Category Archives: Quick! Before it Expires

Quick! Before it Expires: Videodrome, Demolition Man, and Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels

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Videodrome

You may recall that on a few times Josh and I have talked about our appreciation for David Cronenberg. We even did a debate pitting him up against David Lynch.

Cronenberg made his mark on Hollywood by leading the charge in a horror sub-genre called “body horror.” These are movies that focus on our culture’s obsession, fear, and ignorance about our bodies. Most often the horror from these movies come in the form of body mutilation and destruction.

Many critics and fans cite Videodrome as Cronenberg’s crowning achievement. The story is about James Woods’ character finding a strange television station. As he unfurls the mystery behind this tv station, he begins to loose his grip on reality. The movie is chock full of trademark Cronenberg imagery, themes, and gore. It’s arguably the best movie to start with if you’ve never explored his filmography.

Videodrome expires on July 1st.

Demolition Man

Demolition Man isn’t a great movie. In fact, it’s kind of bad. However, I recommend it for two reasons.

One, it takes place in the future. Whenever a movie takes place in the future, it uses the present to predict and extrapolate what will happen in the future. In this case, the movie takes place in a future filtered through 90s sensibilities. In other words, it’s an unintentionally hilarious depiction of the future. This is a timeline when fast food chains go to “war” and the sole victor is Taco Bell. This is a future that tickets people for swearing.

Two, have you ever heard a joke about using three seashells in a bathroom? Watch Demolition Man and you’ll finally get the references. (Sort of.)

Demolition Man expires July 1st.

Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels

Guy Ritchie has jumped to bigger audiences with his two Sherlock Holmes movies.

But the way he got his start was by making clever, slick crime movies that featured lots of characters, interconnected stories, and a loose timeline. In short, for a while, he was the British Quentin Tarantino.

Lock, Stock was Ritchie’s first movie and it’s quite a feat. The movie has a general air around it like it’s the director’s third or fourth movie. The level of filmmaking competence is quite high.

The movie is about four friends who get mixed up in an underground poker game and must pay back a local gangster 500,000 pounds. The movie follows around a few factions of people including pot dealers, a debt collector, and two dense thieves until each storyline ingeniously dovetails together. It also features a pre-action star Jason Statham.

Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels expires on July 1st.

-Harrison

QBIE Rocky, They Live, and Collapse

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Rocky

Do I have to talk about Rocky? This film is so pervasive that I’m worried that many haven’t actually watched the film or even worse, written it off as schlock. Yes it does have some jarring elements (particularly the score) but it’s a classic piece of filmmaking. Avildsen is a very talented director but under appreciated filmmaker. He is adept at making you feel the film on an emotional level. When you’re done with Rocky check out Avildsen’s lesser known and much more serious film Joe.

Collapse

Collapse is a strange little film. It’s an interview with Michael Ruppert who published the newsletter From the Wilderness. Ruppert’s belief is that we’ve reached “peak oil” and the next few years will become increasingly difficult because of that. It’s always interesting to hear the “crazies” talk about what scares them the most. Ruppert is a special case though, a former LAPD detective, who builds a very convincing case. In any event, this film isn’t for the weak of heart.

They Live

Now for my favorite film in the list. They Live is one of the best sci-fi films to come out of the 80’s and it stars Rowdy Roddy Piper and Keith David. Can one ask for anything better than that? It does have one fatal flaw, the makeup effects are incredibly dated. They’re so dated that it seems that they were bad when the film debuted. Either way if features the best fistfight over a pair of sunglasses ever and possibly the best line ever written by a human being: “I’m here to chew bubblegum and kick ass, and I’m all out of bubblegum.” Watch it.

Each of the three movies listed in this article expire in one week (6-1).

As always, check Queuenoodle for a list of all expiring Netflix movies.

-Josh E.

Quick! Before it Expires: Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Final Sacrifice

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Slim pickings this time for expiring Netflix movies. Though there is one I wholly endorse.

