Police Academy 3: Back in Training

The governor announces a plan to close one of the city's two Police Academies, putting Commandant Lassard and Commandant Mauser in a competition to be the last Academy standing. All of Lassard's favorite graduates come back to help out after Mauser gets up to his old tricks. Police Academy 3 marks the return of Leslie Easterbrook's Lieutenant Callahan to the series. Bobcat Goldthwait and Tim Kazurinsky's characters from Police Academy 2 also return to join the academy alongside Fackler's equally accident prone wife, Tackleberry's brother-in-law and Brian Tochi as Cadet Nogata. Back in Training borrows a few beats from the first two films but, considering the whole thing ends with an extended jet ski chase, I'm not complaining.

Rating: 63%

(Image from Wikipedia)

The Creature from the Pit

After Romana reinstalls an emergency transceiver that the Doctor had deemed 'a bore,' the TARDIS makes an abrupt landing on the planet Chloris. The Doctor quickly takes interest in an enormous metallic eggshell lying in the middle of a dense jungle. Before he can reach any conclusions about the eggshell, the Doctor and Romana are arrested by the local authority and sentenced to death. Their lives are temporarily spared by the Lady Adrasta, who takes an interest in the Doctor's theories about the mysterious metallic eggshell. But the Lady Adrasta's benevolence is only out of self-interest as the Doctor and Romana soon learn that there's a terrible secret on Chloris and it's at the bottom of a deep, dark pit. There might be a lot to like about The Creature from the Pit but it's far from perfect. It definitely could have been a better serial if it weren't for two major flaws. First, the story really runs out of steam in the last episode. And second, the titular creature looks terrible. It's supposed to be an impressively large, amorphous green blob but the end result looks more like an inflatable Halloween costume with laughably phallic limbs.

Rating: He's only a little dog, you know%

Die Hard with a Vengeance

John McClane, the hero of Nakatomi Plaza and the Dulles Airport, is at an all time low in Die Hard with a Vengeance. Estranged from his wife, suspended from the force, and in the midst of an epic hangover, John becomes a terrorist's plaything. McClane and a reluctant good samaritan (played to perfection by Samuel L. Jackson) are sent on a series of missions, with an epic explosion awaiting them should they fail. Die Hard with a Vengeance probably has more jokes per minute than any of the other Die Hard movies, but I'm not complaining. Willis and Jackson play off of each other so well, it's a shame Jackson's character never returned in any of the other sequels.

Rating: 79%

(Image from Wikipedia)

Fun Fact: Colleen Camp, who played Kowalski, also played a cop, Corporal Kirkland, in Police Academy 2 and 4.

Spring Break

Due to an overbooking mishap, two Spring Break newbies get paired up with some seasoned party animals. Bawdy hijinks ensue. Technically, there is a little bit more to the movie than that but nobody ever watched Spring Break for the subplots about political campaigns and shady real estate deals. It's a movie that was made for people who wanted to see boobs and butts on the big screen. Spring Break definitely tries to replicate some of the humor and debauchery of movies like Porky's and Animal House, but never quite manages to achieve those heights.

Rating: 62%

(Image from Wikipedia)