The Spirit: Not quite Batman, not quite Sin City, but all cheese...

A lot of cheese, and a lot of fun!

I think I enjoyed The Spirit for all the wrong reasons. I have never read the comic books, so I didn't have to worry about being horrified at how they were translated to screen, which is a complaint I'm reading from hard core fans. What I got out of this movie, however, was a long giggle fest, and my full daily allowance of quality cheese.

Right off the bat you know this is going to be a little awkward. We get a long soliloquy from The Spirit, played by Gabriel Macht, as he leaps across rooftops. He's going on and on about how he loves the city and the city loves him, to the point where you wonder how long it's been since The Spirit has been with a real girl. It's so over the top, I started picturing another comic book hero, translated to small screen, The Tick, in his place, and didn't feel I was very far off in my comparison.

Then there's a long, drawn out fight scene between the bad guy, The Octopus, played by Samuel L. Jackson, and The Spirit. Silken Floss, The Octopus' accomplice, announces that they'll be there all night, so everyone may as well leave. The fight just keeps going, the banter gets ridiculous, and someone ends up with a toilet smashed over them. I think we may have a tone set here, folks, but it works for me!

The jist is Denny Colt was a good cop shot down in his prime, but miraculously rises from the grave to become The Spirit. He then hides his true identity, including from his former loves, the bad girl Sand Saref whom he loved from childhood until a terrible accident tore them apart (plus her lust for sparkly things), and the goody goody gum drops doctor he dated right before he died, Ellen Dolan. You know Ellen is the 'real' thing just because her name is normal. The Octopus has the same amazing healing abilities, but is going for true immortality, and doesn't care if he destroys the city in the process of obtaining a vase with the blood of Hercules to get it.

The storyline is interesting, and doesn't drag. This, however, is only because this is so over-the-top, comic-book-brought-to-life that you're giggling too much to get bored. Some of the monologues are just plain weird, but it all fits the feel of the film. The characters are mostly ridiculous, overblown stereotypes, but there is some depth when it's needed. Is Sand Saref a villain, or just a girl who likes her jewelry too much? The Spirit has become a notorious womanizer, who loves cats and his city, but does he ultimately love Ellen Dolan? And does Ellen Dolan really not recognize her dead boyfriend as she tends to The Spirit's wounds?

Then there's characters like Silken Floss, played to the hilt by Scarlett Johansson. She's beautiful, brilliant, and just having fun being the right hand of the bad guy. Plus her line of "I have a lucrative business, and I'm great eye candy!" really sums up the movie. The film is glossy, very reminiscent of Sin City, but be careful you don't look too close. There's not a lot of substance holding this up, and it will shatter under any scrutiny or criticism.

Over the top characters, slick backdrops, funky black and white with red thrown in details, and lots of cheesy dialogue add up to a good movie for The Queen Of Cheese. It's not great, and not worth running out to own a copy unless it's on a super sale, but it is definitely worth sitting down with a big bowl of popcorn and no distractions so you can catch all the cheesy goodness!

30,000 Leagues Under The Sea: 10,000 Leagues Less Quality Than It's Inspiration

Dead weight of a plot sinks this unseaworthy tale.

I was bored and decided, what the heck, I'll watch an obvious quest for accidental viewings that is 30,000 Leagues Under The Sea. It has Lorenzo Lamas, so I figured it could be good for a few laughs. And it should have been.

This was frustrating, because it could have been very entertaining. They went with some slick CGI on the submarines and the nifty mechanical squid beasties at Captain Nemo's command. There were even a few mildly entertaining exchanges of dialogue. There was a little bit of action. There was a little bit of intrigue. But there wasn't enough of anything to keep it afloat, even for the less than 90 minutes of screen time they invested in it.

