What Emmanuelle Movie Did You Just Watch?

[Matt]

Did BLADE and BLADE 2 over the past few days.

BLADE (in glorious 4K): still a lot of fun. The special effects were dodgy back then and the 4K transfer makes them look dodgier, but it doesn't really matter...the film has a ton of energy to it and all of the actors are fully engaged and having fun. Additionally, the production design is first rate with some really excellent sets. The final blood god temple is particularly great.

BLADE 2: Almost as good as the first one. My main ding against it is the retcon of Whistler's death...it simply doesn't work and it takes some big mental gymnastics not to have that ruin the credibility of the film. That aside, it feels akin to the first film tonally and in terms of overall look/demeanor. There is a marked improvement in special effects which is nice, and the whole reaper mandibles thing is particularly well done.

Not sure if I'll do TRINITY or not. I don't remember much about it other than it felt like a lesser effort.

[Abraham Smashington]

I love the second one much more than the first one overall. Dorff sucked as a villain in my opinion and the effects are terrible. The blood rave scene was neat though. Trinity sucks HARD man, go in with no expectations and maybe it'll be okay. I'll always remember the CGI eyes they put on Wesley cause he's a bitch in that one so it has that going for it.

[Abraham Smashington]

Nevermind, read his wiki. That’s a shame but who can keep track of who is who and doing what when the camera is off these days. Seems like everybody is going down in flames.

Yeah, all that shit with him and the production company and whatever is a shame. Remember the days before the internet when people could be complete shitheels and we'd still enjoy their output?

[Abraham Smashington]

[Captain Russ]

I love the second one much more than the first one overall. Dorff sucked as a villain in my opinion and the effects are terrible. The blood rave scene was neat though. Trinity sucks HARD man, go in with no expectations and maybe it'll be okay. I'll always remember the CGI eyes they put on Wesley cause he's a bitch in that one so it has that going for it.

I still think, CG warts and all, the first Blade is the best of them. And I like Frost as a villain for that matter. His gambit for power was enjoyable to watch as he traded victories and defeats with Blade throughout the runtime. it is a tall order to make such a short man seem threatening but Dorff did a good job conveying menace (special mention to Donal Logue for his second-in-command performance).

Blade 1 utilizes its style in the best way by placing it in the context of fleshing out the world that remains unseen by humanity. There is an off-kilter point of view introduced and developed throughout that film. It navigates that space without being crushed under the weight of too much superfluous wank, unlike the sequel.

In retrospect, Blade 2 has in its corpus the blueprint for every single movie del Toro would make in the genre going forward (whether one enjoys that or not is up to the individual. Personally it is long in the tooth for me and refuses to die or evolve).

A lot of Blade 2's problems fall on the planks of wood cast in extremely pivotal roles, as Marta 1's School of Gadot acting kept everything that should have hit emotionally for her character fall to the wayside like a wet sack of cats. Tom Kretschmann's cartoonishly gravelly voice didn't really give anything he said much weight and was just laughably distracting throughout. The obvious love of the tragic monster shines through with del Toro's focus on Nomak, but there really isn't much to him and he doesn't move beyond the wounded beast role (the sad Greenpeace elf in Hellboy 2 was a more fleshed out model in this make). There was something there with the familial strife subplot, but it wasn't given much room in an already crowded plot of shitty double triple quadruple turns and revelations and unnecessary, lingering sequences of effects wank (that have aged like milk in their efficacy).

The biggest flaw, as mentioned earlier, is the retcon of Whistler's fate. Such a terrible idea that it actively dismantles any growth for Blade and the potential of what else is going on in part 2 with the uneasy alliance and dissension in the ranks. As it is, Blade 2 is a lot of style with very little substance. When I play it back in my head, it is just exposition walks and ootz ootz music the entire way through. The stakes feel absolutely hollow due to this decision.

I enjoyed the corniness of Blade 1's rough CG and practical mix. The weightless, nonsensical CG ragdolls on display in part 2 are just off-putting, especially in the finale. Young me loved the Tweekend music as Wesley beat up a bunch of faceless drones. Older me shakes his head at the ridiculous emptiness of it. Not to mention the editing styles of the two are night and day in terms of their results. The first remains frenetic but it accentuates the characters' extraordinary physicality, but the pacing of shots in 2 make everything feel slow and overly choreographed.

Having written this blog post, it is messy but I can understand why Harry fingers his asshole to it. There's a "lunatic running the asylum" quality to it that I cannot move beyond

It'd make a fine double feature with XxX for mid-2000s cornball spectacle but I will reach for the first one every day, all day.


And Matt? Avoid Trinity at all costs.

