Review #64: Diary of the Dead (2008)

Cast/Notable Credits:
George Romero (Director)

Joshua Close (Jason): Exorcism of Emily Rose (2005)

Shawn Roberts (Tony): Land of the Dead, Stir of Echoes 2 (2007), X-men (2000), Skinwalkers

Chris Violette (Gordo): American Pie: Beta House (2007), Return to Sleepaway Camp (2008)

Tatiana Maslany (Mary): Stir of Echoes 2, The Messengers (2007)

Megan Park (Francine): Kaw (2007) (pictured right)

Trailer:


Plot:

University of Pittsburgh students are filming a horror movie on their own for class out in the woods when weird events start happening around the world. Scattered reports of the dead walking the Earth are surfacing over the media outlets. The students decide to head back to campus and pile into their Winnebago and head for town.

One of the students, Jason, decides that it is important to document the events over the next few days as he uses the camera to film the trip. As the students head back into town, they discover that the reports of the dead walking are true. They pick up Jason's girlfriend from campus and decide to head home...as if it's still there...while the world slowly is over ran by zombies. Tagline: Where will you be when the end begins?

Villain:

Zombies. What more can I say? If your one of those people who care whether they are fast or slow moving zombies...grandma speed zombies. Not the rabid super-charged that 28 Days Later introduced. This is actually a big deal for some people. For me, either one works. It's all good!

Cast:

I wasn't too impressed with the cast members. For once, I thought Romero did a horrible job making the audience connect with the cast. In his previous "Dead" films, he did a remarkable job with the cast.

The main guy, Jason, was a little irritating. I thought that he was a little too obsessed with filming the end of the world. It was way over-the-top in my opinion. Who cares if he films every minute of it? Who is gonna be alive to watch it? But I guess that was the premise of the movie, video taping the events. Could of been done better, I thought.

His girlfriend wasn't much better. She was just as dumb and annoying as him. In fact, they all seemed to be dumb. The hot southern blonde chick and the college professor were the only enjoyable characters in the film. At least ones that I could tolerate.

SFX/Gore:

A lot of deaths. But what do you expect? It's a zombie movie. The special effects were state of the art, not like the earlier Romero films with the fake zombie eating. Not like I disliked that quality of his earlier films. My favorite kill: the zombie out in the woods.

TNA:

They squeezed a few hot chicks into this one. Like Amy Lalonde (pictured right) and Michelle Morgan (pictured left). There wasn't even a flash of the twins. That's easy to fit in the film. Just have a chick changing a blood soaked top with a fresh new one. It's that simple. But there really was no room for the hibbidie-jibbidie. Wait a second...there's always room for that. Especially if the world was being overthrown by zombies. I would try to squeeze that in if my world was about to end due to a zombie infestation.

T.Gun's Take:

Diary of the Dead was a pretty fesh new idea about college students filming "real-life events" of a zombie take over that turns out to be a zombie-documentary. The film was done pretty decently but I felt that the film's pace and tone just wasn't there. I just wasn't "feeling it". Don't get me wrong, I liked the direction and idea of the movie, but overall I felt that something was missing. Maybe the underlining message was not all that powerful than I was hoping.

It was dubbed...The Blair Witch Project meets zombies. The audience's view from a hand held camera. The Blair Witch Project was the first, and people loved it. Personally, I thought it sucked. That style went away until this past spring, and then it came back with back to back films in Cloverfield and Diary. Unfortunately I saw Cloverfield first, and it was done better with the use of only one camera. I guess that's the biggest hang up that I can't get over, seeing a similar style done better.

