Review Grindhouse

On Saturday the IFI, put on a one off screen of the ill-fated Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino double feature Grindhouse.

For anyone who is unaware of Grindhouse, it was a concept that the two directors made, to make two full-length features and show them back-to-back. The two directors were big fans of the Grindhouse genres, which were popular in the 70’s. Grindhouse movies were often shown as a double feature. Grindhouse movies or exploitation movies featured woman with little or no cloths on, and a large amount gore. And that is where the idea for this movie was born.

The two movies that they made as homage to the Genre were Planet Terror (Rodriguez’s feature) and Death Proof (Tarantino’s feature) as well as two features, the movie contains a trailers for fake movies.

Grindhouse Fake Trailers

Machete

Written by Robert Rodriguez

This is no longer a trailer for a fake movie it’s set for release as a straight to DVD feature.

Werewolf Woman Of The S.S.

Written by Rom Zombie

Don’t

Written by Edgar Write

Thanksgiving

Written by Eli Roth

Grindhouse begins with the trailer for machete. Afterwards follows Rodriguez’s homage to the zombie sub-genre of horror. Planet Terror. The plot of the movie is about a gas being released that turns the inhabitants of a Texan town into flesh eating Zombie. El Ray played by Freddy Rodriguez tries to lead a group of survivors to freedom.

This movie is a fun watch, a really damn fun watch. The plot of the movie is a very basic one. But who cares? The action is over the top, and gore is so over the top that it can’t be taken seriously.

Stacy Ferguson (Fergie from the Black Eyed Peas) makes a brief cameo, only to be ripped limb form limb by fleshing eating Zombies. That alone made it worth the price of admission, let’s see you try to sing London Bridge now, bitch?

After three more fake trailers, comes Tarantino’s feature Death Proof. The polt of the movie revolves around a psychotic a psychotic stuntman, Stuntman Mike (played by Kurt Russell) who tracks down woman and uses his car to kill them.

Death Proof is the weaker of the two, but it’s far a bad movie. There are moments when the dialogue comes across as if Quentin was trying to make the language too hip. And it moves slower than Pallet Terror. And yes this is the worst of the five movies Tarantino has made to date, but a sub power Tarantino movie, is still better than most directors out their.

But by the time it comes to the car chase at the end, which is one of the best car chases it really has you on the edge of your seat.

These movies should never have been released separately, as they only work as a double feature .

It’s a bit of a waste of time for me to write this, and for you to read this because no matter how pervasive I am, you may never get to see Grindhouse.

At this moment no news has surface as to wheather Dimension Films have decided to release this movie in the future. Any one who reads this post should send a petition to demand that the movie be released in the UK and Ireland on DVD.

Strange Wilderness review

Director: Fred Wolf

Screenplay: Peter Gaulke and Fred Wolf

Certificate: 16

Trailer

Strange Wilderness has an extremely simple plot., the movie’s about a motley crew who make a TV called Strange Wilderness. When the head of the network the show is aired on gives the creators two weeks to come up with a great idea to save their show. They are at a loss of what to do, and think that the show is doomed.

Until their camera man tells them that he has a map that will direct them to Bigfoot, so they pack up their van and go off to film the creature.

That is until their camera man tells them that he has a map that will direct them to Bigfoot, so they pack up their van and go off to film the creature.

The script was written loosely which gave the actors a lot of room scope from them to improve the lines in this movie. Not all the jokes in the movie work, but those that do are very funny indeed. The funniest scenes in the movie are when the presenter of Strange Wilderness, is doing the voiceover for the TV show.

The best line in the movie is when he is talking about monkeys, when he comes out with this “monkeys make up 80 percent of the worlds monkeys population”.

Strange Wilderness is not one of the best comedy movies that has ever been made, but it’s a million ways from being terrible. It succeeds in what it set out to do, which is to provide an entertaining night in the cinema. If you want a good laugh, then you go do a lot worse then going to see strange wilderness.

 

Neon Neon Stainless Style Review

Album: Stainless Style

Artist: Neon Neon

Label: Lex

Released: Monday 17^th Mar 2008

Below: Stainless Style Album cover

This is further proof that more often then not, records that receive little or no media attention are great listens. And this is such a release.

Maybe the music media cave this band a lot of coverage prior to this albums release. Maybe the hype was so massive that there was a New Years Eve style countdown in Time Square. If there were was any hype about Neon Neon it passed me by.

For those who don’t know, Neon Neon is a calibration between Gruff Rhys (he of super Furry Animals) and American musician Boom Bip. Their debut album, is a concept record about the life of John Z DeLorean, the fellow who stumped up the cash to make the DeLorean, which was the Back To The Future car, just encase you didn’t know who he was.

Making concept records at the best of times is a huge gamble, they took the gamble and it pays off.

This record is heavily influenced by 80’s electro power pop. This a fantastic release. This is a definite contender for the album of the year. Let’s hope that they duo have plans to release more music as Neon Neon.

