30/September/2010

Watched Darkman. Scientist tries to create artificial skin, but it can last only one hundred minutes in daylight before it melts. He's then blown up because of mobster activity (in the first of several possibly unintentionally hilarious moments - you could add the Goofy scream and you'd hardly tell it was a dramatic moment!) and becomes super strong, unable to feel pain and slightly crazy after his hospitalisation. Quite miffed by the mobsters that wrecked his lab, burned him alive and killed his Asian lab assistant (who I mention because he has the cutest cowlick ever), he uses his synthetic skin technology to impersonate the mobsters and wreck their organisation from the inside.

Being a Sam Raimi movie, it's got a beautifully pulp look to the whole thing; it's moody, it's dark, and it's really, really cartoonish when it wants to be. Darkman himself... he's not exactly a superhero, given the fact he's just a dude with a messed-up face and no sense of touch, but his gimmick of disguising himself as people is a really interesting one. It's not something he can just parade around with infinitely, the whole time limit aspect adds a great sense of urgency to his crazy schemes, so he needs to make the best use of his time. But it's one thing to be prompt - it's another to accurately imitate who he's masquerading as, and when spoofing a scary mofo who cuts off people's fingers for a living, he needs to watch footage of the guy many, many times to nail his mannerisms correctly. It shows the kind of accuracy he's going for to make his schemes work, but it also shows just how crazy he is.

Let's face it, the guy had it pretty decent in life before he was thrown in a vat of unidentified bubbling liquid and then blown sky-high like Wile E. Coyote - he had a loving girlfriend, a great scientific career, and he's portrayed by Leslie freakin' Nielsen. It could be considered heroic to take down the mobsters that ruined his life, but the way he goes about it, especially in his emotionally unstable state, it just seemed like he was digging himself in a hole he'd be unlikely to get out of. I was almost surprised he didn't end up crazy (well, crazier) by the end of the movie, but given the fact there's two sequels, I guess they had to avoid a downer ending. Very unlike Raimi, though!

The whole movie is kinda dark and gritty but with a mildly ridiculous vibe about it, and then it drops all pretension of realism during the climatic chase scene where Darkman is dangling on a helicopter's tow hook while the villain shoots grenades at him, slings him inside an office building ("Excuse me!") and hauls him over a highway, resulting in him working his legs cartoonishly fast over the roof of a trailer. It's like watching Tim Burton's Batman and then ten minutes of Tom & Jerry are suddenly spliced in to serve as the climax - and it somehow works. Remove Sam Raimi's name from the movie and that'd be the only thing that'd get me asking questions.

I can't imagine the sequels will be much good (though they're bound to be better than Elektra, honest to god), but I'd definitely be interested in watching them just to see where they run with the concept.

Today's doodle is something I'm pretty sure I already drew like a year ago.

28/September/2010

Was it really just eleven years ago that people thought the Dancing Baby was hip and fresh?

Ah, shareware CDs. My personal gateway into knowing what was popular a decade ago. This originated from PC Format magazine, issue 92 (February 1999!), and I had really high hopes for it. It had demos for Rogue Squadron 3D and Klingon Honor Guard! It contained a full accounts app that would, and I quote, "take control of [my] cash!" And if that wasn't enough, the goddamned Dancing Baby was promoted as an exclusive feature. Delving into this would be like that stupid Pokémon CD I wrote about, except more '90s flavoured!

The CD is disappointingly barebones, and it doesn't recognise new versions of Quicktime. And - get this - you have to install the demos. What is this, the stone age? Can't I just stream it off the CD? I know it's impractical and not recommended for optimum performance, but I'm not made of installation time, man. I can't waste my vital man hours waiting for a ten year old demo of King's Quest 8: Mask of Eternity to transfer to my hard drive, even if it is a mere 48mb! Do you want me to die of old age?

If I were making any attempt to be funny I would investigate what currently lies on www.babycdrom.com, but I'm a little scared to find out. It'd be a little embarrassing to be land in jail because I was snooping out web addresses that are older than my dog.

I watched Masters of the Universe last week. I know nothing about He-Man and am familiar with the movie only through CodieKitty's complaints. Great reason to watch it, eh?

