Thanks shaxper. Otay then, let us see how you all interpret this one for June. Dynamic Duo's. Powerful Pairs. Titanic Teams! I'm talking about how the movie's over the decades manages to pair up folks for some darn fine movie magic. By teaming or pairing up actors, actresses, and/or directors together into that mystifying mixture which provides a unique combination of talent that entertains us. Put your brains to work and watch something from your favorite teaming's. It's as simple as that. You got lots of options here folks! Examples to inspire: Lone Ranger and Tonto, Green Hornet and Kato, Batman and Robin, Batman and Superman, Laurel and Hardy, 3 Stooges, Hope and Crosby, Abbott and Costello, Astaire and Rogers, Gable and Garbo, Bogart and Bacall, John Ford and John Wayne, Douglas and Lancaster, Durango Kid and Smmiley Burnette, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans and Gabby Hayes (or Rogers and Trigger if you prefer), John Hughes and Molly Ringwald,  Smokey and the Bandit, Ron Howard and Tom Hanks, Han Solo and Chewbacca, R2D2 and Threepio, Hitchcock and Cary Grant, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Thelma and Louise, Kirk and Spock and McCoy, Tarantino and Samuel L. Jackson (or Jackson and his favorite F word if you prefer), Riggs and Murtaugh, Buzz and Woody, Cheech and Chong, Jay and Silent Bob, Carpenter and Russell, Tom and Jerry, Shaggy and Scooby, Burton and Depp, Sherlock Holmes and Watson, Beauty and the Beast, Kermit and Miss Piggy and so forth and so on. The coupling is up to your imagination, so let the viewing begin... 

After failing miserably last month and not seeing a single movie of any kind whatsoever, I should have more time this month to watch something, though not sure yet if any of them will fall under the heading for June's topic. I like the idea, though.

I made some time this weekend (around sleeping, I've been dog tired).  

Abbott & Costello meet Frankenstein - I've long said that this is my favorite horror film.  That may not actually be true, but what the Hell.  Part of that is that, overall, I don't like horror films (though I do generally love the Universal horror movies).  Part of it is nostalgia for watching Abbott & Costello with my Mom on Friday and Saturday night late night movies. For all its weaknesses (and there are a number) this movie is sheer joy.  I can defer in part to Shaxper's review in his Bela thread.  It appears that Lou Costello hated the script initially (and it has some serious problems) but was appeased by Charles Barton being brought on board as director.  It's a joy to see Lugosi finally get to play Dracula again and largely play him straight.  You can say what you will about Lon Chaney, Jr. he gives as good a performance as he ever did in this film and even went the extra mile to re-don the Frankenstein make-up when Glenn Strange hurt himself on-set during the scene in which The Monster throws Lenore Aubert's character out the window.  The biggest complaint I have is that The Frankenstein Monster is horribly underused in the film.  The movie was named to the National Film Registry in 2001.  

Abbott & Costello meet The Killer, Boris Karloff - The second of the A&C "meet" movies.  The titular pair play a hotel detective and a bellhop respectively in a resort hotel.  A respected criminal defense attorney checks in and is murdered with all the clues pointing to Costello's character Wilbur as the suspect.  There's a panoply of mysterious characters who happen to be there and have connections to the deceased, including Karloff as a "Swami" with the power of hypnosis.  As usual, hijinks ensue. The movie is fun if you turn off your brain and just enjoy the silliness.  The motives of many (possibly most) of the characters in the film make absolutely no sense.  Karloff is generally under-used, though he shines when he appears.  Again, Lenore Aubert, could steal the show if she had enough to work with to do so.  It's middling A&C...not near their best but well beyond their worst.  One simply wishes that Karloff had had a better vehicle or had appeared in the earlier film.  

The Music Box - Laurel & Hardy - The classic 1932 short starring Laurel & Hardy as two delivery men trying to get a piano up a very long steep flight of stairs.  And that's mostly it.  There is continued slapstick once they get to the top and have to get it into the house, but the stair ascent is the crux of the film and is one of the funniest things in early cinema.  It's just a classic and brilliant thirty minutes of slap-stick comedy that won the very first Academy Award for Best Short Film and in 1997 was named to the National Film Registry.  The latter was possibly fitting as the film was a semi-remake of the 1927 Laurel & Hardy short Hat's Off which has since been lost.  

