RoboCop 3 (1993)

RoboCop 3 (1993)

Directed by: Fred Dekker

Starring: Nancy Allen, Robert John Burke, Mario Machado

Robert Cop returns, and he’s the more the same than ever! Oh, except he has a jetpack and a flamethrower. I’m a little surprised he didn’t show up with a chest-mounted grappling gun, but I guess even the toy market knows some things are just too silly (that was sarcasm).

RoboCop’s still fighting against the evil corporation that made him, who are now trying to get rid of all the homeless people in Detroit by, well, killing them. They’re EVIL. RoboCop joins up with the underdogs and has to dodge two robotic ninjas who attack him with swords. Well, not so much “dodge”, that isn’t really in his repertoire. More… survive being hit all the time because he can’t move all that well.

There’s some early, primitive CGI in this film, but overall it still looks pretty decent. Also, to my complete surprise, they managed to sneak in some half-decent character development and sub-plots in there. Still, at it’s core, it’s about a robot cop fighting robot ninjas, and there’s only so much you can do with that, assuming you aren’t a seven year old boy.

RoboCop 2 (1990)

RoboCop 2 (1990)

Directed by: Irvin Kershner

Starring: Peter Weller, Belinda Bauer, John Glover

So, correct me if I’m wrong, but the only reason the RoboCop franchise became popular was because of all the video games and comic books and stuff, right? Because I’ve now seen all three of these movies, and none of them are anything to write home about.

So there’s this guy who’s part robot and he’s a cop, so they call him RoboCop, right? Right. Well, he’s out to crack down on the newest and most dangerous drug on the streets, “nuke”. After he nearly kills the leader of the evil drug gang, the corrupt and even more evil corporation that runs everything turns the drug guy into another, even bigger RoboCop… which obviously goes crazy and blows everything up.

Just like in the first film, the only good part of RoboCop 2 are the stop-motion special effects. There’s an art to making big robot things shoot missiles at each other, and that’s pretty much the only part of the film they cared about. I mean, nobody’s going to be commenting about Peter Weller’s performance as the titular cyborg or anything. “He’s very deadpan. Excellent work. I really did believe that he was a robot!”

Grand Theft Auto: XXX Parody (2010)

Grand Theft Auto: XXX Parody (2010)

Directed by: Dawn

Starring: Monique Alexander, Bill Bailey, Breanne Benson

Why hasn’t anybody made a porn parody of the Vin Diesel movie XXX? Is it just too obvious? I would say that it’s the thirtieth in the series, just so I could call it XXX XXX: XXX Parody.

This porn parody actually has no story to speak of. Normally I wouldn’t review it at all, except for the sad fact that my reviews of porn parodies by and far generate the most traffic. I know, I’m just as much a whore as the actors in this film. There are some vague themes about guys with bad Russian accents shooting people, but I’m not sure if you could call that a story.

Come on, guys, you could’ve done better than this. The cover is by and far the most Grand Theft Auto-ey thing about this movie. You can just tell they didn’t even try. I demand more out of stupid porn parodies, dammit!

Tripod Versus the Dragon (2010)

Tripod Versus the Dragon (2010)

Directed by: Neil Gladwin

Starring: Scott Edgar, Simon Hall, Steven Gates

This is a recording of a live show by an Australian comedy troupe, Tripod, with a D&D theme to it. It mixes songs with shadow puppets and insults and… it’s just terrible. You know all those bad stereotypes about improv comedy? Turns out they’re all true.

Three guys, a warrior who wants to be a bard, a priest and a wizard, go on a quest to a part of a map that’s not filled in and find a dragon there, who approaches them earlier in the story as a woman. Then they go down to hell and there’s something about magic wizard hats, and the songs… oh god, the songs…

Part of what makes this such a bad mish-mash of a comedy are the songs. Obviously the whole thing is just a play to show off their music, but it’s either uninspired comic songs or just boring serious songs, which don’t fit in with the tone of the rest of the show at all. Mix that with hackneyed, obvious fantasy tropes and equally common jokes, and the end result is an uninspired, unfunny waste of time. Luckily, there’s little chance you’ll be running across this anywhere, as they don’t even have an IMDb page, and it actually took quite a bit of digging for to me to find out just the few credits I require for my own OCD to be satisfied.

Valley of the Bees (1968)

Valley of the Bees (1968)

Directed by: Frantisek Vlácil

Starring: Petr Cepek, Jan Kacer, Vera Galatíková

Contrary to what the title may suggest, Valley of the Bees is not a movie about bees who eat people or anything like that. In fact, it’s a Czech New Wave film (don’t know what New Wave means? Well… go look it up, I ain’t gotta explain everything to you, man) about incest and religious zealotry. I just wanted to clarify that so nobody else makes the same mistake I did.

The story is about a boy who grows up in a religious order of knights in the middle ages. When he returns home, he falls in love with his step-mother, who is significantly younger than his dad, and they start having an affair. He’s caught by his friend in the order and thrown quite literally to the dogs.

There’s a lot of philosophical discussion in this film and things of that sort. It’s interesting enough, I guess, if you’re into that sorta thing, but it’s really just not my scene. It’s got really pretty cinematography, and the acting is fine, it just wasn’t a story that piqued my interest.