Piranha 3D (2010) - Aja's gory sexploitation remake is a hoot

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+ Best Sexploitation Movie of the Year

 

The enticing poster for Alexandre Aja's Piranha 3D

 

Piranha 3D is a very loose remake of Joe Dante's Piranha (1978). Mutated piranha fish attack a lake that's popular among youths on spring break.

 

Director Alexandre Aja (Mirrors (2008)) has created a retelling of the hokey Dante-shenanigans and given it a new, virile injection of bare skin, promiscuity and blood. And color-graded the whole affair very heavily, which gives the genre-conscious killer fish film a bizarre but consistent look.

It is an important part of the film's success that it has attracted such great stars as Ving Rhames (Caged Animal (2010)), Elisabeth Shue (Back to the Future Part II (1989)), Christopher Lloyd (Snowmen (2010)) and Richard Dreyfuss (Jaws (1975)). Piranha 3D has lots of fun over-the-top gags, as one could hope for, but most of the CGI-scenes look crappy and just very weird, which, however, was also the case with the practical effects in the fish attack scenes of the original film. It doesn't rob the film of its fun.

Piranha 3D is written by Pete Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg (Sorority Row (2009), both).

 

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Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 24 mil. $

Box office: 83.1 mil. $

= Box office success

[Piranha 3D was released August 20 and runs 88 minutes. Dreyfuss only agreed to star in the film after he was given a higher salary, which he donated away to charity. Chuck Russell was scheduled to direct, before Aja finally landed the job. Filming took place in May - July 2009 in Lake Havasu, Arizona. It was delayed so the water would get hotter, and shooting with 3D equipment was abandoned due to practical issues. The film was instead converted to 3D in post. It opened #6 to a 10.1 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it grossed 25 mil. $ (30.1 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Russia with 9.4 mil. $ (11.3 %) and the UK with 6.9 mil. $ (8.3 %). Piranha 3D is certified fresh at 73 % with a 6.2 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Piranha 3D?

Piranha 3DD (2012) - High on DD, low on IQ

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The highly attention-grabbing poster for John Gulager's Piranha 3DD

QUICK REVIEW:

This follow-up to the mostly funny horror comedy Piranha 3D (2010)
starts with Gary Busey blowing up a dead whale using its own farts, and thus sparks a new piranha attack on David Koechner's titty-obsessed aqua park!
Many totally ludicrous scenes follow this 'appetizer', and, unfortunately, all the ones including the young members of the cast remain cardboard-ish and terrible, and include awful sex/piranha-attack scenes.
The mollifying bits of Piranha 3DD are: SPOILER Koechner's decapitation-death scene, (he is pretty unbearable in the film); and the fun, irreverent scenes with David Hasselhoff (Baywatch (1989-2000)), Christopher Lloyd (Back to the Future (1985)) and especially Ving Rhames (Pulp Fiction (1994)).
Still, this is a certified bad movie and a big step down from the first one.
It is directed by John Gulager (Feast (2005)), who has since also graced the world with Zombie Night (2013), a TV-movie that looks highly dubious.
And again, summing up the three main highlights of Piranha 3DD:

Christopher Lloyd, not in his proudest moment ...

David Hasselhoff, in just another moment for him ...

... and Ving Rhames, who is the funniest of the three, in John Gulager's Piranha 3DD

I love that there's a filthy b-movie called Piranha 3DD. I just don't love the movie itself

Budget: 5 mil. $
Box office: 8.4 mil. $
= Even Steven

What do you think of the Piranha 3D movies?
Have you seen other of John Gulager's ventures, and if so, how were they?

