Date: Tue, 27 Nov 2001 02:01:56 -0500
Subject: Re: INSTANT DVD REVIEW: TOMB RAIDER
Status: R

In alt.religion.kibology, kibo@world.std.com wrote:

Tom Kraemer (tkraemer+ark@world.std.com) wrote:
>
>  WOW THAT SUCKED!!!!!

Yeah, well, speaking of crappy movies based on games, today I saw
"Dungeons & Dragons: The Movie" on cable.  There were so many things
horribly, awfully wrong with that movie that I can't even begin to
articulate how I feel about it except to say that if Harlan Ellison
were here, he would probably throw a glass of warm vomit in his own face
to show how much he hated the movie.

I wasn't expecting "Dungeons & Dragons: The Movie" to be good.
I do not believe it's even possible to make a good movie out of
the game.  However, it would take Stephen Hawking and Einstein
combined to discover a way to actually make this movie worse.
Albert Pyun could improve on it.  Bill Rebane could improve on it.
Heck, Hal Warren could improve on it.  Even Spice Girls could.

I'm sorry, but a bald guy with lavender lipstick just does not make
an effective scary villain.  Unless you're really homophobic and
baldophobic.

And I was quite happy when the Stepin Fetchit guy (played by one
of the many lesser Wayans brothers) FINALLY got killed except that
the movie ended with everyone heading into the netherworld to bring
him back to life in the sequel.  It's as if George Lucas ended
"Star Wars: Episode I" by holding up a card saying "NEXT MOVIE:
EVEN MORE JAR JAR!" and that killed "Star Wars" forever.  There
was more shuckin' and jivin' in this movie than in "Bamboozled".

The movie as a whole was more derivative than "Krull".  I mean,
"Krull" was an attempt to nail "Star Wars" to "Dungeons & Dragons"
(the game) while "Dungeons & Dragons" (the movie) was a pitiful
attempt to nail "Dungeons & Dragons" (the game) to "Tomb Raider"
(the movie of the game.)  It was a movie based on TWO games for
extra insipidity.  Oh, and it also had a bunch of Harry Potter
moments and other stuff.

It also featured MORE ACTING than my "Witchiepoo & Terl" movie idea.
Jeremy Irons appeared to be trying to overact as much as possible
to show his contempt for the crappy Canadian-Australian-Czech
production he was trapped in, but he came across as giving the
_best_ performance in the movie.  It was one of those films where
I spent the whole time just making mental lists of what order I'd
like to punch every one of the characters in the face.  By the
end of the movie, I had expanded it to include the director, writers,
producers, costume designers, Makeup Translator (that was an actual
credit), everyone who liked the film, everyone who liked the game,
everyone who liked "Tomb Raider", and everyone else in the world
except maybe Jeremy Irons who was clearly expressing disdain for
the crap that was trying to destroy his career.

You know you're in trouble when the movie, like all costume dramas,
includes lots of fetishistic close-ups of the characters' leather
boots and gloves, and you sit there saying "Gardening gloves from
K-Mart.  Engineer boots from Doc Martens.  Galoshes."  I mean,
we expect the Cylons to have hockey gloves and galoshes on
"Battlestar Galactica" because they're robots, but fantasy heroes
should be held to a higher standard, especially if they are hoping
to maintain dramatic realism in the face of Stepin Fetchit.

This is the kind of movie where, even if you died in the theater,
you'd still walk out afterwards.

I have now come to support the position of "Rona Jaffe's 'Mazes & Monsters'"
that "Dungeons & Dragons" is evil, and have come to accept that
"Rona Jaffe's 'Mazes & Monsters'" is actually a much more thoughtful
movie about "Dungeons & Dragons".

This movie was so stupid that it made "Baby Geniuses" seem as intellectual
as Orson Welles's version of "The Trial".

The costumes were so ridiculous it made "Aelita" look like a documentary.

The acting was so bad it made Marcy Lafferty look like Meryl Streep.

And the Stepin Fetchiting was so bad it could make a racist weep.

So, Tom, I will see "Tomb Rader" if you will see "Dungeons & Dragons"
so we can compare notes.  I should warn you, remove all breakable objects
from your home before attempting to watch "Dungeons & Dragons".
I suggest wearing a welder's mask and avoiding looking directly at
the screen.  If all else fails, have the dentist from "Marathon Man"
drill holes in your jaw to distract you from the movie while it plays.

                                   -- K.

                                      It took about two hours of my life
                                      to see the "D&D" movie and I want the
                                      filmmakers to pay me back in blood,
                                      and every excruciating minute of
                                      that movie was equivalent to about
                                      a tanker truck of blood.

                                      BY THE WAY, I DIDN'T LIKE THE MOVIE.