“Ultimate Spider-Man” the comic, from what I remember, was an edgy, sleek and rather dramatic reboot of the entire Spider-Man universe. And odds are if you’re used to angsty stern Peter Parker from Sam Raimi’s films and the newest cinematic outing with Andrew Garfield, “Ultimate Spider-Man” the TV series might take some getting used to. In fact, “Ultimate Spider-Man” completely side steps most of the angst, drama, and melancholy that comes with the territory of Spider-Man’s world, and grabs a hold of the comedy by the throat and dives in head first.
Detention (2012)
Director Joseph Kahn basically creates the “Scott Pilgrim vs. The World” of slasher movies, a movie so meta and so self-aware that a subset of audience members may be convinced this movie is actually an affirmation of the fads this movie tackles. I imagine some folks will smile thinking “He really gets us” while Kahn is pointing and laughing at them in the background. Kahn seems to have little respect or regard for people in to fads and spends most of the movie skewering just about everyone in this odd vacuum of cyclical nostalgia and retro crap with a modern age lacking an actual identity of its own. “Detention” is a film that many movie fans will either love or hate. I often fell in to the category of despising it but also kept dabbling in the area of admiration for being so unpredictable and original.
Screaming in High Heels: The Rise & Fall of the Scream Queen Era (2012)
Like pretty much any documentary involving the video age and golden age of horror “Screaming in High Heels” is a love letter to the genre, and a requiem for a period of horror and filmmaking that is dead and buried. Granted there is the occasional Danielle Harris and Diora Baird, but the facet of the scream queen is defunct, thanks to a new wave of horror directors who feel they’re above such elements. Scream Queens were once upon a time a big lure for potential horror audiences to a new title. Director Jason Paul Collum sets the spotlight on three of the most beautiful women to ever rule the horror world, and examines the highs and lows of being a scream queen.
Sci-Fi Invasion: 50 Movie Set (DVD)
Do me a favor. If and when you buy “Sci-Fi Invasion – 50 Movie Set,” be sure to skip all of the features temporarily and pop in the DVD of “Future Hunters.” This Robert Patrick vehicle is perhaps one of the most inept and inadvertently hilarious movies ever made with a plot so convoluted and nonsensical it’s a pedigree above sucky and dabbles occasionally in to retarded. There’s post-apocalyptic nomads fighting over a spear of some kind, and Robert Patrick getting his ass kicked by literally everyone as the film’s inept protagonist who helps a young archaeologist find a way to keep the sacred spear from some evil collectors.
Blasting off with the "Hypernauts"
Like ninety percent of all my great pop culture memories, I stumbled upon “Hypernauts” one very early Saturday morning in 1996. When I say early, I mean five in the morning on ABC TV in the US, and I recall finding it to be a rather entertaining and exciting science fiction series, then. It also helped my excitement that one of the primary stars of this action adventure series was the lovely Heidi Lucas who, kids my age at the time would remember her as one of the stars of the Nickelodeon comedy “Salute your Shorts.” This series is a long departure for her from the “Meatballs” summer camp comedy, approaching a more dramatic and gritty science fiction show that could appeal to young audiences.
Albert & Juliet (2012)
I don’t know exactly what the intended meaning behind “Albert & Juliet” was originally, but the entire time I sat through Nic Barker’s gut wrenching short film, all I could think of was “This is a film about a mom and her child.” I mean it would be a bit overbearing in dramatic weight to feature a mom with a newborn baby being relentlessly tortured by everyone around her, but in a sense I felt as if “Albert & Juliet” was symbolic of a single mom and her baby.
Batman (1966)
So we learn in ten minutes of “Batman: The Movie” that Batman manages to store and keep handy a Bat Copter in a warehouse manned by a bunch of workers without actually giving away his identity as Bruce Wayne, office buildings oddly house a large group of scantily clad groupies all of whom will willingly stand on a launch pad to wave at Batman (so much for covert operations), and that Batman labels the ladder in his copter with “Bat Ladder.” Oh so this is the Bat Ladder! I often get it confused for the Hyena Ladder and the Panther Ladder. Good thing it’s labeled. Prudent. Also, even if a shark is robotic, it’s vulnerable to shark repellent.