Next up in my sickly watchings was the 1984 action comedy starring Eddie Murphy. It's only fitting that my first Eddie Murphy movie be his break out film.

Beverly Hills Cop follows Detroit detective Axel Foley (Murphy) as he tracks down the gentlemen who murdered his best friend. Foley is not the type of guy who follows standard conventions or rules. He'll do whatever he feels is necessary to get the information he desires, including a lot of social engineering. His investigation takes him out to Beverly Hills, where he makes enemies (and friends) of the local police department, a no-nonsense, by the book operation. In particular, Foley is paired up with/against the bumbling duo of John Taggert (John Ashton) and Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold, aka Dr. Neil Miller) as he tears through Beverly Hills in search of the those who murdered his friend.

What I found most odd about this movie is how low-key it is. The action pieces are few with the largest one being a shoot-out between maybe ten guys spread over the course as almost as many minutes. The set pieces are also few, with the story bouncing back and forth between a half dozen locations; from the precinct to an art gallery to a hotel, back to the precinct to a warehouse, back to the precinct to a mansion, back to the art gallery, then to precinct and the hotel again. It keeps the scale of things very small. Indeed, even the movie's theme, which is played just a few too many times, is a cool yet almost mellow riff.

One would think in a movie labelled "action comedy" starring Eddie Murphy would have the comedian putting his talents to use. But, he's is definitely not where most of the comedy is. He'll spit off a one liner or two, but generally he just plays Foley as a too cool for school type personality. No, where most of the comedy comes is from our cop duo of Taggert and Rosewood. These two riff off each other exceptionally well and provide, in my opinion, about 90% of the entertainment the film has to offer.

In the end, I didn't hate Beverly Hills Cop; it was a mildly entertaining flick. But, it's too small in scope and played to low key to really work well as an action movie. They also try to put in the little bits of comedy here and there, but rarely did I laugh at loud of those attempts. How it managed to be the biggest movie of '84 ahead of Ghostbusters - which, I think we will all agree, has at least more notoriety than Cop - I'll never know.

Rating - 3/5

Having been cooped up the past few days due to root canals, pain killers, and sickness, I had an opportunity to hit some items on my movie watch list. The first of which was Battle Royale.

Battle Royale is a fairly standard "battle survival games" type story. In some dystopian alter-verse, a bus load of middle schoolers is shipped off to an uninhabited island and tossed out into the unforgiving wild with the given goal of being the only survivor by the end of three days. It covers the general theme of how extreme situations can cause people to do things they never would have otherwise. You've seen this story plenty of times over in things such as Lord of the Flies, Hunger Games, and probably a couple dozen sitcom plots. Only, this time it's in Japan and if more than one person comes out alive, everybody dies.

Not knowing what the plot really was, I went in thinking that this was going to be in the vein of Vampire Girl vs Frankenstein Girl or Hobo with a Shotgun: a campy, slasher gore film that wasn't anything to be taken too seriously. What I got instead was a very well thought out and well put together movie that happened to have a cliche plot line. There were some bits that were a little bit over the top, but the theme was definitely played very seriously.

At the beginning of the movie, there are some 42 entrants in these gory games and, while most don't receive much in the line of attention when they're killed off, some groups and individuals get their own little arcs. One group of girls has holed themselves up in a lighthouse on one of the island's coasts. There's a group of nerds who find themselves a shack and, thanks to the power of brains and hacking, wreak havok upon their captor's via electronic warfare while attempting to sneak in a homemade bomb. Yet another girl goes rogue on her own, killing without hesitation. She's on her period, apparently, so perhaps it's semi-justified. Of course, there's the two protagonists (one of whom is the actor for Light Yagami in the live action Death Note movie) who find themselves at the mercy of one of the game's previous winners.

It's the way that the movie explores the dynamics of these groups/individuals and how they attempt to cope with the situation (or don't) that make this movie so intriguing. Friends are enemies and enemies just might be friends. Trust is an item best given out carefully, if indeed at all. The main characters interface with most all of these circles of individuals to varying degrees and effect, and provides for the main drive of the plot narrative.

And, as a quick note, I didn't have the usual issues I have with Japanese live action movies with this film. I can't quite put my finger on it, but their cinematography language is different than what you see in the usual blockbusters. Often, it seems as if their films are shot in cheap equipment, poorly acted, and perhaps shot by amateurs. BR has none of these issues, is well shot, edited, and acted.

As stated before, I was not really expecting much of this movie, but am so glad I went in with an open mind and watched it. It was highly entertaining and a great way to spend a lortab addled evening.

Rating: 5/5

Across from my desk at work are mounted three TVs. I get to watch the Price is Right in the morning and Let's Make a Deal in the afternoon. Both shows are highly similar in format and hosted by Whose Line veterans, but Deal seems to be where all the weirdos go what with all their costumes and what such.

