The ICP are a rap duo who have wrestled in the ECW, WCW and the WWE. They also put out a hysterical film called Big Money Hustlas that I should really review one of these days.
Bowling Balls is released as a bonus DVD inside the 2004 CD "Hell's Pit." I love 3D movies and I like ICP, but I had not even heard about this until the other day.
How did I live without it?
The DVD contains two versions of the film (3D and 2D) and is a long music video, like Thriller.
The film starts out with two pretty girls driving a beat up truck into Shaggy 2 Dope (one half of the ICP.)
An injured Shaggy walks off into the woods and the girls call for help.
Then the other half, Violent J shows up.
J offers to let them wait inside his 'bed and breakfast' until their friends get there to help.
He also botches a line about "lemonny-lemonny-lemonade" and keeps going.
Then the camera goes out of focus and they keep going.
Then Shaggy cuts one of the girl's head's off.
Look at that photo closely. If you have 3D glasses put 'em on. Then, in 3D you can see a crew member ducking at the bottom of the frame.
Hi crew member!
Still, the movie moves on. I read that the whole film was shot in 6 days and it kinda looks like it. Of course that's part of the charm.
Speaking of charming, another pretty girl shows up with two wacky horror movie stereotypes. One guy is a pothead, the other a jock.
Actually, I think the white guy was both a pothead and a jock. I don't remember what stereotypical horror character the black guy was.
WAIT! "The black guy" is a horror stereotype, too. He's the one who tries to be tougher than the killer and talks trash... then gets killed.
However, I don't think this guy fit that THAT mold.
Of course most horror films have the stereotype of the "old black guy" he gives sage advice that no one follows.
That was this guy, except the "old" part.
Every few minutes the movie is put on hold so they can show some of the "music video."
The song "Bowling Balls" is about collecting decapitated heads. They call the heads "bowling balls." The song is one of those songs that seems 'just OK' at first but is so catchy it gets stuck in you head for days.
Believe me. It's stuck in there RIGHT now.
Anyway, I don't want to spoil the whole film so I will just mention two scenes.
One involved a guy eating watermelon:
In perhaps the biggest disappointment in film history he DOESN'T spit seeds at the camera IN 3D!
Another scene features a gory decapitation that goes on forever. Here is a rundown.
18:11 Throat gets slit
18:19 Hacking at neck causes decapitation
18:21 Blood oozes, scene becomes very gross
18:27 Still hacking at the head, scene goes from 'gross' to 'absurd'
18:33 Music gets more intense, hacking continues and the scene goes from 'absurd' to 'hysterical'
18:38 Scene ends...
18:40 False alarm, still hacking at the head and neck, scene goes from 'hysterical' to 'down right ridiculous'
18:53 The funniest decapitation scene in the history of film (or at least 20 minute videos that are kind of like films) ends.
BOTTOM LINE:
This is one of the best examples of anaglyph (red and blue) 3D I have ever seen. The picture is sharp and the appearance of depth is very convincing. Also, since it is so short, you don't get the headache that 3D sometimes gives people during a full length film.
The movie features some great death scenes and is really funny. I highly recommend it.
Let's take a poll. Name some 3D films you remember seeing. I love 3D, so I see ANYTHING I can get in 3D. Some of them included:
ReplyDeleteSpy Kids 3D
Sharkboy and Lava Girl
Polar Express
Creature from the Black Lagoon
The Mask (not the Jim Carrey one... or the Cher one)
of course in theme parks they have tons of 3D, but my favorite is Muppet Vision 3D
I also saw a 3D Spongebob film in Paramount's Kings Dominion that dealt with Spongebob chasing after a pickle... I think.
I saw Creature from the black lagoon in 3-d. I also saw some crappy 1950's man in an apesuit film that was shown around here several times(Baltimore area)on a local channel. You had to go to Burger King to get your 3-d glasses. This was in 82 or 83. I had the glasses on, but don't remember too many impresseive 3-d effects in this movie.