I wouldn't even know where to begin on recapping the story, mostly because I didn't understand a lick of it. Yeah, Skeletor's kidnapped some sorceress, I get that, and then there's something about He-Man's sword granting super powers and the universe being made of music, but I'd be hard-pressed to piece the whole movie together coherently. The scenes on Eternia with He-Man and company seem to exist only to forcibly emphasise the fact "these guys are going to land up on Earth, you know!" That fact is doubly emphasised by how there's only three sets made for Eternia. It's like they wanted to make a fantasy Star Wars, but budget concerns forced them to shoot most of the movie in any contemporary building they were allowed into.

Despite my snarky attitude, it's an enjoyable piece of fluff. It's totally cornball, but it appears to almost try and take itself almost seriously, which I guess adds a little ironic extra appeal. Dolph plays He-Man as an incredibly boring character, though - I know main protagonists are usually the most dull character of any medium, but I couldn't see any resemblance of personality in the guy. He's basically a big plank of cardboard with muscles. Frank Langella plays a wonderfully hammy Skeletor, but it's kind of wasted when he has no one to play off. His minions are as boring as unbuttered bread and He-Man can't make snappy retorts to save his life. It's kind of sad when the only heroic character I liked was Man-At-Arms, purely because he had a great moustache.

Although pretty unremarkable, I loved just the look of the movie. Yes, there's only three Eternia sets, but they really look fantastic - Gwildor's abode is fantastically homely, and the castle throne room is suitably massive and makes for some dynamic shootouts, especially when a chunk of a Californian alleyway is suddenly warped inside. The costumes, although kind of dorky on occasion (I couldn't help but be weirded out by Skeletor's nose, and of all the minions to kill off, why did they spare the stupid jerk with the white Elvira hair?) were pretty neat looking, and going by the credits it looked like they had some fantastic concept artists on board. There was one guy in particular I looked up, he had done some fantastic stylised artwork of dinosaurs, but I can't remember the guy's name. Instead I found Edward Eyth. Very exquisite stuff; the fact most of his work is just human faces makes it even more appealing to me.

And on the subject of art, here's today's random doodle.

I drew this on request from somebody at work, and apparently she printed it out so her child could colour it in. While that's kind of sweet, I can't help but think "man, that kid's going to notice that Spongebob's eyes are lopsided and he's missing his left cheek." I trust the child to ignore how terrible those hands are, because seriously, have you seen how kids draw hands? They're like sausages pinned to a flattened soccer ball.

23/September/2010

I went to see Scott Pilgrim last night. While Resident Evil: Degeneration is a video game movie in atmosphere and overall vibe, Scott Pilgrim is effectively a video game movie in visuals, action, and general corniness. And it works so, so well.

... do I really need to explain the story? I mean, I'm pretty sure anyone even faintly familiar with it knows at least the basic gist. Love story, have to defeat girl's evil ex-boyfriends, nerd references, yadda yadda yadda. You could try and say that it's basically a love story of people fighting for the girl's affection taken very, very literally, but I'll be frank and say it's a simple plot. The main attraction is simply the look and feel of the movie.

And my god, what a look and feel it is!

One of my concerns when a comic, game or other non-live-action medium is converted to a movie is whether or not it captures the look of the source material. It's not a constant worry, mind you, I'm not always wetting my pants in fear that a Spider-Man movie won't have thought balloons, but when the source material has a good look, you want to stick with it. My personal experience with Batman medium is that of a dark and gritty environment that maintains a sinister style of colour, all with a rather old-fashioned 1920s-esque manner of architecture and machinery; complain all you want about Batman & Robin, but I thought it captured the look of my idea of Batman perfectly.

Scott Pilgrim is (to my knowledge!) a comic about indie bands and exaggerated love stories and geeky medium references. It is set in Toronto. It might not be as outlandish as rich white boys growing up to be killer clowns or dorks in tights, but it has a fast-paced, dynamic and punchy style of editing that really just captures the atmosphere of the movie flawlessly. Ramona Flowers isn't stripped of her distinctive garments so she can just look more conventional in live-action - she's still got the dyed hair, the roller skates, the colourful clothing and the big ol' hammer. The vegan guy is still a huge, towering mofo with ginormous eyebrows. And Scott's still an awkward looking dork.

The casting is great.

It's hard to pinpoint what brings the movie to life so well, though one of the elements is definitely the editing. It's hard to truly describe! Onomatopoeia springs out of the most mundane actions (and lies on the floor like paper trimmings), passages of time are done snappily, and captions float in for additional punch lines. I mean, I could say the visuals as a whole just work with the film so well. Even simple things like how each shot is framed, the use of shadows to blur out anything that isn't relevant during important discussions, it really just works with the story and actions so well. It may be regular Toronto indie-scene environments, but the movie is just shot in such a manner that the transition from comic seems so seamless.

