Released: March 2024

Director: Denis Villeneuve

Rated PG-13

Run Time:  166 Minutes

Distributor: Warner Bros.

Genre: Science Fiction

Cast:
Timothée Chalamet: Paul Atreides
Zendaya: Chani
Rebecca Ferguson: Lady Jessica
Javier Bardem: Stilgar
Josh Brolin: Gurney Halleck
Austin Butler: Feyd-Rautha
Florence Pugh: Princess Irulan
Christopher Walken: Emperor Shaddam IV
Dave Bautista: Beast Rabban
Stellan Skarsgård: Baron Vladimir Harkonnen

It’s not very often that I walk out of a movie theater and remain speechless for a particular period of time.  When I’m rendered speechless, it’s usually in awe of how terrible a movie is.  And when the credits start rolling, I’m up and out of the theater pretty quickly, it’s rare that I just sit in stunned silence at what I had just seen.  The last time that I remember that happening to me was Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, and that was over 20 years ago.  Tonight, I saw a movie that left me gob-smacked and stunned.  Not in awe of how bad it was, but in sheer amazement of the incredible science fiction epic that was Dune Part 2.  I’m going to attempt to put into words how absolutely incredible this experience was.  Let me say this first: See this movie in the biggest theater possible.  It deserves it.

This film starts immediately after Part One with Paul Atreides and his mother Jessica being led into the desert by a group of desert warriors known as the Fremen, led by the mysterious Stilgar.  Paul and Jessica attempt to pick up the pieces after the treacherous Harkonnens launch a sneak attack on the Atreides, obliterating their great House.  With help from the Fremen, Paul learns the ways of the Fremen.  He eventually reunites with his old friend and mentor Gurney Halleck, and with Paul’s emerging powers as a possible Kwisatz Haderack, they plan to overthrow the Emperor and destroy their enemies.  I haven’t read the book that this movie’s based, but I will be shortly, but the story of Dune and Paul Atreides’ rise to power is a fairly complex affair that involves a great deal of treachery, tragedy, and bloody warfare.  There’s also a great deal of religious and political themes at play here, but it’s handled in such a way that people who haven’t read the book can pick up on it.  It’s a powerful story that’s motivated by revenge, but it’s also a cautionary tale about the blind belief of messianic figures and the devastation that can bring.  There’s a reason why Frank Herbert’s novel is widely celebrated as a staple of science fiction literature.  It’s deep, thought-provoking, while also providing an extraordinary adventure.  Denis Villeneuve has managed to craft two truly outstanding movies that are going to set the new standard of epic science fiction for YEARS to come.

I thought Part 1 was an absolutely stunning film.  Part 2 takes to a whole new level.  When you talk about epic, it’s not just epic giant battles, but also grand and sweeping vistas.  The movie was shot on location in UAE, Jorand, Hungary, and Italy.  Yeah, there’s definitely a lot of CGI involved here, but they shot in real locations, which gives the movie its grand scale.  The cinematography is some of the best I’ve ever seen.  I have to bring up Geidi Prime, the home planet of House Harkonnen.  It’s gorgeous, yet bleak.  The planet orbits a black sun, so the film takes on a black-and-white feel during exterior shots, especially in the arena.  We actually get to see more of Geidi Prime than in any other adaptation of Dune.  It’s AMAZING what they’ve done.  Obviously, Arrakis is a wide-open and gorgeous desert that’s peppered with man-built structures as well incredible rock formations that conceal sietchs, which house the Fremen people.  Everything about this movie is spectacular.  The worm-riding sequences are…well…epic.  The way it’s done is so cool, especially when Paul calls a huge one and rides it for the first time.  The battle sequences are executed masterfully.  Again, epic doesn’t really begin to describe the scale of the action here.  The movie’s a slow-burn, but the bursts of action throughout make it worthwhile.  The main battle at Arrakeen towards the end of the movie is absolutely wild.

