Tag Archives: Arnold Schwarzenegger
Documentary Review: Bruno (2018)
Release Date: April 20th, 2018
Cast: Bruno Sammartino, Arnold Schwarzenegger, various
WWE, 46 Minutes
Review:
This was thrown together and released onto WWE Network just a few days after Bruno Sammartino passed away in 2018.
However, instead of trying to release it as quickly as possible, I really wish that WWE would’ve spent the time to put together a good, feature length documentary on Bruno. Hell, if anyone deserved it, it’s this guy, a legitimate legend that really helped make the World-Wide Wrestling Federation, decades before it became today’s WWE. In fact, this guy was the Hulk Hogan before Hulk Hogan. He was the megastar of the company and really carried it on his back.
Bruno and Vince McMahon had a falling out in the late ’80s, though, and they never really patched things up until a few years before Bruno’s death when he finally accepted a spot in the WWE Hall of Fame, after rejecting those offers for nearly two decades.
This documentary does go into Bruno’s life and his career but it mostly covers him coming back into the WWE fold and his reunion with Vince McMahon. It also features some neat backstage footage of Bruno and Arnold Schwarzenegger from the night of his Hall of Fame induction.
This was fairly decent but if I’m being honest, a legend like Bruno Sammartino deserved more and this just felt like it was slapped together to capitalize off of his death happening just a few days earlier.
Rating: 6/10
Vids I Dig 747: The Critical Drinker – After Hours: ‘Commando’, Featuring HeelsVsBabyface
Documentary Review: Pumping Iron (1977)
Also known as: Pumping Iron & Stand Tall (Australia VHS title)
Release Date: January 18th, 1977 (New York City premiere)
Directed by: George Butler
Written by: George Butler, Charles Gaines
Music by: Michael Small
Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Lou Ferrigno, Franco Columbu, Mike Katz, Ken Waller, Ed Corney, Serge Nubret
Rollie Robinosn, White Mountain Films, Cinema 5, 86 Minutes
Review:
“The greatest feeling you can get in a gym, or the most satisfying feeling you can get in the gym is… The Pump. Let’s say you train your biceps. Blood is rushing into your muscles and that’s what we call The Pump. You muscles get a really tight feeling, like your skin is going to explode any minute, and it’s really tight – it’s like somebody blowing air into it, into your muscle. It just blows up, and it feels really different. It feels fantastic.” – Arnold Schwarzenegger
Pumping Iron is a much better film than one might think at first glance. It’s really more than just a documentary about bodybuilders, as it features Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lou Ferrigno before both men would go on to become superstars of film and television.
With that, you really get to know these guys at this point in their lives and man, are they super competitive and charismatic. Most importantly, both of these mastodon men were incredibly driven and obsessed with taking the Mr. Universe crown.
This takes a subject that may seem completely uninteresting to an outsider and it makes it really damn interesting. The whole culture around bodybuilding in the ’70s was fascinating and this film captures it magnificently. In fact, had I been alive back then and saw this picture, I might have been inspired by it.
Pumping Iron is the culmination of multiple journeys, many of them incredible, as we see these men transform themselves just to be called “the best”. I loved the camaraderie between Schwarzenegger and Ferrigno’s family. This was just a really fun, entertaining watch.
Rating: 8/10
Pairs well with: Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lou Ferrigno’s films and television shows, as well as other documentaries about competition.
Vids I Dig 696: The Critical Drinker – After Hours: ‘Terminator’ & ‘T2’, Featuring MauLer
Vids I Dig 560: Filmento: ‘Terminator Genisys’: A Guide to Making the Ultimate Boring Blockbuster
Film Review: Total Recall (1990)
Release Date: May 31st, 1990 (Los Angeles premiere)
Directed by: Paul Verhoeven
Written by: Ronlad Shusett, Dan O’Bannon, Jon Povill
Based on: We Can Remember It For You Wholesale by Philip K. Dick
Music by: Jerry Goldsmith
Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rachel Ticotin, Sharon Stone, Michael Ironside, Ronny Cox, Mel Johnson Jr., Marshall Bell, Roy Brocksmith, Ray Baker, Michael Champion, Rosemary Dunsmore, Robert Costanzo, Marc Alaimo, Dean Norris, Debbie Lee Carrington, Lycia Naff
Carolco Pictures, 113 Minutes
Review:
“Sorry, Quaid. Your whole life is just a dream.” – Lori
Paul Verhoeven has made some of the most iconic and entertaining sci-fi action movies of all-time and Total Recall is no different. While I don’t put it on the same level as RoboCop, a near masterpiece, or Starship Troopers, it is still a fun, badass, sci-fi action flick that stars one of the top action stars to ever walk on Earth (or Mars for that matter).