The main thing it was missing was Captain Nemo. We have to wait until at least halfway into it before we meet him, and then he's there just to deliver a few hyperbolic "I'm going to show the surface world the evils of it's ways by launching nuclear missiles at it!" lines. He's supposed to be mad! Where's the crazy? Where's the feral looks as he realizes his plans are being foiled by land lubbers? Where's anything that would have made him more interesting?

Sad thing is his character had a lot of promise, but they kept his screen time so minimal there was no chance to let the psychotic inside of him shine, like it should have. Instead we have to follow around Lorenzo Lamas and his crew, which includes his ex-wife, and none of them are interesting enough to make me care if they survive or drown. Again, they could have been, but they don't focus on any of them long enough to draw you into their world. The banter between Lamas' character and his ex-wife is bearable, but lacks the spark to provide any believable tension.

The basic plot is a submarine gets attacked by a squid beastie, and is stuck at the bottom of the ocean. Lamas and his crew are sent in with their nifty technology that creates a giant oxygen bubble underwater, with the intent to use it to save the crew of the submarine. Captain Nemo has designs on both the nuclear warheads on the sub, and the oxygen bubble technology. He wants the bubble to restore the lost city of Atlantis, which he has discovered. Things just get a little waffley after that, and I just nursed my glass of wine and waited for the inevitable predictable ending.

This is a movie that actually would have benefited from having more screen time, as long as it was used to develop the characters properly, flesh out the plot so things made sense, and given much more Captain Nemo. I was surprised it wasn't a made-for-tv movie, since it had that feel all over it. If it had been a mini-series, I think it actually would have turned into something great, instead of this rushed-through, by-the-numbers (minus one) formula.

Poor Lorenzo Lamas. You're not as great as a David Hasselhoff, but you definitely don't deserve being stuck in a "Stephen Baldwin is the only Baldwin we could get" role like this one. Personally I can't wait to see the upcoming Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus! It has a mega shark, a giant octopus, you, Mr. Lamas, and Deborah Gibson. If that kind of setup doesn't provide a ton of laughs, my faith in this world will simply be shattered.

Nick Fury: Agent Of S.H.I.E.L.D. - as only David Hasselhoff can do it!

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Thanks to the Sci Fi Channel airing this movie once many years ago, I was able to catch one of the absolute cheesiest displays of cinematic wonder ever made. It's Nick Fury: Agent Of S.H.I.E.L.D. with the one, the only David "Don't Hassle The Hoff" Hasselhoff as the eye patch-wearing, cigar clenching, black leather clad hero himself.

This is a made-for-tv movie based on the comic book character introduced back in 1963. I never read any of the comics, so I have no clue how closely they followed the canon. I just know that there are some great backgrounds, gadgets, and special effects for a made-for-tv movie. It gives a lot of big budget feature films a run for their money.

The cast of characters are played by actors culled from various soap operas, including some Baywatch alumns. We have Lisa Rinna as Contessa Valentina 'Val' de Allegro Fontaine, who is basically the love interest. I'm sure she was chosen because she had experience with cheesy lines from her soap opera work, and could pull off the tight leather outfit with high heels and not fall down when she needed to run in it. This was before Lisa Rinna got a little too interested in lip plumping treatments, so she's pretty, instead of a little freaky. For being so short in comparison to Mr. Hasselhoff, she holds her own quite well against him.

We have Neil Roberts as Alexander Goodwin Pierce, a British gent trying not to screw up in this rough and tumble world. He's charming, even as his character fumbles through some situations, and doesn't come off as a wuss. We also have Tracy Waterhouse who plays a psychic named Kate Neville. She looks very much like the morally bankrupt doctor from Robocop 2, but it's not her. She's a great character to have, both for the convenient psychic thing, and to have a sensibly dressed tough chick. Both of these side characters do their part to balance the full on cheese of this movie and it's characters.