For some reason, the camera point of view didn't do it for me on this film. It's not like it was done terrible with flaws, because the movie was technically sound with it's use. I just can't put a finger on it other than I liked how Cloverfield did it better. The style of using the camera's point of view is a great idea, and if you can be the first to do it, then you've got a hit. It's always better to be the leader than the follower.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened on February 17, 2008 in limited release and made $950K at the box office

Review #63: 30 Days of Night (2007)

Cast/Notable Credits:
David Slade (Director): Hard Candy (2005)

Josh Hartnett (Eben): H2O

Melissa George (Stella): The Amityville Horror (2005), Turistas (2006)

Danny Huston (Marlow): The Aviator (2004), Children of Men (2006), Number 23 (2007)

Ben Foster (The Stranger): The Punisher (2004), Hostage (2005), X-men 3 (2006)

Mark Boone Junior (Beau): J.C.'s Vampires, Die Hard 2 (1990), Seven (1995), I Still…Last Summer, Batman Begins (2005)

Amber Sainsbury (Denise): The Ferryman

Craig Hall (Wilson): The Ferryman

Trailer:


Plot:
In Barrow, Alaska, the 152 residents prepare for a seasonal change unlike any other. For the next 30 days, it will be night time in the little snowy Alaskan community. I guess that’s what happens during the winter time at the top of the world, you just don’t see the sun that much.

Little does the townsfolk of Barrow know that some other species has decided to make Barrow their residence for the next 30 days…vampires. Yes, vampires. It makes perfect sense. Sunlight “supposedly” kills vampires, at least according to myth, and what better place to hang out than a city that receives no sunlight?

So a gang of vampires decide to take vacation up in Barrow and wreck havoc (or snack) on the town’s remaining citizens. A few of them survive the initial attack and hold up in various hidden places around town as they await for the big yellow ball in the sky to show its face again.


Villain:

A gang of thirsty vampires take center stage in this flick. They visually look awesome and there was a nice touch of their own language incorporated into the film. They looked just as scary as a goth festival happening in the front lawn of a church.

Cast:

Josh Heart-throb-nett returns to the big screen in a horror movie (formerly the nephew of Michael Myers in H2O). Harnett plays the lead character and small town's sheriff, Eben. Eben and Stella used to be a couple, but for some unknown reason they broke up and she moved out. Once Eben discovers that she came back, he nags her about the break-up.

While the gorgeous Melissa George (Pictured Above) counterparts Harnett as Stella, or at least fills the part of eye candy. Stella gets trapped in town as the attack takes place and toys with Eben's emotions. Does she looks a lot like Estella Warren (Planet of the Apes Remake chick…or Kangaroo Jack…which ever suits you better).

The rest of the cast did an okay job considering the writing involved. Mark Boone Junior plays a nutty old fart named Beau. He was truly the shining star in the film. At first I hated the character, but as the movie went on, he became the prize of the film.

SFX/Gore:

What we lack in writing, we shall make up in death! That’s exactly what the film makers did. I counted around 23 deaths, give or take…couldn’t keep up with the town’s massacre. The special effects were good and top notch. The UV light melting the vampire chick was the best.

TNA:
Four hot chicks but no dirty deeds. One of these pictured hotties is Melissa George and the other is Estella Warren. You decide. Hint: cleavage equals 30.

T.Gun's Take:

This was another graphic novel (comic book) turned into a motion picture. The first half of the film was kick ass and then the bottom fell out and got pretty ridiculous. The idea of a pack of vampires shackin’ up in an Alaskan town about to face 30 days of night was an awesome concept. Expectations came up a little short though. Visually, the town looked great. After watching the special features and seeing how they filmed this place in daylight in the desert made it even more impressive.

I was lovin’ the film until the film got to Day 7. For some reason the bottom fell out. Maybe it could be explained by people being “stir crazy”, but it seemed that everyone was starting to make stupid decisions. The old dude taking off and his son following him out was just dumb. I would be like, “See ya pops, but I’m keeping my ass here away from the vampires.”

