[5] James Bond (Roger Moore) goes into outer space to stop a bad guy’s plot to… you know, destroy the world. While Moonraker packs more action than most other Bond films, it’s also sillier than most. Richard Kiel’s ridiculous Jaws character makes an unwelcome return and the final act aboard the space station is laughably inappropriate for the franchise. At one point, after Bond has …
[5] This monster romp was the first solo effort by effects wizard Ray Harryhausen. All the stop-motion animation has the usual Harryhausen charm, including a famous scene where the dinosaur rages down Wall Street and chomps on a policeman. Unfortunately, there’s not much else going for this creature feature until that point. The story is one of the earliest to feature atomic mutation, but the …
[8] King Kong, the grandfather of all monster movies, is an ambitious visual effects extravaganza servicing a fast-paced adventure story. The film’s action set-pieces have inspired generations, whether its Kong’s clashes with prehistoric creatures on spooky Skull Island or his iconic last stand atop the Empire State Building. The film works fine as a good old-fashioned matinee movie, but its “Beauty and the Beast” overtones …
[8] After finishing The Lord of the Rings, Peter Jackson tackled a remake of his favorite film, King Kong. Jackson’s remake is largely faithful to the 1933 original, while generously expanding the storyline and embellishing some of the characters. Jackson protracts the opening act more than necessary, but his interpretation of Skull Island is amazing. It’s this middle portion of the movie that delivers the …
[5] After the unbridled silliness of Moonraker, For Your Eyes Only makes an effort to dial down the franchise’s more comic-book qualities. After an unceremonious pre-title demise of long-time supervillain Blofeld, For Your Eyes Only achieves that goal, but it struggles to forge a unique identity in the series. With yet another villain seeking nuclear power and a rehash of skiing and underwater stunts from …
[6] Roger Moore is looking worse for wear in his penultimate outing as James Bond, but Octopussy still satisfies on most levels. This time around, Bond is trying to uncover a global jewel-smuggling operation that ends up being a cover for a nuclear attack against NATO forces. I like that Desmond Llewelyn, as curmudgeonly Q, has a larger part this time around, and I’m also …
[3] Gordon Scott makes his debut as Tarzan in this entry. He’s a taller, beefier Tarzan — kinda cute, but certainly the dumbest of the lot. Poachers are in the jungle (again), and a well-meaning animal doctor is accidentally leading them into an area of the jungle ripe with big game. There’s also a skiddish African tribe called ‘the Sukulu’ drifting around in the screenplay. …
[7] James Cagney makes his breakthrough performance as a Chicago street kid who becomes a successful gangster during prohibition. I don’t usually like gangster movies, but director William Wellman (Wings, The Ox-Bow Incident) frames The Public Enemy as a cautionary tale with a moral ending — it doesn’t glamorize the lifestyle like so many more modern movies do. And while I may not relate with …
[3] American International takes a break from Edgar Allen Poe pictures to slam two Jules Verne books together for a movie called Master of the World (based on the book of the same title and Robur, the Conqueror). Vincent Price headlines as a Captain Nemo-like character who flies around the world in his magnficent flying machine destroying all the world’s armies in a sort of …
[3] Hello, it’s the 1990s. We want our big, stupid action movie back. I really, really disliked this movie. It’s so devoid of emotion and tediously boring, I thought about leaving before it was over. It’s like Con-Air for the 2010s or something. So maybe if you liked that big stupid Con-Air movie, you’ll also like this big stupid King Kong movie. But I guess I …
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