With so much to offer, you can't afford to miss it!

Ever wanted to know who Gary Daniels, costar of The Expendables, is? Watch The Fist of the North Star!

Ever wanted to know what happened to Rufio after Hook? Watch The Fist of the North Star!

Ever wanted to see another Chris Penn movie during the Summer of Action? Watch The Fist of the North Star!

Ever wanted to see how 90s filmmakers would do at making adaptations of graphic novels? Watch The Fist of the North Star!

Ever need a Downtown Julie Brown fix and can't get your hands on Club MTV tapes? Watch The Fist of the North Star!

BEST OF THE 5Qs 2

As promised at the tail end of BEST OF THE 5Qs, the touching conclusion of Best of the Best inspired me to immediately queuuequequeqeeueueueueueueue up its imaginatively titled sequel, Best of the Best 2. It came in on the very same day that the good viceroy of West LA leant me the footage of the goings on at The Party at Kitty & Stud's. Having already expended quite a bit of energy getting all erotic'd up with Italian Stallion, I was having second thoughts about rocking another SoA double feature. However, when the netflix envelope told me this:

My fate was obviously sealed. And so I partook of the fantastical revenge of Alex and Tommy...

Universal Soldiering is an Imperfect Science

Soldier on soldier!

Inspired by Sean's near nude picture of Jean Claude, and inspired by Dolph Lundgren's gripping performance in Rocky IV, and inspired by my love for ear necklaces, and inspired by everything awesome that ever existed, I decided to Netflix (is that officially a verb now?) Universal Soldier.  I used to love this movie.  According to wikipedia, it is a trilogy now.  This excites me a great deal. They are also making a FOURTH Universal Soldier starring the original leads and set in a "more modern setting" than, um, the early 90's?  The first Universal Soldier was not a period action piece.  It was awesome though.

Here's pretty much what happened:

The movie starts with Jean Claude standing in a rain-soaked Vietnam. That war had so much rain. Then, Jean Claude tells everyone to leave.  Except they can't leave because they are all dead.  Dolph Lundgren killed them.  He then cut off their ears and made a necklace out of them.  His ear fetish was not explained.  Nor was his hysteria.  We just needed to know he thought everyone was a traitor, and that he was CRAZY.  His craziness was accentuated when he shot two innocent Vietnamese people.  Similarly, Jean Claude was not crazy because he wanted the Vietnamese people to live.  Unfortunately both Jean Claude and Dolph killed each other three minutes into the movie.

WHAT!?!?!  The leads can't die.

Hell, the Viceroy told me this was gonna be an art movie

The subheading of this blog, "Men across the nation search for greatness in action films" was penned as a sweeping and dramatic nod to the fact that the contributors are far flung. More realistically it should say "Men in the central time zone plus two in the western part of L.A. get giddy about shitty movies". This would more accurately reflect the identities of the participants (until we acquire a friend in the east) as well as the purpose of the quest.

So, anyway, I'm not sure where Sean lies his head after drinking a cube of delicious Old Mil Light, but the Viceroy and I may be the most closely located pair of contributors to this blog. This offered me the opportunity to snag "Italian Stallion" from him this morning before it need be returned to Cinefile. I won't belabor many points, as he covered it all quite nicely just a couple days ago, and the movie hasn't changed aside from perhaps being more grainy and poorly lit than it was when he put it on the spin cycle in his video-playing machine. In the interest of full disclosure of my habits, and further discussion of a momentous piece of film, however, I record here some supplementary thoughts.

* I would update "panty hamster" to "panty chinchilla". That, or those are some very ferocious hamsters.

PREDATOR 2010

What would happen if the loaded cast of the original Predator were to get back together today, knowing what they know? In what direction would the all-star, power-packed cast lead a sequel if it hadn't been handed to Danny Glover, Gary Busey, and Bill Paxton? How would they govern the downfall of the wicked-mouthed alien/reptile thing if it hadn't been spun off into a weird nostalgia-grab/FX orgy co-starring those scoop-headed Aliens?

Arnold: As the governor of America's most populous state, I hearby declare dat in Predata 2010 zere vil be seven times the asplosions and ve will hunt down seven of dose ugly motherfuckers! Ve vill flip da script of the original. I wanted to vork only with my team in zat one- in dis one we will have teams from all over ze world. A team from Mexico to cut off all ze tree branches so when he wears dat invisible suit it won't be zo trippy to see! A team of da Japs who vil be well educated by a state education system dat is bleeding money like za stuck goats in Austria!

“I’ll Be Velvet Mouthed On Your Shank of Love”

A conventional wisdom of the people of the United States of America is that action stars are born, not made. They believe the likes of Bruce Willis and Sylvester Stallone came out of the birth canal with a headband already tied around their head and a chip already planted firmly on their shoulder. Their state of affluence was sitting there next to the curl bar just waiting for them to claim. To which I say, “Hark!” This is America. No one rides for free. Van Damme, Lundren, Statham—all God-fearing Americans—had to start out on the bottom rung and pick themselves up by their bootstraps while doing a chin up to get to where they are today.

