Category: Cinema

Things That Would Have Gotten My Mom to Disown Me

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I was making a cup of coffee with a Kuerig machine, and the coffee I grabbed was a Newman’s own Pod.

I turned to the person next to me,and said, “I turned to the person next to me, and said, “Paul Newman started this company. I think that he had another line of work before he started making organic food.” 

My mom, whose favorite movie was Long Hot Summer, or as she put it, “Long Hot Summer with Paul Newman ……… YUM!!!” would not have been amused by that joke.

She probably would not have disowned me permanently, but she would have been very unamused by this bon mot.

Certainly she was unamused when her cousin at a political event, was asked to point out a politician’s wife, said cousin said, “She’s standing next to the tall handsome man with the striking blue eyes,” and the person she was pointing the woman out to said, “You mean that she is standing next to Paul Newman?”

My mom though that not recognizing Paul Newman was taking politics WAY too far.

That’s Fronkensteen

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Gene Wilder has died at the age of 83:

Gene Wilder, who established himself as one of America’s foremost comic actors with his delightfully neurotic performances in three films directed by Mel Brooks; his eccentric star turn in the family classic “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”; and his winning chemistry with Richard Pryor in the box-office smash “Stir Crazy,” died on Sunday night at his home in Stamford, Conn. He was 83.

Eric Weissmann, who was Mr. Wilder’s lawyer for many years, confirmed the death. A nephew, Jordan Walker-Pearlman, said that the cause was complications of Alzheimer’s disease.

………

He made his movie debut in 1967 in Arthur Penn’s celebrated crime drama, “Bonnie and Clyde,” in which he was memorably hysterical as an undertaker kidnapped by the notorious Depression-era bank robbers played by Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty. He was even more hysterical, and even more memorable, a year later in “The Producers,” Mr. Brooks’s first film and the basis of his later Broadway hit.

………

He was nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance as the wizardly title character in “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” (1971). The film was a box-office disappointment, partly because of parental concern that the moral of Roald Dahl’s story — that greedy, gluttonous children should not go unpunished — was too dark in the telling. But it went on to gain a devoted following, and Willy Wonka remains one of the roles with which Mr. Wilder is most closely identified.

His next role was more adult but equally strange: an otherwise normal doctor who falls in love with a sheep named Daisy in a segment of Woody Allen’s “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex but Were Afraid to Ask,” in 1972. Two years later, he reunited with Mr. Brooks for perhaps the two best-known entries in either man’s filmography.

In “Blazing Saddles,” a raunchy, no-holds-barred spoof of Hollywood westerns, Mr. Wilder had the relatively quiet role of the Waco Kid, a boozy ex-gunfighter who helps an improbable black sheriff (Cleavon Little) save a town from railroad barons and venal politicians. The film’s once-daring humor may have lost some of its edge over the years, but Mr. Wilder’s next Brooks film, “Young Frankenstein,” has never grown old.

Mel Brooks movies were a part of my adolescence, and Mr. Wilder had a real skill in being both low key and hysterically funny at the same time.

And in the World of Film

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Andrew Wakefield’s fraudulent anti-vaxxer documentary has been pulled from Robert DeNiro’s Tribecca film festival:

A controversial film about the discredited link between autism and vaccinations has been pulled from Robert De Niro’s Tribeca film festival, after the actor consulted “the scientific community” and found

The father of an autistic child and co-founder of the festival, De Niro at first defended the decision to premiere Vaxxed: from Cover-Up to Catastrophe, despite outcry from doctors and researchers.

Repeated studies involving more than a million children have found there is no evidence to link childhood vaccines to autism. But a small movement of activists persists in the belief that vaccinations might somehow harm children.

On Saturday De Niro released a statement to explain the new decision. “My intent in screening this film was to provide an opportunity for conversation around an issue that is deeply personal to me and my family,” he said.

“But after reviewing it over the past few days with the Tribeca film festival team and others from the scientific community, we do not believe it contributes to or furthers the discussion I had hoped for.

