I took a punt on this one a few months ago during one of Vinegar Syndromes irregularly regular sales, I figured with Christmas only a few months away at that point, it might have been nice to have something of a novel documentary to explore during the season.

The way this was pitched to me was:

‘Mick Foley loves Santa Claus, so much so that he wants to have a go at PLAYING Santa Claus, and he’s going to team up with some folks who are professional Santa Claus’ to learn the ropes ahead of actually getting to be the big guy in red for a day!’

The reality is? this is really actually kind of two documentaries uncomfortably crammed together. The first (and probably my favourite part) is just a pretty straightforward documentary following just shy of half a dozen gentlemen who play Santa professionally, they all have different backgrounds (one was a former tattood biker, another poses for specialist ‘bear’ magazines etc) but we get to spend a year with these gents as they ride the highs and lows of the industry, the impact on their personal and social lives and why they gave so much of their time to such an unusual and rewarding field.

The second part of this doc is Mick Foley kind of stumbling around slowly trying to figure out how to play the part of Santa. They establish up front that he’s a major Christmas nut and loves the season the whole year round, and that, while he’s worn santa suits and appeared WITH Santa, he’s never ACTUALLY played the guy seriously…and then the film just kind of…bumbles around with him as he gets the materials together to play the part, leading to him getting his chance to play the part, and much like a Godfrey Ho movie, for one scene, the two documentaries overlap…just about.

I’ll be honest, I actually kind of liked this one, but my biggest fault with it is just that this really does feel like it needed to be two seperate documentaries. Both sides of this film had MORE than enough ammunition to make two really solid and much more fleshed out documentaries. But by cramming the two together in this way, it kind of makes for a ‘worst of both worlds’ for both sides, it pulls you away from the, at times genuinely quite impactful ‘Life as a professional Santa’ documentary, but also it means the Foley doc, to me at least, came across as a little bit hollow and undercooked. There just wasnt enough ‘oomph’ behind it to make it its own thing, and compared to the other side of this doc, it just felt a bit tepid.

I dont know this for sure (This is just my opinion), but it almost felt like this started out as a documentary about people who perform as Santa professionally, but in order to secure the last of the funding from the backers to complete the documentary, they said they wanted a bit more goofiness and a stronger USP…and so Foley entered the frey.

Again, that isnt to say this documentary is BAD at all…its genuinely delightful in places, and the cine and direction is rock solid. I just feel like its all a bit inconsistent structurally. As a character piece, its a gauntlet of emotions and you really feel for these guys as they dedicate their lives to a greater cause, its also a fascinating insight into the. ‘cliquey’ nature of the profession…and the weird (but not unsurprising) split in the industry between the guys who play Santa to bring joy to kids, the guys who believe that Santa and Christianity are intrinsically tied and add a hard religious tone to their ‘portrayals’ and the guys who sit between the two fence posts.

I found this documentary (for the most part) a lot more engrossing than I expected. With, even the extra features offering a good tug on the heart strings for good measure. But its a documentary that feels a bit conflicted and confused about exactly what it wants to be for the audience. It flip flops around on ideas and by the time the end credits rolled, I wasnt entirely confident that what i’d seen wasnt at least a LITTLE bit cobbled together, But I was still very happy id seen it.

I think this ones worth catching at least once, that I can recommend. If you like it, then im certain it’ll become a welcome addition to the Christmas rotation, but do be prepared to be jostled a bit.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/i-am-santa-claus/

Its quite hard to impress on someone who wasnt alive when ‘Beavis and Butthead’ were a serious ‘thing’ just how all encompassing that show was to live through, indeed if you were aged between 7 and 25 during that time, barely a day would go by without hearing at least one half hearted attempt at ‘the laugh’ or a faltering ‘Cornholio’ impression. And, as expected whenever kids latch on to something as a craze or vocal stim, theres an immediate backlash, with parents and pressure groups citing the show as ‘the end of decency and culture as we know it’. If you believe the current ‘6-7’ craze is a sign of the end times, you have to remind yourself that every generation has at least one fad that would make the average Gen Alpha recoil in their seat with cringe.

