Sounds Delicious

4/8/09:  ”The House By the Cemetery” and “Beast with a Gun”

4/1/09:  ”Rescuers Down Under” and “Dancing Outlaw”

3/26/09: “Bucket of Blood”  and “Hitch-Hike”

3/11/09:  ”Ninja Scroll”  ”Daddy Long Legs”

3/4/09:  Series Night with “Oliver and Company” and “Beyond Thunderdome”

 2/25/09: “The Terror”

2/11/09:  ”The Crimson Pirate” “Cold Sweat”

2/4/09:  ”The Great Mouse Detective” and “The Road Warrior”

1/21/09:  Goodbye Bush: “Wrong is Right”  and “Rhinestone Cowboy”

1/14/09:  Dancin’:  (the chinese thing)”Dirty Dancing”

1/7/09:  ”Quiet Earth”  ”Divorce: Italian Style”

12/17/09:  ”Stephen Colbert’s Christmas Special”, “Pee-Wee’s Christmas Special”

12/10/09:  ”The Roaring Twenties” “Whisky Galore”

12/3/09:  ”The Little Mermaid” and “Mad Max”

11/26/08:  Hanky Panksgiving!  “Planes Trains and Automobiles”  

11/12/08:  Purgatory: ”Liliom” (1934) is pretty great, with a timeless message of ‘do whatever the hell you want’.  “Izo” (2004) is not Miike’s best or his weirdest, but not the most boring thing out there. 

11/5/08:  The Greatest Country in the World:  “1776” (1972) was real long (we accidentally watched the extended version). “Rocky IV” (1985) is basically a string of patriotic montages.  Good music.

10/29/08: Monster Month Pt. V Featuring Nightmares!  Aaaah!  “Beyond Dream’s Door” (1989) is remarkably ambitious for a homemade horror film.  And hilarious!  “Bad Dreams” (1988) fails to live up to its opening sequence, but that part is super-awesome.  

10/22/08:  Monster Month Pt. IV Featuring Sea Monsters!  Oooh! ”Frankenstein Vs. The Creature From Blood Cove” (2005) is for nerds, by nerds.  Stay away.  “The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms” (1953) is an early example of the ‘giant monster awakened by a nuclear bomb’ movie.  Great script, great visual effects by Ray Harryhausen, worth seeing.

10/15/08:  Monster Month Pt. III Featuring Politicians! “Unprecedented” (2002) was depressing.  “Bob Roberts” (1992) was a comedy when it was released, but it is also depressing now.

10/08/08: Monster Month Pt. II Featuring Animals!  “Day of the Animals” (1977) has some A+ bear and panther wrangling and a shirtless, crazed Leslie Nielsen.  “Cujo” (1983) is wonderful.

10/01/08: Monster Month Kick-Off Featuring Zombies!  “Night of the Seagulls” (1975) is just terrible, despite having lots of boobs and a bunch of bloodthirsty live crabs. 

9/24/08: You are going to hell: 

9/17/08: Where were you when the lights went out?: “Blackout“ (1978), which is like “Die Hard” but if Bruce Willis was really tired the whole time.  ”Alone in the Dark“ (1982), which is sort of scary, in a very calm way.         

9/10/08: Women in Politics: we watched the pretty-damn-good political drama “The Contender” (2000), followed by the weird and delightful “All-Girl Revue”, a musical short from 1940 in which a batch of nameless dames get to take over the city government for a day to “make the city pretty”. Topped by Roger Corman’s “Barabarian Queen II: The Empress Strikes Back” (1989), which was picked for boobs alone, yet turned out to be extremely relevant.

9/3/08: Series Month Part Three Make-up: Series Month concludes with the scariest Disney movie since Snow White: “The Black Cauldron” (1985); followed by the immediately forgettable, low-stake, in-joke heavy “Crocodile Dundee III.

8/13/08: Series Month Take Two: “The Fox and the Hound” (1981) and “Crocodile Dundee II” (1988). “Dundee II” is far superior to the first one. Far superior.

8/6/08: We kicked off the first ever “Series Month” (we are in a rut, by the way) with “Crocodile Dundee” (1986) and “The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh” (1977).

7/30/08: Series Night Again: Disney’s “The Rescuers” (1977) and Kieslowski’s “Red” (1994). “Red” is Soooooo RED!

7/23/08: Scores by Vangelis: “Chariots of Fire” (1981) is great, “Bitter Moon” (1992) is not. Seriously, don’t watch “Bitter Moon”.

7/16/08: Remake Night: “Bedtime Story” (1964), and “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”. Except Wild and Woolly gave me something called “Bedtime Stories” (?) that had very little to do with international con-men and very much to do with some italian girl’s hairy beaver.