“The Festival doesn’t seek to avoid or shy away from controversy. However, we have concerns with certain things in this film that we feel prevent us from presenting it in the Festival program. We have decided to remove it from our schedule.”

The controversial film was directed by Andrew Wakefield, a disgraced British former doctor who published a study in 1998 that claimed links between a vaccine for measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) and autism. The paper was quickly found to contain numerous flaws and was deemed by the British Medical Journal “an elaborate fraud”.

You know, 45 seconds on the internet would have revealed that Wakefield is a charlatan and a fraud who should be in jail.

There is a difference between controversial and con man.

The classic Scorsese movie is Taxi Driver, not Uber Driver.

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I dunno, maybe it’s a 20-teens thing that a wannabee Travis Bickle is now driving Uber:

The man accused of killing six people and injuring two more in a Saturday evening shooting rampage in Kalamazoo, Michigan, was an Uber driver who picked up and dropped off passengers between shootings, a source with knowledge of the investigation told CNN.

 The source, who is not authorized to speak to media, said investigators believe Jason Brian Dalton was even looking for fares after the final shooting of a nearly seven-hour killing rampage.

It could be that this guy is just nuts.

It could be that Uber’s abuse of its drivers drove him mad.

It could be that a he has a history of issues that would not have allowed him to get a hack license.

I’m not sure, but I saw the Scorsese reference.

It Was Inevitable

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It seems that whenever you have a conspiracy theory nutcase, they will eventually descend into antisemitism and/or Holocaust denial.

Case in point, Oscar winning director Oliver Stone:

Jewish control of the media is preventing an open discussion of the Holocaust, prominent Hollywood director Oliver Stone told the Sunday Times, adding that the U.S. Jewish lobby was controlling Washington’s foreign policy for years.

In the Sunday interview, Stone reportedly said U.S. public opinion was focused on the Holocaust as a result of the “Jewish domination of the media,” adding that an upcoming film of him aims to put Adolf Hitler and Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin “in context.”

“There’s a major lobby in the United States,” Stone said, adding that “they are hard workers. They stay on top of every comment, the most powerful lobby in Washington.”

The famed Hollywood director of such films as “Platoon” and “JFK,” also said that while “Hitler was a Frankenstein,” there was also a “Dr Frankenstein.”

“German industrialists, the Americans and the British. He had a lot of support,” Stone told the Sunday Times, adding that “Hitler did far more damage to the Russians than the Jewish people, 25 or 30 [million killed].”

Referring to the alleged influence of the powerful Jewish lobby on U.S. foreign policy, Stone said that Israel had distorted “United States foreign policy for years,” adding he felt U.S. policy toward Iran was “horrible.”

So not a surprise.

This is an Inspired Protest

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Britain has an official board, the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), to review and censor movies.

It charges the film makers for the costs of censoring their movies, to the tune of  £101.50 plys £7.09 per minute of film.

British film maker and journalist Charlie Lyne had a kickstarter to make a protest film, and when he totaled up the costs, he submitted a 10+ hour of film of paint drying:

The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) has determined that Charlie Lyne’s 10-hour Paint Drying contains “no material likely to offend or harm”, and has accordingly awarded it a “suitable for all” U certificate.

Nicely described by the BBFC as “a film showing paint drying on a wall”, Paint Drying is the result of a Kickstarter campaign aimed at highlighting the “prohibitively expensive” cost of presenting cinematic works for classification.

The BBFC charges a £101.50 submission fee and £7.09 per minute of film. However, it is obliged to sit through every single frame of material, so Lyne decided he’d make the censors work for their money.

He originally planned to raise £109 for a symbolic one-minute submission of paint drying, but ultimately attracted pledges of £5,936, financing an extended 607-minute submission to the BBFC.

It took 2 days for the BBFC to review the film.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?!?!?

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Normally, I pay little attention to the various awards, but I heard that Mad Max Fury Road was nominated for a best picture Oscar.

This not something I would expect from the Academy:

George Miller and Margaret Sixel were asleep in their Sydney home when, just before 1am, a torrent of text messages, emails and phone calls from well wishers lit up their phones.

