My Favorite Non-Superhero Comicbook Movies.

I was kinda surprised that as a comicbook nerd, I was never even aware of MIB until the movie came out. So afterwards, I decided to look up the printed version & check it out. And no wonder I had never heard about it: it was a piece of crap. Which I guess just made me like the film version even more, for what it was.

They say what you don't know can't hurt you.
And in this movie, this applies to idea of aliens as well.
Extra-terrestrials have not only touched down to Earth, they are living amongst us and have been doing so for quite some time. So, how did we get by for so long without knowing?
The MIB, a secret organization that makes sure that unidentified flying objects remain unidentified and that extra-terrestrials remain "extra" (I hope that mkaes sense...).
And it's not a conspiracy, it's for you're own good.
These black suited, dark sunglassed agents know that if any of us average joes were aware of the fact that we had been being visited for years now, it would be too much information for us to handle.
In short, to save from us being taken away by the men in white, we need the Men In Black.
We just don't know it.

Heck, a being from another planet could be writing these very words that you are reading right now.

I always thought that Scott Pilgrim was a weird choice to make as full-length near-end summer flick. Trying to depict this series on screen, it seems to come off as a bit awkward, in it's story, pacing, editing, & just overall, as a concept. Especially to mainstream audiences.
And even though it's hipster alternative plotline feels alot more like this should've be done as an independent movie instead of a wide release feature film,
I was still glad that I got a chance to see it with the kind of budget that the average mainstream movie usually gets.
Definitely the type of cinema not for everyone,
but a change of pace for those seeking escapism of the alternative nature.

   Art School Confidential first appeared in the #7 issue of the Dan Clowes comicbook series Eightball, as a four page short story that was, of course, expanded to fit within the span of a full length feature movie.
   This was director Terry Zwigel’s second attempt at making a movie based off of Clowes comic book. The first one was Ghost World and has since become a classic in the independent film community. Unlike GW however, Art School was not a success, critically or commercially. But truth be told, I rather enjoyed it. I read several reviews of why this is considered to be a bad movie. And I am being honest when I say that I just don’t see it that way. I’m not saying it’s great, but I don’t see it as being too many steps away from Ghost World ( athough I am in agreement with the general consensus that GW is the better movie). Since, for a list this long, I’m trying to keep the description boxes short, I won’t get into the details of why (I’ve left that for another list which includes this misunderstood missive of outsider cinema ), and say that, to this day, every time I watch ASC , I fall to see anything that would rank it below the 50% threshold. It may not be art, but it definitely ain’t trash.

Confidentially speaking.

One of the most important moments growing up for me as a huge comicbook nerd was the discovery of Heavy Metal, an anthology comic-magazine full of fantasy, futuristic and/or the emergin cyber-punkologic stories that were not restricted by those imposed upon more immature superheroic fare.
When the movie came out, even though it lacked the technical strength of more general-audience targeted animated features, in it I saw the potential for the kind of creative diversity & no-holds barred story telling that I had experienced in the magazine. It is definitely flawed & definitely qualifies as not being for everybody. What it is, however, is a vehicle for anyone interested in looking for something that is not the same ol' same ol' & with an interesting anthology theme whose rock'roll/sci-fi/animated integrated format is bound by neither PC restrictions or by the rules that result from the more kid-targeted genre.

It is well known within the comicbook community that famed writer Alan Moore does not approve of his films being made into films. And From Hell is a good example why. The four color printed form of this work has an intensity & deepness to it's mystery plot device that is impossible to capture within the limited timeframe of a movie.
However, if one were to watch this film without having read the comicbook series first, it can come off as a satisfying mystery tale with a unique speculation to the identity of the infamous London street killer known as Jack the Ripper.

Before there was Beatrice Kiddo, the Bride, waking up after her supposed death and staining the snow with blood in Kill Bill vol. 1*,
there was Yuki Kashima, aka Lady Snowblood, doing the exact same thing. But unlike the Bride, who did it as a homage to the Pinky Violence genre, Lady S did it as the originator of these kinds of story themes and was an early entry into the field of female film bad-assery.



*(For any fans of the Kill Bill films, the battle scene where Kiddo goes Hanzo sword to Hanzo sword with O-Ren Isgii was inspired by this movie.)

This movie was my very first look into anime. Well, kick @ss anime that is.
And my initial viewing of this Otomo classic, I realized that, if I didn't have to work, I would spend all of my time lookin' up at what those crazy asians were concocting on the animation tip, yo.

Okay, this entry is basically a cheat.
I know that Coraline is a book that got translated into a graphic novel & then it was adapted into a movie.
But, as a comicbook nerd, & since it's author it more well known as a comicbook writer, I was first introduced to Coraline as a comicbook. So, y'know.... there you go.
Regardless, it's still a fine modern update of the Alice In Wonderland theme, with it's mixed ingredients of creative psychodelica, slightly edged childlike wonder, along with a nice dash of horror, but just enough to gurgitate a lump of fear in the throat of the kiddie audience within its targeted age. But not so much that it would scare any of it's young viewers to the point of absolving their parents of any responsibility for any trauma that might lead 'em up to the top of a building with a sniper gun, later on in life.
Hopefully.

