Box Office Battle

Today we explore two films starring the immortal Albert Brooks.  This is 40 is the story of...well...being 40.  Defending Your Life is about people dying and trying to move further into the afterlife through a courtroom setting.  Both are funny.  Both have wry observation.  Only one will make it to the mountain top.

The BBC has strict rules about playing rock and roll on the air so a group of DJs broadcast rock from a pirate ship in:  Pirate Radio.  A voice cuts into the first broadcast of WBN , and cast members wind up dead in the comedy/mystery movie:  Radioland Murders.  Only one will survive.

Two video game movies from the nineties face off today.  Double Dragon takes place in New Angelos in the future year of 2007.  The Lee Brothers take battle against the Shadow Demon (Robert Patrick) with help from their friend Marion (Alyssa Milano).  Super Mario Brothers is the story of two different brothers (Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo) try to save a princess from King Koopa (Dennis Hopper) and other dinosaurs.

We're pitting young geniuses against each other tonight.  Finding Forrester is the tale of a reclusive author who's brought out of his shell by an inner city youth who also has a gift with words.  Real Genius is the Val Kilmer vehicle about college kids who unknowingly make a weapon for the government...and undermine it with wackiness.

It's a Lambert-off.  First, Christopher Lambert, Sean Connery, and Clancy Brown are immortals killing each other until their is only one left because...well...there can only be one.  From the bowels of the eighties comes Highlander.  Next, Christopher Lambert plays Rayden, a God who decides that maybe mankind being annihilated is a bad idea.  So he sponsors man in a fighting tournament based off of an arcade game.  Even gods have to get inspiration from somewhere.

Val Kilmer gets a double header.  Batman Forever is the story of a...well come on.  You already know.  Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is the tale of a private detective joining up with another PI for adventures and stuff.  Just listen.  I'm tired of typing.

It's an alien theme tonight.  Enemy Mine is the story of a human and a Drack who find friendship despite trying to murder each other multiple times.  Attack the Block is a story about humans who murder aliens and never find friendship with each other.  Shit's about to get real uncomfortable.

A son (Ewan McGregor) goes to find out how authentic his father's tall tale is in the Tim Burton film:  Big Fish.  Ewan McGregor stars with Christian Bale in the glam rock love letter:  Velvet Goldmine.  In the end their can Obiwan.

We battle out another three way, this time with the movies of John Milius.  First the Milius written bomb which has since made up it's money and become a classic:  Apocalypse Now.  Then the Wolverines battle the red army in Colorado in:  Red Dawn (the original).  Finally, a forgotten Vietnam film starring Danny Glover and Willam Dafoe:  Flight of the Intruder.

This week we cover two movies which clearly don't use their comic book source material at all.  Dr. Strange is the story of a doctor at a psych ward who learns to become a sorcerer.  The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is about several literary characters (Allan Quartermain, The Invisible Man, and Tom Sawyer) who team up to fight evil.  Only one awful, awful movie will mount Valhalla.

A bare knuckled brawler (Clint Eastwood) fights in a championship of sorts.  It catches the kind of attention from Nazi gangs and the Jersey mob that you don't want.  Clyde the orangutan also stars in Any Which Way You Can.  It's opponet is about an author who follows a thief and winds up learning the ropes from him.  But he learns harsher lessons in the process.  Christopher Nolan's first movie:  Following.

This Bill Paxton themed episode of the podcast stars Danny Glover as a police chief who is tracking down an alien in the jungle of Los Angelos in the future year of 1997.  He discovers the first cinematic tie-ins to AVP, as well as the fact that he's too old for this shit.  That's right...1990's Predator 2.  Also, Bill Pullman stars along side Bill Paxton in a trippy Roger Corman movie about two brain surgeons.  One is employed by a wealthy corporation, the other lives off of grants.  But what happens when they team up and one of them begins to lose his grip on reality?  Brain Dead is what happens.  No matter who wins, Bill Paxton loses...or wins...I guess.

Leaves of Grass features Edward Norton playing duel roles:  one is college professor estranged from his family.  The other is a pot dealer.  Things don't go well.  In the other corner is Peter Jackson's The Frighteners.  Michael J. Fox plays a psychic who must stop a serial killer from beyond the grave.  Only one movie will perch atop Valhalla.

Jack Black strikes it rich with his new product Vapoorizer.  His best friend and neighbor Ben Stiller goes crazy with jealousy in the movie Envy.  Jack Black and Steve Zahn kidnap Amanda Peet in order to help their friend, Jason Biggs, find the right woman in  Saving Silverman.  Either way Jack Black will be victorious.

Keanu Reeves mans a football team filled with scabs to get through a strike affected football season in The Replacements.  Johnny Depp and Benacio Del Toro mourn the end of an era by going on a drug fueled adventure in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.  As usual, there can be only one.

Method Man and Red Man smoke a lot of weed and shake up Harvard in How High.  Jason Lee and Tom Green commit multiple crimes and escape prison in Stealing Harvard.  Only one Ivy League graduate will come out victorious.

Ed O'Neil, Lou Diamond Philips, Fred Gwinn, Corbin Bernson, and Hoyt Axton star in a Disorganized Crime.  This bomb covers a group of bank robbers trying to get a big score while staying one step ahead of Montana police and the FBI.  Brain Candy is sketch comedy starring The Kids in the Hall that weaves sketches into a central story about a new pill that unlocks peoples happiest memories.  Only one film will make it to the top of the Philadelphia Art Museum to shadow box.

This week's podcast has a special guest judge:  Sentient Rotten Tomatoes!  Zac reviews The Slaughter Rule.  It's an independent film about a teenager (Ryan Gosling) who plays six man football and deals with drama on and off the field.  They Live is a John Carpenter directed movie that pays homage to fifties sci-fi films.  Roddy Rod Piper and Keith David play two men who put on special sunglasses that show the world is run by aliens who control humanity through subliminal messages.  As always, their can be only one.

We review Roger Corman's 1994 version of The Fantastic Four.  Find out what happens when a production company is given 1.5 million dollars to make a superhero movie that they don't want anyone to see.  In the other corner we have the Sam Raimi cult classic:  Bruce Campbell vs. The Army of Darkness.  A man from the future lands in medieval times and trades in his chainsaw arm for a cybernetic fist.  Along the way he learns bravery, how to love, and how to make ammunition all while fighting evil demonoid creatures.  In the end...there can be only one.

Hot Rod is the tale of a wannabe stuntman (Andy Samberg) who tries to raise enough money through stunt work to pay for an operation for his stepfather (Ian McShane) so that he can kick his ass.  Southland Tales is the complicated movie starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Sarah Michelle Gellar that tells of the end of the world. There can be only one.