We’ve added quite a few movies to Stoski’s Ultimate Movies Rating Guide this month; a wide range spanning genres and eras.. Looking for something to watch? Here are a few things that might have flown past your radar.

Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006)

Yes, it took me thirteen years to watch FF:TD. Yes, it’s a little cheesy at times, and yes I like the ‘new’ FF better than the ‘old’ FF. You know what I mean; the distinction between the ‘old’ racing movies and the ‘new’ action heist movies between which Tokyo Drift draws a clear line.

While heists and buff dudes punching the shit out of each other is fun, old FF has an irresistible and lost charm that new FF can’t match. It was more ‘raw’ and ‘edgy’ and ‘less meticulously calculated to maximize box office sales’. It was a trilogy of movies that wanted to tell a set of stories. They aren’t worse, just different. 100% worth watching and/or re-watching.

3/5

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)

What can we say about Indiana Jones that hasn’t already been said? After all of the 8s, 9s, and 10s, I resolved to finally watch all four movies. Raiders was decent, earning a solid 3/5 on the Stoski meter. Temple of doom is next and, boy, were my expectations of a steady upward trend in quality dashed. Most of Temple of Doom plays out more like an elaborate multi-set play than a professional action/adventure movie, with annoying characters and poor pacing to boot.

The movie starts off strong; Indie is in a club in Shanghai, up to his ears in thug guff. Great dialogue and lively action make this the highlight of the movie, and the following scenes, culminating in Indie & crew jumping from a plane in an inflatable raft, only add to the excitement. It’s a great start, but, save for one or two scenes in the third act, it’s a completely downhill ride from then on. Indy’s South-American adventure is a dull one indeed. Rather than foster a strong sense of continuity between scenes that feature well-rounded characters with which to interact, most of the film plays like a disjointed, unappealing funhouse.

Many of the scenes, particularly those preceding the entry of the Temple itself, are terribly lifeless and dull. Non-main characters (other than Indie, Short Round, or Nightclub Blonde) are basically NPCs as far as this movie is concerned, and interact with each other on very few occasions throughout the entire movie. This creates an unnatural atmosphere that gives the impression that almost every NPC in this movie goes into suspended animation whenever they aren’t on camera - like the whole thing is a theme park designed to facilitate this particular Indiana Jones adventure, except the developers forgot to script and NPC-to-NPC interactions. In any other well-made movie, the world is bigger than what the camera sees, Temple of Doom instead opts for the ‘1970s Atari game’ feel, keeping the size of the world limited to the camera’s viewing angle - something that even earlier, more claustrophobic, single-location movies have managed to avoid.

If the dusty more than half of the entire movie weren’t bad enough, we’re also forced to put up with two annoyingly incompetent sidekicks; an 11 year old Chinese boy (Short Round) and a useless blonde woman whom he takes with him from the Shanghai club in the opening scene. Together, they account for 99% of Indy’s problems, and cause them in the most overt and obtuse way possible. Between Short Round tripps painfully obvious booby-traps (which could have been avoided with the slightest amount of wherewithal! come on dude!),and Annoying Blonde Woman; gives Indy’s location away by shrieking in fear, cares more about her broken nails than Indy’s life, has no sense of herself or her surroundings in the slightest, and is just plain useless in almost every instance she’s called upon. These two make this movie painful to watch, something most directors take care to avoid.

Aside from these specific issues, the film has overall pacing problems. There are a few exciting action scenes, sure, but most of the film is paced far too slowly to work well with these scenes. I don’t think it’s today’s instant gratification society, but rather just a poorly paced film.

Normally famous movies have redeeming qualities that make the entire package worth it, but not here. What’s on offer was bearable for an initial viewing but unless it’s for a project; never again. Here’s hoping the Indiana Jones 3 offers a better ride. Here, though, unless you’re curious, don’t bother.