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The 'Burbs, a review by KinyCyborg

Title:The 'Burbs
Year: 1989
Director: Joe Dante
Rating: PG
Length: 102 Min.
Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 1.85:1
Audio: English: Dolby Digital: Dolby Surround, French: Dolby Digital: Dolby Surround
Subtitles: English

Stars:
Tom Hanks
Bruce Dern
Carrie Fisher
Rick Ducommun
Corey Feldman

Plot:
Tom Hanks portrays suburbanite Ray Peterson, whose plans for a peaceful vacation are disturbed by a creepy new family on the block, in this outrageous suspense-comedy directed by Joe Dante.
To the disappointment of his wife Carol (Carrie Fisher), Ray decides to spend a relaxing week at home, and soon gets into trouble with his neighbors - a hefty busybody (Rick Ducommun), a freaked-out ex-soldier (Bruce Dern), and a spacey teenager (Corey Feldman) - as they observe the strange happenings next door at the Klopek's bizarre residence.
When the neighborhood grouch suddenly disappears, the men are convinced the ramshackle house hides some hideous clues. Armed with assault rifles, high-powered binoculars and a shovel, they decide to see for themselves exactly what is going on in the Klopek place, Set in an average neighborhood that is anything but average, THE 'BURBS blends slapstick comedy and spine-thrilling mystery with the type of witty humor that has made Tom Hanks one of today's most popular stars.

Extras:
Scene Access
Feature Trailers
Deleted Scenes
Production Notes
DVD-ROM Content
Closed Captioned


Probably the funniest of the Tom Hanks comedies, or at least on par with Bachelor Party. Knee slapping funny throughout the whole film, the real scene stealer is Bruce Dern. He has some scenes in this film that make you piss yourself laughing. Rick Ducommun and his seemingly rambling improvisations are hilarious too. The Klopek's serving sardines on crackers to their house guests is a riot!  I've seen this movie a half a dozen times now and it's a hoot every time. 

KC

Rating:

(From KinkyCyborg's Random Reviews 2010 on August 3rd, 2010)

A Film With Me In It, a review by Tom

A Film With Me In It (2008/Ireland) IMDb | Wikipedia Capelight Pictures (Germany) Director: Ian FitzGibbon Writing: Mark Doherty (Writer) Length: 87 min. Video: Widescreen 1.85 Audio: English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 Subtitles: Dutch

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Stars:
Mark Doherty as Mark
Neil Jordan as Director
Laura Way as Casting Assistant
Amy Huberman as Sally
Keith Allen as Jack

Plot:
Doherty plays an unsuccessful actor and clarinet player who ends up with a large number of dead bodies on his hands. Together with his friend Pierce (Dylan Moran), they attempt to escape their predicament by re-writing the day's events as if it were a film. As the body count mounts, they pitch ideas back and forth desperately searching for a way out.

Extras:

• BD-Live
• Bonus Trailers
• Scene Access
• Trailers
• Wendecover

In a guy's apartment three deadly accidents happen in a span of a few minutes. Fearing that the police would think that he murdered them (which it awfully looks like), he is trying to cover it up after a bad advice from his best friend. Nice black comedy with a lot of laugh-out moments. I first saw it at the FantasyFilmFest. I don't remember it starting this slow. Also I enjoyed more with a big crowd.

Rating:

(From Tom's Random Reviews on February 12th, 2011)

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: The Complete First Season marathon, a review by Tom

2. Gnothi Seauton (2008-01-14)
Writer: Josh Friedman (Created By), Josh Friedman (Writer), James Cameron (Original Characters By), Gale Anne Hurd (Original Characters By)
Director: David Nutter
Cast: Lena Headey (Sarah Connor), Thomas Dekker (John Connor), Summer Glau (Cameron), Richard T. Jones (Agent James Ellison), Sonya Walger (Michelle Dixon), Tony Amendola (Enrique Salceda), Jesse Garcia (Carlos), Omid Abtahi (Sumner), Sasha Roiz (Police Officer), Jonathan Sadowski (Sayles), Dean Winters (Charley Dixon), Brian Allen (Highway Guy), Ambrit Millhouse (Receptionist), Sabrina Perez (Chola), John Henry Whitaker (Chet), Lisa Wilhoit (Sales Assistant)

After the pilot episode, I had feared that they couldn't hold, what the pilot episode promised. Because it is hard to have as much action as in the pilot on a television budget and time constraints. Unlike in a pilot, where usually the budget is higher.
So I knew going in, that the action will be probably be toned down for the rest of the series, but I am glad to see, that they could still provide some action while keeping the story interesting.
But one peeve I have about this episode:
They made it perfectly clear in the movies, and even made a big point about it in the pilot episode, that only living tissue could travel through time. This is why they sent back guys from the future, to build weapons and a time machine to hide it in the bank vault, and why they arrive naked in the future. But why was the Terminator metalic skeleton sent through time?
And I also didn't like it, that the skeleton walked around without a head. For one thing, as far as remember, the CPU of the Terminators is in the head. And for another thing, I had always had the impression, that they had visual perception only through the eyes.
I found it ridiculous and unnecessary. They could have just kept his head and the body together. The reason for these obvious errors was, that they wanted to send the Terminator back in time for the series, but at the time of shooting the second episode, they had replaced the actor. So they couldn't send the Terminator back in one piece (living tissue intact) because they didn't have the original actor available and they had to find a way to have the Terminator looking for another human "suit".

Rating:

(From Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: The Complete First Season marathon on January 13th, 2009)