Riddick 3, Audience 0

In this edition of Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy (NOT!), io9 reports that Vin Diesel just. won't. let. Riddick. die.

Yes, Pitch Black (2000) was good - a lean, muscular lower-budgeted sci-fi action thriller where Diesel really had a presence about him as the convict Richard B. Riddick with the spooky see-in-the-dark eyes.

Chronicles of Riddick (2004) spent some big bucks to only go waaay overboard and create an ass-load of backstory and shit around Riddick, making a shady convict anti-hero into a mythological prophesied space god (or something).

Since Chronicles didn't do gangbuster biz, Diesel and writer/director David Twohy tried to go back to basics with the modestly budgeted Riddick (2013). Audiences everywhere shrugged - what was this movie even about?

Now that Diesel's profile has been raised by the admittedly fun Fast & Furious franchise, Vin wants to do ANOTHER Riddick movie for the six people still interested in the character, AND do a TV series tie-in set in the "Riddick Universe."

Come on Vin, you might have a small, and I mean small, cult following around the Riddick character, but after three movies that received wide releases over a 13 year period, and only managed to gross on average just over $46 million each - audiences has spoken: they simply don't care for this character.

The mercs didn't catch up to Riddick, but audience indifference surely did.

The Works Network Airs The Weirdest Movies

There’s a new(ish) over the air channel called The Works.  A quick Google search shows that it’s another one of those “retro” channels (like Me-TV, Cozi, etc); for movies it pulls from MGM’s library as it is owned by that studio.

Now MGM is one of the oldest and most prestigious of movie studios; their inventory also consists of the libraries of such companies as Orion Pictures, The Samuel Goldwyn Company, and United Artists.  From  all those companies, there's a lot of great, interesting movies to choose from.

So, why the hell are they showing Mr. Hercules Against Karate?  It’s a martial arts movie from 1973, directed by Italian Antonio Margheriti, where “Two Americans go to Hong Kong to rescue the son of a Chinese restaurant owner who is being held hostage by his stepmother and the sadistic owner of a kung fu school.”

In that one paragraph, it’s a virtual United Nations of moviemaking: Italian director, American cast, Hong Kong locations and Chinese kung fu.  So naturally the title includes “karate” which is Japanese, you nitwits! 

The Works had previously aired Jon Voight’s first feature film, a surreal superhero comedy from 1967 called Fearless Frank, written and directed by Philip Kaufman of all people.  It was heavy on the surreal and light on the comedy as far as I was concerned.  It was just too wacky for me.

If The Works is going to continue to air this kind of strange, off beat fare, they really need to showcase it by having someone like Joe Bob Briggs (world’s greatest drive in movie critic) or Michael J. Nelson (star/head writer of Mystery Science Theater 3000) host the thing.  If not, I suggest they rename the channel WTF, because every time I switch over to it, my first reaction is, What The F—k?

It's Gun Fu Time - Equilibrium's Gun Kata Fight Scenes

The movie: Equilibrium.

The stuff: the Gun Kata fights. (You know you love 'em.)

James Bond Will Return...

...in SPECTRE, which was announced today.  (See article on Deadline.com)

Yes, it seems that the Daniel Craig-helmed super-spy series is getting back to its roots in a major way by bringing back the fictional terrorist organization SPECTRE (SPecial Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion).

And where SPECTRE goes can Ernst Stavo Blofeld, he of the bald pate and super-fluffy white Persian cat, be far behind?  Even though his character is listed as Oberhauser, acclaimed actor Christoph Waltz is believed to be the new Blofeld in the film.  (If that is the case, I hope it comes across better than the silliness of Benedict Cumberbatch as "John Harrison" who every one KNEW was Khan in Star Trek Into Darkness, despite all the denials of the filmmakers.)

