Let's wallow in the mediocrity of sub-par art - Podcasts about bad movies

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Rapidly Going Deaf > Let's wallow in the mediocrity of sub-par art - Podcasts about bad movies

Call Me Charlie: Dec 3, 2005; by Smythe

My favorite We Hate Movies has to be the one they did on No Holds Barred

http://www.whmpodcast.com/2012/03/episode-50-no-holds-barred.html

Their complete disdain for pro wrasslin', while being former fans, is like gasoline on the fire which is this terrible movie. I don't want to go any further into it because going blind into this episode is the best.

# ¿ Feb 2, 2013 00:55

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 01:26

Call Me Charlie: Dec 3, 2005; by Smythe

Hewlett posted:

Re: HDTGM, I will say I really want to listen to that Nothing But Trouble episode, if only because I love when other League cast members guest, and I adore Steve Rannazzisi in particular.

I'm listening to it now and it's one of their better episodes. No crazy screaming over each other. No missing basic plot points. It's everyone basically going :stonk:

for the entire episode.

Plus Nothing But Trouble deserves that type of reaction. That movie is loving nuts.

# ¿ Feb 24, 2013 03:54

Call Me Charlie: Dec 3, 2005; by Smythe

Mogambo posted:

What's wrong with We Hate Movies, pray tell, aside from "Rar how DARE these people do goofy impressions of Wilford Brimley; I much prefer podcasts where they read letters for over half the episode and then make cat noises"?

Only problem I have with them is when they get lazy with a slower paced movie.

Instead of doing any prep, they just repeat "OH GOD WHY ISN'T THIS MOVIE WHAT I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE I'M SO BORED PLOT IT DOESN'T MATTER WHATEVER" for the entire show. The Deep Impact episode was really terrible because they kept expecting Armageddon and it clouded everything. The Cat People episode was also kind of bad because they focused on the remake aspect instead touching on the way more interesting fact that it was Paul Schrader's drug-fueled nightmare and his final studio movie until 1998.

imdb posted:

By his own admission, director Paul Schrader says that one day he got so stoned on set that he refused to come out of his trailer. A whole day's filming was lost.

How do you not touch on that?

# ¿ Apr 20, 2013 21:42

Call Me Charlie: Dec 3, 2005; by Smythe

OldTennisCourt posted:

Deep Impact made sense though. Those 2 films are going to always be constantly compared, and I think it makes sense to compare a flm that was all action, but was at least fun, to a movie that tries to be serious but just comes off as silly and boring.

Judging a movie on its own merits should be Film Criticism 101.

Spending a hour going "Armageddon did _____! Why didn't this do _______? It's so dumb at least Armageddon did _______" is just plain lazy.

# ¿ Apr 22, 2013 03:23

Call Me Charlie: Dec 3, 2005; by Smythe

Illinois Smith posted:

If you listen to Patton Oswalt's tales of punch-up sessions for lovely movies it's probably the other way around.

Actually, Last Action Hero is the classic hollywood story of a studio buying something good and passing it off to so many writers that they completely ruin what made it attractive in the first place.

quote:

Penn and Adam Leff, two young graduates of Connecticut�s Wesleyan University, loved action movies. So in 1991 they decided to write an ambitious script, titled Extremely Violent, which would work both as a deconstruction of the genre and a kick-rear end romp in its own right. �The basic idea was: wouldn�t it be cool if a kid got sucked into a silly action movie and used his knowledge of the genre to subvert all the clich�s?� explains Penn. �We dubbed it Reverse Purple Rose after we realised it was the opposite of Woody Allen�s Purple Rose Of Cairo, where a character comes out of the screen into the real world.� For research, the pair visited their local videostore. �We rented every action movie we could think of and made a checklist. Does the second-most evil bad guy die before or after the most evil bad guy? Does the hero have a Vietnam buddy? It was fun, although watching Steven Seagal movies one after another can be soul-crushing.� Extremely Violent, which can be found online, lives up to its name. In the opening sequence, invincible cop Arno Slater takes on a horde of hitmen in LA�s Beverly Center, blowing them away with a laser-sighted hand-cannon while merrily dispensing one-liners such as, �Shopping can be hell.� The twist is, all this is revealed to be a trailer for a movie within the movie. Later, after the teenage hero has been yanked into the actual film, he uses his knowledge of the story�s beats to help Arno through the mayhem.