[Abraham Smashington]

That is a lot of words for Wesley Snipes killing vampires. I'm the asshole who thinks Blade 2 is one of Del Toro's best flicks not named Hellboy, everything else has been okay or a let down for me because I'm an emotionally stunted man child who enjoys silly shit. That being said, it's been a long fucking time since I've seen ANY Blade flicks because overall I always thought he was kind of lame in the movies. The best shit in the 2nd one is the practical effects and ridiculous vampire hunting team. Blade never really factored in to why I enjoyed the flicks. Even weirder is that I always remember Blade as ripping off The Matrix but in reality it came out first so maybe everything I've ever believed in is wrong? I AM GOING NUTS.

Maybe the first one would be more up my alley now, but I'll never know because I am too busy rewatching Batman v Superman for the umpteenth time. I always forget XxX is a thing.

[Captain Russ]

I wouldn't say as much about it if I didn't really enjoy Snipes movies and the initial reinvigoration of the capeshit genre via a hard R genre picture (what a monkey paw that has become). I gets very little love for the amount of good will it deserves for what it accomplishes.

Re: The Matrix being derivative. There's also their entire production design for most of the Matrix being readymade material from Dark City (and that whole narrative's hero journey beneath layers of manufactured reality).

[BillyG]

GDT movie rankings - Hellboy, Hellboy 2, Blade 2, Cronos, Devil's Backbone, then various levels of disappointment.

[Abraham Smashington]

I'd put HB2 in front of HB if only for the troll market scene, but yeah, your list is about the same as mine. Dude needs to just make video games at this point.

[BillyG]

I'd put HB2 in front of HB if only for the troll market scene, but yeah, your list is about the same as mine. Dude needs to just make video games at this point.

I think I like 2 better as well.

[gravedigger]

SHE DIES TOMORROW- How to make 90 minutes feel like 390 minutes. We get it, depression is terrible! Fuck off with this nonsense.

[BillyG]

Sarah and I usually watch dumb bad silly movies on NYE. Any recommendations?

[B_Metal]

Sarah and I usually watch dumb bad silly movies on NYE. Any recommendations?

Get Duked on Prime is pretty silly, but we laughed the whole thing through. But if accents bother you, you might skip it.

[BillyG]

We watched WW84. What a terrible movie. Like an all time bad fucking movie. It is so fucking dumb and poorly made. It's set in the 80s, but they do nothing with it. How is it not FILLED with 80s music? i don't think there's a single known 80s hit in the whole soundtrack. They can't even do the fish out of water well, because Chris Pine has his fucking MIND BLOWN over an escalator...but can jump into a fucking modern fighter jet and be like yo I can fly this shit! Then the whole plot...what plot? i have NO IDEA what was happening...Pascal had some kind of oil cooperative? Boy, do I have news about how the oil cartels work boys. I kept asking Sarah how is he supposedly trying to make money, like buying plots of land to drill on? So he's just a midstream company? I was furious, it made no fucking sense. And then why would he renouncing his wish not undo EVERYTHING wished upon him? Why did it ALSO take everyone else renouncing? Her fucking stupid speech at the end was part 2 of her dumb ass signing Imagine on Instagram. Somehow the movie had no plot, and WAY too much plot.

Then I am supposed to think Kristen Wiig is becoming bad for beating the shit out of a sex pest on the street? Also, EVERY MAN is a fucking sexual predator on the streets. "I've never been popular" except for the fact every man that sees you is desperate to fuck you? Then I am supposed to dislike the Egyptian dude for wanting to boot out the fucking Israelis that pushed their way into the strait? WHILE YOURE LEAD ACTRESS IS A FORMER IDF MEMBER. Holy shit.

There is nothing redeeming about this movie. Every line of dialog is bad. Every bit of action is bad. Wiig looked so fucking stupid they made their final battle in the dark to hide the shit CGI that filled the whole movie. When she swung to save the kids in the highway she let the lasso slip out of her hand, but when she landed THE LASSO IS FUCKING ATTACHED TO HER BELT. Also, that's how you make the lasso look? Holy shit, we laughed when we saw it. Oh god, and that whole opening montage of crime stopping, and how she makes sure to break 4 cameras in the mall but hey the hundreds of people here won't tell anyone they saw me! And the big OH THIS GOLD ARMOR and then she did kind of nothing with it except let the wings get beat up for 30 seconds AFTER she got her powers back, so she shouldn't even need it! And Chris Pine "it's just wind...and air" speech. WIND AND AIR, YOU MEAN THE SAME SHIT?! And all of a sudden she can fly and like...lasso clouds to propel herself?

I'm glad Pine, Pascal, and Wiig for some checks and a chance to kind of go nuts. And the WW theme from BvS still fucking rips. Otherwise holy shit this is a bleak piece of shit, I could go on and on. That mid-credits sequence was the cringiest fucking shit.

[Timothy225]

If you ever leave the oil industry, I will totally follow you for your movie reviews, Bill.

Planning on FINALLY watching WW84 this weekend, and I'm kind of hoping it's as bad as y'all say it is. 'Cause I'm in the mood for a really cheesy awful flick right about now.