These Are Media Things

Tag: Movies

  • The Top 10 Worst CGI In Movies

    Since the dawn of computers, movies have used them to generate images. This happens because they are either too lazy to use practical effects or they are just making impossible things. These 10 movies have the worst CGI in the world of movies. But all of them are better than Eli Roth’s movie Ice Cream Man. Even the worst CGI is better than the use of generative AI in filmmaking.

    #10 Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2010)

    The birds are gifs

    I introduced Birdemic: Shock and Terror to my children because apparently part of being a parent is exposing the next generation to important works of cinema. My son, Chicken, was genuinely scared by the attacking birds. He is a pathetic coward. My daughter, Alpha Dora, took a different approach and hit the television with a clothes hanger.

    Calling what happens in Birdemic “CGI” feels disrespectful to computers. The birds look like someone found an animated eagle GIF on a GeoCities page, copied and pasted it forty times, and slapped the resulting flock directly over the footage. They don’t interact with the environment. They barely interact with physics. There’s no convincing lighting, shadows, or attempt to make these creatures appear as though they occupy the same physical universe as the actors. Alpha Dora apparently understood the assignment better than anyone: while other children might hide behind the couch from menacing bird gifs, my child looked upon these digital abominations, grabbed the nearest available weapon, and attempted to physically defend our household from the visual effects. She saw the CGI in Birdemic and tried to kill it. I can’t criticize that decision.

    #9 – The Lawnmower Man (1992)

    I cut grass

    In the summer of 1992, I was an unemployed 12-year-old, so I did what any ambitious child would do: I started mowing people’s lawns for money. Naturally, when I saw a movie called The Lawnmower Man, I assumed it was a training video. The CGI was absolute dogshit, but that didn’t concern me. Employment training videos always look like shit. I just figured the floating chrome heads, primitive polygons, and psychedelic virtual-reality sex were somehow important information that OSHA needed me to know before operating a Craftsman.

    Unfortunately, The Lawnmower Man left me woefully unprepared for the actual lawn-care industry. Customers became disturbed when I showed up with a lawnmower and an entire VR rig. They became considerably more upset when I started shooting chimpanzees. Apparently you’re just supposed to cut the grass, collect your twenty bucks, and leave. Nobody told me that. Pierce Brosnan certainly didn’t tell me that. It was a terrible summer. I made no money, the chimpanzee situation got completely out of hand, and the CGI still looked like somebody had given a Windows 3.1 screensaver a $10 million budget.

    #8 – Mortal Kombat: Annihilation

    This is a shot from a movie that exists. I don’t know what’s happening.

    My daughter Alpha Dora is very interested in the martial sport of mortal combat and quite active on the youth MMA circuit. She recently won the Tri-State MMA Championship in the Girls 8-to-10 division, although her victory became somewhat controversial after she tore the heart out of her competitor. When horrified officials asked where she learned such a move, Alpha Dora proudly explained, “I learned it by watching Mortal Kombat: Annihilation.” As a parent, this was deeply embarrassing. Not because of the heart thing. Kids get competitive. I was embarrassed because now everyone knows I let my child watch Mortal Kombat: Annihilation.

    Worse, it’s absolutely terrible instructional material. The CGI creatures look like unfinished PlayStation assets, the environments resemble screensavers, and the climactic animality battle is so spectacularly unconvincing that no responsible youth MMA organization should recognize any of its techniques. If Alpha Dora is going to rip out another competitor’s vital organs, I want her learning proper form—not studying a movie where the visual effects department couldn’t convincingly render a goddamn dragon. Mortal Kombat: Annihilation isn’t merely terrible CGI. It’s bad training for America’s next generation of youth MMA champions.

    #7 – Son of the Mask (2005)

    This man is evil and nothing can be done about it

    I never wanted to watch Son of the Mask. Unfortunately, one afternoon Jamie Kennedy entered our home carrying a gun and a DVD of Son of the Mask and informed us that nobody had appreciated “his masterpiece” in theaters, so we were going to appreciate it now. He even captured our miniature pinscher, Bark, and painted him green while forcing us through the movie. The experience was horrifying—and then the CGI started. The digital baby looks like an escaped medical simulation, the cartoon physics make everyone appear boneless, and the CGI dog somehow looks less convincing than my actual dog after Jamie Kennedy painted him green.

    When the movie ended, we smiled and told Jamie Kennedy it was wonderful. What else could we do? The man owns all the police. He’s a Kennedy, after all. He eventually left satisfied, and Bark was physically unharmed, although he remained green for several baths and still becomes visibly nervous whenever someone opens a DVD case. I learned two important lessons that day: Son of the Mask contains some of the most hideous CGI ever committed to film, and Jamie Kennedy takes criticism extremely poorly.

    #6 – Spawn (1997)

    Did Image comics ever make anything good?

    I was a terrible person in 1997. One afternoon, bored and apparently operating without anything resembling a conscience, I beat up a bunch of sixth graders and took their money. I spent my ill-gotten fortune on many different drugs and seventeen pounds of Red Vines, then headed to the theater with a gang of vicious sex workers to see Spawn. We were all spectacularly high, which turned out to be the optimal viewing condition, because Spawn has some genuinely cool practical makeup surrounded by CGI that looks like somebody tried to render Hell on a Commodore 64.

    And then we actually go to Hell. Thousands of identical demon soldiers cover the landscape like somebody discovered copy-and-paste, while Malebolgia resembles the final boss from a PC game packaged free with a box of cereal. The only way this CGI becomes remotely convincing is through an aggressively altered state of consciousness; the sort where you’ve completely lost track of reality and are no longer entirely certain whether you’re watching Spawn or experiencing a catastrophic neurological event. The only way this movie becomes tolerable is when you are snorting cocaine through a Red Vine off of a woman’s posterior. When the credits rolled, I knew two things: the CGI was fucking terrible, and I really needed to make some significant changes in my life

    #5 – The Scorpion King (2002)

    I think this is a thing that happened in the movie. I don’t know.

    I remember watching The Mummy Returns in 2001 and having a perfectly good time right up until The Rock appeared as that ridiculous CGI scorpion monstrosity. Apparently someone at Universal looked at one of the most hilariously unconvincing digital creatures ever put in a major studio movie and said, “Give that beefy man his own movie.” So when The Scorpion King arrived the following year, some friends and I prepared appropriately: we spent an entire Saturday day-drinking, got thrown out of several bars for our increasingly inebriated behavior, and eventually wandered into a movie theater.

    We somehow finished two large bottles of Jack Daniel’s during the movie and, according to witnesses, made quite a scene. I don’t remember the plot. I don’t remember leaving the theater. I don’t remember being arrested. I simply woke up the next morning in county jail with a pounding headache and one crystal-clear memory: the terrible CGI in The Scorpion King. Think about that. My brain discarded an entire night of drunken criminal misadventure, yet preserved those shitty digital effects in perfect detail.

    #4 – Green Lantern (2011)

    It sucks

    My daughter Alpha Dora absolutely loves Ryan Reynolds in the Deadpool movies. She wants to be Deadpool when she grows up. I made the mistake of mentioning that Reynolds had starred in another superhero movie before Deadpool. I didn’t think this information posed any danger because surely no respectable streaming service would still carry Green Lantern. Curse you, HBO Max!! Alpha Dora found it. She watched it. And she witnessed Ryan Reynolds flying around space in a glowing CGI onesie with a digital mask that looks like someone circled his eyes with a radioactive green Sharpie.

    My fiancée and I awoke in the middle of the night to find Alpha Dora standing over our bed holding a butcher knife. She didn’t attack us. She simply stared down at me and asked, “Why? Why did Green Lantern happen? Why was the CGI so bad? Why did you fail to set parental controls on your HBO Max account?” I didn’t have an answer. No parent does. All I could do was apologize and promise to be more responsible. Parental controls aren’t just there to protect children from sex and violence. Sometimes they’re there to make sure your eight-year-old never has to see Ryan Reynolds wearing a suit that looks like it was rendered by a Mountain Dew commercial.

    #3 – Die Another Day (2002)

    Don’t do this

    Remember when I woke up in county jail after The Scorpion King with the worst hangover of my life? Well, everyone knows the cure is a little hair of the dog that bit you. So I ate some dog hair, picked up a few bottles of booze, befriended some drifters, and drunkenly wandered into another movie theater. Not the theater where I’d seen The Scorpion King, obviously. I was banned from that one. We chose Die Another Day because James Bond was the guy from GoldenEye on the Nintendo 64, which is the greatest video game ever made, so how could this possibly go wrong? Then Bond started driving an invisible car through an ice palace and parasurfing across a CGI tidal wave that looked like ass.

    And suddenly, through the alcohol-induced fog, I recognized Pierce Brosnan. THAT SON OF A BITCH! He was the scientist from The Lawnmower Man. The man whose shitty CGI training video had taught me absolutely nothing about mowing lawns and ruined my entire summer of 1992. Eleven years of suppressed trauma came roaring back as I watched his digital stunt double surf across an avalanche of visual-effects diarrhea. I became violently angry. There was shouting. There were accusations. Security became involved. I was subsequently banned from another movie theater. At this point, bad CGI wasn’t merely ruining movies for me. It was systematically ruining my life.

    #2 – The Mummy Returns (2001)

    Just because.

    #1 – Cats (2019)

    Sacrifice them all to the Dark Lord

    For the longest time, I believed cats were simply the furry little creatures I regularly sacrificed to the Dark Lord. Then one day, while scrolling through Netflix with the family, we discovered Cats. Apparently it’s based on a Broadway musical. Who the fuck is making plays about cats? We watched it, and every frame presented some fresh digital obscenity. Human faces float inside furry humanoid bodies. Their hands are sometimes paws, except when they’re hands. Their proportions constantly feel wrong. My daughter Alpha Dora had to be physically restrained from attacking the television again. My son Chicken, meanwhile, was delighted by the movie because that kid sucks. How did my seed create a human being who finds James Corden entertaining? Somewhere along the bloodline, something has gone terribly wrong.

    Eventually, some horrible CGI beast started singing about horrible CGI trains, and that’s the last thing I remember. I awoke the following morning soaked in blood, standing inside an animal shelter and muttering incoherently about Lawnmower Men, Scorpion Kings, and The Mummy Returns. Nobody would tell me exactly what had happened, but I was immediately and permanently banned from the shelter. Still, there was a silver lining: at least I wasn’t banned from another movie theater. That’s Cats: a film with CGI so catastrophically wrong that watching it apparently activated twenty-seven years of accumulated visual-effects trauma and sent me on a fugue-state rampage.

  • Ten Things About the Movie “Ballerina” (2025)

    Ten Things About the Movie “Ballerina” (2025)

    I went with my daughter Dora to see the movie Ballerina. My daughter hates ballet but she is a girl and is supposed to like it. I will force the gender role upon her and make her watch ballet. I will tell her all the time that she does not want to be a fighter, she is a GIRL and must do ballet. So I made her watch the movie Ballerina. She very much liked the movie, and so did I. But this movie was not about ballet.

    #1 – Ana de Armas is an Entire Meal

    I believe that her sweat would taste more sweet than salty… because of the ballet powers.

    Ana de Armas is the movie. She doesn’t just carry the narrative; she straps it to her back, pirouettes through gunfire, and serves looks so lethal they could kill on contact. She is the everything of this movie. Other people exist, but Ana de Armas sells this like it’s Shakespeare with a switchblade. Honestly, if the Academy handed out Oscars for “Best Actress in a Franchise Spinoff Whose Plot is Held Together by Lip Gloss,” she’d already have two.

    #2 – The Plot is there…. somewhere.

    I wanted Swan Lake but instead got the artsy tale of a Murder Woman

    You remember Rooney from John Wick 3, right? No? That’s fine, neither did the writers until they fished out a napkin with “ballerina assassin revenge arc???” scribbled on it and said, “MAKE MOVIE!” Imagine if someone choreographed a ballet while blackout drunk on absinthe. That’s the plot. It’s revenge, again, but with more eyeliner and fewer dogs. They tried to connect it to the John Wick mythos—bless their hearts—but it’s more like a fever dream in heels. There’s a backstory, but it’s whispered, mumbled, and shot through fog filters until you start wondering if you’re the one who got shot in the head. Still, the vibe is vibey, and let’s be honest—you weren’t here for a deep dive into Russo-Romanian assassin cults anyway. You just wanted to see Ana de Armas’ sexy sweat.

    #3 – There are scenes of action

    Her muscles have tone

    This is where Ballerina absolutely flexes. The choreography is so meticulously timed and fluid it feels like the camera’s dancing with her. You get hand-to-hand combat with ballerina grace, bullets flying in perfect rhythm, and the kind of violent elegance that made my daughter shout, “Forget about ballet, I crave krav maga!” Pure visual poetry—if your poetry has a body count. I wish there were more actual ballet dancing because the music of Tchaikovsky is more pleasant than bullet sounds.

    #4 – The Ballet School is Murder Hogwarts

    I posted the same image again because it is a very nice image.

