Watch This With Rick Ramos

Yippee-Ki-Yay, M*#^%$F@!^!#: John McTiernan's Die Hard  This week a 1980s Action Classic . . . John McTiernan's Die Hard (1988). A huge gamble for 20th Century Fox in the late 1980s,  Die Hard   remains the standard for "everyman" action films. Before the character would become a superhero, impervious to any and all pain, John McClane was a New York cop, visiting Los Angeles, and struggling to kee...

Like Looking in the Mirror, Only Not: John Woo's Face/Off This week Mr. Chavez and I continue our look at blockbusters with this 1997 John  Woo Classic of stylized violence, ridiculous plotting, and unbridled overacting . . . we are - of course - talking about Woo's Face/Off . There's no way to really get into how utterly ridiculous this film is for an episode synopsis, but I will say that it was...

Like a Doll's Eyes: Steven Spielberg's JAWS This week, a classic . . . in 1975 Steven Spielberg changed the face of cinema with his adaptation of Peter Benchley's 1974 novel  Jaws.  The story of a man-eating shark terrorizing a small island community,  Jaws would usher in a new era of moviegoing. There's little that should be written in this episode synopsis; the history and legacy of Spielberg's...

Make a Move and the Bunny Gets It: Simon West's Con Air   This week Mr. Chavez & I celebrate bad cinema with a look at the 1997 Simon West Action/Comedy/Prison/B-Movie Character Actor Extravaganza Con Air . Based on a real-life judicial system prison transport program,  Con Air is an embarassing and exaggerated look at 1990s Hollywood Action Cinema. Featuring a slew of character actors (M.C. Gaine...

Obvious Action, Patriotic Porn: Michael Bay's  The Rock This week Mr. Chavez & I dive into the world of 1990s Big Budget, Over-Hyped & Underwritten, Garbage Cinema with one of the best that would come out of the Don Simpson/Jerry Bruckheimer Machine, Michael Bay's 1996 opus  The Rock Featuring Nicholas Cage (in the first of a series of big-budgeted, ridiculous films), Sir Sean Connery, David Morse...

The Bailey Effect: Frank Capra's  It's a Wonderful Life This week Ibrahim & I re-watch a classic (Thank You - Anonymous Donor, Someone ), Frank Capra's 1946 Jimmy Stewart/Donna Reed Classic  It's a Wonderful Life .  Few films have captured the public's hearts and imaginations like Capra's look at the life of Bedford Falls' George Bailey - A man with big dreams hobbled by the responsibilties and ch...

A Fighter's Journey: The  Rocky  Saga & Legacy This week Mr. Chavez & I continue our look at Sylvester Stallone's 1976 Oscar-Winning creation, Rocky Balboa. For nearly five decades Stallone's Balboa has captured the hearts of the American public. An underdog character that has appeared seven times on the big screen, Balboa's story has run the gamut of emotions featuring deaths, births, disappointm...

America's Underdog: John G. Avildsen's Rocky & Sylvester Stallone's Rocky II Jumping into the world of underdogs (last week's Popeye ), Mr. Chavez & I look at one of the great American Cinematic creations - Rocky Balboa. The Balboa character's screenplay origin rivals that of the character's struggle in the film(s). From a real life adaptation of the 70s Muhammad Ali/Chuck Wepner bout, Stallone is...

Comic Strip Underdog: Robert Altman's Popeye This week we look to the fans with a special episode dedicated to WatchThis supporter, Jorge Saucedo. Mr. Saucedo asked that we take a look at the much-maligned 1980 Robert Altman comic strip adaptation, Popeye . This was a great time re-visiting a classic of my youth and, although Popeye   is not Mr. Chavez's type of film -  good guy hero, comic strip...

We'll Always Have Aqaba - David Lean's Lawrence of Arabia Few films are able to live up to the label of "epic".  In 1962 David Lean created one of the great epic masterpieces of cinema, Lawrence of Arabia . Based on the life of British archaeologist, army officer, diplomat, and write, T.E. Lawrence, Lean's film chronicles Lawrence's involvement in the Arab Revolt (1916-1918), his life among his ad...

Frank Herbert's Burden: Denis Villeneuve's Dune Part 2 This week Mr. Chavez & I return to Planet Arrakis for the conclusion (a lie) of Frank Herbert's Sci-Fi Classic,  Dune .  We partly imagined that this would be more of our previous look at this film (Episode #353), however we were able to find more to complain about. Take a listen as we fortify our stance in the minority opinion regarding this...

Woman in Trouble; Audience Perplexed: David Lynch's Inland Empire  Few filmmakers can live up to the title "auteur" . . . David Lynch almost requires the use of it. From daring soundtracks through troubling narratives and controversial story elements, fascinatingly over the top performances and strange journeys into the subconscious, Lynch has left audiences reeling with confusion and excitement f...

