KETCHUP
Posted: Mon Apr 25, 2011 8:59 pm
Okay, here it is... a spot for NON-current reviews of films that I didn't get around to earlier but which are worth a mention for one reason or another. Perhaps I vowed I'd never pay to see them. Perhaps they never played near me. Perhaps I simply missed them and never got around to them... until I took advantage of several going-out-of-business sales, that is.
Tonight's selection: POSTAL (2007)
After HOUSE OF THE DEAD, ALONE IN THE DARK and BLOODRAYNE, could anybody seriously blame me for declining to venture out to witness more from director Uwe Boll? Of course, for THIS movie I had no real choice--it played in exactly ONE indy house hours away from me. As for the video release? I very seldom rent movies, and it was never going to become a priority.
And yet... and yet... this film in particular was one that people continued to talk about. Mainly because this was a "bad taste" comedy that tried its best to be as universally offensive as possible. So--let us dispense with questions of taste. 9/11, massacres of people of all sizes, ages, races, genders and body types, sexual/scatological humor, bestiality (actually, the animals get off the easiest), political and religious targets, Verne Troyer as himself, Uwe Boll as himself... look, if anything can set you off, it's probably in there somewhere and that was the entire idea. Comparisons to a live-action SOUTH PARK are somewhat justified as far as content goes--though one might wonder if it tries anywhere near as hard to make a POINT as Parker and Stone often do. Whatever the case, people kept talking about it, and it even earned a chapter in a recent book I bought ("My Year of Flops" by Nathan Rabin).
So I finally broke down and bought a copy for the proverbial song. And I will tell you this with a completely straight face. Had this been the first Uwe Boll film I'd seen, I wouldn't have zeroed in on him as one of the world's worst directors. I have NO desire to go back and look at any of those previous films again. They have no scares, no effective drama and no competent action. They're just as terrible as I said they were earlier. But when it comes to INTENTIONAL comedy, Dr. Boll actually has something you might call a "knack."
It's not just that POSTAL made me laugh out loud frequently, but it did. I actually thought that the massacre in the unemployment office scored the laugh as the Postal Dude (Zack Ward) crawled through the carnage, scouring the victims for a ticket that would get him closer to the front of the line. I actually chortled when he used a cat for a silencer (said feline survived with merely an indignant yowl). I enjoyed the fate that Boll set up for himself (and his last words in the movie). So on and so forth--but remember that I said it wasn't JUST the fact that I laughed. I also had to admit that his cast was (for a change) completely comfortable with their characters and the outrageous material (Dave Foley was especially good as the odious Uncle Dave).
It's not an easy film to recommend, but it did NOT have me tearing at my hair, hitting the fast-forward button or begging for it to stop. POSTAL announced what it was going to do in the very first scene and went on and did it with full confidence. And it made me laugh. So there you go.
Tonight's selection: POSTAL (2007)
After HOUSE OF THE DEAD, ALONE IN THE DARK and BLOODRAYNE, could anybody seriously blame me for declining to venture out to witness more from director Uwe Boll? Of course, for THIS movie I had no real choice--it played in exactly ONE indy house hours away from me. As for the video release? I very seldom rent movies, and it was never going to become a priority.
And yet... and yet... this film in particular was one that people continued to talk about. Mainly because this was a "bad taste" comedy that tried its best to be as universally offensive as possible. So--let us dispense with questions of taste. 9/11, massacres of people of all sizes, ages, races, genders and body types, sexual/scatological humor, bestiality (actually, the animals get off the easiest), political and religious targets, Verne Troyer as himself, Uwe Boll as himself... look, if anything can set you off, it's probably in there somewhere and that was the entire idea. Comparisons to a live-action SOUTH PARK are somewhat justified as far as content goes--though one might wonder if it tries anywhere near as hard to make a POINT as Parker and Stone often do. Whatever the case, people kept talking about it, and it even earned a chapter in a recent book I bought ("My Year of Flops" by Nathan Rabin).
So I finally broke down and bought a copy for the proverbial song. And I will tell you this with a completely straight face. Had this been the first Uwe Boll film I'd seen, I wouldn't have zeroed in on him as one of the world's worst directors. I have NO desire to go back and look at any of those previous films again. They have no scares, no effective drama and no competent action. They're just as terrible as I said they were earlier. But when it comes to INTENTIONAL comedy, Dr. Boll actually has something you might call a "knack."
It's not just that POSTAL made me laugh out loud frequently, but it did. I actually thought that the massacre in the unemployment office scored the laugh as the Postal Dude (Zack Ward) crawled through the carnage, scouring the victims for a ticket that would get him closer to the front of the line. I actually chortled when he used a cat for a silencer (said feline survived with merely an indignant yowl). I enjoyed the fate that Boll set up for himself (and his last words in the movie). So on and so forth--but remember that I said it wasn't JUST the fact that I laughed. I also had to admit that his cast was (for a change) completely comfortable with their characters and the outrageous material (Dave Foley was especially good as the odious Uncle Dave).
It's not an easy film to recommend, but it did NOT have me tearing at my hair, hitting the fast-forward button or begging for it to stop. POSTAL announced what it was going to do in the very first scene and went on and did it with full confidence. And it made me laugh. So there you go.