The performances in this movie are just incredible.  Florence Pugh as Princess Irulan gave the character a particular grace and old-fashioned elegance and intelligence that makes her somewhat suspicious.  Josh Brolin was great as Gurney, bringing a gritty determination and force to the role.  Javier Bardem just knocks it out of the park as Stilgar.  The character is a clearly a religious-type, so Javier gives that character the kind charisma that one would need from a leader.  Rebecca Ferguson just nails it as Jessica.  While the character was portrayed somewhat differently in previous adaptations, here, she’s a cold and calculating Reverend Mother who is also pregnant with Paul’s sister.  Austin Butler as Feyd-Rautha is brilliant casting.  Coming off his role as Elvis, Butler’s Feyd is a ruthless and completely psychotic individual with a lust for violence, not entirely unlike Heath Ledger’s Joker from The Dark Knight. Stellan Skarsgård, while nowhere near as bombastic as Kenneth McMillan’s floating fat man, is far more sinister and threatening, especially when certain truths are revealed.  Zendaya is phenomenal as Chani, Paul’s love interest in the film.  The character is fierce, intelligent, and an incredible fighter in her own right, and Zendaya brings all that and more.  She gives the character an emotional depth that was sorely lacking in the other movies.  But the real star of the shows is Timothée Chalamet as Paul Atreides.  While he was really good in Part 1, he shows that he’s more than capable of bringing the emotion, the gravitas, and the absolute grit and determination that the character requires.  There are scenes in this movie where I feel he is going to get a Best Actor nomination at the very least.  It’s been said that Mr. Chalamet is the next Daniel Day-Lewis.  I’m beginning to agree with that assessment.  He is an absolute FORCE to be reckoned with here and his chemistry with the people around him feels real.

The Dune movies may very well be Denis Villeneuve’s finest cinematic achievement.  Visually and narratively, these movies have come to define what it means to be a science fiction epic.  The music by Hans Zimmer is very striking, grand, yet feels like a character in and of itself.  Dune Parts 1 and 2 are going to define the genre for a long time.  They are Denis Villeneuve’s Lord of the Rings.  He’s currently writing the script for the next entry in the Dune Saga, called Dune Messiah, also based on the second novel from Frank Herbert.  I can almost guarantee you that it’ll get the greenlight when Denis decides to make it.  But it’s not the only Dune project in the works.  There’s supposedly a series based on the Bene Gesserit sisterhood that’s in the works.  It’s supposed to detail the work of the sisterhood around producing the Kwisatz Haderack, or super being, over the course of 10,000 years.  I don’t know if it’s still in the cards, but Dune Part 2’s success might actually allow it to happen.  As of this writing, Dune Part 2 is predicted to make about 70-80 million on its opening weekend, which is really good for a movie of this scale.  Will it be a billion dollar movie?  Probably not, but I would estimate a 600-700 million dollar windfall.  How this movie does overseas remains to be seen, but I expect it to do pretty well.  Everybody involved with the production of these movies should be proud of the work they’ve done.  It is a cinematic achievement that I haven’t seen the likes of in a very long time.  This is the kind of movie that cinema was invented for.  It is the reason why people go to the movies. It’s not Star Wars, so set your expectations about what kind of movie you’re seeing.  If you have an open mind, Dune is one of the most gratifying cinematic experiences you could have.  I haven’t mentioned any negatives, because there really aren’t any.  I guess you could say that I wanted at least 2 more hours out of it, but we can’t always have what we want.  What we got here is truly special.

Released: May 2004

Director: Phil Tippett

Run Time: 88 Minutes

Rated R

Distributor: Sony/Tristar Pictures

Cast:
Richard Burgi: Captain V.J. Dax
Ed Lauter: General Jack Gordon Shephard
Brenda Strong: Sgt. Dede Rake
Colleen Porch: Pvt. Lei Sahara
Lawrence Monoson: Lt. Pavlov Dill

One of the greatest things about director Paul Verhoeven is that regardless of what kind of movie he makes, you can almost guarantee that people will talk about it for years.  Why?  It’s a huge number of reasons.  It could be the over-the-top bloody violence.  It could be the not-so-subtle sexuality on display, or it could be the incredibly obvious social commentary that permeates each of his movies.  Regardless of which reason a movie of his is memorable, the fact that they are so memorable speaks volumes about his dedication to the craft.  This last weekend, I saw my Twitter feed explode with really ding-dong takes about how Starship Troopers isn’t a satire of fascism.  I’ll settle it right now: It IS satire.  Now, whether or not you like it as satire is a whole different can of beans.  For a movie that’s nearly 30 years old, people are still divided over it.  Personally, I loved the hell out of it, and I’ve read the book it’s LOOSELY based on.  It wasn’t a super successful movie, but for some reason, Sony decided to start doing sequels to the movie.  We now have three live-action films and two animated ones.  All of which are canonical to the original 1997 picture.  20 years ago, in 2004, we got our first direct-to-video sequel in Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation.

