Wednesday, April 22, 2009

50 Movie Pack - Nightmare Worlds MOVIE REVIEW TIME FUN YAY part deux (a French word for "2")

Saturday and Sunday I was able to fit four more movies in.

ATOMIC RULERS OF THE WORLD
IMDB link
This is the first of the two Starman movies I watched. (There are 3 in the entire set, and also 3 American movies.) Starman movies are about what I discovered to be Japan's first on screen superhero, Starman, played by Ken Utsui. A little wikipedia digging informed me that Ken Utsui is a respected actor, but to this day refuses to talk about the role, mainly due to embarrassment. Apparently they used to stuff his crotch area with cotton. The suit was a little silly too.

Regardless of what you think about Starman's cape attached to his arms or his little antennae coming out of his over the head spandex costume, the movies are kinda neat. Originally parts of movies from a Japanese series called Super Giants (yes plural, and there's only one super hero.. he is not very giant either..), the plot revolves around a group of aliens from a distant planet who need to protect Earth from nuclear disaster. They do this in order to protect their own planet; nuclear fallout on Earth could directly affect them. Somehow, from space, many miles away. I'll allow it. Starman is their answer to Earth's bodyguard needs, armed with this watch that gives him the ability to speak every language on Earth, look like a human, and fly through space. I think he is also made of super powerful metal, because he has super human strength. It is Starman's duty to thwart any nuclear threat on Earth, which is convenient, because in these two movies a country that doesn't really exist and some aliens from another planet, respectively, are determined to blow up the Earth.

Starman is a friend to children, and boy that is a good thing because there is a group of sneaky orphan kids that sure do like to get themselves into trouble in these movies. In both movies one of them gets kidnapped and Starman, being the gentleman he is, makes it a point to save them. After all, children are the Earth's future. That's the movie talking, not me.

White people always play the villians in these movies. They're pretty decent, I think, and kind of cute. There's some really bad fight scenes, I think he was fencing in one of them. These two movies were basically the same plot with different people, but I enjoyed watching them both.

The Alpha Incident
IMDB link
I thought that I had finally reached a movie that wasn't about aliens coming to Earth, but boy was I wrong. This one definitely tries to sneak it past you though.

A space probe comes back with a deadly virus. It killed a bunch of rats. We aren't told how they died. These scientists for some reason think its a good idea then, to put this virus on a boxcar train guarded only by some guy that reminds me of a girl I went to high school with's dad (Mr. Rogers but less fun and totally scary). They don't even package it up well. It just kind of sits there in jars in a box.

The hillbilly that is driving this boxcar train gets so curious as to what those bottles are that he breaks them open. Now this guy is a piece of work. He's really endearing because of how silly stupid he is, and I felt bad for him the whole time to tell you the truth. Anyway, boxcar stops at a station, Evil Mr. Rogers discovers that the bottles have been broken, and is totally forced to quarantine himself and the three or four (doesn't matter) people who are at the station.

Long story short people start to freak out, wondering what happens when they die. We find out here that the way to survive is to stay awake. They do some drugs, a woman kills herself, one guy falls asleep and dies. And I'll spare you having to watch the movie, his skull contents like his brain and eyes and shit start to expand and bubble out of his head. The whole thing is pretty gory and gross, but its the only good part of the movie. In the end the government doesn't find a cure in time, and goes to exterminate or whatever the whole place. At this point Evil Mr. Rogers discovers he's fallen asleep but hasn't died, realizing he hasn't been infected. OOPS, TOO LATE, the government exterminators shoot him in the stomach. He's dead.

The end!

Beast of the Yellow Night
IMDB link
Yellow Night indeed! The whole film was washed out and yellow and dark and at times completely unviewable. Good job.

The only thing I got out of this film is that a man sells his soul to the devil in exchange for his life, he may or may not have become immortal. This said man also has a hot wife, who he either hates or loves. This man is the head of a company somehow and tries to dick a bunch of people over. Or not. He may or may not have tried to kill his wife. I am 80% sure he ends up turning into a vampire or demon or wereworlf at night eventually to pay the devil back. And according to this movie I am 100% sure the devil is a fat Philippino man in a bad suit and snarky attitude.

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