SHOOTING FROM THE HIP - "GOING GREEN"

SHOOTING FROM THE HIP - EPISODE 3

There are many ways to go green!

http://youtu.be/g_-70wZJYKA

SHOOTING FROM THE HIP: "THE HAMMERER"

SHOOTING FROM THE HIP - EPISODE 2

A famous scene from the low-budget, cult hit "The Hammerer."

http://youtu.be/zkEji6UCheU

Check out our first episode, "Smackin' Cheese!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkEji6UCheU

BAD MOVIES THAT SHOULD BE SEEN (5 OF 100)

 

"The Room" (2003), Dir: Tommy Wiseau

$6 Million in Budget vs. $1,800 in Gross

Inspired by the dramas of Tennessee Williams, watching Tommy Wiseau's The Room, one feels a lot like Stella in A Street Car Named Desire... And by that, I mean brutally getting the crap kicked out of you by Stanley... Oh, man, where to begin? We could talk about Wiseau himself, and what the hell is up with that guy? Namely, his weird, unhealthy-looking body that you unfortunately have to see naked several times throughout the movie. (In my own cowardliness, I made excuses to duck-out during those parts.) We could go on for days about his poor decisions as a movie director, such as shooting the film in both 35mm and video at the same time and then cutting the two together later. (The cost of film vs. video never really entered his mind apparently with the film's $6 million dollar budget.) With that kind of brand of thinking, I suppose it makes perfect sense why his script makes absolutely no sense at all. Characters flip-flop at the drop of a coin, no one is quite sure of their motives for anything, and everyone says "hi" whenever a character enters the room. But when it comes down to it in the end, it just seems to me that Wiseau's whole reasoning for making "The Room" was to put himself in gross sex scenes with poor Juliette Danielle and subject his audience to really awful R&B. Yes, these are all signs of a horrible filmmaker (and person I might add), but the thing that gets me the most is why Wiseau would want to have rooftop scenes in a movie and not use a real San Francisco rooftop. Instead, the roof is obviously a green-screened cityscape and badly at that. Why not just film on a real rooftop, goddamn it?! Why?! See if you like bad movies, but avoid if you like sex.



For your viewing displeasure, The Flower Shop scene, which I would argue is probably the stupidest and most senseless twenty seconds of cinema ever. I showed it to a co-worker and his reaction was "It's like watching a Commodore 64 programmed to make a movie scene, or interpret the most fleeing of human interaction."

BAD MOVIES THAT SHOULD BE SEEN (4 OF 100)

 

"Southland Tales" (2006), Dir: Richard Kelly

$17 Million in Budget vs. $374,743 in Gross

Some movies are so bad that they are fascinating, like The Crow 2 or Natural Born Killers. You watch it and wonder what exactly was going through the director's mind they made whatever this is. Apparently Richard Kelly's abomination Southland Tales was inspired by the events of September 11th. Now, what exactly the Highlander driving around in a van, Sarah Michelle Gellar as a porn star, Kevin Smith as a gun-totting Obi Wan Kenobi, and the Rock traveling through time have to do with the events of September 11th is beyond me, but that's what was on Kelly's. (The funniest thing is that besides the time travel part, I could see most of the insane notions of celebrity explored in this movie coming to fruition.) Starring pretty much every C-grade actor and misfit in Hollywood -- Sean William Scott, Jon Lovitz, Cheri Oteri, Will Sasso, that midget-lady from Poltergeist -- Southland Tales is a senseless, pretentious mess. Abundantly attempting to be social commentary, the dares to go places its audience might not necessarily want to, ie. seeing Stifler try to seriously actor, Cheri Oteri threatening to kill herself unless she gets some Dwayne Johnson c%$#@, and some androgynous Chinese woman dancing in, like, every scene. Unraveling into moments of what looks like a  George Michael video and with a soundtrack entirely by Moby, this giant mess runs over two whole hours. The movie has its moments, but that's mainly the C.G.I. car commercial that turns into vehicular pornography with one truck ramming another. The rest, I just don't know...



For your viewing displeasure, what could arguably be the best scene in the film or the worst. I'm gonna be generous and call it the best because at least its creativity takes over the confusing aspects.