Today, Matt tackles the current crop of Oscar nominees for 2016. He gives you the lowdown on the good, the bad and the decidedly “meh”. Listen below!
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2015 is hitting the bricks! I for one, welcome our new 2016 overlord! The Guys look back at their fav flicks, the morbid movies and what they feel was tots overrated in 2015!
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SQUEEEEEE!!!!! It’s finally here! No text wasted. This is OUR REVIEW OF STAR WARS EPISODE VII – THE FORCE AWAKENS
Nothing more. Nothing less.
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Release: November 13, 1998 
I sat down for I’ll Be Home For Christmas. This flick was made at the peak of the popularity of Home Improvement. The show that launched the career of young Jonathan Taylor Thomas; the star of this little Christmas bag of sleazy-feel-good.
I sat down with an open mind, and got up after with the same: a gaping hole where my brian used to be.
This flick hit theaters when I was but a little lad of 10. I really idolized JTT because he was a kid who was famous. And could only make good films like WIld America. I was such a stupid child.
Directed by Arlene Sanford, who also unleashed A Very Brady Sequel onto humanity as well as a slew of TV episodes; I’ll Be Home For Christmas also stars the lovely, pre-Timberlake Jessica Bieland Gary Cole.
The film starts off with with Jake (Thomas) a young crafty college student with all the right answers, asking his lady-friend (Biel) to join him on a trip down south (not a double-entendre) only to be shot down because she wants to spend time with her family in New-York. Coincidentally, this is where young Jake is from too.
Always avoiding a trip home since his father (cole) remarried, Jake changes his tune when daddy offers his beloved 1957 Porche as a bribe to get Jake to come home for Christmas dinner. The catch? He has to be home by 6pm sharp!
Unfortunately for Jake, he runs into trouble with former “clients” when one of his schemes goes awry. He’s then got to get home, save his relationship and win a car all the while wearing a Santa costume and no money to boot. He’s gotta do all that and learn the true meaning of Christmas.
Heart warming? Nope.
Like many things from my childhood, this should have stayed buried in the back of my closet until they found me in the desert somewhere down south with a Santa costume and a bottle of Jack!
– The pacing. This film chugs right along like the little engine that could. I never really felt like this film was too long in length.
– The dialog and humour. This is actually what I miss most about comedies from the 90’s. Nothing was too over the top. Yes, the acting sucked. But I could sit back and actually believe this scenario.
– The Acting. There’s a reason The Hallmark Channel now airs this.
– The lack of a true B-plot. Yes Jake’s main want is the car and his need is to learn about the true meaning of Christmas and accepting his father’s new wife, but they could have played more into Biel’s character’s doubt in Jake as a boyfriend. She was just too flat of a character to have been given so much camera time.
– The moral. Yeah Jake finally realizes that he should be going home during the holiday break to see his family and not to win a car. But It really does feel like he just clicked into that mentality once he finally did make it to New York. The whole trip there he didn’t really look like he was evolving at all.
I said it before and I’ll repeat it for good measure: There’s a reason this plays on The Hallmark Channel now. This movie is kinda boring. I believe it was intended to attract a younger audience than the general “family film” but in it’s delivery I can’t really find a suitable audience for this film to enjoy. Maybe spider monkeys. They’ll watch anything with JTT in it.
So when searching through your vast holiday film collection to curl up next to the fire while watching; you can just skip right on over it to another Christmas film starring a Home Improvement alumni: Christmas With The Kranks! … Or maybe not.
The Guys finish their Star Wars retrospective with The Empire Strikes back! Oh what a lovely tea party that is. Next week the guys finally get to watch the seventh instalment of the franchise: Star Wars Episode VII – The Force Awakens! Cue the girlish squeals.
They also discuss the most overrated and underrated holiday films Hollywood has vomited onto the silver screen in the past!
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Repost from September 11 2015
The Guys sit back and watch Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.
They do it live and will watch it on mute and listen to their sexy voices as they talk over your (current) favourite of all the Star Wars flicks!
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The Guys are back and singing that sweet song of 50 episodes! Matt checks out the latest film in the world of Rocky Balboa: Creed! Then they dive into the first film from long ago in a galaxy far, far away: Star Wars Episode IV – A New Hope!
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Releas date: October 2, 1998 
SCORE!
Can anyone else show me where the late 90’s is better represented? No, no please don’t call Busta Rhymes. I was but a young lad of 10 years when A Night at the Roxbury came out. I think that’s where I developed my love for hair products throughout my teens.
A Night at the Roxbury is the 11th film based of off Saturday Night Live (SNL) skits. Following in the huge footsteps of such films like The Blues Brothers and Wayne’s World. As with all SNL based films, this one is produced by comedic producing genius Lorne Michaels. Written by Chris Kattan, Koren and Will Ferrell; A Night at the Roxbury stars, Kattan, Ferrell, Loni “McBoobskis” Anderson, Dan Hedaya, Molly Shannon, Richard “Don’t mention Depp” Grieco and an uncredited Chazz Palminteri as Mr. Zadir.