Also, oh my god - the fight scenes!

It feels like it's been a really long time since I've watched a new movie that had fight scenes I found genuinely enjoying all the way through, without a single feeling of "ehhh, they could've done that better." Scott Pilgrim has fight scenes that are well and truly a blast to watch - and there's six of them! They don't cut to new angles every half-second just to look edgy, they don't film the fights with hyperactive cameras that blur out half the action, and we aren't just treated to the boring old chop-socky we've seen plenty of times before. The battles are dynamic, energetic, vibrant, and bursting with character. Each fight takes on a slightly different style, all of them truly entertaining, and it's just a serious joy to watch. Who knew you could make a generic anime fight scene a dozen times more engaging just by filming it in live-action, but keeping the exact same vigorous actions and editing?

Heck, I was even pleasantly surprised by how relatively clean the movie was! I was mildly astonished by how it only had a 12A rating - when a film is chock full of fighting, has lust act as the primary reason behind most actions and is full of geeky nerd humour, I generally expect things to turn sour at some point. But no! There's little in the way of bad language, it never decides to think 4chan humour would be so hilarious when put on a film screen, and despite the brutal (albeit hilariously exaggerated) fisticuffs, there's only one glimpse of blood in the whole thing. Defeated foes merely burst into showers of coins - a simple River City Ransom reference that appeals to absolute dorks, but also an effectively quirky way of achieving bloodless violence. I wholeheartedly respect it for the manner in which everything is presented. Despite my crude internet mannerisms, I have the utmost respect for clean entertainment, and while Scott Pilgrim probably isn't a fun-for-all-the-family flick, I imagine it's easily got the sort of action and visuals that'd appeal to any child who watches Saturday morning cartoons.

It's a long movie, and I won't deny that I didn't notice, though I'd hardly say I was bored either. It's got to compress six years of comics into a two-hour running time, and from what I've heard there's a lot of stuff cut out, though even as an outsider I can tell - some characters are given very little time to shine, Kim especially, and you get the impression it's going out of its way to avoid exploring Scott's past just so he won't have to fight his own personal league of evil exes, but it never really bugged me. I will say that about halfway through some of the segments between fights just been a bit of a drag- there's some laugh-out-loud humour and the general bouncy atmosphere of the movie always keeps the momentum going, but the dorky nerd humour wears thin very quickly. All-purpose humour, great, but dorky nerd humour about dorky nerd references and how dorky nerds act, it wore thin pretty quickly. For being a man who writes about video games on the internet, I'm a bigger fan of more general humour rather than the kind that relies on dorky nerds knowing what they're like so they can laugh "ha ha, dorky nerds!"

I will say I'm a fan of the term "dorky nerds," though. I've a bad feeling I won't stop using it. Somebody help me.

So... yeah! Lots and lots of fun! I had never even seen the trailer and my familiarity with the comics is zilch, so I hadn't a true idea of what I was getting into, but I enjoyed it, my dad enjoyed it, and the whopping seven other people in the audience seemed to enjoy it. You get your money's worth for the ticket price, and I might have to go against my very morals and say that I may actually but the DVD... within two months of its release! That's something I've never ever done before, you know.

I'll also say that, man, it's really spoiled my appetite for the video game. Yeah, it looks okay, but it doesn't look freakin' awesome like the movie does. What, so I have slowly jump kick the Bollywood guy to death rather than exchange blows via dramatic high-octane anime-style flying punches? Where's the fun in that?

Here's a guy with big feet. That's the only productivity you're getting out of me today.

21/September/2010

There's a lot of things I don't give a hoot about, but I love discussing them with people. I'd like to say that I enjoy discussing politics with similarly cynical people, but, well, no, I don't. It's an exercise in losing my will to live. What I do enjoy discussing, however, is Pokémon! With select people, of course. With any old Tom, Dick or Harry it also becomes an exercise in losing my will to live. I do not care to discuss the tournament rules of Pokémon battling, buddy, just give me a debate about why people think Gardevoir is so attractive and then I can get my Freudian ball rolling.

Namely, something I was discussing recently was the leakage of, well, everything from the new games Black & White. All one hundred and fifty something of the new creatures? Everyone knows what they are now, apparently! I was shown this little creature...

... and I was rather... offput by it.

