Super Hero Movies

With ever growing gaps in my T.V viewing schedule (no more ER, no more Alias, no more 24) it’s time to go back to the DVD rack to fill in all those extra hours that, well, could be better spent doing more important things, but hey.
This month I will be looking a couple of those Super Hero Super Movies. I took out a small sample of super flicks to watch. The best, by far, would have to be the 1966 Batman movie. Starring TV’s Adam West as Batman and Burt Ward as his faithful sidekick Robin, this classic was directed by Leslie H Martinson. Full of colour, more corny one-liners than James Bond and a lot of alliteration, Batman: The Movie has all of your favourite bad guys. The Penguin, Joker, Riddler and Cat Woman join together in an attempt to take over the world – as they usually did on TV. See Batman fight a fake blue shark only to defeat it with a can of ‘Shark Repellant Bat Spray’, see the Bat Copter with the Bat Ladder, the Bat Boat, and inside the Bat Cave with everything so clearly marked – when was the last time you mistook a magnifying glass for a drinking water dispenser?
With more technical gadgets than Star Trek and special effects that would make George Lucas blush, this Batman movie is so much better than the recent remakes. Now available on DVD in a ‘Holy Special Edition’ with interviews with Adam West, Burt Ward and the maker of the Bat Mobile.

Holy Dramatic Pause – Batman!

It seems that many scientific laboratories in the U.S.A have pretty lax Health and Safety procedures. One mistake, one explosion, one bite from a genetically engineered spider is all it takes to turn an average Joe into a mutant Super Hero or Super Villain.

Tobey Maguire – Climbing the walls in Spider-Man

Spidey-sense tingling?? Y’all must go and see Spider-Man 2 with Alfred Molina (Chocolat) as bad guy Doc Oc. The ‘Spot the Stan Lee’ game is available in this movie; as usual he is only in the shot briefly. A bit more emotionally grounding than the first one, we see how being a super-dude can be taxing on a young Peter Parker. With Mary-Jane about to get married and Harry Osborne obsessed about avenging his father’s death and his Aunt about to be evicted, Peter decides to take a break. S2 has great special effects and a really good lead up to S3.

Not so ‘Super’ Super Heroes

When Mystery Men came out in 1999I was working at a video shop. I saw it at the cinema, I bagsed the preview tape at my shop, I bought my own copy to watch over and over again. Captain Amazing (Greg Kinnear) is captured by the recently released Casanova Frankenstein (Geoffrey Rush) and the only heroes left in the city are the Mystery Men. Ben Stiller – Roy, Janeane Garofolo -Baby Bowler, Hank Azaria –The Blue Rajah, William H Macy – The Shoveler, teams up with the Invisible Boy, the Sphinx and the Spleen (Want to know his power? Pull his finger) to rescue Captain Amazing. This hilarious super-spoof will make you laugh as the team fight over whether or not Lance Hunt is Captain Amazing, but Lance Hunt wears glasses and Captain Amazing doesn’t wear glasses. Heaps of clichés but heaps of fun. 10 thumbs up for this one!!