![]() ![]() The concept behind King Arthur is almost so good that you can overlook its iffy execution. Even Stallone’s Versace-designed uniform holds up well, an appropriately outré look for futuristic fascist police attire. But the movie isn’t that bad, with lots of cool ideas and nifty flourishes (like that giant robot Armand Assante recruits). Widely criticized for both its lack of faithfulness to the original source material ( Sylvester Stallone as Dredd takes off his helmet) and its derivative design and screenplay (not to mention Rob Schneider, wildly miscast and deeply annoying, as Dredd’s mismatched comedic sidekick), it ended up losing money and was quietly written off. In fact, it needed all the help it could get. (Three separate composers came and went Alan Silvestri ultimately stayed.) When the movie garnered an R rating, reports came out that kids were buying tickets to Pocahontas and sneaking into Judge Dredd. Judge Dredd’s was production was a complete nightmare, from multiple unused drafts of the screenplay being commissioned to a prolonged post-production process that saw Disney endlessly tinkering in an effort to cut the film down and secure a PG-13 rating. How High Fidelity got the Hulu original series treatment and Grosse Pointe Blank hasn’t is beyond me.īefore it got the gritty reboot treatment, the British comic book character first appeared on screen in Judge Dredd. (The score was composed by The Clash’s Joe Strummer, which is also very cool.) Breezy and fun, it’s the perfect HBO Max watch for folding laundry or doing the dishes. For a movie as seemingly lightweight as this, it made a surprisingly large impression, from the resurrection of the Violent Femmes’ “Blister in the Sun” (originally released as a single in 1983) to the certification of Cusack and Driver in the Romantic Comedy Hall of Fame. ![]() ![]() Directed by underrated journeyman filmmaker George Armitage, Grosse Pointe Blank stars John Cusack as a hitman attending his high school reunion, where he attempts to make a romantic connection with a former classmate ( Minnie Driver) while avoiding various killers. Released around the height of the post- Pulp Fiction oooo, dark comedy feeding frenzy, Grosse Pointe Blank has emerged as one of the better movies from that period – effortlessly charming and occasionally startling violent. The only thing missing from the HBO Max presentation is the Roger Rabbit short film that ran before it in theaters. Also, the original songs by Stephen Sondheim (yes really) and score by Danny Elfman are terrific. If you’ve never seen the movie, it’s certainly worth a look – Beatty was adamantly committed to preserving the comic strip aesthetic of the source material, heavily utilizing matte paintings and limiting the entire movie’s color palette to seven colors (all the same shade) and the cast is genuinely insane, including (deep breath) Madonna, Al Pacino, Dick Van Dyke, Kathy Bates, Dustin Hoffman, James Caan, Mandy Patinkin, Seymour Cassel and Charles Durning. But in the years since, it has amassed a cult following and the movie holds a fascinating place in Disney history at a truly critical juncture for the company. A bonkers take on the beloved Charles Gould detective comic strip, Disney had huge hopes for the movie (which is about to celebrate its 30 th anniversary next month), but those hopes ultimately fell flat with disappointing box office returns and a middling critical response. ![]() One of the more glaring omissions from Disney+’s lineup was (and continues to be) Warren Beatty’s Dick Tracy. And while some of the visual effects (a handful of which were added last minute to give it more ammo against Deep Impact) don’t hold up, and the rah-rah patriotism is more befitting a Coca-Cola commercial than a major motion picture, Armageddon still holds up and exists as the kind of big budget, high concept stand-alone Disney spectacle that they just don’t make anymore. Abrams, Robert Towne and Tony Gilroy) and a soundtrack album full of new and preexisting songs from Aerosmith (their Disney theme park attraction, Rock N’ Rollercoaster, would open the following year at what was then Disney-MGM Studios). Advertised as “a Jerry Bruckheimer production directed by Michael Bay,” Armageddon was basically designed in a lab to be the biggest, most 1998 possible, with a cast that includes Bruce Willis, Liv Tyler, Billy Bob Thornton, Ben Affleck and Steve Buscemi, working from a script with five credited screenwriters and several more who went uncredited (including J.J. There are few live-action Disney movies as kick-ass or as incredibly profitable (globally it was the #1 movie of 1998) as Armageddon. ![]()
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