A warm welcome everybody (not like I got) and welcome to a special edition of Casinoflaws (.com, I guess). My name is Avery Mann (AKA @dadjokedane) and this week's special victim is the Grand Casino. And THIS is my Grand Casino story. So it's Sunday, game 7 between the Minnesota Timberwolves and the defending Champion Denver Nuggets looming and I think: Let's shake things up. (Aside-love using their slogans and catch phrases against them, delightful.) So I take my wife and newly 18 YO daughter up to Grand Casino for a little gambling/dinner/watch party thinking it would be fun to be out cheering the Wolves (them's ma dawgs) on with other fans. We arrive and get in a little gambling action (up and down, overall broke about even for the three of us) before heading over to the Grille House sports bar to settle in for dinner and the big game. We no sooner sit down and ask for 3 waters as we look over our menus, when we are accosted uninvited by the drunken oaf at the next table. "Three waters!" he bellows, (insert slurred speech here) "No drinksh? Ya gotta order some beersh, they got good beers here." When we pointedly ignore him, he gets ready to leave. He poutingly leaves throwing one final shot our way (I guess since I was wearing a Timberwolves t-shirt-more on that in the NPOTW section) "Are ya gonna cry Boo-Hoo when the Timmerwuves lose? Cause they're gonna lose!" he opines as he weaves his way out. So much for watching the game with like-minded fans, only about 4 other people are even watching the game. Our waiter takes our order and we get to watching. (Our waiter was very nice, food took a little long, but that was OK as we wanted to prolong our dining/watching experience. Food was above average and amply portioned.) Game goes on and it's not going well for our heroes and they are down by 15 at the half. All of a sudden out of nowhere this big-mouthed, dumpy little casino worker (she wasn't working in the restaurant, must have come in from the casino) comes charging right up to our table unbidden (once again, because of my shirt I guess-see the NP section please people) and gets in my face, ranting "No way you're gonna win, dude, it's all over-the Wolves are done!" The silent treatment doesn't work on this little runt and she continues on even louder. (At this point people are looking at us and my wife and daughter are uncomfortable and embarrassed) "Dude, SERIOUSLY, I will KISS YOUR FEET if the Timberwolves win, but they WON'T!" Still not having said a word to this disrespectful pest wearing the casino's uniform, I wave her away with my hand and she finally leaves, muttering further derision under her breath when I didn't engage her. Having had enough (we're paying them money for this kind of treatment?!) we leave and head home, sour experience taste in our mouths. We get home with 2 minutes left and the TIMBERWOLVES WIN! (Bad taste magically gone). Still, I am upset about the disrespect to our family just trying to have a pleasant night out, so I message the Hospitality Customer service team. I haven't received a reply yet, so I must give Grand Casino a CTSR of RED-don't go and give them your money if they treat you like this! I may have a little plan up my sleeve if they don't reply to my complaint. (Editor's note-Avery did message the Hospitality team 2 more times and got no replies. And boy, he wasn't kidding when he said he had another plan! Tune in next week to see the bit and how it went-it's a doozy)
The year is 1997 and a 30 something naive huckleberry from the Midwest has moved to Hollywood (like millions of others throughout history) with stars in his eyes and hope in his heart to make in big in LA-LA land. Having met with no success (except extra work through Central Casting-shout out but not REALLY acting work) our hero finally lands his first commercial/infomercial for a company called The Hair Factory. This first taste of success, which greatly bolstered his confidence that he could make it, was cast, written, and directed by a young film student graduate recently moved to LA named Thunder Levin. If you don't recognize the name, he went on to later success as the creator of the SHARKNADO series of movies, which have made BILLIONS of dollars of revenue. (While yours truly went on to very little success in comparison.) Still, I am forever thankful to Thunder Levin for giving me my first break and inspiring me to go on in Hollywood to seek the American Dream. This is my first tribute review (in appreciation, though I will spare no barbs-you know how I am) to the work of Thunder Levin and his 2013 sci-fi epic-AE: APOCALYPSE EARTH (written AND directed by Thunder (multi-talented) Levin.) This Asylum Films offering (if you don't know, Asylum specializes in putting out low budget, decently made mockbusters of