Alright party people?
This blog was last updated on 22/10/20, with a post writing about GI Joe: A Real American Hero: The Movie- that’s nearly a year ago! After that- as I had always tried to warn was a possibility- the well ran dry and I stopped posting. I wanted some free time back, and kept missing deadline for posting updates, so I let it all slide quietly into the night.
But since then, a yearning has grown in me; you might say a desire, nay, a NEED. Like Bruce Banner I find something inside me yearns to be free. While he had his unstoppable green rage monster, I have something far more frightening. A desperate need to mock sub-par cinematic efforts!!!
Also there’s a pandemic and I’m out of work…
So here we are!
Sarcasm aside, I’m glad to be back, and I hope you, dear reader, will enjoy the posts I have in store. I’ve already picked up a handful of films, and will surely secure more when the need arises/ the mood takes me. However, as the news never stops reminding us, we live in unprecedented times, and I think this resurgence of blogging requires a bit of a soft reset. I’m keeping my FILM RANKINGS as they were, but Pound Shop Flicks is going to have to be a spiritual, rather than literal, name for the time being. I don’t often go past pound shops at the moment, and it feels irresponsible to make special trips to pick up DVDs for this blog. As such I will be buying films from other sources like Ebay and CEX’s website. Also, while I’ll try to maintain the impulse/ semi-random nature of my choices, not having a shelf-ful of stuff in front of me makes this a little harder, so it may be that I end up picking up films I’ve heard of before, or even searching for particular ones. But rest assured, I promise to try and make them stinkers.
This brings me now, to my first pick: THE MARTIAN WAR :
Let me tell you reader: This is the Good Shit. The Martian War (TMW) is a direct to DVD film – called ‘Martian Land’ in America- produced by an independent American film company called ‘The Asylum’. You might have heard of ‘Mockbusters’- films which attempt to befuddle consumers via presentation into thinking they are actually different films entirely. The Asylum are the daddies of Mockbusters* and TMW appears to be a prime example. TMW, as you can see above/ below, is ripping off The Martian, the Matt Damon flick from 2015 where he goes to Mars and which got nominated for 7 Oscars. The Asylum’s business model seems to be thus: try and turn a profit by keeping the films low budget (usually under a Million dollars) and making them look just enough like particular popular Hollywood films to fool people into buying them.
I won’t lie to you, stumbling upon this film in CEX pleased me greatly. This kind of nonsense is what I started this blog for. In fact, I could write about ONLY films made by ‘The Asylum’ and it would keep me going a while. For whatever its worth, the plot doesn’t appear to bare much relation to that of The Martian, except in that, ‘The Human Race Can’t Go Home’ (to Earth), and The Martian is chiefly about Matt Damon trying to go home (to Earth). The film stars Alan Pietruszewski, Lane Townsend and Jennifer Dorogi. I shall be watching and posting about this by 31/08/2020. Count on it!
Until then my friends, here’s some links to stuff you might find interesting!:
A piece on the Satanic Panic that enveloped Dungeons and Dragons in absurd controversy and produced some beautiful cinematic drek: https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/dungeons-and-dragons/cinema-movies-dd/
Bill and Ted 3 is coming a looks like good fun. Check out the Trailers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hAL7emClFM
See you soon!
-Tom
*And are the people behind Sharknado
Pound Shop Flix 