Mystery Men
I don’t understand why this one isn’t better known. It’s great.
Tucker and Dale vs Evil.
It has a silly/dumb sounding name, a premise with every likelihood of being schlocky garbage, and no budget or marketing to speak of. And some of the cast certainly act like they know they’re in a low budget flick just phoning it in. Yet Tyler Labine as Dale and Alan Tudyk as Tucker bring so much humor and endearing energy to it as a couple of misunderstood sweethearts, that it is one of my all-time favorite films.
Honestly I like its message too. If nobody told stories about crazy homicidal hillbillies, none of the movie would’ve happened.
Definitely a great film worth watching.
The live action Chip N’ Dale Rescue Rangers remake on Disney+ is SOOOOOO much better than it has any right to be.
It should be terrible, unwatchable, irredeemable garbage.
It is probably one of the best “kids” movies I’ve seen in the last decade.
Saw that one in theaters. Girlfriend is a Zillenial who has never seen the show. Still loved it. It’s great even on its own. Don’t want to spoil anything so the only other thing I’ll say is just see it. Going in blind is best.
Alita: Battle Angel.
The film looks stupid because they gave the main character giant anime eyes.
In the context of the film it makes sense and I think the look is meant to mirror the anime it is from… but for the film it still makes the film look stupid. Now the film itself is far from perfect, there is at least one storyline that is utter dogshit. However! The film ultimately was solid.
Sadly it ends setting up future films that will never happen, but I think it’s still enjoyable overall.
Love the universe but the whole anime eyes thing was just way too silly. They should’ve pulled a Sonic and made her look more normal.
Oh I completely agree. The anime eyes did not add to the film. It also sucks because the actress who played Alita, Rose Salazar, did a great job, but it’s such an uncanny valley type look that I didn’t recognize her anywhere else.
It’s one thing when it’s Andy Serkis playing Gollum or something but she was just playing a robot girl, but she looks like a throwaway CGI character.
Also she was the only one with the eyes! That’s the most inexplicable thing. Maybe if other people had the eyes it’d be ok, maybe there a thing people do. But she’s the only one so it’s extra weird.
How comes they won’t be making more?
Because no one saw the first one.
Now some very influential people who were involved in the first one want to make a second one, so maybe just maybe it will happen one day… But I doubt it.
I saw it. There’s at least two of us.
There are dozens of us!
It’s funny I saw it completely randomly.
I was chatting with a coworker and just off handedly mentioned how bad Alita looked and they jumped on to defend the film and series harder than I’d ever seen anyone defend anything before. It was a true, “I’ve waited all my life for this moment” for them.
My evening was free and it was one of those $5 Tuesday type movie nights so I figured what the hell.
So there was at least another that convinced me, got to pay it forward.
Three
It still looks goofy as f
The Lost City with Sandra Bullock, Channing Tatum, and Daniel Radcliffe. It seems like a tropey romance-action flick, but is more a parody of genre clichés. The writing, acting, and humour are pretty good.
Nacho Libre
Napoleon Dynamite
Brain Candy
“Did you tell them they were the orphans’ chips?”
Nacho Libre rules.
We were having a movie night in our neighborhood a few years back where we got a bedsheet and a cheap projector. We hooked it up to a laptop to project a movie on someone’s garage for the neighborhood kids.
We ended up projecting The Lego Movie and most of the kids lost interest about half an hour in - and were falling asleep and ready to go home.
I’ll be damned if it wasn’t one of the best animated movies I’ve ever seen. I sent my wife home with our youngest just so I could stay and finish the movie.
Lego movie is brilliant. It’s not a kid’s movie. It’s so good.
Everything is awesome.
Edit to add: both 1 and 2 have great soundtracks.
Real steel. Its about boxing robots
I watched it yesterday for the 2nd time (first time with my son). We laugh, we cried, we danced, we were shouting out loud and watched final battle standing on our feet. I unironically think it’s an excellent sport movie.
Honestly, princess bride. I’m usually not all that into rom com type movies, but princess bride is a masterpiece
Hey, that’s the metaplot of the movie!
A Knight’s Tale. Not only is it a good movie but it was my introduction to Paul Bettany and Alan Tudyk and they were brilliant in it.
Genuinely a top 3 movie for me. Heath, Paul and Alan are all fantastic in it. I will never not watch it if an opportunity presents itself.
It didn’t click until I’d finished watching it that they’d tricked me into loving a sports underdog movie.
It’s true. The cocky rival who cheats, the training montages, the win despite all odds… It has every trope of the genre with a medieval set dressing.
