Radio On, The One-Armed Swordsman, The Americanization of Emily, Rambo, & Yo-Yo Girl Cop

Radio On has a great soundtrack: it kicks off with Heroes (the mixed English/German version) and continues on with a jukebox playing Whole Wide World, which was also used well in Stranger than Fiction, which I didn't mention before, but had a great soundtrack. And the rest of it wasn't as well-loved by me, but there was still Kraftwerk and Devo. The plot itself was secondary, a road trip by a disaffected youth in England trying to find out information about his brother's apparent suicide. So basically, just listen to Heroes and then Whole Wide World while watching black and white scenery, and you'll get about the same out of it.

The One-Armed Swordsman was apparently one of the first big kung fu films of the Shaw Brother Age. It was also ridiculously obsessed with stabbing people in the stomach. Except for the arm cutting which gives the film the title, pretty much everyone who died was stabbed in the stomach. The fight scenes were pretty silly, as the good guys kept doing the same stupid things and then dying, and they were much slower than they should have been. When you have a guy with one arm, he may not be able to attack that quickly, but I'd be damned stupid not to try to take advantage of that fact when attacking him. It was quite an impressive set, though, with the early scenes in the snow being pretty. And one last thing: if some woman ever want to show that they care, do it by telling me, or kissing me, or something like that, not cutting my arm off. That is not cool.

The Americanization of Emily is a cynical as all hell film written by Paddy Chayefsky, and proves that he wasn't a one hit wonder like I postulated based on the Hospital. I don't blame him for Altered States, I blame Ken Russell. But anyway, this one was James Garner as a dog-robber in World War II, working for an Admiral who wants to play up the role of the Navy in D-Day, so he wants Garner to make a movie about the Navy's important role clearing the mines. And somehow that leads to Garner being the first man on Omaha. He falls in love with Julie Andrew's war widow along the way, who prizes him for his cowardice due to the fact that it would be unlikely he'd die like her former husband. And James Coburn plays Garner's friend who wants to fight, but has bad eyesight and was given a desk job. And this is all a ridiculous satire of bravery and the military, along with great performances from all involved. I recommend this film to all who like good films.

Rambo is a film I recommend to all who like terrible films. My comments on the series can be summed up as "Although the first one is actually not a bad movie, the next two (in II he single-handedly refights and wins Vietnam, and III where he single-handedly defeats the Soviet Army in Afganistan and paves the way for the rise of the Taliban and 9/11) are terrible." This one is also terrible. I'd also like to point out that there were 262 deaths in the film (in just 91ish minutes), and only two of them are white people, missionaries who basically have no personalities or names before their death. The Arab or Hispanic mercenary lives, I think, but the asian one dies, because no Asian must come out alive. Seriously, 260 deaths are Asian? There was a decapitation as well a throat being ripped out. Also, surprisingly anti-religion, as the missionaries had to overcome their reluctance to kill in order to save themselves. One final note: "sometimes a guy getting turned into hamburger by a jeep-mounted machine gun is just a guy getting turned into hamburger by a jeep-mounted machine gun".

Yo-Yo Girl Cop is no The Girls Rebel Force of Competitive Swimmers. It's quite terrible, with precious little Yo-Yo fighting, although there are girls and cops. It's ridiculously bad. Also, it's an adaptation of a series of mangas, and the return of a tv and movie series of the mid-80s. At least they brought back the character from the original series for the movie. The titular cop somehow gets a bulletproof uniform at the end, but is still extremely stupid, like running towards explosions and ignoring the guy with the big sword who keeps cutting her. It was directed by the son of the guy who directed Battle Royale and The Yakuza Papers. Based on this movie, directing talent is not genetic.