Monday, July 14, 2003 Eleven Reasons Why LXG Sucked Spoilers follow. But... Um. Yeah. Ten minutes spent establishing the not-peril that Europe's in ("It could lead to a WORLD WAR!"), mostly via spinning news headlines. SPINNING NEWS HEADLINES. Because there have been no advances in film since 1936. "Why, hello, you league of extraordinary gentlemen. Pardon me while I take this opportunity to introduce myself fifteen minutes into our little story here. My name is the Fantom -- I will be the villain for this picture -- you know this, because I look oh-so-intimidating in this oh-so-shiny metal helmet. Do not worry about such things, though -- for although I seem to be a reference to either an obscure series of French novels or an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, in an hour it will make absolutley no difference." Development meeting #1: "What this flick needs is another white male." "But how will we tell him apart from the eight other white males in this movie?" "He's American!" "Brilliant!" Shaky-cam. When I say shaky-cam, I don't mean handheld family movie shaky-cam. I mean Saving Private Ryan on crack and Red Bull shaky-cam. The camera? It SHAKES. Development meeting #2: "You know what's hot? Women who kick ass. This movie should have one of those." "Well, Mina Harker..." "Who the fuck is Mina Harker?" Tom Sawyer: "Miss Harker is very attractive. I would like to have sex with her. I'm American, after all." Dr. Jekyll: "Miss Harker is very attractive. I would like to have sex with her, but instead of doing that I'll stare at her intensely and run away every time she looks at me. Chicks dig that." Sean Connery: "Miss Harker is very attractive. But I'm old and don't want to sleep with her, so I'll just treat her like a big talking fern." Dorian Gray: "Miss Harker is very attractive, and I'm the only remotely appealing character in this movie. We should have sex." Audience: "Wait a sec -- weren't you in Queen of the Damned?" The Duke from Moulin Rouge: "Bwahahahahaha!" No, really. Development meeting #3: "So the Harker broad was in Dracula? What is she, some kinda vampire chick?" "Hey, boss -- vampire chicks? Hot." On the set: "Hey guys? We're gonna do that big iconic shot of everyone putting their hands together. You know, from the comic book?" "Are we going to do the shot overhead, so that we can see the effect of all those different hands joined together for one cause?" "Eh. Who cares?" Moral of the story: it's been three decades since Goldfinger. And no one cares. About twenty minutes into this movie, I tried to fall asleep so that I wouldn't have to keep watching it. But when I woke up, it was STILL HAPPENING. Poorly made beyond compare. It should have been a Masterpiece Theater special; it should have been ANYTHING but a big budget American film. No. No. No. | permalink blog • archives • photos • about • contact This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. All content © 2004.