Set sometime after the Terran Federation captured a brain bug on the distant planet P, we see a platoon of Mobile Infantry troopers trying to escape the Arachnids when they reach an abandoned outpost.  Taking cover from the bugs and the storm, the troopers, led by psychic Lt. Dill, discover that there is one lone occupant of the outpost: a former Federation officer named Dax.  After being released by Pvt. Sahara, Dax helps secure the building when a handful of lost troopers, including General Jack Shephard show up.  Things start taking a turn for the strange when these new troopers start behaving very strangely.  It turns out that these troopers are host for a new kind of bug intent on infiltrating the Federation at the highest levels.  It’s very clear from the film’s budget of 7 million dollars, that Starship Troopers 2 was never going to match the original movie in any capacity.  Story-wise, this is a far more contained film than the sprawling space soap opera that was Verhoeven’s movie.  Instead, this movie is set pretty much in a single location: An abandoned outpost on the fringes of Federation space.  That alone makes this a very different kind of movie.  This is more of a horror movie than a big sci-fi epic spectacle.  It actually has more in common with movies like The Thing and Alien.  Now, I’m not saying it’s as good as those movies.  Far from it.  It’s not even in the same league.

When I first heard that a sequel to Starship Troopers was made, I was excited.  I thought I was going to get more of the great action sequences that peppered Verhoeven’s original film.  Nope.  It certainly had action, but it wasn’t even close to being what the first movie was, and that pissed me off.  I remember distinctly HATING this movie when I first saw it.  From the acting to the CGI, it was an abominable mess.  Now, having seen it nearly 20 years after its release, do I still hate it?  No.  Not remotely.  I’m not saying it’s a good movie.  It isn’t it.  Between the obvious budget limitations and the fact that this was the directorial debut of creature effects guru Phil Tippett, Hero of the Federation has a lot going against it.  This is not a grand sci-fi spectacle.  This is a horror movie, and on that level…it kind of works.  This is a pretty gory movie, and most of the blood and guts are practical, which is a HUGE plus in my book.  It’s also pretty atmospheric.  The level of claustrophobia is high.  Again: more points.

Everything else about the movie is…questionable.  The CGI isn’t the worst I’ve seen, but it’s still not very impressive, when you can see it.  There’s another bad mark: The cinematography is AWFUL.  I get that this is a very different kind of movie than the first, but the film is so poorly shot, you can barely make out anything that happens.  It’s a dark movie…literally.  The set designs are fine as it’s all on stage.  But the green-screen effects are…nasty, and not in a good way.  The acting is also not very good.  In fact, the only person that returned to the franchise was Brenda Strong, who played Captain Deladier in the previous movie.  Here, she plays Sgt. Rake, a tough-as-nails, cigar-munching squad leader.  I thought she did just fine.  The other acting highlight is Richard Burgi as Captain Dax.  I think he knew exactly what kind of movie he was in, because he chews the scenery like its nobody’s business.  Everyone else, though is weak, and so are the characters.  Lawrence Monoson plays the psychic Lt. Dill, who comes across as a bit of a…dill.  Colleen Porch is supposed to play our resident hero, Pvt. Sahara, but she just wasn’t convincing.