The new film appears to be more in the mold of a traditional Bond film: for the first time in a Craig-Bond movie, we will have Q (Ben Whishaw), Miss Moneypenny (Naomie Harris), M (Ralph Fiennes), a new Aston Martin (yea!), Dave Bautista as a classic Bond uber-assassin named Mr. Hinx and James Bond facing off against SPECTRE.  Could a giant hollowed-out volcano base with jump-suited henchmen be far behind?

Predators - Put this dull beast out of our misery

Predators (2010) Predators is the worst kind of sequel, one which simply regurgitates the first entry in the series and wants a generous pat on the back for doing so. 

The original Predator (1987) concerned a group of Special Forces types led by Arnold Schwarzenegger with all his late 80s charisma in full effect, as they navigate a treacherous jungle on a mission. The tables are quickly turned as these mercenary predators find themselves the prey of a hunter - one from outer space. It was a Rumble in the Jungle like none other with larger than life figures like Arnold, Carl Weathers and Jesse Ventura, all machismo ("Ain't got time to bleed!"), rippling muscles, and cigars as big as loaves of French bread. Predator was directed by action maestro John McTiernan who went on to helm Die Hard (1 and 3) and The Hunt for Red October. 

Predators is produced by Austinite Robert Rodriguez and directed by Nimrod Antal, the script was written by Michael Finch and Alex Litvak, reportedly from an earlier story idea by Rodriguez. This “original” story concerns dropping (here, literally by parachute) Special Forces types, led by Adrien Brody, into a treacherous jungle where they find themselves the prey of alien hunters. Like Predator, the Predators cast is multi-racial. Like Predator, Predators has a lone female member. I can hear Rodriguez saying “homage” but I call bullshit. The writers’ big idea was to make the soldiers multi-national, instead of from just one country’s army; they are pulled from hot spots all over our world (Russia, Sierra Leone, Israel, etc.). The problem is, not one member of this group "pops" or is memorable in any way (neither the actors, or the characters). They’re bland ciphers, just waiting to be killed off. I believe a much better angle would have been to have the characters be from different time periods: a feudal-era samurai warrior, a Clint Eastwood-esque cowboy from the 1870s, a Viking, a Special Forces merc, and, at this stage in the sequel game, throw in at least one EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL soldier to boot. Predators and Aliens have already clashed, so introducing time travel and other intelligent E.T.s into the mix is the next logical step. That would be a real motley crew, a dirty half-dozen of the best human (and non-human) warriors to go up against the Predators. 

SPOILER: The major deviation from the original is that this story is set in the jungle of an alien planet, apparently the game preserve of the Predator species. END SPOILER.  McTiernan shot in Mexico, while Antal has to make due with Hawaiian locations. After Avatar, which created an alien world from the ground (and blades of grass) up, it seems pretty lazy for filmmakers to go to familiar locations like a tropical jungle and call them “alien.” The exotic swamp world of Dagobah in The Empire Strikes Back was built on a soundstage, in the Star Wars prequels they created green screen CGI shots of exotic and bizarre worlds, which is what Avatar did. I’m sorry, but the jungles of Hawaii are not alien enough. To add insult to injury, at one point a character recognizes a particular poisonous plant. My question is, HOW COULD HE HAVE RECOGNIZED A POISONOUS EARTH PLANT ON AN ALIEN PLANET THOUSANDS OF LIGHT-YEARS AWAY? And do NOT say the Predators brought the plants with them. That would be beyond stupid. 

This is the type of movie that really raises my ire: stupid, pointless, uninspired, and boring. It’s a sequel/remake similar to what Rodriguez did with his second film Desperado, which was a bigger-budgeted sequel that was essentially a remake of his first micro-budget film El Mariachi. But while Desperado improved on the original by casting Antonio Banderas and Salma Hayek (professional actors with real charm and personality who "popped" from the screen) and ramping up the action and mayhem, Predators fails at every turn with a dull cast (seriously, you do NOT go from Schwarzenegger to Adrien Brody unless there is a real character to play - see Robert Patrick in T2 for how to play the strong/lean silent type), lifeless characters, and standard cookie cutter action scenes. Rent the original Predator instead.