"Planes" Slayin' with Automobiles

Bizarro Movie House- Set after the events in "Maximum Overdrive", a short story and movie from the imagination of Stephen King, "Cars" was an ambitious glimpse into an Earth dominated by sentient vehicles. With the corpses of their human creators left to rot in massive pits, the motorized master race soon evolved eyes, mouths, and various prehensile digits that can be used to refuel themselves without the use of fleshy slaves.

Disney seeks to add an entirely new dimension to the popular franchise with "Planes". As the name implies, the principle characters are aircraft possessed with various ethnic stereotype demons that embark on a big racist adventure of self-discovery.

Universally hated has-been Dane Cook lends his voice to Dusty Crophopper, a crop duster who wants to be a combat plane. Seeing potential in the scrappy bi-plane, combat drone Willy Pete agrees to take him under his wing [Editor's note: Goddamnit.].

While the premise might sound trite, "Planes" takes an edgy narrative direction when surveillance plane El Burrito Nacho takes a break from his daily routine of sexual harassment to investigate a possible human refuge concealed in a Pakistani bunker. The race is on to see who can cleanse the infestation with fiery murder and secure the future of bloodthirsty living vehicles across the world.

"Planes" hits a couple of comedy snags, with a heinous fart joke worked into the crop duster's lethal gas deployment training. Fortunately, the comedy is just garnish for this feast of gripping drama. Dusty is taunted by modern jets like Drunky McIrishson and the sultry Slutra Objectiva (the only female character in the cast) as he attempts to lift a bunker buster with his inadequate engine. Much to their surprise, Dusty uses their bullying to teach himself a valuable lesson about not being a pussy, and goes on to eliminate the final vestiges of humanity.

Did I just spoil the movie? Not quite. All of this takes place in the first ten minutes. The remaining one hour and thirty minutes are devoted to enriching the imaginative world of "Cars" and "Planes" by introducing us to their dark and lurid reproduction rituals--and by revealing that all Pixar movies take place in the same world through the graphic massacre of other beloved Pixar characters in feats of motor-driven carnage. "Wall-E" isn't cannon, by the way.

I insist that your family buy a ticket to ride on Air Force Fun [Editor's note: You horrible bastard] with "Planes". And don't forget to take your connecting flight to Wal-Mart for exclusive "Planes" action figures, bedroom sets, underwear, t-shirts, baseball hats, kickballs, helium balloons, gift wrap, toothbrushes, mouthwash, children's vitamins, eating utensils, cups, posters, wallpaper, birthday cakes, squirrel rifles, bleach, laxatives, suppositories, and child coffins.

"Sharknado" a Disappointing Twist on B-Movie Idiocy

Bizarro Moviehouse- As someone who enjoys a shameless, low-budget romp through schlock I expected a number of things from "Sharknado". I wanted flat, static characters. I wanted CGI on par with that Dire Straits video. Most of all, I wanted the gratuitous TV-MA violence.

"Sharknado" did not deliver.

The cast of "Sharknado" is trapped in a tangled web betrayal and intrigue. Every scene is driven by stunning performances and inspired cinematography. Every frame is a masterclass in film-making; a love letter to the craft.

Ian Ziering is a tormented veteran, struggling to come to terms with the blood on his hands after ordering a mortar strike that went tragically astray--hitting an orphanage for the blind instead of a Bombz-N-Things Terrorist Wholesale Store. There are fights and tearful reconciliations aplenty as Ian realizes that his family can never know his pain; that the love his wife and daughter have is for a man that died on that fateful day in Afghanistan. And who was this new man, this Ian Ziering that stared into the abyss and saw something looking back?

As Ian trudges to the liquor store on a stormy night, the wind begins to rise into a roaring tempest.

"That's a goddamn tornado!" shouts a fleeing tourist. "Everyone, get inside!"

Faced once more with the concept of his own mortality and the frailty of flesh, Ian stands idle as the waterspout approaches land.

"Give me one reason," Ian mumbles. "Come on God. You just give me a damn reason I should get out of the way. Who knows? I just might listen."

Ian's cell phone rings. It's his wife.

"Ian!" she cries, the infamous freight train of tornadic winds buffeting against the receiver. "I've been out looking for you for hours! You have to get inside, for the love of God!"