The film is a very loose adaptation of a Philip K. Dick story, but then so were most of the earlier films based on his work.
In this, we see an average guy go to a company that has the technology to enter his brain and send it on a vacation, tailor-made to his personal preferences. However, things suddenly go nuts and we’re taken on a journey where we never really know if what we’re seeing is a dream or reality. While there are clues sprinkled into the film, unintentional or not, it’s still left pretty ambiguous.
Honestly, I don’t care if it’s a dream or not, I just like rolling with the movie and letting it play out, regardless of what the truth is. And frankly, I’m not going to devote much time to over-analyzing the hell out of it like other people have done for decades. There are much better, smarter films to ponder the mysteries of.
Anyway, this is a well cast picture with a lot of people that were either stellar character actors or people just on the verge of breaking out like Sharon Stone.
Additionally, the special effects were really good, especially for this coming out just before the CGI-boom. The effects were best in regards to the animatronic and physical model work. The scenes with heads about to explode in the Martian atmosphere, as well as the mutant effects, were top notch stuff for the time.
In fact, this was one of the most expensive films of its day, as far as production costs went. It’s uncertain if it broke the record or not but it was definitely in the running.
However, the weird thing about that, is I thought the sets looked pretty cheap and generic. I’m not trying to knock them but the Martian city stuff looked weak. This isn’t just me seeing it through 2020 eyes, I actually felt this way when I saw it as an eleven year-old kid in 1990.
Now the sets aren’t terrible, they just aren’t impressive or very creative. I felt like more money definitely went into the animatronic effects and that they tried to trim some of the budgetary fat by making the world these characters inhabit a little too basic.
Also, I think that the lighting didn’t help the sets either, as everything was lit really, really well. Even the scenes in the mining caves. I feel like some of the cheapness could’ve been easily obscured with more subdued lighting that felt more natural and not like these characters were on a stage or a sitcom.
Complaints aside, I still love this movie and none of the flaws really wreck it.
All in all, this was and still is an exciting film. It did really well when it came out and a sequel script, based off of Philip K. Dick’s Minority Report was written. It never got made, however, but Minority Report would eventually become a film by Steven Spielberg, who used a very different script.
Rating: 7.5/10
Pairs well with: other Paul Verhoeven sci-fi movies, as well as other Arnold Schwarzenegger action films.
Vids I Dig 402: Filmento: How to Achieve Action Perfection
From Filmento’s YouTube description: You might’ve heard about the 2019 non-canon fanfiction Tim Miller movie Terminator Dark Fate which was pretty meh and flopped pretty badly, but the movie is based on, Terminator 2, is perhaps the greatest action movie of all time and solidified Arnold Schwarzenegger as the greatest action movie star of that time. But that can’t be just because of action, because a lot of other action movies like even Dark Fate have great action. So what sets Terminator 2 apart from its peers? In today’s Film Perfection, let’s find out. No need to make any more new Terminator movies after Dark Fate, because we have the perfect one right here.
Film Review: The Long Goodbye (1973)
Release Date: March 7th, 1973 (Los Angeles premiere)
Directed by: Robert Altman
Written by: Leigh Brackett
Based on: The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler
Music by: John Williams
Cast: Elliott Gould, Nina van Pallandt, Sterling Hayden, Mark Rydell, Henry Gibson, David Arkin, Arnold Schwarzenegger (uncredited)
E-K-Corporation, Lion’s Gate Films, United Artists, 112 Minutes
Review:
“Listen Harry, in case you lose me in traffic, this is the address where I’m going. You look great.” – Philip Marlowe, “Thank you.” – Harry, “I’d straighten your tie a little bit. Harry, I’m proud to have you following me.” – Philip Marlowe
I find it kind of surprising that this is the first movie I’ve reviewed with Elliott Gould in it, considering the guy has done so much and I’ve already reviewed 1914 movies on Talking Pulp. But hey, I guess I’m correcting that by finally watching The Long Goodbye, which has been on my list for a long-time.
My real interest in this is due to it being an adaptation of one of Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe novels. Also, I’m a big fan of classic film-noir, as well as neo-noir, especially from the ’70s. From what I understand, this is one of the best ones I hadn’t seen yet.
That being said, this did not disappoint, as I was immediately immersed into this version of Marlowe’s world and I enjoyed it immensely.
Elliott Gould is incredible in this and while this statement may come across as really bold, I don’t know if he’s ever been better. On paper, he seems like an odd choice to play the super suave Marlowe but he nails it and gives the character a certain life and panache that we haven’t seen before this. Sure, Humphrey Bogart and Robert Mitchum are masters of their craft but Gould, in this iconic role, shines in a very different way making the character even cooler and more charming. While my assessment of Gould’s Marlowe is certainly subjective and a matter of preference and taste, seeing this film truly made me wish that Gould would’ve played the character more than once.
