. Most lists have it as number two below the classic Plan 9 from Outer Space, but you could defiantly make a case for Manos as number one. Though number two may be a good descriptor for the movie. It was written, directed, and stared in by Insurance and Manure salesman Harold P. Warren in 1966, but it was almost completely forgotten until MST3K found it, and it is one of their best episodes.

The movie starts with a young family on their way to a vacation at Valley Lodge, but they get lost and end up in the desert, so they ask to stay with the creepiest looking hillbilly of all time named Torgo, but at first he doesn’t want to let them because The Master doesn’t like dogs or kids (even though The Master has a dog), but he relents and lets them stay. What will happen when The Master finds out?

You know your in for a good movie when the movie starts off with like fifteen minutes of camera out the window driving shots, and the characters have to beg to stay with a creepy guy who works for a person he calls “Master”.

Everything is bad about this movie. There is no script and the “actors” have to repeat the dialog to fill time, and to call it dialog is an insult to writers everywhere. The sets are someone’s small living room, and a place in the desert with pillars where The Master and his Wives live.

I hope Warren was a good Manure and Insurance salesmen because he was an awful director. He never framed his shots, and anytime he showed the “actors'” faces they were bad close ups it is like he had never seen a movie before and he was making up something new as he went along.

It is safe to say the Joel and the Bots had a field day with this movie. Every seen has so much to make fun of, and the movie is so strangely bad that you can take your eyes off of it much like a train crash.

“Manos” The Hands of Fate is so bad that I think everyone should watch it at least once it will make you appreciate how good most movies are. This is streaming on Amazon Prime so there is no reason not to see it, other then fact it is really bad.

May 23, 2013May 25, 2013

Shmee Explores Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories

This is my first music review and I am not a music connoisseur by any stretch, so I would not expect them very often, but for certain bands I will make an exception, and one of those groups is Daft Punk. Their new album Random Access Memories came out two whole days ago, and I love it.

The album has a very 70’s disco feel, but it doesn’t get stuck there. It explores all kinds of music from rock to orchestral, and they are really pushing the boundaries of what Techno/Electronica can be. I know some people are disappointed by the fact it is not a straight up techno album, but it is fun to hear artists explore their craft. Like most electronica albums some songs outstay their welcome, but it is a small nit pick.

I am sure I am not the only one who’s best stereo is in their car, and the first morning I got the album I thought of calling in sick and taking a drive just so I could listen to more. Instead I had to go to work and listen to it at my desk.

This album may not be for everybody but it is for me.

May 22, 2013

Don’t take a Flight with Denzel Washington!

Flight is a 2012 film by Robert Zemeckis, and it was nominated for two Academy Awards: Best Actor (Denzel Washington), and Best Original Screen Play (John Gatins). For me, it did not scare me to fly, but it did try awful hard to put me to sleep.

The story starts off with Whip Whitaker (Denzel Washington) drinking and taking cocaine, and then jumping in the cockpit and flying a plane. As the plane nears its destination it starts to fall apart, and Whip through some amazing maneuvers is able to crash land the plane in an open field and save most of the people, but since there was a crash there will be a toxicology report, so will he or won’t he get blamed for this and go to jail.

I have to start off by saying Denzel is great in this movie, and it is easy to see why he gets an Oscar nomination for it, but the movie is two hours and eighteen minutes long, and the plane crash is over in the first thirty minutes, so then you are forced to watch Denzel drink and lie about it for an hour and forty-five minutes. They needed an editor to cut this down by at least a half hour, but as it is it just a way to see that Denzel can act, and see if the audience can stay awake.

I wanted to like this movie because I like most of the people in it, and that made it, but it is just too long for the subject matter, so I would say pass on it unless you are an Oscar movie buff and just want to see Denzel’s role.

May 21, 2013May 21, 2013

Daft Punk/Star Trek Winner!

The official numbers are out and Star Trek Into Darkness made $70,165,559. Which is quite a bit lower than they expected it to make, but that is good news for Daniel Robison since he was the lowest guess with $75,000,000, and thus the winner of the contest. I will get the CD shipped to him shortly.

May 20, 2013

Star Trek Into Darkness!

Star Trek Into Darkness is the twelfth Star Trek movie, and the second that features the recast original crew of the Enterprise in their alternate reality. J.J. Abrams was once again the director of this film, but can it live up to the hype following the last film? Not quite, but it is still pretty darn good.

Captain James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) is forced to brake the Prime Directive of not interfering with primitive cultures to save Commander Spock (Zachary Quinto) from a volcano, and has his command taken away from him, but only to get it back again to go after the terrorist John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch). That is about as much of the story as I can tell you without spoiling anything, and trying not spoil things is also why it will be hard for me to explain why this movie wasn’t as good as the last one, but I will do my best.

The main problem I have with this movie is that script makes us believe that a very dumb chain of events happened to kick off the plot of this movie, and you don’t get see how dumb they are until the end of the film, and this seems to be something that writer Damon Lindelof struggles with since he was charged with the same offence with Prometheus. But he did get the character interaction right.

Despite the lens flares, I think J.J. Abrams does a great job directing this film, and he keeps the pace up so you never get to sit and think about the dumbness of Lindelof’s script until after the movie is over, and everything looks and feels great.

The actors once again prove that they were selected to fill their roles well. The swagger of Chris Pine as Jim Kirk, the irritating logic of Quinto as Spock, and the bromance they develop is great. Karl Urban is excellent as the Bones we have all come to know and love, and they way the crew interacts with one another is pitch perfect. Cumberbatch as the villain does his job, but I wish they the would have used him better.

I liked this movie, and without a doubt Star Trek, and Star Trek Into Darkness are the best back to back Star Trek movies yet, but I wish in the four years it took to bring this movie to theaters that they would have tightened up the story a bit, but as it is it is still well worth watching.