CoreyRuehling Reviews

Hey Moe, Hey Dad! (2015– )

Worth it for the home movies and family photos

[6/10 · 13 May 2022]

This documentary series seems cheaply-made, a bit too saccharine, and has a whole three-minute song that plays at the beginning of each episode, but it is very informative.

The real treat of this series comes with the full involvement of the Howard family, who seemed to have opened up their archive of photo albums and home movies, most of which I had never seen before, even as a huge Stooge fan. I'm not sure this documentary will appeal to anyone unfamiliar with the Stooges, but it's definitely worth a look for any Stooge fan.

Hawk Jones (1986 Video)

Charming and Entertaining

[7/10 · 23 April 2022]

When I was in elementary school, my friends and I preferred to spend our recess time playing imaginary games of good versus evil instead of swingsets, kickball, or whatever else we had at our disposal. And that's exactly what this feels like - one of our imagined games, but immortalized on film.

While it's most definitely cheaply made, Hawk Jones is a charming film that completely understands the material it's lampooning all while fully committing to the gimmick all-child cast. Even if most of the children clearly weren't gifted actors, their performances only helped make this film as fun as it was to watch. And judging by the blooper reel during the credits, it looked incredibly fun to make for everyone involved.

Also have to give a hand to the music - it totally outshines many other similar low-budget films of the era.

The Legend of the Lone Ranger (1981)

A Misfire

[4/10 · 15 March 2022]

I had very limited knowledge about the Lone Ranger before watching this, I can't offer my own opinion in how it holds up against other iterations of the character.

In his one and only major film appearance, Klinton Spilsbury has proven to be more enigmatic than the title character. He isn't as dreadful as I expected, but not necessarily great by any measure. The dubbing job possibly saved us from any of his poor line deliveries (while providing a few of its own, unfortunately), but it sticks out like a sore thumb, so didn't appear to help the film all that much. But all in all, Spilsbury was a definite miscasting, though it is unfortunate that this film seemed to end his career quicker than it began. I sincerely hope he's had a good life in the days following his brief acting stint.

Michael Horse (Deputy Hawk himself!) plays Tonto here and I think he's actually pretty decent, in an instance of the sidekick being more interesting than the hero.

While they are the strongest actors in this film, Christopher Lloyd and Jason Robards don't have much to offer to improve upon a half-baked script.

The narration is weird and takes away opportunities for dramatic tension. In fact, I don't recall any dramatic tension at all.

The film takes forever for anything to happen, and when something finally does happen, I didn't find it all that exciting or interesting.

The production design, cinematography, and music are the real standouts. While not nothing here is incredible or unique, nobody in these departments can be blamed for the misfire this film was.

Not a good film.

Rocky IV (1985)

Director's Cut

[7/10 · 25 December 2021]

This review is for the director's cut, Rocky IV: Rocky Vs Drago.

Pacing feels tighter, though possibly a little rushed at the beginning due to the removed scenes. However, that could be due to the fact I just rewatched the theatrical cut immediately before.

Apollo and Drago feel more developed.

Overall, it's edited a lot better, with the recap, press conferences, fights, and the funeral being the real standouts here, these being the main things that pushed my rating higher than for the theatrical cut. And I recall fewer over-dramatic edits.

But this version does introduce some editing room oddities. For example, I noticed there are at least a couple lines of dialogue that are cut too early. And purely out of taste, I didn't like the removal of Rocky's hesitation with the towel. In the theatrical cut, he's having an internal struggle - let his friend die or go against his wishes. In this version, it seems like he doesn't even grab the towel quickly enough to even consider both choices. Also, I didn't like the addition of Rocky's inner voice telling himself to get up. Felt so out of place and unnecessary.

The montages are still there, or else we'd lose a lot of runtime, but Paulie's robot isn't and I don't miss it. I did mostly like the changes to the ending, although Rocky Jr. Gets sidelined even more by not even being acknowledged in the ending. The removal of the Soviet big cheese's applause and the last shot no longer focusing entirely on Rocky being draped with the American flag made it feel less like a propaganda film.

Overall, an improvement. I don't think anybody was clamoring for a new cut of this film (especially over Rocky V, though I'm not sure they shot anything that could save that one) but this version is nice to have.

Trick or Treats (1982)

Mostly trick, barely any treats.

[2/10 · 31 October 2021]

This film has an identity crisis - it can't decide whether it wants to be a slasher movie or a parody of one. Its comedic tone throughout would convince you that it's a parody, but when it gets to the actual slasher bits, it's like they were actually trying. None of the jokes were aimed at the slasher genre. The only bit I found unironically funny was the late Catherine Coulson's character being interviewed on the news. If this was supposed to be a horror movie, it failed me as well, because in no way did I find this scary or even suspenseful.