Then it seems like everybody has to go here and then there, let’s split up, we need to get here. It became pretty dumb by then. Just sit your ass down for another 2 days or so. The dumbest thing: Eben injecting himself with vampire blood. WTF?! How would you even know if that would work? And then take on the leader of the vamps as Uber-Eben.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened on October 19, 2007 and made $39.5 million at the box office ($15.9 million opening weekend)
-The film was mostly filmed during the day despite taking place all at night

Review #62: One Missed Call (2008)

Cast/Notable Credits:
Eric Valette (Director)

Shannyn Sossamon (Beth): Catacombs (2007)

Edward Burns (Jack): Saving Private Ryan (1998), Sound of Thunder (2005)

Ana Talancon (Taylor): Alone with Her (2006)

Ray Wise (Ted): Jeepers Creepers 2 (2003), Swamp Thing (1982)

Azura Skye (Leann): Red Dragon (2002)

Johnny Lewis (Brian): AVP2

Margaret Cho (Mickey): Face/Off (1997)

Meagan Good (Shelley): Saw 5, Venom, D.E.B.S. (2004) (Pictured to the right)

Trailer:



Plot:
College coeds receive mysterious missed phone calls on their cell phones. The caller I.D. of the missed phone calls tells them the date and time they will die. Why can't they ever relay important things like...winning Lotto numbers? It's always got to be doom and gloom.

In the mean time, the recipients of the calls see weird dead Japanese people. When the time comes....they die. At least you can say they didn't get fair warning. Oh…one other thing...they cough up a little piece of red candy. Which I thought was a marble for about thirty minutes of the film. Who could blame me?

The rest of the film has the “evil phone spirit” going through that person's cell phone book and then calls the next dude or chick in the list to kill. Something like a chain-letter-cell-phone-book-killer. That's why it's important to remember phone numbers and not store them in those little electronic devices, you'll save a life or two. So…who’s in your Fav-5?

Villain:

AT&T, T-Mobile, Cingular, Verizon and any other cell phone company...that's the true villain of the film. Is the movie industry trying to hint something to us? Throw in the unexplained "evil spirit world" which seeks revenge on college coeds to the mix and we get another technology demon. Bottom line...you probably won't get a cool free T-shirt for signing up.

Cast:

The dude from Saving Private Ryan who looks like Ben Affleck takes the male lead for this movie. He plays Jack, the detective leading the case of the Fav-5 murders. I swear Edward Burns is Ben Affleck...it's got to be an alternative name or something like that.

Shannyn Sossamon (Pictured Below) plays the lead female Beth in the film. I wasn't too impressed with her performance or character...sometimes it's not the actor/actress's fault. Beth was a cardboard cut-out of many poorly done horror movies lead females of late. She was just pleasant on the eyes, but everything else about the character sucked.

The film also has the little kid brother from AVP 2. All the chicks are basically…hot and never been in any big projects to note with the exception of Megan Good. And based their performances in this film…they shouldn’t expect the phone to be ringing off the hook either.

SFX/Gore:

Not as many deaths as there should have been. Three out of the five were dead in the first twenty minutes. Coolest death was the explosion that sent a metal rod through someone’s chest. Reminded me of kill that has/or could take place in a Final Destination movie. I guess the next "best death" is a chick throwing herself in front of a moving train.

TNA:

About five or six hot chicks, no sex acts or boobies. Blah blah blah. Here are two pictures of the movie stars...or actresses. Azura Skye and Ana Talacon. Hot, but no boobies.

T.Gun's Take:

Japan-o-rip-off strikes America part…5…6…10? Whatever. Same type of atmosphere that has been established in previous Japanese horror movies.

Someone has flashes of dead people, spooky music, gloomy settings, internet research to explain everything from the past…and a pissed off troubled spirit killing people. Through a cell phone. Right. Find the source and defeat the spirit.

I think it's time for America to move on from (or at least take a long break) the Japanese horror film formula and move on to something else…like to the return of the slasher movies! Have I mentioned B.H.A.?

One Missed Call is a movie I should have just...missed. Boredom. Nothing I haven't seen before. I was thinking that it was a mix between the Final Destination movies and the Ring.

Common sense says: "Why don’t you get rid of the cell phone or take out the battery? Or at least break it?" But noooo...it can't be that easy. The producers decided to get around that by saying...well, once you get the call, you’re pretty much screwed. Just like once you press play on the DVD player for this movie…you’re pretty much screwed.