the Big Budget Blockbusters-preferably quickly made and released about the same time or before. AE is a knock-off of the Will Smith and son mega-flop AFTER EARTH.) stars Sci-Fy pin-up boys Adrian Paul and Richard Grieco. We begin this alien invasion saga with Lt. Frank Baum (Paul) loading up Capt. Sam Crowe's humanity lifeboat the N.A.S.S. ALBERT EINSTEIN for the trip to our new home at Alpha Proxima 5. Lifting off, Frank wants to return and defend Earth (and his family) but Capt. Sam says no way, our ass is kicked we're heading to our new crib-time for cryo sleep. (Which consists of an oxygen cannula and thin transistor-type wires attached to electrodes on the head-some cryo sleep, it looks 70's ish) Arriving at the planet, this ship burns in the atmosphere and literally EXPLODES upon landing in the jungle world-YET somehow a lot of the people survive. From the frying pan into the fire, the woozy, wounded Earthlings and a race of albino humanoid natives are being hunted by cloaked alien savages (the cloaking looks like the PREDATOR movies and is well done, but the NP here is even when they are killed, they don't uncloak so we never see what they look like-saves on make-up budget, I guess) Frank and injured Sam gather the survivors from the ship and a nearby surviving ship-the N.A.S.S. ISAAC NEWTON. Heading back to the intact ISAAC NEWTON to regroup, they are attacked by giant, super-imposed bugs and are saved by a beautiful, camouflage-pigmented humanoid named Lea. (She likes Frank's fatigue pants...duh) Helping the group return to the intact ship, they have to avoid an alien flying ship and a giant lizard (pretty weak visuals) with the additional help of T.I.M.-an incredibly blatant DATA rip-off from Star Trek (except TIM can use contractions). Frank and Lea feel the sparks and have a waterfall pool sexual episode (wife and 5 YO daughter are far away and probably dead, after all) . Frank asks Lea if her pale people will help fight the Chameleons and she leads them through the mountain to try, but reveals that she has been cast out of the whitey society because of her different skin color (sledgehammer subtle message on racism and discrimination much?) Translator T.I.M. convinces the people that the Chameleons are the enemy of all and they break out the weapons cache (all types of weapons from many times and races) and the battle is on! Having to carry a fuel cel from one ship to the flyable one, many die and the battle rages. Frank and Lea survive a methane blast and are concealed from the aliens by a giant fern blanket. As they rise when the aliens pass by, we are treated to a spectacular Nip-Slip at 1:11.13 in (censors probably couldn't see it, it's camouflaged!) As they try to escape down the river, they look done for as Chameleon ship is ready to blast them, but Sam and TIM save them at the last minute in the newly-refueled N.A.S.S ship. As the survivors wing off into space to return to Earth, T.I.M. makes a startling revelation to Captain Sam and the inter-racial lovebirds. Turns out the cryo limit was 100 years of suspension and when TIM didn't find any inhabitable worlds within 50 years, he instructed the ship to return to Earth (didn't do their homework very well on a destination planet it seems). Unfortunately, 100 years through space=325,00 years on Earth! Whoops! ("Relativity is a bitch" opines Sam-best line) Since they are ALREADY home, the only option is to take back the planet says Frank. As they settle the ship down on a plateau, we pan down to see the Mount Rushmore presidents overgrown and eroding below. (Planet of the Apes finale or what?) With a decent amalgamated, hodge-podge of a script, OK acting , and passable special effects, this hour and a half B-movie was a pleasant diversion for Sci-Fy channel aficionados (but maybe not for everyone) and I give this fast-paced survival saga a MTSR of YELLOW. See it if you like the genre (it's above average) don't if you don't . This is Avery (Space) Mann, signing off.
Hi Everybody and welcome to the premiere episode of Plotflaws!! I'm your host Avery Mann (not his real name-Ed.) and this weeks movie is a recent M. Night Shyamalan end of the world thriller Knock at the Cabin. I admit I'm a big fan of his about half the time (think Sixth Sense and Split) and meh the other half (the Village, After Earth...pew). Anyway, this one is interesting so on with the show(s)! The movie opens with little Wen Lei collecting grasshoppers for biological study. At 3 min. in, she puts a grasshopper in the jar and makes a 4th entry in her journal. Problem is there are already 5 or 6 in the jar! Maybe work on those math skills a little more Wen? Enter Leonard and then the rest of the 4 Horsemen and the shit really hits the fan.
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