7/2/08: Series continued with the classic “Robin Hood” (1973), and Kieslowski’s “White” (1994). And some people claim we watch shitty movies.

6/18/08: Excellence in Journalism: “Good Night, and Good Luck” (2005) and “Network” (1976). Both are terrific.

6/11/08: Divorce. “The Awful Truth” (1937) is pretty funny, if often a bit clunky. “Divorce-Italian Style” is hilarious.

5/28/08: Series continued with “Aristocats” (1970) and “Bleu” (1993) of Kieslowski’s “Trois Colors”.

5/21/08: Notable film directors who were notoriously murdered: “Cinderella 2000″ (1977), directed by Al Adamson - killed by a live-in contractor and buried under a hot-tub. “May 6th”, directed by Theo Van Gogh - killed by Islamic extremists.

5/14/08: Remake Night: “Out of the Past” (1947), the stunning, smart, sexy, classic noir that never tries too hard. Cool. Remade into “Against All Odds” (1984), a boring, heavyhanded, unsexy mess that always tries too hard and comes off as pathetic. Not Cool.

5/7/08: Claudia Jennings Night: “Sisters of Death” (1977), in which 5 ladies and a dude and Nat from 90210 spend 48 hours trying to get over an electrified fence; and “Unholy Rollers” (1972) which is the rise and fall saga of a roller derby queen.

4/30/08: Series Night continued with the Disney classic “Jungle Book” (1967) and “John Rambo” (2007), which contains easily the most steady stream of mindless violence we have ever watched on a movie night. Kudos!

4/23/08: Teenage Girls on Film! “Picnic at Hanging Rock” (1975), set in Victorian Australia, features angelic, innocent schoolgirls venturing outdoors with no gloves and, later, no stockings. “Bratz” (2007) has a fuckin’ whale-load of brattitude.

4/16/08: Movies where, like, everybody in the world dies or something. You know, like that one movie. “The Last Woman on Earth” (1960) is sooo shitty. Bummer. “Quiet Earth” (1985) is very good, however.

4/9/08: Movie Night’s Official All-Star Farewell and Tribute to Charlton Heston. First - the “Naked Jungle” (1954), kind of a short “Gone With the Wind”, but with killer ants instead of a civil war. Also stars Eleanor Parker (the Baroness from “Sound of Music”). Second - “The Agony and the Ecstasy” (1965), also starring Rex Harrison as the pope.

4/2/08: Resurrection (Happy Belated Easter, Christian Movie Fans!): Thank the almighty frog king for the delightful “Psychomania” (1973) a psychadelic british biker gang/living dead movie with great stunt sequences and just the right amount of thigh. “The Wraith” (1986), which has a killer soundtrack, a super-sweet super-car, and almost enough of Sherilyn Fenn.

3/26/08: Series Continued: the stylish, sexy, puppy buffet that is “101 Dalmations” (1961) and “Rambo III” (1988).

3/19/08: Rickys: We experienced “The Story of Ricky; Ricky-Oh” (1991) and somehow survived. Then Howard Hawkes’ “Rio Bravo” (1951) which is, I say, a damn fine film.

3/12/08: Remake night: “The Thing From Another World” (1951) and John Carpenter’s “The Thing” (1982). Both excellent for vastly different reasons. Finally a good remake.

3/5/08: Goin’ Bananas! We went batty over Herzog’s “Woyzeck” (1979) and the incredible “The Hidden” (1987).

2/27/08: Series continued with “Sword in the Stone” (1963; we had to reverse order with “101 Dalmations”), and “Rambo First Blood Pt. II: Second Blood” (1985)

2/20/08: Dan O’Bannon Bonanza! We watched “Invaders from Mars” (1986) and “Dead and Buried” (1981).

2/13/08: Happy Birthday Dustin! By request, “Tideland” (2005), which is -in a word- hysterical, and “The Adventures of Baron Munchausen” (1988), which actually seemed kind of dull in comparison.

1/16/08: Series Night continued with “Sleeping Beauty” (1959) and “Rambo” (1982).

1/9/08: The Best of 2007: “Trilogy of Terror”, and “Shortbus”. Congrats to the lucky winners.

1/2/08: Happy New Year! Let’s Make a Baby! “Teenage Mother” (1967), which has some great dancing and a live birth. “Three Men and a Baby” (1987) totally has a way creepy ghost in it!

12/19/07: Christmas Miracles: “Jack Frost” (1979), the bizarrely entertaining Rankin/Bass stop-motion eastern-european myth/economic allegory. Followed by the absolutely brilliant “Mickey’s Christmas Carol” (1983); “Muppet Family Christmas (1987), totally awesome by the way; “A Wish for Wings that Work” (1991), the fantastic Bill and Opus miracle; and to top off this gushfest, the newest holiday tradition: “Pee-Wee’s Christmas Special” (1988), worth it if only for K.D. Lang.