Yet again, technology comes back to kill us. This time it's disguised as a cell phone. That's why you need to get an i-phone. That way you can receive evil death spirits, and watch the video of them and die seven days later. It's like this movie and the Ring in one! Hint for the next Japanese/American horror movie compilation.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened January 4, 2008 and $26.8 million ($12.5 million opening weekend)
-The 508 area code is from Brockton, Massachusetts and apparently what the studio exec got on his SAT's.

Review #61: Aliens (1986)

Cast/Notable Credits:
James Cameron (Director): Piranha 2 (1981), The Terminator (1984), The Abyss (1989), Terminator 2 (1991), True Lies (1994), Titanic (1997)

Sigourney Weaver (Ellen Ripley): Aliens Quadrilogy, Ghost Busters 1 (1984) & 2 (1989), Working Girl (1988), Copycat (1995), Galaxy Quest (1999), Heartbreakers (2001), The Village (2004)

Michael Biehn (Cpl. Hicks): Planet Terror

Lance Henriksen (Bishop): Omen 2 (1978), Close Encounters of the 3^rd Kind (1977), Piranha 2, Terminator, Near Dark (1987), Aliens 3 (1992), AVP, Super Mario Brothers (1993), Scream 3 (2000), Mimic 3 (2003), When A Stranger Calls (2006)

Paul Reiser (Burke): Beverly Hills Cop 1 (1984) & 2 (1987), Mad About You T.V. series

Bill Paxton (Hudson): Terminator, Weird Science (1985), Commando (1985), Near Dark, Navy Seals, Predator 2 (1990), Apollo 13 (1995), Twister (1996), Titanic, Might Joe Young (1998), True Lies, U-571 (2000), Frailty (2001), Vertical Limit (2000), Club Dread (2004)

Willaim Hope (Lt. Gorman): Hellraiser 2 (1988), The Saint (1997), xXx (2002)

Jenette Goldstein (Vasquez): Near Dark, Lethal Weapon 2 (1989), Terminator 2, Star Trek: Generations (1994), Fair Game (1995), Titanic

Mark Rolston (Drake): Lethal Weapon 2, Robo Cop 2 (1990), Body of Evidence (1993), Eraser (1996), Hard Rain (1998), Rush Hour (1998), The Departed (2006), Saw 5

Daniel Kash (Spunkmeyer): Due South T.V. series, Exit Wounds (2001), Don’t Say a Word (2001), The Tuxedo (2002)

Trailer:



Plot:

After floating in space for 57 years after the events of the first movie, Ripley’s escape pod is finally rescued by a deep space salvage crew and brought back to Earth.

A lot has changed though. Ripley learns that her daughter has died a few years back, and humans started colonizing planets, including the planet (LV-426) where her previous crew had picked up the alien that ended wiping them out.

Ripley now faces trial for destroying her old ship, the Nostromo, by her old employer. Ignoring her story of the killer Alien, the company claims that she had blew up an expensive company ship for “no apparent reason”. Once again...money talks.

Ripley tries to convince the inquiry board that there was an Alien on board which they had picked it up on LV-426. The board refuses to believe her story, because the planet has been colonized for quite some time and so far has found no evidence of the creature she has described.

In the mean time, the company (The Weyland-Yutani Corporation) secretly orders some colonist to investigate the coordinates Ripley had given them during her story. A couple weeks later, they lose contact with the colony.

In the Special Edition of Aliens there is a five-ten minute storyline showing the colonists and the party that goes to check out the crashed spaceship. If you haven't already...you should definitely see the S.E. of Aliens...it makes the movie even better.

The Wey-Yut. Corp. gets a little nervouse and decides to dispatch a group of space marines to go investigate the sudden loss of contact. A representative of the company, Burke, goes to Ripley and convinces her to tag along for her expertise in dealing with the Alien species...if that is the cause of the lost communication...because everyone is still in denial of the species. Ripley agrees to go to LV-426.