The movie was so low-budget they couldn’t even afford blanks for the guns, so instead they used flashing lights to indicate a burst.  That’s great, if you’re going up against someone who has epilepsy, but giant bugs?  I don’t actually blame Phil Tippett entirely for this mess.  He’s an award-winning visual effects artist that’s worked on some of the biggest movies that Hollywood has made.  This movie was clearly intended to be what it ended up being, so in that regard, it works.  It really does.  But as a sequel to Starship Troopers, it sucks.  For fans of the original movie, there were certain expectations that Hero of the Federation was simply never going to deliver, and when I first saw it, I was devastated at what I was seeing.  20 years later, I now understand what the intent was, and I think it was decent enough.  Also, the whole propaganda angle of the original film was mostly removed, so the movie played it straight.  It’s a vastly different kind of movie, but I don’t hate it as much as I used to.  Is it a good movie?  Not by a long shot.  It’s got a lot of problems from a technical and narrative perspective, but I think it’s fun in its own way.

Released: August 2012(United States)

Director: M.J. Bassett(As Michael J. Bassett)

Rated R

Run Time: 104 Minutes

Distributor: Anchor Bay

Genre: Action/Fantasy

Cast:
James Purefoy: Solomon Kane
Max Von Sydow: Josiah Kane
Rachel Hurd-Wood: Meredith Crawthorn
Pete Postlethwaite: William Crawthorn

Conan: The Barbarian is widely regarded as one of the best fantasy films of the 80s, and why not?  It was an epic revenge story starring Arnold Schwarzenegger that put him on the map.  It also a great cast including Sandahl Bergman in her first real role as Valeria; Max Von Sydow as King Osric, and the legendary James Earl Jones as the iconic Thulsa Doom.  Arnold would go on to star in movies like The Terminator, which was his next project.  There are die-hard fans of Robert E. Howard’s original stories that don’t care for the movie, because it wasn’t in line with who and what the wanted the Cimmerian to be.  Still, the movie got a sequel, The Destroyer, and a television series as well as multiple comic book adaptations through Marvel, and a reboot starring Jason Momoa.  But Conan wasn’t the only character that was the creation of Howard’s.  He created other characters like Kull(who also got a movie starring Kevin Sorbo).  But for this review, I’m tackling Solomon Kane.

Solomon Kane begins in the year 1600, when privateer captain Solomon Kane lays siege to an Ottoman fortress.  Killing his way to the throne room, he encounters the Devil’s Reaper, who has come to claim his soul for all the evil that he’s committed.  Escaping the demon, Kane ends up at a monastery, swearing off his life of violence for a more peaceful existence.  A year later, he’s forced to leave to find his own way to redemption when he crosses paths with a Puritan family, the Crawthorns, a kindly family on their way to the New World.  One night, they are attacked and the young woman, Meredith is kidnapped.  Forced to return to violence, Kane hunts and kills his way through the countryside to find and rescue Meredith, not realizing there are more sinister forces at work.  This is actually a very interesting origin story for one of Howard’s more obscure “heroes.”  I’ve read a bunch of the short stories, and there really isn’t a whole lot of exploration of Kane’s past.  You get a few hints here and there that he committed some horrendous acts of violence, and is searching for some kind of redemption by fighting evil, but that’s it.  What this movie does, and I love it for this, is that it doesn’t directly adapt anything from the stories, does its own thing, but it remains mostly faithful to Howard’s vision.  At least, in my opinion.  It’s a surprisingly good story.

Before I go any further, I want to discuss the film’s release.  The movie was completed in 2008 and was released world-wide in 2009…except for North America, due to legal reasons.  It would eventually get released on DVD and Blu-Ray in 2012.  I don’t know the ins and outs of what the legal issues where that prevented the film’s release in North America, but I can tell you this: Solomon Kane needed a theatrical release.  In my opinion, it’s the best adaptation of a Robert E. Howard character since the original Conan.  First off, let’s talk about the casting: Absolutely phenomenal.  James Purefoy as Kane is one of the best castings of the last 20 years.  He has the look, the charisma, and the physicality to bring The Puritan to life.  Pete Postlethwaite plays William Crawthorn, the patriarch of a West-bound family.  He’s got this warmth and gravitas that just permeates the screen every second that he’s in front of the camera.  Alice Krige is also really good, despite her limited run time.  Max Von Sydow brings some real legitimacy as Josiah, Solomon’s father.  It kind of makes sense to cast HIM, because he was in Conan: The Barbarian.  Seriously, though, Sydow could do no wrong.  He was one of the great actors of his generation.  Again, not much screen time, but the man had presence.  The acting overall, is pretty good, but there really isn’t much character development aside from Kane.