Another failure was a sense of logic. Would a hairdresser really be open at night? Would a psychiatric hospital really take your husband away for no reason other than you asked them to? I'm all for suspension of disbelief, but this asks for too much.

The plot takes a back seat for most of the film, with most of its runtime being spent on a babysitter constantly being pranked by the child she's watching. The boy, while obnoxious, is really just a kid trying to be playful. But then the movie betrays his character in its final moments, showing us that his final prank on the babysitter is to stab her to death.

The locations aren't interesting and sometimes just bad (I'm still trying to figure out what they were trying to pass off as a mental hospital), the special effects are passable, the music's nothing to write home about.

The acting wasn't great, but at least I could tell Peter Jason was having fun. David Carradine's character was just plan weird. And again, Catherine Coulson, the beloved Log Lady was hilarious in her brief role. She's the main reason I gave this a two stars instead of one.

So, if you're looking for a good slasher film, I'm not sure you'll find it here. There are many other options that I think are better. If you're looking for a good spoof of slashers, check out Student Bodies (1981).

Dune (1984)

Honestly Not Bad

[6/10 · 20 October 2021]

Rewatched this after re-reading the book to prepare for the Villeneuve version. I've always liked this one, despite its shortcomings.

The biggest weakness is the script. Because the filmmakers were forced to a ridiculously short runtime to cover the whole book, it's missing quite a bit of Frank Herbert's epic novel. As a result, there's a lot of missing context and many of the characters are underdeveloped. What does remain is mostly faithful to the novel, but I'm not entirely keen on the differences, particularly with the ending. The inner monologues also don't really translate well to film.

I love the visuals in the film. Arrakis looks just as I imagined it and the costumes are awesome to the point where I will take this film's stillsuits over what I've seen from the 2021 film thus far. As for the special effects, I don't think the shields ever looked good (they seem to be the only thing my roommate remembers about this movie whenever I mention it), but I don't have an issue with anything else. Sure, a lot of it looks dated, but I don't like to demerit films for doing effects that were standard at the time.

The soundtrack is friggin' awesome, all I need to say about that, really.

The cast is pretty great for the most part. Really my only complaint has less to do with casting, but rather a creative decision, being that I think Harkonnen is a bit too cartoonish, rather than a fearsome enemy. Other than that, I think the acting is good for what little the script gave them, which is probably the same reason I don't think there are any particular standout performances. Except maybe the Atreides pug. Love that pug.

This film had potential to be great in my book, though I do admittedly have a soft spot for it. The best thing this movie really did was get David Lynch and Kyle MacLachlan together for the first time. Without this film, MacLachlan might have never played Agent Cooper.

Terminator: Resistance (2019 Video Game)

Pleasant Surprise

[6/10 · 16 May 2020]

First off, to refute another review on here, you CAN shoot Terminators in the game. And you kind of have to, unless you're stockpiling explosives. That reviewer clearly didn't play much of the game.

When I heard that Teyon, developer of the not-so-great Rambo video game, had acquired the license to create a Terminator game, I prepared for a similar experience; an on-the-rails shooter with ugly visuals and chock full of voice clips from the movies. However, this game turned out much better, and honestly, I enjoyed it much more than Terminator: Dark Fate, the franchise's most recent film.

The game's story puts you in the shoes of a Resistance member in the midst of the war against Skynet, the very war seen in a few scenes of the first two Terminator films. And not to mention, this game actually ties directly into the plots of those films and is full of references to them, so one can tell that this game was indeed created by fans of the films. But overall, the plot here was nothing amazing, but enjoyable for Terminator fans. While some would say it's a short game (took me about 8 hours total, including side content), but I felt it was just the right length.

The voice acting is okay, I suppose. There aren't any standout performances, but there also weren't any that made me cringe. The graphics aren't anything to write home about, but they're a major improvement over Rambo's. There aren't any celebrity likenesses used in this game, so the "that looks nothing like Stallone" issue Rambo had was avoided.

As for the gameplay, it's pretty much standard-fare first-person-shooter. It's not a broken buggy mess or anything, but it can get pretty repetitive and monotonous, which I suppose is the main reason I didn't rate it much higher. That, and it's not particularly amazing on any fronts, aside from the fact that it is much, much better than their previous attempt at a film license. Speaking of that, I assume Teyon will do another film license next... I'll hope for RoboCop.