Sunday, October 22, 2006

MINI REVIEW: Blood Tide

NOTE: Blood Tide was a movie "gifted" to me as part of the B-Movie Messagebaords "Pass the Turkey" Review Circle game. I can't complain, it was my idea.

But I'll complain anyway.




I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I like my movies in one of two ways. Very, very good. Or very, very bad. I can't stand people who settle for mediocrity.

Blood Tide is the pinnacle of mediocrity.

In just over eighty minutes of running time, the closest thing to an action sequence we see is James Earl Jones punching open a watermrelon. The closest thing to any sex or nudity is a 1/16th-of-a-second boobie shot that re-defines both "gratuitous" and "piontless". And the closest thing to the effect of the movie is a general anesthetic.

The plot (term loosely used) centers around Neil (Marty Kove, the Evil Sensei from
The Karate Kid) and his new bride Sherry (Mary Louise Weller from.. well, sweet fuck-all, really.) Arriving on the Greek isle of Cinnimon. Cimmaron. Symmilie. Anyhoo, they're there to find Neils missing sister Madeline. There they meet crusty treasure hunter Frye (James Earl Jones) and his shapely-though-dumb assistant Barbara who's accidently released an ancient horror from the deeps..

Okay, ignore that last paragraph. It kind of makes the film sound like it may be interesting. It isn't. The first 45 minutes could well be titled "James Earl Jones: What I Did on My Summer Vacation", as we watch him lie around on the beach, dive into a dank cave, and cit-chat with our insipid leads. (To give you an impression of how much impact they made on me, I had to use the IMDB to remember their names. I finished watching the flick five minutes ago.) Eventually the monster does get released, but don't get too excited about that. In the remaining 40 minutes or so, the two(!) shots we get of it (discounting a brief shot of the critters webbed hand) last about one second, tops. I'm aware that if your monster suit looks shoddy, it's best to hide it. But rubbery gill-man or not, we really are missing our creature-features Creature. The last 15 minutes of the flick see the already-wafer-thin plot wobble off course, with a little off-screen slaughter of nuns, auto-self-pleasure-by-unexplained-mystic-amulet and an unsatisyfying James Earl Jones Explody finale.


I'm at a loss how to pad this review out, folks. Seriously, nothing happens. There's unsubtitled Greek dialogue, which is all Greek to... well, you know. The minscule budget means James Earl Jones's salary was evidently deducted from the lighting budget, as many of the opening scenes are so dimly lit, it's more akin to a radio play than a motion picture. James himself looks like he took the flick to avoid paying for a European vacation. Marty Kove looks like a chunky Micheal Landon, and Babs's gratuitous topless scene is filmed from the back only.
Jaws rip-off attack scenes are a given. The 80's soundtrack is big on Casio musical stings and awful ballads. And the island itself is pretty butt-ugly by Greek standards.

In the end, only two major questions have been raised from me.

1) Was the UK cut of this film (FIFTEEN minutes longer than the U.S version) even MORe boring?

and

2) Why the hell did Neil give his sister and WAY-too intimate tongue kiss after rescuing her? Ick, dude.


OTHER RECENT MINI-REVIEWS:

(And repeat viewings)


Battlefield Earth:
Still excellent, mindless fun. John Travoltas' wild over-acting is awe-inspiring. Goofy plot elements, idiotic characters, laugh-out-loud dialogue. A modern B-Classic.

Robot Monster: Brilliant stuff. Gorillas in diving helmets. Billion Bubble Machines. Insane dialogue. Craptacular plot. Abrubt bouts of claymation dinosaur stock footage. A bonkers wedding sequence that would make David Lynch go "Huh?". The "Must, but cannot" speech. The Space Platform that's spinning in cirlces trailing smoke and flames while emitting a noise like a bumble-bee with a faceful of Raid. The "Sonic Hotdog" Brand Soldering Iron. The brilliant 'You're so bossy, you ought to be milked before you go to bed." line. Homicide of a Minor. Grips-hand-in-shot. The Rug-out-from-under-the-feet ending. Cheese Factor Five. Thumbs WAY up for our sort of required viewing. "Normal" people need not apply.

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