Baby Geniuses (1999) - Hollywood-stars and Bob Clark violate the integrity of several babies in overly stupid atrocity

[ZERO]

+ 2nd Worst Movie of the Year

+ Most Undeserved Hit of the Year  

Kathleen Turner, Christopher Lloys and a smiling, unknowing baby on the poster for Bob Clark's Baby Geniuses

QUICK REVIEW:

A baby company/imperium is opening a new indoor amusement park, but also run an underground baby-nest for little baby geniuses, who, however, escape. 
The babies talk together, often without moving their lips (...), and tell each other lots of pop-cultural references and the likes, - which they obviously haven't learned yet or been born with, - and hit adult men in the nuts and laugh, - at one occasion two times right after another.
Humor-bereft, free of anything resembling soul or heart, ugly and wildly unlikely, idiotic, humanly offensive movie: Whatever in the world could possibly justify the use of actual babies in the leads in anything as crappy as Baby Geniuses? I watched the film and felt extremely sorry for these young individuals, while I knew that I will despise the adult (crackpot) stars of the movie for a considerable future: Kathleen Turner, Christopher Lloyd, Peter MacNicol, Ruby Dee, Dom DeLuise and Kim Cattrall.
Turner (Romancing the Stone (1984)) screams and snorts her way through the film, red as a balloon, and most every other actor also turn in wretched performances in this preposterous movie.
Baby Geniuses is a big Hollywood-ghastliness directed by Bob Clark (Black Christmas (1974)), which somehow became financially successful and spun an - also critically loathed - sequel. The film deservedly positions itself in # 80 in IMDb's Bottom 100 List.

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Watch this movie, if you're ready for something offensively bad, Bob Clark's Baby Geniuses

Watch the trailer here

Budget: 12 mil. $
Box office: 36.4 mil. $
= Big hit

What do you think of Baby Geniuses?
Have you seen the sequel?
If so, please, 'enlighten' us about it ...

Back to the Future Part III (1990) or, The DeLorean Time Traveler's Final Adventure

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Exciting graphics and fonts, bright colors and an expertly crafted painted image with the three stars provoke imagination and anticipation on this poster for Robert Zemeckis' Back to the Future Part III

 

Doc Brown falls in love during a time travel to the Wild West of 1885. Will Marty McFly succeed in getting his pal to return with him, back to the future?

 

Back to the Future Part III is written by co-writer/co-producer Bob Gale (1941 (1979)), with Illinoisan master filmmaker, co-writer/director Robert Zemeckis (I Wanna Hold Your Hand (1978)) contributing story elements. It is the 3rd and final film in Gale/Zemeckis' Back to the Future trilogy (1984; 1989; 1990) and Zemeckis' 8th feature.
The movie is driven by the same love of storytelling and effects as the two first, and the story and script are again intelligent and fun. But the exciting time aspects of Part II are mostly left for a romance that, however sweet feels somewhat recycled.
Part III is still a good and exciting film, and Michael J. Fox (Spin City (1996-2001)) and Christopher Lloyd (Taxi (1978-1983)) are still an entertaining delight as its lead duo.

 

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1941 (1979) - Spielberg's bizarre 'comedy spectacular' sinks like a rock (co-writer)

Take a look at the movie in its original trailer here

Cost: 40 mil. $
Box office: 245 mil. $
= Huge hit (returned 6.12 times its cost)

[Back to the Future Part III was released 25 May (North America) and runs 118 minutes. Fox was paid 5 mil. $ for his performance in the film. The old West setting was reportedly chosen based on a remark by Fox made during production of the first film. Shooting took place back to back with Part II (11 months of production in total) from August 1989 - January 1990 in California, Utah and Arizona. The film opened #1 to a 19 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent another 3 weekends in the top 5 (#2-#3-#5), grossing 87.7 mil. $ (35.8 % of the total gross). Roger Ebert gave the film a 2.5/4 star review, translating to a notch under this one. Zemeckis returned with Two-Fisted Tales (1992, TV movie, segment) and theatrically with Death Becomes Her (1992). Fox returned in The Hard Way (1991); Lloyd with a voice performance in DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Last Lamp (1990) and physically in Suburban Commando (1991); and Mary Steenburgen (Antiquities (2018)) with a voice performance in The Long Walk Home (1990) and physically in The Butcher's Wife (1991). Back to the Future Part III is certified fresh at 80 % with a 6.70/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Back to the Future Part III?