Stinker Madness - The Podcast for Bad Movie Lovers

Men of War - It's batshit, literally

 Sometimes a studio puts too much talent behind a terribly stupid movie. Sometimes there's some subtle social commentary that sneaks into the script and then has the competency behind the camera to accurately capture those topics. Then you have action guys who just like to blow everything up. Welcome to Men of War.
I absolutely adore this movie. It suffers from the Idiot Plot, yet has some level of emotion behind everything it tries to achieve. It's like a mashup of Forrest Gump/Platoon and Deadly Prey. Everything is shot well, the location is fantastic, the dialogue is sharp.... until Dolph gets to deliver some one-liners.
Without spoiling much, I have to say that the plot revolves around a couple of corporate dorks hire ex-mercenary Nick Gunar to invade an island, get the natives to sign a legal document or else kill all of them and then.... profit? After learning what their business model is (they aren't selling widgets) Gunar decides they are idiots and isn't going to murder a bunch of women and children for their soon to be bankrupt business partnership. Then insanity ensues.
It's an up and down ride from start to finish with Dolph splitting his time with kicking ass, falling in love with the island and it's people, dealing with the Idiot Corporation, his rival mercenary Keefer (played by the always at an 11 Trevor Goddard) getting some Charlotte Lewis naked playtime and shooting people in the face with a rocket launcher. All of it is a blast (get it?) and is constantly throwing you new curveballs of questionable story-telling. 
This is a must do.

Bubba Ho-Tep - The plot has left the building

Elvis and JFK team up to take down a butt-sucking undead SOB in a nursing home. OR Elvis ends up in a horrible nursing home and struggles to find a reason to keep living. Pick one. You can't have both without muddying up the other. 
While Bubba Ho-Tep should absolutely be praised for accomplishing what it does on only $500,000, it must also be dissed for its non-budget related flaws. Chiefly its duality but also in its production. If you read the back story on this movie, you'll learn that they had a mismatch with the cameras and the level of knowledge on how to run them. So what should have taken 15 days to shoot took 30. That made a lot of stuff in the screenplay that needed to be in film, end up on the floor and a lot of stretching of what was available (which isn't much). This is one of the lowest on content movies we've ever reviewed.
Sadly, this is exceptional work by Bruce Campbell. He is putting everything he's got in the role and is clearly attached to the part, but the horrendous production (lighting, cinematography, makeup, script and plot) get completely in his way and drag everything he does down. Ozzie Davis is great (of course) but he suffers from the same tragedy. It's a shame that both have to lose their skills to a mountain of problems not related to them.
Frankly, at the end of the day, the film is just ruined by it's lack of focus on what it's trying to do. Halfway through, it loses the themes and look it tried to establish in the first half, and the isn't setup to have the second plot work in anyway and thus becomes a lackluster conclusion to something you can't be attached to. 
Some will disagree with us (this is beloved - but likely because people are trying to will it to be good) but this is a straight-up do not from us.

Year 5 in Review: Part 2

Each year we recount the creme' de la crappe, and discuss our very favorite 10 films (each) from the previous year in podcasting. These are the films that are the most important to see. This episode is like a cornucopia of terribly awesome stinkers. Stop what you're doing and watch these movies. Here are numbers 4-1 plus our very favorite movies that were released in 2018.

Year 5 in Review - Part 1

Each year we recount the creme' de la crappe, and discuss our very favorite 10 films (each) from the previous year in podcasting. These are the films that are the most important to see. This episode is like a cornucopia of terribly awesome stinkers. Stop what you're doing and watch these movies. Here are numbers 10-5.

Dune - You gotta keep the angel dust flowing!