I Lust U Video

Gun’s N Roses to reunite?

Scott Weiland has been kicked out of Velvet Revolver, could this pave the way for a Guns N Roses reunion?

This may not be a far fetched as you may think, as Slash has said that he wouldn’t be adverse to a reunion, if the time was right. With Weiland having been kicked out of Velvet Revolver it this is the prefect time for a Guns N Roses reunion.

Clearly this is just speculation, but I wouldn’t be surprised if within in the next couple of months an official announcement of a reunion tour was to be released, watch this space.

Smoking

Anti smoking adverts are bugger on my wallet because every time that I see one, it makes me want to go and smoke a cigarette. 

 One example of this is the Niccoretee advert that features the giant cigarette. Once I see the image of the 6ft cigarette, a mother fucker of a craving for nicotine is triggered and I need to have a cigarette.

 Some of Niccoretee adverts carried the slogan “don’t think cigarette, think Niccoretee. I was thinking about having a cigarette until the ad’s slogan flashed upon on the screen, and again I get one motherfucker of a craving for nicotine and cigarette is needed. 

 It’s like somebody has told you do not look over there, but there is a midget standing over there when you had not even spotted the midget. You never knew the midget was there, and now that you know that is there you have to look.

Another example of non-smoking adverts that had the reverse affect on me was an advertising campaign that was shown on MTV when I was in my teenage years. Like many teenagers, I used to think MTV was cool, so a cool station telling me that smoking is something that I shouldn’t smoke could have worked.

If they advertising campaign had been produced by MTV I’d have probably listened. However that bastion of cool the EU produced the campaign. Who knows better what teenager’s think is cool more than a group of politicians?

One of the adverts in the campaign I remember is the advert that featured a teen that enjoyed skateboarding. It was saying all things that he doses then at the end came the big reveal he doesn’t smoke. The ad was saying to me and other teens that if you don’t smoke, then guess what kids? You can be just like the teen in the ad! Jesus H Christ, someone, anyone hand me a Marlborough I don’t want to be anything like that kid.

The reason, I guess that those adverts don’t work on me, is because I hate people beating me over the head with the message that smoking is bad for me. I already know that is bad for me when I began smoking. Mr Benson or Mr Hedges never put a shotgun to my head, and forced me to put the cigarette in my mouth, I did it under my own freewill.

At this time I am not sure if I will ever stop smoking. Whenever that happens, it will be my choice, right now that right is over; it is time for a smoke.

Should Cowen be allowed to become Ireland’s next leader?

Minster Brian Cowen, is the most likely man to be the next Taoiseach of this country, most people in Ireland already know this.

But should Minister Cowen be allowed to put his name forward to become Taoiseach after admitting to smoking a joint while he was in college? this was a question that raised on  late night talk show  Adrian Kennedy on  FM 104 last night.

Look, he smoked cannabis when in he was in college; it was over years ago. He never dose it anymore, its not as if he sits in his office smoking bongs. 

He admitted that he did it, and politics is a profession that is associated with people lying. It is extremely refreshing to hear a politician being honest.     

New deer species spotted in Ireland

Muntjac is a new variety of deer that has been spotted recently in Ireland, in areas such as Arklow. The deer is 19 inches in height, and barks like a dog.

Muntjac deer were introduced to Woburn Park, Bedfordshire in the early 20th Century.

The dear, unlike other varieties has no breeding session. This isn’t an elaborate April fools prank, this is a genuine species of dear, type Muntjac into Google and you will see pages of results.

Here is a picture of the deer.

Accelerate revisted

When the review for Accelerate was posted on this Blog, it was posted after one listen, which was a tad hasty. So this is why a revision was posted to see if the thoughts originally posted are still the same after a couple of more listens.

Well, is Accelerate still as good as it was after the original review? The answer to that is, yes it is still as good.

Man Sized Reef (not wealth, as it was incorrectly called on the original post) still kicks ass, Living Well Is The Best From Of Revenge still kicks ass and Supernatural Superserious is still as good.   

Video For Supernatural Superserious

A couple of tracks, have grown on me since the first play. One of song is Mr Richards, which deals with sexual abuse, but this reviewer has always had a habit of misunderstanding the meanings of songs, so it could be about folk dancing.  

Huston is a song that has made a bigger impact since the first listen, it begins with the political statement “if the storm doesn’t kill me/the government will” clearly referencing the bad handling of the Hurricane Katrina by the bush regime a couple of years ago.I’m Gonna DJ still packs a serious punch. It also has the some pretty cool lyrics. One example is the opening lyrics “death is pretty final/I’m collecting vinyl/I’m gonna dj at the end of the world/cause if heaven does exist/with a kicking play list/I don’t wanna miss it at the end of the world.”

 

I’m Gonna DJ – REM Dublin 01/07/07

Q magazine have said  “ rejoice they’ve struck gold again” which is an apt summation of what a lot of fans will that were let down by R.E.M’s output over the last decade or so.