The husband-and-wife filmmakers quickly discovered their film, Mad Max: Fury Road, had made Australian film history with 10 Oscar nominations.

Not only did Miller score directing and, as producer, best picture nods, but Sixel was nominated for her editing and 11 other Aussies crew members were among the nominees for their work on the post-apocalyptic action-adventure.

I gotta watch this now.

My Thoughts Following David Bowie’s Death

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Live Version

I never bought any of his albums or singles, but my favorite song of his is Putting out a Fire from the 1982 movie Cat People.

I saw it, but was not particularly impressed. I preferred the original 1942 movie, which is widely viewed as a classic.

Most of my experiences with Bowie as an artist were as an actor.

I saw him in the 1976 film, The Man Who Fell to Earth, which was a his cinematic debut, and quite literally the worst cinematic experience in my life.

It was boring, pretentious, confusing, ponderous, and dull.

Looking back, I am left the question, “How the f%$# can you cast David Bowie as an alien, and completely f%$# it up?”

By the same token he was also in one of my favorite films, the Tony Scott’s criminally unappreciated The Hunger, a stylish film starring Bowie, Susan Sarandon, and Catherine Deneuve.

It is a stylish vampire film that eschews many of the cliches, and it is unbelievably hot. (Watch it)

Of Labyrinth, one of Jim Henson’s few fizzles, the less said the better.

I do see a parallel between his music career and his theatrical career, in that he never seemed to settle on a personae.

Both in music and in film, he was a sort of character actor, where he reveled in changing who he was in public.

Any of the music and cinema buffs out there, feel free to tell me that I am full of it.

Disney To Lucas, Go Cheney Yourself

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Han Shot First

George Lucas is not a fan of the latest Star Wars movie.  In interviews, he has noted that they ignored his story treatments, and likened their treatment of the franchise to white slavery, though he has disavowed the whole “white slavery” bit.

Well, Disney just put the original theatrical releases of Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi out as a new Blu Ray release:

Every few months, rumors arise that the original Star Wars Original Trilogy – as in the one where Han Solo shoots Greedo, not the other way around – is finally coming to Blu-ray, remastered for your HD television. It’s the sort of thing that Star Wars fans the world over have been clamoring for since George Lucas released the Special Edition on DVD back in 2004. Those fans – and just, well, film purists with a general respect for the history of movies – don’t much care for the updated movies and their CGI Jabba the Hutts and CGI musical numbers and ghost Hayden Christensens. They want to see what these movies looked like when they were originally released, matte lines and all, only with a noticeable upgrade in the audio-visual quality. Not too much to ask for, right?

Unfortunately, Lucas has famously refused to release remastered versions of the unaltered originals. He’s pretty stuck on the idea that the most recent Special Edition – there’ve been three at this point – is the truest version, the most accurate representation of his vision, and that no other iteration need be released to the public ever again. There was some renewed hope that he might loosen his grip on the movies when he sold Lucasfilm to Disney, but some four years on and there’s been no movement on the matter. At least, not officially, not yet.

Star Wars Original Unaltered Trilogy Coming to Blu-Ray

But there is a new glimmer of hope. John Landis – who directed Animal House, An American Werewolf in London, Trading Places, and more – was recently at Universal Studios in Orlando to talk about the newly installed Halloween Horror Nights American Werewolf in London maze. When asked whether or not he’d ever considered updating American Werewolf with modern effects a la the Star Wars Special Edition (which is an insane thing to ask because those werewolf effects are amazing and horrifying to this day), he said:

First of all, [the studio] wouldn’t let me. George owns his movies, so he can do what he wants … My personal opinion is George hurt his movies by doing what he did. However, George said to me, ‘But they’re my movies.’ I thought, ‘That’s fair.’

Did you know Disney, by the way, is putting out the original Star Wars the way it was? So Disney, they’re like, money on the floor.