A guy with unrealistically great hair, stands atop a giant earthworm (who isn't even wearing a costume) and uses his Alexa-style hand laser to be less effective in combat than just going and buying a regular laser gun. It's Dune and arguably one of our most controversial choices to lampoon.
Dune is that unique mix of "well, that looked really good" and "this is a really accurate representation of the novels (sorta)" on one side while also being complete nonsensical crap and horribly cheesy effects and acting on the other side. Is it a stinker? Probably. Is it also passionately made art? Probably. Its not only a head-scratcher on how you want to label it, its a head-scratcher within its content.
What are the damn rules of the Dune universe? I mean seriously. It's nonsense. There's a space guild that is also a little guy with a vagina mouth that acts as a Mass Relay (see Mass Effect games). There's a telepathic witch guild that gets mad if you have a male child because it won't fulfill the prophecy even though the male child CLEARLY is the prophecy? Also they are bald, because..... There's a guy just puts corks into people's chests or is it ALL the people that live on his planet, like a social security card. The universe's most important commodity is literally just angel dust but if you do enough of it you can bend space and time to your will. I mean duh phuq? 
Aside from all that, it's a pretty basic plot though - these guys are bad and they killed the Duke, so the son is going to get some revengeance and end up as Neo. So try not to get too hung up in the details.
The film is a complete mess. It's disorganized, incoherent, sloppy and too long and rambling. But there is a sort of wonder in its problems. It's the weird kind of stinker that you enjoy, not because it's unintentionally funny, but because it's unintentionally so confusing. Whether you love it or hate it, it's a must watch and must riff movie.

Teen Wolf Too - Tony Danza's origin story

You didn't ask for it, but you got it. A sequel starring a different guy who finds out he's a werewolf and is good at sports, but this time he's in college! Things are about to get a little wild, right? Sadly no - this college is actually just a junior high school.
Nothing says wild college party like punch and pie mixers, right? Getting fast and loose while the "Dean of Men" chaperones! Yeah, college! This is the nerd's version of college for sure. All these rascally rule breaking college freshman are about as nutty as the girl whose best friend is her mom (so, Jackie?).
We've got to address the one major moment - frog fight. Seriously, not acceptable. There's some shots that appear that they used actual frogs to whap each other in the face with solely for the entertainment of dumb pre-teens, especially one that shows a frog with clear damage to its face. Man, screw the 80's.
We really don't know what to tell you about this movie. It's typically offensive, suffers from awful writing, brings little plot replacing it with montages, isn't clear on whom the antagonist is, doesn't follow it's own rules, is quite unclear on the lore of teen wolves, and so leaves lots to discuss but not much to enjoy while viewing it.
We can't really tell you what to do here - it's not great but there's enough here to enjoy a good riffing Sunday. But in total it's a do not from us.

Running Scared - Retreat Annoyed

The greatest question posed by man since 1986 is "what the heck do people see in this pile?" It's like working next to a construction site. Its like a toaster that always burns your bread. Its like a script that tries to make the leads the two most annoying people on the planet and succeeds. Running Scared sucks.
Imagine yourself living in the universe as Gregory Hines and Billy Crystal's characters. Worse yet, imagine having to work with them. They're worse then Lumberg. Each and every Monday would be a compounding hell, when you the entire department is called in for the morning brief and you can't get through it because these two are trying to be funny throughout the whole thing. Keyword - "trying".
The "jokes" are constant - yes, but not only are they not funny - they aren't even jokes. It's the classic trick that crappy comedians pull on the unwitting - make goofy voices and talk really fast and constantly. Those are clearly jokes, right? Wrong. I mean look at this:
"Excuse me, we're from Noisebusters. Do you know where the Menudo concert is?"
THAT'S funny? It's nonsense! It doesn't even make sense in the context of any of its own premises!
Running Scared is a loud, constant annoyance and the sooner mankind realizes that it's a travesty, the sooner we can move on as a society.

