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That's probably another thing. The biggest hurdle I had when I did start my way through those Hammer Draculas was that like the campy sets and rubber bats and snarling counts and fake blood felt like the kind of stuff I had grown up seeing mocked in the 80s and 90s. I liked them once I got over that and really saw that as a positive, but my initial reaction was "Oh... THAT's where that came from."
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Apr 23, 2020 19:15
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I love the fake blood and the campy sets, always have. Can't really explain why but there's a charm to it all that I fell in love with instantly.
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Apr 23, 2020 19:32
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I like both Conjuring movies and would vote for it if it were against Dusk and Blade.
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Apr 23, 2020 19:51
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I like both Blade and Blade II a lot but Scream is in my top 5 horror films of all time and Scream II is real solid as well. Even 3 and 4 are fine. The first Candyman is a better film than any of the NoES movies, but the latter has at least three films that I really like and even the bad ones are entertaining enough (except the remake). Evil Dead is no contest, 4 films and a TV series that are all excellent. I like the first Conjuring film a lot but from what I’ve seen of the rest they are at best mediocre. I like From Dusk til Dawn well enough but it’s at best like a solid B+ for me. Haven’t seen the sequels. Hellraiser wins easily, the first two are excellent and some of the rest have their moments.
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Apr 23, 2020 19:54
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gey muckle mowser posted:I like both Blade and Blade II a lot but Scream is in my top 5 horror films of all time and Scream II is real solid as well. Even 3 and 4 are fine. Agreed on many of these points except the Candyman one. I'd say it's as good as Dream Warriors, maybe, but not better. That's a hard one to call. From Dusk Til Dawn is fine, but Hellraiser 1 and especially 2 are just way more creative than FDTD bait-and-switch. Although I do like the sight gags in FDTD. Shame that Rodriguez doesn't have a knack for that creative goofy sense of humor anymore.
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Apr 23, 2020 19:58
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FDTD's opening short film (everything up to them returning to the hotel) is such deliriously inspired dialog from QT married to just fantastic, joyous direction by Rodriguez that it stands as an unimpeachable short film on its own
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Apr 23, 2020 20:00
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Reminder that From Dusk Till Dawn has Tom Savini playing a character named Sex Machine who has a cock gun.
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Apr 23, 2020 20:01
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TrixRabbi posted:Reminder that From Dusk Till Dawn has Tom Savini playing a character named Sex Machine who has a cock gun. But that gag was re-used from Desperado.
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Apr 23, 2020 20:07
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I actually haven't seen FDTD in a long time, but it was a staple back in high school and college. I should probably revisit it. I should also revisit NoES III, I'm not as hot on it as everyone else seems to be. It's been a pretty long time for that one too.
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Apr 23, 2020 20:09
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TrixRabbi posted:Reminder that From Dusk Till Dawn has Tom Savini playing a character named Sex Machine who has a cock gun. If anyone needs to be reminded of that they should not be voting!
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Apr 23, 2020 20:13
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EFFORTPOST TIME! Blade is good. Blade II is good plus it has Ron Perlman, Donnie Yen and Guillermo del Toro. Blade III is bad but does give us Patton Oswalt's story about Blade III. It also gives us (once again) Parker Posey effortlessly stealing the show, as well as Trips on screen with a demon Pomeranian. So yeah. But I'm not here to say any of those is better than any Scream. What I am here to do, is to tell ya'll about the wonder that is the Blade TV series.  So a couple of things. The Nashville Network, a country-music-and-hunting-shows channel had rebranded as "The National Network" and gotten the rights to Star Trek: TNG somehow. This raised their rating enough to afford bringing the WWE on to TNN before they eventually moved to USA where they've been for decades now. Between TNG and RAW, TNN's Nielsens among the Monster-Energy-and-Axe contingent was sky-high, so they rebranded again to (ugh) Spike TV. The all-dude channel for bros!  