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Piranha (1995)

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In 1995 Showtime got together with b-movie maven Roger Corman to create an ongoing series called Roger Corman Presents .  Although he was finished with directing he still produced tons of movies per year, often going direct to video, and Showtime figured this was a cost-effective way to create original programming.  They were right as Corman did what he could to keep the movies below 1.5 million dollars each, and that meant a lot of cost cutting. The result was that a good number of the films were remakes of earlier Corman movies such as Not of This Earth and, in this case, the 1978 Joe Dante film Piranha .  It was Dante's feature debut as he had been working with Corman, and it featured a script by up-and-coming arthouse favorite John Sayles.  Like many of Dante's films to come it featured some great b-movie horror combined with subversive, tongue-in-cheek sequences.  It was a ripoff of Jaws , but it is remembered for its sly self-reverence as well as some neve...
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Dolan's Cadillac (2009)

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  One thing Stephen King did to both help upcoming filmmakers and encourage many of his stories to be made into movies is sell the rights to a good number of them for a dollar.  For someone making a short student film this meant a starting point to adapt the story to their own needs without breaking the budget and, for King, it meant a steady stream of his movies available in the theaters and cable as well as on video and, later, DVD.  While much of that output is low budget, amateurish and sometimes outright horrid, it meant that studios with money to put behind many of the professional adaptations were more willing to do so. Dolan's Cadillac was a novella first printed in Castle Rock magazine in 1985 and later released in the collection Nightmares & Dreamscapes in 1993.  It is a crime story rather than his usual horror although it does pay homage to Edgar Allen Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado", something the film emphasizes more than the story.  It is quite...
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Blue Beetle (2023)

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Blue Beetle had everything going against it.  The DC Cinematic Universe was on its last legs and everyone knew it, from audiences to the Warner Bros. executives.  By the time the movie was wrapping up I'm sure even director Angel Manuel Soto knew it.  At this point movies like Batgirl , which was pretty much completed, were being scrapped and used as tax write-offs.  Blue Beetle , which had originally been meant to stream on HBO Max, somehow scampered into theaters and, except for those who revel in seeing things fail, it was largely ignored.  Though critics gave it decent reviews it didn't catch on with audiences. Part of the problem is that by this time most people only wanted to watch these movies to mock them.  So many of the DC films had been hollow spectacles with little to no entertainment value, so it was expected that the movie also wouldn't be any good.  It's a minor character, the plot is way too similar to Shazam! , and it came on the heels...
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The Inheritance (2026)

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I work hard to support local artists and the community around them.  The problem is that, as a critic, it is important to be honest in an assessment.  It's a bit hard to do so when it is obvious that a person is amiable and is trying to make something for others to enjoy while calling attention to a community that they love.  Part of criticism is to help someone improve and, hopefully, reach the goals they are hoping to achieve.  I that spirit I dive into  The Inheritance.  James Mills (James Mills) inherits a property near the Arizona town of Globe from his father.  It is significantly off the beaten path and covered in trash.  However, not being in the best financial straits, he decides to see if there is anything worth doing with the property.  His uncle's attorney also wishes him to check it out and let her know if he intends on doing anything with it.  However, as he approaches, he starts getting strange vibes, including sudden...
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Bad Moon (1996)

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Eric Red is known more as a writer than a director.  He is the one behind two classic horror films, The Hitcher and Near Dark .  His own output has been hit or miss.  He is technically skilled and often provides some good visuals, but it seems he gave his best material to other directors.  Although I'm not necessarily a big fan of most of his films he did manage to produce one of the few decent werewolf movies of the 1990s. Ted (Michael Paré) is bitten by a werewolf while in the Amazon.  When his girlfriend is killed he narrowly escapes and kills the monster, making his way back to the United States.  A few months after returning he calls his sister Janet (Mariel Hemingway), who with her son Brett (Mason Gamble) visits him at his campsite near the lake.  It is also near where a number of recent animal killings have been reported.  As the police investigate Ted takes Janet up on her offer to stay on her property. The problem is the family dog Thor...
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No Smoking (2007)

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I knew it was just a matter of time before I got around to Indian cinema.  The reason it has taken so long is I know their movies, even when they are dramas, action, science fiction or horror, often have musical numbers.  That is a bigger barrier for me to get over than the cultural differences, especially since it must be obvious at this point that subtitles don't bother me like it does some Americans.  I'd rather read what they are saying than have an Indian guy dubbed with a Brooklyn accent.  The reason I finally took a dive is because No Smoking is based on a Stephen King short story called "Quitters, Inc.".  This isn't the first time it has been adapted for a feature film, as it is the first segment of the 1985 anthology film Cat's Eye .  It is a story about a guy who decides to quit smoking and signs up with a company that is guaranteed to cure anyone of the habit.  It just so happens their methods include constant surveillance, torture of loved ...
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The Eagle (2011)

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Sword and sandal movies have not been popular since the 1950s despite the anomaly that was Gladiator .  However, everyone loves a good mystery, and 1900 years later there is still some question about what happened to the Ninth Legion.  Whether they were slaughtered in an ill-fated incursion into northern Britain or eventually disbanded or moved to mainland Europe is up for debate and may never be answered.  However, Rosemary Sutcliff gave us a fictional account of what may have happened to them in her 1954 novel The Eagle of the Ninth .  Adapted by Jeremy Brock and directed by Kevin Macdonald, The Eagle is a mostly forgotten low-budget version of the book, but it manages to outshine some of its contemporaries. Marcus Aquila (Channing Tatum) is the son of a commander of the Ninth Legion who requests a post in Britain 20 years after their disappearance in order to help redeem the family name.  He quickly earns the respect of his fellow soldiers in battle but is wo...
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