Why This Is My Favorite Scene in Any Superman Film

Posted on November 15, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

I love the first two Superman films starring Christopher Reeve. I think they are nearly perfect in just about every way. They’re exciting, funny, dramatic, and emotional. And, best of all, they earn all of their big Superman moments by putting the character through a number of moral dilemmas and forcing him to make tough choices along the way. My favorite of these comes in Superman II.

No, it isn’t Superman’s showdown with the three Kryptonian criminals in Metropolis or the Fortress of Solitude. It’s actually the moment when Clark Kent hits rock bottom and is forced to admit that he made the wrong choice in giving up his powers to be with the woman he loves.

Not only is this a great scene on its own, but I would argue that it is the best scene in the entire pantheon of Superman films. I mean it. It’s got everything I could want in a Superman film. It shows the suffering that Superman has to endure because of his earlier choice, and it’s the reason why the fight in Metropolis and the Fortress of Solitude resonate so much. Seeing Superman fall so hard and then pick himself up and return to greatness as the Man of Steel is awe-inspiring. And seeing him outsmart General Zod at the end is so satisfying, as well, thanks to this scene.

Let’s delve deeper into the elements that make this scene perfect. Continue reading →

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Forgotten Film Gems: Frequency

Posted on November 8, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

There are two kinds of people: those who love Frequency and those who haven’t seen it yet. Those are the words of my younger brother Kevin. He has been asking me to review Frequency almost since I created the Deja Reviewer website more than five years ago. I’m sorry for taking so long to finally get to it.

If you have not seen this movie, please drop what you’re doing and watch it immediately. It’s so good. It’s a time travel movie unlike any other. It uses time travel to tell a gripping crime drama spanning decades. You keep thinking the film is going in one direction until it pulls the rug out from under you and finds a whole new avenue to explore.

Join me as we discover what a freakin’ awesome movie Frequency is! Continue reading →

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Clue (1985) Is a Parody of House on Haunted Hill (1959)

Posted on October 31, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

Happy Halloween! I have a special treat for you to mark this holiday. 1985’s comedy classic Clue is obviously based on the popular board game. And yet its plot and characters seem to have quite a bit in common with the ones in 1959’s House on Haunted Hill. The big difference is that Clue is a dark comedy while House on Haunted Hill plays it completely straight as a horror film.

There is a lot to cover in this Movie Matchup, so let’s not dilly dally, but consider each similarity one by one as we discover that Clue is a brilliant parody of House on Haunted Hill. Continue reading →

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Movie Matchups: The Ninth Gate vs. In the Mouth of Madness

Posted on October 25, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

Someone named Daniel recently begged me to do an article on Roman Polanski’s 1999 film The Ninth Gate. I’m always happy to oblige my readers, so I promised him I would work it into my schedule. It just so happened that I had a slot open close to Halloween, so everything worked out perfectly. Daniel, this one’s for you!

I felt like I was having déjà vu as I watched The Ninth Gate. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but a lot of it reminded me of another unconventional horror film I had seen years ago. It wasn’t until I talked to my wife about it after the fact that I finally realized what it reminded me of: John Carpenter’s 1994 film In the Mouth of Madness.

I want to make it clear I’m not saying these films are copies of each other or essentially the same in their plots, the way I’ve striven to do with other Movie Matchups. I’m just saying that they have some surprisingly similar setups and characters, which they do different things with, and both films gave me the same feeling of dread the whole way through. With that in mind, let’s find the devil in the details of The Ninth Gate and In the Mouth of Madness! Continue reading →

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The Death of a Family Member

Posted on October 18, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

My heart is heavy. I had intended to publish another fun, thought-provoking film analysis today, but something happened this week that made me change my mind. Right now would not be an appropriate time for levity.

Alan Blood and his young son react to discovering Alan's breast cancer had returned.My brother-in-law, Alan Blood, died on the morning of Saturday, October 15, 2016. He was only 43 years old. He leaves behind his wife (my sister) of 20 years, as well as his three daughters and one son, aged 8, 12, 14, and 17. Continue reading →

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The Problem with Lethal Weapon 2

Posted on October 11, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

Lethal Weapon 2 has not aged terribly well.For years, I heard that Lethal Weapon 2 was an excellent sequel that stacks up nicely to the original film. I put off watching it for a long time so as to savor the anticipation of seeing it. When I finally got around to seeing it, I couldn’t help but feel underwhelmed by the experience. The weird thing is that I didn’t find the film to be terribly boring or bad. I just felt like I had seen it many times before.