The bad guy at the heart this flick is a fanatical group named HYDRA, but the main representative we see the most of is Andrea Von Strucker, code name Viper, played salaciously over the top by Sandra Hess. The character is German, so we get the full on, probably getting a little spit in your eye if she's facing you when she talks, accent. She struts around in low cut dresses, fashionable head coverings, and lipstick laced with poison. Sandra Hess obviously had a ton of fun with this role, and just went for broke being all 'villainy'. She even does that awesome 'mwah ha ha' style laugh, so you know for sure her character is evil. I love her in this movie!

Then we have Nick Fury, as only David Hasselhoff can play him. Being tall and still in great shape certainly didn't hurt his ability to do this role. The fact he obviously had fun with it comes through loud and clear in every scene. He delivers his lines through grit teeth whenever possible, glares at any authority figure in his path with as steely a gaze as he can muster, and clenches that cigar butt through 95% of the movie without actually taking a puff. He may have actually smoked a cigar at some point in the movie, but even for all the times I've watched it, I've been too busy laughing to notice every detail. It's Mr. Hasselhoff's sense of fun that is absolutely infectious, and makes this movie one the favorites in my collection.

If you're a fan of cheese, you must get yourself a copy while you still can. It was finally released to DVD exclusively through Best Buy back in 2008. I snapped up my copy already, and I encourage you to do the same. There's something about owning such a cheesy masterpiece. It's a sensation that can't be duplicated by watching it whenever you're lucky enough to catch it on Encore Action. So go, my five readers. Run to Best Buy and place your order. You will not regret it!

And now for just a hint of what you'll get when you make the investment in your own copy of Nick Fury: Agent Of S.H.I.E.L.D....

Bottom Feeder: Shouldn't it have been about a fish creature, then?

Interesting creature, albeit misclassified...

Okay, first I have to get my complaint about this movie title out of the way. It's called Bottom Feeder, right? And a 'bottom feeder' is a type of fish, right? But the creature in this feature has nothing aquatic about him! So what's with calling the movie Bottom Feeder? I was expecting a fish creature movie, and get a man/rat/dog thing instead.

Oh well. It's not like the movie is going to be one I watch again, anyways. It's not as bad as some of the movies I've watched lately, but it's definitely not a keeper. There's guts and blood and slimy skin mutating, but it's there for a reason, so I can deal with that. The characters are actually pretty funny, and there are lots of great lines bandied about.

Even the premise of the story is interesting, hinging on a genetic serum designed to heal all sorts of damage, including burns, broken bones, and other wounds. Of course with any scientific enterprise based on genetics, there are horrible side effects that can only be countered by more scientific stuff. In this case it's blue stuff that has to be injected into the patient at the right time after you inject them with the green stuff. If you don't, then they're going to be very, very hungry, and eat anything that crosses their path. Disgusting as that can be, the kicker is their cells will continue to mutate without the blue stuff, and they'll mutate into hybrids of whatever they've eaten. Fun stuff.

So a billionaire is hoping to buy himself full recuperation from his severe burns, and then a long life. He's paid a team to track down the scientist who made the green and blue stuff, and lures him in with promises of money that would help the scientist's ailing wife. Instead they test the green stuff on the scientist, and completely ignore what he tells them about the blue stuff, so he mutates, and the story goes into full swing.

Stumbling into the middle of the mess is a maintenance crew led by poor bastard Tom Sizemore. The four of them end up going into the tunnels where the scientist has been locked up to mutate. It isn't very pretty after that, but there are some great one liners. There is also a good side story going on with this evil wench of a woman working for the billionaire. She has no problems beating and shooting someone, leaving them to mutate, and then go in prepared to chop up his body with a power saw, all the while making comments like "A woman's work is never done." She's played by Wendy Anderson who has a Gillian Anderson look about her, but a lot more attitude. Her character by far is the most interesting of the bunch, and I found myself hoping she survived to the end.

The only thing this movie has going for it is the interesting characters and entertaining dialogue. The plot never really takes off, and the science is flawed, even for a B-movie. The theory is you'll mutate into whatever you eat, so if you're eating humans, you should become more human again, right? That probably would have called for too many changes to the makeup after the man/rat/dog hybrid was established, and I bet there wasn't enough budget for it.