Anyway; I digress, Beavis and Butthead were a cultural force in the early 90s and by 1995 the show had hit such a fever pitch, the Mike Judge and the team were given the opportunity to bring the wayward teens to the big screen, with an inflated budget and less regulations than TV had. And…well, if you were worried they’d screw the pooch on this one, your in safe hands.

The plot is, in essence, just a bigger budgeted(?) slightly bigger narrative than the original 15 minute shorts. Some bunghole has stolen Beavis and Buttheads TV, and they decide to try and track the fartknockers down. In doing so however (and breaking several TVs in the process) they end up in the motel room of ‘Muddy’ a criminal who’s been double crossed by his partner ‘Dallas’ Muddys been drinking and mistakes the pair for some hitmen he’d arranged to meet to ‘take out’ Dallas. And Beavis and Butthead are too dumb to realise that they arnt the hitmen Muddys looking for, instead; they misunderstand the situation and assume that Muddy wants them to ‘Do’ his wife for 10 grand. So they agree immediately and head to Vegas to find Dallas.

On finding Dallas however, she quickly realises that these boys have NO idea whats going on, and using her ‘womanly wiles’ convinces the boys to go to Washington, where she’ll go ‘all the way’ with them AND offer them 20 grand if they’ll ‘do’ Muddy…something the boys are less enthusiastic about…The reality is, Dallas has hidden a high tech device in Beavis’s shorts, and is using them essentially as mules to get the device to Washington without raising suspicion. Little does everyone know, the ATF are hot on the case, tracking the boys across America in an attempt to reclaim the device.

The boys have NO idea any of this is going on, and are literally only doing this to score and get 20 grand…hilarity ensues.

I think, if you were only going to show one piece of ‘Beavis and Butthead’ related media to someone to give them an idea of how it worked and why it was so successful. This would probably be it for me. it distills pretty much everything I love about Beavis and Butthead into an hour and 15 minute non stop dumber than dumb freakout, but it does so in a polished way that the TV shows budget just couldnt accomodate.

The animation is smooth, crisp and the swap to film really excentuates the finer details. The TV show was notorious for reusing animation from as far back as the pilot and first series (when things were INFINITELY rougher) and its nice here to just see consistant animation style without the need to recycle.

The scripts a riot, barely 2 minutes goes by without a chuckle or just…full blown belly laugh from me, the pacings zippy, the act structuring meanders, but that plays into the humour really nicely. the direction feels bigger budgeted than the TV series and while I am a bit sad that the ‘Music Video’ segements couldnt be better integrated. The fact they managed to pull artists ranging from Isaac Hayes, to the Red Hot Chilli Peppers to White Zombie more than makes up for the loss.

The cast is frankly star studded, with Demi Moore and Bruce Willis absolutely nailing the brief as Muddy and Dallas. Though, I do feel seeing all these more complex characters here feels a bit unsettling to the universe already built. The whole point of Beavis and Butthead was that these were two small town dumb teens who couldnt think beyond there city, treating the handful of grownups and kids that they knew (who were equally fairly one dimensional) as if they were idols. Introducing richer deeper characters in some regards feels a bit weird. But it acclimatizes pretty well ultimately.

Beavis and Butthead do America is one of those movies that I can just throw on at a moments notice, its full of lovely small gags, and the relentless repetative humour has me a captive audience for the full runtime. Up until the MTV reboot in the 2010s, this was probably the best the series looked, its stupid, its daft, its silly, its a junk food movie…but a bloody satisfying one!

