Chris Palko first stormed onto the underground hip-hop scene as Cage with “Agent Orange,†a Clockwork Orange-sampling single from his 2002 album, Movies For the Blind. His free associative film column pays tribute to that record and runs on our daily site every Monday.
Oh no, it’s the ’80s again! I got so stoned before going to see Hot Tub Time Machine that I accidentally walked into Our Family Wedding and threw up on myself. I saw Forest Whitaker, assumed it was Repo Men, and since I was early, I decided to stay for a few scenes. (I saw this last week and liked it…sort of.)
When the un-sweaty Forest didn’t start killing, I knew I was in trouble, so I disrobed and walked into Hot Tub Time Machine wearing nothing but a towel. To my surprise, the entire theater got the same swinger’s memo I did, and everyone was scantily clad and ready. I know this movie didn’t get the greatest reviews and earned like $13 million in its opening weekend but I laughed a lot. Fuck the critics, and fuck me too, this movie is funny. Craig Robinson owns in this film. John Cusack must have thought he was in another one of his awesome dramas, though. It’s a shame–he was such a great comedic actor. Remember Better Off Dead? Well, this movie hits that vibe hard, and thankfully, Chevy Chase doesn’t suck the comedy completely out of it.
It helps that Robb Corddry’s hilarious. In one scene (SPOLIER ALERT), his son walks in on him fucking his mom before he’s born and disappears so he has to keep fucking her to bring his son back. That’s fucking Back To The Future funny. ★★★
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My friend Alex Pardee–a sick artist from San Francisco–was in the city on business last week, so we decided to go see something. There wasn’t anything disgusting playing, so we went to see How To Train Your Dragon in 3-D. We were so put off by the lack of 3-D in Alice In Wonderland that we wanted to make sure there was nothing wrong with us–that 3-D would in fact work on our eyes. That is the only reason we went to see this movie.
If you’re waiting for me to trash this film like the 8 year old I threw my monster-sized diet Coke on…keep waiting. I loved this movie; loved dragons that don’t kill and are like dogs that just want fish and to be loved. Fuck yes, there is 3-D in this movie. I wasn’t bored once. I stood and cheered with some kid’s mom for Toothless the stealth bomber dragon as he soared through the Viking sky. Alex was so jubilant he screamed out, “I wanna fuck that dragon’s fiery mouth!” and was escorted out. Some know-it-all 5 year old also pointed out, “Look mommy, a dragon.” No shit, asshole. It’s called How To Train Your Dragon and it’s better than Alice In Wonderland. ★★★★
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In honor of Hot Tub Time Machine I did a little time traveling of my own and went back to 1982–back when I was molested by a babysitter. A female babysitter, assholes. I noticed a movie starring Kristy McNichol on the television. The film is called White Dog and it was banned shortly after its release. Why was it banned? It’s a movie about a hot young pouty McNichol nursing a white German shepherd back to health, only to discover the dog was trained to attack black people. This movie came out a year before Cujo (which is far better), but White Dog is funnier than flinging dog shit on a racist. Yes, it’s one of those movie–a WTF-were-thinking-with-this-shit kind of thing.
Now, I know what you’re thinking: they bit Cujo. Wrong! This is based on a novel that was written in 1970. Cujo was written more than a decade later! So Steven King probably bit White Dog. (For all you non-street savvy people, “bit” means copied.) Whether you’re black or white, you should see this movie. Now that I think about it, my babysitter looked an awful lot like Kristy McNichol. ★★★
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Survival Of The Dead? How about The Survival Of George Romero, as we hunt and kill him so he stops doing these goddamn movies?
Zombies that learn and get smarter? Don’t you mean remember, George? They knew how to do all this stuff that they are “learning” to do already. And didn’t you do this three zombie films ago with Land Of The Dead? Zombies that learn; I mean remember. Is it me or is George Romero the worst at making films in a genre he created? He was late revisiting the genre and I just feel sad for George, but more importantly I feel sad for zombie fans. There is some good gore in this movie, but it just feels like an old crusty zombie made it. Wait for it… ★1/2
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IN SEARCH OF THE GRAND GUIGNOL:
First things first: REC 2 is about demons, not zombies, but what the fuck ever. This might be better than the first REC, which was made into a shitty American movie called Quarantine. Thank god Quarantine changed REC around so much they can’t remake REC 2. If you haven’t seen either of these, watch them both. If you disagree with me, go suck a demon’s dick, because you’re wrong. For all you teen readers new to the horror genre, REC 2 is “sick,” “tits” and “awesome.” It’s actually a little scary and the story is great! Even the ending is good. And it has subtitles, so you know it’s better than say, Paranormal, which ate out a poltergeist’s asshole. ★★★★1/2
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Back in February, a horror movie challenge was brought to my attention–one involving Phoonk 2, a sequel to a film I hadn’t heard of. Filmmaker Ram Gopal Varma asked daring souls to sit in a theater alone and watch this sequel for 10K. I was so dumbfounded by such a challenge, I had to watch the first Phoonk to prepare for this fear fest. After viewing it, I can tell you I doubt any person can sit through Phoonk 2 for any amount of money if it’s as bad as Phoonk. This is Bollywood’s Exorcist, but not scary; not even for a second. Think lots of evil laughs and really bad demonic voices–more of a psychological thriller than horror. Twilight is scarier than this, and cooler.
In short, Phoonk you, Ram Gopal Varma. ☆ (this one’s not even worth a full star)
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SICK PICK:
Because I was so appalled at that Phoonk nonsense I had to watch something to get that shit out of my head and I found just the film. It’s called The Entity. This gem from 1983 is about a horny poltergeist that torments a young woman by repeatedly beating and raping her with ghost dwarves or something. It even makes a cuckold of her boyfriend in front of him. This might sound like a campy horror porno, but trust me it’s brutal and with no gore. I still can’t figure out how they made her breasts look like an invisible hand squeezed it. Any horror movie where a ghost says, “Welcome home cunt” is a must-see in my book. ★★★★
