Tag: Kindergarten Cop

Son of Godzilla (1967)

SON OF GODZILLA (1967) **
I made a terrible mistake.

Not in watching Son of Godzilla, the eighth film in the Godzilla series, per se, but watching it through the most available version online.

Characters begin speaking in dubbed English, of course only the best for us American monster movie aficionados, for a few seconds before a foreign language (presumably Russian) overlays the English. We get two bad dub jobs for the price of one, sure yeah whatever never mind.

I was desperate, though, and needed to watch Son of Godzilla to complete the entire 15-film Godzilla series Japan’s hallowed Toho Studios produced from 1954 to 1975. I sucked it up, buttercup, who cares about the bloody dialogue in a Godzilla movie anyway for crying out loud, and mission accomplished. Yes, I always save the worst for last.

Son of Godzilla marks the beginning of a period of several pictures when Toho made Godzilla a kinder, gentler monster. Like Arnold Schwarzenegger, as Godzilla became a bigger star, a monster if you will, the big guy preferred not playing a villain and so Son of Godzilla and 1969’s All Monsters Attack (a.k.a. Godzilla’s Revenge) are the equivalent of later Schwarzenegger pictures like Kindergarten Cop and Jingle All the Way. Not sure that Schwarzenegger ever made his Godzilla vs. Hedorah (a.k.a. Godzilla vs. The Smog Monster) and that’s a bummer.

The suits at Toho have made Godzilla and the men inside the suit do some awkward bull over a nearly 70-year period, but seeing the big guy try and relate to his adopted son Minilla during Son of Godzilla and All Monsters Attack just might take the cake. Godzilla rescues Minilla from a trio of Kamacuras or a mutated mantis species found on Sollgel Island, and is it in poor taste to say that I wish Minilla had been eaten by the mantis. Minilla’s just so darn cute that it took a great deal of restraint to not puke all over my relatively new laptop.

W.C. Fields died eight years before Godzilla’s screen birth, but we can be sure the famously curmudgeonly performer would have found some choice words for Son of Godzilla and All Monsters Attack, easily the worst of the 15 Showa Era films.

I believe Fields said, “I like children, if they’re properly cooked.”

Playing with Fire (2019)

PLAYING WITH FIRE

PLAYING WITH FIRE (2019) One star

Imagine our surprise when the opening credits began at the Flick Theatre in Anderson, Missouri, and it was PLAYING WITH FIRE and not JOKER that we had for our entertainment or, in this case, lack of entertainment pleasure.

I would like to start the long road to recovery by writing this review.

PLAYING WITH FIRE belongs to a rather dubious sub-genre where passable, let alone good, movies are nearly impossible to find: The Big Man vs. Bratty Children. Let’s see, in the past 25-odd years, we have seen Hulk Hogan in MR. NANNY, Vin Diesel in THE PACIFIER, Ice Cube in ARE WE THERE YET?, Dwayne Johnson in TOOTH FAIRY, and now the latest perpetrator John Cena in PLAYING WITH FIRE.

I doubt any of those movies even approach Arnold Schwarzenegger’s KINDERGARTEN COP, the CITIZEN KANE of The Big Man vs. Bratty Children sub-genre.

I say doubt in the previous sentence since luckily, I’ve missed most of those movies because life is short and I only have a finite amount of time watching movies, so why put myself through something that’s akin to a root canal without sedative.

Personally, I feel like every one of those movies barring one (the one starring Arnold) should be shortened to a poster, because everything we need to know about MR. NANNY, THE PACIFIER, ARE WE THERE YET?, TOOTH FAIRY, and PLAYING WITH FIRE can be contained in a 24 x 36.

Hell, I recommend watching KINDERGARTEN COP again every single time a new Big Man vs. Bratty Children movie slithers into multiplexes everywhere.

There’s not a single unpredictable moment in PLAYING WITH FIRE.

I must in all honesty report that I almost, almost, laughed out loud a couple times during PLAYING WITH FIRE. I smiled a couple times.

More often than not, however, the 96 minutes of PLAYING WITH FIRE afforded me the opportunity to practice my poker face or hone my groan.

The last firefighter movie we saw at the Flick was ONLY THE BRAVE and now we have one good firefighter movie and one bad firefighter movie on the dossier. I do wish the nearest fire department would have stopped in and put out PLAYING WITH FIRE.

PLAYING WITH FIRE should not be confused with the 1984 New World production THEY’RE PLAYING WITH FIRE … just as John Cena and his bust should not be confused with Sybil Danning and her bust.

Youngsters might not remember Ms. Danning. She and Lou Ferrigno clashed while making HERCULES and Ferrigno legendarily made Danning wear a cloak so she would not upstage the bodybuilder turned actor. The nerve of that big lug, who demanded that Danning be changed from the good princess to the villain and the picture be made kid-friendly because Ferrigno did not want to disappoint any fans he earned from “The Incredible Hulk.”

A strong female presence like Ms. Danning would have been welcomed in PLAYING WITH FIRE.

Instead, they just waste Judy Greer. Greer and Cena share no chemistry whatsoever.

That is true and here’s another truth: If you play with fire and watch PLAYING WITH FIRE, you will get burned.