The Bill Murray Stories: Life Lessons Learned from a Mythical Man (2018) [Cinepocalypse 2018]

Everyone who’s on the internet has heard of the Billy Murray stories, like the time he did the dishes at a house party, the time he rode a golf cart alone, or the time he stole a fry from a random stranger. These stories are numerous and sometimes seem hard to believe, which is why filmmaker Tommy Avallone went looking for the truth.

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Wolfman’s Got Nards – A Documentary (2018) [Cinepocalypse 2018]

Andre Gower’s “Wolfman’s Got Nards” is a fantastic, long overdue look at the making of, and legacy of “The Monster Squad,” one of the best horror movies of the eighties and one of my favorite films of all time. Anyone who knows me, knows I love “Monster Squad,” just love it. So “Wolfman’s Got Nards” was ninety minutes of pure bliss celebrating this unique horror comedy. “Wolfman’s Got Nards” is not only a testament to the importance of the video age, but how “The Monster Squad” turned in to a classic underdog tale.

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Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018)

It’s a shame that we’ve reached this milestone, but it warrants noting that “Jurassic World” is the first “Jurassic Park” movie to ever put me to sleep. I’m not saying “Fallen Kingdom” is an awful movie, it’s just that it’s not a very good one. If “Jurassic World” became a Saturday morning cartoon to entertain kids between bowls of cereal and bathroom breaks, “Fallen Kingdom” would be the pilot episode. It’s thin on narrative, but crowded with a ton of half baked, under developed characters, all of whom are so paper thin we barely get to know them, or engage ourselves with them all over again.

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The Bootleg Files: Let’s Go Collegiate

BOOTLEG FILES 642: “Let’s Go Collegiate” (1941 comedy with Frankie Darro, Keye Luke and Mantan Moreland).

LAST SEEN: It is on YouTube and other video sites.

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO: On public domain labels.

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS: A lapsed copyright doomed this to public domain hell.

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE: Wouldn’t it be nice if The Criterion Collection offered it as a digitally restored presentation?

During the 1940s, the low-rent Monogram Pictures reigned as the king of the second features. Back in the day, this studio churned out scores of B-movies that helped support the major studios’ prestige productions. (In that era, you didn’t just go to the theater and see a single flick, but you got a main feature plus a second feature and an assortment of newsreels, cartoons and short subjects.)

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The Incredibles 2 (2018)

“You can’t count on anyone, especially your heroes.”  – Syndrome

Leave it to Disney and Pixar. They have the stable of Marvel superheroes at their disposal and they approach “The Incredibles 2” not as a cash grab but a sincere look at the idea of superheroes in the modern era. Sure superheroes seem like a great idea in theory, but “The Incredibles 2” uses its concept as a means of exploring the world with superheroes and how it can have its definite upsides and crushing downsides. The first film had the concept of the idea of the meaning of being exceptional, our natural advantages, and how mediocrity has become the norm for society that only accepted stellar, once upon a time. “The Incredibles 2” takes it a bit further dissecting the need for heroes and whether self-reliance is the only thing we have in this world.

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