This movie is beautifully shot.  It’s beautifully ugly, I should say.  The cinematography is great, but the world of Solomon Kane isn’t exactly sunflowers and dandelions.  No, this is a very dark world that’s suffering through disease and bandits and demonic forces.  So, the color palate is very…subdued and grey.  It’s also very wet and muddy.  It’s an ugly reality that Kane inhabits.  You could definitely tell that this was not an easy shoot.  The action sequences are not just competent, but they’re actually really solid, especially the opening siege as well as Kane’s slaughtering of the bandits that kidnapped Meredith.  The sword-fighting, while not as memorable as something like The Mask of Zorro, is well-staged, with Kane using a rapier, a dirk, and two flintlock pistols.  There is definitely CGI used in the movie, and it’s not particularly great, but it gets the job done, but for the most part, it’s all done for real.  The stunt-work is phenomenal with Purefoy doing a lot of his stunts and fighting.  It’s a fairly exciting movie to watch, but the tone is definitely very serious and dark, and that’s just not going to work for a lot of people.  I love the hell out of it, though.

It’s hard to judge how well Solomon Kane should’ve done, because it’s based on a character that the audience member has no idea exists.  For Robert E. Howard fans, it was either a joy to see this character brought to life, or it was an abomination.  But the overall reaction to the film was surprisingly not overly negative.  It wasn’t going to win awards or anything, but there were a number of outlets that actually enjoyed the film.  It’s flawed, to be sure, but I think this movie could’ve done better with better marketing and an actual release in North America when it was first released.  When I first heard of the movie, I was excited, but I wasn’t able to see the film until it Blu-Ray 4 years later.  It’s a solid action adventure film with really strong performances from most of its cast, and decent action sequences that rival some of the stuff that we see today.  Also, the music by Klaus Badelt is pretty epic.  If you liked Conan: The Barbarian, you might actually find something here to enjoy.  It’s not the best movie of its kind, but I think it’s good enough on its own merits.  Highly recommended.

Released: July 1985

Director: Richard Fleischer

Rated PG-13

Run Time: 89 Minutes

Distributor: Warner Bros.

Genre: Fantasy

Cast:
Arnold Schwarzenegger: Kalidor
Brigitte Nielson: Red Sonja
Sandahl Bergman: Queen Gedren
Ernie Reyes, Jr.: Prince Tarn
Paul Smith: Falcon
Ronald Lacey: Ikol

This may come as a huge shock to many of you, but I really like bad movies.  When you look at my movie collection, you might see that I have more bad movies than good ones, and you would probably be correct.  There is a word to use describe the bad movies that I love so much: Guilty pleasures.  But that begs the question: If I love these kinds of movies so much, should I really feel guilty about it?  Well, all I know is that I don’t feel guilty at all.  Especially when it comes to 80’s fantasy movies like Krull, Dragonslayer, or the Conan movies.  I LOVE that stuff.  I grew up on it.  The whole sword-and-sorcery aspect of the fantasy genre can be truly epic when it’s done right.  When it’s not, you end up with something like Red Sonja.  It’s widely regarded as one of the worst movies to come out of the 80’s, and for good reason.  Yet, for all it’s problems, I grew up loving it.  This movie is what I define as a “guilty pleasure.”

Red Sonja is set in the fictional age of Hyboria, same universe as Conan.  The film begins when a cult of priestesses are attempting to destroy the Talisman, an ancient object of immense power, before it destroys the world.  But, they’re interrupted when the evil queen Gedren shows up.  Most of the priestesses are slaughtered and the Talisman is stolen.  One priestess manages to get away, but is mortally wounded when a man named Kalidor finds her.  She tells him to find her sister, Sonja.  Sonja is found training with a master swordsman when she learns that her’s dying wish is that Sonja find and destroy the Talisman before it wreaks havoc across the land.  Along the way, she discovers that a young prince, Tarn and his guardian Falcon, are the only survivors of Gedren’s assault on their kingdom.  Believe it or not, Sonja’s story isn’t awful, but it does feel like there’s too much going on.  You’ve got Sonja, who is out for revenge against Gedren, who murdered her family.  You’ve got Kalidor, a lord whose duty was to see the Talisman destroyed.  You’ve got Gedren, who we learn literally next to nothing about except that she’s evil and power-hungry.  Gee, haven’t heard that one before.  There’s a lot going on, but there’s not enough information to really connect the audience with this world.  And at 90 minutes, there isn’t a whole lot of room for the characters to really develop.