12/12/07: Christmas Disasters: “Nightmare Before Christmas” (1993), which calls into question everything Danny Elfman has ever done. Also “Gremlins” (1984), which is fucking “Gremlins”.

11/28/07: Series Night: “Lady and the Tramp” (1955), follwed by “Police Academy” (1984). These next six months are gonna be spectacular.

11/21/07: Happy Thanksgiving! We consumed a whole messy lot of “Ratatouille” (2007) and “La Grand Bouffe” (1973). Both films are just plain gross if you ask me.

11/7/07: Radley Metzger Features: “Carmen, Baby” (1967), and “Score” (1973). See both with someone you want to nail.

10/31/07: Happy Halloween! Monster Month Concluded: Ghosts. We sat on our fat, stupid American asses and tried to follow “Kwaidan” (1964) which is fairly slowly paced and abstract. So we turned that bullshit off and watched “High Spirits” (1988), in which a perpetually drunk Steve Guttenburg has no problem with the fact that his wife would rather kill herself - thus becoming the eternal loveslave of a 16th-century murderer - than have sex with him.

10/24/07: Monster Month Part IV: ‘Friendly’ Monsters. Whoops, I sort of thought that “Little Monsters” (1989) was a cute family film about mischievous but ultimately harmless demons. Actually, these fuckers have very shitty intentions, and, by the way, this movie really blows. Sorry to everyone involved. “Harry and the Hendersons” (1987) is a delightful romp with a heart and a message.

10/17/07: Monster Month Part III: Demons. We watched “The Devil’s Rain” (1975), which is notable for its creative casting (John Travolta with no eyes; Ernest Borgnine as the Devil) and for the longest scene of people melting ever commited to the screen. Also “Demons” (1985) which was a big messy joy to consume.

10/10/07: Monster Month Part II: Mummies. “The Mummy’s Hand” (1940), which included the rest of the Mummy as well. Also Hammer Studio’s “The Mummy” technicolor remake featuring Peter Cushing as John Banning and Christopher Lee as the Mummy.

10/5/07: Special Monster Month Kick-Off Bash featuring almost no-one. ‘Mad Monster Party?’(1969) is a Mod-ish stop-motion party comedy that is ridiculous and waaay too long. ‘Attack of the Crab Monsters’ (1957) needs no explanation. ‘Monster Squad’ (1987) The best movie ever released after ‘Goonies’ and before ‘Lost Boys’.

9/26/07: Series Night: ‘Peter Pan’ (1953), and ‘Dead or Alive Final’ (2002).

9/19/07: History of Hollywood Comedy Part II, 1936-1950: Abbott and Costello’s ‘Keep ‘Em Flying’ (1941) and Bob Hope’s ‘Paleface’ (1950).

9/12/07: Remake night: ‘Village of the Damned’ (1960/1995). Why do people always do shitty remakes of amazing films? Why not do an amazing remake of a shitty film?

9/5/07: History of Hollywood Comedy Part 1, 1915-1935: “Easy Street” (1917) with Charlie Chaplin, “Animal Crackers” (1930) and Frank Capra’s utterly fantastic romantic comedy “It Happened One Night” (1934).

8/29/07: Series Night Continued: “Alice in Wonderland” (1951) and “Dead or Alive 2: Birds” (2000). A wonderful combination in retrospect.

8/15/07: X-rated Oscar Nominees: “Last Tango in Paris” (1972) followed by “Midnight Cowboy” (1969). Ouch.

8/8/07: Russ Meyer Boob-nanza: “MotorPsycho” (1965) and “Supervixens” (1975). Boobs, boobs, boobs, enormous fake dong, boobs. You have to make little X’s.

8/1/07: We watched episodes 1-4 of BBC’s amazing “Spaced” and followed with “Hot Fuzz” (2007).

7/11/07: Remake Night with “Yojimbo” (1961) and “Fistful of Dollars” (1964).

7/4/07: Ah, Independence. “An American Tale” (1986) and “Wet Hot American Summer”.

6/27/07: Series Night: “Cinderella” and Takashi Miike’s “Dead or Alive”.

6/6/07: Movies featuring non-simulated sexual acts. “9 Songs” had Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Super Furry Animals, Franz Ferdinand and an impressive splooge. “Short Bus” is pretty great; a good movie to watch with someone if you sort of want to sing into their butthole.

5/30/07: Series Night: We watched “The Adventures of Icabhod and Mr. Toad” and “It’s Alive III: Island of the Alive”. Oh yeah, and the “Spring Dance” episode of 90210 from the first season.