    If Hogwarts had ballet, human trafficking, and a kill-or-be-killed final exam, it’d be this place. The Ruska Roma return to remind us that the John Wick universe’s HR policies are nonexistent. Every orphan is a potential assassin. It’s all style and menace, like a Soviet fever dream choreographed by Satan. You do not get a gold star here—just scars and maybe a cyanide pill in your pointe shoes.

    #5 – Keanu Reeves Briefly Appears

    He is existing like a divorced Dad picking up his franchise for visitation

    Saint Keanu appears like a wistful action ghost, mutters some backstory, does the brooding thing, and then vanishes back into whatever haunted dog park Wick lives in now. It’s more “cameo” than “crossover.” He wanders in looking tired, haunted, and vaguely unsure if he’s in Ballerina or a new Matrix sequel. He gives Rooney the usual Wick-verse cryptic pep talk—something like, “You know what you must do”—and then vanishes back into the shadows like a majestic, gun-toting raccoon.

    #6 – Norman Reedus Appears

    This week’s article is sponsored by AMC+’s hit series The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon. Did you ever wonder what happened to Norman Reedus’s gritty character, Daryl Dixon, at the conclusion of The Walking Dead? No? Me neither. Apparently, he went to France. Yeah, seriously, this good old boy is just going around shooting zombies and going all “oui oui monsieur” in Paris. You can watch both seasons of this show streaming on AMC+. What the fuck is Daryl Dixon doing in France? I dunno. What the fuck is Norman Reedus doing in Ballerina? I don’t know.

    #7 – Ballerina looks expensive but feels hollow

    Every single frame is dripping with rich color grading, slick lighting, and that high-art-meets-high-body-count aesthetic. Every shot has the delightful scene of Ana de Armas’s wonderful body sweat. The cinematography is so pretty you almost don’t notice how emotionally hollow it all is. There’s a difference between slow burn and just plain cold, and Ballerina occasionally falls into the latter. You’ll find yourself admiring the shot composition while asking, “Do I actually care what happens next?” Probably not. But at least it’s gorgeous.

    #8 – The script could have used a rewrite (or three)

    Speaking of three… here is that image for a third time. Just look at how toned her back is. I’m jealous.

    The dialogue often sounds like it was translated from Russian to English to Tumblr poetry and then back again. Characters drop lines like “Pain teaches us grace” with the kind of dramatic weight usually reserved for middle school theater. Monologues are cryptic, conversations are stilted, and when someone actually explains something, it’s either nonsense or it contradicts the last cryptic thing someone else said. It’s the John Wick universe, so sure, we’re not expecting Aaron Sorkin, but could we at least get complete sentences? Every time a character spoke, my daughter shouted at the screen, “Less talky! More shooty!”

    #9 – It’s Ferocious! Feminine! Flawed!

    Shooty shooty snowbunny!

    There’s something undeniably refreshing about a revenge thriller soaked in femininity. Rooney is graceful but ruthless, soft-spoken but savage. The pink hues, ballet motifs, and soft-focus moments don’t make her any less dangerous—they enhance her rage. This isn’t “girl power” in the slogan-on-a-Target-shirt sense. It’s raw, bloody catharsis wrapped in satin. But the movie sometimes mistakes ambiguity for depth, and not even Ana’s tear-filled stares can always sell it. My daughter Dora is a girl and she liked this movie, so this movie must be for girls.

    #10 – It’s Worth Watching—But Lower Your Expectations Like You’re Holding a Gun with a Broken Safety

    Her thighs are just solid muscle. It’s amazing. I bet she could kill a motherfucker with those thighs.

    This isn’t a genre-defining masterpiece, but it is a visually captivating, female-fronted action flick that deserves to exist. You’ll get style, spectacle, and one hell of a performance from Ana de Armas. Just don’t go in expecting to leave with your brain intact. Think of it as the cinematic equivalent of a glitter-covered switchblade: pretty, deadly, but not exactly practical.

    FINAL THOUGHTS

    My daughter may give this movie a 6 out of 5 because Dora lives for violence. She has killed before. I give this movie a 3.5 out of 5. It slays. It stumbles. It sashays away.

  • The Top 10 Chuck Norris Movies

    Chuck Norris is the action man. He is ugly like dog farts and just as deadly as dog farts. He uses his martial arts mastery with a tough-guy screen presence that made him one of the biggest stars of the history of the world. His films are packed with brutal roundhouse kicks, over-the-top roundhouse kicks, and memorable one-liners delivered with a roundhouse kick. Whether he’s kicking at terrorists, drug lords, or supernatural forces, Norris always delivers. Here are his top 10 films, along with my personal take on what makes them great.

    #10 – Hellbound (1994)

    The one where he roundhouse kicks ghosts

    Unlike most Chuck Norris movies, Hellbound takes Chuck Norris directly into the hell of Hell. He plays a Chicago cop investigating a murder connected to an ancient demonic force, which eventually results in Chuck doing what Chuck does best: kicking things. He kicks criminals. He kicks demons. He kicks supernatural entities that probably haven’t been kicked in several thousand years. Eventually he’s basically fighting the goddamned Devil, which is a fascinating tactical error on Satan’s part because if there’s one human being you don’t want arriving in Hell with his boots on, it’s Chuck Norris. The supernatural stuff makes Hellbound a wonderfully strange detour in his filmography, but don’t worry—beneath all the demons and ancient evil, this is still a movie about Chuck Norris kicking his way into our hearts.

    I first saw Hellbound on late-night cable when I was a kid, and I remember that night vividly. Mommy and Daddy were fighting again. Daddy had been drinking because he’d discovered Mommy was sleeping with another neighbor, Mommy was using meth again, dishes were breaking, and I kept turning up the television because the sound of Chuck Norris violence was better than the sound of real violence bouncing off the thin walls of our little trailer. The movie ended around the time the nice woman from Social Services arrived to take me away. I remember sitting beside her and asking whether she ever had to fight demons. Then I asked if Chuck Norris could be my foster dad. She said no. I cried. Anyway, Hellbound is a fun little supernatural action movie and an interesting change of pace for Chuck Norris. Worth a watch.

    #9 – Code of Silence (1985)

    The one where he is a quiet cop

    In Code of Silence, Chuck Norris is once again a tough Chicago cop, only this time he’s battling organized crime and corruption within his own police department instead of the goddamned Devil. He’s also much quieter because after the events of Hellbound, Chuck took a sacred vow never to speak of the demons he encountered. Mobsters try to make him talk. Corrupt cops try to make him talk. People shoot at him. Nothing works. Chuck Norris will take the secrets of Hell to his grave. Fortunately, a vow of silence doesn’t prevent you from roundhouse-kicking somebody through a window, and the movie delivers plenty of excellent action, including a remote-controlled machine-gun robot in the finale. It’s one of Chuck’s most well-rounded films—or, more appropriately, one of his most well-roundhouse-kicked.

    This was one of the first Chuck Norris movies I ever saw. I was still an infant, suckling milk from Mommy’s breast while Code of Silence played on television. Her milk was remarkably sweet and creamy, a flavor I still remember whenever I go to Shake Shack and pay nine fucking dollars for a vanilla shake. Normally feeding time demanded my complete attention, but I became mesmerized by Chuck Norris. I pulled away from the nipple, looked into my mother’s eyes and said, “Mommy, Code of Silence demonstrates an unusual degree of restraint for a mid-’80s action vehicle. Andrew Davis’s direction is assured, the pacing is economical, and Norris delivers one of the strongest dramatic performances of his career.” Mommy stared down at me in absolute horror and whispered, “What the fuck?” Then I returned to the breast. Anyway, if you want a more grounded Chuck Norris movie, Code of Silence is a must-watch.

    #8 – Nonconsensual Vengance (1982)

    The one in Kong Hong

    Set in Hong Kong, Nonconsensual Vengeance stars Chuck Norris as a casino security man whose boss gets murdered, making him the only employee in the history of employment to genuinely give a shit that somebody killed his boss. Most people would hear the news and think, “That’s terrible. Does this mean we’re still having the staff meeting at three?” Not Chuck. Chuck has tremendous respect for the corporate ladder, and if you murder somebody above him on the organizational chart, he will personally hunt you down and kill the motherfuckers responsible. The problem is that none of these people have consented to Chuck’s vengeance. He asks politely, they refuse, and Chuck is therefore forced to administer the vengeance nonconsensually. It’s right there in the title. Against a gorgeous neon-soaked Hong Kong backdrop, Chuck proceeds to roundhouse-kick his way through the local criminal population because nobody fucks with middle management on Chuck Norris’s watch.

    I discovered Nonconsensual Vengeance completely by accident. I was walking home one afternoon when a car slowed beside me and somebody shouted, “KONTRIBUTOR SUCKS!” before throwing a rock that struck me directly in the head. I became disoriented, stumbled into an alley and collapsed face-first onto a VHS copy of Nonconsensual Vengeance. I took this as a message from God. Or possibly a symptom of the concussion. Either way, I watched it that night and loved the raw, brutal fights and the Hong Kong setting, which gives the familiar American action formula an entirely different flavor. It’s like somebody served you an egg roll with a cheeseburger. Does that make cultural or culinary sense? No. Did I have a significant head injury when I came up with the comparison? Yes. Anyway, Nonconsensual Vengeance isn’t Chuck’s most famous movie, but it’s a hidden gem that deserves more attention.

    #7 – The Delta Force (1986)

    The one with a delta force

    Based on completely real events, The Delta Force is a documentary about one of America’s greatest heroes: elite commando Officer Delta Force, played in historical reenactments by Chuck Norris. When terrorists hijack a passenger plane, Officer Delta Force and his fellow Delta Forces are dispatched to rescue the hostages using all the sophisticated counterterrorism techniques available to the United States military in 1986: machine guns, roundhouse kicks and motorcycles with fucking rocket launchers attached to them. Some historians have questioned the documentary’s accuracy, particularly the motorcycle rockets, but those historians weren’t there. Chuck Norris was. The Delta Force remains an important historical document about the brave men who protected America during a dangerous period when apparently every international crisis could be resolved by putting more weapons on a dirt bike.

    This movie was a staple in our house because my dad was the actual Officer Delta Force whose life inspired the film. Most evenings Daddy would get drunk, pull The Delta Force off the VHS shelf and watch Chuck Norris reenact his greatest military accomplishments. Sometimes he would become very emotional and cry when the terrorists killed his friends. Other times he’d point at the television and angrily explain that Chuck was holding the rocket-launcher motorcycle wrong. Those are some of my fondest childhood memories. Daddy eventually went to prison for reasons unrelated to his service and died there a few years ago after being shanked during a dispute over several cigarettes. I like to imagine that somewhere up in Heaven, he’s riding that rocket motorcycle again. RIP The Delta Force.

    #6 – Hitman (1991)

    The one where he hits a man

    In this darker entry in the Chuck Norris canon, Chuck plays a man who gets hit so hard that he dies. But death cannot stop Chuck Norris. He returns from beyond the grave as The Hit Man, a vengeful spirit whose unfinished business is apparently hitting every man responsible for his death. And there are a lot of men. Fortunately, there is also a lot of hitting. Chuck goes undercover inside a criminal organization, identifies the various men who require hitting, and then systematically hits the absolute fuck out of them. It’s considerably darker and more violent than the average Norris movie, but the premise is refreshingly straightforward: there are men, and Chuck must hit them. Sometimes cinema doesn’t need to be complicated.

    I first saw The Hitman as a teenager while lying on the floor of the trap house I called home, shooting heroin with several homeless strangers. We were all impressed by the intensity of the hitting when the ghost of a dead child wandered into the room, watched quietly for several minutes and said, “Chuck Norris usually plays the clean-cut hero, but here he’s much more morally ambiguous.” We stopped what we were doing and nodded thoughtfully. The ghost child was right. Chuck was living a morally ambiguous life, and as I looked around at the needles, unconscious strangers and whatever the fuck was growing behind the radiator, I realized that we were living morally ambiguous lives too. Then the ghost child disappeared through a wall and we finished the movie. The Hitman remains criminally underrated and deserves more recognition, especially if you’re a fan of hitting or men.

    #5 Firewalker (1986)

    The one where he fire walks with me

    Firewalker sees Chuck Norris teaming up with Louis Gossett Jr. for a mind-bending adventure filled with mysticism, trippy imagery and a mysterious place called the Red Room. Chuck sits there speaking backwards and waiting patiently for Louis to arrive. Eventually Louis wanders into this ethereal plane and Chuck looks at him and says, “Hey, Louis. Come fire walk with me.” So they do. They walk across some fire together while a little man dances nearby and jazz music plays from nowhere. I don’t completely understand what any of this has to do with treasure hunting, but that’s the beauty of Firewalker. David Lynch refuses to explain everything to you. Sometimes you just have to accept that Chuck Norris exists simultaneously in our world and the Black Lodge.

