DOA: Dead or Alive (2006)

Based on the popular video game, DOA – Dead or Alive finds three high-kicking females competing in a martial arts tournament on a secluded island. The women include wrestler Tina Armstrong (Jaime Pressley, My Name is Earl), jewel thief Christie Allen (Holly Valance, Neighbours), and Japanese princess Kasumi (Devon Aoki, Sin City). Although initially rivals, the trio are forced to work together in order to defeat a malevolent force. Master action film director Corey Yuen (The Transporter) injects a huge amount of flair and energy into the film, the plot of which predominantly consists of scantily clad women engaged in fights. WWE wrestler Kevin Nash (aka Diesel) makes a notable appearance as Tina's father, who also competes in the tournament.


WARNING: Although the rating for this film is agreed by every Teacake Society member, this review is very much Megan's own personal diatribe. 


Before I start this review, I should confess something, and get a bit of a rant out of the way.


I was kind of pre-destined to hate this film. As a young woman who enjoys watching films that have complex, three-dimensional, interesting women in them, and who regularly tuts at the semi-naked, plastic women that seem to occupy most tabloid newspapers/some films/a lot of computer games, and who point blank refuses to even watch a second of DOA: Extreme Beach Volleyball, I was never going to find this film a hoot. It didn't disappoint, either, as from the get-go there are boobs and hair extensions flying in all directions. I don't think I've ever tutted so much in my life during one evening. But to give it a smidgen of credit, the costume design at least is pretty faithful to the games, which means that I am not allowed to spend this whole review ranting on about their lack of clothing. Make of that what you will ...


I'll give it this though: its brazen. It's all action and lipgloss. But the problem is with movies is that you expect some kind of feasible plot, something that at least pads out the long action scenes and gravity-defying boobs stunts (I'm really trying here). The three protagonists find themselves invited, for reasons unknown, to compete in a martial arts tournament, located on an island. To kick-start the improbability factor, the contestants are dropped out of a plane and have to arrive at the top of the island by a certain time. This involves a heck of a lot of gravity defiance as the girls lithely swing and leap through the air. Goodness knows how the other contestants got there as this whole section of the film shows none of them. They probably took an escalator or something.


In fact, the other contestants get a pretty raw deal in this film, as they have the tiniest screen time that is physically possible without having to rename the competition (to DOA: Let's Watch Three Women Play Volleyball Together and then Fight in the Rain). The film is littered with little plot moments for the three of them. Holly Valance's character, Christie Allen, is a jewel thief/part time nudist, and the Japanese princess character Kasumi spends a lot of time pouting whilst daydreaming about her kingdom/thinking about looking for her long lost brother (whilst not actually doing anything about it). Female wrestler/All Round American Blondie Tina Armstrong has quite a sweet relationship with her Dad, though, and they have a few nice moments together (in fact, their fight scene is probably one of the few highlights of the film, even though it involves lithe Tina fighting against her Hulk of a father on a thin raft on a lake without one of them tipping it over). Plot-wise, the cliches keep on coming. Here are a choice few:

• Nerdy tech guy hangs around a beautiful woman and makes an arse of himself whilst trying to chat her up, but eventually wins her over by saving her life or something like that
• One of the girls actually says "I broke a nail!"
• There is a narrow escape from an explosion which involves all the characters flying through the air as a fireball erupts behind them.

The overarching plot, meanwhile, doesn't make any sense - AT ALL. The organizer of the whole competition turns out to be eeeevil, which you would have thought the contestants would have seen coming ("Come to my mysterious island and let me scan your DNA and watch you constantly through the obvious CCTV cameras! I'm not evil though!"), and this is dramatically revealed as he kidnaps the lovely ladies and shows them a pair of glasses that he has designed, which apparently let him see what moves to use next in a fight. He manages to beat up quite a few of them before the glasses get knocked off his face (During which we were all screaming: "TAKE HIS GLASSES OFF! JUST TAKE THE GLASSES OFF!"). You'd think he would have designed them with a strap or something.

Anyway, the film concludes the way you'd imagine it to (explosion, leaping through the air). And it is exactly as you'd imagine just by looking at the box. A lot of boobs; a little bit of brain. Some of the action sequences were choreographed quite well, and there were a few funny little moments. The acting and plot however are dreadful. If you're a teenage boy (or a man with no pride), this film will make you happy. If you're a woman who isn't in the film yourself, it will make you want to vomit. Go watch Charlie's Angels instead (or on second thoughts, maybe not ...)

M.

Lone Wolf McQuade (1983)

Texas Ranger and martial arts expert J.J. McQuade (Norris), along with FBI agent Jackson must track down bad guy Rawley Wilkes (Carradine) who is stealing U.S. military weapons and selling them to terrorists in Central America. When he comes face-to-face with the so-far undefeated Wilkes in a violent showdown, it's karate vs. kung fu.


Lone Wolf McQuade. The title alone ensures you're in 'maverick law enforcer' country, with a good dose of uzi spray, face kicking, beer swilling, and 'under-appreciated partner getting shot at' peril, all set against some faceless dust-bowl... and Chuck Norris' chest. 