The script found a champion in Chris Moore, now a producer of such films as The Adjustment Bureau and the American Pie series, but back in 1991 an up-and-coming agent. �I saw it as a modern-day Wizard Of Oz,� Moore recalls. �The kid has a problem with his family. His father has left and he�s not getting on with his mom. And instead of getting whisked away to Oz, he does what most kids today would want to do, which is to escape into a movie.� He wasn�t the only fan. Penn and Leff watched agog as a bidding war unfolded, with Sony-operated studio Columbia Pictures ultimately prevailing by plonking down $350,000. More miraculous still, it attracted the attention of the star who had inspired Arno Slater in the first place: Arnold Schwarzenegger. �We never thought we�d actually get Arnold,� says Penn. �We were just two guys sitting in my apartment, thinking maybe someone would read it and get the reference. When we heard he wanted to do it, Adam and I looked at each other like, �This is insane.��

It seemed their dream was coming true. But it was about to curdle into a nightmare. Hot off the success of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Schwarzenegger was in no hurry to make a commitment. As well as Extremely Violent, he was considering a family comedy called Sweet Tooth, in which he would play the tooth fairy. Columbia top brass, desperate to bag the world�s biggest star, met with Schwarzenegger at his Santa Monica restaurant, Schatzi, where he puffed on a Romeo y Julieta Cuban cigar, sipped schnapps and explained that while he loved the concept � �Having a kid come into a movie awakens certain fantasies I had as a kid in Austria, like sitting on a horse with John Wayne� � the script wasn�t �executed professionally�. He also had concerns about Extremely Violent�s extreme violence.

To their dismay, Penn and Leff were swiftly dismissed from the project. Then, at Schwarzenegger�s suggestion, Columbia called in Hollywood�s hottest scribe. Shane Black�s first script, Lethal Weapon, had launched a lucrative franchise; his latest, The Last Boy Scout, had netted him an incredible $1.75 million. He also had history with Schwarzenegger, having played a commando alongside him in Predator. �The irony is that we�d gone to the MPAA library and read all of Shane�s scripts,� says Penn. �We were big fans of his � he was the Elmore Leonard of action movies. So it was this surreal moment of, �We�re parodying this guy, and now he�s been hired to rewrite us.� It was just a strange, strange occurrence.�

To Black, who took a break from Iron Man 3 pre-production to talk to Empire for this article, it looked like easy work. �Me and my partner, David Arnott, were to take this very small script, where not a lot happens, and beef it up into a summer movie, with a lot of set-ups and pay-offs and reversals. Zak seemed to think that we ruined his script, but I was actually quite fond of what we came up with. We had a silly gag where Slater reaches up, grabs a scratch on the film and stabs a villain with it. I know Columbia told us at the time that they were very happy with it. But then, abruptly, things changed.� Black attributes the sudden chill to the hiring of John McTiernan, the man behind action classics Die Hard and Predator, as director. �McTiernan had made a lot of hits, so the studio said, �Let him do what he wants.� And we watched as John rewrote the whole thing. I have a lot of fondness for John. He�s an interesting guy with a lot to say. He just wasn�t keen on the things we�d written.� Watching from the sidelines, the original writers became more and more anxious. �We always thought it would be someone like Robert Zemeckis or John Landis directing,� says Penn. �Someone with a history of pulling genres apart. I like Shane and I like John McTiernan � I wouldn�t have watched all their movies so many times if I didn�t. But I do think it�s easier for someone from the outside to mock the conventions of action movies than it is for the people who created them in the first place.�

Stress levels were rising fast on the project now called Last Action Hero, with Penn alleging that Black hung up on him during a phone call and Schwarzenegger still unhappy with the story. Before long, Black and Arnott were themselves fired and the increasingly choppy script sent to legendary writer William Goldman, who was paid an eye-watering $1 million for four weeks� work. �Back in those days, that kind of thing was an insurance policy for keeping your job at an executive level,� says Black. �A script would be questionable and the trembling executive would give it to a famous writer with a million bucks, so he could say, �Yeah, it�s fortified now. We�ve given it vitamins. Wait, wait, wait... It needs the woman�s touch. Give it to Carrie Fisher!� It just made people breathe easier, throwing money at this enormous behemoth. Even if the movie sucked, now they could say, �It�s not our fault.��

As well as Fisher and Goldman, several other script doctors, including The Hunt For Red October�s Larry Ferguson, made nips and tucks. The projectionist of Danny�s favourite cinema went from demonic villain to kindly old man; a scene in which dozens of iconic movie villains invade the real world was added, then deleted; even Slater�s forename changed from Arno to Jack. Also new was a climactic premiere set-piece, where Slater � having escaped from his movie Jack Slater IV � would meet the real Schwarzenegger, the star sending himself up as a nitwit who won�t stop plugging Planet Hollywood. But the more money Columbia threw at the script, the more problematic it became. Late one night, a desperate McTiernan called Black, asking him to take a look at the action sequences. �I declined,� says Black. �We�d been fired and now they wanted us to fix up the explosions and helicopter scenes? I considered it an insult to my professional pride.�

http://www.empireonline.com/features/last-action-hero

# ¿ Jan 23, 2014 19:53

Call Me Charlie: Dec 3, 2005; by Smythe

Infamous Sphere posted:

Just listened to the new WHM. Wow, The Butterfly Effect really does sound like a poisonous little movie. I remember hearing about it when it came out, and I had no idea it was so...uncomfortable sounding (I suppose in my head it was going to be more time traveller's wife-y or something, I wasn't labouring under a serious misapprehension, I just never cared enough to find out more.) I think that they were right, in terms of...when you go into a movie like, say, Mysterious Skin or American History X, you know what you're going in for and you're sort of...prepared for it, you're ready to deal with it, and it's handled well - whereas with a movie like the Butterfly Effect, it's sort of....nasty themes made into a movie by people who really didn't have the capability to handle them.

Did they touch on the director's cut alternate ending? Because it's hilarious.

The director's cut alternate ending shows Evan turning on the home movies, only this time instead of watching a home movie at a neighborhood gathering he's watching the video of his own birth. He travels back to when he is about to be born and commits suicide by strangling himself with his own umbilical cord, therefore he was never there to change the timeline in the first place and explains why Evan's mother had 2 still-born children before him.

# ¿ May 6, 2014 16:40

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 01:26

Call Me Charlie: Dec 3, 2005; by Smythe

Tato posted:

I also like that I've listened to like, 4 bad movie podcasts on Dreamcatcher and none of them have ever been able to come close to actually describing all of the insane poo poo in that film going on. You can listen to all 4 and there's still tons of stuff left out. It's the gift that keeps on giving. The book is even worse.

Stephen King posted:

Well, I don't like Dreamcatcher very much. Dreamcatcher was written after the accident. [In 1999, King was hit by a van while taking a walk and left severely injured.] I was using a lot of Oxycontin for pain. And I couldn't work on a computer back then because it hurt too much to sit in that position. So I wrote the whole thing longhand. And I was pretty stoned when I wrote it, because of the Oxy, and that's another book that shows the drugs at work.

Call Me Charlie fucked around with this message at 17:10 on Oct 17, 2016

# ¿ Oct 17, 2016 17:03

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Rapidly Going Deaf > Let's wallow in the mediocrity of sub-par art - Podcasts about bad movies