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/beavis-and-butt-head-do-america/1/

I have a long and fond history with the original animated adaptation of ‘How the Grinch Stole Christmas’, cozy winter evenings watching a beat up VHS copy of the special taped from live TV, and once Satallite TV became a thing, Cartoon Network would often show it AT LEAST 2-3 times a week in syndication, and if I saw it in the listings, i’d usually take the 25-30 minutes needed to reacquaint myself with it, in the last few years i’ve unfortunately not been able to catch this one. But tonight; I pulled out the HD ‘Ultimate Edition’ and decided to revisit this one, and I really wasnt dissapointed.

What we have here is, in my opinion the best adaptation of the short story to date. and the big key to this one is simply that its short. I’ve found the longer Grinch adaptations stretch the plot of the story WELL beyond its natural running length and bog the story down with character origin stories or unecissary sideplots that dont really add much to the tone or vibe of proceedings.

This special takes the core elements of the story and animates them beautifully via the mind of Chuck Jones and animation talent including Phil Roman. its a creative labour of love that builds on the illustrations from the book, bringing a vibrant and unique spin to proceedings. with the pacing running just right and the messaging landing with the kind of heartwarming sweetness that could melt even the coldest of fogies.

The animation style is perfectly suited for this kind of story and the remastering carried out on the latest release scrapes years of discolouration and ‘fuzziness’ away from those old TV broadcasts, revitalising the short in a way that positively blew the cobwebs off.

As important and relevant today as it was almost 60 years ago. This version is certain to captivate young children and the parents and grandparents who saw this when they too were kids. I love this film quite dearly and while im sure every man and his dog has seen this one before, if it’s been a while, or you legitimately HAVENT seen this one. Its definitely time to fix that.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/how-the-grinch-stole-christmas/

I spent the majority of this film arguing with my partner about when its appropriate to turn off Christmas lights. She was adamant that all our lights needed to be switched off before 11pm, I argued that turning the ‘street level’ lights off at 11pm was courteous, but that our second floor lights (50x tiny LED ‘icicle bulbs’ spread over two windows) could stay on longer because the light they emmit isnt bright enough to illuminate past the window frame, and the light it DOES emmit creates a nice ambient tone in our recreation room…AND on top of that! Non of the houses in the surrounding area even HAVE a second floor…so even if the light DID break past the window frame (which it doesnt) it STILL wouldnt be a problem, because theres no properties in the area at the same height as the lights to be impacted by them.

This arguement lasted the full 79 minutes, didnt have a resolution and im now in the dog house for being ‘inconsiderate’ to people who dont exist. Not ONLY was it about as much attention as this film deserved, I found the argument more pleasurable. And I will say this, if you plan on arguing with your spouse, having ‘Mission to Moscow’ running in the background is the PERFECT backing track.

Literally if it wasnt for the frankly Jaw Dropping (non endearing) perforamances from Christopher Lee and Ron Pearlman. This would have been a total and utter waste of my time, and probably the worst comedy i’d have seen in the last 15 years. Mission to Moscow blows.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/police-academy-mission-to-moscow/

Six entries into the ‘Police Academy’ franchise, and I began to ask myself profound questions; ‘Who am I?’, ‘Why did I choose to subject myself to this way of living?’, ‘Do people truely understand suffering?’…The list goes on, but my patience does not.

This time around a shady crime lord is orchestrating a mass crimewave of the city utilising henchment with high tech gadgets to pilfer valuables. The mayors at his wits end, and so; he calls for the best, and the best? Is the ever decreasing circle of Police Academy veterans who could be bothered to turn up. Hilarity ensues…

And thats basically it, Like the last film, this is less a coherent 3 act plot and more a series of really bad comedy sketches vaguely linked together, 90% of the film is just Harris getting pranked or our cops wandering around suburban locations watching people do things.

This one in particular is weird, our ‘known’ cops turn up, but barely get any comedy material, they drift in and out of the film frequently, like the writers forgot the characters were even in the movie. Not ONE of them gets a good laugh, and…again; this script feels less like an actual plot and more like a series of sketch shows from someone who watched ‘The Naked Gun’ for the first time, and wanted to do that with non of the talent or scope.

No real big grand finale showdown either this time…they reveal who the crime lord is and…thats about it.