Much Chuck Norris goodness to be had from this, most of it beer-fuelled by the look of it. The action starts out in the desert with the rescue of some cops, moves on to a very one-sided arms deal that introduces the villain-in-chief, christmas cardigan wearing David Carridine (have you ever notice how many teeth that man had),
 and carries on sporadically throughout the film interspersed with a girl screaming "Daddy!" and running at McQuade. Cut to (eventually) a racecourse for one of the best "villain" reveals ever committed to celluloid. A man is seen looking through binoculars and a whirring, whining electrical noise is heard. The camera pans down and a small person in a wheelchair moves into view. This character comes complete with revolving wall escape method and silly laugh.


Added to all this we have the Carradine's "partner" (business, sexual, canasta? We don't know) Barbera Carrera in a random ill-fated and unlikely whirlwind romance with McQuade, which starts with her well heeled lady of means breaking into his shack and doing the cleaning. Naturally this results in them frolicking around with a garden hose in a pool of mud. Then there's the man we all thought was Eric Estrada, Robert Beltran as McQuade's unwanted new partner (definately business) who spends most of his time chasing after Mcquade like a jilted girlfriend in his police car.

You can probably guess how it it all ends, yes Carradine and Chuck hitting each other a lot. You won't, however, be able to conceive the vastness of Chuck's sweat sodden shirt collection. The man has a lot of shirts. And his knee joints sweat, which I thought was weird.

We discover that McQuade seems to have a beer-filled fridge in every room, and that this beer seems to do for him what spinach does for Popeye. Take, for instance, the time he is buried in his truck/SUV. We are shown earlier in the film that this truck has some sort of turbo-boost system installed, and this is used to full effect to escape his early grave. After swilling a little beer, and then liberally applying the rest of the can as a sort of body wash, he activates the boost and stomps on the gas. At first the truck moves slowly up the slope, and then leaps majestically out of the hole to run down some henchmen.

If you can dodge a point blank uzi burst and sweat like Big Daddy in a burning wendy house, then you're Chuck Norris, and you don't need to watch this stuff. It's what you do betwixt breakfast and brunch. If you aren't Chuck Norris, you must settle for the Lone Wolf my friend, and maybe punch a large soft toy at your convenience.

Happy watching and go careful out there.

J. D.

Paranormal Ascendancy (2008)

Housemates Michael and Kenny have experienced some strange events in middle the of the night and Kenny is now convinced that he has a ghost living in his room who becomes active at 3.00am every night. Expecting to see nothing but a few tricks, Michael visit's Kenny's room himself one night and is totally freaked out by the experience.
Soon the activity becomes increasingly worse and they find themselves being taunted by mysterious spirits.


Wow! This redefines awful in terms Uwe Boll or Ed Wood couldn't dream of.


It looks pretty obvious from the film title and DVD cover that someone's trying to cash in on the success of Paranormal Activity. There is however very little to compare the two. Paranormal Activity is a horror film using familiar universal fears (things that go bump in the night) to scare the audience. Paranormal Ascendancy is a HORRIFIC film using bad film making to scare the audience. It was very scary, just not as the makers intended.


It's hard to conceive how bad this movie is. Every aspect of it (with the possible exception of some of the music) was poorly made. The script, the acting, the plot, the camera work, the editing, the lighting, the sound. All of it was terrible. Utterly terrible.


NO SHOT is framed properly! Characters will be talking to each other and one will barely be in frame. Its as if someone went through the film and cropped each shot randomly. 
The entire film has been tinted in a dull grey/green. Its as if the director watched The Matrix and thought "Wow, that was a unique and atmospheric film. Colour tinting my film will surly create a similar effect and be a sure-fire way to success." All it succeeds in doing here however is make the film drab and unwatchable.


The sound levels go up and down more than... actually more than anything. The sound even cuts out at times. Dialogue is muffled and distorted. We seemed to miss entire scenes of dialogue because it was so hard to hear, eventually we would just give up and talk amongst ourselves. It sounded like they were hiding the microphones in weird places like bedding and car doors. There were a lot of loud bangs and rustling that had no connection to the movie, apart from the fact that someone got into bed and a car door was shut.
Just when we thought it couldn't get any worse, at one point the picture and audio just disappeared for over a second. Leaving us with a black screen to stare at! Thinking about it, that was probably the most convincing moment of the film.


The script is atrocious and the "action" is so wimpy it could open a burger restaurant chain. The acting seemed to consist of reading the lines off a card held just out of shot. 


It does, however, have a quarter-way decent soundtrack. There were small pockets of atmosphere that came purely from the music. How the hell they managed to get permission to use Stevie Wonder's Superstition for the closing credits, we will never know.


The thing about Paranormal Ascendancy is its a bad film in every way, and an utterly unenjoyable film. In the Teacake Society we try to find enjoyable elements in all the bad films we watch, but there is just nothing in this film to smile at. We can usually find something ridiculous or ambitious to share in and enjoy, but Paranormal Ascendancy doesn't go far enough either way. Its just dull poorly made cinema.


In summary: Don't!


D. C.