Trio, Me-o, My-O

The barrage of movies taken in continues for me. There are another three movies to report on, one of which is not a VHS tape. It's a novel experience to watch a movie via the latest technology (although it's now arguable whether that can fairly be said of Blu-Ray discs) when you proceed to watch two more on technology that was surpassed something like fifteen years ago. The picture and sound may be better, but is the film?

Finally I've seen "Gangster Squad", which I'm sure I meant to watch soon after I saw "Public Enemies". Instead it came a long time later, but if a comparison must be made, it's Gangster Squad that comes out looking better. I would have said a lot better, but then I watched more than the first half hour or so. The film, while gorgeous to look out throughout, and while featuring some really fun performances and moments, just is not there all the way story-wise.

I followed that up with "Aces: Iron Eagle 3" on the VCR. It's a pretty watchable film. Louis Gossett, Jr (who had to assume he'd be making better films than this after winning an Oscar) reprises his role as Chappy, an increasingly elderly Air Force colonel, this time avenging the death of an old friend by assembling a crew of even older comrades to defeat a drug lord, who has enlisted Chappy's own commanding officer in his operation. Other memorable characters include a streetwise kid who takes surprisingly well to armed combat and the sister of the fallen friend, who is played by Rachel McLish. She's heavily promoted in the trailer as a Playboy Playmate of the Year, but remains dressed throughout.

Closing out the trio was the Chuck Norris film (I guess) "Sidekicks". I had heard for years about how amazing this film was, and it had been sitting in my collection for a long time waiting for me to develop the interest. Finally I did, and the big thing with every Norris film is to see just how the film manages to hide the enormous liability that he represents. In this film, as in most of his films, the solution is just to not have him be in it very much. The lead, a young asthmatic boy is not the worst, and veteran martial arts film staple Mako is really very good. Richard Moll and Joe Piscopo likewise do their thing.

I'm now in the high 40s on that backlog of unwatched tapes, and progress remains steady (as you see). I figure that if that remains constant, I'll finally be done with it in just a few weeks. I don't really need to hit zero. I do always want a few tapes to watch, for myself and for my movie nights, but I also want to be sure that new acquisitions need not cool their heels waiting behind a pile that I feel I must watch first. Such are my problems.