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Kageoween: The Thing, 1982, movie review.

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INTRODUCTION: As I stated in my previous review, 2023 seems to be the year of John Carpenter. Sadly, the same could not be said, 41 years earlier, when Mr. Carpenter released The Thing to cinemas. So how good is this movie?

PLOT: A group of scientists fight a Ailen. No, you’re it wrong, that is the plot to Ailen (1979) as well.

CHARACTERS: Not bad. I mean, the star studded cast makes up for weak character development. These dudes are basically hibernating alcoholics, that already seem depressed as fuck, making the “threat” seem like a mercy killing. A tad bit more, upbeat characters and some banter between them, that suggests they’re at least friendly would of been nice. Not in this film though.

ACTING: Excellent! They all do a great job here. Granted it isn’t award winning, but given the material they have to work with, the fact they did their job seriously and not typical b movie, phone it in, is excellent.

STYLE: John Carpenter at his best. The visuals are stunning and a nice tidbit, the blue lights, which unbeknownst to scientists back then, for preventing suicidal tendencies, adds an accidental layer of depth to these men’s plights and isolation they’ve going through, making this choice very ahead of the curve.

DIALOGUE: Good

PACING: Typical slow moving pacing, which is nice, but doesn’t give us enough to make use of it, as it tries to be face paced with the sequences we’re seeing, making it awkward as to if it’s supposed to be an action or a horror movie that adds tension.

FX: Excellent, especially given how old the movie is. They hold up exceptionally well. Minus the early moments of the movie showing the space craft.

CONCLUSION: This movie bombed at the box office and is one of John’s biggest laments. It’s not a bad movie though, I think it suffers due to coming too soon on the heels of Ailen. It’s basically the same movie, but starring Kurt Russell. It some ways, that makes it better, in other ways it suffers for it. Had this movie been made in the 90s, 20 years after Ailen, I think it would of been a smash hit, especially post Ailen Reserection, given that movie sucked by most people standards, except me, who liked it. Sadly for John, it came 3 years after the 70s classic and didn’t add much new to the genre. This movie could beat be summarized as Evil Dead /Ailen hybrid, so much in fact, that I’m shocked they never showed the necronimicon. Despite its flaws, like needing more details about the Ailen and its purpose for possession of humans and it’s weak ending, it is still a very good movie and one I prefer over Ailen.

3.5 out of 5

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Kageoween: John Carpenter’s Suburban Screams, 2023, review

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INTRODUCTION: So JC at one point said something to the effect of “I put my hand out and there’s a pay check in it, I’m happy” well, who can blame him? I love having money in my hand as well, but this isn’t a pay day for an old movie getting a remake based on his characters, rather it’s a sale of his name to another true crime series, the world doesn’t need.

PLOT: Maybe real crime stories re-enacted by actors that even porn would reject for their horrible acting.

CHARACTERS: What characters? I think they’re supposed to be based on real people, but the episode never mentions the crime that this is covering.

ACTING: This makes pornography actors seem like Kate Winslet.

VISUALS: Dated, retro and not in a very good way.

FX: Mid card as fuck!

CONCLUSION: This show is one more in a genre that’s done to death, no pun intended. JC doesn’t have much to do with this show, except in name only. It’s fine if he wants to milk his name for all its worth, but a little bit of editorial discretion as to what your name is on, would be a nice touch. Much like John Carpenter, I too placed my hand out, only I didn’t get a pay check, I just got a headache.

1 out of 5 stars

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Independent Kiosk: Here to stay!

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So independent kiosk are trending and being called a failed experiment. I disagree and have no problem pointing out that the complete opposite is true. So here is a quote from The Atlantic.

The checkout kiosks bleat and flash when you fail to set a purchase down in the right spot. Scanning those items is sometimes a crapshoot—wave a barcode too vigorously in front of an uncooperative machine, and suddenly you’ve scanned it two or three times. Then you need to locate the usually lone employee charged with supervising all of the finicky kiosks, who will radiate exasperation at you while scanning her ID badge and tapping the kiosk’s touch screen from pure muscle memory

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2023/10/self-checkout-kiosks-grocery-retail-stores/675676/

So basically, nothing changed at the grocery store, but instead of small talk with the local elementary school drop out, that has a criminal record and is now a tax break, thanks to Obama, that can’t scan the code right, you get the luxury of doing it yourself. Yeah, that sucks so bad!

Table tasting had this to say

self-checkout systems more than double the rate of theft in stores.

Read More: https://www.tastingtable.com/1366529/reasons-self-checkout-failed-time-to-move-on/

https://www.tastingtable.com/1366529/reasons-self-checkout-failed-time-to-move-on/

Ok, for one, there is no evidence to support this claim. A machine going off due to a misplaced item is automatically seen as theft. This is the kiosk equivalent of the “teen pregnancy rates are down” because abortions don’t count toward that total, which is bullshit. Pregnancy is pregnancy and carried to term or not didn’t stop it from developing. Same here, More bleeping is not more theft. Look at California, where theft is out of control at the moment, what independent kiosk caused that?