Even the cine and direction was kind of bland by this point and its clear they absolutely should have stopped two movies back…but here we are.

I think I marginally prefer Police Academy 6 over Police Academy 5…because they at least PRETEND that the film isnt an excuse to steal money from the studio to go on a two week all paid vacation…But even so…this was VERY thin on the ground and a real slog to get through at 80 minutes long…DEFINITELY not recommended.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/police-academy-6-city-under-siege/

This was…barely a movie honestly; in fact, i’d go as far as to say that im pretty convinced the producers behind this entry somehow managed to convince the studio that they were VERY serious about making the ‘next exciting entry’ in the ‘Police Academy’ franchise…when in reality they just wanted money to take the cast and crew on a two weeks paid vacation to Miami. And then after filming the non stop party for 13 days, on day 14..while somewhat hungover, they shot 20 minutes of the LIGHTEST plotting they could, to slot inbetween the home movie footage.

The Plot? Harris finds out that Lassard is one year past his mandatory retirement, and sets in motion the process to retire him so that Harris can become the new chief. This involves some key (affordable) members of the previous ‘Police Academy) series alongside a couple of new faces flying down to Miami with Lassard and Harris to see the chiefs time out with a bang…

Oh! and theres a jostling A-plot involving a group of bumbling thieves who’ve stolen some very expensive jewels with the intent to sell them on for profit, who end up getting their luggage mixed up with Lassards, leading to several comedy hijyx where the bandits try to get their stolen goods back from the cops.

The rot appears to be setting in with this entry. The vast majority of it feels like bad improv mixed in with stale jokes that stopped landing about 3 movies ago. It all feels very gentle and inconsiquential. Why did I bother watching this movie? I have no idea. Its kind of nice to hang around with some of these characters again, but by this point the big hitters arnt even here, and the cast from the original films still with us barely get any screen time or anything really of substance to do.

Its a sloppy, unfunny and overly rushed script thats badly paced, isnt interested in trying to establish new growth for the new Characters who are introduced, and feels very much like a series running on fumes…The fact that there were 2 more written after this one GRAVELY concerns me.

Add to this that on a technical level, the films middling at best, shakey unfocussed camera work, lazy shot structures, mixed to poor editing. The grand finale feels positively underwhelming not just because its not as grand as previous entries, but because they film it in such a way that sucks the fun RIGHT out of it. Its very safe, and VERY beige as a viewing experience.

All I can say? is im glad the cast got a good holiday out of this. But I feel sorry for every Schmuck who paid full price to see this back in the day, and im only grateful that this film cost me (approx) 75p (roughly $1) to pick up in the boxset that I did. It’ll be a LONG time before I watch this 86 minute waste of time, thats for sure.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/police-academy-5-assignment-miami-beach/

I’m told the decline in Police Academy movies starts from this point onwards, and Police Academy 4 is definitely trending that way.

In this outing even less of the core cast are back, this time supporting on a newinitiative the C.O.P programme ‘Citizens On Patrol’ the scheme aims to train citizens and business owners on Police procedure in order to help support the community and actual law enforcement who are stretched to their limits…something something yadda yadda members of the public verses a money laundering criminal gang.

Again, like the last one…I just kind of had to as why this was made at all? When you film is living or dying based on the actions of Bobcat Goldthwaite something has gone dreadfully wrong.

Here the humours largely dead, Goldthwaite gets the biggest laughs, but I don’t even crack a smile for this film. Its an hour and 23, but feels like 2 hours. The regular cast have barely anything to do, the humours dropped off significantly and the new cast are iffy at best.

I could tell you how this film opens, I could tell you how it ended…everything between those two points might as well have been wiped from my brain. Its just endless sketch comedy with rubbish punchlines IF there’s a punchline.

