woljm45

NO SPOILERS HERE....Don't worry

As I'm watching this film, I'm seeing a crew on board a medium sized vessel that is going out to visit a mysterious planet which has funky parasites that like to go into people's stomachs. Also, on this crew there is a robot helper, a Black ship captain, and even a potential strong-minded woman like Ripley. I'm saying to myself; "This all looks all too familiar and too much like 'Alien'". I understand Scott directed that one as well and directors tend to have a lot of similar material among their films, but this was getting ridiculous.

I won't mention what happens, but save your money and cross this off your summer movie list. The plot is quite confusing, the characters are as dumb as mud and the lead-woman protagonist is suicidal in stupidity as she confronts the enemy head on. It gets so annoying that you find it hard to even root for anyone to survive.

When the movie was over, everyone, including myself, left disgusted!

I've been wanting to buy the DVD of this movie for quite some time, but just never made the leap when I saw it on the shelves. Last night it happened to air on Showtime, so I gave it a shot, and I was instantly blown away!!! I guess it could be labeled as a dark comedy, but there's also so much brutal reality tied into it that the only way to tell a tale such as this is through humor. Rutger Hauer plays a hobo who passes through a town which is under the thumb of a sadistic mob boss and his bratty sons who happen to control everything, even the police force. After witnessing too much crime and debauchery around him, the hobo decides enough is enough and takes up a shotgun to start cleaning the city streets.

The plot isn't the most sophisticated in the world, but the comic book fashion in which the story is told makes it every enjoyable to watch. I like when a movie knows what type of movie it is and doesn't take itself too seriously. This reminded me of a crossover between "The Toxic Avenger" and "Sin City".

It's also a very short flick, so there's no reason not to spend 90 minutes to see this wacky gem.

For a man who was the backbone of the United States for nearly five decades, one would think Clint Eastwood and Leo could've turned out a better movie than this. I went to a showing tonight and there were less than 10 people in the audience, that should've been a sign.

The style in which the movie is told is very similar to the 1959 Jimmy Stewart classic, "The FBI Story", which backtracks history of the FBI from its early days and reviews its key early triumphs. There's also biographical accounts of Hoover's life, but nothing major we didn't already know, as in his likely homosexuality, his grudge against RFK, and tapes of scandalous material on JFK and MLK. The whole time I kept wondering to myself, what's this movie about and where's the story?

The make-up on Leo and his sidekick, "Clyde", was also ridiculous when theyhad to make them look older, it reminded me of the first Jacka$$ movie when Johnny Knoxville did the old man shoplifting sketch. Perhaps they would've been better off casting a legitimite aged person to play the older Hoover. Although in brief scenes, Bob Hopkins portrayal as Hoover in "Nixon" and Ernest Borgnine's version in "Blood Feud" left a better impact than the two hours Leo had to work with.

Without a real central story holding this together, with Leo not fooling anyone in his old man costume, and the fact we learn nothing substantial about Hoover we didn't hear about before, this movie is a real dud. Even if his more fictionalized and outdated, one would be more satisfied with the Jimmy Sterwart 1959 story about the FBI than this.