Firestarter 2022 Review

By Paul Anthony

I have to admit that I don’t know much about this franchise. I know there was a previous film and it’s based on a book that was written by Stephen King, so there is no judging this from the previous film. So, we know this film is a remake, this film was made from a budget of 12 million dollars and so far, has grossed 6.2 million but keep in mind it is also streaming on Peacock. The film stars Zac Efron as Andrew “Andy” McGee, Ryan Kiera Armstrong as Charlie McGee, Sydney Lemmon as Vicky McGee, Kurtwood Smith as Dr. Joseph Wanless, John Beasley as Irv Manders, Michael Greyeyes as Joh Rainbird and Gloria Reuban as Captain Jane Hollister. Production on the film started last May and ended in July and the score composed by John Carpenter.

Right off the bat the film starts with a baby Charlie in her crib and her parents’ saying goodnight to her but then once they left the room Charlie begins to catch her toys on fire which Andy runs back and saves her from the fire. We then roll to the opening credits which informs us that Andy and Vicky were a part of a trial in which they took an experimental drug called Lot-6 which unknown to them that it would give them supernatural powers. Andy gains telepathy and Vicky obtains Telekinesis though we learn after the credits that Vicky doesn’t use her powers where Andy uses very often, which we learn causes him nosebleeds and we learn later in the film that is a true side effect of the drug. We now move forwarded in time and Charlie is 11 and dealing with bullies at school which is making her having outburst with her powers. Her outbursts cause the agency that gave her parents their powers to take notice and track them down using another superhuman named John Rainbird. But when Rainbird arrives at their house, he only sees Vicky because Andy and Charlie are out because there was a previous argument in which Charlie by accident burned her mother. Vicky tries to overpower Rainbird using her powers that she hasn’t used in years but proved to be no match in the end for Rainbird. Just then Charlie gets home with Andy and Rainbird holds Charlie at Knifepoint which Andy uses his powers to trigger Charlie’s powers which burns Rainbird and allows them to escape. While on the run they encounter a Man named Irv who takes them in but the next Day Irv who called the cops on them after he watched the news, Rainbird shows up and Andy uses his powers to allow Charlie to run away as he battles Rainbird which works but Andy is captured. At this point we know the Agency wants to kill Charlie because she is a byproduct of their drug that they have no clue what she is capable of since she is born with her powers from their drug. Once at the agency Rainbird who is locked up as well tricks Charlie into believing that her father wants her to come to the building and save him and destroy the building. Which she does in full angry mode of sorts, and she leaves a path of destruction in her then she sees her dad who uses his last push which kills him to give Charlie the extra boost she needs to kill everyone in the building. Rainbird who is free now waits for her to kill him which she begins to, but she stops and after she learns that he is just like her and that she is alone in this world now, in the end he carries her off as the agency burns to the ground.

Now at face value this movie wasn’t bad, I did enjoy the sound to it and honestly enjoyed everyone performance in this film. I don’t think this was a weak link, yet I didn’t think anyone stood out of the pack either. I felt they didn’t do enough with the Rainbird story arc to make any child in a fit of rage to spare his life after all just days ago he killed her mom. Another miss for me was Captain Jane Hollister which when she was on camera, she would steal the scene but making her into a coward at the end ruin it for me. In the end I thought this movie was just average and because of that I am giving it a C wasn’t bad just wasn’t good.

Saturday Sequel Presents The Haunting in Connecticut 2: Ghosts Of Georgia

By Paul Anthony

I am just going to start from here and let this be clear how do you title a movie with one state as the main title than have it take place in another state as the subtitle suggest. It weird that I start this blog off this way but since I first learned of this sequel, for some odd reason it would just keep bothering me. Like they could have called The Haunting in Georgia and that would have made more sense. Okay I am done ranting about the title. This is the sequel to the 2009 film The Haunting in Connecticut. This film stars Chad Michael Murray, Katee Sackhoff, Abigail Spencer and Emily Alyn Lind. The film had a budget of 1.5 million and had a limited release and was on video on demand because of that it managed to make 5.1 million dollars. Though I am shocked that it made that much. Okay let’s jump right into the plot!!

