Netflix Reviews: The Asylum's "Nazis At The Center of The Earth."

Like most entries in my Netflix reviews this movie has a story behind it. This story is in regards to The Asylum. If you don't know what The Asylum is, I will explain. The Asylum is a film studio that is notorious for creating cheap "mock-busters" that have a title sounding like a popular film. When Transformers was released The Asylum released Transmorphers and when Battleship was released The Asylum released American Warships. Evidently, back when The Da Vinci Code was in theaters, The Asylum produced a film called The Code Conspiracy. And the similarities between these two films begins and ends with the fact that they have the word "code" in their titles. 

The Code Conspiracy is by far the worst film I have ever subjected myself to. It is the bane of my existence, and if you made me choose between having to watch Twilight or The Code Conspiracy for the rest of my life I would pick Twilight. It's that bad. The Geneva Convention should make the film illegal because it is cruel and unusual torture. It was enough to put me off of any and all Asylum films for, what I expected, all eternity.

However this wasn't the case. I found myself back in The Asylum. This time, with a film humorously titled: Nazis At The Center of The Earth.

However, I did not realize it was an Asylum picture until the studio's logo popped up on my screen. Even if I had known this was an Asylum film I probably would've given it a look regardless. I mean, come on, it's called Nazis At The Center of The Earth for heaven's sake! No self respecting internet film reviewer would pass up the chance to see this film! So, I prepared myself for the inevitable pain I had come to expect from an Asylum film and dove right in. And what I found was one of the most entertaining film I have ever watched.

Now don't mistake that last statement as being genuine praise. The film (which I will shorten to "Nazis" for the sake of brevity) is a laughable excuse for a film that you'd only find on syfy as an original movie. However, in spite of this, I found I genuinely enjoyed the film, in a way one genuinely enjoys getting hung by the ceiling by their nipples. 

The trick, I found, to enjoying the film, is to go into it knowing you're not looking for a high quality motion picture directed by, say, Christopher Nolan. No, you know you're in for tons of wooden dialogue delivered by people who are "actors" that were scribbled down by someone who shouldn't call himself a writer. You know you're going to see dime store special effects that belong more in a Playstation 1 game rather than anything resembling a film. When you expect this, and are still determined to make the most of the bad situation you're in, you can enjoy Nazis. 

The film takes place in Antarctica, and like most films that are set in Antarctica you know that if it isn't John Carpenter's The Thing you know it's going to suck. The thing that somewhat resembles a plot follows a group of scientists that make the ones in Prometheus look credible. These scientists, led by The Son of Busey (Jake Busey. Don't let the fact that The Asylum has a recognizable actor in the cast fool you into thinking this is an actual movie.) discover a lost colony of Nazis hiding deep within the earth who have plans to begin a new Reich with immortal and cybernetic soldiers. 

The first half of the film is your typical B-Movie setup. We get to know the mindless drones who will stand in for actual protagonists as they do science-y stuff and try to figure out why people are starting to go missing. It's all terribly dull, unless you make fun of the fact that some of these actors look like aliens in bad human costumes. It's really a testament to The Asylum's cheapness when their actors don't look any more realistic than their special effects. You also get to see Jake Busey attempt to be a mad scientist which is hit and miss, mostly miss. Had it been Busey Sr. I could've totally bought the character as a mad scientist. Though I have to hand it to the Son of Busey, he does at least try to act insane, which is more than I can say for the other actors. 

However, once the second act being and our "heroes" actually discover the titular Nazis at the center of the earth the plot picks up. There are plot twists and betrayals aplenty as some characters are revealed to be Nazi spies while others decide to join the Fourth Reich and betray their countries. It'd all be truly gripping stuff if this were an actual film. Anyways, the scientists, who are all medical doctors and biologists, apparently, even though I was under the impression they were all geologists considering that they were studying ice cores in the beginning of the film, are forced to help the Nazi's perfect their face swapping technology to keep themselves immortal (no I didn't just suffer a stroke, that is really what happens) as well as utilize experimental stem cell research to ( ...and I am dead serious about this no matter how awesome it sounds...

...are you ready for it? Because it is so awesome it might just make your head explode...)

resurrect Hitler's decapitated head in a giant robot suit!

This is actually WAAAYYY better than what you see in the movie, but still..

So, basically, this whole movie is the video game adaptation to Id Software's Wolfenstein 3D! This is where the movie really becomes awesome as Robo-Hitler stomps on aliens-posing-as-humans-posing-as-actors and leads the new Fourth Reich to take over the world in a giant flying saucer. Why this wasn't given a bigger budget I will never know...

Meanwhile, our "heroes" manage to take on the entire Nazi army armed with Nerf guns (in that the Nazis are armed with Nerf guns. I know because I have the same pistol that is the standard Nazi sidearm, apparently...)

My guess is the Fourth Reich's plans involve littering people's backyards with thousands of those whistling darts. 

Thankfully, the Air Force comes in to take out the Nazi's flying saucer, Robo-Hitler gets infected with a flesh eating disease and falls into the icy depths beneath Antarctica (where I have no doubt he meets the alien queen from the first AVP movie and they join forces to to exact revenge on humanity with Nazi-Xenomorph hybrids), and the world is safe from the threat of having to clean up any Nerf darts. 

All in all, Nazis is, at its best, a hilariously bad film. However, unlike other Asylum films I've subjected myself to over the years it's still an entertaining film. Considering the fact that for any film, be it a Hollywood blockbuster or an Asylum mockbuster, I at least expect to be entertained, Nazis At The Center of The Earth manages to be more entertaining than most films in theaters today. It's certainly not the best film ever made, not by a long shot, but I still managed to have fun while watching it.