Let’s look at this argument. People claiming it cost jobs. The same was most likely claimed about the fork lift, but today, many men and some women, still man the docks of a store and take items off the back of the truck. In fact, one argument back then in favor of the switch to a fork lift was probably, less people on the truck, less likely to get stolen. There is a reason “it fell off the back of a truck” has always been a figure of speech that meant stolen.

Independent kiosk are effective, efficient and helpful to strengthen and streamline the shopping process. Besides, when 90% of shopping is done online at Amazon, why would you want more chasiers working over glorified welfare? Some of these arguments could of held some truth over 20 years ago, when they first started popping up, but the landscape has changed and millennials are more mad about doing this as a chore, while sounding like out of touch, middle aged, fuddy duddies.

In the long run, these automated machines will continue to make the little bit of real world shopping, far easier than ever. Independent kiosk are here to stay!

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Kageoween: The Fog, 1980, review

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INTRODUCTION: So my television decided this year should be dedicated to John Carpenter movies. I assume it has to do with his soon to be released Peacock Halloween anthology series. Anyways, I seen a majority of this man’s movies, but never reviewed them, so I’m doing so for Kageoween. The Fog has to have had the weirdest of pitch meetings ever attached to it, because I don’t know who in the blue hell could of say straight faced through it, Which seems fitting to say about most of John’s movies. Lame concepts turned into iconic movies. So what are my thoughts? Read on!

PLOT: The Fog is rolling in. People are trapped on this island or something, IDK! Ahhh! Scary/sarcasm

VISUALS: It was made in the 1980’s on what appears to be a $13 dollar budget. Not millions, but literally $13 dollars USD. Thankfully John had great people surrounding him and a knack for visual flair, which makes a movie that should look a lot no retro, seem like it still could of be released yesterday to capitalize on nostalgia with retro movies, instead of being limited to tacky styles due to actually being filmed in the decade that birthed those styles. Unlike Halloween, where bell bottom are seen, along with middle age men, running around in tweed jackets thinking those were excellent style choices. (Writers note, I tend to like tweed jackets.) The most dated thing in this movie is a shot of a captains cup, looking like a middle schooler’s first attempt at clay firing and shellacking. You know, the hard to wash cups that get filled with cracks from day one and still, for some reason, exist? While still not John at his best, visually, it definitely shows a director making better overall choices and about to hit his peak with style by the time he gets to The Thing.

ACTING: Mostly good, but Jamie Lee is at her worst acting ever and her character is basically worthless, making her dialogue to Tom Akins in the boat, the most meta dialogue ever, about how she is basically worthless.

CHARACTERS: Mostly good, albeit sparse character development. Compared to other movies of its time though, this is still pretty good.

FX: You get two FX styles in this. Ghouls and the fog. The only really bad FX shot is near the end as the fog, rolling over a crespecular bay, looks like it’s on par with the moon in Evil Dead, except instead of a box, it looks like the fog is moving sideways on top of the water, like those old kids toys, that pretended to be video games, but just featured a moving background with a plastic car on top of it. Except those toys were bigger eye sores.

DIALOGUE: Good. Nothing overwhelming cringe.

CONCLUSION: For a movie whose title misrepresents the entire premise is a pretty good movie. It even has some pretty intense and scary moments that got me, even. The scariest part, is the lack of Tom Atkins mustache. The story is mildly interesting and done very well, for what is really a “from beyond the grave” ghost movie. Albeit I’m not quite sure why it took the Ghost nearly a century to take revenge, but lack of plot details aside, it works, minus the weak resolution that leads to an awesome finale sequence that more than makes up for it. Still a great Halloween movie, that hold up, some 43 years later.

4 stars out of 5

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Kageoween: One Chip Challenge Video.

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Normally I won’t post videos. Not really my thing. I don’t absolutely hate it, though. It has its place, but for the stuff I do, I find it a major waste of time. No one needs a 25 min long, super edited video of a review. Although I enjoy some of those videos myself, I just don’t think the footage is worth it. It would be different if I was directing a movie, but overall I think it would be unnecessary to to videos. That said, I did mention in my review that I recorded video of me talking the #OneChipChallange in Sept, so I am posting it here as well. I also updated the review with the video, which is at the bottom. Enjoy!

Me eating the #OneChipChallange

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Kageoween: Clash Royale, app game.

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Quick view at gameplay. I won this one, thankfully to a crazy start.

INTRODUCTION: Normally this time of year I focus on Horror reviews, I mean it is Halloween time after all. While couple of those may be coming this month, I want to focus on this game as it has a Halloween theme this month so it fits right in.

GAME: Simple game. It’s like Infinity Wars, meets WWE Supercard with a bit of Magic:The Gathering sprinkled on. The concept is capture the flag like. First person to destroy all three castles or the major one wins. Seems super simple and in a small part it is, but it can be challenging and rewarding.

GRAPHICS: Remember Advanced Wars for the Nintendo Advanced? Yeah, these graphics were on point 22 years ago, but it suits the games cartoon like aesthetic.

PRICE POINT: Free to download but in app purchases. You can play without making a lot of purchases and this game does not seem like a pay to play. It balances everything out.

OVERALL: This game can be a time sap. My brother has been playing for over a year and I’ve been playing for three days, but it has its moments. I think it’s worth a gander.

4 out of 5 stars

Source:IMDB.com