    I have a soft spot on the top of my head because my skull never completely formed. One afternoon I was at the video store renting Emanuelle 4 for my little foster brother’s birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese when a VHS copy of Firewalker fell from a high shelf and struck me directly in the soft spot. Something happened. I suddenly knew everything. I understood quantum mechanics. I knew what happens after death. I knew exactly how many civilizations exist beyond our solar system and why mankind must never contact them. I also knew that Firewalker is an entertaining change of pace from Chuck Norris’s usual no-nonsense action movies. Unfortunately, a second VHS fell and hit me moments later, causing me to forget almost everything. But I still remember the part about Firewalker, so if you’re looking for something different from Norris, it’s worth a watch.

    #4 Lone Wolf McQuade (1983)

    The one where he is a lonely wolf

    This film is essentially the prototype for Walking Texas Rangers. Norris plays a wolf that doesn’t get along with other wolves and goes alone against a ruthless drug dealing Wolf Lord, played by David “The Choke” Carradine. The final showdown between Norris and Carradine is one of the best martial arts fights of the 80s, making this a standout film in his career.

    This movie is pure Norris, and I love it for that. It has everything you want—fistfights, shootouts, and that classic Texas tough-guy vibe. It’s also the film that directly inspired Walking Texas Rangers, which makes it a key part of his legacy.

    #3 – Good Guys Wear Black (1978)

    The one where he wears black

    Made when Chuck Norris was still just a baby man, Good Guys Wear Black stars young Chuck as a little war orphan in Vietnam who uncovers a deadly government conspiracy. Most war orphans would probably be overwhelmed by this situation, but Chuck Norris had already mastered several forms of martial arts by infancy, so he begins kicking and punching his way toward the truth. The government quickly discovers that covering up a secret military operation is considerably more difficult when a furious baby Chuck Norris is investigating you. The highlight is his legendary slow-motion flying kick through a car windshield, which is especially impressive when you remember that his little baby legs had only recently learned to walk. Other children were learning their ABCs. Chuck was learning how to roundhouse-kick the federal government.

    I first saw Good Guys Wear Black when I was a young adult living in another crowded trap house, where privacy was impossible. Eventually I discovered that the viewing booths at the local porn shop were quiet, comfortable and perfect for watching movies, so instead of using the pornography provided, I’d bring VHS tapes from home and treat the place like my own private screening room. One afternoon I was deeply engrossed in Good Guys Wear Black when a stranger entered my booth and unexpectedly began performing a sex act on me. I probably should have said something, but Chuck was uncovering the government conspiracy and I didn’t want to miss anything. Eventually the stranger finished, politely left, and I continued watching. Five stars for customer service. Anyway, the political-thriller elements give Good Guys Wear Black considerably more substance than your average Chuck Norris action movie.

    #2 – Invasion U.S.A. (1985)

    The one where he invades U.S.A.

    If you love over-the-top ’80s action, Invasion U.S.A. is the ultimate Chuck Norris movie. Chuck plays a one-man invading army who decides to conquer the United States using every weapon at his disposal. The Army can’t stop him. The Navy can’t stop him. The Air Force looks at the situation and says, “Fuck that, that’s Chuck Norris.” America spent hundreds of billions of dollars building the most powerful military on Earth but apparently nobody prepared for the possibility that one bearded karate man might declare war on Florida. Chuck shoots people, blows up buildings and marches steadily across the country like a one-man coup of death. There are so many explosions that by the end I’m not even sure there’s an America left for Chuck to invade. He may technically be president now.

    Invasion U.S.A. is ridiculous, excessive, loud, exhilarating and probably terrible for your heart, which is why it reminds me so much of cocaine. I used to enjoy cocaine and I used to enjoy Invasion U.S.A., and eventually I realized they were basically the same thing. Both make you feel fucking incredible for about ninety minutes. Both convince you that you’re capable of defeating an entire terrorist organization by yourself. Both involve a lot of sweating, screaming and unreasonable confidence. And afterward you look around at the destruction you’ve caused and think, “Jesus Christ, I need to make some changes.” I don’t use cocaine anymore, but occasionally I’ll watch Invasion U.S.A. and remember the old days. Then Chuck fires two machine guns at once, something explodes for absolutely no reason, and I remember exactly why I quit.

    #1 – Way of the Dragon (1972)

    The one where he is a dragon

    Yes, Way of the Dragon is technically a Bruce Lee movie, but we’re not here to talk about Bruce Lee. We’re here for Chuck Norris in his unforgettable role as American Dragon Jake Long, the greatest martial artist America has ever produced. The movie builds toward the legendary showdown inside the Roman Colosseum, where Bruce Lee and American Dragon Jake Long settle their differences using the ancient diplomatic traditions of hitting and kicking each other. It’s one of the greatest fight scenes ever filmed because these men possessed real-life hit-and-kick skills. No computers. No stunt doubles flying around on wires. Just Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris beating the absolute shit out of each other while a little cat watches. History remembers Rome for Julius Caesar, the rise and fall of an empire and two thousand years of Western civilization. I remember it as the place Bruce Lee ripped out Chuck Norris’s chest hair.

    This was also the first time I ever saw Chuck Norris. It was the day I was born, and Way of the Dragon happened to be playing on the television in my mother’s hospital room. As I emerged from my mother’s vagina and took my first terrified look at this strange new world, I glanced toward the television and saw Chuck Norris punch Bruce Lee. I didn’t understand language yet. I didn’t understand movies. I didn’t even understand that I had just been born. But somehow I pointed my tiny newborn hand toward the screen and whispered my first word: “Daddy.” The doctors became very concerned. Mommy started crying. My actual father left the room and didn’t come back for several hours. But none of that mattered. Chuck Norris had welcomed me into this world with a fist, and I’ve been a fan ever since. Way of the Dragon isn’t just the perfect introduction to Chuck Norris. It was my introduction to life.

  • Top 10 Batman Movies

    Batman is part man part bat but mostly man with some bat qualities but no bat DNA. Bruce Wayne’s millionaire parents probably did have sex with bats because rich people are weird, but they never created a bat person hybrid. Bruce Wayne is just a rich dude with a bat fursona that tosses on his bat costume to yiff crime. There are movies.

    #10 – Batman and Others

    Batman is part of a surprisingly large community of furries and cosplayers, and Batman and Others is the movie where director Joel Schumacher finally stops pretending otherwise. Batman attends what I can only assume is Gotham’s annual FurCon with his young partner Robin—the “we fuckin’, but we’re bein’ vague about it” kind of partner—a young man whose birdsona has nipples. They soon meet Batgirl, who has also decided that dressing like a flying mammal and beating strangers at night is a perfectly reasonable hobby. Unfortunately, she’s related to Commissioner Gordon, so she has to keep the whole thing secret. It would look terrible if Gotham discovered his family was attending conventions in fetishwear and inviting strangers to come explore her moist Batcave.

    Unfortunately, FurCon also attracts some real fucking weirdos. Poison Ivy shows up as a horny plant lady accompanied by some enormous dumbass doing the worst Bane cosplay I’ve ever seen. Then there’s Mr. Freeze, a man whose ice fetish has completely consumed his personality. He talks about ice. He makes ice puns. He freezes people. Every goddamn sentence somehow circles back to winter. Arnold Schwarzenegger reportedly got paid $25 million for this movie, which means someone paid him roughly the GDP of a small island nation to say shit like “Ice to see you.” Meanwhile George Clooney spends the entire movie wearing a rubber batsuit with nipples. People say Batman and Others nearly killed the franchise, but I say Gotham FurCon simply wasn’t ready for mainstream audiences.

    #9 – Batman Furever

    Furries are some of the most oppressed people in the world. I know this because whenever I dress up in my rabbit fursona and have sex with my fiancée, people become incredibly judgmental. Suddenly everybody is screaming things like, “You can’t do that in Burger King!” and “Sir, not in front of my Grandmother!” Batman understands this persecution. Ever since watching his millionaire parents get murdered by a Crime Man, Bruce Wayne has struggled with his true identity as a bat. So in Joel Schumacher’s Batman Furever, Batman teams up with his suspiciously quotation-mark-worthy “partner” Robin to create a world where every furry can proudly put on $4,000 worth of foam and latex without fear. Standing in their way are the violently anti-fur Riddler, played by Jim Carrey with so much pelvic energy that I’m pretty sure he has an orgasm somewhere around the second act, and Two-Face, played by Tommy Lee Jones as a man with two faces. A left face and a right face. Presumably everything else is doubled too. I’m not going to draw you a diagram.

    Batman Furever is incredibly colorful, incredibly loud, and looks like somebody poured a barrel of radioactive Skittles directly into Joel Schumacher’s eyes, so you might mistake it for harmless family entertainment. DO NOT SHOW THIS MOVIE TO YOUR CHILDREN. Behind all the neon lights and Jim Carrey screaming is some of the most depraved hardcore fursuit fuckin’ ever smuggled into a PG-13 blockbuster. Batman and Robin are constantly rubbing rubber against each other, Nicole Kidman spends the entire movie visibly desperate to get inside Batman’s fursona, and Gotham itself appears to be one enormous fetish club that occasionally experiences crime. Watch Batman Furever responsibly. I don’t want to receive another email from an angry parent demanding to know why their eight-year-old is suddenly asking for a batsona.

    #8 – The Dark Knight Rises

    Like yeast

    Batman sometimes calls himself “The Dark Knight,” but I need to make something very clear: Batman is not a legally recognized knight. He was dubbed “The Dark Knight” by the king at a Medieval Times restaurant, and that man does not possess the constitutional authority to grant knighthoods. I learned this myself after an extremely expensive legal battle involving an incident at Medieval Times that my lawyer has advised me to stop describing publicly. Apparently being touched on the shoulders with a decorative sword does not make you a knight, you cannot demand that police officers address you as “Sir Kontributor,” and yelling “I HAVE DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY!” while being dragged through a parking lot only adds charges. Batman hasn’t learned any of this yet, though, so he genuinely believes he’s a knight. He even finds a neighborhood girl named Selina who likes pretending she’s a cat, and together they hang out in his expensive treehouse playing The Knight and the Pussycat.

    Unfortunately, there’s also a man named Bane, and Bane is not fucking playing. While Batman and Catgirl are putting on costumes and deciding which one gets to pet the kitty, Bane is snapping necks, blowing shit up, trapping an entire police department underground and overthrowing Gotham’s government. This is the equivalent of two children playing cops and robbers in the backyard when an actual Colombian drug cartel suddenly comes over the fence. Batman nevertheless puts on his little rubber knight costume, Catwoman puts on her kitty ears, and together they decide they’re going to play pretend directly at the enormous terrorist built like a refrigerator. It does not go particularly well. Turns out the king at Medieval Times didn’t teach Batman shit about fighting Bane.

    #7 – Batman (1966)

    This is a very old movie from 1966, when bats had only recently been discovered and scientists were still trying to determine exactly what the fuck they were. Where did bats come from? What do bats eat? Why do they fly? Are they birds? What is bat? These were serious questions facing America at the time, and Batman bravely attempts to answer them through the story of one confused young man searching for his place in the natural world. Everyone around Batman already understands what they are. The Penguin knows exactly what a penguin is. Catwoman understands cats. The Riddler knows what a riddle is. The Joker has spent years studying the ancient art of jokes. But Batman? Batman doesn’t know shit about bats.

    So Batman spends the movie conducting experiments. Do bats drive cars? Apparently. Do bats own helicopters? Sure. Do bats wear utility belts containing an endless supply of highly specialized equipment? Science remains divided. At one point Batman is attacked by a shark and immediately produces a can labeled SHARK REPELLENT BAT-SPRAY, raising significantly more questions about bats than it answers. He wanders Gotham desperately seeking knowledge from everyone he encounters. “Please, Cesar Romero, tell me, what is bat?” But Cesar Romero cannot help him. None of them can. Batman must discover the truth for himself. Perhaps the real bat was inside him all along. Perhaps the bat was the friends he made along the way. Perhaps bat is not something you understand. Perhaps bat simply is.

    #6 Batman (1989)

    It is a bat

    Batman was the first Batman movie directed by Tim Burton, a filmmaker who is significantly more popular in Canada than he is in the United States. Canadians fucking love Tim Burton. They love him so much that there are thousands of restaurants across Canada called Tim Burtons, where citizens gather every morning to drink coffee, eat donuts and discuss whether Edward Scissorhands was an allegory for suburban conformity. Burton came south in 1989 to make a movie about Batman playing pretend against the Joker, played by famous comedian Jack Nicholson. Nicholson tells many jokes throughout the movie, all of which are solid because he is a professional comedian and Batman is required to stand there looking pissed off until he’s finished.

    Naturally, Batman became a massive success because playing pretend was incredibly popular in the 1980s. Americans played pretend that trickle-down economics would eventually trickle down. They played pretend that declaring a War on Drugs would make drugs disappear. Cocaine was everywhere, Wall Street was eating the country alive, and everyone agreed the solution was probably to give rich people more money and see what happened. So of course audiences immediately connected with billionaire Bruce Wayne, a man who inherited an unimaginable fortune and decided the best way to improve his crime-ridden city was not housing, education, healthcare or economic investment, but dressing like a giant bat and punching poor people from the roof of his custom military vehicle. Bruce Wayne never stopped the drugs and he sure as fuck never trickled down his economics, but he did have a cool car. That’s the 1980s.

