Tag: action

General Commander (2019)

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Welcome to the final week of Steven Seagal Month here at B-Movie Enema.

Thank fucking Christ. Guys… I mean it. Sure, we’ve had some fun with week one’s Attack Force. That movie went through some crazy post-production rewrites. It’s a movie that was bad, but not the kind of shitty bad. I’d argue it’s not fun, but it’s got enough goofy stuff that makes it a halfway decent watch even though it sucks. Week the second was Urban Justice. That movie was, to my shame, enjoyable. I had a good time watching that movie. We don’t need to say much more there. Read that review. Last week’s Contract to Kill suuuuuucked. It was dumb. It was without any energy. It was a lot of Seagal mumbling, and, worse, it was boring.

Knowing Contract to Kill moved us from the 2000s to the 2010s, I knew we were going to be in some trouble. The closer you get to the present year, the shittier his movies get. That makes this week’s movie real dangerous waters for my personal desire to remain alive and breathing in this world. So, let’s talk about 2019’s General Commander.

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Contract to Kill (2016)

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Welcome to B-Movie Enema and the continuation of Steven Seagal Month!

And, oh boy… We’ve dodged a couple bullets already. Attack Force was a movie that was originally supposed to be about space vampires and was rearranged, reshot, and turned into a movie about a designer drug that gave people crazy superpowers that made them want to murder. Urban Justice was… actually entertaining. I enjoyed watching that one. There was a fairly straightforward plot and there were some moments I honestly had a good chuckle about.

But Steven Seagal Month moves into some pretty dicey waters with the 2010s. This week, we’re going to look at Contract to Kill from 2016. We’ve not only visited Seagal in his 2010s films before, but we’ve seen another of his films from the same year – Sniper: Special Ops. That movie was awful. In fact, I’d call it embarrassing. Seagal looked like he didn’t give two fucks. He was hardly in the movie that his name appeared above the title on the DVD box. He spent a lot of time sitting down with a high-powered sniper rifle on his lap while another person in his battalion was dying. It was bad. Like, bad bad.

Contract to Kill will likely be no better… or possibly worse.

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Urban Justice (2007)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle2 Comments

Welcome to week #2 of B-Movie Enema’s Steven Seagal Month!

This week, our large mound of pounding fudge rounds is doling out some Urban Justice. This comes to us from director Don E. FauntLeRoy. FauntLeRoy previously directed Seagal in Today You Die and Mercenary for Justimce. This would be his third and final collaboration with the actor. Aside from the trio of mid-00s Seagal action flicks, he also workj ed on the Anaconda series directing the thiyrd andm my z,a fourth films. He worked with Jason Connery, Sean’s son, on a superhero movie called Lightspeed which featured a character created bl Stan Lee.

Those directing credits aren’t too impressive, but he still has some impressive films on his resume. You see… FauntLeRoy’s real trade was as a cameraman. He worked behind the lens as an assistant early on in the 70s and 80s. He cut his teeth on TV before getting to be either an assistant cameraman or second unit cameramk,qan on films like Raging Bull, 2010: The Year We Make Contact, and The Goonies. Perhaps his biggest film on the list of films he worked on as a camera guy was in 1991 when e worked on Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

When he graduated to become the Cinematographer on films, he worked on cheap-o movies like Munchie, The Skateboard Kid, and Munchie Strikes Back. However, he did work on three episodes of Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero and eventually hooking up with Victor Salva on the first two Jeepers Creepers films. Maybe the less said about Salva the better, but the point still remains, it’s not like FauntLeRoy hasn’t done some notable stuff. It maybe bodes well that this movie might look decent at the very least.

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Attack Force (2006)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle4 Comments

Welcome to my public suicide note!

That’s right, Enemaniacs. This month of B-Movie Enema reviews might just end me. I hope not. I have lots of movies planned and I think 2024 is going to be a good one for the blog. There’s a new season of B-Movie Enema: The Series coming soon. Despite what some people might believe when talking to me, I have no intention of throwing my life away recklessly on foolish pursuits. But… Did I bite off more than I can chew with this opening theme month?

I guess we’ll find out in four weeks’ time. Welcome to Steven Seagal Month at B-Movie Enema. I know, I know… It sure did seem as though I would never again touch a Seagal flick after the torture that was Sniper: Special Ops, but I guess I’m just a glutton for cinematic diarrhea. It’s only four weeks. That can’t lead to that much pain and suffering, right? Right?

Anyway, I start the month off with this 2006 action flick Attack Force.

