Announcements and a Double Header Review

Announcements:

Welcome back Sporefans. I've got a couple of announcements to make and then we have not one, but two reviews. First off I have to tell all my loyal readers that I'm heading back to college to finish up my degree. While this means that my writing will improve and hopefully bring even more entertainment to my readers, it also means that I might miss a week or two here and there. Sorry Sporefans, but you don't pay me enough to make this my full time job.

Actually, you don't pay me at all.

Second announcement is the new tag line for the website. Check the top of the site to see our new slogan.

Third, I'm holding a contest. Its time to replace the Spored to Death logo under my profile. I'm holding an open contest to all my readers with artistic talent. Or crayons, I don't care. The contest is to design the new Spored to Death publishing logo. There are only a few criteria for this. It must be original artwork, it must have some sort of mushroom or fungus theme, and it would be preferable if it were somewhat cute. The winner will receive a "Minion" T-Shirt. The contest will run until I get a winner or, after no one enters I get off my butt and make a logo myself.

Which means you have lots of time.

And now for the big announcement. While there will be no review next week, the week between Christmas and New Years, the first review of January will be a MAJOR review. I've been holding out on you Sporefans for some time now. You see, I have a movie so vile, puerile and incredibly awful that even I cringe at the thought of watching it in its entirety.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the first Spored to Death Publishing review for 2007 will be "The Malibu Beach Vampires".

Don't miss this review Sporefans, as it will most undoubtedly leave me a broken and twisted shell of my former self, and as we all know: that's entertainment.

And now for this weeks reviews...


Aliens Gone Wild:

First up we have a little film called "Aliens Gone Wild". I ordered this little gem from our local cable company and paid my $5 to see what all the fuss was about. You've got to love On-Demand: they charge you $5, don't give you a preview, and you have to believe whatever they type in as an accurate description of the movie you're trying to order. Which means even if they're lying through their teeth you've already paid your $5. Now, I'm not saying that my cable company is run by a bunch of incompetent liars.

Wait a minute, that's exactly what I'm saying.

The movie led me to believe that I was ordering something of the caliber of a Naked Gun or Scary Movie picture: full of big name stars doing bit parts around a mediochre comedy. But what I actually got was a montage of clips of other movies which had been sewn together and slapped in a can. I'm sorry, but when I order a movie called "Aliens Gone Wild" I expect to see a bunch of drunk grey aliens lifting up their spacesuits and exposing their chests only to explode (or is it implode?) due to the dreaded vacuum of space. This movie lacked both alien boobs and explosions (implosions?) in deep space, so its a huge letdown in my book.

Also there was no plot in this movie, just the best of the worst movies ever produced by some movie company that I've probably never heard of and that probably never went anywhere. While I did find this "best of the worst" compilation entertaining, it was pretty disappointing when you consider what I thought I was getting. The list of stars even included Demi Moore and George Takei. I saw Demi Moore somewhere in a clip of the movie "Parasite" but George Takei was no where to be found. I refuse to believe that the one chubby Asian guy I saw piloting a giant robot scorpion was George Takei, no matter what was listed on the cable company's credits.















She went from this to doing "Ghost". Demi, what were you thinking? Why would you ever agree to be in "Ghost"? Why, Demi? WHY?!?!


On a side note, I should send Mr. Takei my copy of "Dark Heritage". He may appreciate it more than I do. You know what I mean.

Even more frustrating is the fact that because "Aliens Gone Wild" isn't a movie in the traditional sense, it has no listing on IMDB. So even if someone were entertained enough by a clip to seek out one of the movies they saw, they might not be able to find the full version of the film. Luckily the publishing staff and I were able to pick out some scenes from "Dollman" and the "Trancers" series. This lack of proper credentials really steams my Zoosporic flagellum! But rest assured Sporefans, that I will track down these movies, so I can present their rotten goodness to you all.

One particular clip stands out among the rest. One of the six movies in the "Trancers" series (the fourth movie I believe) takes place in an alternate reality that has not advanced past ye olde medieval times. The Main Character Jack Deth (Tim Thomerson) has been transported to this reality to fight the evil "Trancers", who are life force stealing vampires from the future. Unfortunately Jack's ray gun has been damaged, leaving Jack defenseless against the sword wielding Trancers and their human lackeys.














Jack Deth smokes because smoking is cool. You'd smoke too if you did 5 of the 6 movies in the Transer series. Because that would make you cool.