The first original show produced by Spike was, of course, Blade. A passion project for Stickyfingaz (a huge Blade fan, correctly I might add, as Blade fukken' owns), he attached his name to it to get funding approved. David S. Goyer (prolific screenwriter and shepherd of the Blade franchise) wrote the series bible and directed a few episodes. However, they had a small problem: Stickyfingaz can't act. This wasn't previously a problem, as he was rapping (a thing he can do) and didn't need to act. The solution to "how do you make a action/drama with the main talent being a guy who can't act" was, simply, to not feature him as much as possible. Most of "Blade"s screen time is Sticky's stunt double doing (pretty great for the budget) fight scenes. But even that is only a small amount of the show's runtime. So what did they fill the rest with? A recently-returned Army sniper/badass named Krista Starr who gets wrapped up in vampire politics searching for her brother and gets turned into a vampire - but is saved by Blade and convinced to work as a double-agent. Jill Wagner as Krista has amazing chemistry with Neil Jackson's Marcus Van Sciver who oozes gothic malice and the proceedings are delightfully gory while having tons of little subplots working their way around the main plot. It premiered after Wrasslin' and did banger numbers, it was the highest-rated show on the network. Then the Neilsen detailed stats came out, and were a disaster. The show was through the roof with women. Turns out, having a badass vampire sniper double-agent spy lady was popular.  This was, of course, a disaster for SpikeTV, who were selling ad buys to razor companies and Axe body spray, and those advertisers didn't want to advertise to women. So it was cancelled (sadly) after one very satisfying season. The whole show is fantastic, it's a hard-R "this program not suitable for all audiences" bloodbath interspersed with the sort of palace intrigue that would make the boldest Vampire: The Masquerade GM jealous. I cannot recommend it enough, it is just so satisfying at all times that Kirk 'Stickyfingaz' Jones is not on screen. Hell, the new Whistler is better than anything in the third movie, which was a whole movie designed to move Blade away from being a Blade-focused movie. Anyway, I'm voting for Scream because Neve Campbell is my Hollywood crush. Shrecknet fucked around with this message at 20:29 on Apr 23, 2020 |
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Apr 23, 2020 20:24
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Blade (1998) is one of the best films of the 90s and has a blood rave and Udo Kier burning in the sun. I have not seen Blade II or Blade Trinity but that alone secured my vote.
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Apr 23, 2020 20:36
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TrixRabbi posted:Blade (1998) is one of the best films of the 90s and has a blood rave and Udo Kier burning in the sun. I have not seen Blade II or Blade Trinity but that alone secured my vote.
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Apr 23, 2020 20:42
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I've seen all of the Hammer Dracula movies. I don't think a single one of them is as good as Tremors 1 is. To be honest, that vote wasn't even close for me. I find Hammer movies in general to be overrated and mostly bad, but in the cultural hindsight the bad has been glorified as fun and campy when they often aren't that fun to watch and the dialog is often terrible...
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Apr 23, 2020 21:39
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gey muckle mowser posted:I like both Blade and Blade II a lot but Scream is in my top 5 horror films of all time and Scream II is real solid as well. Even 3 and 4 are fine. Oh, gently caress off with this. There's a lot of Scream 3 that is decent-ish but we do not speak of Scream 4. It is an utter abomination and I don't blame Wes Craven for regretting his directing work on it.
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Apr 23, 2020 22:43
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Scream 4's Knife In Head scene's pretty great. It's the only thing I remember about it, though. There's a barn party, I think?
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Apr 23, 2020 22:48
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They have like a town tradition of watching the Stab movies every year in a barn, yeah. 2 had good stuff but was brought down by the new cast rehash that felt really empty, which is probably because of the rewrites and script leak drama. 3 I didn't care for but was silly enough not to hate. 4 I've only seen once but kinda liked it. Not a masterpiece or anything, too long, same basic format which had become cliched, but some fun stuff and a manic fun performance. I'd have to watch it a second time to be confident in my placement of it.
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Apr 23, 2020 23:01
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I just shotgunned the original trilogy and I had forgotten just how gleeful they all were. Like, in the middle of absolute carnage and legitimate terror the movie is always quick to add in a joke or a nod to just how silly the idea of slashers is. It intentionally defuses itself, which I think is basically in service of making the violence just that much more distressing. I definitely liked 3 more than 2; 2 is just an annoyingly cloy retread while 3 really seems to be the next evolution, not only is this a slasher movie that takes place in a world that has slasher movies, it takes place in the sequel to the movie based on the first movie based on a world where slashers exist. There's so many lines and gags about, for instance, Jenny McCarthy's character complaining about her character dying topless and the absolutely inspired chase through the "Sydney's House" set that just work to highlight and elevate how artificial the whole thing is. The killer's identity and the reveal almost feel like an afterthought as though they were having so much fun lampooning Hollywood they forgot to put in an interesting slasher motive and good villain. And, as stated, Parker Posey walks off with the whole show with her Gail Weathers appropriation. Also having just rewatched them all, it is literally bonkers how much star power the series could attract.
