Posts tagged Hotshots
“Seven Psychopaths” Is Gruesome Twisted Fun
Oct 27th
“Gruesome Twisted Fun”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Seven Psychopaths is a very funny, very bloody, and very violent comedy that keeps you laughing, but you almost feel guilty about doing so.
It begins with a surprising double murder that seems to be out of place with the rest of the movie until an explanation later on identifies the killer as the first of the psychopaths.
Colin Farrell plays Marty, who is living in Los Angeles and writing a screenplay, but all he has so far is the title, Seven Psychopaths.
Sam Rockwell plays Billy, Marty’s best friend who is also a struggling actor, but he has a profitable enterprise which gets him into serious trouble.
Billy steals dogs from people, and then another friend named Hans, played by Christopher Walken, returns the dog to its owner and modestly accepts a reward for the dog’s return.
Meanwhile, Marty gets drunk at a party, his girlfriend throws him out of the house, and he wakes up the next morning in Billy’s house. And yet when Billy accuses Marty of having a drinking problem, Marty says, “I don’t have a drinking problem. I just like drinking.”
Then Billy helps Marty with his screenplay by thinking up additional psychopaths, and we see scenes of the film as Marty narrates it.
However, when Billy makes the mistake of stealing a shih-tzu named Bonny, all hell breaks loose for everyone involved and some who aren’t involved.
You see, Bonny belongs to a mob boss named Charlie, played by Woody Harrelson, and Charlie will do anything to get Bonny back.
Anything.
As if that weren’t enough of a problem, Billy puts an ad in the local newspaper asking for psychopaths to answer the ad, so that they can help Marty and him with the screenplay.
A man named Zachariah, played by Tom Waits, shows up holding a rabbit, and he tells his gruesome story, which we also see.
Meanwhile, Charlie and his henchmen start closing in on Billy, and so Billy, Marty, Hans, and Bonny take off to the desert, where they can all work on the screenplay and where Billy thinks that the desert is the perfect place for a final shootout.
Now, don’t walk out of the theater when the closing credits start, because the movie isn’t over, and there are additional laughs coming.
Seven Psychopaths is gruesome, twisted fun.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
“Argo” Is Funny and Serious
Oct 20th
Hotshots, October 17, 2012
“Funny and Serious”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Argo is an excellent film based on a true story you might never have heard about concerning the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy for 444 days by Iranian militants.
It is also a very funny film that pokes fun at the filmmaking business in Hollywood, which together makes it a sure-fire candidate to be recognized at the 2013 Academy Awards.
As a matter of fact, the film was a surprise hit at the 2012 Telluride Film Festival, where director Ben Affleck told a screening audience that he tried to make a film that was one part action thriller, one part comedy, and one part inspired by a 1970s film like the 1976 All the President’s Men.
He succeeded, and he should be very proud of the results.
What the world didn’t know at the time was that when the American Embassy was taken over in November 1979, six men and women managed to escape and hide out in the Canadian Embassy.
Affleck also stars as Tony Mendez, a CIA “exfiltration” specialist, and he comes up with a risky and dangerous plan to get the six Americans out of Iran without the militants knowing about it.
Once Tony’s plan is approved, his boss, played by Bryan Cranston, tells him, “The whole world is watching you; they just don’t know it.”
What Tony proposed was that he pretend to be a Canadian filmmaker, get into Iran with all the necessary documents for himself and the six Americans, and then convince the Iranian authorities that all seven of them were a Canadian film crew who were in Iran scouting for locations for a science-fiction movie they were making, using a script for an actual movie in turnaround called Argo.
However, in order to do that, Hollywood has to be convinced that the story is real, as well, and Tony gets the help of a producer played by Alan Arkin and a makeup artist played by John Goodman.
The title of the ARGO movie is used in a very funny and profane way, and you won’t be able to hear the word again without smiling or laughing.
When Tony tells the six Americans what he wants them to do, they aren’t completely cooperative, and the tension keeps building and building until the very end.
Argo is very funny and serious.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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