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Reviews
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation: Ending Happy (2007)
Ahhh....James Whitmore
I've already watched this episode twice, and love it. It's great to see the creators still know how to have some fun with these characters...especially the interplay between Brass and Doc Robbins. My favorite, by far, has to be casting James Whitmore (see also The Shawshank Redemption, Them!, several episodes of The Twilight Zone, and the narration of Ken Burns' Lewis & Clark documentary, among many other credits) as the old man no-one takes seriously. I know it's not the exact line, but when, after completing the "I Shot an Arrow Into the Air" poem, Sara tells him to "Keep the Faith," I was almost hoping for her to call him Brooks - again see Shawshank.
Ator 2: L'invincibile Orion (1983)
"Proud" owner of the actual movie, not just MST3K version
Just to advise people out there that there are some folks, such as myself, who relish watching the actual movies used on MST3K. At present, my collection of such films is in the dozens, including such hallmarks as Cave Dwellers, Pod People, Manos: The Hands of Fate, Hobgoblins, Final Sacrifice, The Screaming Skull, Boggy Creek II, The Beast of Yucca Flatts, and many, many more. Frankly, I find it enjoyable to provide my own commentary, not just suffer through what isn't always particularly funny from Mike/Joel and the bots. Granted, I have suffered some degrees of pain while watching these films, but you should give it a try. Some elements of the films, like the "Hear the Engines Roar Now!" song in Pod People are completely obscured by the overdubbed commentary. If you want a truly unique experience, watch the episodes, and then rent the films themselves.
It (1990)
The book, while long, was a LOT better
When I first started reading the book "IT" by Stephen King last summer, I knew that it had been made into a "made-for-tv" movie - one which I had never seen. During my on-again, off-again reading of the book (most of which I read just in the last seven days), I kept wondering how this or that scene would be handled in the movie, such as the blood coming from the sink, the rock fight, the leech attack against Patrick, the travels through the sewers with only a couple packs of matches, and of course the annihilation of Derry that capped off the book (pre-epilogue). While I must admit that they did serve many points in the book well, such as the rock fight, the fact that they ignored some critical points altogether - the leech attack in which Bev saw Patrick die, the fact that Bev's husband Tom came after her, the truly frightening idea of being in the sewers only with matches (not flashlights), the way that Victor and Belch died (Frankenstein, not getting sucked up a pipe), the first encounter by the Loser's Club with IT in the house on Niebolt Street, and most crucially, the fact that it was ONLY Bill and Richie who killed IT, simultaneous with the destruction of the town. I can't count the number of times I sat there screaming at TV things like, "NO, Ben did that, not Richie," or "Where's Mike's Bird? or Stan's encounter with the two drowned boys???" Would this have been a horrible movie had it only been made as an original film? No. But it was based on a book. A very long, very DESCRIPTIVE book. I was truly underwhelmed...truly.