One thing that came out of RiffTrax Live: Godzilla was that I reminded of this 1969 gem of a short film by Marv Newland [IMDB]. I can’t believe that I had never subjected my children to its understated genius before now.
I remember having to track down eccentric little movie theaters to see stuff like this when I was in my teens. Thanks Internet!
When the fine, funny people at RiffTrax decided to take their special brand of snark to theaters across the country we knew two things:
The first show, August 20, 2009, was “Plan Nine from Outer Space” and this was followed up regularly with a small herd of super-cheese staples including “Reefer Madness”, “Manos: The Hands of Fate” and the modern, solar-powered classic, “Birdemic“. To do bigger movies, they’d need more money. Being that special combination of smart/lazy/awesome they left that part up to us. A hugely successful KickStarter campaign gave us an amazing evening with “Starship Troopers“.
So, after another successful KickStarter and nearly five years from that first show, they brought us Roland Emmerich’s 1998 character assassination of “Godzilla”. In it he accused the Big “G” of being an asexual, hermaphroditic, tunnel-crawling, no-fire-breathing, Jay Leno-looking mutated iguana. It got what it deserved and it was hilarious.
Broadcast by Fathom Events to hundreds of theaters across North America (the good America) the shows bring together thousands of fans and and some high-quality father/son time. I’ve seen “Guardians of the Galaxy“, but this – Roland-freakin’-Emmerich’s Godzilla – is still the most fun I’ve had in a theater all year.
Presented without undue delay or comment (but a hell of a lot of schoolgirl giggles from a fat old man):
We’re huge RiffTrax fans here and when they did their first KickStarter campaign back in February we backed them. Backed them hard! They were trying to earn enough to Riff “Twilight”. Apparently, since the movie is still busy printing money like Guttenberg on Meth, there isn’t enough for that. So they did “Starship Troopers” instead.
Broadcast by Fathom Events to hundreds of theaters (and, for the first time, Canada) this is the fifth live RiffTrax event and the first using a major studio film. The prior events, “Plan Nine from Outer Space”, “Manos: The Hands of Fate”. “Reefer Madness” and the modern turkey classic, “Birdemic”, were some of the best times we’ve had in a theater and this one didn’t disappoint.
“Starship Troopers” is actually a decent film on its own. Campy, clichéd and over-the-top, but also fun, well-paced and visually impressive. I prefer it when the guys riff truly terrible films so I can’t say this was my favorite live event. It was still worlds better than any of the comedies I’ve seen this year.
RiffTrax never disappoints!
We moved to Scranton, from Boston, about seven years ago to follow a job. Scranton’s a nice town. It manages its finances like a schizophrenic chimpanzee but the people are decent, my kids are happy and we’ve actually got a backyard. It’s not the most exciting town you could name; but it does have its moments and this is one of them.
As a belated birthday treat for my son my lovely bride and I took him and a van load of his dumbass friends to see the latest RiffTrax Live event from the fine folks at RiffTrax (presented by Fathom Events). The movie this time out was the modern crapterpiece “Birdemic” [my less than charitable review].
Birdemic was made for this. Not only did Mike, Bill and Kevin make suffering through the movie enjoyable they quite literally turned the experience into the funniest experience I’ve had with a movie… well, since the last “RiffTrax Live”.
The experience is not unlike inviting a bunch of friends over to watch bad movies. The difference here is that the screen is 40′ tall, you have 300 friends and you don’t know any of their names. It’s some of the purest, simplest fun you’ll ever have in a theater, hands down.