So you’re probably wondering: “Why would John Landis have any inside information on whether or not Disney was releasing the theatrical editions?” That’s a good question. Maybe he doesn’t. Maybe he just heard this rumor – like we’ve all heard this rumor, time and again – and passed it on as though it were fact. It’s worth noting, however, that Landis and Lucas are close friends. They came up together in the same group of filmmakers. Lucas offered Landis the directing job for Howard the Duck, which Landis wisely passed on. Landis put Lucas in Beverly Hills Cop III, a movie probably just as bad as Howard the Duck. Which means it’s entirely possible that he got his information from a very inside source – George Lucas himself.

I hope that this is true.

I have a tendency as an engineer to fiddle beyond when the design is done, to the detriment of the end product, budget and schedule. 

I spend a lot of time fighting against this in my work.

I call it George Lucas syndrome, for obvious reasons.

I see nothing wrong with a creators original vision, and perhaps some commentary, back story, and deleted scenes in a DVD package, but the fact that Disney is prying this from his cold stiff fingers is a good thing.

According to the Customs of My People, Chinese and a Movie on Christmas

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Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Cast:
Harrison Ford … Han Solo
Mark Hamill … Luke Skywalker
Carrie Fisher … Princess Leia
Adam Driver … Kylo Ren
Daisy Ridley … Rey
John Boyega … Finn
Oscar Isaac … Poe Dameron 

Director: 
J.J Abrams

This is a spoiler free review, so I will not go into the minutae of the plot.

I think that J.J Abrams did a thoroughly competent job in this movie.

As my son said, no one is going to call J.J. Abrams “Jar Jar Abrams” after this.

It was worth watching in a movie theater.

That being said, I was not as impressed as my wife and kids were.

The original Star Wars was very consciously following anthropologist’s Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey.

George Lucas has been very explicit about this.

The nickel tour of the Hero’s Journey is:
1. Ordinary World
2. Call To Adventure
3. Refusal Of The Call
4. Meeting The Mentor
5. Crossing The Threshold
6. Tests, Allies, Enemies
7. Approach To The Inmost Cave
8. Ordeal
9. Reward (Seizing The Sword)
10. The Road Back
11. Resurrection
12. Return With The Elixir

Campbell posits that this is at the core of most, if not all, hero stories and myths.

I don’t think that J.J. Abrams did this. I think that he was looking at doing Star Wars.

I got the sense in a number of scenes that Abrams was marking the checklist. I found it a bit distracting and I found the film derivative.

As to the performances, I thought that Harrison Ford was more playing Harrison Ford than Han Solo, Carrie Fisher was a clenching her jaws throughout her performance a bit too much .

As to the newcomers, both Ridley and Boyega did well.  Neither of them were overawed by the shoes that they had to fill.

They were both fun to watch, particularly Boyega, who has a flair for playing a flawed character finding himself.

Oscar Isaac’s performance was good, but basically he was just playing the eye candy hotshot pilot.  It was kind of a throw away role.

That being said, of the 5 Star Wars movies that I’ve seen, I’ve not seen the Phantom Menace or Attack of the Clones, it is firmly in 3rd, behind the original and The Empire Strikes Back, and well ahead of Return of the Jedi (I hate Ewoks) and Revenge of the Sith (I hate Hayden Christenson even more than I hate Ewoks)

I would give it 3½ out of 5 stars, but as I noted, my wife and kids all thought that it was the best thing since light saber sliced bread.

I Haz a Sad

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I just discovered the fate of the Westgate theater in Beaverton Oregon. It was demolished in 2006.

It was an early multiplex, just three screens, and its largest theater seated over 1,000.

It was also where I first saw Star Wars, and where I first saw The Empire Strikes Back.

It has an interesting role in the lore of Star Wars.

By dint of the demographics of Portland, which obligated both the theater and the studio to continue to show the film until attendance dropped below a certain level, the film was shown, in 70mm on a huge screen, for over 2½ years.

For a much of this time, which was before the time of video rentals and the rise of the VCR, it was the only theater to have carried the film since initial release, and for some of this time, it was probably the only screen in the US showing the form.