This was worth one viewing, but I won't be making an effort to watch it again. For a creature feature it's tolerable, saved by the dialogue, but this is another movie that will go in my mental 'don't bother' pile.

The Professional: a.k.a. "Léon" a.k.a. Gary Oldman can play creepy psycho like no other

Violent, a little discomfiting, and very, very good.

It took me fifteen years to finally watch The Professional, or Léon as it is also called, with Jean Reno, Natalie Portman, and Gary Oldman. It's directed by Luc Besson who also directed another of my favorite movies, The Fifth Element. Mr. Besson must have a thing about violence, and older men with much younger women, and while the age difference isn't as uncomfortable in The Fifth Element, there are times in The Professional when I cringed watching the twelve year old character, Mathilda, with the professional killer old enough to be her grandfather.

The Lolita hints aside, this is a very well written, directed, and acted film. I like my cheesy movies, but I also like solid action movies with cheese thrown in as one of the spices.

The movie starts off introducing Léon, and showing off his skills as a silent, efficient assassin for hire. I can't imagine anyone other than Jean Reno playing this part. He can do the action, but he can also act, which raises this above a, say, Jean Claude Van Damme kind of film.

Then we see young Mathilda sitting outside her apartment smoking a cigarette. It's clear Léon is concerned for her as he asks how she got the undeniable bruise on her face. Mathilda has been watching him closely, too, because she knows how much and what kind of milk he drinks, and offers to buy him some when she goes grocery shopping. However, he is a man who can't afford to get personally involved, so he leaves her and simply goes into his apartment where his only companion is a plant he tends to meticulously, and the darkness as he sleeps sitting upright in a chair.

Enter Stansfield, a pill popping DEA agent who has issues with Mathilda's father. Gary Oldman plays this character with his usual quirky, creepy, 'Christopher Walken ain't got nothin' on me' style. Stansfield gives the man one day to resolve it, and you just know things aren't going to end well for this family. The only thing that saves Mathilda from the blood bath the next day is her grocery shopping trip. There is a heartwrenching scene where she walks up the stairs, sees her apartment surrounded by men with guns and hears them talk about how they shot the whole family, including a little boy. Realizing her family, including the only member she loved (her little brother), is dead, and she should have been, too, she doesn't even look at the apartment, walks straight past the men, and down to Léon's apartment. Léon is involved in her life inextricably after that.

There are several scenes with Mathilda and Léon that are laugh out loud funny. Léon isn't good with people, has obviously had a hard life, and while smart, isn't educated enough to realize his 'friend' who gets him his jobs and 'holds' his money for him is actually ripping him off. Léon has a sweet side that belies his ability to take out an entire S.W.A.T. team if necessary, and it comes out whenever Mathilda is with him.

Mathilda is a normal twelve year old girl in the fact she becomes infatuated with the man who saves her, and who can take on all the bad guys in the world. Her infatuation gets them in trouble and forces them to move a few times because she does typical twelve year old girl things, thinking she's being cute, or grown up, but is just being stupid. She's at the stage in life where she's still a little girl who carries a stuffed bunny with her everywhere, but thinks she's in love with Léon. She makes Léon choke on his milk with her comments several times.

The last third of the movie keeps you on the edge of your seat. Mathilda is determined to kill Stansfield to avenge her little brother, and Léon is determined to protect her. As things comes to a violent head, you're keeping your fingers crossed that everything will work out the way it would in a perfect world.

If you have never seen The Professional I definitely don't want to spoil it for you. It is violent, but not gory. It's a little uncomfortable, but never inappropriate. There are plenty of funny moments throughout to break up the tension, but the action is relentless when things hit the point of no return. It is definitely a movie that earns the title of 'classic', and I certainly won't wait another fifteen years to watch it again!