Again, like the last film, this was inoffensive…I didnt HATE it. But there’s just…absolutely no real reason to watch this one. It’s a dull and plodding mediocre comedy with a handful of good moments, largely carried by brand recognition. And it’ll likely be a while before I revisit this one

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/police-academy-4-citizens-on-patrol/

The ‘revenge of the nerds’ification of this series really needs to be studied. Police Academy 3 is…well, I can’t honestly say it’s a ‘new’ movie, because…itreally isnt. What this is is elements from the first 2 Police Academy movies, polished up and slammedtogether in some kind of unholy union…and it works…but I just spent most of the credits asking myself ‘why’?

The plot? There’s budget cuts happening in the city and it’s finally hit the force! With our beloved Police Academy and a rival school under heavy evaluation, and one of the academies for the chop!

As such, our old friends from the force are pulled back to the Academy to train te next generation of cop and wouldn’t you know it! Is mainly bit part actors who played members of the public from Police Academy 1 and 2! But when the rival Academy sends two saboteurs in to try and wreck up the place, it’ll take more than some funny voice effects to save the day!

And again…the only question I really had was…Why? Technically, id put this on par with the last film, and I will say that it’s consistent across the full runtime on pacing and jokes. But a lot of the humour here is retrod ground, and while I will say that the elements pinched from the last two movies are much more polished here, it doesn’t make the comedy better. In some cases it makes it worse.

I didnt really laugh at all through this film. It had good intentions and was a fun enough watch. But it isnt really trying to do anything new, and making something work smoother and time better doesnt always mean it IS better than when it was originally done.

Oh and the racism is back again more than the last film…huzzah!…

Ultimately, I’d say if you’d seen the first two, this is fine, but non essential. If you only have time to see one Police Academy film. This covers the bestow what’s come before it…and I don’t say that as a compliment.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/police-academy-3-back-in-training/

A short and sweet one from me with this one. Having been a bit unimpressed with the first police academy movie, I didnt exactly have high hopes for the 2nd outing. But I do feel going i to this one with lower expectations did so what improve the experience.

Some time has passed and our grads from the first film (the ones the studio could afford) are back and working lower level police and police adjacent jobs. But the city is in peril! With crime at an all time high, the mayor has put the police on notice, 30 days to improve the safety of the city, or the chief of police will be fired. Unluckily, the chief is brothers with the owner of police academy. And on asking g him to provides some ‘young blood’ to he,p reinvigorate the force. The chief ends up with WAY more than he bargained for!

I do think really have a lot to say on this one. It’s the same shape and for, technically as the first Police Academy. But the bigger budget allows a few more grander set pieces and stunts which pull the production up a bit.

Humour wise, its a lot more focussed. Nowhere near as scattershot with the gags, and the quality of the material is higher too, with at least a handful of moments where I actually laughed, which is a step up from the last movie.

Unfortunately, I don’t feel the final act was as strong as the first film, the gags in the last 20 minutes are thin on the ground, and lack the focus of the front two thirds of the movie…it felt a bit rushed.

Of the two, id choose this one over the first, purely for it’s j provements and consistency. I felt the big thing missing from the first film was these bizarre characters interacting with normal members of the public, and this film delivers that in spades. I still didnt outright LOVE this film. But I think it got more right this time than the last film got wrong…I probably still wouldn’t recommend this one though.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/police-academy-2-their-first-assignment/

Many things can be said about the Polonia Brothers, but it cant be said that they never tried to think a little outside of the box when it came to their work together. The original Feeders was a bizarre ultra low budget tongue in cheek sci fi movie, that felt like the cinematic equivilent of an old banger of a car that was held together with prayer and bubble gum, that could collapse any minute, but had a distinct charm and charisma to it that made it lovable, if not a bit underplayed.

Well; a few years later the Polonias returned again with a sequel. And whereas most film makers might want to continue to develop the plot they’ve already created, maybe try to ground the work a bit more with some additional lore or deeper context. These guys decided ‘Hey! y’know what our killer alien sci fi movie needs to REALLY kick it up a notch? CHRISTMAS.’