There’s always going to be bad art. No matter what the medium. Bad ballet, bad movies, bad paintings, bad sculpters, bad novels, bad guitarists, bad poets.

Some scoff at inferior products. They mock and ridicule it without mercy. Others may ignore bad art and only focus on the good. However, I do think a viable option is to embrace bad art and do something with it to elevate it.

To that end there’s Mystery Science Theater 3000. Airing between 1988 and 1999, the show featured human and robot characters gently mocking truly awful movies. The mission statement of the show as to take bad movies and replicate fun times had by gathering a group of friends and cracking wise as the awfulness ensues.

One of the best episodes of MST3K is The Final Sacrifice. The movie is about a reluctant boy who is caught up with a Canadian death cult. Joining the boy is a character named Rosdower who, for the MST3K fanbase, has since turned into a mythical hero.

Yes, the whole movie is on Youtube. It’s arguably easier to watch on Netflix though.

This episode aired fairly late in the show’s run, but it still achieves the gut busting heights of the very best episodes. There’s a schism between fans of MST3K over which host was better — Joel or Mike. For fans of Mike, The Final Sacrifice is one of the best episodes to showcase his strengths as a host.

There isn’t too much else I can say (I don’t want to spoil any jokes) other than watch this episode. If you enjoy it, Netflix has plenty of other episodes to whet your appetite for a goofy and endearing show that makes terrible movies entertaining.

Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Final Sacrifice expires in three days (March 16th). For a full list of expiring movies, check out Queuenoodle.

-Harrison

Quick! Before it Expires: Unlikely Movies

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This time on Quick! Before it Expires it’s a trio of unlikely movies ever to be seen again.

Shaolin Soccer

First up is Shaolin Soccer. It’s a movie that perfectly blends to unlikely film genres: sports and martial arts. Shaolin Soccer is a hilarious comedy about a former Shaolin monk who wants to promote his school of martial arts. In order to do so, he recruits fellow monks to enter an open soccer tournament.

Not only does the movie have fantastic action, the tropes of the martial arts movie are seamlessly grafted onto the sports movie. Each Shaolin monk has a fighting specialty (such as powerful kicks or fast hands) that translate into a skill on the soccer field. It’s great fun to watch as these two unlikely genres of movie are mashed up together.

The story is standard inspirational sports fare, but to see it in such a different light really amps up the quality. For the martial arts fans, there’s many subtle and not-so-subtle references to past martial arts movies (particularly the goalie who loves to emulate Bruce Lee).

Shaolin Soccer expires in 12 days.

Big Trouble in Little China

I don’t think there’s been a movie since 1986′s Big Trouble in Little China that is so unabashedly strange and goofy. The movie is about a truck driver (Kurt Russell) Who gets mixed up in an Ancient Chinese mystic cult.

The movie starts off slow but continuously builds on the strangeness until coming to a boiling point at the end. By the time the credits roll you’ve seen floating head monsters, one character blows himself up by holding his breath, epic sword fights, and a cult leader age in reverse.

The subject matter is strange, and so is the relationship of the protagonist to the story. Kurt Russell plays the lead character, but he’s hilariously inept. He walks around with swagger and bravado, but the real hero is his sidekick, Dennis Dun. Dennis’ character is a nearly master swordsman who single-handedly takes on many of the threats they encounter.

Big Trouble in Little China expires in 12 days.

Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans

Nicolas Cage’s career is built on top of playing unhinged characters. This can be for good (Raising Arizona) or bad (The Wicker Man). Even though the movie was just released and even though Nic Cage is still getting roles in movies, I don’t think any movie will showcase his craziness like Bad Lieutenant does.

Cage is a Lieutenant in the New Orleanian police department who during the floods of Katrina severely injured his back. His injury and subsequent drug addiction only fuels the fire of his character’s insanity. Over the course of the movie, Cage’s character extorts people, teams up with a money making venture with a drug lord, yells at old ladies, and gets into trouble with his bookie.