The Lost Empire - The Worst Infinity Gauntlet Ever

It's got a random gorilla, a laser "unit", eyebrows that change from shot to shot, a trio of tough ladies, possible ninjas and a dubious plot to build the Infinity Gauntlet so you know this must be a Jim Wynorski movie. Bring on the chesty women!
If you've ever seen a Jim Wynorski film, you know of two things to expect: the left boob and the right boob. This one is no different. It's just a silly budget movie with a fairly standard plot (a trio of chesty ladies team-up to destroy an evil plot to take over the world) but that's where the convention ends. Things get pretty loosey goosey with regard to its own script as Jim runs roughshod with his own project. It's glorious.
This is not a tight ship that's being ran here. And it was never supposed to be. This project was intended to lose money as a tax write-off for a movie theater owner. But Jim just can't help himself and made one of his most fun films. There's errors and mistakes everywhere including very strange and cryptic ad-libbing that couldn't be reshot due to time constraints and location limitations. There's bad props and terrible costumes. There's strange sequences that don't fit into anything leaving the viewer having to try and make sense of all the nonsense.
Arguably, it's one of Wynorski's "best" films as it's got all the hallmarks of his usual fodder but without the expertise that he garnered as his career progressed. It should not be missed by any fan of Stinker Madness's film selection.

2018 SMABFA Awards

The hottest awards for bad films in 2018 are here and the winners are all set. Listen to the 2018 SMABFA Podcast and check out all the nominees and winners below.
Best bad actor -
Dwayne - Rampage
Toby Kebbell - Hurricane Heist
Eric Johnson - 50 Shades
Trevante Rhodes - Predator
Shaq - Show Dogs
Gerard Butler - Hunter Killer
Jeffery Dean Morgan - Rampage
Jamie Foxx - Robin Hood
Jackson Rathbone - Samson 
Tom Jayne - Predator - WINNER
Hugo Weaving - Mortal Engines
Jake Lacey - Rampage
Tom Jayne - AXL
Worst bad actor -
Taylor James - Samson
Dwayne - Skyscraper
Bruce Willis - Death Wish
Taron Edgerton - Robin Hood
John Boyega - Pacific Rim: Uprising - WINNER
Will Arnett - Show Dogs
Jason Clarke - Winchester
Toby Kebbell - Hurricane Heist
Jackson Rathborne - Samson
Alex MacNichol - AXL
Best bad actress - 
Julia Goldani Telles - Slenderman
Maggie Grace - Hurricane Heist
Olivia Munn - Predator 
Dakota Johnson - 50 Shades - WINNER
Natasha Lyonne - Show Dogs
Helen Mirren - Winchester
BDH - Jurrassic World: Fallen Kingdom
Joey King - Slender-Man
Malen Akerman - Rampage
Melissa Bologna - Hurricane Heist
Jahae - Mortal Engines
Worst bad actress -
Helen Mirren - Winchester
Alicia Vankender - Tomb Raider - WINNER
Eve Hewson - Robin Hood
Neve Campbell - Skyscraper
Lindsey Wagner - Samson
Olivia Munn - Predator
Hera Hilmar - Mortal Engines
Becky G - AXL
Elizabeth Shue - Death Wish
Best bad movie -
Predator
Rampage
Hurricane Heist
Fifty Shades Freed
Mortal Engines
Hunter Killer
Slender-Man
Worst bad movie -
Robin Hood
AXL
Samson
Tomb Raider
Winchester
Pacific Rim: Uprising
Mortal Engines
Skyscraper
Winchester
Slender-Man
Death Wish
Riffer - 
Mortal Engines - WINNER
50 Shades
Rampage
Slender-Man
Hurricane Heist
Winchester
Samson
AXL
Hunter Killer

Short Circuit - Our childhood actually sucked

There's a really good reason that this film disappeared from cable networks and the cultural lexicon. Take an heavy level of racism, add a cavalcade of annoying characters and jokes then sprinkle all that on top of inane plot and you've got yourself a monster bud movie.
We'll give this movie one thing - the animatronics and puppeteering are great. That's it. Everything surrounding the work of the grips, best boys and effects team stink. Guttenburg is groan-inducing, Sheedy is baffling, Stevens is offensive and Johnny 5 needs to take a long drive off a short pier. Even for a "kids" movie it's just so damned annoying. Like dogs barking while you're trying to sleep.
Skip this turd.