Broken Mirror: Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan Fun talk . . . This week Mr. Chavez and I continue to look at the films of Darren Aronofsky with this discussion of his 2010, Five Time Oscar Nominated (Including Best Picture and Director, and Winner for Best Actress - Natalie Portman) look at the world of Ballet. Aronofsky's film is a tense and often brutal look at the world of artistic perfection fea...

Souls Dead, Eyes Dilated: Darren Aronofsky's Requiem for a Dream On this week's episode Mr. Chavez & I sit down for a re-watch of Darren Aronofsky's second feature, Requiem for a Dream , based on the 1978 novel by Hubert Selby Jr. Aronofsky's adaptation is a tragic and often times painful viewing of heroin addiction and the victims (Jared Leto, Marlon Wayans, and Jennifer Connelly) it leaves in it...

Mima's Room: Satoshi Kon's Perfect Blue  This week we thank long time listener and  Buy Me a Coffee supporter, Cornelius Burroughs with a viewing and discussion of Satoshi Kon's  Perfect Blue . Mr. Burroughs was kind enough to gift me a blu-ray copy of this Classic Japanese Anime many years ago . . . I have finally made the time to watch it and am eager for listeners to hear our admiring, problema...

From Cute & Cuddly to Killer: Joe Dante's Gremlins and  Gremlins 2: The New Batch This week Mr. Chavez & I continue our stroll through the 1980s with a look at a stange kind of Comedy/Puppetry/Action/Horror hybrid, Joe Dante's Gremlins (1984). Dante - a graduate of the Roger Corman School of Low-Budget Filmmaking - is one of the most criminally underappreciated directors of the 1980s and 1990s.  T...

What's Out There: Ridley Scott's Alien and John Carpenter's The Thing This week we take a look at two of the greatest Science-Fiction/Horror films in the History of Cinema: Ridley Scott's  Alien   (1979) and John Carpenter's  The Thing (1982) We've talked about both of these films throughout the history of the podcast, however on this go-around we take a slightly different approach, looking at the...

A Safe Alien for the Box Office: Steven Spielberg's E.T. The Extra Terrestrial This week Mr. Chavez & I shift our focus from the dangers of extra terrestrial life to the cute and cuddly alien that captivated audiences in 1982 - Steven Spielberg's E.T. The Extra Terrestrial . At the time, the biggest box office hit in the history of cinema (a title it would hold until Spielberg's own  Jurassic Park...

Paradise Lost - Ridley Scott's Alien: Covenant This week brings us to the end of our look into the Alien franchise with a discussion of Ridley Scott's final journey into the world he introduced audiences to in 1979. 2017's Alien: Covenant did a great deal to explain the origin of the xenomorphs and the space jockey, however an equal number of questions arose. As we await the release of Alien: Romu...

F*cked Around and Found Out: Ridley Scott's Prometheus  It's rare that a director can tell a story, go on to fabulous critical and commercial success, and return to his origins, answering questions that have hovered around a franchise for decades, while doing so in an exciting and innovative way. Ridley Scott's  Alien   introduced one of the great Science Fiction/Horror creatures. In 2012 Scott wo...

Dead on Arrival: John-Pierre Jeunet's Alien Resurrection Closing in on the end of the month brings us to the end of the original   Alien franchise. 1997s Alien Resurrection is a ridiculous mess of a film that is a final disappointing period to one of the greatest Horror/Sci-Fi franchises in the history of cinema. From a script by Joss Whedon and direction from Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Alien Ressurrecti...

  Dragon, Mother, Queen: Not David Fincher's Alien 3  Continuing our descent into the world created in 1979's  Alien and continued with 1986's  Aliens ,  this week Mr. Chavez & I find ourselves crash landing on Fiorina "Fury" 161 - a foundry and maximum-security planet prison. David Fincher (in his feature directorial debut) takes the helm for 1992's  Alien 3 .  Arguably the most beautifully photo...

Unfinished Business: James Cameron's Aliens  This week Ibrahim & I return to LV-426. 57 years later - but feeling more like seven - James Cameron takes over the reins for the masterpiece created by Sir Ridley Scott. 1979's Alien   would change the Sci-Fi genre. An incredibly influential work of cinema, the film would influence any number of directors, with James Cameron springboarding off of the w...

Crew Expendable: Ridley Scott's Alien  Might as well not screw around and start 2024 with a bang . . . This month Mr. Chavez and I dive into the world of Ellen Ripley and the Xenomorphs. At this point it's been nearly 45 years since we were first introduced to the crew of the Nostromo: Tom Skerritt, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, Ian Holm, John Hurt, Yaphet Kotto, and - in her film debut...

L.A. After Midnight: Dan Gilroy's Nightcrawler Finishing December and starting 2024. (Sorry, we're a bit late getting this one out.) A continuation and closing out of Ibrahim Chavez's Los Angeles. We've talked James Ellroy, Charles Bukowski, Thom Andersen, and Paul Schrader's Los Angeles. This week we filter the darkest,  most cynical, and bleakest impressions of Los Angeles through the tabloid an...