It looked like some kinda freaky fish thing given an ill-fitting body. Like a Snorunt decided to sand itself into a rounded fish-like shape, acquired a thin lanky body and an oversized pair of pants. Those beady little e-y-e-s

Turns out it's just meant to be a bug-eyed lizard. I was interpreting its nostrils as its eyes. At least this incident was resolved quickly and didn't plague me for years like the last time this happened (see 11 September 2008 entry!).

20/September/2010

Watched Resident Evil: Degeneration. It's a film full of slow-motion bullet tracking, stuff blowing up, needlessly dramatic emotional scenes and characters being unharmed after being punched across the room. Is it any surprise my dad considered it one of the best video game movie he's seen so far?

Like any good Resident Evil story, my interpretation of it was like so: A load of convoluted balls. There's like three corporations involved and there's talk of spreading viruses and vaccines and all kinds of waffle, but personally, the only plot point I needed to comprehend was "that British guy is soooo evil. Like, seriously, just listen to him. How much more evil can he be? He could order a tray of scones and he'd sound like he's sentencing a litter of puppies to death." Aside from that, there's zombies and people shoot them. Some people get killed by them in stupid manners. Then the zombies are forgotten about for the second half so it can rehash the final boss of Resident Evil 2 as the main threat. If you were expecting a sensible summary of the story, sorry folks! I'm only familiar with the story of the first game, and only because there's no way you can possibly make it any dumber.

So, just like any video game, I don't give a toss about the story. What I did care about was the atmosphere and the action, and man, discounting how comparatively mellow is it to a typical campaign of Left 4 Dead, I'd dare say it captures "video game" in movie format down to a T. It's hard to accurately pinpoint and explain, no thanks to video games having numbed my ability to explain things efficiently to my internet audience (if any), but it's really bleeding obvious when you sit down and watch it, even by the first ten minutes. It's also a relief for a CGI film to actually be quite comfortable to watch - the likes of Beowulf and its freaky motion-captured shenanigans were seriously off-putting, and my latest escapades in Dead Rising have only reminded me of how wonky and drawn-out a lot of those movie scenes are.

On that subject, I was really expecting Frank West to just show up out of nowhere. I know they're meant to be separate continuities, but seeing the dude in proper film-quality CGI would just be awesome, especially with his giant schnozz, and he'd certainly make a more intriguing protagonist than Leon, who's been stripped of all his snarky dorkiness from Resident Evil 4 and turned into a boring superhero. For that matter, I know there's some kind of Dead Rising media (is it a movie? Is it a series?), but I think a movie in the same style as Degeneration would rock pretty hard if done right. A mixture of following the story and Frank just goofing off. Heck, they could just rip off the by-the-numbers plot from the Land of the Lost movie, apply it to a zombie-apocalypse-in-a-mall scenario with the scientist replaced with a journalist and tada~!

Today's doodle is a pelvic thrusting flamboyant robot drawn on request. I'll leave it at that.

Today's observation: I haven't seen it in years, but I've just realised that Ms. Doubtfire actually had a story, and wasn't just about Robin Williams wearing a dress and using a urinal. Took me long enough to realise.

13/September/2010

Am I doomed to having nothing interesting to talk about besides what movie I've seen lately? It's geting a little boring having nothing of interest to discuss outside of some moving pictures.

I watched The Ruins, an idle suggestion I received and then I promptly spoiled everything about it for myself before watching. American tourists and their German hombre go to an obscure ruin, but it's covered in a strange, sentient plant life that the Mayan locals consider to be an infectious plague, and anyone who's put in contact with it is killed or quarantined to the temple. Can you guess where the remaining hour of the film is spent?

As a horror movie it focuses more on the psychological edge - yes, there are living plants (living in the sense that they'll totally grab you by the wrist and drag half-dead people around the place, not in the traditional sit-there-and-look-pretty real life plant sense), but it's more the quarantine aspect that's played up with the limited resources, infections and general cabin fever driving the plot. You could argue it's more what the characters do to themselves that's grotesque more than the real threat. If you've got a thing for body horror, this is your movie! If not... well, say hello to an uncomfortable hour and a half. I found it to be an interesting premise to explore, though I'd probably rather read the book - actually seeing people cutting vines from under their skin and amputating each others' legs is a bit too far for my liking, personally.

You know what I had totally forgotten?

My attempt at including a random doodle in every entry. The last unique one I included was way back in June! This is especially annoying since if I was ever to have a blog routine, having a doodle for every entry would be easy to do. It's not like that ill-fated attempt to play some obscure NES game and waffle about it every week. Man, that only lasted three games, didn't it? Story of my life.

