Letterboxd — Your life in film

Surprisingly dark for a "family" flick, either you'll be on board for Fred's slapstick stupidity - brought to life by the oft-brilliant Rik Mayall - or you'll find it grating.

As obvious as the film's message can be - it practically bludgeons you over the head with it - it's still a frequently amusing picture with an interesting sense of surreal style from Dutch director Ante de Jong.

Christopher Coppola over-directs this lukewarm vampire picture that houses some interesting ideas, but mostly just distracts with too many characters and too many actors doing pretty dire line-readings of already bad dialogue. Some of the violence and acting is worth a laugh, but Dracula's Widow doesn't quite rise up to so-bad-it's-great territory - instead existing as a so-bad-it's-just-not-that-good flick.

A great understated thriller/drama with two fantastic performances from Kathy Baker and Morgan Freeman - who goes from slick and cool to terrifying at the drop of a hat. Christopher Reeve puts in some rock-solid work as the lead - a reporter with dubious ethics.

Reeve famously attempted to get this project started for a number of years, before finally agreeing to make Superman IV for Cannon - but only if they financed Street Smart.

The specs on Orange County are pretty promising: Jack Black and Colin Hanks fronting a stacked cast of seasoned professional funny people, script from Mike White, and directed by Zero Effect's Jake Kasdan.

It ends up being fairly diverting comedy, but it never quite builds up enough momentum to be anything more. It also brings diminishing returns, getting less and less clever and more and more predictable as time passes.

Mama could have been a much better film than it is. It has an interesting story, it's just executed in a way that belittles the impact it could have had. And, because this is a horror movie made recently, of course it completely falls apart at the end.

Reminded me a little bit of Sinister, in that way.

I didn't hate The Great Gatsby, and I didn't really like it either. It didn't need to be in 3D - though it looks nice enough - and it features a lot of actors I very much enjoy putting in solid work. I felt like the early scenes didn't fit together the way they should have, and that the over-the-top Baz-ness of it all betrayed the depth of the source material. I also found the anachronistic use of music to be off-kilter in a few scenes.

The Great Gatsby was basically a thing that happened in front of me for two and a half hours.

Puns galore in this early 90s Universal slasher effort that benefits from a go-for-broke performance in the titular role and just the right amount of cartoonish direction - dig that "from the mouth" shot. Not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but it's a lot more fun than it has any right to be.

I had some minor issues with Iron Man 3 - mostly that the story is treated as fairly featherweight while still feeling overcrowded, leaving little to really 'latch on' to at times. I also had a few problems with The Mandarin. Otherwise the action was top-notch and exhilarating - every major action scene had me wondering how they would top it with the next... and then Shane Black would do just that.

What a ridiculously terrible and hilarious movie. Featuring Pauly Shore in one of his earlier roles.

Ted Nicolaou directs this silly and entertaining creature feature goof for Charles Band's Empire Pictures. Gerrit Graham, Diane Franklin, Jon Gries and Jennifer Richards all put in gloriously unhinged cartoon-inspired performances, spitting out intentionally cheese-ball dialogue and one-liners.

Terrorvision seems to work solely because of how committed everyone - Ted Nicolaou included - is to the material. It also has a pretty wicked sense of humour. There's a fair amount of sincerity and love of the genre beneath all the lame gags and neon-lighting. I was pleasantly surprised at how well Terrorvision held up over the years.