"Why?" Ian replies. "Let's get it all out there. This is the last chance for both of us."

"Because you're worth it, Ian. Because you're worth caring about. Because your daughter is needs her father. You've changed, but I love you."

The phone is sucked out of Ian's hand, which clenches into a fist.

"Time to move."

Ian makes for a nearby storefront, but he has delayed too long. And this is no ordinary tornado. Indeed, it is a Sharknado.

Using his belt to lasso a light post, Ian hangs on desperately as sharks are launched from the funnel--nature's cruel catapult. The fearsome beasts' strength and dexterity are irrelevant here. Sharks slam into parking lots, break against brick walls, and are delivered into power lines for an excruciating demise. For the shark, there is no mercy but death.

As the Sharknado retreats into the clouds, Ian is left kneeling in a street that is red with chum. His wife appears behind him and crouches--her arms circling his neck.

"God," she whispers. "There's so many dead sharks. They didn't even have a chance. What did these animals do to deserve this?"

Ian sighs and grasps her hand. "This godforsaken world of ours, with all its chaos and unchecked power, doesn't give a damn who deserves what. Who's good, who's evil. Who's young and innocent, who's old and cynical. In the end, we're all just sharks in a Sharknado. Let's go home."

Asterisks are for Lawyers. "Turbo" is for Winners.

Bizarro Moviehouse- The cynical may take a glance at “Turbo” and write it off as yet another Dreamworks movie where the entire premise is an animal doing something that an animal doesn’t usually do. They might lament the old and musty trope of an underdog rising through the ranks to beat the villain--who for the sake of narrative convenience is always the most skilled at whatever event the protagonist is trying to master. An abundance of celebrity voicework will inevitably lead to groaning about easy paychecks and attempts to wallpaper over a bland story with starpower. Sure, tossing out all the of the Indy 500’s notoriously uncompromising regulations and allowing a snail to compete would probably require far more effort to explain than Dreamworks was willing to actually put in. Others might point out that allowing a genetically enhanced snail that can travel at obscene speeds to race with Formula 1 cars is like Superman challenging Spiderman to a contest to see who’s the most bulletproof. Latino writers might note that the only Mexican characters in the entire movie sell tacos for a living. Every single one of these observations is true, and by all rights I should condemn “Turbo” for being as lazy as any movie possibly can be when it comes to messaging and storycrafting.

But I won’t.

There are some movies that, while technically terrible in every way, excel at seizing an uncomfortable truth and bringing it to the forefront of our social consciousness. “Night of the Living Dead” had a miniscule budget, and the undead threat consisted primarily of extras stumbling around in boxer shorts. However, its black male lead was portrayed as a capable and bold problem-solver. White characters were either catatonic or bloviating jackasses. Romero took the entire Hollywood racial paradigm, which nobody wanted to acknowledge, and turned it on its head.

“Turbo” has a message too: Steroids are awesome.

In the golden age of American sports, we marveled as home run records were constantly broken by titanic bat-to-ball connections. Lance Armstrong made America proud year after year with his world-famous cycling performances. Professional wrestlers were titans—performing incredible feats of simulated sportsmanship. We had it all until the whiners in the anti-juicing crowd decided that all the fun should be jettisoned from sports by replacing our favorite players with mere mortals of unoptimized flesh. Since cartoon snails don’t have fingers, middle or otherwise, I’ll be happy to lend my appendage and give these wimps a rightly deserved invitation to sit and spin.

Theo the snail is living a life of drudgery harvesting produce; dreaming all the while of a career in racing. Being an ordinary snail, this is clearly beyond his abilities. However, in a twist of fate, Theo is submerged in a vat of nitrous oxide and gains the exact super powers he needs to achieve his dreams. “Turbo” teaches children that people who play by the rules are doomed to a lifetime of conciliation prizes—a job that pays slightly above minimum wage, a house in a neighborhood that allows you to be quickly profiled as a criminal by your betters, and a spouse and children that disappoint your parents. But if you’re willing to take a dip in that gently glowing vat of get-up-and-go, every joy life has to offer will fall into your hands. Your meaty, rage-clenched hands. “Turbo” celebrates an America that refused to accept anything less than a literal 110% effort. And by God, I think we’ll all be better off for it.