This stupid drawing has been kicking around for months, maybe even since April or May. I liked the face and I liked the hands, but the rest was just too cumbersome to really finish. Also the story of my life.

09/September/2010

I went to see The Expendables a couple of days ago. It was a toss-up between that and Scott Pilgrim, and I guess we just decided that since Expendables has been out longer, we might as well catch it now before it's gone. Mind you, given how niche I hear Scott Pilgrim is, it might not be long before it's gone from theatres too! OH WHAT A DILEMMA

So there's this multi-racial group of bikers and they're all played by these big actors and they're contracted for dangerous work, their latest mission to track down some dude who defected from the CIA and is gaining profits from a Mediterranean dictator's work. That's about it, really. Explosions and gun fights ahoy!

What is there to say that hasn't been said? It's a fun 80s-style action movie and everyone's already shat their pants at the all-star line-up - Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis and Arnold Scharzenegger all sharing the screen, even if it is for five minutes? It's friggin' enchanting. I will admit it wasn't until after the movie had ended that I realised Mr. Church was Bruce Willis; I just thought he was some bozo with a potty mouth when I was watching it.

I will admit, after the initial allure of all these stars on-screen together, it becomes rather mundane. I was actually more interested in seeing some of the less big-name guys get their time to shine. Terry Crews' character was practically invisible up until the climax, but hot damn, it was worth the wait. And yes, the movie had Stallone, Jet Li and Dolph Lundgren (the man with the biggest dick I've ever seen!) all taking part in a scrap, but it was actually seeing Steve Austin beat into someone I was most interested in seeing. I've never seen the guy's wrestling work, and heck, I only really know him because I once borrowed a WWF game from someone years and years ago, but it was satisfying to finally see him get something to do. And better way to be killed than by being set on fire?

It's a seriously nitpicky complaint but I can't go without saying - Stallone's facial hair really got on my nerves. It's not so bad when you see it at a normal distance, but when you see it up close it's more like someone slapped a poorly trimmed garden onto his face. It's a weird, patchy little mess that seems to be greying more than the hair on his head is. I can see what kind of look they were going for, but, sorry, it just looked really uncomfortable to me. It's like he had black and white cactus needles growing from his chin. On the contrary, Jason Statham? His eyebrows are fascinating. If I had access to a camera that dangled in front of his face, I could just watch his expressions all day. I'm serious.

Creepy, moi?

One of the things I was concerned about was, well, was the movie worth the hype? I mean, I kind of forgot what a feat it was for all these action stars to get together in one film after about half an hour, and I was almost going to question the common consensus that the movie was chock-full of explosions since you don't see enough of them until the climax. It's not too bad, but one thing I felt was disappointed was how they get all these stars and make them get at each other's throats... and then they film the fights with a shaky camera and jump-cut every two seconds. It didn't completely ruin everything and I won't argue that it still kept the intensity strong, but it seemed rather comparable to getting hold of Bigfoot, encouraging him (or her!) to have a sit-down interview in a coffee shop and film the event, and then you forget to take the lens cap off. When's the next time we'll see Jet Li and Dolph Lundgren kicking the shit out of each other without a bunch of scaffolding and a convulsive camera getting in the way of the action?

Still, I can hardly deny it was an enjoyable movie. Personally, I'm just wondering why it hasn't got a tie-in video game yet. I'm not talking your typical 3D shooter bollocks, I'm talking old-school 80s arcade action. I mean, the movie starts with someone's torso being blown off their legs. If that doesn't scream Metal Slug meets Streets of Rage, I don't know what does.

