18.11.14

Nanarsday ... The Ice Pirates



The fun thing about really bad movies is that they are not at their best watched like a normal film.  They are done at best by sharing the terrible nature of these films with a group.  Drinking games, snarky riffing MST3K style, or just having it on in the background so that every now and again the weirdness allows for short moments of enjoyable levity between whatever else you may be doing with your social circle; that is how some of the best worst movies are experienced.  The Ice Pirates is indeed the perfect film for this kind of viewing.


Some bad movies I've talked about are more fun to enjoy as a real film.  This movie ... that is not the case.  My oh my, is Ice Pirates not the case.  This movie is bad.  Super duper very very uber bad.  It is a semi-comedy, semi-parody, semi-action movie that is sort of kind of being Star Wars.  Sort of.  It's real bad when Spaceballs has a higher production quality than you do as a space "epic."

Plot: Water is basically gone everywhere except on one planet, that is ruled by the evil Templars, and the only people who can get water to the galaxy is the noble pirates.  We follow our pirate heroes as they try to steal some ice, end up almost stealing a princess, then getting captured, almost turned into eunuchs, escape, and ... just so many more things happen.

I'm going to go ahead and put this out there; this movie is boring.  If you were just watching it alone, I am not positive you could make it through the first 40 minutes without dozing off.  I know I couldn't.  I have tried to watch this movie for years, and without fail would always end up falling asleep.  I am not sure what it is that makes movies like this.  They tend to be comedies for me, and they always seem to have stuff happening, like ... Ice Age is a movie I've only made it through maybe twice and every other time fallen asleep.  Maybe it has to do with the "ice".  Anyway, the pace of the movie, the music, the acting choices, the really bad direction, all of it leads to sleepytime by yourself.

But didn't I just lead into this review talking about watching this movie with friends!  That's what I did this time!  And I would very much suggest everyone do that!  Because there are some tiny little bits that are hilarious.  The eunuch factory was a great little funny section of the movie.  The pirate getting upset that he didn't get to rape the lead female character is hilarious to me.  The finale of the movie, which is a huge time travel weirdness where a few years go by every thirty seconds, that is a really fun and fast finish.  But I would never ever suggest you watch this thing without others there to have fun with.

Grade: F (+ if in a group)

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