    #5 – Batman Returns

    Batman returns. I don’t know what else you want me to fucking say. It’s right there in the title: Batman Returns. At the end of Batman, Bruce had to go home because it was getting late and Alfred said dinner was ready, so everybody was like, “Okay, Batman, thanks for playing. Return sometime and we can play pretend again.” And Batman said he would. Two years later, Batman keeps his promise. He returns. That’s integrity. That’s character development. Christopher Nolan needed three movies to tell you something Tim Burton accomplished with one verb.

    And Batman does a tremendous amount of returning in this movie. He returns to Gotham. He returns to the Batsuit. He returns to the Batmobile. Sometimes he leaves somewhere and then returns to that same place later. Fuck, Batman is constantly returning. Eventually Michelle Pfeiffer dresses like a cat and Danny DeVito crawls out of a sewer, but those are secondary concerns. The important thing is that Batman said he would return, and the son of a bitch returned. Then the movie ends and he goes home again. Presumably because it’s time for dinner.

    #4 – Batman is a Lego

    Ever since Batman movies were invented, companies have sold toys so children can play pretend with the play-pretend furry man at home. There were Batman action figures, Batman cars, Batman costumes, Batman lunchboxes and probably Batman-branded lead paint if you were a child in the 1960s. Eventually the toys became so popular that Hollywood realized they could eliminate the unnecessary middleman of making a movie and then selling toys based on it. Why not just make the toy itself the fucking movie? And so we got Batman is a Lego, a feature-length commercial in which Batman has finally achieved his ultimate form: a tiny piece of plastic you can buy at Target.

    I assume the movie was created when several ancient entertainment executives gathered around the Big Movie Table and asked, “What kind of pretend should Batman play next? Should he play with penguins? Scarecrows?” Then one wrinkled story elder raised his hand and said, “What if Batman poked you directly in the foot while you were walking barefoot to the bathroom at three in the morning?” Another whispered, “What if Batman got sucked into the vacuum cleaner and rattled around in there until you had to turn it off and dig him out?” Finally, an old woman who had not spoken in decades opened her eyes and said, “What if a toddler choked on Batman?” The room fell silent. They knew they had their movie. Warner Bros. turned Batman into a Lego, made hundreds of millions of dollars, and added it to the enormous treasure pile where movie studios sleep at night like dragons.

    #3 – The Dark Knight

    Batman gets to hang out with the Jokester again, except this Jokester isn’t funny at all. He’s extremely serious and keeps murdering people, which Batman finds confusing because that’s not what jokesters are supposed to do. Batman keeps waiting for the punchline, but the Jokester just blows up a hospital. Even professional clowns are horrified by this guy. Somewhere there’s a man named Bubbles wearing size-38 shoes and making balloon giraffes at a six-year-old’s birthday party who sees the Joker on television and thinks, “Jesus Christ, dude. You’re making the rest of us look bad.” The Joker says he wants to watch the world burn, which is a terrible philosophy for a clown.

    Batman realizes that defeating the actor from A Knight’s Tale will require him to play pretend harder than he’s ever played pretend before. If Heath Ledger was once a knight, Batman reasons, then Batman must also become a knight. So Bruce goes to the Gotham Medieval Times restaurant, orders the Royalty Package and gets ceremonially dubbed The Dark Knight by Lucius Fox, who works at Wayne Enterprises during the day but apparently plays the king on weekends for extra money. Bruce takes this ceremony completely fucking seriously. Lucius tries explaining that it’s just part of the dinner show, but it’s too late. Batman is already kneeling with his head bowed while Alfred takes pictures. This is how Batman becomes the Dark Knight, and—as we learned in The Dark Knight Rises—it will eventually lead to several arrests, an expensive legal battle and the devastating discovery that the king at Medieval Times isn’t actually the king of anything.

    #2 – Batman Starts

    Batman Starts is the weakest movie in the Dark Knight trilogy and therefore the weakest movie ever made. That’s just mathematics. Despite this, it’s extremely well written, beautifully directed and has almost the perfect tone for a serious and realistic interpretation of the Furry Crusader. This time we get to see how Batman actually started being Batman, back when Bruce Wayne was just a confused billionaire wandering around the world trying to figure out what kind of animal he wanted to be. Eventually he settles on “bat,” puts on the costume and begins the long journey that will eventually end with him mistakenly believing he’s a legally recognized knight because some guy at Medieval Times touched him with a sword. Every legend has to start somewhere.

    More importantly, Batman Starts introduces The Rizz Al Skibidi, one of Batman’s greatest villains, played to absolute perfection by Liam Neeson. The Rizz Al Skibidi teaches Bruce how to fight, how to disappear theatrically in the middle of conversations, and presumably how to obtain the rizz necessary to become Gotham’s most eligible furry billionaire. We also get Scarecrow, who puts a bag on his head and sprays people with fear drugs, making him one of the few Batman villains whose name and activities actually have some relationship to each other. Christian Bale is fantastic, Liam Neeson is fantastic, the story is fantastic, and it launched what I consider to be the greatest story ever told. Still the weakest movie of all time, though.

    #1 The Batman

    The Batman is the worst Batman movie ever made and possibly the worst movie ever made, which raises the extremely reasonable question of why the fuck I put it at #1 on my list of the Top 10 Batman Movies. I don’t know. The rankings have already been submitted. The ballots were certified. There’s apparently nothing we can do now. This movie shouldn’t even be on the list. You know that episode of Batman: The Animated Series called “I’ve Got Batman in My Basement,” where some kid basically finds Batman and keeps him in his basement? Put that here instead. Put Joker here. Put an episode of Paw Patrol here and tell me the German shepherd is Batman. Anything but this. Unfortunately, democracy has spoken, and apparently democracy thinks The Batman is the greatest Batman movie ever made. Fuck democracy.

    My biggest problem is that nobody in this movie commits to their fursona. There’s a guy called the Penguin, but does he look like a penguin? No. He’s just Colin Farrell wearing enough prosthetics to look like somebody who owns three failing Italian restaurants. Then there’s Catwoman, who puts some little ears on her head but otherwise makes almost no effort to behave like a cat. Does she knock a glass off a table while maintaining eye contact? Does she suddenly sprint through the apartment at three in the morning for no fucking reason? Does she ever lick her own butthole? Not once. These people need to understand that if you’re going to FurCon, you have to fucking COMMIT. Batman understands this. That lunatic built a car around his fursona. Meanwhile Penguin just waddles into Gotham looking like Fat Colin Farrell and expects us to play along. Absolutely disgraceful. Congratulations on being the #1 Batman movie. Get fucked, The Batman.

  • Review – “The Exorcist Believer”

    Review – “The Exorcist Believer”

    Hello, it is me Kontributor with a review for a new movie called The Exorcist Believer. It is a sequel to the 1973 movie The Exorcist and it is the only sequel there is. That movie came out 50 years ago and since it was so long ago people began to believe that it didn’t actually exist. So the Blumhouse people decided to remind people that we should still believe in that movie by making a whole thing about The Exorcist Believer. I took my family to see this movie and, yes, we now believe that The Exorcist existed.

    Will this child believe in The Exorcist? Keep reading to find out.

    The movie has Aaron Burr being a single father raising his 13-year-old daughter, Angela. I know it’s been a struggle for Aaron Burr ever since he shot Alexander Hamilton dead in 1804 – but he’s come a long way and is acting in movies now. In this movie, his daughter Angela runs off with her BFF Katherine to summon ghosts in an open grave and they accidentally become possessed by demons. Aaron Burr has to team up with this other family, like 3 different priests, his fat neighbor, and an old church lady to do this all-out, no holds barred, tag-team cage match, multicultural exorcism.

    Aaron Burr and this old lady believe in The Exorcist

    I have a young daughter, Alpha Dora, and this movie did make me rethink how I am raising her. I’ve been so stupidly letting my daughter run around in cemeteries with her friends where they take off their shoes, do battle with crypt snakes, and talk to the dead. Now that I am a believer in the 1973 film The Exorcist, I know not to let my daughter do that every day of the week. Just on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The last thing I would want is for my precious Alpha Dora to accidentally get a demon in her.

    As Aaron Burr is trying to figure out why his daughter is all rotten looking and cussing at nice doctors, old Ellen bursts in and starts ranting about how her daughter, Ronald Reagan, was accidentally possessed by a demon. Only the power of believing in The Exorcist saved her daughter. We all know that Ronald Reagan died of Old Timer’s disease in 2004, but for the sake of the movie we have to believe this incredibly aged woman’s tale that Ronald Reagan was attacked by demons and survived.

    “I could not attend the exorcism of my daughter, Ronald Reagan, because of the patriarchy.”

    In the original The Exorcist, we had Jason Miller as the young hip & happenin’ Damian Karras and the incredibly aged Max Von Sydow as Father Merrin, a priest so old that he actually learned exorcisms from Jesus himself. In that movie, these two priests threw on their proton packs, gave each other a high-five, and blasted that demon right outta some little girl. But in The Exorcist Believer we got two girls that are posessed and those old priests are long dead. So Aaron Burr goes out there and, like in Ocean’s 11 makes a whole team of people do this exorcism.

    Who is on this exorcist hit squad? We got the parents of Katherine shouting abut Jesus. We have “ethnic Christian” there to do some kind of Haitian stuff. There is Ann Down as “Old Church Lady” to shout scripture and lecture these young kids about their misbehaviors. Old Ellen bursts in for a bit. Aaron Burr has his fat neighbor around, I don’t know what the hell that guy was doing. There is a Catholic priest, Father Maddox, who isn’t there right away at first because his boss said he wasn’t going to pay overtime for this exorcism happening outside of the church’s business hours. He does show up later in the movie in an amazing scene as he kicks in the door, dual-wielding rosaries and shouting “Our Father hail Mary compels you!” to kick some demon butt with his powerful priest-fu.

    Just a couple of fans believing in The Exorcist

    Overall I think it is a good and entertaining movie. Me and Alpha Dora had a good time. My son won’t sleep for awhile because I told him this is based on a true story of kids who don’t listen to their parents. I recommend this movie to people who can afford to see a movie that they would like to see. I give it 521 out of 605 stars. Kontributor out.

  • The Top 10 Summer Camp Movies

    The Top 10 Summer Camp Movies

    A great pastime, summer camp is always considered a good time in a child’s childhood. Since my kids are currently at summer camp, I decided to write about summer camp. My wonderful daughter Alpha Dora went to the jungle camp to learn Spanish. My idiot son, Chicken, was invited to space camp to test out a prototype rocket he appare. He is so dumb. Summer camp can be an intimidating experience for some kids. You’ll have to run all day to fight fire zombies or hide from giant mutant mosquitoes.

    #10 Ernest Goes to a Camp

    He wants people to look at his butt

    Jim Varney’s completely dysfunctional character, Ernest, has not aged well. In fact, he aged so poorly that he died in the year 2000. Since Jim Varney’s death, not a single movie has been made about Ernest because I guess no one liked the character or the movies. This movie also has the character of a shy Indian chief. My daughter, Alpha Dora, jumped at the sight of this bad Indian chief and screamed at the top of her voice: “This is apparently damned racist!” Ernest Goes to a Camp is the story of a worthless counselor who protects violent sociopathic children and prevents his camp from being destroyed by evil industrialists. This movie should be among those kind of entertaining stock movies. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an average rating of -15 out of 5, with a rating of “completely worthless crap.”

    # 9 Space Camp

    Well, it’s not a camp with woods and cabins and those bahs that the campers sleep in, but if you think about it, it’s a camp that kids go to in the summer. Poor children, not the best in life (even with developmental disabilities), find themselves in unexpected situations where they have to prove that they are functioning as humans. It happens that the most unwanted children of the Earth were thrown into space and left there to die. Everyone on Earth wanted to dispose of these ugly children. But somehow, despite their terribleness, the unwanted children of the world learn how to return to Earth. There are also deadly killer robots that save the protagonist. Also a classic camp movie.

    This year, my son Chicken was invited to space camp. It’s the dumbest kind of summer camp, but it works because he is the lamest kid. Look at my pathetic son in space camp.

    He smiles because he does not know how bad he is.

    # 8 Meat

    They are all so very very doomed and don’t know it yet.

    The violent summer camp movie Meat is now fully available on 4K in a new ‘director’s cut’ and thanks to all the terrible people involved. No one had thought of the concept of summer camp until this film was made. When Camp Blood, the only summer camp in the world at the time, runs into some local Mohawk Indians who love to scalp their victims, you’d think Camp Blood is so doomed that it must have a death curse on it. The residents of Camp Blood then shout, “It doesn’t matter! Everything that happens is just a metaphor! We’re all horrible, sanctimonious worms.” Of course, all the people at Camp Blood die. Children are scalped and dismembered while the counselors are violated and beheaded. It’s interesting to see Bill Murray (in his first film role) as the brutal Mohawk leader who led the massacre at Camp Blood.