And so, we have ‘Feeders 2: Slay Bells’, and its a film with a plot somehow even MORE out there than the first entry.

The plots a bit of a weird one, becuase we pick up with John Mcbrides Derek, whos now being interrigated after the events of the first ‘Feeders’ movie…But; this is totally unconnected from the actual FILM. Hes just here to essentially fully recap the first movie in dribs and drabs across the runtime, essentially cutting in to add context or background where its appropriate. Beyond this? he has absolutely nothing to do with this movie.

Instead it’s Mark Polonias time to shine as Alan Parker, husband and father of the Parker Family, a lovely little suburban household just about getting by, and as LUCK would have it, its December 23rd! ALMOST Christmas. and the family are busy decorating the tree, wrapping presents, and getting festive…When, seemingly at random; THE FEEDERS ARE BACK! and this time they’re planning a full scale invasion! some recon feeders beam down from their mother ship and set up camp in the Parkers basement. and while Alan spots the mothership in the sky on the night of their landing, he writes it off as a helicopter, before returning to bed.

And from here the film kind of forks into two plots, one being the Parkers prepping for Christmas, including Alan working and getting grief from his boss, while also having the occasional unsettling vision. While the Feeders begin to explore the houses in the neighbourhood, and well…they feed on the residents.

This goes on for about 50 minutes of the hour and 13 runtime, until late on Christmas eve Night, when the feeders attempt an attack on the Parkers! leading to all out christmas warfare between humans and aliens…AND SANTA…Independence day showed the earth under attack from aliens. Feeders 2 will make you FEEL it.

And basically? this is a vast improvement over ‘Feeders’ in almost every capacity. and I think the biggest reason for that is down to one simple factor, they decided to film across two indoor locations for the vast majority of the film over shooting outdoors.

This had a LOT of benefits, filming indoors means they had a lot more control over the conditions of the shoot, meaning we get a LOT more creative lighting and colour work that looks fabulous, more coherent and staged direction, thats open to experimentation, while also clearly trying to produce something somewhat professional, the cinematography is much more thought out and staged. with even the occasional nice tracking shot and experimentation thrown into the mix.

The edit is a LOT sharper than the first film, and the introduction of more computer generated effects that, in my opinion, are handled a lot better this time around, help really bring a richer and bigger budgeted effect to the film. Dont get me wrong, this is still unmistakably SOV, with the rickety-ness that comes with it. But this is upper tier SOV in my opinion, a stronger work that is much more standout that your typical ‘Two teens running around with a camera in the woods shooting cool things’ fare…

The script is probably the only thing thats truely a bit wobbly here, and the main reason for that is the scourge of SOV…filler. the core plot of the film is daffy in the best possible way, totally eccentric and a littered with nuggets of genuinely bizarre visuals and narrative points. But in amongst the good, is a whole HEAP of people having inane discussions, random wandering around, and scenes that feel repetative and arnt particularly that interesting. it just about takes the film over to feature runtime. But the end result is a bit of a mixed bag. I adore the more bizarre moments of on screen chaos and the wonderful dialogue moments. But im less enthused about discussions about christmas presents, or extended scenes from the Feeders POV of them wandering around a garage.

Mercifully; there is more good than bad here. The performances are the perfect kind of dry and awkward to appeal to’bad movie’ hunters and the acidically cheerful christmas midi soundtrack crammed into this thing really helps tip it fully into the kind of manic, goofy self aware christmas sci fi horror film that I never truely knew I needed.

‘Feeders 2’ wont win over the ‘real’ movie crowd, but in many ways it isnt a film for them, this is a lumpy, messy, but quite high quality for SOV little movie for fans of the bizarre and inexplicable. I really had a soft spot for it, and could easily see myself revisiting it over the festive period. and I highly encourage you to check it out this christmas too if you havent seen it already. No need to watch the first film because about 80% of it is recycled into this movie in one way or another.

Its a hoot of a film, thats more than earned its reputation. and is definitely worth your time.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/feeders-2-slay-bells/