The story itself really isn’t the biggest issue this movie’s got.  First of all, let’s talk about the casting.  I’ve yet to see a movie that is so miscast as this one.  The only one that manages to somewhat fit into this world is Arnold Schwarzenegger as Kalidor.  I think he knew he was going to be in a bad movie, so he had fun with it, and you can tell.  Sandahl Bergman, who had her breakout performance in Conan: The Barbarian as Valeria, doesn’t strike me as menacing as Gedren should be.  Gedren is a woman that should be incredibly intimidating, not just from a personality standpoint, but from a physicality level as well.  I just don’t believe Bergman as a sociopathic ruler.  I don’t necessarily think it’s HER fault, entirely.  Now, Ernie Reyes, Jr. as Prince Tarn:  Again, not his fault with what he was given.  His character was written as this spoiled, arrogant little brat that somehow manages to get the most character development in the movie.  That said, even as a youngster, Ernie could handle the physicality, as he’s a martial artist.  The real standout, in the wrong way, is of course, Brigitte Nielson as Sonja.  I get why she was hired.  She was tall and absolutely stunning.  But good god, she could not act.  Her performance was all over the place, and most of it was wooden.  Then it would go over-the-top.  I think she handled the physicality better than Bergman could, but Bergman was clearly the better performer.  Then you have character actors like Ronald Lacey and Pat Roach show up basically to collect a paycheck.

As far as the action goes, it’s pretty bog-standard when it comes to the sword-play.  It’s nothing that no one saw before, and some of the choreography is outright ridiculous.  Granted, Schwarzenegger handles it with ease, and to a certain extent, so does Nielson.  But you could absolutely tell that Sandahl Bergman was NOT comfortable wielding a sword of that size.  She didn’t really have the physical build for a weapon like that.  She would’ve been better off with a smaller sword like in Conan: The Barbarian.  For all the gripes that I have with Ernie Reyes’ performance, he could move, even at such an early age.  He would really come into his own in the 90s as a stuntman and martial arts actor.  It’s just a shame that he never really got the break that I think should have.  Red Sonja was definitely not the best start for his career.  The visual effects were mostly weak, except for the finale, which involved an exploding castle, which was pretty damn cool, as was the monster in the cave.  But some of the miniature work was weak.  We also never got to see the full extent of the Talisman’s power, just from a distance, and meh.  The set designs were pretty good, and the costumes were pretty interesting.  But the late Ennio Morricone’s rousing score was better than what this movie deserved.  The score was epic.

Red Sonja was based off of the Marvel character of the same name from 1973, which was partially inspired by Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories.  I’ve never read the comics, but I’m pretty sure that this movie really didn’t do them justice.  It’s hard to say what went wrong here.  The dialogue is awful, and the direction by Richard Fleischer was painfully inconsistent, which is weird, because I actually enjoyed Conan: The Destroyer, which came out the previous year.  This movie is a mess, but it’s a glorious mess that I honestly enjoy.  It’s not boring and it doesn’t really overstay its welcome at 90 minutes.  Let’s be honest here, I’ve seen much worse than this.  Arnold Schwarzenegger had gone on record saying that this movie was the worst that he’s ever made…and I can’t disagree.  It IS a bad movie, and certainly one of the worst fantasy films of the 80s.  BUT: I can’t bring myself to hate it.  I grew up as a kid watching it and being completely entertained by it.  I feel that this movie falls under the “so bad, it’s good” category.  I would love to see Shout Factory or Vinegar Syndrome pick up the rights to this movie and give us some new interviews about the film and the how’s and why’s of what went wrong.  Obviously, Richard Fleischer wouldn’t be a part of it because he passed away in 2006.  So, yeah, I’m still having fun with this gloriously bad movie from my childhood.