It was Asian Action weekend this time around! 

Saturday morning was the 1973 Shaw Bro's Chang Cheh movie Blood Brothers with a very dynamic martial arts duo who made many movies together at Shaws: David Chiang and Ti Lung. There is a are a pair of bandits wandering around with no real goal (Chiang and Chen Kuan-Ti) who try to rob Ti Lung and are unable to defeat him or escape with his money. Typically of these movies: they find respect in one another's skills and join forces in teaming up thrashing the neighborhood hoodlums and taking over their territory and gangs. Ti Lung soon grows tired of this and chooses to seek a political position with power and prestige. They 3 masters meet several years later where Lung falls in love with Kuan Ti's wife and has an affair with her as she wants the prestige and power as much as he does. Eventually Ti Lung must have Kuan Ti killed lest his past and affair comes out and he lose his position and fall into disgrace. The youngest Chiang seeks revenge and murders Ti Lung. As with any Cheng Cheh movie, plenty of action and interesting fights along the


Saturday afternoon was a 1986 pairing of John Woo with Ti Lung and a soon to become megastar: Chow Yun Fat  in A Better Tomorrow. It's ranked #2 in the Best 100 Chinese Motion Pictures and it broke many Hong Kong box office records. Essentially a Chinese gangster movie with Chow Yun Fat the best friend and partner of Ti Lung within the Triad.  Ti Lung's youngest brother is in training with the police and doesn't know of his older brothers criminal life. Ti Lung's family is killed by another gang and he goes to jail while Chow Yun Fat executes the gang. Years later Ti Lung is released from prison and he vows to remain "free" of the criminal life as he meets up with Chow Yun Fat again who is reduced to being a crippled (shot in leg while avenging Ti's family) errand boy in the Triad. Ti Lung convinces Chow Yun Fat they should turn evidence on the Triad to his younger brother in the police. Eventually it all goes wrong and Ti Lung and his brother are blackmailed and injured and near death so Chow Yun Fat delivers his sensational Gun Fu massacre of the Triad and saving his partner and his brother only to die in being shot by the Triad leader. In the end the gangster leader laughs saying his money and power will ensure his release after surrendering to the police. Ti Lung's brother slips him his police revolver and Ti Lung avenges Chow Yun Fat's death and kills the leader and handcuffs himself to his brother. A true classic!

Sunday morning I went Bollywood for the movie DHOOM (translates ads Bang/Blast) with Abhishek Bachhan and Uday Chopra as 2 ppolice officera after John Abraham who is committing robberies throughout Mumbai with his high speed motorcycle gang. A fast moving, funny and fun movie it became a top grossing action Hindi movie in 1994 and spawned 2 more sequels. These are some wild and crazy special effects driven action movies that seriously can stand up against any USA action films. 

Sunday afternoon was spent with another Bollywood action film called RACE teaming Anil Kapoor as a police officer after Saif Ali Khan and his younger brother Akshaye Khanna for an action/thriller where 2 brothers sibling rivalry causes them to compete in everything they do in life and crime. Also starring Katrina Kaif and Bipahsu Basu the movie focuses on a plan to commit insurance fraud with the fake murder of the younger brother.Lots of gambling and risk, a horse race and devilish car race where the younger hopes to kill the older brother after tampering with his cars brakes. A very stylish and fanciful movie It also spawned 2 sequels and was the highest grossing Bollywood film for 2008 when it was released. 

I'm sure it was just a typo, but A Better Tomorrow would have been much earlier than 2010 - probably the mid-80s, without looking it up.

For my first entry this month I went with the first thing that came to mind upon reading the theme... Batman and Robin will forever be the image I think of when I hear Dynamic Duo and one of my favorite outing for the pair was the 1966 film starring Adam West and Burt Ward. I've always loved the series but the film is particularly good as it features the best villains from the show who were far and beyond the best parts.

After that my mind went down a simmilar rabbit hole as Slam as I went with comedy duos, specifically Abbot in Costello in Africa Screams and a trio of their meet up films(Frankenstein, The Invisible Man and the Mummy).