Finances - I managed to stick to my guns and purchased nothing extraneous last week. Food and gas were the only items money was shelled out for. I'm going to duplicate that trend this week.

Health - I did some walking almost every day last week and crammed in nearly ten miles of it yesterday. I feel my overall calorie intake was lower than usual as well. Also, I mention it every time I write this, but still doing well on keeping away from McD's and TBell. I note this because I was eating there for late night snacks three to four times a week in the later months of last year. That I haven't been to either place in nearly two months is kind of a big deal. I'm not even craving them anymore which is more surprising. This is certainly a boon to my overall health and indeed my pocket book.

Japanese - I haven't been studying, that much I can say. I do keep myself immersed in small ways, though, by reading kana that I come across. I even had a brief all Japanese conversation with my brother last week. This week I will do at the very least thirty minutes of studying every day, an hour preferable. That I have a basic grasp of the language is more crucial now that the trip to Japan is set in stone.

Drawing - Seriously, I'm just going to drop this one. There are too many other things that I rank higher in importance (that have money invested in them) over improving my art skills.

I think I just saw Danielle Fishel on the Price is Right...

I think John Hughes films may have been the conversation that sparked my movie watch list, so it's only fitting that I start at the beginning. That and the library just happened to have it on the particular day I strolled in. On blu-ray, even.

For those who may have been like me and have no clue what this movie is about, it's about a certain Samantha Baker and her sixteenth birthday. Or, rather, how everybody forgets it's her sixteenth birthday, primarily because it also happens to be the eve of her air-headed sister's birthday. The first act of the movie is essentially a slice-of-life type bit about Sam as she mopes about in adolescence. She's not popular in school, is overly conscious of her "under development", and crushes on a guy that doesn't even know she exists, a certain Jake Ryan. Thanks to her interactions with the male protagonist - credited as "The Geek" but also referred to as "Farmer Ted" - she eventually makes it into the heart of Jake while "Ted" gets Jake's previous girlfriend. Also, Kuni shows up and is generally awesome.

Now, I'm going to rant about a few things, but I want to make it clear that Sixteen Candles is a good movie and one that I definitely enjoyed. It's a heart-warming little flick with good characters, good humor, and a bit of drama. All the actors convey believable performances and, despite it obviously being set in the 80s, the movie carries an almost timeless feel to it. The themes here are universal even if the outcome is not.

Now to some musing. Thar be spoilers ahead.

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There's no reason to reiterate the fact that I created a site where people can recommend movies for me to watch. You've probably heard all about it already. The first movie for me to watch off this list was Hobo with a Shotgun, suggested by my French buddy Mickael.

Our film starts out with the titular Hobo - who never actually receives a name - rolling into a town presumably in Canada. The opening music is chipper, the sky is a highly saturated blue, and life in general seems to be just swell. Three minutes later, some dude has shoved down a manhole, a rope tossed around his neck, and a truck yanking his head off. It rains blood and some random chick in a bikini dances in it. This pretty much sets the tone for the remainder of the film until until our Hobo friend gets sick and tired of the wanton killing that seems to plague the town. He buys himself a shotgun and becomes the hero that Namelessville deserves. Oh, and he also befriends a stripper along the way.

Hobo with a Shotgun is pretty much everything I anticipated it would be; campy, cheesy, and violent for the sake of violence. There's no message, no point, just an excuse to watch people get their hands shoved into the whirling blade of a lawn mower. Which actually leads me to a musing. Along the way, Mr. Hobo gets letters carved into his chest with a knife, beat up, and stomped repeatedly by a dude wearing ice skates. But does that keep our intrepid protagonist down? No, not really, no. Give him a night of sleep and he's back up like nothing happened. Even his stripper companion nearly gets her head sawed off, but a couple hours in the ER and all is right again. Dialogue is equally cheesy, culminating in a scene where the Hobo is addressing babies in a hospital nursery about the bleak future and that, with any luck, they won't become a hobo with a shotgun like him.

The visual effects are relatively decent, I guess. I mean, once you've seen one movie with tons of blood and gore, you've seen most of them. Nothing too new or interesting here. Every scene seems to be hyper saturated, creating many shots that look almost mono- or dual-chromatic. Example on that last point, the finale is lit with a cyan light on one half and an orange on the other. After the extreme color correction, the effect is kind of nifty.

All in all, it was a pretty stupid movie. Everything was over the top and an obvious homage to the exploitation films of yore. I wouldn't really recommend it to anybody unless they get a kick out of mindless violence.

Rating - 2.5/5

EDIT: I forgot to mention the part where one of the baddies burns a bus full of kids with Disco Inferno playing in the background. Nothing more need be said.