ORCA (1977)

After an opening scene that is so laughable that it almost seems like a warning to walk away, we're introduced to a crotchety old boat captain who concocts a plan to capture a live male orca.  Of course, being a heartless idiot with a shitty boat, all he ends up doing is slaughtering a female orca and her baby.  The female's baby daddy witnesses the whole horrible ordeal (as do we) and proceeds to spend the rest of the movie tormenting the captain. The End.

Films like ORCA, help me appreciate JAWS even more than I already do.  If you think about it, the basic story for JAWS was pretty simple: one individual shark (who happens to be very large) starts feeding on humans near a quiet fishing village/tourist destination...the humans fight back.  Bam!  That's all you need.  Unfortunately, the people behind ORCA decided that it's be a good idea to add a deeper psychological aspect to the story...guess what?  Nobody cares!  Audiences want to see sharks, whales, alligators, giant hamsters, wookalars, whatever gnawing on people and people fighting back...NOT a pregnant whale being chopped up and hoisted out of the ocean as it's giving birth and then the newborn being murdered!!!  That whole scene was just terrible, I hated it.  I was definitely on the side of the whale after that!

Misguided story aside, ORCA is okay...for a lower budget 1970's ripoff flick.  The pace moves along quickly enough, but the whole thing just looked like a movie.  The majority of the shots of the whales either looked fake as fuck or like shots of whales in captivity.  Passable acting from a cast that is too good for this script, depressing beginning and ending, topless scuba diver, lame kills, questionable scenes early on of live sharks that might or might not have been animal cruelty.

I didn't hate ORCA, but I damn sure never want to see it again. If you need me, I just be in my room watching JAWS again or maybe even THE GREAT ALLIGATOR or THE LAST SHARK.

HELL OR HIGH WATER (2016)

"Y'all been here for awhile?"

"Well, long enough to watch a bank getting robbed that's been robbing me for 30 years."

Two adult brothers (who must have seen too many reruns of THE GREAT TEXAS DYNAMITE CHASE on late night TV) start robbing small banks in West Texas to pay off their family ranch.  That part, while not original, is interesting.  Unfortunately, the filmmakers also decided that the film needed a cantankerous old lawman just shy of his retirement...cause, you know, that idea hasn't been done to death and back.

Anyway, HELL OR HIGH WATER is still a solid film.  I liked the way it looked and relationship between the two brothers.  More backstory would have added some much needed depth to their characters, but you can't have everything.  Zero nudity, nice photography, good acting by everybody (even Jeff Bridges who comes across like a 200 year-old version of Wilford Brimley), a couple of entertaining shoot-outs, good musical choices (that song played by the douches at the gas station was hilariously bad), reasonable pace, Texas looking a hell of a lot like New Mexico.

If you need me, I'll be in the bathroom shitting like an old goat.

This really isn't part of the review, but I just wanted to give a special recognition to Margaret Bowman as the "T-Bone Waitress".  She only had a few lines, but goddamn, she was absolutely perfect.  I watched that scene six times!  "So what don't cha want?!"