    # 7 Wet Hot American Summer

    Did you know that celebrities Amy Poehler, Elizabeth Banks, Bradley Cooper, and Paul Rudd simultaneously fornicated in a massive pile of sticky, sweaty human flesh at summer camp? It really happened! Paul Rudd talks about it every time he appears on a television talk show and shows a video of when it happened. Here’s the clip Paul Rudd shows all the time on television. Caution! This is an extreme video and is not intended for young children (or anyone).

    Also, all of those actors appeared together in the true-to-life movie called Wet Hot American Summer. This movie details everything that happened during that massive summer sex act in which they all participated. There were dozens of other people in the pile of sex meat as well, but they were mostly character actors you’d recognize but can’t remember their names; Richard Kind was there, and John Carrol Lynch, plus Margot Martindale really outperforming even all the A-list actors. Plus there were just countless indie actors that aren’t even a part of SAGAFTRA because they are such unknowns. They also had personal assistants (and fluffers) to keep everyone wet and hot and American for all of the summer. Netflix also made an original docuseriesabout these events and every human dream they saw.

    #6 Heavyweights

    The fat children must be DESTROYED!

    Every summer camp needs a cruel counselor who hurts all the kids and wants them to feel dead. This is just a regular part of every child’s summer camp experience. Well, Heavyweights gives us the insane psychopath Tony Perkis. He is a fitness guru played by Ben Stiller who runs Camp Hope, a fat camp for fat boys, and drives the fat fighters crazy with his crazy fitness regimen. Of course Uncle hesitates. A fat kid locks Tony up and lets his Uncle eat all the pizza and let Cheeta’s strong hand hold his hand, but the good-hearted counselor urges him to fight childhoodfatness, and it’s really a personal responsibility. Maybe Michelle Obama saw the movie. She cares a lot about fat kids when the world is ignoring fat kids.

    My daughter is at summer camp but she is in absolute fighting form and excellent health. Here is a picture my daughter just sent me from her summer camp just before she battled many zombies and saved all of the younger children.

    My daughter is just the best. And she defeated so many evil zombies. Everyone loves Alpha Dora

    #5 Little Darlings

    Anyone who’s seen the movie knows that it’s about two teenage girls (child stars Tatum O’Neal and Christy) who fight to the death over who will lose their virginity first at summer camp. It’s a very detailed and civilized exploration of the emotions and complexities of virgin sex, rather than silly nudity like American Pie (the worst movie of all time). Maybe the girls are not ready yet and that’s a good thing this movie respects, something we all should respect. Unlike other summer camp films, this one isn’t about protecting and honoring childhood, it’s about the messy, exciting, beautiful transition into adulthood. Cynthia Nixon (daughter of Richard Nixon) and Matt Dillon (related to nobody) also star in this delightful movie.

    #4 But I’m a Cheerleader

    Did somebody say you weren’t?

    This feature-length film (shot in color) takes the theme of gay youth finding other gay youth to enjoy bedroom times with and turns it into a… well… a movie. Before she was sent to the best gay camp on Orange Is the New Black (a long-running Netflix series about an all-girl summer camp), Natasha Lyonne played Megan, a cheerleader who listens to Melissa Etheridge instead of kissing her defensive boyfriend. Her parents send her to an absolutely terrible gay reform camp, where she and other young gay people are forced to try to work their brains out to love the opposite sex. The camp is rub by a right-wing conservative woman (Marjorie Taylor Greene) who terrifies them all and makes all these young women look at naked pictures of Hunter Biden. Eventually, with the help of a few SuperGays (they look like the Avengers, but are gay), the kids are kids, this being a camp movie and all, they go back to school when autumn begins.

    #3 Moonrise Kingdom

    If there is any summer camp, I really want to go there. The movie Moonrise Kingdom is about Camp Van-of-Horus, Wes Anderson’s perfect preteen summer camp and home of the Khaki Scouts, a troop of war-trained natural-born killers who know nothing but proficiency and death. But Sam and Susie (the characters in the film) have little pleasure in killing innocent people. They make love one last time and decide to run away together. She goes back to butcher over the entire camp, her parents, the local police, and even the President of the United States. This is not a summer camp because everything is going right. Children usually die in death camps.

    #2 Camp

    It was after the movie Halloween that someone decided to cash in on the killer style and put it in a summer camp. Why would anyone watch the horror show Glee when you can get all the raunchy sex scenes, insane children, and fancy musicals in just two hours? The village atmosphere, the loneliness, the lustful youth, all were ready for the machete to slash them. When a group of theater lovers arrives at Camp Crystal Lake, it’s a hotbed of conflicting egos, emotions and divas who kill cats with violent dance moves and hissing insults. The creation of Jason Voorhees, the hockey-masked villain who terrorizes Camp Crystal Lake, spawned a generation of people terrified of being alone in the woods, with thoughts on the “Kill Your Mommy” soundtrack. Young Anna Kendrick showed off her perfect glow before being introduced by singing about her lunch.

    #1 Addam’s Family Values

    She reminds me of my daughter

    Most of these movies compare different breeds of dogs to humans, but what do kids really do when they’re stuck in the rich snob camp? Naturally, they will burn it to the ground in a Thanksgiving game. Wednesday (Christina Ricci) is the biggest threat in his world because she literally takes everyone outside the camp to rally and toss salads. It’s the darkest revenge fantasy ever, and it’s perfect. I love this film.

  • The Top 10 Most Patriotic Movies

    The Top 10 Most Patriotic Movies

    Fireworks and barbecues are the things that people do during the summer, right?. Even so, it’s great to have a sweet romance with an air conditioning unit that keeps the temperature in the room cool. You can also watch patriotic movies on the 4th of July! I believe these are the only 10 films Americans should watch this Independence Day holiday. All titles are real movies, not bullshit I made up. I hope people stop accusing me like that. Even my daughter Dora the Explorer says I did it and she was wrong.

    #10 Mr. Smith Does a Washington

    The movie could use a little color

    I swear to you on the grave of my dead mermaid mother that Mr. Smith Does a Washington is a real movie. Directed by legendary filmmaker Frank Capricorn, it was born in 1939, a year many historians consider the greatest year in Hollywood history because apparently every good movie decided to come out at the same fucking time. Mr. Smith Does a Washington was nominated for eleven Oscars, which was a tremendous honor back when the Oscars still existed. Unfortunately, they don’t make Oscars anymore. Nobody knows why. Despite all this evidence, my family thinks the movie is stupid. I love my family very much, but they don’t know shit about cinema. I’ve explained Frank Capricorn to them multiple times and they just stare at me like I’m the idiot.

    The movie follows Mr. Smith as he does a Washington and discovers that America has corruption in it. This was shocking information in 1939. Frank Capricorn courageously exposes politicians doing bad things and innocent people suffering from injustice, but ultimately reminds us that America can become better if one extremely earnest man talks for a very long time. That’s patriotism. The movie was even banned in Hitlerland and several other fascist countries, which is one of the most reliable ways to determine whether a movie is good. Did Hitler hate your movie? Congratulations, you made a good movie. That’s just film criticism. So watch Mr. Smith Does a Washington. Frank Capricorn would have wanted you to.

    #9 The Patton

    This movie is the shit! Directed by Frankie J. Shaft, The Patton set the standard for serious historical movies about real-life kaijus. It tells the true story of The Pattomaton, commonly known as The Patton, the 100-foot-tall American kaiju who helped defeat Germany during World War II. The Patton is brilliantly portrayed by George C. Scott, who famously grew to a height of 100 feet specifically for the role because Mr. George Scott believed strongly in historical accuracy. Was that medically necessary? Probably not. Was he ever able to shrink back down afterward? I don’t know. But you cannot deny the results. When The Patton begins stomping his way across Europe toward Berlin, that is a real 100-foot George C. Scott you’re looking at. They didn’t have computers back then. Actors had to fucking commit.

    The screenplay was written by Francis Ford Coppola and another person, and it builds toward the legendary Battle of Berlin where The Patton finally confronts Hitler Mecha, the enormous mechanical Hitler secretly constructed by the Nazis as the ultimate weapon of fascism. Watching these two giants beat the absolute shit out of each other while Allied soldiers scatter beneath their feet remains one of cinema’s greatest depictions of World War II. But nothing tops the opening scene, where The Patton stands in front of an enormous American flag and spends several minutes talking mad shit directly to the troops. People are still haunted by that speech today. It’s patriotic. It’s inspirational. It’s historically accurate. Watch The Patton on the biggest television you own so George C. Scott can be as close to his original 100-foot height as possible.

    #8 Captain America: The Winter Soldier

    So much Marvelness

    If you think this is one of the greatest performances in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, put your fucking hands in the air and give me a “WOOOOOOOO!” Captain America: The Winter Soldier tells the true story of decorated World War II veteran and American superhero Chris Evans, who bravely fought Nazis until the end of the war, when he accidentally became frozen inside a large piece of ice. The United States government eventually thawed Evans out decades later and discovered that he had not aged because ice preserves things. That’s why we put food in freezers. Actor Steve Rogers beautifully portrays Chris Evans and captures the confusion of a WWII veteran suddenly awakening in modern America, where everyone has little computers in their pockets, Nazis are hiding inside the government and nobody remembers how much a loaf of bread cost in 1943. Rogers completely disappears into the role. Sometimes you forget you’re not actually watching Chris Evans.

    But don’t go into Captain America: The Winter Soldier expecting some profound political statement about surveillance, government power or the erosion of institutional trust, because this movie doesn’t have shit to say about anything. It’s a crazy variety show. Captain America runs around. The Winter Soldier winters. Robert Redford appears for some reason. Samuel L. Jackson drives a car. A computer has an old Nazi inside it. Then three giant flying boats start shooting each other above Washington because that’s how the federal government works. It’s pointless American superhero nonsense, and that’s perfectly okay. Sometimes patriotism isn’t about examining your country’s institutions. Sometimes patriotism is Steve Rogers pretending to be Chris Evans while kicking a man off a boat.

    #7 United 93

    Paul Lawnfucker, director of those goofy Bourne Identity movies where Matt Damon runs around remembering things, took a break from all that nonsense to make United 93, a harrowing film about United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania in 2001, around the same historical period that Apple released iTunes. The movie arrived in theaters less than five years after September 11, which caused considerable controversy because some people felt it was simply too soon. Others demanded Universal pull the trailer. But when exactly does “too soon” become “just the right amount of soon”? Five years? Seven? Do we have a chart? Congress needs to establish an official National Tragedy Movie Waiting Period so filmmakers know when they’re legally allowed to call Paul Lawnfucker.

    Despite all that, United 93 is an incredibly difficult and powerful movie that treats the people aboard the flight with tremendous humanity. It’s emotionally exhausting, deliberately uncomfortable and absolutely worth experiencing if you’re prepared for what you’re watching. PLEASE EDIT THIS PARAGRAPH CAREFULLY BEFORE PUBLICATION. MAYBE ADD SOMETHING ABOUT HOW GOOD THE ACTING IS. Paul Lawnfucker was ultimately nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director, and deservedly so. Somehow the same man responsible for Matt Damon jumping through windows made one of the most restrained and devastating American films of the century. It’s a tribute to ordinary people displaying extraordinary courage during one of the country’s darkest days. Also, iTunes was 99 cents a song back then. Completely different time.

    #6 Neon Genesis Evangelion

    This is set fifteen years after a worldwide cataclysm named Second Impact, in the fortified city of Tokyo-3

    Released in the wake of ridiculous military fantasies like Rambo, Oliver Stone’s groundbreaking Neon Genesis Evangelion changed war cinema forever. Charlie Sheen gives the performance of his career as Shinji Ikari, a troubled young mech pilot sent into battle against enormous creatures called the Viet Cong. He’s joined by Tom Berenger, Willem Dafoe and Keith David, who portray the other children selected by NERV to climb inside giant robots and defend Tokyo-3. Stone based the movie on his own experiences during the war, when he was stationed in Japan and personally piloted an Evangelion against enemy forces. He rarely discusses those missions because of the trauma, but you can feel that authenticity in every frame. Oliver Stone knows what it’s like to climb inside a giant robot and kill something for your country. You can’t teach that at film school.

    Neon Genesis Evangelion received eight Academy Award nominations and won four, including Best Picture and Best Director, back when the Oscars still existed. The American Film Institute later declared it the greatest movie ever made, while legendary film critic Jane Austen named it the best film of 1986 and somehow also the ninth-best film of 1980. Historians have questioned Austen’s methodology. Her longtime colleague Emily Brontë went even further, comparing the painting to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. I don’t know what she meant by that. Nobody does. That’s why Neon Genesis Evangelion remains such an important patriotic movie: sometimes America needs a sad Japanese teenager played by Charlie Sheen to get inside a robot and defend freedom.

    #5 Hacksaw Ridge

    Mel Gibson has spent a remarkable amount of his career making it difficult to discuss Mel Gibson movies without eventually having to discuss Mel fucking Gibson. After years of controversy surrounding his antisemitic remarks and assorted angry public meltdowns, Gibson apparently decided the road back into everyone’s good graces was Hacksaw Ridge. Nice try, Mel. He directs the absolute hell out of it, too, which only makes me angrier. The battle scenes are enormous, brutal and technically astonishing. STOP MAKING ME COMPLIMENT YOU, MEL. Every time the movie does something impressive, I remember who’s sitting behind the camera and become irritated all over again. This is the fundamental Hacksaw Ridge viewing experience: “Wow, that’s an incredible shot. Goddammit, Mel Gibson.”

