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Megaforce

By Adam Lippe

The initial financial failure of Disney’s Tron (directed by Steven Lisberger) was attributed to the enormous expectations based on the egregious expense of the project because of the complicated computer effects. Tron was simplistic story-wise, and the replication of the feel of a video game would become commonplace not long after its 1982 release. The […]

Bullet in the Head

By Adam Lippe

A filmmaker like Larry Clark puts a viewer in a tough spot. When watching a movie like Kids, Bully, or Wassup Rockers, are we to believe that Clark has perfectly portrayed the aimlessness and idiocy of bored, wayward teenagers in search of a good time? Or is Clark just lazy himself, and he simply hasn’t […]

I Come With the Rain

By Adam Lippe

It’s been said, by a much wiser man than I, that Charles Bronson looked like Mr. Potato Head. This was especially true in his later years in front of the camera, mailing it in while working with J. Lee Thompson and Michael Winner and Cannon Films in the 1980s on such sleazy and workmanlike films […]

Shaolin Soccer

By Adam Lippe

In 1997, when ownership of Hong Kong was returned to China from the United Kingdom, more than a transfer of land took place. Many filmmakers and actors, who sensed the upcoming political change, had already left to pursue careers in the US where they anticipated they would have more freedom to make the kinds of […]

Naked Killer

By Adam Lippe

The Hong Kong equivalent of Jerry Bruckheimer, writer/producer/director Wong Jing has been cashing in on trends for so many years, it’s no wonder that his movies are completely dated within a year. Watching films like City Hunter, where Jackie Chan dresses up as every character from the Street Fighter 2 video game, or the inane […]

Full Contact

By Adam Lippe

The combination of the transfer of Hong Kong back into the hands of the Chinese and the Chow Yun-Fat/John Woo films like The Killer and Hard Boiled caused Hollywood to take notice of these foreign directors and actors wanting to cross over and establish themselves in a new venue. Producer Moshe Diamant, who had specialized […]

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Roadracers

By Adam Lippe

Whenever there’s a genre parody or ode to a specific era of films, such as Black Dynamite’s mocking of Blaxploitation films or Quentin Tarantino’s Death Proof, the second half of Grindhouse, the danger is that the film might fall into the trap of either being condescending without any particular insight, or so faithful that it becomes the very flawed thing it is emulating.

Black Dynamite has nothing new to say about Blaxploitation films, it just does a decent job of copying what an inept [...]

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Featured Quote (written by me)

On Cold Fish:

Though the 16 year old me described the 1994 weepie Angie, starring Geena Davis as a Brooklyn mother raising her new baby alone, as “maudlin and melodramatic,” Roger Ebert, during his TV review, referring to the multitude of soap-operaish problems piling up on the titular character, suggested that it was only in Hollywood where Angie would get a happy ending. “If they made this movie in France, Angie would have shot herself.”

Well Cold Fish was made in Japan, where Angie would have shot herself and that would have been the happy ending.