Big Touble in Little China (1986)

2/5

John Carpenter's Big Trouble in Little China is a popcorn flick with non-stop action and cheesy acting. The plot follows truck driver Jack Burton (Russell) and Chinese gambler Wang (Dun). Burton falls in love with lawyer Gracie Law (Cattrall) and Wang is set to marry Miao Yin (Pai). When Miao Yin gets kidnapped by a gang and brought to Lo Pan (Hong), an ancient spirit who wants to marry her in order to become flesh and blood again, the other three set off to rescue her.

The story is unnecessarily convoluted and bites off more than it can chew. With every explanation of some supernatural event comes more questions and loose ends. In fact, it's not even worth listening to their explanations, because it doesn't affect the movie in any way, shape, or form. The problem is that it spends over 30 minutes trying and trying and trying to explain everything, which ends up being 30 minutes of wasted time. Even if they weren't wasted on dialogue, however, those 30 minutes would be wasted on the same ludicrous action, horrendous special effects, and hollow acting that fill up the other 60 minutes. The way Kurt Russell speaks reminds me of Private Joker's fake John Wayne parody in Full Metal Jacket. Pretty much nothing about this movie is good. But at least it's fast-paced crap. It isn't mind-numbingly boring or too terribly offensive to my senses. Still, avoid it if you can.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090728/

The Thing (1982)

4/5

John Carpenter's The Thing is an awesome horror movie, one of the few in the genre I truly enjoy watching. The story follows an alien life form that can imitate organisms that it kills, including the ten (approximately) men of an Antarctic research center. As the alien slowly kills the men one by one, you yourself feel the terror and uncertainty of the situation. You suspect everyone else of being the alien, out to kill you. The biggest praise I can give this movie is that it held me in its grip the entire time. My involvement in the plot and my psychological presence in the research station itself made it one of the scariest horror films I've ever seen. Some of the technical aspects of this film are equally fantastic. I loved the camera movements and shot compositions; hallway sequences were always incredibly well-choreographed and tense. The special effects and make-up were phenomenal. While not utterly convincing or realistic, they were very impressive in their own rights in concept/vision.

However, a lot of the acting and dialogue was excessively unrealistic and stylized. The colors were drab and a lot of shots felt really flat. I remember liking it so much more the first time I saw it, probably because I had no idea what I was getting involved in. It doesn't hold well on repeat viewings, I don't think. Also, the alien spaceship in the beginning was really gimmicky. And dated. In fact, much of the movie is dated--like the chess computer game, the cell simulation/prediction, and the special effects in general. Still, well worth watching.

IMDb link: http://imdb.com/title/tt0084787/

Halloween (1978)

3/5

I was really excited going into this movie because I absolutely loved Carpenter's remake of The Thing. Halloween is a great horror movie, but I was a bit disappointed because it wasn't as good as The Thing. One genius aspect to Carpenter's direction was his use of music; he used it to build up tension when nothing tense was going on and took it away when something exciting started happening. He achieved a constant tension, in a sense, where you're always on the edge of your seat; the fear doesn't come in bursts like modern slasher flicks. Also, there's a lot of subtle shot composition and good ideas; unfortunately, most of the time they are just self-indulgent filmmaking to the point of hurting the overall movie.

It still feels like a late 70's movie because of the dialogue and fashion--it's not timeless, as I was hoping it would be. And it never actually scared me. I just watched it and said, oh, wow, that's cool. The slow pacing sometimes doesn't achieve its goal of building tension and you realize that what you're watching is just really really boring. The murder in the beginning started off as a really great and ballsy idea, but as it went on and on, it ceased to serve its function and actually hindered your appreciation of it. Which is a shame, 'cause it really was an awesome idea.

IMDb link: http://imdb.com/title/tt0077651/