Ax 'Em (1992)
Director: Michael Mfume
Rating: 0.5 of 5 stars
If you haven't seen Ax 'Em, you are unqualified to call a movie the worst ever made. It debuted at an NAACP office, then faded into obscurity until it was finally released on video in 2002.
The sound recording is so execrable that it interferes with the viewer's ability to comprehend the plot. From what we can make of it, there's a crucially misspelled opening crawl that tells of a man whose family was murdered in the woods in 1992. In 2003(?) he seeks revenge.
From there, four students at a historically black college exhibit racially stereotypical behavior, then decide to spend the weekend in the woods. Once there, they feast so much it's a wonder they're not in the then-21.5% obese (or 30% in '03) of America. Later on, the film's only white players come in and it goes downhill from there.
The cinematography is not up to scratch, and every scene ends with a fade to black.
The acting makes that of a typical silent movie look positively Shakespearean.
The movie's soundtrack will only appeal to the biggest diehards on the NWA fringe.
Manos: The Hands of Fate may just about have met a contender.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Slipshod portrait of a 'Killer at Large'
Killer at Large: Why Obesity Is America's Greatest Threat (2008)
Major Genre: Documentary
Director: Steven Greenstreet
Rating: 1.5 of 5 stars
A look at the issues going along with the rising epidemic of American obesity.
The trend that my country started is, without a doubt, one of history's great tragedies. In fact, I believe it is a little worse than the Holocaust because some obese people got that way deliberately. Such a horrific tragedy deserves better documentation than what is given here.
Toward the beginning, an obese 12-year-old girl's family is interviewed, and as she gets liposuction, her parents say she has a "genetic" predisposition. The parents are thinner than her, but the movie doesn't question this.
Some topics within this heinous trend - such as the reversal of the price structure of food, and the cheerleading for junk food on children's television - get plenty of mention, but others, like the evolution of obesity and the trend around the world, get discussed in literally one or two sentences.
Perhaps worst of all, Killer at Large is defective to the increasing demand for bad news in the media. Interviewees say things rather bluntly, for example "Being fat has become a part of American life." It's been some time since I saw it, and I don't remember any positive information.
As was mentioned, some significantly overweight persons are such because they just don't care. The odds between voluntary and involuntary obesity run about one to one, but this movie doesn't talk about the involuntarily fat folk. It was listed (by me) in the "Don'ts" of handling sad endings to movies. Killer at Large presents disparaging statistics about body count and failure to reform, and no alleviation.
I haven't yet seen The Weight of the Nation, an HBO miniseries with a similar concept, and I might not if it, too, is this grim. At least Greenstreet's next film, 8: The Mormon Proposition, was much better (not to mention more widely-seen).
In 1994, Entertainment Weekly published a book about the top 100 movies by genre; their documentary selection probably reflects the quality of documentaries at the time (read: lower). Consign this one to the same league as those.
Major Genre: Documentary
Director: Steven Greenstreet
Rating: 1.5 of 5 stars
A look at the issues going along with the rising epidemic of American obesity.
The trend that my country started is, without a doubt, one of history's great tragedies. In fact, I believe it is a little worse than the Holocaust because some obese people got that way deliberately. Such a horrific tragedy deserves better documentation than what is given here.
Toward the beginning, an obese 12-year-old girl's family is interviewed, and as she gets liposuction, her parents say she has a "genetic" predisposition. The parents are thinner than her, but the movie doesn't question this.
Some topics within this heinous trend - such as the reversal of the price structure of food, and the cheerleading for junk food on children's television - get plenty of mention, but others, like the evolution of obesity and the trend around the world, get discussed in literally one or two sentences.
Perhaps worst of all, Killer at Large is defective to the increasing demand for bad news in the media. Interviewees say things rather bluntly, for example "Being fat has become a part of American life." It's been some time since I saw it, and I don't remember any positive information.
As was mentioned, some significantly overweight persons are such because they just don't care. The odds between voluntary and involuntary obesity run about one to one, but this movie doesn't talk about the involuntarily fat folk. It was listed (by me) in the "Don'ts" of handling sad endings to movies. Killer at Large presents disparaging statistics about body count and failure to reform, and no alleviation.
I haven't yet seen The Weight of the Nation, an HBO miniseries with a similar concept, and I might not if it, too, is this grim. At least Greenstreet's next film, 8: The Mormon Proposition, was much better (not to mention more widely-seen).
In 1994, Entertainment Weekly published a book about the top 100 movies by genre; their documentary selection probably reflects the quality of documentaries at the time (read: lower). Consign this one to the same league as those.
Monday, May 28, 2012
Hey there!
My ratings scale is as follows:
5
Masterpiece
4.5
Near-masterpiece
4
Very good
3.5
Decent
3
Above average
2.5
Average
2
Mediocre
1.5
Poor
1
Terrible
0.5
Blecchh! (only used occasionally)
My focus is on:
Movies in TSPDT's (http://www.theyshootpictures.com/) Starting List, or movies that are so widely seen at IMDb.
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