Hello again, Ladies and Gentlenerds! By now, you’ve all diligently viewed the entirety of our oh-so-meticulously compiled lists of lockdown-killing shows. You’ve behaved yourself, stayed at home, spent time with the spouse/rugrats/parents/pets/dust bunnies. You’ve developed new and fascinating ways to prepare Ramen. You were good to go.
And now (at least in Wisconsin), we find out it’s gonna be at least another month.
We at the Pullbox feel your pain…and so we’re back, with more shelter-at-home commiserating goodness. This time through, it’s our Silver Screen Edition: one staff member per day will offer up their list of three, somewhat to very under the radar films we’ve enjoyed in forestalling our own boredom.
So without further ado, here with today’s recommendations is Paul:
Hudson Hawk– Okay… hear me out. I get a few odd looks when I list this as one of my favorite Bruce Willis movies ever made, but what can I say? Die Hard may forever be my most repeatable Christmas movie, but this one stands out as a great off the wall action/comedy. Released from prison, professional thief Hudson Hawk is blackmailed (by his probation officer) into stealing a valuable Da Vinci artifact. It’s all hijinks & snappy banter from there. Willis is joined by a great supporting cast, with Danny Aiello as Hawk’s past-his-prime partner, Andie MacDowell as the quirky nun with a killer dolphin impression, & a truly bizarre villainous married couple played by Sandra Bernhard & Richard E. Grant. Everyone in this movie knocked it out of the park… even David Caruso in probably the only role I can seem to stand him in.
Lockout– Okay, hear me out on this one… I like action movies. I like them a lot, especially the ones that can give me something a little different in a hero. Maybe “hero” is a bit of a stretch, but Guy Pearce’s completely against type spin as black ops specialist Snow is a non-stop run of one-liners & an uncomplicated plot that just lets you sit back, switch off the higher brain functions, & enjoy some popcorn. The action & effects are good in this sci fi burner, but it’s lines like “Wait a minute, I’m getting beaten up by a guy named Rupert?” that really trip my trigger. Pearce is a great actor, & without a doubt his talent is wasted in this movie, but it looked like he was having a blast making it. Sadly, he’s not getting any younger and it’s not likely that he’ll be doing much more work like this.
John Carter– Okay, hear me out… again… on this one. The only real reason this epic rendition of a science fiction classic didn’t make the grade was because it seemed like the studio just didn’t know how to handle it. They did away with the full title “John Carter of Mars”, kinda botched up the advertising campaign so that only existing fans of Edgar Rice Burroughs’s books would be aware of it, & then wondered why no one went to see it. Everything else about this flick is spot on. The performances are perfect, the script was solid, & even the heavy use of CGI didn’t put me off as Disney had a pretty solid handle on it, even pre-Thanos. The only thing I don’t like about this movie is that I’m never going to see another one.
So there you go—get to hunting for some Friday night action, and we’ll be back tomorrow, with Susan’s recommendations! Until then, keep your feet and the ground, and keep reaching for the stars!
