The MacGuffin

More horror movies should be set in the Old West. This much I am sure of. It is one of the reasons I was so excited to discover Ravenous (1999) exists. Alas, the film did not hit the sweet spot I so hoped it would.

Night Strangler: This Kolchak sequel has a less interesting villain, but Darren McGavin is still perfect as the bumbling reporter. 8/10

Night Stalker (1972): Laid the ground work for “The X-Files” and many others by presenting the supernatural in the modern world. 8/10

[And yes, I know John already posted a review – I’m just reinforcing his thoughts on it, since I read his after I wrote mine up. John’s is actually a better review, damn him! Haha]

Here is what I knew about MacGruber before going to see this film: MacGruber is a character from an SNL skit (I haven’t seen SNL in more than 15 years) and MacGruber is a spoof of MacGyver (I haven’t seen MacGyver in more than 15 years). I wasn’t familiar with the skit and I hadn’t even seen a preview, I’d only heard people say “it wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it would be.” Where I come from, that’s usually means I should see this film.

Spencer welcomes back John from his hiatus and they discuss the movies from Saturday Night Live, consider video game based movies, and give their DVD picks of the week.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003): Takes the gritty original and fills it with polished cinematography and beautiful actors. 5/10

There are many reasons why MacGruber shouldn’t work.  It’s a Saturday Night Live spin-off movie, the original skits were parodies of a TV show that ended in the early 90s, and every minute long skit ended with the main character being blown up.  But in spite of those seemingly insurmountable odds, MacGruber ends up being an extremely funny movie that easily sustains itself for 90 minutes.

Two samurai are set to duel on the following day. One samurai has a family and if he wins he will become the new Instructor for the ruling family, an honor that will be passed down from father to son for generations. It ensures that his family will be taken care of indefinitely. The other samurai is a ronin, a masterless, wandering warrior with no loyalties. Since this is not a duel to the death he has nothing to gain and nothing to lose. The ronin is visited by the wife of the other samurai. She knows that the ronin is too skilled to be beaten by her husband so she goes to him, hopefully to persuade him to throw the fight. It would be the most honorable thing a warrior could do. But she does not yet realize with whom she is dealing.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre 4: So bad that stars Matthew McConaughey and Renee Zellweger fought to never have it released. 1/10

Woody Allen’s “A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy” begins with a simple setup.  Andrew, an amateur inventor (played by Allen), is preoccupied with the intimacy problems he’s experiencing with his wife (Mary Steenburgen).  He invites two friends to his home in the country for the weekend: Leopold, a stodgy old college professor (Jose Ferrer) and the dentist Maxwell (Tony Roberts), a notorious lothario. They each bring their own dates for the weekend and so the fireworks begin when all three couples find themselves in seclusion, tucked away from the world with only themselves for entertainment. There’s much more to this plot than the setup but why ruin it? Needless to say, the point of any sex comedy is not who will get together at the end of the film or even why, but how.