Arnold Schwarzenegger started out his storied Hollywood career in a feature called, Son of Hercules. The previously mentioned Jean-Claude Van Damme has an uncredited but crucial moment in the critically acclaimed prequel to the groundbreaking film, Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo, titled Breakin’. Heck, even Ronald Reagan started out as a humble B-movie actor before becoming an action hero.

Sylvester Stallone is no different. Broke and homeless, the Man That Would Be Cliffhanger took a gig that paid $200 (US) for two days work (ET). The final product was, The Party at Kitty and Stud’s. And it was the start of Stallone’s storied career.

BEST OF THE 5Qs

Tonight: The Best of the Best

Who: Eric Roberts. You know him because Chet did such a fine job introducing him yesterday.
Also: James Earl Jones, you know him as the black dude with the awesome voice; Phillip Rhee, you know him as the guy who made his career out of "Best of the Best" movies; Chris Penn, you know him as Sean's fat younger brother, or from Reservoir Dogs, Corky Romano, Mulholland Drive, Footloose, shit I don't know it depends on your viewing habits; various Korean actors.
What: The preparations for and action of an international karate tournament between the American and Korean national teams.

Sean Watches Universal Soldier 2

I'm not what you would typically call an 'action movie' type of guy. My netflix que is usually filled up with silly romantic comedies featuring amy adams and involve this lady somehow?

"Buzz's Girlfriend.....woof."

It's either that, or old episodes of Gossip Girl. (I wish I was half as funny as Videogum)

Tiger Hi-Line Entertainment Review: The Pope of Greenwich Village

If you are looking for an 80s drama about guys who accidentally get themselves involved with the mafia, "The Pope of Greenwich Village" might be for you! I recently attended a screening this movie. Here is what you would be getting your self in to.

Some of you may have heard adults talk about Mickey Rourke's resurgence. You know Mr. Rourke as the big ugly guy from Sin City and also the wrestler in The Wrestler. Well, your mom and dad were right about resurgence, because once upon a time Mr. Rourke was younger and much prettier! Once upon a time he looked a little like Kiefer Sutherland (but not Kiefer Sutherland from Lost Boys. Older than that.) He will also feature in this summer's movie The Expendables. This is one of his early movies, and he plays Charlie a down-on-his-luck wannabe restauranteur with a smoking hot aerobics instructor girlfriend. She gets pregnant! That's sure to make things complicated.

But his buddy Paulie is going to make things complicated enough. Paulie is a waiter who gets Charlie fired at the start of the movie for not selling enough steak. And later, Paulie gets them in even more hot water by crossing up the mafia. Paulie is played by Eric Roberts, who was Salvatore Maroni in The Dark Knight and will also be in The Expendables. It was weird that they cast Eric and Mickey in this movie because the characters are supposed to be Italian. Except neither of them are very good at acting Italian. Especially Mr. Roberts whose facial expressions and accent would make Heath Ledger roll over in his grave. It was fun to see Mr. Roberts with a haircut my parents called a 'jerry curl' though.

The Pope of Greenwich Village suffers somewhat from being long and ambling, but it is a well made and interesting movie so you should consider watching it.

Chet Germilla is a junior at Cedar Falls High School. We are happy to have him as the official Summer of Action intern.

So who's the baked potato?

There are two Death Race films, which conveniently both feature an Expendables star. I was going to compare and contrast, in a very concise and not overly verbose manner, producer Roger Corman's original 1975 film starring David Carradine and Sylvester Stallone and the 2008 adaptation starting Jason Statham. But about ten minutes into DR2K I realized you needed to come on the (preposterously verbose) journey with me. Enjoy it now because I'm not sure how many more of these I'll do.

So, without further ado, real time thoughts, analysis, and description of three-plus hours of tantalizing action, starting from the start.
*edit I'm trying the fancy jump break because Jay had the brilliance to reveal the button to me. This way this post will take up less front-page real estate. I assure you you should still read it though. It's brilliant.

Communism Meets Its End Because of Change (Not Really)

Rocky IV confused me like it has never confused me before. It's been years since I've watched any parts of the movie except for the epic battle between Ivan Drago and Rocky Balboa and Rocky's corresponding speech that united two nations, tore down a German wall, banned Cuban cigars from the US of A, and, of course, caused China to start growing their future Olympic athletes in labs and train them to cheat in gymnastics.

Okay, before we get into the whole fall of communism, which is what everyone knows about this movie, I think it's time we talk about how truly awful of a movie this is. Everyone says Rocky V is the worst. Um, no. Rocky V is awesome because Rocky is all of a sudden mentally retarded (twist!), his son aged ten years between movies when all Rocky did was fly back from Moscow (also, his son started to hate his now retarded father when the fourth one ends with them mouthing their love to each other via television), and their is a street fight with a real life AIDS victim. AIDS is bad and people who have it should be beat up in alleys by Sly Stone.

