Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie (1995)

MMPRIt’s kind of sucky that, though “Mighty Morphin” is a solid bit of silly escapism, it’s also a film that promises a lot, but never really amounts to anything, in the end. If you followed “Power Rangers” in the 90’s rabidly like I did, the series was overhauled again after the movie, and everything cool that was in this movie was never featured. Even the cool helmet headlights/scanners. Also, how horrible must it be to live in Angel Grove, eh? Does anyone else suspect this is a hell mouth or is it just me?

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Dragonworld (1994)

While Charles Band and Moonbeam films tend to be silly on occasion, they’re hardly ever bad. “Leapin Leprechauns” was goofy but fun and while “Dragon World” can be occasionally silly, it’s kind of a fun film in its own right. It’s a version of “King Kong” that doesn’t really opt for violence, so much as it tries to tell a story about friendship. Director Ted Nicolao obviously has little budget for the film, so when we see the film’s creature Yowler the Dragon, most times it’s only just his head and most of his neck. On long shots it’s claymation super imposed over live action footage.

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Song of the South (1946)

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It’s become well known that Disney has an immense history with creating some of the most racist characters of pop culture. There’s their noted hatred toward the Jewish religion, and even the infamous lyric to “Arabian Nights” in “Aladdin” that reads: “Where they cut off your ears if they don’t like your face,” and that film came out in 1992. But many of them are considered rather irrelevant when you bring up the name Uncle Remus.

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Bambi (1942)

Narrative wise, there isn’t much to “Bambi” and its story that garners a lot of subtext or undertones. Bambi is born, he learns about the world, his mom dies, he becomes a man, falls in love, and the end. For the rest of the world “Bambi” is a bonafide masterpiece, but objectively it’s a very stripped down and basic animated movie that feels so much more like an animation experiment than it does a movie.

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The Lion King (1994)

The-Lion-KingWhether Disney did or didn’t plagiarize Osamu Tezuka’s “Kimba the White Lion,” we’ll never truly know. What I do know for certain is that “The Lion King” is still one of the best cinematic experiences I’ve ever had, and my number two animated film of all time. It’s a bold mixture of 2D animation, and amazing CGI that combines to tell a rather adult and complex tale about revenge and destiny.

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Least Among Saints (2012) (DVD)

It’s not often indie dramas can compel and pull off a story so steeped in melodrama without being a cloying sickening glorified TV movie. Thankfully, Martin Papazian’s drama about two mentally unstable outcasts finding one another in the sadness manages to be a fantastic bittersweet drama filled with rich performances all around. Director Papazian manages to bring the film down to a level that doesn’t try for sap and sugary sweet, and keeps its characters grounded enough to where their conflicts and dilemmas feel realistic and warrant audiences empathies.

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Paddington Bear: The Complete Classic Series (DVD)

It’s Paddington Bear! Yeah, I don’t remember him either, but he’s now on DVD available from Mill Creek in his complete series where the often befuddled and reluctant sweet Bear finds himself an orphan lost at a train station who is soon taken in by a friendly family who helps him discover life and all sorts of misadventures where he bakes cakes, fishes, and discovers new foods.

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