I love this film’s sense of humor and its wit. Gould really brings all this out in a way that other actors couldn’t. There is just a certain charisma he has that worked perfectly here and the end result is the greatness of this picture, which may be the most entertaining neo-noir of its decade.
Additionally, the rest of the cast was good and I especially loved seeing an older Sterling Hayden in this, as he was involved in some of the best classic film-noir movies ever made. Nina van Pallandt also impressed and it was neat seeing Henry Gibson and an uncredited Arnold Schwarzenegger pop up in this too.
The craftsmanship behind the picture also deserves a lot of credit from Robert Altman’s directing, Vimos Zsigmond’s cinematography and the interesting and instantly iconic score by John Williams.
One thing that really adds a lot to the picture is the locations. Whoever scouted out these places did a stupendous job from Marlowe’s apartment setting, to the beach house to the Mexican locales. It’s just a very unique yet lived-in environment that sort of makes the locations characters within the film.
In the end, I can’t quite call this the best noir-esque movie of the ’70s but it might be my favorite and it’s certainly the one I’ll probably revisit the most, going forward.
Rating: 9.25/10
Pairs well with: other neo-noir films of the ’70s, as well as any movie featuring Philip Marlowe.
Film Review: End of Days (1999)
Release Date: November 16th, 1999 (US premiere)
Directed by: Peter Hyams
Written by: Andrew W. Marlowe
Music by: John Debney
Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Gabriel Byrne, Robin Tunney, Kevin Pollak, Rod Steiger, CCH Pounder, Derrick O’Connor, Miriam Margolyes, Udo Kier, Mark Margolis
Lucifilms, Beacon Pictures, 122 Minutes
Review:
“How do you expect to defeat me when you are but a man, and I am forever?” – Satan
This may be the worst Arnold Schwarzenegger movie I have ever seen. It’s truly deplorable on just about every level. Granted, it did give the world that awesome “choir boy” line.
I’m sure there are a few worse Schwarzenegger movies, as he’s made a lot and a good amount of the later ones are shit, but I tend to stick to his ’80s and early ’90s stuff. There are still a handful (or slightly more) that I’ve never seen due to a lack of interest on my part. Honestly, everything after Eraser, kind of just blends into a big blur.
That being said, this is the first time that I’ve watched this film in its entirety, as I just didn’t have much interest in it back when it came out in late 1999, at the dawn of the new millennium.
Also, at the time, these “end of days” movies were coming out in droves, as the fear of Y2K and the new millennium in general spawned a huge resurgence in religious horror. From memory, none of them were all that good, except for maybe The Devil’s Advocate but it’s been so long since I’ve seen that one.
End of Days just sort of follows the trend of the time but throws in Arnold and tries to give it an action movie twist, as opposed to just being about religious horror.
The movie was originally written to be a vehicle for Tom Cruise. I assume that he read the script and ran because he eventually said “no” and then went off to film Magnolia, which was a really wise decision. There were also three casting changes with the lead female character. It eventually went to Robin Tunney, who I like in just about everything, but the role was first given to Liv Tyler and then Kate Winslet; both dropped out.
There were production issues in locking down a director too, as it was offered to both Sam Raimi and Guillermo del Toro but they turned it down to focus on their original projects. Marcus Nispel was hired, at one point, but he dropped out due to issues with the script. The studio finally brought in Peter Hyams, who was coming off of The Relic and two Jean-Claude Van Damme flicks: Sudden Death and Timecop but was probably most famous for directing The Presidio, 2010 and Outland, a space western with Sean Connery.
However, despite all these early production issues, they really aren’t the biggest problems with this movie.
The script is just detestable. It’s really bad. It’s cookie cutter, generic, “Satan comes to Earth” schlock of the cheapest and lamest caliber. It’s not a good story, it’s derivative as hell and simply wedging action into the plot doesn’t make it cool or even salvageable. Frankly, all the twists are predictable and you can sleep through most of the movie without waking up, feeling lost.
What’s even worse than the script are the special effects. This has some of the worst CGI effects I’ve ever seen in a big budget movie, even for the time. The stealth armor effects of Predator, which predates this by twelve years, blows this out of the water in regards to its “invisible” Satan scenes.
Additionally, the big CGI Satan is laughably bad and it completely wrecks the final battle within the movie.
There’s honestly a lot I could pick apart about End of Days but to put it simply and to wrap this up, it’s just lowest common denominator horseshit and even though Schwarzenegger has made some real crap in his career, the guy deserved better than this.
Rating: 3/10
Pairs well with: all the other religious horror that was running rampant around the turn of the millennium.
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