5/23/07: Canadian Blockbusters: “Porky’s”, “Bad Cop, Bon Cop”. Thanks a lot, Spence.

5/16/07: Love in War: “The Clock” with Judy Garland and “Darling Lili” starring Julie Andrews and Rock Hudson.

5/9/07: Remake Night: “Cape Fear”.

5/2/07: Rue Brittania: We hail the return of our sovereign ruler with an all-star tribute. “The Sea Hawk” and “Excalibur”.

4/25/07: Series Continued with “Bambi” and “It’s Alive 2″.

4/18/07: “Kung-Fu Classics”: Prodigal Son II: The Dreadnaught (1981) and Shogun Assassin (1980). Bloody and awesome.

4/04/07: Dan Curtis T.V. Movies: “The Norliss Tapes”, a rejected television pilot, in which people talk a great deal and occasionally a blue-faced dude runs in and drains people of their blood. Followed by “Trilogy of Terror”, starring Karen Black, in which she talks a great deal and occasionally herself or someone around her falls victim to a ghoulish cliche.

3/28/07: Series-es Night Part IV: “Dumbo” and “It’s Alive” (1974) both capture the birth of underappreciated freaks.

3/7/07: Riches to Rags, Back to Riches; featuring “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” which bummed everybody out and raped us of our proverbial 401Ks, and “King Ralph”, which elevated our collective mood the way only fiction can.

2/23/07: Series-es Night, Ash Wednesday Edition. “Fantasia” followed by “Death Wish 3″. There’s more tits in “Fantasia”, just so you know.

2/14/07: Happy Valentine’s Day! We snuggled on the couch and watched “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” followed by Catherine Breillat’s “Brief Crossing”.

2/7/07: Remake Night - we unfairly pitted the 2006 remake of “The Wicker Man” against the original, 1973 version. There is quite a large difference between a fantastic Edward Woodward performance and a phoned-in Nic Cage.

1/31/07: Chuck Norris returns with “Silent Rage” (1982) and “Forced Vengeance” (1982), both of which were from that notorious year when having your silly side-kick hugged to death was all the rage.

1/24/07: In “Pinocchio” (1930) and “Death Wish II” (1982), we learned that bad boys who aren’t turned to donkeys when they are young will probably be shot in the face by Charles Bronson when they reach adolescence.

1/17/07: Hitchcock’s incredible “39 Steps” (1935)and “Spellbound”(1935).

1/10/07: Part Two of our ‘Remake’ series featuring the 1979 classic “When a Stranger Calls” and the 2006 version. The original has a fantastic soundtrack and a refreshingly non-formulaic storyline. The remake takes place in a super-sweet house.

1/3/07: Holy Matrimony: “Bride and Prejudice” (2004), and Tom Hanks’ “Bachelor Party” (1984).

12/27/06: The first of our “Series” Nights kicking off a presentation of all Disney animated classics with “Snow White” and the first installment of the “Death Wish” series.

12/20/06: It’s the most wonderful Movie Night of the Year: He-Man and She-ra Christmas Special followed by Black Christmas followed by the incredible “Pee-Wee’s Playhouse Christmas Special”.

11/08/06: First ever “remake review” with the original, stunning, 1974 “Swept Away by an Unusual Destiny in the Blue Sea of August” followed by the prattling and compromised Guy Ritchie/Madonna remake.

10/24/06: We had our souls torn apart (…again) by the horrifying sequels “Aliens” and “Hellbound:Hellraiser II”.

10/18/06: Two adaptations of Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein”: the original Boris Karloff version and Kenneth Branagh’s dramatic, bare-chested and placenta-soaked 1994 interpretation.

10/11/06: We gorged ourselves on gore with a deliciously devilish “Food” theme, including “The Gingerdead Man” starring Gary Busey (which, clocking in at 1 hour, was 45 minutes too long), and “Attack of the Killer Tomatos”.

10/4/06: A frightfully delightful kickoff for our annual Monster Month (that’s trademarked, FYI) featuring Mel Gibson as a frozen freak from the past with the power to age rapidly in “Forever Young” and as a hatchet-wielding maniac in the classic “The Patriot”.

9/27/06: Anchor Bay Darlings- Vice Squad (starring Wings Hauser)/Bad Boys (Sean Penn, Allie Sheady, and the bad guy from Highlander)

8/1/06: Tales of Survival and Heroism- To Hell and Back (starring Audie Murphy as himself)/The Passion of Joan of Arc (original French silent masterpiece)/Missing in Action (Chuck Norris)

Unfortunately, records before August of 2006 are sketchy.  Movie Night was created in late 2002, long before any other regular film-watching event in the whole world.