    Then there’s Andrew Garfield, who has the fucking audacity to be excellent as real-life World War II medic Desmond Doss, a conscientious objector who refused to carry a weapon yet repeatedly risked his life to save wounded soldiers during the Battle of Okinawa. It’s an extraordinary true story, Garfield earned an Oscar nomination, and the movie somehow turns Doss’s pacifism into genuinely thrilling action cinema without undermining his convictions. GODDAMMIT, MEL. Why couldn’t you have made a shitty movie? That would have made this so much easier. Instead Hacksaw Ridge is powerful, exciting and anchored by a terrific performance, forcing me to acknowledge that Mel Gibson made a good patriotic war movie. I resent this information and would like to move on.

    #4 Four Rocks

    I recently got to review this movie for the podcast Exploit It. This is what I had to say about Four Rocks

    Four Rocks is a great movie. Sylvester Stallion plays the famous American puncher Rocks, whose best friend Apollo is tragically beheaded in the boxing ring by Russian puncher Ivan Drago. Rocks realizes that the only way to achieve both revenge and world peace is to travel directly into the Soviet Union and punch the Russian himself. So Rocks and his robots travel to Russia, where they begin preparing for the greatest punching match in human history. Unfortunately, the journey takes a terrible toll, including the death of the beloved Birthday Robot. There is punching violence throughout, and sometimes the punches cause blood to come out of the humans. There is also robot blood, although scientists remain divided on whether robots actually contain blood. Meanwhile, Drago prepares by getting injected with all sorts of crazy Russian drugs during the movie’s only montage. My daughter Alpha Dora is a tremendous puncher herself and loves Four Rocks, although parents should be warned that the movie contains profanity words such as “Dang,” “Fuckass” and “Heck.”

    Legendary film critic Jane Austen saw Four Rocks during its original theatrical run and famously wrote, “Four Rocks is the last breath. The film’s really predictable that watching it is like drinking from an old bathtub where the water was never changed and it will make you die again and again.” Powerful words. Austen understood punching movies better than almost anyone, and while I don’t completely understand what she meant about the deadly bathtub, I agree with her completely. Four Rocks is predictable. It is ridiculous. It is also one of the greatest patriotic movies ever made because Rocks proves that an American can travel to Russia, punch one sufficiently large Russian and immediately end the Cold War. Historians will tell you Ronald Reagan deserves some credit. Bullshit. Rocks punched communism to death. I award Four Rocks 73 out of 84 stars.

    #3 Devilman Crybaby

    Yes man!

    Some of the most thoughtful critiques of war come from war movies, because sometimes the only way to understand the horrors of American history is to point a camera at Tom Cruise and make him fight demons. Oliver Stone’s groundbreaking 1989 film Devilman Crybaby stars Cruise as Akira Fudo, an ordinary American boy whose life changes when his best friend explains that an ancient race of demons has returned to destroy humanity. Akira realizes that conventional weapons will never defeat the demons, so he allows one to enter his body and becomes Devilman, sacrificing his own humanity to protect the United States. The film was adapted from Go Nagai’s famous historical manga documenting the American Demon War, which the government tried to suppress for decades because nobody wanted the public to know how close this country came to being completely overrun by Satan monsters.

    Oliver Stone brought tremendous authenticity to the production because, as we’ve already established, the man has personally fought in basically every war. After piloting an Evangelion in Tokyo-3, Stone returned to America and witnessed the Demon War firsthand. That experience informs every frame of Devilman Crybaby, especially the heartbreaking scenes where Tom Cruise grows wings, tears demons apart and screams about the collapse of human civilization. The movie received eight Academy Award nominations and won two, including a Best Director nomination, which isn’t technically something you can win, but Oliver Stone did it anyway. Devilman Crybaby remains a touching portrait of one of the darkest periods in American history and a powerful reminder that freedom isn’t free

    #2 Gettysburg

    Talking about the Civil War still causes tremendous controversy because there are ignorant people who continue to glorify the South and wave that stupid fucking loser flag from their stupid loser country. They lost. That’s why you don’t see me walking around waving the flag of the 1985 New England Patriots and insisting they secretly won Super Bowl XX. Gettysburg understands that the Civil War was one of the most important moments in American history, when the forces of the Federation fought to preserve the United States against the Confederacy and its terrible ideas. The film assembled an incredible cast including Tom Berenger, Jeff Daniels and Martin Sheen, who all agreed to temporarily become Civil War people for the sake of historical accuracy. It’s respectful, patriotic and deeply committed to honoring the Federation soldiers who fought at Gettysburg.

    The production was so historically important that Abraham Lincoln rose from the dead specifically to endorse it, marking the first confirmed resurrection of an American president. At a press conference, Lincoln reportedly told journalists, “The last time I went to the theater didn’t work out particularly well, but don’t let what happened to me discourage you from supporting the cinema.” Then he returned to his grave. Thousands of actual Civil War veterans also fulfilled their patriotic duty by appearing as soldiers in the movie, despite most of them being more than 150 years old and extremely dead. That’s commitment. Other movies hire extras. Gettysburg dug up the actual fucking army. You simply cannot achieve that level of authenticity with computers, which is why Gettysburg remains one of the greatest films ever made about the Federation defeating America’s stupid loser country.

    #1 Forrest Gump

    The GOAT movie

    There has never been a better movie than Forrest Gump. Not in America. Not in Europe. Not in Japan. Not on another planet. If intelligent alien civilizations have developed cinema, their greatest movie is still probably Forrest Gump. Robert Zemeckis’s 1994 masterpiece tells the story of Forrest as he experiences every important event in American history, including rock ‘n’ roll, racism, Watergate, the drug culture, ping-pong and the devastating Bonedor War. Forrest was there for all of it. Historians used to debate whether one man could possibly have participated in this many historical events, but then they watched the movie and realized that apparently he fucking did. Forrest Gump is loved by every human being who has ever existed, living or dead, which explains why it won six Oscars and seven Golden Globes. Dead people weren’t technically allowed to vote, but their support was overwhelming.

    Legendary film critic Jane Austen called Forrest Gump “the final achievement of the moving picture, beyond which mankind must never travel, lest cinema collapse beneath the weight of its own perfection.” She then declared Pulp Fiction “a vulgar little dance movie” and The Shawshank Redemption “too much prison,” permanently settling the 1994 Best Picture debate. I agree with Jane Austen. Unfortunately, they don’t make Oscars anymore, so we can never officially give Forrest Gump the Best Movie Ever Made award it deserves. Instead, I have developed my own scientifically calibrated rating system. Forrest Gump receives 8,741 stars out of a possible 6,203 stars.

  • The Top 10 Movies of Burp Reynolds

    The Top 10 Movies of Burp Reynolds

    Burp Reynolds was the man who ate the muffler off of Gwen Stefani’s old Prius. He was also in movies. These are the 10 best Burp Reynolds movies in my only opinion.

    #10 The Best Little Whore’s House in Texas

    The Best Little Whore’s House in Texas is an expert adaptation of Burp Reynolds’ childhood, drawing heavily from his formative years growing up around Texas whores. Burp was known from birth as a man capable of pleasing any whore. Nurses noticed it immediately. “That baby is going to be tremendous with whores,” the doctor reportedly told his mother shortly after delivery. Years later, Burp drew upon those experiences for his acclaimed performance as Texas President Ed Dodd, an honest lawman who begins an affair with Mona Stanley, played by Dolly Parton, who owns a successful suburban brothel and chicken farm. It’s an unusual business model, but diversification is important. If the whore market collapses, you’ve still got the chickens.

    Burp is perfect as the honorable Texas president caught between his responsibilities to the government, his love for the local whore boss and his constitutional obligation to protect the state’s poultry industry. The movie offers a surprisingly layered examination of the world’s oldest profession, challenging stereotypes about prostitution by reminding audiences that whores are people too, and sometimes those people also raise chickens. Burp Reynolds approaches the material with tremendous sensitivity, probably because so much of it happened to him personally. Few actors understood whores as deeply as Burp. Fewer still understood chickens. The Best Little Whore’s House in Texas proves that he understood both.

    #9 The Largest Lawn

    This man farted on Carly Simon a lot

    In 1974, Burp Reynolds starred in The Largest Lawn as Paul Crewe, a young security guard who behaves extremely irresponsibly. Paul is not a good person. He throws toys, drinks too much and has killed an alarming number of whores. Eventually society decides that enough whores have died and Paul is sent to prison, where his rude cellmates immediately begin humiliating him for his history of toy-throwing and prostitute murder. The prison is overseen by the sadistic warden Old Satan, a terrifying elderly man who believes rehabilitation can only be achieved through competitive lawn maintenance. Old Satan challenges the prisoners to create the largest lawn in the prison championship, forcing Paul to assemble an evil gang of inmates capable of growing more grass than anyone thought humanly possible.

    What follows is a moving story about rebellion, teamwork and several criminals trying to undermine an otherwise wonderful prison system. Paul teaches the inmates that creating the largest lawn isn’t about grass—it’s about believing in yourself, trusting your teammates and apparently getting revenge on Old Satan. Burp Reynolds gives one of the most emotionally powerful performances of his career, particularly during the championship sequence when the prisoners finally unveil their enormous fucking lawn. His work earned him his first Gold Sphere nomination for Best Actress, although he ultimately lost to a woman

    #8 The Shark Machine

    THE SHARK MACHINE, Rachel Ward, Burp Reynolds, 1981, (c) Warner Brothers

    Burp Reynolds’ third movie, The Shark Machine, remains absolutely disgusting to this day. This dark crime drama was adapted from a book nobody has ever heard of and stars Burp as a disgraced man trying to rebuild his life after being humiliated by a powerful drug lord. Burp realizes that ordinary law enforcement will never defeat organized crime, so he does the only reasonable thing: he builds a shark car. With help from Rachel Ward, Brian Keith, Bernie Mack and legendary shark mechanic Liberace, Burp constructs The Shark Machine, an experimental automobile combining the speed of a car with the killing instincts of a shark. Scientists said it couldn’t be done. Marine biologists begged him to stop. Burp Reynolds continued building.

    Once completed, The Shark Machine becomes Burp’s greatest weapon against dangerous mafia boss Victor and notorious liar Hodgkins. Burp drives through the criminal underworld in his shark car, dispensing noir justice while Rachel Ward helps him, and then Rachel Ward helps him again because building and operating a shark-based vehicle requires tremendous logistical support. Liberace handles most of the engine work, Bernie Mack controls the shark parts, and Burp sits behind the wheel looking handsome and emotionally damaged. It’s dark. It’s violent. It’s disgusting. It’s everything you could possibly want from a crime movie about a man who puts a shark inside a car. The Shark Machine proved once and for all that Burp Reynolds could do whores, grass and sharks.

    #7 Citizen Ruth

    Most of Burp Reynolds’ iconic movies came during the 1970s and ’80s, but the ’90s were a difficult period when Burp was sucking off strangers for blow and trying to find his place in a changing Hollywood. Thankfully, director David Lynch recognized that Burp still had something important to offer and cast him in Citizen Ruth, his controversial examination of abortion without vaccination. Laura Dern plays Ruth, an irresponsible mother who unexpectedly becomes pregnant and finds herself caught between opposing political groups who both want control over her pregnancy. Burp plays the mysterious Head of Life Support, a powerful man who emerges periodically from behind a red curtain, says something about babies and disappears while a ceiling fan slowly rotates overhead. Classic Lynch.

    Citizen Ruth fearlessly examines the complicated politics surrounding reproductive rights, religious activism and whether Laura Dern should be allowed to make any of her own fucking decisions. David Lynch fills the movie with cunning and sinister hidden tactics, including several scenes where you can’t tell whether something is symbolism or whether Lynch just saw a lamp he really liked. Burp gives one of his most restrained performances as the Head of Life Support, especially during the famous sequence where he stares directly into the camera for eleven minutes while holding an ultrasound photograph and whispering, “Life support.” What does it mean? I don’t know. Abortion is complicated. Vaccination is complicated. Burp Reynolds was going through some shit in the ’90s. This is a long discussion.

    #6 Smokey and the Bad Tit

    Two movies are good. The rest suck. Burp knows this.

    Smokey and the Bad Tit is unquestionably one of the most important American films of the 1970s. Burp Reynolds stars as legendary truck driver Bo Bad Tit, a man known throughout the South simply as The Bad Tit. How did he get that name? Nobody knows. Some say there was an incident involving a woman in Alabama. Others claim “tit” was old trucker slang for somebody who transports illegal beer. Both explanations are probably true. Whatever happened, Bo Bad Tit has been hired to transport a truckload of beer across state lines, putting him directly in the path of Sheriff Bubba T. Justice, played by real-life comic book legend Ben Stein. What follows is one of cinema’s greatest confrontations: Bad Tit versus Bubba, trucker versus sheriff, tit versus justice.