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Apr 23, 2020 23:12
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It is pretty funny that the matchup is of 2 franchises whose 3rd entries can both be summed up as "Parkey Posey chewing scenery in a supporting role is the best part."
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Apr 23, 2020 23:45
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Wait, are we voting based on best movie? Am I watching a bunch of crap sequels for nought?
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Apr 24, 2020 00:00
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Its a franchises tournament, we should be voting on franchises. 
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Apr 24, 2020 00:02
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BisonDollah posted:Wait, are we voting based on best movie? Am I watching a bunch of crap sequels for nought? No it's about the overall franchises but it's kinda hard to get away from the fact that some have masterpiece level films in them and others don't. The ones that do get credit for that, at least that's the way I'm voting.
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Apr 24, 2020 00:12
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Basebf555 posted:No it's about the overall franchises but it's kinda hard to get away from the fact that some have masterpiece level films in them and others don't. The ones that do get credit for that, at least that's the way I'm voting. Same. Hence TCM being so highly ranked in my mind. Two great great movies make up for a lot of mediocre sequels and reboots.
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Apr 24, 2020 00:23
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I can see how someone who just watched all the Tremors sequels might feel like the results are being dominated by single-movie voting, but yeah it's just variance in how heavily people weight the standouts and the dreck. I'll forgive a lot of pointless garbage if you've got something as good as the first two Hellraisers, while if you never rise above "that was okay, I guess" I don't really care that you have fifty perfectly okay movies to your name. Other people feel differently. edit: Well, that and people not actually watching Hammer stuff. Monsters.
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Apr 24, 2020 00:28
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Considering Blade was one of my favorite superheros since the Marvel Vampire Tales magazine, I had to vote for him.
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Apr 24, 2020 00:58
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Timby posted:Oh, gently caress off with this. They also did successfully troll a lot of people into thinking that it was an actual psuedo-reboot.
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Apr 24, 2020 03:56
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I'll admit that I could go deeper on Hammer, but the stuff I have seen tends to never grab me as much as I want it to. The blood is great, but the stories feel so plotting and take forever to get to the goods. And this isn't a problem with "Old Movies," the Universal Monsters are filled with masterpieces and I'm banking on them being the Jason Killer in this tournament. edit: It's a shame we won't have a Universal vs. Hammer showdown so we could debate Lugosi vs. Lee.
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Apr 24, 2020 14:21
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Timby posted:Oh, gently caress off with this. granted I haven't seen it since it came out, but I thought it was entertaining enough. It's bad compared to the other Scream films for sure, but it's still better than the worst films in most franchises.
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Apr 24, 2020 14:33
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Sad to see the end of Hammer Dracula, but I also have a fondness for Tremors so I'm can't be too upset. I do wonder if Hammer Frankenstein would have fared better. On the whole it's probably the stronger series of films and I don't think any of the Dracula movies ever stray as far from their comfort zone as far as Frankenstein Created Woman does.
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Apr 24, 2020 14:34
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STAC Goat posted:It is pretty funny that the matchup is of 2 franchises whose 3rd entries can both be summed up as "Parkey Posey chewing scenery in a supporting role is the best part." Being pedantic, the best part of Blade Trinity is Parker Posey being called a cockjuggling thundercunt.
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Apr 24, 2020 14:37
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Flying Zamboni posted:Sad to see the end of Hammer Dracula, but I also have a fondness for Tremors so I'm can't be too upset. I do wonder if Hammer Frankenstein would have fared better. On the whole it's probably the stronger series of films and I don't think any of the Dracula movies ever stray as far from their comfort zone as far as Frankenstein Created Woman does. Not sure, I guess from what people are saying the overall image that Hammer has kinda worked as a double-edged sword. So while Hammer Dracula is definitely the more well-known and iconic series(at least outside of the UK), but that may have actually worked against it. People who may not have seen a lot of the films have a certain idea of it in their head and it doesn't necessarily represent the total package. Like, yea the sets can feel artificial and the blood looks fake and the pace can sometimes be pretty slow, but they're greater than the sum of their parts. I wonder if people who hadn't actually seen the films felt more comfortable voting against them because they felt they knew what they were through pop culture osmosis, versus with Cushing Frankenstein maybe more people would've gone out of their way to actually seek out and watch them to see what they're all about. They're more consistent, that's for sure, because Cushing's presence is there from beginning to end. Lee's Dracula wasn't even around for Brides of Dracula and then there's a few later sequels where he's there but he barely has any screentime.