A new ship, The Sulaco, is sent to LV-426 carrying Ripley, Burke and a platoon of space marines. When they arrive at the planet, they enter the colonist complex and find out that the colonists are nowhere to be found, except for a little girl hiding in the air ducts. Everyone had simply vanished, but there are clues of some sort of an attack with evidence of Ripley's fairy-taled Alien species.

Using the signals of surgical implanted GPS devices inside the colonist's bodies, the marines find the whole colony gathered in the lower levels of the planet’s atmospheric processing plant. The processing plant is basically a big *ss plant that makes the atmosphere livable to humans. It takes decades to transform a world into a habitable planet.

The marines’ head on over to the plant only to walk into an Alien lair. Unprepared for what takes place next, the Aliens attack...and a lot of marines die. The survivors exit the plant and take refuge in the colonist complex as they are stranded on the planet with little supplies and ammunition.

The overdue date for a standard rescue mission is 17 days. With moral and hopes down, the remaining survivors barricade themselves in the colonist community center as they attempt alternatives for rescue. Outside of the complex are hundreds of vicious Aliens searching for ways to get in the complex. Ripley and company must find a way off the planet before they become victims of the Aliens.

Villain:

The “Alien” has always been my favorite monster/creature. Acid for blood…kick ass! It’s pure evil; it attacks, hunts and doesn’t contemplate about what to do next. It just attacks! Well it does show some intellegence though.

The eerie screeching sounds the alien makes are creepy as hell. If you've never heard it before, the sounds become known as "The peacock-elephant sound". It sends shivers down my spine!

This movie has it's share of aliens and face-huggers...oh did I mention you get to see what the Queen alien looks like? A lot of carnage and dead things, both of which makes a good creature flick. Still...I would never want to come across one of these mother fuckers in my life…unless I had one of the kick ass pulse rifles in the movie.

Cast:

Aliens featured an awesome cast! Just look at the movies they've all appeared in. Leading the cast is Sigourney Weaver as Ellen Ripley. If Jamie Lee Curtis defined the role as a "Scream Queen" then Sigourney defined the role as "Tough chick". Just look at her handle one of the marine's M41A pulse rifles...better watch out boys...there's a new sheriff in town!

Sigourney delivered a memoriable performance for the ages in this flick. She kicked aside the stereotype of damsel in distress and took on the "I'm gonna do something about it" role.

Sigourney took charge in a pinch and showed that she had the guts to take on the Alien species. Sigourney also delivered one of most recognizable lines in the franchise when she took on the Queen Alien:

"Get away from her you BITCH!"

Starring along with Sigourney are a couple of great characters in the film. Michael Biehn stars as Corp. Hicks. Hicks is a tough "cool cat" space marine who works well with Ripley on screen. They develop a deep connection which can be considered as close as a love story that you can expect from an Alien movie.

Other key members of the cast include Bill Paxton as Private Hudson (the smart ass marine), Paul Reiser as Burke (the greasy snake-like company man), Jennette Goldstein (the tough female marine), Carrie Henn as Newt (the little colonist girl survivor) and many, many more.

If there were ding here, then it would be Newt screaming like a little bitch half the time. But I guess that's what frightened little girls do. Give the Henn credit, she was like nine or ten when she did the film. The many different personalities of marines kick ass and in turn...get their ass kicked.
"Game over man. Game over!"

SFX/Gore:

Since I didn’t rated TNA for this movie (if there was any to grade…then that would be awesome), so I doubled the SFX/Gore category just because the FX were really, really ahead of it's time and just plain awesome.

I remember seeing this movie in the theater and was blown away with the military technology it created. The weaponry is realistic and state of the art for a futuristic setting. I loved the M41A pulse rifle featured in the film.

I think that it's the best Sci-Fi weapon ever...at least from a realistic perspective. The S.E. has a coule of deleted scenes featuring some really bad ass remote centurion machine gun units.