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The Toxic Avenger (1984)

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He was 98 lbs. of solid nerd until he became… THE TOXIC AVENGER!

Welcome to a brand-spankin’ new B-Movie Enema. As it were, Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas, my Enemaniacs! To celebrate, let’s visit Tromaville, New Jersey, the home of everyone’s B-movie uncle, Lloyd Kaufman. Kaufman and his producing partner Michael Herz co-directed this breakout film for Troma Entertainment.

Now, I’ve covered several movies released by Troma from within the distribution arm of Kaufman and Herz’s entertainment company. I’ve even covered a few other movies that featured Kaufman as an actor. Only once, though, did I ever cover a film actually funded, made, and released by the Troma team. I’ve not brought this one up for quite some time. It used to be one that I would reference often, and definitely compare to when I’d see a movie of a particular level of quality. Do you guys remember which one that was?

That one is the cinematic diarrhea disaster that was Pot Zombies.

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Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins (1985)

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Welcome to yet another B-Movie Enema, my dear Enemaniacs! This week, we’ve got ourselves a real adventure. In fact, the title says it begins here. What it doesn’t say is that it also ended here. That’s right, I’m going to be writing many, many words about 1985’s Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins!

Where to start? Well, let’s start with our titular hero. Remo Williams is the lead character in a series of pulp adventure novels that go back to 1971’s Created, The Destroyer. He was created by authors Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir. Sapir wrote a handful of other books, but none were as popular as his Remo Williams co-creation. Murphy, on the other hand, is a little more interesting.

Murphy wrote the screenplay for 1975’s The Eiger Sanction starring Clint Eastwood. In 1989, he worked on the story for Lethal Weapon 2 with Shane Black. The TV Series Murphy’s Law was also based on the Trace series of books that he also wrote. Most interestingly, Murphy would be married to Nancy Cartwright from 1988 to 2002, the pair having two children. Who is Nancy Cartwright, and why does that name sound so familiar?

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Krull (1983)

Published on by Geoff ArbuckleLeave a comment

Happy Thanksgiving weekend, Enemaniacs! I’ve got a bit of a feast for you for this week’s B-Movie Enema review.

In the early 80s, there were a couple of phenomena going on. The first was the re-emergence of the sword and sorcery or sword and sandal movies. That was mostly due to the popularity of 1982’s Conan the Barbarian but I would also count 1981’s Clash of the Titans as also being an inspiration for the genre of fantasy action films. The other big phenomenon was the adventure sci-fi genre thanks to the huge success of 1977’s Star Wars and 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back.

If you really think about it, Star Wars isn’t really science fiction. More accurately, it would be called space opera. That means it’s a little more fantasy than true science fiction. Star Trek is the more true action science fiction type of movie where it both features some action and adventure but also tackles other concepts that are more sci-fi in nature. The advancements made in special effects also made for movies that could feature more lasers and spaceships and different types of creatures, though maybe the last one would be more due to advancements in makeup effects and artistry. That brings us to this week’s topic, 1983’s Krull.

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Black Snake (1973)

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Welcome to the penultimate week of Russ Meyer Month II here at B-Movie Enema! We move from the 60s Russ Meyer sex comedies and romps to his 70s bigger budgeted and slightly more interesting films. This week, I’m reviewing 1973’s flop Black Snake.

This one is an interesting entry in Meyer’s filmography. I labeled it a flop. It was. Meyer was not unaccustomed to making a movie that wouldn’t perform well. Sure, maybe not all of his 60s films scored well with critics, but almost none of them were outright flops. As the 70s dawned, though, Meyer’s films would change. This would mostly be due to 20th Century Fox calling on Meyer to make actual studio-backed films. Beyond the Valley of the Dolls was the first and it was a hit – despite critics not really appreciating it. The next film for Fox was assigned to him after the original director had to back out. That film would be an adaptation of the book The Seven Minutes. Meyer’s friend, Roger Ebert, would write that the latter was not well-suited to Meyer’s affection toward eroticism. After all, it was a drama about law and freedom of speech. While the central thing in the movie did evolve around an erotic novel a teenager bought, it’s not really Meyer’s realm, even if the studio felt it was right for him based on the movies he made in the past and how he championed the abolishment of censorship.

The Seven Minutes was, by far, Meyer’s most expensive movie and it didn’t do well. In the end, it just didn’t work out. He would only complete one of the three films he was contracted to make for Fox after Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. The end was maybe on the horizon anyway. Black Snake would be his next movie and the first of the final five films he would ever make. While his next three would recoup some of his past magic, this film would prove to be a massive disappointment and bomb.

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