Movie Review - The Chosen One: Legend of the Raven (1998)

I thought this movie was a piece of crap before I even watched it. It had touches of The Crow and a poorly thought-out superhero costume, designed specifically to distance it from the Brandon Lee film. Yet the movie was a Troma Team release, so my friend Jim and I watched this video, knowing that the movie would only reach a certain level of competence if only to facilitate a sex scene. Such is the destiny of the Lawrence Lanoff movie The Chosen One: Legend of the Raven.

The film starts out crappily enough: it starts with a murder. Emma Bravenight (Playboy Playmate May 1996 and notorious Caucasian Shauna Sand-Lamas), member of the sacred Tribe of the Crescent and Guardian of the Crescent--a magic Native American Indian talisman of power--is killed by the forces of evil while frolicking in the woods in sexy lingerie. Her sister, McKenna(former Prince protoge and fellow Playboy star Carmen Electra), has returned from the Marine Corps to attend the funeral with her Native American Indian "father" Papi (Frank Salsedo). After Emma is given back to the four elements, McKenna asks around to find out who killed her sister. She starts out in the obvious place: her ex-boyfriend, Sheriff Henry (Dave Oliver). He's no real help, so she goes to live in her sister's house.
McKenna is soon haunted by Emma's ghost, who keeps telling her that she's next in line to receive the powers of the Raven or some such nonsense. The hauntings continue before and after McKenna's initial kidnapping and branding by Native Americans. She goes through some metamorphosis and starts to act more like a cat than a raven, as evidenced by her obsession with milk (more on that later). The sheriff, still smitten with McKenna after all these years despite his marriage to the town barfly Nora (Debra Xavier), continues to come over and hang out with the grieving non-Native American. Nora spied on him and became angry, so angry that she decided to escalate her adulterous relationship with the local crystal meth dealer Cole (Michael Stadvec). It's at this point that the movie becomes iffy.

Somewhere between McKenna's eventual transformation into the evil-fighting Native American superhero the Raven, both she and Nora are killed but revived by the Crescent talisman McKenna wears around her neck. While this was the first of the trials necessary to become the Raven (the worst of them a nine-hour session where you must hang from your arms in the cold night air...so much worse than dying, I suppose), Nora took the path of evil--the path of the Wolf. Somehow, she receives special powers, but becomes ten times sluttier than she was before. Nora soon puts herself at the mercy of the Route 33 serial killer, only to kill him and bathe in his blood. She enjoyed the bath and decides to do the same to McKenna.
Luckily, McKenna has finished her transformation into the Raven. She now has powers like bending space and time, heightened senses and the ability to heal with the power of love (a very appropriate skill: if anyone can heal with the power of lovin', it'd be a porn star). She cobbles together a superhero costume out of her sister's closet: a skintight white bodysuit with spiked chrome gauntlets and greaves, with a grated chrome faceplate to match. I see why Emma ran around in the woods with just lingerie on. She had no decent clothes. Speaking of poor choices in clothing, both Nora the Wolf and McKenna the Raven square off in a battle to the death for the souls of mankind in a local back alley.
McKenna wins, becomes Guardian of the Crescent, rides off into the sunset with the sheriff, THE END, THANK GOD.

This movie was absolutely horrible. It had no direct basis in Native American myths (although the references to elements and ravens were enough for the filmmakers) or Native American peoples (there are three Native American characters and only one is a Native American; the others are Caucasians from Ohio and California). I wasn't looking at this as a cultural representation of all Indigenous Americans, I just wished that the casting director had been more realistic by hiring more American Indians. If Mel Gibson could find people to play Meso-Americans in Apocaplyto, actual Naive Americans could have been found for this crapfest.  for They could have also written a story based less on reality and incorporated the wacky mythology of the Raven into a fantasy world, where White Native Americans are easily accepted. In either case, the movie's output (and my review score) could not have been completed without the most wonderful scene in the whole production: the milk bath/sex scene.
The milk bath/sex scene started with the proper innuendo. McKenna, wearing white, goes overboard on the drinking milk and spills it all over shirt and onto her fake boobs... and the sheriff. The sheriff, like any dedicated yet philandering lawman, is intrigued and goes in to investigate. Soon they're having sex in McKenna's room and puting out all the candles with milk, milk and more milk. Spilled, poured and splashed all over McKenna's taut and sculpted tan body, I truly think that this is some of Ms. Electra's finest work, with her prior soft core porn a close second. I dare you to disagree.

It is in this vein that I can honestly say that The Chosen One: Legend of the Raven really shines. All other things in this 'action' movie--even the funny parts--pale in comparison. Just as pale as a paleface playing a Native American.

Movie Review - Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon (2011)

The third installment of the Michael Bay franchise based off the Hasbro property of the 1980s, Transformers almost wore out its welcome when it was announced to me.  OK, moon landing was a cover-up, trapped Transformers on the Moon, yadda yadda yadda.  What does the story have to deal with? More slow-motion? More Optimus Prime dying for no reason other than the fact he can come back? More blue and orange cluttered with lens flares?  Not only that, but something I've never seen in a Transformers cartoon episode that I can recall: a bona-fide Cybertronian invasion.

Yes, the Decepticons finally get it right and attempt to take over Earth, starting with Detroit or Chicago, and attempt to bring the entire host of Cybertron over to Earth. The only ones who can stop them are the Autobots and their human allies, the most prominent of their number not doing so well...relatively speaking.

Sam Witwicky (reprised by 'actor' Shia Lebouf) is out of college--paid for by the U.S. Government as reward for saving the planet TWICE--but chronically unemployed.  His new girlfriend Carly (played by Victoria Secret underwear model Rosie Huntington-Whiteley) is gainfully employed and works for a rich guy, Dylan Gould (Patrick "McDreamy" Dempsey).  Feeling frustrated with interviews, threatened by a possible rival, and unappreciated by the world, Sam tries very hard to get along without his giant robot friends--Bumblebee in particular.  Though there would be no movie with only Autobots; what of the Decepticons that survived the Fallen's...fall?
It would seem Megatron went into hiding in the African savanna, along with Starscream, Soundwave, and a curiously verbal Laserbeak. His new plan requires the Autobots to do his bidding--yes I know it sounds strange, as Autobots usually have a sixth sense about Decepticon plans--and the plan goes off without a hitch, introducing us to Optimus Prime's predecessor, Sentinel Prime.
Sentinel Prime (voiced by a briefly out-of-retirement Leonard Nimoy) meets with Optimus and they team up to handle the Decepticons as much as possible, but eventually things change and the Decepticon plan goes into effect.  It's up to the members of NEST--human members of the Earth-Autobot alliance task force--to handle the outcome. Tyrese Gibson and Josh Duhamel make appearances and help win the day.

Concerning the invasion, they might have been cribbing from the 2005 version of War of the Worlds, some of Battle: Los Angeles, and just a smidge from September 11th footage.  I will say this: they got it right.  It was the footage of the invasion that made me want to see this film.  Seeing it in 3D is not a good idea, as your eyes will hurt afterward.