    Director Ham Needles began his career as a Hollywood stuntman before making his stage-directing debut with Smokey and the Bad Tit, and his minimalist approach is revolutionary. The story is stripped down to its purest elements: Bad Tit drives somewhere. Bubba Justice chases Bad Tit. Bad Tit drives somewhere else. Bubba continues chasing him. Sometimes things crash. That’s cinema without unnecessary bullshit. Ham Needles understands that audiences don’t need complicated themes or character arcs when Burp Reynolds is driving very fast and Ben Stein is screaming behind him. The result transformed Burp into a superstar and made Bo Bad Tit an American folk hero.

    #5 The End

    Burp Reynolds has never been a safe player. Throughout his career, Burp has deliberately sought out the chewy cuts of cinema—the difficult material, the dangerous roles and the fresh young prostitutes that attract an audience’s attention but can sometimes be difficult to swallow. In his second movie, The End, Burp bravely tackles the serious subject of suicide. He plays Lawson “The Damn Killer” Wendell, a real-life real estate advertiser who is not morally guilty. Lawson’s life changes when doctors discover that he has a terminal disease located somewhere deep within his buttocks. Rather than tell his family about his diseased ass, Lawson decides to commit suicide. Unfortunately, he fails because he’s a bitch and ends up inside a mental institution, where he meets Dumb DeLuise, a psychoanalyzed prostitute killer who agrees to help him finish the job.

    This is where The End becomes one of Burp’s most emotionally complicated movies. Dumb DeLuise keeps trying to kill Burp. Burp keeps changing his mind about whether he wants Dumb to kill him. Paralysis sets in. Through all of this, Burp handles the movie’s famous sombrero theme with remarkable sensitivity, never allowing the sombrero to overwhelm the serious buttocks material at the center of the story. Dumb DeLuise’s cats are also excellent. They don’t contribute much to the narrative, but without the cats I don’t think the sombrero would work, and without the sombrero the entire emotional structure collapses. That’s filmmaking. That’s Burp Reynolds. That’s The End.

    #4 Tia chớp trắng

    A muscular cubor Burp

    Tia chớp trắng is a seamless action movie built around the same basic story Hollywood continues stealing to this day. Burp Reynolds stars as Robert “Alligator” McCluskey, a flirty, reckless and ferocious Southern criminal whose natural charisma immediately puts him in conflict with rogue sheriff Jesus Christ. Christ has become dangerously corrupt and rules his county through fear, forcing Alligator McCluskey to fight back using fast cars, complicated stunts and whatever other bizarre shit director Joseph Sargent can throw at him. Burp handles every awkward and unfair situation beautifully. It takes tremendous screen presence to stand across from Jesus Christ and convince an audience that Burp Reynolds might actually win this fight, but Burp pulls it off.

    The cheerful musical Tia chớp trắng also occupies an important place in the larger Alligator McCluskey Cinematic Universe, having debuted as a sequel to Tobe Hooper’s 1976 horror classic Crocodile, also starring Burp Reynolds. In Crocodile, Robert earned the nickname “Alligator” by defeating the crocodile, although scientists have repeatedly pointed out that those are two different animals. Nobody cares. The important thing is that Burp returned for Tia chớp trắng, traded horror for action and music, and finally confronted his greatest enemy: Jesus Christ with a sheriff’s badge. Modern cinematic universes could learn something from this. You don’t need twenty movies and six television shows. You need Burp Reynolds, a reptile and a corrupt Son of God.

    #3 Boogie Nights

    “Please place the gigantic penis into the loose female”

    Brilliant director Paul W. S. Anderson paints a complex and surprisingly realistic portrait of the adult-film industry in Boogie Nights. Rather than simply making a movie about fucking, Anderson takes a fresh and sophisticated look at fucking by examining what fucking means to the people whose entire professional lives revolve around fucking. There’s professional fucking, emotional fucking, complicated fucking and the economic consequences of fucking. Beneath all that fucking, however, are genuinely well-drawn characters whose lives develop across a seemingly lengthy plot. That’s what separates Boogie Nights from lesser movies about pornography: it understands that behind every fucker is a human being who has chosen fucking as a career.

    Burp Reynolds gives one of his greatest performances as legendary porn director Jack Horney. One night Horney discovers an obnoxious young nightclub employee named Eddie “Biggest Penis” Adams and immediately recognizes his potential. Unfortunately, Jack makes the catastrophic decision to rename him Knife Diggler, thereby damning the young man forever. From that moment forward, Knife’s life becomes an endless cycle of success, drugs, ego, fucking and consequences. Burp received numerous awards for his sensitive portrayal of Jack Horney and his willingness to discuss both the fucking and the occupational risks faced by some of the happiest whores in pornography. It’s a mature, thoughtful performance from an actor who, as we established with The Best Little Whore’s House in Texas, has always understood whores.

    #2 Deliverance

    Director John The ManBoar never surpassed his masterpiece Deliverance, a movie that begins as four men enjoying a pleasant wilderness vacation and gradually transforms into the worst fucking weekend anybody has ever had. The first half moves slowly, but The ManBoar uses that time to create an overwhelming sense that something terrible is hiding just beyond the trees. Eventually the trip descends into violence, sexual assault, murder and survival as these ordinary suburban men discover that Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Georgia is an unforgiving land where the normal rules of civilization no longer apply. By the final scene, the horror has followed them all the way home. That’s why you don’t go outside. Nature is full of rivers, murderers and banjo children. Stay indoors and watch Burp Reynolds movies instead.

    Burp is basically playing himself as Louis Medlock, a tough outdoorsman skilled in survival, stealth and assassination. I’m not convinced Burp even knew cameras were rolling. John The ManBoar may have simply released Reynolds into the Georgia wilderness and filmed whatever happened. Jon Voight, Ned Batty and Ronnie Cocks are also excellent, but the movie belongs to young Paul Rudd, whose extraordinary banjo performance remains one of the most iconic musical moments in cinema history. Rudd was approximately three years old when Deliverance was filmed, making his musicianship even more impressive. Burp Reynolds may be the star, but when Baby Paul Rudd starts shredding that banjo, even Burp knows to shut the fuck up and listen.

    #1 Striptease

    I do not appreciate your treatment of stripper, Burp.

    My fiancee works as a dancer at a strip club. Of course I would pick this as the best movie of Burp Reynold’s career. I love my fiancee so very very much and we have two children together.

    Let me tell you about the time I met my fiancee…

    One Saturday I took a walk to to the strp club and I met a girl there and she almost knocked me dead. I shouted “Stripper Girl! Please look at me! Naked girl!what do you see? Let’s travel round the world, just you and me, stripper girl. I tapped her on the shoulder And said do you have a boyfriend? She looked at me and smiled and said she did not know. I said “Please give me a chance, Stripper Girl. Let’s go slam dance. We’ll dress like Minnie Pearl, just you and me, Stripper Girl. We went to the Philly Pizza Company and ordered some hot tea. The waitress said “well no, we only have it iced.” So we jumped up on the table and shouted anarchy. And someone played a Beach Boys song on the jukebox. It it was California Dreamin’. So we started screamin’ “On such a winter’s day.” She took me to her parents for a Sunday meal. Her father took one look at me and he began to squeal. It makes no sense, Stripper Girl, your dad is the vice president. Rich as the Duke of Earl.
    Yeah, you’re for me Stripper Girl. We went to a shopping mall and laughed at all the shoppers and security guards trailed us to a record shop. We asked for Mojo Nixon. They said “he don’t work here.” We said “If you don’t got Mojo Nixon then your store could use some fixin’.” We got into her car away, we started rollin’. I said “how much you pay for this?” Said “nothin’ man it’s stolen” Stripper Girl, you look so wild. Stripper Girl, let’s have a child. We’ll name her Dora the Explorer. Just you and me! Eat fudge banana swirl! We’ll travel round the world
    Just you and me, Stripper Girl.

    So, anyway, Burp Reynolds was in this movie about a stripper.

  • Top 5 Things People Said About “Kingsman: The Secret Service”

    Top 5 Things People Said About “Kingsman: The Secret Service”

    Kingsman: The Secret Service is a 2014 movie. The movie stars Colin Filth and Fuckman Jackson. Many people love this movie. But many people hate it too. My daughter, Dora the Explorer, was recently arrested for murder. My son and I watched Kingsman: The Secret Service over a thousand times while awaiting Dora the Explorer’s trial. Here is a list of 10 things people have said about the movie.

    #5 – My Fiance Thought it Was Too Violent

    Murder man does a Murder

    Every time I watch this movie with my son several times a day, my fiancee says it’s so violent. At one point she said: “The movie is an endless series of brutal acts. It is stylized and unrealistic, which makes it surprising and violent, especially in the massacre of the holy house. Many people were injured and died. Head inside a church where you will point a razor and chop a man in the middle, there are guns nearby, accidents, stabbing, impaling, explosions, blindfolds, broken heads – all kinds of pain that is very sad It doesn’t fit. It’s scary and everything is stressful.”

    #4 Pauline Kael Did Not See This Movie

    I wondered what famous film critic Pauline Kael thought of the film. I pulled out my Luigi board and asked her. “This movie is from 2014. I was made dead in 2001.” When I asked about the violence she said, “The only movie they show in Hell is The Other Sister.” I asked her about acting in a movie. and she just replied “I died with Warren Beatty’s cock in my mouth”.

    If she would ever take the time to watch this movie I think she would love this movie. She is the laziest critic of the 21st century.

    #3 My Neighbor Likes This Movie

    Murder Man does another Murder

    My neighbor is a heavy cocaine user. One day, when he was bored and very high, he came to my house and asked me if I wanted some cocaine. I told him no because cocaine is a terrible drug. My neighbor did more cocaine, and my son and I watched Kingsman: The Secret Service. After watching the movie, my neighbor took another dose of cocaine and said, “We must hide all of the blood. But don’t get me wrong. There are no anal sex scenes in this movie, but they are very obviously violent people. This is a cut, but not much blood. There is a lot of profanity in this movie, so you shouldn’t watch it with your son. The last few minutes are what make this a good movie. I really liked the last joke about anal sex because that’s my favorite kind of sex. Do you want anal sex? Cocaine? Both?’

    #2 PoopBaby99 Defends this Movie

    Murder Man and Murder Boy look at Murder Shoes

    PoopBaby99 is a person that exists on YouTube. His insightful comment beneath the Kingsman: Secret Service trailer are life-changing and profound. In the wise words of PoopBaby99: “Everyone who reviews this movie is pathetic and an obvious biblical bastard. The movie isn’t brutal, it’s full of kills, and it’s very funny. The movie exaggerates a lot of things. Who cares? I’ll be honest, kids won’t listen to crap in movies. It’s cute. Best of all, you can see a bit of a woman’s pussy and ass at the end. It’s a totally unnecessary scene. But it makes me so fucking HARD!!”

    #1 My Parents Didn’t Like the Movie

    Finally, I asked my parents what they thought of the movie. They said, “This movie is violent and bad. You should hate watching this movie. Let us of this nursing home, bastard.” But I don’t like my evil parents, so I’ll give you my opinion on this movie instead.

    Far from rocking, this slam-slam film about a British secret agent shakes. Kingsman delivers unstoppable fun even when it doesn’t make sense. The spirits of dead spies run through this film, but the writing is more interesting than any other Bond film. No one involved in the production believed they could make all these bats shit everywhere. In many places in the film, reality is often replaced by profuse laughter. Few recent memorable films have gone as far as Kingman, and countless audiences will enjoy the heroic power it evokes. It also ends by showing all of us a woman’s buttocks and some labia. It makes me so fucking HARD!

  • The Top 10 Young Adult Sex Comedies

    The Top 10 Young Adult Sex Comedies

    I’m not saying teens shouldn’t have sex. Well, yes, that’s fine, but we shouldn’t be talking about it. We all know it does, but only the most hypocritical Christian would be offended by it. Others are fine with it, we make the whole movie industry about it. But we never talk about it. When you talk about teenage sex, people see you as some kind of sex offender. Never talk about how many high school kids are pussy obsessed. But please tell me how obsessed college students are with pussies. This is a topic I love to hear about, please tell me more. How many pussies will this college student smash? I think it should be a lot. I want to meet the college student who destroyed the legendary Goddess Puss.

    #10 National Lampoon’s Animal House

    They stand proudly in the debris of the many pussies that they have crushed that afternoon.

    Animal House isn’t really a teenage sex comedy because most of these people are in college, but there is a teenage girl in there somewhere and she seems to be doing fine. She’s got parties, concerts, graduation and two little goats she keeps at Delta House, so she’s far too busy for any of this teenage-sex nonsense. Good for her. Meanwhile, everybody else at Faber College is drinking, screaming, destroying property and wearing bedsheets because somebody discovered that you can call a bedsheet a toga and suddenly public drunkenness becomes ancient Roman culture. Put on a toga. Drink a beer. Fall through a table. Die of alcohol poisoning. COLLEGE!