Lethal Weapon 2 did such a good job being sleek, paying off everything it sets up, and being an all-around solid sequel that it wound up being parodied, copied, and recycled in numerous ways. It’s so ubiquitous that I have trouble thinking of clear examples of other films that follow its formula, but it just seems like so many other action films have borrowed heavily from this film. The following things didn’t necessarily originate with this film, but their presence in this film makes it feel like other films got some of their ideas from it:

  • The love interest works for the villain and gets killed (Tomorrow Never Dies)
  • Someone uses a nail gun (or something like it) in an action sequence (Casino Royale (2006), Arachnophobia, Darkman)
  • An overbearing, annoying, yet endearing sidekick shows up to provide comic relief (The Fifth Element, Another Stakeout, Judge Dredd, Shrek)
  • A villain claims diplomatic immunity after killing police officers (U.S. Marshals)
  • The villain puts a bomb on an everyday object that the heroes manage to circumvent (Speed)
  • During a chase, a car speeds onto a sidewalk, endangering pedestrians (The Bourne Identity)

There are a lot of other things, but you hopefully get the idea. I had already seen Lethal Weapon 2 many times over by the time I finally sat down and watched it. I’m sure that me saying this sounds like I might as well be criticizing William Shakespeare’s works for being clichéd. I realize that this is the source of the clichés, much like other trendsetters like Star Wars, Rocky, and Psycho (1960). But while those movies still hold up well today and are just as effective at evoking emotions, Lethal Weapon 2 has lost a lot of its luster since it debuted in 1989.

In addition to its overall sense of “been there, done that,” here are a few other things that keep Lethal Weapon 2 from being a great film in my eyes. Continue reading →

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Lethal Weapon and the Fearless Action Hero

Posted on October 4, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

We like fearless action heroes. Arnold Schwarzenegger epitomizes the image of the action hero who rarely shows a hint of weakness and kills without remorse. In 1987’s Predator, he does have a few moments where he looks like he could actually die, but for the most part he’s in complete control of his emotions.

That same year another action film debuted, which deconstructed the ‘80s action hero and gave us a completely new take on the idea of fearlessness – Lethal Weapon. I admit I didn’t like Lethal Weapon the first time I saw it. In fact, I included it in a list of movies I regretted watching a few years ago. I’ve changed my mind about several films on that list since I wrote it, especially Lethal Weapon.

I recently rewatched Lethal Weapon, and I found a lot to love about it. Most of all, I found Martin Riggs to be an incredibly compelling character and one that I can definitely empathize with. Let’s deconstruct this deconstruction of action heroes as we discuss Lethal Weapon’s unique take on the fearless action hero. Continue reading →

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Star Trek’s Insights Into the Campus Rape Hysteria

Posted on September 27, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

Season 3 of Star Trek: The Next Generation is probably my favorite season of that show. It introduced us to the awkward yet lovable character of Reginald Barclay, offered a proper sendoff to Tasha Yar after her embarrassing departure from the show in season 1, added a new dimension to the previously one-note Q, and, of course, gave us the greatest TV cliffhanger of all time in the form of “The Best of Both Worlds, Part 1.”

Sandwiched in the middle of “Deja Q” and “Yesterday’s Enterprise” is a little episode entitled “A Matter of Perspective.” Star Trek is at its best when it takes a moral dilemma and shows us multiple sides of the issue so we can make our own value judgments on it. And “A Matter of Perspective” takes that concept literally by showing us multiple people’s takes on events leading up to a murder.

It’s never clear exactly what happened leading up to the murder itself, and that’s part of the brilliance of this episode. We want to believe one character’s side of the story because he’s a main cast member, but we can’t be absolutely certain he didn’t embellish to make himself look just a little more stalwart than he actually acted.

While this episode aired more than two decades ago, it has a lot to say about the supposed rape culture taking place on college campuses. Some people claim that between 1 in 4 or 1 in 5 women will be sexually assaulted while attending college – numbers that are insanely high and easy to debunk. But this supposed crisis has led to a lot of injustice, and I’d like to talk about it by walking through “A Matter of Perspective” and likening it to current events. Continue reading →

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Netflix Dedicated a Video to My Back to the Future Chiasmus!

Posted on September 20, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

It’s not every day that you can say a big name like Netflix took notice of you. Well, last Wednesday (coincidentally right after I published another Back to the Future article) Netflix posted a video on their YouTube account depicting my giant article detailing the Cinematic Chiasmus of the entire Back to the Future Trilogy! Seriously, check it out above.

That’s pretty amazing. This isn’t the first time someone has noticed how awesome that particular article is, but I’m not gonna lie – it’s pretty cool to be noticed by Netflix and to have my name forever etched into the popular pantheon of film fandom.

I’m just going to briefly share what I love about the video and offer a little constructive criticism about what I wish they had done a little better. Continue reading →

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5 Ways Marty McFly Could Get Rich Without the Sports Almanac

Posted on September 13, 2016 by Robert Lockard, the Deja Reviewer

In Back to the Future Part II, when Doc Brown discovered that Marty McFly was going to take lucrative information about the future back to the past (in the form of a Sports Almanac), he was furious. He didn’t want anyone to use the time machine for financial gain. But he didn’t realize that just by walking around the 2015 version of Hill Valley Marty had already soaked up so much valuable information that he could make a fortune by remembering what he saw and heard. No Almanac required.

Here are five ways Marty could still get fabulously wealthy from his experience in 2015, even after Doc threw his Almanac in the trash. Continue reading →

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