Part of what makes Bad Lieutenant such a great Nicolas Cage movie is that it was made by an equally crazy director — Werner Herzog. Both of their crazy tendencies combine together to make a movie greater than the sum of its parts. Unless Herzog and Cage team up again, I doubt there will be another movie like this.

Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans expires in 12 days.

For a full list of movies expiring on Netflix, check out Queuenoodle. (There’s a ton of movies expiring in the next two weeks.)

-Harrison

Quick! Before it Expires: Six for the Price of One

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I have a trio of movies for you dear readers to watch.

One good, one bad, and one ugly.

The Good
The Dirty Dozen

Of all the super specific sub-gernes in film, one of my favorites is “soldiers on a mission.” In that super specific genre, The Dirty Dozen is one of the best.

Lee Marvin stars as a reluctant Major tasked with training a group of convicted soldiers to a suicide mission into a Nazi stronghold. The movie hits all the great beats, from the “recruitment” of the soldiers, to their training sequences, to the the actual execution of the mission.

Joining Marvin are a slew of grizzled character actors. Charles Bronson, Jim Brown, John Cassavetes, and Telly Savalas. While the action hasn’t quite aged that well, it’s definitely a fun movie to watch.

The Dirty Dozen expires on February 1st, 2012.

The Bad
Mortal Kombat

During the 8-bit heyday of games, an often used device was the palette swap. Basically there would be one character model with two different color schemes. The most famous example of that is Mario and Luigi from the first Super Mario Bros. game. They had the same character model. One’s clothes were red and blue; the other was green and white.

Mortal Kombat is often considered the best video game adaptation movie. In my opinion the movie largely succeeds because it is a palette swap of Enter the Dragon.

A man gets sucked into an old and dangerous fighting tournament along with a few friends. The tournament is run by a deliciously evil villain who has ties to the hero’s past.

While Mortal Kombat’s plot isn’t terribly original, all the actors show up and give it their all. Particularly Linden Ashby who plays the narcissistic Johnny Cage. Veteran B-movie actor Christopher Lambert gives good performance as the thunder god Raiden. The fight sequences are also largely effective and memorable. They have good choreography and style.

Mortal Kombat expires on January 30th, 2012.

The Ugly
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra is not a good movie. It barely, and I do mean barely, qualifies as a “so bad it’s good” movie.

So why am I recommending that you watch it before it expires from Netflix? There are a few action sequences in the movie that are bat shit insane and worth your time. Particularly in the movie when the heroes test their exo-suits in Paris.

Also, this is one of the few movies where Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays a bad guy. So there’s that.

Finally, the film maker’s idea of an evil underwater lair is too ridiculous not to see.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra expires on February 1st, 2012.

-Harrison

The Crying Game
The Crying Game is an amazing film. It’s hard to summarize without giving away the good bits. It’s about a member of the Irish Republican army who moves to England to combat his grief about a death he inadvertently caused. Neil Jordan is overlooked as a filmmaker. The performances in this film err on the side of the overly dramatic but it works in this film. Stephen Rea and a young Forest Whitaker give awesome performances in this film. And the ending… Well if you don’t know it and you don’t figure it out, well watch out.

The Crying Game Expires in 5 days

Tetro

Tetro is a film by written and directed by Francis Ford Coppola; his first since 1974′s the Conversation, which we all know is my favorite Coppola film. It’s not his most successful film but I would argue it’s his most personal and most interesting film he made in a long time. It’s about Italian immigrants in Argentina and more specifically, about a weird Italian Nicholsonesque family in Argentina. If you don’t know what that means you should watch this film.

Tetro Expires in 5 Days.