The APC carrier (Armored Personnel Carrier) was a cool looking transport vehicle (Pictured Left). I always loved that thing as a kid. It was a blast seeing Ripley ram that thing into the Alien lair.

I wasn't too impressed with the design of the mother ship, The Sulaco, but I did like the designs of the drop-down ships. The design of the ship was inspired by the looks of a F-4 Phantom II fighter jet and an AH-1 Cobra helicopter. They were pretty sweet lookin'!

The human robotic exosuit cargo loader was another terrific idea by the film. It was great to see Ripley battle the Queen with one. On top of all those mechanical FX, the movie had terrific creature FX, explosions, and other cool looking models.

As far as the gore section goes, there were at least a dozen human deaths and countless Alien deaths. Aliens had a great blend of military and monster movie action and war sequences in it.

TNA:

This category was not really rated. Afterall, it was a good ole' fashion guys shoot out with guns and monsters so I doubled the SFX/Gore category. I'm not a huge fan of Sigourney Weaver, so if it makes you feel better, the little chick Newt (Carrie Henn)...well here's a pretty picture of her grown up. (Pictured right)

T.Gun's Take:

James Cameron did a superb job on this flick (like most of his movies). Return to the alien crash site planet with unsuspecting colonists, throw in a couple of egotistic marines, and strand them there with hundreds of aliens crawling around…hell yeah!

Honestly this would be my #1 horror movie of all time, but after thinking about it, this movie is more sci-fi than horror...but it works on both levels. So I pushed Friday Part 2 just a head of it (just because it’s an actual horror movie). But not by much.

I have always loved this movie. It’s probably in my top ten of all time (including all Star Wars, L.O.T.R.’s – that’s nine already). If I was ever bored, I could throw this movie on to past time and still love it. Unfortunately for Aliens 3, this movie set the standard so high…that I was soooo disappointed when the third movie came out.

I believe that Aliens holds up well over time. I can watch it and still be amazed at the awesome job they did on the film. I highly recommend checking this film out...and if you can...watch the S.E. or Director's Cut of the film.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
- Filmed opened on July 18, 1986 and made $85.1 million at the box office ($10 million opening weekend)...and I was one of them!
- The word "fuck" is used 25 times in the film...18 by Hudson (Bill Paxton)
- All of the marine cast (except Michael Biehn) attended a military training course before filming. They were instructed to read Robert Heinlein's novel, Starship Troopers, to help with the military mindset. If you're thinking...yes that novel ended up into a kick ass movie...at least I liked it.

Review #60: Alien (1979)

Cast/Notable Credits:
Ridley Scott (Director): Blade Runner (1982), Gladiator (2000), Black Hawk Down (2001)

Sigourney Weaver (Ripley):

Tom Skerritt (Dallas): Top Gun (1986), Contact (1997)

Yaphet Kotto (Parker): Nightmare Part 6

Veronica Cartwright (Lambert): The Invasion, Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978), The Birds (1963), Candyman 2 (1995), Scary Movie 2 (2001)

Harry Dean Stanton (Brett): Escape from New York (1981), Red Dawn (1984),

John Hurt (Kane): Hellboy 1 (2004) & 2 (2008), Indiana Jones 4 (2008), Skeleton Key (2005)

Ian Holm (Ash): Lord Of The Rings 1 (2001) & 3 (2003), From Hell (2001), The Day After Tomorrow (2004)

Trailer:


Plot:

While returning from a deep-space mission, the crew of the commercial spaceship Nostromo is awakened by a supposed SOS call from a system they are passing through. Members of the crew take a shuttle to the planet's surface, and they discover a strange derelict spaceship - the apparent source of the transmission.

One of the crew (Kane) descends into the hold of the spaceship. What he finds are thousands of strange alien eggs. While examining one of the eggs, it hatches and the spider-like parasite inside (known as a Face-hugger) attacks him. The Face-hugger attaches itself to Kane’s face, wraps its long tail around his throat and places Kane in a comatose state.