ReplyDeleteLove da flick. Did ya catch the cables pulling the girls head up when Shaggy cuts it? Wicked funny.
ReplyDeleteFreddy's Dead! That was awesome with the 3D ending.
ReplyDeleteBTW, I loved the I Love the 80s 3D (glasses available at Best Buy)
I also saw Married With Children 3D (glasses at 7-11.)
They also ran a Nerds film 3D, but sadly I missed it.
Apart from theme parks, I've never seen a 3D movie.
ReplyDeleteI lead a sad life.
Theme parks and Imax do offer better 3D than regular theaters, but soon you may be able to see great 3D in theaters.
ReplyDeleteI saw Chicken Little in 3D at a regular (non-Imax) theater and it was fantastic.
The Coen brothers are up there with my very favorite filmmakers (Scorsese, Kubrick, Carpenter). I am very fond of their work. Throughout their irreverent career, they have explored different subjects and themes. Their best stories evolve from kidnapping schemes in films like "Raising Arizona " and "Fargo", one of my very favorites. I thought that film was fervently free. I was so ever wrong. It's as if the Coen Brothers have celebrated their complete breakthrough success (Academy Award winners), and now are willing to do whatever they please. I say this in a good way: this film captures bowling's underbelly, where even the pro stars sometimes have to supplement their income the old-fashioned way: by taking it directly from obviously weaker bowlers who somehow manage to be convinced to risk their money. Just as poker games are often won with guns, bowling for money has hazards all its own, something I learned even as a junior bowler hustling games after the league on Saturday.
ReplyDeleteA serious case of baggage mix-up gets the plot going for this flick. I laughed more than I expected to; at points the writing and acting are almost hilarious, there are also several scenes which had me sending kind thoughts to the director who provides comedy points through swift cuts and twists of the camera. On the downside there is too much sloppiness in the writing as the film progresses. Roy E. Munson is such a loser that acting like a total loser is actually called "being Munsoned." Fast forward to 1996, and Roy stumbles across an Amish bowler named Ishmael Boorg (Randy Quaid), the most talented bowler he's ever come across. He offers to coach Ishmael for a $1 million tournament in Reno, Nevada that can save his family farm, but Ishmael is conflicted (the deepest emotion of the film) because he has strayed from the Amish country. Ishmael's brother is the requisite family member sent to bring the stray relative back home, and Vanessa Angel is extra-hot as the love interest for almost every guy in the film.
Basically a b-movie, the film's artistic style is mostly unremarkable and the casting is flawed -- Kristy Swanson and Andy Comeau both seem inadequate as the young couple who lack seriousness in their approach to the wicked situations they are faced with, and the same can be said for some of the smaller roles. This film so meandering, so wonderfully novel, that I found myself missing the many other sporadic jokes as I was heaving from laughter. The film is basically about mistaken identity, eccentric characters, and a soiled rug. This film extols the bowler, the allies, even the pins. We experience an actual bowling ball POV, this film has nihilists, feminists, millionares, paedophiles, drugged out hippies, underachieving students, incompetent criminals, pornographers and 'Nam veterans. This movie is open to anything , anything... Some people are turned off by absurd looniness, because it's so grandiosely different. Yet who couldn't chuckle, if not explode, when a bowler dressed in a tight purple suit licks a bowling ball's finger hole, and the camera pans down to reveal his name as Jesus! I will disclose no more, but urgently recommend you to traverse to your nearest video abode and rent this true escapists' feature. Abandon all solemn inhibitons, though! One can not keep a straight face whilst watching.
If you think this is a parody of bowling, the joke may be on you. Hang around enough lanes, in certain places, and you just might see these guys or something very close to them. Just be careful if they look drunk and want to play for money.
I think I saw the Dudley Boys perform a 3D on the ICP in WWE.
ReplyDelete