The Golden Child
I love this movie. I know, I’m supposed to be the snob of this board and I’m picking this weird Eddie Murphy action film. But this one along with, Big Trouble in Little China seem to be a bit different from the action films of this period. They are ahead of their time in terms of genre: both films combine comedy, action, sci-fi/horror and to some degree a western influence. Both films also feature “heroes” that aren’t exactly skillful in their pursuit of the villain. Kurt Russell is more inept while Eddie Murphy is more sardonic. It’s visual effects are dated, but it’s an enjoyable film if you keep your expectations low.

The Golden Child Expires in 5 days.

As always check QueueNoodle for more expiring title.

-Josh E.

Quick! Before it Expires: Big Fan

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It’s time for another edition of Quick Before it Expires. In an effort to be more consistent with the QBIE posts we plan on posting at least two a month, about a week before the 15th and the first of every month, when Netflix likes to take movies away from the instant queue. I’m going to be doing a lot of watching in the next week or so. Here are some of the films I (Josh E.) will be watching in the next week:

Brief Encounter
 The Red Shoes
The Train
This Sporting Life

But enough of what I’m going to watch. I wanted to draw your attention that is expiring in two days, I repeat TWO DAYS (1/12/12). Sorry for the short notice, but it’s called Big Fan,  stars Patton Oswalt, and is written and directed by Robert Siegel. If that name sounds familiar it’s because Siegel also wrote the screenplay for the 2009 critical darling The Wrestler. It’s a quirky little film that excellently blends comedy and the “pathology” of a fan’s obsession.

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Quick! Before it Expires: New Years Extravaganza

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There are lots and lots of movies expiring on January 1st. Check out Queuenoodle for a full list.

Drunken Master

Longtime readers might know that I loves me some martial arts movies. Something strange I noticed is that the drunken boxing fighting style is not nearly as prevalent as other styles. This, in my opinion, is because Jackie Chan has a lock on drunken boxing. Nobody can out drunken box Jackie Chan on film. Drunken boxing perfectly suits Chan’s infusion of martial arts mastery and comedy.

The movie, Drunken Master, isn’t quite as good as its successor, The Legend of Drunken Master. However, Drunken Master should give first time viewers a great insight into how magical, hilarious, and mind blowing the art of drunken boxing can be.

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Quick! Before it Expires: Cronos, Crank 2

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Cronos

I stumbled upon Cronos after winning a free copy on the internet, or so I thought. When I didn’t receive my free copy I didn’t think about it again, but remembered the title hoping to find it at the video store. I found a used copy at a DVD store, bought it on a whim, and discovered one of the most inventive and interesting vampire films I’ve ever seen. (And coincidentally one of the better $5 DVD purchases. I’ve ever made.)

Cronos DVD

Check out the Criterion Version

It’s the first film by Guillermo Del Toro. Since Pan’s Labyrinth, most film fans and even causal movie watchers are usually intrigued by watching a Del Toro film. It centers around an antiques collector who discover a scarab shaped device that attaches to his chest and gives him supernatural powers and a supernatural thirst.

The film is excellently written, directed, and has a great visual look. It stars Ron Perlman in a delightfully swarthy role and Federico Luppi who fans will recognize from Pan’s Labyrinth.

You should check it out immediately and if you like it, stop over to get the Criterion Collections Blu-Ray or DVD.

Cronos will expire in five days (12/7)

Crank 2

Harrison turned me onto the gem that is Crank 2, and I love it. I love its tongue-in-cheek style and outrageous set pieces. It’s an action/comedy with Jason Statham as Chev Chelios, a hitman who has had his heart removed and needs to continually power his artificial heart by unconventional means.

Yes, seeing Crank before Crank 2 would enhance your viewing experience but, don’t worry if you haven’t, you can still enjoy the ride.

Crank 2 will expire in six days (12/8)

-Josh E.

Quick! Before it Expires: Blue Velvet

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A few weeks after Harrison and I debated whether Cronenberg or Lynch was better, in an almost Lynchian twist of fate, one of David Lynch’s films is set to expire on Netflix. I write today to talk about Blue Velvet the film that solidified David Lynch as one of the most acclaimed filmmakers of his generation.