Why dont they do this with more genres? Like I want a musician biopic movie ala Bohemian Rhapsody or Rocketman about a couple bards in England in the dark ages, and it is just Simon and Garfunkel doing Simon and Garfunkel songs on lyres and flutes completely anachronistically. Not satirically. Completely earnestly and yet fun.
Alan Tudyk is a gem! There’s a scene that I love from a doc about the voice acting on Moana. Cuts to Tudyk doing chicken sounds (he played the chicken), when he slyly looks into the camera and says “I went to Julliard”.
the clip in all its glory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaGYXjMwS60
If you haven’t, watch Resident Alien.
I must watch the new season of that. And Con Man is so good, too.
Just finished season 3 on Netflix. It was some bullshit. :P
Have to look up Con Man
I think Con Man is available on Prime. I just watched the first couple episodes, myself.
Found it!
Lets not forget Rufus Sewell, who is such an excellent villain
Liked him since Dark City which could be another candidate for this list.
“Trudging!”
“I will fong you. I will fong you until your entrails become extrails! I will—pain! Lots of pain!”
I do believe I’ll be watching this movie again today. 😁
I just can’t get past the dance scene.
I love it. Starts off cringe but then once the Golden Years kicks in it’s magical.
And it left its mark on renaissance jousts everywhere. Always hear We Will Rock You at so many different ren fairs.
Danny Boyd wrote an excellent video essay on A Knight’s Tale. I too always wonder why there’s always someone cutting onions when I choose to watch.
Because you have been judged, and likely not found wanting if you don’t suppress feelings.
That movie has perfect casting. Everyone in it is exactly right for their parts. There is a B movie feel that I can’t quite put my finger on but it is an outright excellent film, one of my personal favorites.
I think it’s that it doesn’t take itself too seriously, while still remaining carefully in the world/rules they set.
Well, that’ll piss some folks off I think. I actually appreciate things like the crowd at the opening joust rocking out to We Will Rock You. The banquet dance scene is better executed; they start out with the old time dance and then fade into modern club dancing, as if to say “Here’s what’s actually taking place” versus “Here’s how the characters feel about it in terms a modern audience can understand.”
I think I’m more talking about how a lot of the sets look like styrofoam? Especially castle interiors or other masonry? There’s just something very 80’s Gragthar The Destroyer about it.
Thank you for posting this so I didn’t have to.
Just a gem of a movie.
The recent Dungeons and Dragons.
‘Upgrade’ is an excellent sifi B movie.
Upgrade was not a “B” movie by any stretch. Low budget doesn’t mean B. Upgrade was more well done than much of the “A” stuff that’s put out.
But obviously this is opinion and depends how you define B movies.
The question was does it look like it would suck, at face value. I think Upgrade qualifies.
I totally thought Upgrade would suck. I’ve watched it 10 times now, and every time it gets better. Just stellar work.
Swiss Army Man - Daniel Redcliffe with farting as a superpower. Sounds ridiculous but really fun to watch.
Daniel Radcliffe while dead the entire movie flexes his ass cheeks as a superpower.
Barbie (2023)
I thought it would be a parody of Barbie but its actually a parody of Mattel and shows how men can be confused in this world. It’s a real movie for all the bros out there. Its the kind of movie I’ll watch again later because its good.
Just saw this a few months ago. And gotta agree. It’s a solid flick. Nothing crazy ambitious, but told a story that seems pretty haunting in the past few months.
Haunting?
I am trying not to sound disrespectful. But Allow my to gesture vaguely to current events.
Clue - A movie based on a board game sounds terrible, but it’s really funny.
For more of a movie that visually looks bad.
Primer - Very low budget time travel movie that gets better every time you watch it.
After the second watch, you should read the hours and hours of content covering the time loops and paradoxes, and then watch it three or four more times to begin to grasp what you read.
Clue didn’t work in the theater because they did this gimmick where they made three versions with three different endings. So because it had to be consistent with three contradictory endings, you CAN’T solve it as you go; it doesn’t function as a mystery movie. And, it was kind of short.
The TV cut crammed all three endings at the end with the “Here’s what REALLY happened” cards inserted, so one ending is now canonical while the others are plausible alternatives, it runs longer, especially the frantic, energetic ending plays longer, so while it still doesn’t function as a mystery movie, it is now an excellent farce.
I think it also found its audience in young millennials on television; it was made for and by my parents’ generation but they don’t like it, while a lot of people my age love it.
There’s a particular character arc twist in Clue that made me jump out of my seat.
Moon. Fantastic mostly 1 man show.
The effects of the rider are amateurish, but the story and acting are awesome.