When the theatrical re-release happened, the chain owning the theater (IIRC Luxury Theaters) put the film on just about every screen in the area, and it finally stopped running the film.

Before this, any number of Portlanders, myself included, saw Star Wars many many times.

If I were within 200 miles of Portland, I would have driven there to see The Force Awakens.

………

Today, the biggest movies are released on thousands of screens across the country. In large cities, you have at least a dozen theaters to pick from, and most of those are multiplexes showing it on multiple screens. Not only that, you can go just about any time you want, since cinema chains open around noon every day of the week. A few summers ago, The Dark Knight Rises was easily the most anticipated movie of the year, yet the day after its premiere, my daughter and I were able to waltz into the theater ten minutes before it started and had our choice of the best seats.

………

Now let’s climb into my time machine and transport back to 1977. If you weren’t around back then, you might be surprised to learn the biggest movies opened in only one or two theaters in town – ‘exclusive engagements’ – giving the impression you were privileged they were playing near you at all. And back then, theaters showed matinees only on weekends. Monday through Friday, the box office never opened ’till around 7:00 PM. Not only that, there was no such thing as home video, meaning if you didn’t catch a movie on the big screen, it might be years before you saw it on TV. So to see a blockbuster movie usually meant waiting in line.

But Star Wars wasn’t simply a blockbuster. It was the mother of all blockbusters, arriving with huge fanfare at only one theater in the Portland area, the Westgate Tri-Cinema, located in the suburb of Beaverton. Since literally everyone wanted to see it (except my dad, who never liked sci-fi in any way, shape or form), this meant there was one 1000-seat auditorium to placate over a million people in the metropolitan area.

I can’t speak for how other cities’ theaters handled the demand for Star Wars in ’77, but at the Westgate, even three months after it premiered (mainly because it took that long to talk Dad into going), we were still required to wait in a massive line to buy tickets, then wait in an entirely different line in get into the theater itself, a total of about two hours (during which time Dad was getting increasingly pissed). It was worth the wait, of course, not only because Star Wars more-than lived up to the hype, but because the Westgate itself was a wonderful place, with huge auditoriums, gigantic screens and plush, luxurious, rocking seats.

………

Regarding the aforementioned connection between Star Wars and my hometown of Portland…as I said before, it premiered as an exclusive engagement at the Westgate, which enjoyed long lines of eager fans. After roughly eight months, it expanded into multiple theaters in town. Then after all the Star Wars hype began to dissipate, the film continued to play at the Westgate, over a year-and-a-half after its initial release. In fact, the Westgate was the only theater in all of North America still showing the film. And there were Star Wars zealots flying to Portland from all over the world, just so they could check-out the movie on the big screen one more time.

I feel the same way.

Brownshirt Much?

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Ernst Röhm Jim Pasco, executive director of the of the PBA, the Police Union has taken to physically threatening director Quentin Tarantino over his statements regarding the police:

On Wednesday, the Free Thought Project reported on the remarkably brave stance Academy Award-winning film director Quentin Tarantino, has made in owning his comments condemning police brutality.

After police across the country had announced their plans to boycott his films, Tarantino refused to be bullied and remained steadfast in his decision to call the police who murdered people “murderers. ”

Tarantino was not calling all cops murderers, nor was he purporting that he “hates cops.” However, these facts are not important to those throwing bricks from the other side of the blue wall.

In fact, during a recent interview with the Los Angeles Times, Tarantino responded, “All cops are not murderers. I never said that. I never even implied that.”

 And what is the response of the PBA?

In a veiled threat, the largest police union in the country says it has a “surprise” in store for Quentin Tarantino.

 Jim Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, would not go into any detail about what is being cooked up for the Hollywood director, but he did tell THR: “We’ll be opportunistic.”

 “Tarantino has made a good living out of violence and surprise,” says Pasco. “Our officers make a living trying to stop violence, but surprise is not out of the question.”

The FOP, based in Washington, D.C., consists of more than 330,000 full-time, sworn officers. According to Pasco, the surprise in question is already “in the works,” and will be in addition to the standing boycott of Tarantino’s films, including his upcoming movie The Hateful Eight.

