THE GREAT BANDIT (1963)

I have no idea what the proper title for this movie is. My DVD has SAMURAI PIRATE printed on it, but the movie itself says THE GREAT BANDIT. But then IMBb and the poster above say THE LOST WORLD OF SINBAD which makes no sense because nobody in the movie was called Sinbad and there wasn't any lost world. I'm going to go what it has onscreen.

Most people only know Toshiro Mifune from his 16 Kurosawa films, but he also made a metric shitload of other movies including this one in which he's a pirate who at the beginning of the movie has his ship destroyed by a storm. He (and his treasure chest) are floating along on a big piece of wood when he's overtaken by the dreaded Black Pirate. The pirates steal his booty and leave him adrift. He wakes up many days later on a beach. A hermit with magical powers has been taking care of him. Toshiro goes to the nearest town where he sees a beautiful princess and learns that the kingdom has been taken over by some asshole. He decides that ain't cool, so he sets off to the castle to get to the bottom of this shit.

There's lots of interesting moments (evil witch turning people into stone, good wizard dude turning himself into a fly so he can spy, Toshiro flying around on a giant hang glider), but over all it got pretty boring pretty quick. Personally I have no desire to ever see it again and I was actually disappointed in it. I guess I was expecting something more along the lines of the "Sinbad" movies from the 50's and 70's.

Worth watching, I guess, if you're a huge Mifune fan but don't expect to be impressed.

Takashi Shimura! Onscreen for probably 5 seconds total.

INSEMINOID (1981)

[Update 08/03/2021: Need to redo this review completely. Fix the screenshots also.]

This movie sucked.

A team of scientists are exploring a distant alien planet when they discover a ancient tomb, they poke around and somehow awaken a creature that kills a dude and then rapes an ugly chick. Once back at the lab, the ugly chick goes batshit and starts killing everybody in very boring ways. Yawn.

I don't want to give too much away (just in case your bored enough to watch this turkey), but whatever happened to the creature that raped the chick? Also, if it's -145 degrees outside why does blood splatter and how come it doesn't even look cold outside? I'm a idiot for even worrying about things like that. For Satan's sake, later on when the crazy lady flips over a computer control station it falls apart and you can see the entire thing is just painted wood with nothing inside it. Fuck this movie. Very boring and not even good for a laugh. If you want to see an ALIEN rip off you'd be better off watching CREATURE.

Maybe I'll revisit this film in a few years when I'm in a better mood.

What the inside of a station on an alien planet might look like.

What an alien penis might look like.

XX (2007)

Two young women go on a vacation to a secluded hot springs hotel that has mutilated dead bodies hanging on posts along the road leading to the resort.  Things only get dumber from there.  MIDSOMMAR it's not.

I went into XX or X Cross or X-Cross or whatever this movie is really called expecting a legitimate horror movie.  I don't know where I got that stupid idea into my handsome brain, but I was wrong.  The long story short is the ancestors of the current villagers were all woodcutters and to keep their women from running away while they were in the forest chopping down trees, they decided to cut their wives legs off.  And now, the descendants really like chopping off women’s legs.  Wow.  Anyway, there's more to the story, but it's all pointless.  Just like watching this movie.

Zero scares, dead pace, goofy acting, tons of phones ringing and text messages flying, boring flashbacks, a woman with a gigantic pair of scissors, a few things that might have been jokes but I'm not sure.  Skip it with a vengeance and never look back.

SHE'S ON DUTY (2005)

A cop (who looks like she's 30) goes undercover at a high school to get close to a gangster dude's 17-year-old daughter. That's an excellent idea for a movie and there are a few light-hearted laughs early on, but then during the second part of the movie the comedy goes right out the window and the movie turns serious. I didn't like it. The main problem for me is the woman who plays the undercover student looks way too old! Somebody please remake this movie with an intelligent, funny script and a hot chick as the student.

Skip it.

HANGING GARDEN (2005)

This movie is pretty slow, but I think it has something to do with a woman who had a bad childhood so she ends up creating a perfect family where they don't hold any secrets...except of course they do. The dad is skipping work and cheating on his wife nonstop and jacking off in the bathroom to porn magazines, the daughter is skipping school and exploring her sexuality and the son has pretty much shut himself away in his room where he's creating his own private fantasy world on his computer. I love the idea for the movie and the style is very interesting, but it just beat around the bush way too much and tried too hard to be mysterious without ever giving the viewer a payoff. I can't recommend it. If it had went ahead and pushed the envelope a little like Miike's VISITOR Q or Sono's NORIKO'S DINNER TABLE then things would be different, but as it is HANGING GARDEN never goes anywhere interesting or engaging. Please don't think it's a bad movie, just average and not worth wasting two hours on.

That's the wildest wallpaper ever!