The Pitch: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels meets Two Wild and Crazy Guys.
Influence: Dumb and Dumberer, Tomcats,
Price of Admission: $3.50
When: December 30th, 1994 at 1:45 pm
My Age: 13
Quote: No, it's a cardigan but thanks for asking. - Harry Dunne.
Hilarious and classic. And seen when on the cusp of turning 14. I didn't even know what cusp meant back then. But I did know that a cop drinking piss out of a beer bottle was funny as shit.
One of the many laxative-spiking movies. Others on the list:
1) The 3 Ninjas
2) The Pope Of Greenwich Village
3) American Pie
4) To Be Updated as I remember more...
Synopsis: Harry and Lloyd are morons. Harry (Jim Carrey) intercepts a briefcase full of ransom money and gets Lloyd to help him to return it to Carrey's future wife/ex in Aspen. Becomes a road trip movie and then a love triangle movie. The kidnappers are after the naive duo. The FBI helps out even if they put Carrey's kevlar-less face in danger.
The Pitch: Star Trek meets Star Trek Influence: Alien vs. Predator, Freddy vs. Jason Price of Admission: $3.50 When: November 25th, 1994 at 4:20 pm My Age: 13 Quote: Who am I to argue with the captain of the Enterprise? - Capt. Kirk
The passing of the torch. The original Star Trekkers hand over the movie sequel reigns to the Next Generation crew. This is the 4th and final Star Trek film I actually saw in the theaters. The first of which was Star Trek IV back when I was just 5 years old. (I liked the part where Spock gave a New York thug blasting his boombox the Vulcan neck pinch.) I was also a fairly regular watcher of The Next Generation TV show.
The Star Trek vs. Star Wars debate reminds me of how I used to debate The Rolling Stones vs. Aerosmith. The Stones and Star Wars are unanimously the better of their counterparts. But Aerosmith and Star Trek have this strange knack of going in and out of style over the course of many years. JJ Abrams is rebooting the Star Trek franchise with Simon Pegg as Scotty. Sidenote: I've never heard Mick Jagger actually acknowledge Aerosmith or Steven Tyler other than saying to the mother of Liv Tyler's mom, "What do you want with the fake Mick when you've got the real one?"
Synopsis: Capt. Kirk is on the maiden voyage of the Enterprise, but gets called in for one last job. As he's getting too old for this shit, he messes up and gets cast into an energy ribbon and maybe dies. Flash forward to decades later as The Next Generation Malcolm McDowell is obsessed with finding the Nexus, which wraps you up in happiness. He wants to destroy an entire solar system in hopes of steering the Nexus back towards him. Capt. Picard finds Capt. Kirk in this net of happiness. Kirk dies trying to save Picard.
Up next: It's the last film of 1994 and we finally land on the moon.
The Pitch: Nosferatu meets Top Gun meets The Crying Game
Influence: Vampire In Brooklyn, Blade, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Brokeback Mountain
Price Of Admission: $3.50
When: November 19th, 1994 at 4:20pm
My Age: 13
Quote:No one could resist me. Not even you, Louis - Lestat.
My sister and I saw this vampire flick after my little brother's 4-year-old birthday party at McDonald's. Which means nothing, other than to place the context of my Grimace mindset upon viewing Interview...
The cast is probably the most intriguing thing about this movie. You got a young buck Brad Pitt, a Christian Slater on the trailing end of his prime, a Kirsten Dunst debut, a post-Philadelphia pre-Desperado Antonio Banderas, and of course a Tom Cruise. River Phoenix was originally cast as the interviewer, but was replaced by Slater after Phoenix OD'ed in front of Johnny Depp's Viper Room. Incidentally, Depp was up for the role of Lestat taken by Cruise.
Synopsis: Had to read the Wikipedia plot entry for this one and, well, I'm still not sure what goes on. So this is just what I remember. Brad Pitt owns a New Orleans plantation. Tom Cruise bites him and makes him part-vampire. Apparently, you're not a full vampire until you bite someone else yourself. So, Pitt survives on a diet of sewer rats. Cruise bites Kirsten Dunst and makes her a vampire. Pitt and Dunst have a tiff with Cruise and somehow sneak away to Paris. Pitt meets up with Antonio "Corazon Throb" Banderas. Vampires turn on Dunst and Pitt. Dunst gets exposed to sunlight and disintegrates. Pitt goes to California and meets up with Christian Slater to do an article for the newspaper. Slater goes driving in his convertible and Cruise lands on his car. And then this happens:
I can't write about this movie and not mention the pairing of Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise. Brad Pitt has that air of confidence and youth that ultimately brings to mind James Dean. Tom Cruise in his youth was the closest thing the 80s had to a Paul Newman. However, the Newman in The Hustler and the Cruise in The Color of Money are two very separate entities. It was the 80s after all. I watched East of Eden a couple of days ago and found this gem. Jimmy Dean and Newman's Own slathering so much charisma, machismo, switchblades and undeniable homoeroticism into one quick little screen test. Classic.
Up next: Imagine Lando Calrissian and Qui-Gon Jinn inhabiting the same Star Wars universe except substitute Captain Kirk and Captain Picard.
The Pitch: Kramer vs. Kramer meets Ernest Saves Christmas Influence: The Nutty Professor, Evan Almighty Price of Admission: $3.50 When: November 11, 1994 at 5pm My Age: 13 Quote: It's Santa! You killed him! - Charlie
Checking IMDb, it seems I saw this holiday shill on opening day. I remember being a fan of Home Improvement at the time. Especially all the sight gags featuring only a portion of neighbor Earl's face. They must have milked that joke from the udders of the Mayfield dairy farm.
Synopsis: Tim Allen's in one of those divorce - fighting for custody - never have time for your kid plot lines. He gets stuck with the kid on Christmas. Somehow he startles Santa on the roof and kills him. He is kidnapped and taken to the North Pole where he is given a contract. The fine print has a clause(get it? not Santa, but as in the legal stipulation. someone based an entire script on a pun. which is awesome.) saying he must become the new Santa Claus. For the next year he goes through a kind of St. Nick puberty. His chin drops. His voice becomes jolly. He notices a change in the girth of his, um, belly. Meanwhile, his wife is in cahoots with Judge Reinhold. I think there was some ensuing of hijinx. And Christmas gets saved.
The most vivid memory I have about seeing this movie is that I went over to my friend's house afterward and played Earthworm Jim on the Sega Genesis for the first time. Up next: It gets sunny and Dunst turns to dust.
Quote: I am a nice guy. Just a different kind of nice guy. - Kevin Bacon
The movie's tagline was The vacation is over. Personally, I would have gone with Streep goes not so Meryl-y down the stream. This fun little action thriller came from Curtis Hanson, the director of L.A. Confidential, Wonder Boys, and, um, 8 Mile. Besides Streep and Bacon, it co-starred some great character actors like John C. Reilly, (John Sayles' regular) David Strathairn, and the kid from the Jurassic Park movies.
Synopsis: Streep takes her son and work-obsessed, family neglecting husband Strathairn on a little white water rafting trip. On the river they meet Bacon and Reilly, who seem like nice enough fellas. They're not. Bacon spies on Streep bathing in the buff. They soon kidnap Streep and her boy to take them down the river so they can make off with the loot they stole. Only problem is they have to take The Gauntlet. This is no Real World/Road Rules challenge. It's a category 5+, which is some rough rapids and then some. Strathairn is apparently an Eagle Scout and helps save the day. Streep flips the raft. She flips it for real.
Here's a scene which shows some pretty heavy foreshadowing:
The Pitch: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels meets Two Wild and Crazy Guys.
