TRESPASS (1992)

Two honky firemen (William Sadler and Bill Paxton) from Crackersville, Arkansas come across a treasure map showing the location of some stolen gold. Problem is the gold is hidden in a factory in East St. Louis which is long closed and now included in the stomping grounds of a violent gang led by King James (Ice-T). But, eh, they being normal peckerwoods and, eh, on a treasure hunt, well they were not going to let a gang of homicidal killers spoil the events of their afternoon. On a day out. It was a day out they were going to remember for a very long time.

TRESPASS is probably one of the most straight-forward 1990’s action movies of all time. There’s zero build-up, zero character introduction, zero flashbacks or side stories, zero sex, zero females, nothing. (Hell, goddamn DEADLY PREY had more story than this movie!) Not that I’m complaining. I actually found the entire wham, bam thank you ma’am (or mx or sir or sirma) approach to be amusing. The film kinda feels like reading a no frills, action-packed short story. I'm surprised there hasn't been a remake.

Solid acting, lots of dramatic pulling out of cell phone antennas (that actually might make a good drinking game), vintage slang, vintage cars and fashions, zero CGI, impressive lower budget stunts, zero nudity. TRESPASS isn’t the height of action cinema or anything, but the first two acts still hold up all these years later. The third act? Not so much. It falls off the rails pretty had during the last 30 minutes or so. Still, it’s always fun to watch Bill Paxton freaking out. That alone is worth watching the movie.

Recommended for all fans of older action movies. Double-feature with JUDGEMENT NIGHT.

Oh yeah, this has nothing to do with the review, but while looking for newspaper ads I noticed that this film was released on Christmas Day, 1992. Who the fuck thought that was a good idea? No wonder it didn't even make it's budget back at the box office.

Now this really, really has nothing to do with the movie, but I was curious about East St. Louis (yes, I know the movie was actually filmed in Atlanta and Memphis), so I started driving around East St. Louis on Google Maps and I found this legendary pothole. I just wanted to share. Imagine hitting that motherfucker late at night in a rain storm!

THE OTHER GUYS (2010)

As punishment for being a dumbass, hot-headed NYPD detective Mark Wahlberg is teamed up with nerd cop Will Ferrell. Stuff happens, including a lot of filler that doesn't move the story forward, and eventually Wahlberg and Ferrell are on the case of a serial killer! Nope. A gang of hoods planning to rob a horse track?! Nope. How about a bunch of horny hobos who like to have illegal orgies in parked Priuses? That’s actually talked about, but nope they’re on the trail of a guy trying to steal some money over a computer transaction. Wow. How exciting.

As a comedy, I’d say that THE OTHER GUYS hits about 30% of the time. And hits really hard with some hilarious bits, but then the other 70% is just…nothing. It’s really odd. Uneven pacing, absolutely pointless narration that adds nothing to the film, lots of familiar faces in smaller roles, multiple scenes that could have been cut or removed completely, average acting, zero characters you'd ever want to meet in real life.

The “Dirty Mike and the Boys” stuff was really funny and should have been the main focus of the film. But it wasn’t and I could never see myself ever wanting to watch this movie ever again.