okay now the film is inspired by the events surrounding the Wyrick house of Ellerslie Georgia. The film takes place in 1993 when Andy and Lisa (Murray, Spencer) move into a house which they got on a great deal because the bank wanted to drop the property and they claimed no one has lived there before, but shortly after they settle in, Lisa’s sister Joyce (Sackhoff) basically moves in with them. At some point their daughter Heidi (Lind) starts to have visons or people that were once on the property and Joyce reveals to her that the women in their family are born with a veil covering their face which allows them to see things that others can’t. Lisa has this ability as well but has been taking medication to suppress the visons. At this point Heidi meets a spirit name Mr. Gordy. After this basically the family starts to deal with paranormal activity, the family brings in a pastor who reveals that their house was once a part of the underground railroad, and it had a stationmaster that lived there and tells them all the good that he did and how they will be getting visitors and they should be nicer to them than Mr. Gordy was to them, which they are, and they learn these people are ancestors of the slaves that came here for freedom but were never seen again. Through more acts the family starts to learn the truth and that is the stationmaster though did good also did bad by killing slaves and keeping some for his personal collections which included a conductor and Mama Kay the visitor ancestors. They learn that Mr. Gordy was a direct ancestor of the stationmaster and tried to cover up the wrong regarding his family name and just have people remember the good. In the end everything works out of course in the end the family no longer have visons and they lived there for another 5 years in peace. The film in the end shows pictures of the real family that the characters were based on.

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This movie was 1 hour and 40 minutes long and by the time the film was ending that’s when you realize what the story was actually about. The affects were fine, and I see most of the budget went towards and nothing else including the acting and cheap writing by making Murray truly look like some hillbilly. The scares and jump scares weren’t there as well so if you were looking to be scared than this movie wasn’t it. In the end I do have to give it a D or 60 percent. What saved this film was truly the affects for the low budget film.

Jackass Forever Review

By Paul Anthony

It has been 12 long years since the last film in this series, castmates have gotten order and had moved on and it hasn’t been the same since Ryan Dunn passed away. Just looking at Bam who once was a star and now got kicked out of the franchise that made him a star. From time to time I think we all would decide to turn on a jackass film regardless of it being 1,2 or even 3. There were talks of part four right after three came out. Jackass 4ever had just a budget of 10 million and managed to make 80 million, which makes it the second lowest only to the very first film. This film also introduces to the new cast members or as I like to call them the next generation. Here we have new members Sean “Poopies” Mclnerney, Zach Holmes, Jasper Dolphin, Eric Manaka and Rachel Wolfson. you add them to the original stars minus Bam and of course Dunn and you think you would have something special.

Now usually here is where we usually talk about the plot but there isn’t a plot. The movie is just full of pranks and stunts and celebrities that are fans of the franchise joining for some of the stunts, that’s the simple part but how can we judge this film? Easy by the stunts themselves and the cast. It made sense to have new cast members come in since the old crew were no doubt old and moved on with their lives, But the problem was this felt way too random. I can see maybe introducing a new cast for third film and having them get the torch for this film. Or even doing the show Jackass again first to introduce them. Instead, they are thrown at us and that is it. The stunts are what makes a Jackass film basically a Jackass film but here it seemed like they took a step back with the stunts and that to me hurt the film, now I understand there will be a 4.5 film because they did say they had filmed so much material but maybe that material should have been added to this film. As for the old cast, well no doubt this film was a passing of the torch kind of deal and given their ages the stunts and pranks were weaker than before minus Johnny Knoxville’s stunt with the bull which this time around ended poorly for him because he had suffered some major injuries which pretty much ends his career. The best stunt of the film was the cup test which Danger Ehren had to perform and suffered a rupture in his right testicle.

I am not saying this film was the worse of the bunch but no doubt that this film took a step back but with a younger cast now and maybe add a few more members this franchise can move into the next generation, how do I rate this film? Well, I have to give it an C or just call it an average film in the franchise. I will say knowing that there is a younger cast makes wonder what the future will bring but we have to see what happens next. We do know now that a new Jackass series is coming, that was announced just two days ago on May 3rd and it will be on paramount+