So last week I talked about Brightburn being disappointing and how it made me long for--and I quote--"a mockumentary from 2000 about a fake boy band." Very specific, right? Well let's take a trip back two decades and talk about a forgotten... "gem" isn't the right word because this isn't an objectively good MTV made-for-TV movie, but it knew exactly what it was and leaned into it appropriately.
music
Purple Hearts (2022)
Updates are gonna be spotty for a while. Such is life. But Purple Hearts pissed me off enough that I had to take time out of my actually busy schedule to rant about it.
Carnival of Souls (1962)
I have a list bookmarked that ranks what most people regard as the best horror movies ever made. And I've... covered an embarrassingly few of those movies on this blog. I definitely have seen a huge chunk of these films! I just tend to gravitate towards garbage because ranting about something being bad is easier than making a post with nothing but praise. But I have plans to burn through a couple of my personal to-do lists, so let's kick off this burst of motivation by talking about something actually good for a change: Carnival of Souls.
Django (2017)
Django is an unusual name, isn't it? The only people I knew with that name were characters in westerns--white Django in 1966's Django and black Django in Django Unchained--or the genetic base for Boba Fett. Yes, I know that one's actually Jango, but still. Turns out it's a Romani name, which makes using it for a western hero extra unusual. Why pick that name out of all the ones available? It's almost like there was some famous person named Django that the filmmakers were referencing, but what are the odds of that?
Cool as Ice (1991)
Mr. Vanilla Ice was never actually cool, right? All I really know about him is that he did "Ninja Rap" for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze, he copied the baseline in "Ice Ice Baby" from Queen's "Under Pressure," and he has an enormous dick. Allegedly. I think he's more meme than man today, but was he ever actually popular to the masses? Apparently not movie audiences if the failure of Cool as Ice is any indication.
Chwineka Watches 