Black Friday (2021) - Bruce Campbell

[Neil]

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[MinionZombie]

I've been meaning to post this!

Looks like fun. It won't be Evil Dead level awesomeness, but it does look like it should do what's required of it ... they're kinda going for a subliminal Evil Dead vibe with the font. Plus you can't go wrong with Bruce!

Also - Devon Sawa - haven't heard that name in a while! "Idle Hands" was a great flick from back in the day.

[Neil]

I've been meaning to post this!

Looks like fun. It won't be Evil Dead level awesomeness, but it does look like it should do what's required of it ... they're kinda going for a subliminal Evil Dead vibe with the font. Plus you can't go wrong with Bruce!

Also - Devon Sawa - haven't heard that name in a while! "Idle Hands" was a great flick from back in the day.

Reminds me of this... Jump to 45s

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[MinionZombie]

Aye, I had that thought as well ... I wonder if there'll be a 'Shop Smart, Shop S-Mart' type of reference in there somewhere.

Mind you, I usually watch the Director's Cut of AoD, with the apocalyptic ending - but the S-Mart ending is quite fun.

[EvilNed]

I don't think I've seen the S Mart ending to Army of Darkness since the VHS times. I think I prefer it though. The apocalyptic one is too much of a downer for that film.
This looks fun, think I'll catch it this christmas.

Good double feature with Poultrygeist?

[MinionZombie]

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Clip from the movie.

Ned - I re-watched Poultrygeist on Halloween. Not as good second time around, it has some issues, although there are plenty of pretty cool bits throughout. I re-watched the rather revealing making-of doc on the DVD ... blimey!

[EvilNed]

Ah, bummer. I remember it being entertaining but I'm sure it's not.
As for the making of, would love to get my hands on that. Troma makes some great making of's!

[paranoid101]

This movie got a 7/10 on IGN, make of that what you will.

[MinionZombie]

Ah, bummer. I remember it being entertaining but I'm sure it's not.
As for the making of, would love to get my hands on that. Troma makes some great making of's!

Well, it was better the first time I saw it, but that's not to say I didn't find stuff to enjoy this time around - but the flaws of the script and structure were evident (e.g. too many fucking songs one after another early on, only for them to - mercifully - almost entirely disappear from the movie. The gore was good and the usual craziness, and it certainly was super gory/splattery, and was quite biting about fast food ... but yeah, I wasn't as hot on it the second time around.

The Making-Of, though, yeah ... that was quite revealing. Lots of behind the scenes turmoil and even a fight between crew members who clearly didn't vibe well together. It's surprisingly honest and lays bare many of the inherent flaws facing Troma productions (so many people working on them have never worked on a movie before and are learning on the job, so how on earth can Lloyd expect them to do everything he expects them to do?) It's also staggering to see how many times hours are wasted on people bickering about small details in the script, even the cinematographer (who came across like an opinionated self-aggrandising asshole in the documentary) harps on about stuff that isn't his job to question, and the fact that Kaufman was getting so irate at times is kinda surprising for an industry veteran - he's just wasting his own time (and everyone else's). Then you've got extras sitting around in extremely uncomfortable make-up for hours and hours and hours and not getting shot at all. Just seemed like total chaos most of the time, people paid an absolute pittance (if anything at all!), the crew all camped out in an old church with one toilet and shower ... fuck that! So yeah - the making of is actually more interesting than the movie itself.

I remember the making of Terror Firmer was quite good, same for Citizen Toxie. I'd like to see the making of for Return To Nuke 'Em High Vol 1 & 2 - the first volume generally works quite well, but fuck me, the second volume is an absolute mess (I hope a fan does an edit and turns two sloppy volumes into one tightly edited single movie as it's clearly in there somewhere).

[MinionZombie]

Watched "Black Friday" last night.

6/10

It's good fun, but I don't think I'll be rushing to re-watch it any time soon. There's some nice practical effects dotted about as a low budget monster movie, although not as many as you might expect/want. As the film goes on you kinda feel like the script needed a bit more development - such as properly figuring out/exploring how and why the monster works the way it does, as well as making full use of the cast. At times they can feel a little thrown away, such as:

Towards the end of the movie, Bruce Campbell's store manager character is on the roof with three others - nobody bothers to look for a way down - while BC stamps on monster hands coming through the roof hatch while finally breaking his 'always positive' store manager persona, then he just jumps down into the hatch and that's his end ... ... like, what? No grand finale for him? No going out swinging? Felt like he was just thrown away ... even more so when the characters accidently discover a way off the roof!

There's definitely a better movie in there somewhere, it just needed more work on the script and certain key moments to lift it up. I also kinda wanted it to tear into the whole Black Friday thing a little more, and really use it more to enhance/guide the comedy as well as the horror/action scenes. It sometimes felt like portions of the script were a bit 'first draft' or underdeveloped. A bit more time hammering out some details on-the-page would have helped it soar. It starts off fairly strong, but then it kinda starts to come apart the more it goes on and loses focus with its characters and its action.

Definitely worth checking out, but it could have definitely been better also.