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Apr 24, 2020 15:33
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There's always a next year for redemption (or next Halloween)! Lots of franchises that were shamefully left out, lots of total jobbers, lots of opportunity to watch new movies.
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Apr 24, 2020 15:39
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Basebf555 posted:Not sure, I guess from what people are saying the overall image that Hammer has kinda worked as a double-edged sword. So while Hammer Dracula is definitely the more well-known and iconic series(at least outside of the UK), but that may have actually worked against it. People who may not have seen a lot of the films have a certain idea of it in their head and it doesn't necessarily represent the total package. Like, yea the sets can feel artificial and the blood looks fake and the pace can sometimes be pretty slow, but they're greater than the sum of their parts. I wonder if people who hadn't actually seen the films felt more comfortable voting against them because they felt they knew what they were through pop culture osmosis, versus with Cushing Frankenstein maybe more people would've gone out of their way to actually seek out and watch them to see what they're all about. For me it's all the pacing. The blood and sets (and costumes, and Lee) are all selling points. But the pacing just does those movies in and I feel like they don't deliver as consistently as I want them to. Now, I don't think they're bad movies and I totally see what the fans love about them, but Hammer just always leaves me a little cold. Though I will say, a theater environment helps. I saw the first Dracula on 35mm once and while I still didn't love it, it was absolutely an improved experience, though that's true of most movies.
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Apr 24, 2020 15:57
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Jedit posted:Being pedantic, the best part of Blade Trinity is Parker Posey being called a cockjuggling thundercunt. Is her character particularly promiscuous or is it just a really juvenile and misogynistic joke that's stuck with you for some reason? feedmyleg fucked around with this message at 16:52 on Apr 24, 2020 |
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Apr 24, 2020 16:42
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Its Ryan Reynolds test-driving his Deadpool character. Theres a subtle nod that Reynolds is being kept alive to be used as Posey's Sex Idiot, which makes sense when you see him with his shirt off in this movie
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Apr 24, 2020 17:30
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Jedit posted:Being pedantic, the best part of Blade Trinity is Parker Posey being called a cockjuggling thundercunt. Vampire Pomeranian is also a great gag.
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Apr 24, 2020 18:36
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TrixRabbi posted:It's a shame we won't have a Universal vs. Hammer showdown so we could debate Lugosi vs. Lee. Let's be honest there would be no debate. Lee and Lugosi went for very, very different takes on the character. Lugosi was the sophisticated monster, feasting on the high class and putting on airs wherever he went. Lee was the beast, a blood driven creature that could think of nothing but death and misery and sought out only that. It's basically what kind of Dracula do you like, the one that can pretend to be human for more than five seconds, or the one frothing at the mouth and wanting to wipe out the entire human race. Universal would still demolish Hammer on every front and is my personal pick for the victor of the whole shebang. There's just too much going for it and too many amazing films.
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Apr 24, 2020 20:11
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Honestly theres a lot of good gags in that movie starting with the first shot (vampire in spacesuit flipping off the sun) and I think the utter direness of Whistler Jr and Hannibal drag it down but theres a lot to like in Blade 3
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Apr 24, 2020 20:15
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One thing I love about thinking of the Universal Monsters as a whole is the realization that the most evil of the monsters, is also probably the most human, in The Invisible Man.
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Apr 24, 2020 22:04
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So with the Sweet Six-scream starting in a few days, I wanted to ask about process. Do you guy want to do two matchups and a shortened voting or four matchups (the entire western division) and a longer 6-7 day voting? I was hoping as we get down to fewer franchises that people were more invested in that we'd get more longform discussion of them (like my blade writeup) as this is the third time we're seeing them so we should have had time to review the canon and be ready to talk more not just as enthusiasts but as critics. Any volunteers to do deep-dives on our next four films (F13, Talbot Universal, Wishmaster and Chucky)
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Apr 24, 2020 22:12
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