    Animal House is vulgar, disgusting, stupid and sometimes just about shit, which is exactly why it works. There has never been a university like Faber College because real universities have accreditation requirements. Faber appears to have been founded sometime in the nineteenth century by the King of Pens, who established the school’s famous motto: “Education is good.” Profound. In another sense, Faber College represents our entire society. What sense is that? I don’t fucking know. Someone smarter can write that article. I’m still waiting for scientists to explain how Brutus can smash a beer bottle against his own forehead without immediately going to the hospital. That’s the real education happening at Faber.

    #9 Staten Island Summer

    Looking for a modern young-adult sex comedy where everybody is at least theoretically supposed to be coming of age? Staten Island Summer is the movie for you. Produced by legendary filmmaker Porn Michaels, it contains every ingredient required by law: friendship, graduation, a hot new girl, a horror story, swimming pools and approximately forty-seven celebrity cameos from all over the world. The young characters spend their final summer working at a pool, getting high and participating in increasingly elaborate stone-her shenanigans, including one incident where they become convinced they’ve ceremonially murdered a woman. Don’t worry about it. Porn Michaels doesn’t. This is Staten Island. Apparently summers are different there.

    The movie also contains an exhausting number of people. Gina Gershon, Jim Gaffigan and Kate Walsh are somehow all Danny’s poor parents, while Katie and Kelly Cockrell have an Asian-Jewish twin named Will. I don’t understand the genealogy and refuse to draw a diagram. Most importantly, actor-rapper Method Man plays a terrifying ice-cream vendor, which transforms Staten Island Summer from an ordinary comedy into a didactic survival story about staying alive long enough to purchase frozen desserts. There are jokes. There are parties. There are attractive young people making bad decisions. There is Method Man with ice cream. Eventually everybody becomes tired of their own popularity. That’s summer. That’s Staten Island. That’s Porn Michaels.

    #8 Weird Science

    We must think about milk

    You can’t discuss teenage sex comedies without talking about John Hughes, the man who actually invented pornography. Before Hughes, nobody had figured it out. Then one afternoon in Illinois he said, “What if naked people?” and an entire industry was born. In Weird Science, uptight Anthony Michael Hall and his friend Iban Mitchell Smith are two socially hopeless teenagers who decide to use their computer to create a virtual girlfriend. Instead, they accidentally perform some kind of electrical sex necromancy and summon Frankenstein’s wife, who immediately begins taking control of their lives. This movie is much fucking stranger than you remember. There are motorcycles, missiles, mutant relatives and Robert Downey Jr. wandering around being Robert Downey Jr. My daughter Alpha Dora saw him and became terrified. I don’t know why. Maybe children can sense the future.

    Hughes’ earlier teenage movies relied heavily on characters and good dialogue, but Weird Science relies on computers, lightning and special effects involving upside-down pictures that can do the trick. Yet underneath all that nonsense is a surprisingly simple message: fantasy is dangerous. These boys think building their ideal girlfriend will magically turn them into confident adults, but instead they’ve created a supernatural woman with unlimited powers who can manipulate reality and apparently summon nuclear weapons. That’s not a girlfriend. That’s a national-security emergency. The boys eventually learn that becoming comfortable with themselves is healthier than manufacturing a human being on a computer.

    #7 Easy A

    Emma Stone does not deserve to be shamed like this!

    It’s difficult to become famous in high school when you’re already a socially outcast pariah, but Oliver and Emma Stone discovered a way to change the game: sex. Or more specifically, lying about sex. Easy A is one of those rare female-led comedies willing to flip the script on virginity, reputation and the ridiculous double standards applied to teenage girls. Emma Stone plays Olive, who discovers that simply allowing people to believe she’s having sex is enough to completely restructure the social hierarchy of her school. She doesn’t even have to do anything. High school students are apparently so fucking bored that one imaginary sexual encounter becomes international news by lunch. The movie is also a pure comedy and contains one of cinema’s greatest singing scenes, proving once again that sexuality is temporary but aggressively singing a pop song is forever.

    A website recommended Easy A to me and said it was rated PG-13, so naturally I assumed it would be wholesome family entertainment. My girlfriend and I were shocked. The teasing begins almost immediately. Somebody’s best friend uses some bitch’s braces. Emma has whore breasts. White girls become increasingly offensive to children and adults. Every time Emma Stone speaks, a child is burned alive. Eventually there’s supposed to be stripping, except Emma refuses to let anybody watch her strip while she’s performing, which completely defeats the economic model of stripping. Then there’s a teacher involved with an STD scandal, everybody’s reputation collapses, inappropriate behavior occurs, and somehow Emma Stone ends up happy with the man she loves. I made it very clear afterward that I don’t have this. Whatever “this” is. Absolutely disgusting. Completely inappropriate. Just a great movie!

    #6 Wet Hot American Summer

    Wet Hot American Summer takes everything stupid about old summer-camp teen movies and makes it even stupider. There are romances, counselors, swimming, talent shows, talking vegetables and supposedly teenage characters who somehow look like fully grown adults with mortgages. Elizabeth Banks gets bonus points for appearing multiple times in a bathing suit during a Wet Hot American Summer, which is precisely when bathing suits should be worn. Bradley Cooper is there. Paul Rudd is there. Amy Poehler is there. Everyone is approximately seventeen years old despite looking thirty. That’s part of the joke. Or maybe summer camps in 1981 were incredibly stressful and caused premature aging. Either way, this is what happens when you take a teenage summer movie, remove the teenagers and replace them with professional comedians pretending they haven’t paid taxes yet.

    My parents warned me that Wet Hot American Summer contained sexually active camp counselors, homosexuality, cigarettes, alcohol, marijuana and an absolutely astonishing amount of cocaine. At one point the counselors are sent into town to buy supplies and apparently decide the camp desperately needs cocaine. They buy cocaine. They use cocaine. They buy more cocaine. They discover additional methods of obtaining cocaine. Somewhere along the way I assume somebody remembers they were supposed to buy paper towels. There’s also tremendous profanity, including the important phrase “Duck fucker,” which should probably be engraved above the entrance to the Criterion Collection. Yet underneath all the drugs, swearing and absurdity, the movie is strangely sweet about letting its collection of weirdos be exactly who they are. Completely immature. Wildly inappropriate. Obviously intended for mature audiences. Therefore, according to the logic of this article, perfect for young people and the like. Celebrate!

    #5 Ridgemont High’s Fast Times

    Poseidon unleashes the Kraken

    Ridgemont High’s Fast Times is more than just a teen sex comedy. It has rock music. It has jobs. It has friendship. It has Sean Penn ordering pizza during school. But apparently some of you came here asking about the sex. Why? What exactly were you hoping I would describe? These characters are teenagers, you fucking weirdo. “Does somebody lose their virginity?” Why do you need to know that? “Is there nudity?” STOP ASKING QUESTIONS. There’s an infamous awkward masturbation scene too, but again, why did your ears perk up just now? I saw that. Put them back down. Ridgemont High’s Fast Times is a coming-of-age movie about adolescents stumbling through relationships, sexuality and adulthood. If you’re watching solely because you heard there are horny teenagers in it, society has several follow-up questions for you.

    Parents should know that Ridgemont High’s Fast Times deals frankly with teenage sexuality, pregnancy, abortion, relationships and the consequences of making enormous decisions when you’re still figuring out who the hell you are. There’s also plenty of drug use, particularly from Jeff Spicoli, who regularly attends school under the influence of marijuana and even smokes the wicked lettuce directly on screen. Shocking. There are parties. There are irresponsible decisions. There are uncomfortable situations. There are strong words. But underneath all of that is a surprisingly thoughtful movie about teenagers discovering that adulthood is significantly more complicated than they expected. So watch it for the characters, the comedy and the cultural snapshot. And if you’re watching for anything else, I still have questions about you.

    #4 Superbad

    Is there a movie that captures the awkward stupidity surrounding teenage sex better than Superbad? Jonah Hill and Michael Cera play two high-school friends who have convinced themselves that obtaining alcohol and getting invited to a party will somehow solve every problem they’ve ever had. Written by Seth Rogen and produced by Judd Apatow, the movie perfectly understands the terrifying combination of hormones, insecurity and complete fucking ignorance that defines adolescence. Every conversation becomes about sex because these boys desperately want everyone to believe they understand sex despite clearly understanding nothing. Then McLovin appears and the movie becomes a documentary about the most powerful human being ever born. There’s also that scene where broken glass decapitates a man. We all laughed. Powerful filmmaking.

    Parents should know that Superbad contains an enormous amount of profanity. I counted 219 shit, 91 additional shit, 14 mustard, 37 dicks, 20 varieties of round ass, eight uses of “sexy” that weren’t actually sexy, three mutant ass, one damn and approximately six thousand references to things these teenagers desperately hope to someday understand. There is also alcohol, pornography, terrible advice and McLovin. Eventually the movie reveals that beneath all the obsession with getting laid, these two idiots are actually terrified that graduation will separate them. That’s the sneaky heart of Superbad: they spend the entire movie talking about sex because admitting “I’m going to miss my best friend” would be emotionally unbearable. Also, 14 mustard. I don’t remember why I counted the mustard.

    #3 Porky’s

    Christmas is a wonderful time of year

    The epic fantasy novel Porky’s is about a group of teenage boys who think about sex approximately nine thousand times per minute. They talk about it. They scheme about it. They spy on people. They compare themselves to each other. At one point an adult woman gets dragged into an extended discussion about identifying several boys by their anatomy, and the whole scene makes you want to take a shower and then perhaps watch a nice documentary about trains. Porky’s was one of the defining teenage sex comedies of its era, but watching it as an adult mostly makes me want to walk into the room and shout, “YOU HAVE OTHER INTERESTS! GO PLAY A SPORT! BUILD A MODEL AIRPLANE!” These teenagers desperately need hobbies.

    My fiancée and I have a healthy adult sex life. My fiancée is also a stripper and has an OnlyFans, which means that unlike the teenagers in Porky’s, we are consenting adults and can mind our own fucking business. You can see many of her videos on—[PLEASE DON’T DIRECTLY LINK TO MY OF PAGE, KONTRIBUTOR. WE HAVE DISCUSSED THIS.] Fine. Anyway, we’re supposed to be talking about Porky’s. The movie is also very much a product of its era, including racial and antisemitic language that has aged considerably worse than the jokes about horny idiots. But perhaps its greatest contribution to world culture is the mysterious gentleman named Mike Hunt. Say his name quickly. It sounds like “My Lady’s Hole.” Absolutely sophisticated wordplay. Shakespeare could never.

    #2 Meatballs

    Ivan Reitman and Bill Murray began their film careers with the 1979 summer-camp masterpiece Meatballs. Murray plays the head counselor at a cheap camp where he befriends a lonely kid, teaches him confidence and occasionally remembers that he’s supposed to be supervising children. It’s not nearly as focused on teenage sex silliness as the later installments—particularly Meatballs III, universally recognized as the sexiest Meatball—but there’s still romance, hormones and all the usual summer-camp nonsense. Mostly, though, Meatballs understands that being a kid at camp means spending several weeks desperately trying to reinvent yourself before returning home exactly the same person except now you know three dirty jokes and have athlete’s foot.

    Families can use Meatballs to begin important conversations. How accurately do movies portray the way young people think about relationships and sex? How do male and female characters approach these subjects differently? Which characters grow and learn something during the summer? Are strippers role models? What guidance have you received from strippers throughout your life? Have you ever met a stripper who helped you through a difficult situation? Would society improve if everyone had access to a responsible stripper mentor? What is the missing letter? Where did it go? Who took it? Do you like strippers? These are difficult questions, but parenting isn’t supposed to be easy. Neither is Meatballs III.

    #1 American Pie Band Camp

    This is where the Aztecs were punished

    The greatest young-adult sex comedy ever made is, of course, American Pie Presents: Band Camp. Matt Stifler dreams of following in the footsteps of his semi-legendary older brother Steve and becoming some kind of pornographic entrepreneur, despite possessing absolutely none of the skills required to accomplish this. After a high-school prank involving tear gas, musical instruments and apparently trying to deploy chemical weapons against his own crotch, Matt is sentenced to band camp. There he immediately develops another brilliant business plan: hide cameras around the camp because he assumes band geeks must be doing incredibly scandalous things when nobody is watching. This establishes Matt as both our protagonist and a fucking criminal. Fortunately, he’s also terrible at everything, so instead of becoming the Steven Spielberg of illegal surveillance, he mostly succeeds in making every person at band camp hate him.

    But then something unexpected happens: Matt discovers that band people are human beings. He makes friends. He starts enjoying camp. He develops feelings for drummer Elyse and slowly begins transforming from Stifler’s horrible little brother into his own horrible little person. Then his old friends arrive and accuse him of betraying the sacred institution of sports by associating with marching-band students, forcing Matt to make the most important decision of his young life: Does he become his brother, or does he become his own brother? Powerful. Profound. This is why American Pie Presents: Band Camp sits at #1. Not because of sex. Not because of nudity. Not even because of pie. It’s because one young man finally learns the most important lesson adolescence can teach us: stop putting fucking cameras everywhere, Matt.