So far, the most updated amazing computer animation in any animated feature.
Simply put, the computer-generated visuals in this film truly have to be seen in order to be believed.
However, even though the story is solid, as the sci-fi epic that Appleseed's visuals aspire to be, it does lack some originality in it's plotline. It is for this reason, combined with the indistinguisnness of the faces (as is usually common for most 3-D anime) that prevented this film from being ranked higher on this list, despite the fact that the graphics are, so far, some of the most favorite that my eyes have ever laid upon.
That said, there wasn't a frame in this movie where I just wasn't completely stunned with awe. The technical details & intricate designs in Ex Machina are some of the most striking ever to be generated on film.
Iron-Man's armor looks like it was created by Fisher-Price compared to the "hardwear" that these guys are sporting.
A true marvel to behold.

A hard-bitten, no-holds barred tale of revenge that bites hard and holds no bars. And while I know that sentence is doubly redundant, it seems to fit the situation as far the level of emotional ravishing that this story leads it's characters up to. Brutal it may be, it's a film that depicts it story at an operatic level and with a refreshing energy to give the film a distinct life that widely separates it from the standard vengeance theme of traditional Hollywood-fare. I found Oldboy to be a great flick that is armed with an in-your-face type of plot twist and proves that the medium of the graphic novel and comic-book (of which this movie is based off) is a world full of potentially good cinema, if one is willing to shuffle passed the mainstream same old same old.

This movie depicts how the process of "keeping up with the Joneses" can be suddenly interrupted when the time comes to "bring out the mattresses".
A normal family man's life is suddenly endangered by gangsters who insist, even against his own memory, that he's more than just an average joe. Soon, an existence that seemed beyond his comprehension begins to unravel before him in a manner that will assure that for better or worse, his family will never be the same again.
And this film is actually based off of a graphic novel called (you guessed it) "A History Of Violence".
I highly recommend reading it.
Cuz there'll probably be a pop quiz later.

I thought that the limited comicbook series was just okay.
But then Zack Snyder & the writers took Frank Miller's story & used this movie to add a whole different dimension to the telling of this early historic battle. While the story itself suffered a bit because it had to be shorten into a "two-hour" movie ( or however long this thing ran), it seemed to be made up by the surrealist matrix-like effects that were used to enhance the story-telling in a manner such as when an artist uses a new medium for his/her artwork.
In this history epic, I have seen the future of film storytelling,
And it works.

First, let me say that while I had seen Scarlett Johansson before in other movies, mostly her more independent work, Ghost World was the first one where she had truly "stolen my heart" (which is saying something considering that her role here is of someone who really isn't all that nice).

Now I always been a big fan of Dan Clowes' comics, mainly because his work definitely subscribed to the idea of having a "style that was all his own". When it comes to the so-called "alternative" genre, for my money, Clowes' style seems to fit in even more effectively in the medium of film than it does in the comic-book version (and don't get me wrong, his printed works mold into the genre quite successfully). From my point of view, his movies bring a well-welcomed shot of something new and different to the experience of viewing just as effectively as his comics bring to the experience of reading.

Let's forget the comicbook for a moment.
Road To Perdition is a quality film that addresses an area of the mobster life that rarely gets any notice from most movies from this genre: the relationship of a gangster with his kid(s) when the child is at the age in which the the parent's influence is most strongest & begins to crystalize in the kid's identity. Just this one aspect of the mafia lifestyle is enough to open a new set of ideas for future movies plotlines that focus on those in the world of organized crime.
Tom Hanks wanders out of his standard role to play an assasin who, along with his only survivng son, is on the run from the crime syndicate which he formerly called home. A life & death experience which reveals that there's a difference between the blood that is spilled for a mob-family & the blood that is shared between a real family.

The weird thing about this movie is that the male lead characters are all practically the same guy. And the stories don't seem to stray too off far from each other or from a theme that we've all seen on the big screen millions of times before. The thing is, the visuals on this thing are so goddamn striking that, for me at least, it almost felt like I was watching a much more unique set of plotlines than was actually being told. Rather than trying to bring the Sin City graphic novel into movie "reel life", it seemed almost like this was more an exercise to bringing reel life into the Sin City comicbook. That the actors weren't trying to portray comicbook characters as much as they were trying to integrate their 3-D physicality into 2-D flat-figured Frank Miller drawings ( as was most evident with the make-up jobs on Marv & the Yellow Man). I know that there are some people who criticized the simplicity & graphic "pointlessness" of this movie, but it's art direction was so full of energy & depth ( for my visual senses, at least) that I couldn't keep my eyes off the screen & found myself truly embedded in the illusion that I was watching something original.