Against protocol and protest, Kane is brought back aboard the shuttle and the crew attempts to separate the alien and its host but cannot succeed without endangering Kane’s life. The shuttle returns to the Nostromo and the crew takes off again to head for Earth. The alien parasite subsequently dies and all seems well again. But what no one knows is that another alien is quietly forming within Kane…and when it emerges, the crew finds itself in serious trouble as the new alien proceeds to pick them off one by one.

Villain:

Truly the most scariest monster ever made in my opinion. EVER! Funny that the Alien design was basically constructed by using the male reproductive organ as a starting point. Along those lines...ripped condoms were used as the tendons of the Alien's jaw and KY Jelly was used as the slime (or acid for blood).

The "facehugger" idea kicks butt! An alien spider looking thing that smothers itself to someone's face and impregnates them with an evil alien seed. Who knew they could make a monster out of a male's reproductive organ? *** Note: if any of the bold terms in this paragraph can be used to explain a drunken college experience that ended wrong, you can blame this movie! Yeah...good luck with that.

Cast:

Let's see we have Viper from Top Gun (pictured right...at least the movie cover. Sorry Gangles, I couldn't find a picture from the shirtless volleyball game.) Dana from Ghostbusters (Dana doesn't live here any more!)...the professor from Hellboy and Bilbo Baggins the psychotic robot man. I think the cast speaks for itself. Even Yaphet from Freddy's Dead!

SFX/Gore:
Super job! Especially for the 70's.

TNA:

This category gets a pass because...well, I wasn't attracted to any of the chicks. Sorry, not a Weaver fan. It does get a bonus point for the effort it made to get Sig in her panties. If it got some smokin' hot chicks in here and showed some of their goods, then...probably best movie ever! This also applies to the sequel. Here's a picture of Cate Blanchett. Who appears in Lord of the Rings with Ian Holm and Indy 4 with John Hurt.

T.Gun's Take:

Fantastic job all around. The atmosphere of the movie was awesome. It was dark, creepy, suspenseful and didn't have to use some cheap Hollywood tricks to achieve it. The chestbursting scene goes down as most memorable scene in a horror/monster/sci-fi movie of all time. Classic.

This movie had a lot of kick ass parts to it, but I there have been some things that has always bugged me over the years.

Here's the Top 5 things that could have been improved:
1. Personal gripe: Dallas in the tunnels. Great sequence. Build up of suspension and terror, but for Christ's sake...Get the F*ck Outta There! He just "took one for the team" when he could have gotten out. I hated that.


2. Kane's alive! Oh...Kane's okay, let's get some grub and go to bed. Are you kidding me? If some weird ass alien thing attached itself to one of my friends for over a day and just "fell off" and died, I would raise some suspicion. Especially if the thing was that much in a pain in the butt to remove. I would be, "Fuck no. You can keep your ass down here in sick bay all quarantined and all. I'm not gonna pretend everything is alright."

3. Jonesy the cat...fuck 'em. Sorry kitty. You have 9 lives, and I don't. I'm not on all fours on the floor looking for your ass as some pissed off alien is picking off the crew one by one.

4. That dumb bitch Lambert standing there with the "deer in headlights" look as the alien takes out Parker...who by the way was sacrificing himself so your sorry ass could escape. Poor Parker. What a noble thing to do...only to go to waste.

5. Got Milk. Didn't like the milk looking fluids out of Ash. It never set right with me. I love milk. It does a body good. And now it's tainted. Doesn't help knowing that Bilbo was an evil psychotic robot in the beginning.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened May 25, 1979 and made $78.9 million at the box office ($3.5 million opening weekend)
- Original title: Star Beast
-130 Alien eggs were made for the chamber sequence
-Chestbursting scene filmed in one take (4 cameras)
-Bolaji Badejo is credited as playing the Alien. He beat out Peter Mayhew (Chewbacca) for the role. BOO! HISS! Should have been Chewie's role! Not that I'm a biased Star Wars fan.