But Rocky IV. No, Rocky IV is the worst Rocky. One is a legitimately great movie. Two is just sort of there. Three had Hulk Hogan and Mr T before they were Hulk Hogan and Mr T. Five had everything I just mentioned. Six finally killed off Talia Shire (off screen) and gave Rocky a love interest that wasn't awful. Talia Shire is so awful.

This is getting too intense

Surgeon. Soldier. Arctic fisher. Oil driller. Rene Zellweger's personal assistant. No. These are not the toughest jobs. The toughest job is trucking. Trucking puts you on the road, all to yourself. For so long. You have to drive treacherous mountain passes and groom yourself in the reflection from your truck's chrome. Trucking makes your toy-empire-wealthy father in law cut you off from the family. Or it makes you desert them to deal drugs. It's not entirely clear, but it definitely has a profound effect on your family life in one of those ways.

Grounding. Spanking. Forgetting a piano rehearsal. Diddling his girlfriend. No. These are not the most difficult transgressions for a father to atone to his son for. The most difficult transgression to atone for is deserting your family and never writing your son. Or writing your son and having your sonofabitch toy magnate father in law keep your son from getting your letters. Hundreds of letters! It doesn't help either if you're a trucker and therefore on a completely different social scale. Muscles aren't everything, after all.

Darts. Pinball. Drinking. Getting VD from truckyard hookers. No. These are not the most hardcore passtime of truckers. The most hardcore passtime is arm wrestling. It's the true test of just how enormous your triceps have become. The true test of how effective your in-cab weight pulley is. And thankfully, when they have big arm wrestling tournaments, you get a second chance to be harcore, because the tournaments are double elimination.

But if one hardcore trucker dude spends enough time with his alienated son, Lincoln Hawk might just be able to teach him a thing or two about muscles. About competitive fire. About believing in yourself. About being a better person. He might be able to begin to atone for being gone for twelve long years and driving his rig so slowly that they miss the passing of his son's mother. He might even be able to teach his son how to drive, which could theoretically come in handy. And by being hardcore and patching things over with his son, he might find the will deep within him to be the best at the most hardcore trucker passtime, to beat Survivor's Rupert at the table, and to win a critically needed new rig in the process. He might find a way to go

OVER THE TOP

May I remind you that arm wrestling tournaments are held in a double-elimination format.

Uh oh

(pardon the terrible photoshopping)

Action is Exciting

Similar to the movie Expendables, this blog is genius and totally called for. I love me the action. Last night I watched a very exciting action movie with "Broken Arrow" star John Travolta and "Die Hard" star Bruce Willis. It was about a talking baby, and oh boy the apartment almost burned down, but John Travolta saved the Bruce Willis baby. I didn't even know babies had telepathy, but they do. They have a lot of telepathy, but they only use it to talk to other babies and, in awesome sequeles, to cats and dogs. It is as adorable as it is adrenaline-rush enducing.

Yippy Kay Ya Mother Baby. I need a nap.

After watching that holy trinity of movies last night (Kirstie Alley is the epitomy of hot action movie star lady*), I've reordered my q (the word queue is needlessly long, similar to the spelling of my name. Henceforth, I am J and my queue is q and all that oil should be picked up please and Arizona should repeal their ridiculous legislation and John Travolta should apologize to all of us for almost everything he's ever done except for Saturday Night Fever, Pulp Fiction, and Battleship Earth--that was so cool).

Below are pictures of my q. Rocky IV should be required viewing for everyone for featuring MIT scholar Dolph, Sylvester, and the fall of communism.




I do have some very important thoughts about the Expendables. It looks awesome, but I fear it lacks too much Jean Claude Van Damme and Steven Seagal. Who will save us from reprogrammed, reanimated soldiers and/or help unhijack our boats? Also, I hope Wesley Snipes stops by. With all the whitey here, someone will need to jump. I'm worried I'm going to watch too many Bruce Willis films, and that he'll hardly even be in the movie. He's probably busy hanging out with Tracy Morgan and laughing so hard.

Tonight I plan to watch a hilarious send up where Arnold Schwargenegger and Danny Devito are fraternal twins and almost opposite in every single way except for the fact they just miss their mom. What's funny is they then marry fraternal twin sisters who are just like them but opposite from each other. Who knew? Also, in this movie a car drives on only two wheels and heavy chains fall on people. It's unbelievable!

True to my word

A screen cap of my queue as of 1 p.m. 6/17/10. I am jazzed.

Mission Statement

I hereby declare July Classic ~80s Action Month in anticipation of The Expendables. I will be filling my netflix queueequeuqueeuw with things like Universal Soldier, Die Hard, and Death Race. I'll watch The Minion, Death Race 2000, and Rambo, which I own, on waiting days.

My rule is thus: it must star at least one cast member of Expendables and must not be "Look Who's Talking" or "Twins". It needn't be from the 80s as that would make Jason Statham and Jet Li movies difficult, and thats why the ~ is in the title of the event.