In one of the final scenes of the movie, Jack finally gets his ray gun working and zaps the evil Count who sought to invade Jack's home dimension or some other such nonsense. The Count's son, who has joined the good guys arrives to watch his father... well... just kind of stand there and glow. Realising that this is the end, the son pleads "Forgive me father!" With his dying breath, the Count exclaims viciously "I have no son!".Then, using advanced graphical techniques developed in the era of "Bewitched", "I Dream of Genie" and "Star Trek", the Count suddenly disappears into oblivion, right after disowning his offspring.

I had to stop laughing because if I didn't I'd either have passed out or peed myself. This was the funniest thing's I've seen in years. So Trancer's definitely gets put on the "To Review" list here at Spored to Death Publishing.


House of Blood:

House of Blood is the latest film from director/writer/actor/special effects supervisor Olaf Ittenbach. When I first saw the name Olaf Ittenbach, I knew that it sounded familiar, but I couldn't quite place the name. Then I remembered that Olaf was the writer/director for the 2001 stinker "Legion of the Dead". If I've never mentioned Olaf Ittenbach before, there's probably a good reason. Here's a good reason: "Legion of the Dead" was painfully bad. I haven't reviewed Legion because I saw it well before I began doing my reviews, but rest assured that one day it will receive the thrashing it deserves.

Lets move on to slightly greener pastures. "House of Blood" is not all that bad. Its a movie about a group of convicts who escape from a prison transport when it collides with a car. The convicts take the driver as a hostage and soon discover that he is a doctor, which is fortunate because one of them was unlucky enough to take a bullet in the arm. They wander about the woods of Washington trying to cross the border into Canada when they happen upon a cabin. The cabin is occupied by a family of backwards folk who look like they belong in the fjords of Scandinavia or some such place. The convicts take over the cabin, brandishing the firearms that they pilfered from the transport, giving the doctor time to amputate the arm of the prisoner who was shot.

Then, everyone turns into vampires.

This story sounds very familiar to me, as if I've seen or heard it somewhere before. Oh, wait. I know! This is the plot of "From Dusk till Dawn" only it takes place on the Canadian-US border and not just past the US-Mexico border. Also, all the things that made "From Dusk till Dawn" cool are completely missing in the Ittenbach translation.

So after the doctor, our protagonist, escapes from the jaws of the bloodthirsty undead, he is captured by the police. The police decide to take the good doctor into custody as a murder suspect on a collection of evidence that an 8 year old child could refute in a court of law. It is at this point that B-movie legend Jurgen Prochnow enters as a hard nosed cop asking the doctor some tough questions. Jurgen delivers his lines like a pro, collects his check and exits stage left for greener pastures. Lets hope that Mr. Prochnow's check doesn't bounce.

Jurger Prochnow asks Christopher Kriesa some tough questions. Questions like, "Where's my money?" and "When's Olaf's check gonna clear?" I wouldn't wanna be Kriesa right now.

So this gets us about 40 or so minutes into the movie. But wait! This movie is scheduled to run for 90 minutes! How will the writer/director/actor/whatever fill the remainder of the movie? What could he possibly do that will keep the audience entertained? What could possibly top the vampire attack sequence?

Are you stumped?

Well, I think that Olaf sure was stumped because he puts the good doctor in jail, which gets him on a prison transport on the exact same route as the first one and the whole movie happens all over again. New convicts, new injury (shot to the groin), same old plot.

Now a good circular plot isn't a bad thing. Its a nice way to leave the audience with a feeling that even though everything is all wrapped up the story will continue after the end of the movie. However, the idea behind a circular plot is that because the audience knows the story already, they don't need to sit through it a second time. Olaf! Learn to pad out your script!

This movie wasn't an atrocious piece of crap like Legion of the Dead; and it might be interesting to see how Olaf evolves as a writer/director/monkey/evil henchman of the dread-knuckled Uwe Boll, but the problems in this movie should have been ironed out in pre-production. Like in the script writing phase. This is what happens when you edit your own work.

Remember when Jurger Prochnow played "Captain Kirk" on the big screen? No? What's the matter with you? Go see "House of the Dead", or Uwe Boll will beat you up!

Did I mention that Mrs. Ittenback plays the lead female vampire trying to convert the vampires into non-human blood drinking vampires? What a nice rack. I mean Lady! Yeah, that's what I meant. A nice lady... who tries to get the vampires to only drink the blood of animals. Its like the vampire version of veganism, only with blood.

House of Blood is definitely a step up for the Ittenbach family. Lets hope that whatever movie Olaf decides to rip off next is as improved as this movie was over Legion of the Dead.