Do I recommend it? Well that's a tricky one. I recommend it to anyone who enjoys riffing on terrible movies, but if you're looking for an actual movie I'd look elsewhere.

(Image Sources: Wolfenstein Hitler, Nerf Maverick Image)

"Loop de loop" Looper review

Once in a blue moon, a movie gets released that is both original and completely entertaining. It's a movie that isn't a remake, or an adaptation, or an adaptation of a remake based on a book. It's a movie that exceeds your expectations and leaves you feeling hope for the future of film. The last movie I recall that was this was Christopher Nolan's Inception. Today another movie has joined those ranks. That movie is Rian Johnson's Looper.

To start off this review I have to mention the first time I watched a Rian Johnson film. That film was Brick and also starred Looper star Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I watched Brick on Netflix with my friend on a late summer night. Today, Brick is one of my favorite films. It was a unique mix of noir storytelling woven into a high-school drama (one of my least favorite genres). The two different genres complemented each other so well that it was actually really humorous and terrifying at the same time. If you haven't seen it, I recommend you do, because it's an entertaining and unique film.

So you can understand that when I heard he and Gordon-Levitt had rejoined to do a time travel film called Looper I was more than excited to see how things would play out. Looper was an original film, not based on anything nor is it a remake. That is RARE in this day and age where Hollywood thinks it's a great idea to remake The Three Stooges. How Looper got made in today's Hollywood seems like a miracle, and the results don't disappoint.

Looper feels like a classic sci-fi action film. The world created by Rian Johnson here is set in the future, but it looks and feels much like our present, only with small differences. Cars are old clunkers that have been retrofitted with solar panels to allow them to run. There are hover bikes, but they're less reliable than the clunker cars. Telekinesis is a common ability found in some people, but most consider it tacky and uninteresting. A majority of America's population is living in poverty. Even in the city the film is set in, which features some tall skyscrapers with futuristic helicopters and flying vehicles, the place looks like a dump. It has a slight Blade Runner feel to it, in that this is a dystopia people have, for the most part, gotten used to living in.

In this world Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays Joe, a special assassin for the mob known as a "looper." Loopers are tasked with rubbing out targets the mob sends into the past from thirty years in the future. If you've seen the trailers you pretty much know this. The beginning of the film has Joe explaining in a narration how, in the future, time travel is only used by powerful criminal organizations for the purpose of disposing of targets. When the mob no longer needs a looper's service, they send the looper's future self for the looper to kill in order to "close the loop." Joe's explanation of the setup and how his job as a looper works is simple and straight to the point. The only explanation Joe gives for why the mob does this is because "disposing of a body is impossible in the future." And it's enough to satisfy you. Looper's concept of time travel has very little exposition, and what exposition it has is very effective. This is one of the defining traits of the film.

However, it's the film's characters that are really the best aspect of this film, with the plot coming in at a close second. Through the course of the film Joseph Gordon-Levitt's Joe comes off as a self-centered jerk. He's an addict who just wants to make enough money to leave the slums of America and travel to France. That's all he cares for, and the way he handles his job as a looper is rather clinical and unemotional. So when Joe is faced with his future self (played by Bruce Willis), he's actually more than happy to kill him upon first seeing him. Of course, future Joe manages to escape and young Joe finds himself in trouble with his employers.

In the middle of the film the focus shifts from Young Joe to Old Joe. We actually watch how Young Joe becomes the Old Joe who arrives in the past, and we soon realize that Old Joe has come back with a plan. As the film progresses your sympathy will jump between Old and Young Joe, both have their flaws, and both have their redeeming qualities. Looper will keep you guessing on who is really the protagonist and antagonist of this film, even though both are the same person. It's this ambiguity that makes Looper an interesting film to watch.

 As the film progresses we see that Old Joe's plan somehow revolves around a mysterious character from the future known as the Rainmaker who is systematically taking over all organized crime in the future. The Rainmaker is somehow tied to a mother (Emily Blunt) and her son (played by Pierce Gagnon who gives a really memorable performance) and Young Joe must figure it out before Old Joe, the mob, or both find him. Emily Blunt's Sara is a tough, down-to-earth, woman who simply wants to raise her son well in a time when most mothers sell their children for drugs. Her relationship with her son, Cid, is shaky to say the least, and they are both harboring a secret that is key to the future. Cid is one of those rare child characters that isn't annoying. He's smart for his age, the kid has a fair knowledge of electronics for being only ten, and the grim world he lives in has made him more aware of how terrible the world really is than a normal child should. You like Sara and Cid, and they both come off as deep, emotional, and damaged human beings. All they want is to live some semblance of a normal life.

This film will keep you guessing what will happen next at every turn. More genre savvy viewers will be pleased with how the film unfolds, because it never goes the way you expect, for the most part. Looper manages to make the time travel tropes we're all familiar with and make them feel new again. As for the rules of time travel in Looper, they're simple to follow and very, very loose. Looper is not the neatest time travel story out there, with it's fair share of paradoxes, but it doesn't matter. Everything that happens, happens, and the film takes advantage of it's loose time travel rules to have some real fun. One instance of this is a horrifying scene of a man slowly falling apart as his past self gets his fingers, hands, legs, and arms amputated. The effects used in this scene are effective and will make you cringe.

Looper is one of those rare movies that takes old tropes and ideas and spins them together into a fun, new, and completely original story. The characters are deep, interesting, and you're not really sure who to root for because everyone has complex drives and histories that make them feel like real human beings. For a time travel movie, it uses time travel as an effective plot device that makes for some memorable scenes and story elements.

To put it simply: Looper is a must see film for anyone looking for a great science fiction film.

I give Rian Johnson's Looper 5 looper blunderbusses out of 5.