“Something is in the works, but the element of surprise is the most important element,” says Pasco. “Something could happen anytime between now and [the premiere]. And a lot of it is going to be driven by Tarantino, who is nothing if not predictable.

“The right time and place will come up and we’ll try to hurt him in the only way that seems to matter to him, and that’s economically,” says Pasco.

When asked if this was a threat, Pasco said no, at least not a physical threat. “Police officers protect people,” he says. “They don’t go out to hurt people.”

Yes, that disavowal of violence is so convincing.

What a story for the 68th anniversary of Kristallnacht.

My guess is that we are going to see law enforcement shutdowns of showings of The Hateful Eight using flimsy “public safety” pretenses all around the country.

I Wish that Heath Ledger Were Alive and Playing Donald Trump in a Biopic

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It would be glorious.

I’m not sure whether Heath Ledger channeled Donald Trump in his glorious performance as the Joker in The Dark Knight, of if Donald Trump is channeling Ledger’s Academy Award winning performance, but I definitely see the Joker in Trump’s eyes.

I didn’t realize this until I saw the Joker meme image on the Internet.

It is “The Donald”.

H/t DC at Stellar Parthenon for the image.

Safe Journey, Roddy.

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“Rowdy” Roddy Piper, nee Roderick Toombs, has died of a heart attack at age 61.

To the degree that I’ve followed wrestling, I had a house mate who was big into it, it was after Piper’s move to acting, so I do not have much of a comment on this, but I do recall his performance in the iconic John Carpenter film They Live:

“Rowdy” Roddy Piper, the kilt wearing trash-talker who headlined the first WrestleMania and later found movie stardom, died Friday. He was 61.

The WWE confirmed the death. The wrestling organization provided no additional details.

Piper, born Roderick Toombs in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, is the second WWE Hall of Famer to die this summer, following the June death of Dusty Rhodes. ………

In addition to his celebrity in the ring, Piper appeared in John Carpenter’s 1988 cult classic “They Live.” In that film, he delivered the memorable line: “I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass — and I’m all out of bubblegum.”

If you haven’t seen They Live, do so.

It is a rather irreverent commentary on the Reagan era, and is perhaps even more relevant now.

Normally, I Avoid Super Hero Racial Casting Issues, But………

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In the new Fantastic Four movie, Sue Storm (later Storm-Richards), the Invisible Girl, and Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, are being played by Kate Mara and Michael B. Jordan respectively.

Ms. Mara and Mr. Jordan are both talented actors with impressive CVs, but she is white, and he is black, and Sue and Johnny Storm are brother and sister.

I went to the Wiki page, and Papa Storm is played by Reg E. Cathey, a black character actor, so I am assuming that Sue is adopted, (well, duh!) and that there will be which means that there will almost certainly be 10 minutes of back story to explain this in the film.

If not, you are going to have a lot of stupid people demanding back story anyway.

My problem is that when one reintroduces a series, this is the sort of sh%$ that you don’t need.

There is a going to be a Lot of back-storying in this film anyway (The first Thor movie was pretty much just backstory, for example, which left me unimpressed), and I think this adds thing that don’t need to be there.

As I noted in my comparison of Captain America and Thor, (link) backstory cannot take precedence over plot and character, and this choice by the director and/or producer points that they have not learned this lesson.

So I think that this points to bad cinematic decision.

And don’t get me started on the fact that Ben Grimm is not wearing pants. The Thing wears pants.

This Is the Best Parody of a Genre That I Have Seen in a Long Time

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I just saw Kung Fury on YouTube.

Doing a parody of a genre, in this case 80s Kung Foo movies, particularly if you are going a high cheese, is dancing on the knife edge.

If you are not cheesy enough, it doesn’t work.  If you are too cheesy, the audience loses the ability to suspend its disbelief.

The director and writer, David Sandberg gets the balance almost perfect.  (Laser Raptors and David Hasselhoff)