I encountered the work of David Lynch late, as a college film student, when a friend of mine, showed Eraserhead to me during my freshman year — I was immediately hooked. Lynch’s meso-length film (not a short not quite a feature) is not for everybody and I would say to the casual film fan or the beginning cinefile, start with either Blue Velvet or the Elephant Man if they want to dive into Lynch.

Velvet has become a hugely influential film that hundreds of filmmakers have quoted as an inspiration. Most don’t remember that Blue Velvet initially divided critics, most famously Siskel & Ebert. Here’s a link to Ebert’s original review of Blue Velvet, which includes a couple of nice clips.

Ebert has since changed his mind about the film

To the normal everyday filmgoer this film is strange. Helium, psychological and sexual domination, fetish, voyeurism, film noir, loss of innocence, and a pastiche of 50′s nostalgia mix into a wonderfully dark and complicated film where repeated viewings only enhance the films interpretations.

The film marks the return of Dennis Hopper after a long drug-rehab-caused break from acting. It also marks an early on screen appearance of Laura Dern, who went on to her marvelous career including repeated collaborations with Lynch. The film also stars many Lynch regulars including Kyle MacLachlan (Dune, Twin Peaks) Jack Nance (Eraserhead, Dune, Twin Peaks) and Brad Dourif (Dune).

This film is worth watching if only to so you can say you saw it and impress your film buff friends. It expires in 3 days. (Oct 31)

For more expiring titles check out QueueNoodle.

-Josh E.

Quick! Before it Expires: Batman Under the Red Hood and Scream

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Batman: Under the Red Hood

Batman: Under the Red Hood might be the best DC Animated movie to date. (Note: As of this writing I’ve still yet to see the adaptation of Batman: Year One.)

The movie is a streamlining of a fairly important and recent Batman story arc. A mysterious man called the Red Hood has come to Gotham. It’s not quite clear whether this Red Hood is a good or bad. Both Batman and the notorious crime lord Black Mask have vested interest in figuring out what Red Hood’s game plan is.

I won’t spoil anything, but this movie has fairly dark themes and action set pieces. The opening sets the tone for the rest of the movie and it’s an absolutely brutal sequence.

This movie also has a radical shift in visuals and voice acting. The animation has a anime edge to it. It looks like traditional western animation filtered through anime aesthetics. Also, longtime animated Batman fans may be disappointed to learn that Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamil have not reprised their roles as Batman and Joker, respectively. However, once you get over that, you realize that Bruce Greenwood (Captain Pike from 2009′s Star Trek) and John DiMaggio (Futurama’s Bender) are great fits for The Dark Knight and the Clown Prince of Crime.

If you’re a fan of DC or animated superhero movies, you absolutely owe it to yourself to check this movie out. It might not best Mask of the Phantasm in your opinion but it will definitely your second favorite animated Batman movie.

Video: Exclusive: ‘Batman: Under the Red Hood’ trailer

Batman: Under the Red Hood expires on October 25th.

Scream

By the time Scream was released in 1996, the slasher genre was dead in the water. At the time audiences were immune to any thrills or scares from the genre. The slasher turned into the type of movie you put on with a group of friends to make fun of.

What better way to breath life back into the genre than to tell the story of cynical, detached, and skeptical teenagers being targeted by a masked killer? Scream challenged its audience head on and won.

That’s the legacy of Scream. The impact Scream had was so great that fifteen years later it’s hard to remember a time where meta and self-referential characters didn’t exist in movies. I’m not saying Scream is solely responsible for that type of storytelling, but it’s certainly a forefather.

If you’ve never seen the movie it might seem “old” or “done before,”  but you really have to remember that before Scream, there weren’t meta characters in horror. Everything was done earnestly. For fans who have seen it before, it’s fun to look back at the first time we encountered characters like this.

Scream expires on November 1st.

You can see a list of all the movies expiring on Netflix here.

-Harrison