02/09/2004: "Saturday Night at the Movies"
I was home alone Saturday night, so I decided to rent a couple of “bad” movies of the sort my wife doesn’t appreciate seeing. I drove over to Family Video and picked up “Once Upon a Time Ago in Mexico” and “The House of the Dead.”
Unfortunately, both movies proved to be far more terrible than I’d hoped.
“Mexico” has a promising cast: Antonio Banderas, Johnny Depp, Salma Hayek, Mikey Rourke and a Chihuahua. Critical note: The Chihuahua by far turned in the most credible acting performance. Despite the beautiful people and exotic settings, the plot is a total mess.
If you like movies where things blow up – and I do – there are plenty of slo-mo gun battles but not a lot of gore. All in all, a good movie to watch while you focus most of your attention on doing something else, like playing the guitar.
Official propaganda: Once Upon a Time in Mexico.
“The House of the Dead” is based on the video game “Resident Evil.” If your psychological makeup is such that you need to see a zombie movie every so often – and I do – “Dead” will satisfy your zombie jones. Still, it’s a particularly ham-fisted movie, and the attempts to link the movie up with the game provide some especially absurd moments. This movie has plenty of laughs, all of them unintentional. Still, zombie movies are like pizzas: even a bad one is basically OK.
Official propaganda: http://www.house-of-the-dead.com/.
Replies: 3 Comments
- On Monday, February 16th, Steph said:
Resident Evil actually manages to incorporate both beautiful people and well-done zombies, plus its fair share of gore. You might enjoy that one.
- On Wednesday, February 11th, romkey@qconline.com">Michael said:
Right you are! Sorry.
- On Monday, February 9th, Talonken@yahoo.com">Marcus said:
House of the Dead is based on the game House of the Dead by Sega. The movie Resident Evil is based on Resident Evil. I am not griping just letting you know.