This flick is straight up stupid. It really is. But it knows it’s failed grade two math and has decided to just have a friggin good time while getting closer in age to the teacher. A teacher with boobs I might add. A Night at The Roxbury follows “The Roxbury Guys” in an expanded universe as they try desperately to get into the hottest club in town, The Roxbury. Proving to be more difficult than getting their own club, the boys have miss adventures with ladies and they overbaring yet well intentioned father. Did I forget to mention there’s more 90’s goodness in this flick than you can squeeze into a pair of faded high-waisted jeans?
WHAT WORKED:
– The Comedy. Kattan, Koren and Ferrell knew they couldn’t pull off an 81 minute SNL sketch, so they slapped in a bunch of funnies. I’ll go on record in saying they didn’t always land, but hot damn I was still giggling like a school girl last time I watched this. I’m almost ashamed proud to I have probably seen this film over 80 times.
WHAT DIDN’T WORK:
– The plot. Many many many holes. My swiss cheese I had in my Subway sandwich didn’t have as many holes. This isn’t you’re most complex of films either. But were you really hoping for a brain teaser?
– The third act. All goes to shit in a handbasket and gets back together quite neatly without much cause and effect. Granted, this still does a much better job at having conflict and resolve than Napoleon Dynamite. (Editor’s Note: I REFUSE to link to the trailer for that piece of garbage. One and ONLY film I walked away from; more than once.)
THE LOWDOWN:
This is a stupid good time. Sit back and travel back to a day when people used cellular phones for calls. An era when you got a girls number on a piece of paper. A time when everyone, man, woman and even troglodite used four cans of hairspray a day. This isn’t a great film, but it’s a great time. Sit back an enjoy Will Ferrell when he was still moderated. A Night at the Roxbury is So Damn Stupid It’s Awesome!
What a jam packed show do we have for you! Not very different from the jam-packed situations Tony and Matt find themselves in usually though.
This week The Guys continue their intergalactic cinematic journey to a galaxy far far away with Star Wars Episode III – Revenge of the Sith! Matt also talks the last of The Hunger Games movies: Mocking Jay Part 2 and Spotlight!
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Grade: B+
Released: 1997
Directed by: Barry Sonnenfeld
Starring: Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones, Vincent D’Onofrio
In retrospect, Men in Black is an important little slice of wacky sci-fi lunacy. Not only did it inspire Marvel, who owned its rights at the time, to pursue the idea of putting other comic book properties up on the big screen (they later collaborated with Columbia, the studio behind MIB, on the first-ever Spider-man title a few years later), but it also managed to insert some much-needed wit and charm into the summer blockbusters of its day, serving a nice counterpoint to mindless fare such as The Lost World and Batman and Robin that hit multiplexes in the same year.
The best moments in MIB come from the offbeat little side jokes that permeate the screenplay by Ed Solomon. It knows how bombastically irreverent the material is and revels in its lunacy. For instance, there’s a moment where the head of the organization, Zed (Rip Torn), shows J (Will Smith) a big board of all the alien lifeforms that are disguised as humans and living on Earth. Some faces in the crowd include Sylvester Stallone, Newt Gingrich and Dionne Warwick, and the result was a knowing chuckle emitted from my person – a chain of events that doesn’t always happen with a movie that centers around grown men chasing various extraterrestrials around New York.
At the outset, Men in Black introduces us to K (Tommy Lee Jones), who subdues a potentially dangerous situation that involves an alien coming from Mexico – and by “alien”, I mean “not of this galaxy alien” – in hilarious deadpan fashion. Meanwhile, after an NYPD officer (Smith) has a run-in with a non-human perpetrator, he is recruited by K to join the eponymous group of suits who monitor extraterrestrial life on our planet, most of whom apparently live in Manhattan. Smith’s J has one hell of a first week at a new job, as the rest of the plot follow him and K on the trail of a sinister, scheming alien cockroach who takes on the appearance of a hick farmer (Vincent D’Onofrio).
The performances are another aspect of the film that lifts it above and beyond run-of-the-mill popcorn flick fare. Tommy Lee Jones is at his unsmiling, stoic best as K, a role that he gets some laughs with precisely because of his unflappably old-school demeanor. Will Smith provides a solid ying to Jones’ yang as J and is clearly having a lot of fun playing the wide-eyed, overconfident rookie along for the ride. It seems a shame that Smith doesn’t get back to roles like this, which he is better suited for, instead of focusing on heavy dramatic roles that sometimes have him in over his head. Elsewhere, Vincent D’Onofrio is suitably ghoulish as the alien in disguise and Linda Fiorentino snags an eye candy role as a sexy morgue employee (not a character description you see everyday).
Special mention should be given to Rick Baker, one of Hollywood’s foremost makeup gurus, for his work on making the many aliens that populate this movie wacky, colorful and intimidating – sometimes all at once. It makes for a far more textural viewing experience, and looking at Men in Black again made me pine for more films like this that meld CGI and man-made effects together with precision. Finally, speaking of precision, the score by the great Danny Elfman provides a solid undercurrent to the film that compliments the visuals nicely. It’s not perfect – the plot gets in the way of the droll banter between the two leads two or three times too many in the final act – but, as far as big, loud, adventure pictures go, MIB provides the kind of comedic allure that both its contemporaries and imitators find hard to equal.
2 Guys, Movies & a Mic 