07/September/2010

Watched Drag Me To Hell last night. I'd only seen posters when it came out, and given how they quite blatantly showed what happens in the ending, I was under the impression it was some kind of battle-your-way-out-of-hell nice-girl-becomes-ass-kicker sort of thing. Instead it's kind of Evil Dead with a sprinkle more plot, a bigger budget and a fetish for bodily fluids excreting from one person's mouth into another person's mouth.
Uh huh.
So a cutesy girl next door accidentally summons the wrath of a gypsy woman by refusing to give her an extension on her home payments and is cursed; she will be tormented by a demon for three days before she will be dragged to hell (natch). She enlists the help of a medium to try and save her from such a fate, while also having to meet her boyfriend's snooty upper-class family and claim a promotion in her workplace, all the while being haunted periodically by a demonic spirit that torments her. Plenty of places and scenarios for her to freak out in!
The film balances seriousness and comedic moments pretty well, and once again, the effects, the look of every scene and angle, it's a brilliantly put-together film. Evil Dead looked fantastic for even a cheapo B-movie, but with an actual modern day budget it's still great in the looks department. Also, camera guys? Serious props, yo. Keep up the good work.
However, while it's a good put-together film, I will admit that it just didn't feel like it made the most of it. Evil Dead, for all its limitations, seemed to make the most of its premise and shenanigans - it had only five people, a cabin and a forest to play around with, but it made for a fun and varied hour and a half. It wasn't just the same elements tormenting them every time - it had possession, floating objects, the unseen thing that chases Ash, rapist trees and all kinds of stuff. Drag Me To Hell just seems to repeat the formula of having five minutes of dramatic build-up, throwing a jump scare at you, and repeating ad nauseam. As said earlier, it helped that the movie was just produced so well, and the climatic attempt to banish the demon is madcap mayhem, but I'm just not the kind of person who has patience for repeated jump scares, I'm afraid. I walked out of a movie a few years ago because it was too occupied throwing jump scares around than advancing the plot; I'm told it picked up afterwards, but it did a fantastic job of making me lose interest.
The climax of the girl finding someone to pass the curse onto is a really intriguing sequence, and I'd dare say it could fuel an entire movie on its own and not just restricted to a mere ten minutes. One could argue that the simple idea of "doing bad things to others for personal gain" is something that's been played out a lot, the first movie that springs to mind being The Box from not too long ago - but while Drag Me To Hell is just passing on a curse so the girl won't be tormented so much, The Box, as far as I'm aware, was just gaining lots and lots of dosh at the expense of one random person in the world dying. Apparently the recent movie also had aliens involved. My suspension of belief works in weird and wonderful ways.

I'm a little torn on it, as it's a wonderfully produced film with lots of amusing and entertaining scenes, but ultimately it came across as rather... half-hearted? I can't find the right terminology, but I just felt that it came and went and it didn't really leave too much of an impression on me. I'd be happy to watch it again just to admire the great camera work (of all things!), but otherwise I'm not too fussed.

06/September/2010

Y'know, I was always under the impression that musicians who leave a legacy always die in a manner befitting of their final days. Jimi Hendrix choked on his vomit because he was all about the drugs, Elvis died on the crapper due to the decay of his health, and I just read that a member of ELO died recently.

By being hit with a bale of hay.

Um.

Mind you, it was allegedly a wonkin' huge bale of hay, it wasn't like it was just some straws that popped his clogs, but still not a good way to go. My condolences.

03/September/2010

Oh, the irony. The very day after I made explicit notes to myself to begin a regime of backing up my files more consistently and to make routine check-ups of my computer's wellbeing, it gets a virus and I have to spend the whole day doing countless scans to remove it. Aren't computers great? I'll use that as my excuse as to why I could only post the August 28th entry now rather than, you know, on August 28th.

Earlier this week I couldn't think straight. I could barely remember what I'd actually done each day, and I'd struggle to remember if I was even productive at all. Did I try and work on any of my projects? Or did I sit on my ass and play games all day? The truth eluded me like the movements of a troublesome wasp, and I could do naught but curse myself for my slothsome folly.
Eventually I blamed it on the box art of the Phantom DVD.

I've seriously no idea why it was on my desk. I mean, I didn't put it there. I've had a mild intrigue in watching it, primarily because of my fascination with old-timey superheroes, but I'm not in such a rush that I want to leave it on my desk as a constant reminder. All I know is that the tagline is driving me insane.

It doesn't suggest "film adaptation of a 1940s superhero" - to me, it suggests "Street Sharks: The Movie!" Maybe it works better when used at the end of a theatrical trailer narrated by a gruff and grizzled voice actor, but as giant flamboyant text, it just seems misplaced, like it took a wrong direction at Albuquerque.
Despite the insanity-inducing front cover, it's actually a very fun film! It's a fun, light-hearted cross-country romp with magical elements involved, though there's no denying it's got a serious resemblance to Indiana Jones in that regard. You could argue that it's a homage, a rip-off, or a simple circumstance that's bound to happen when both movies are effectively based off old-timey pulp action flicks, but I had no real complaints. I'd rather have a movie rip off something good and get a moderately decent result than, say, try and rip off the House of the Dead movie. When you set your standards that low, you're just asking for trouble.
Admittedly, the Phantom isn't really a shining beacon of engaging protagonists, at least in this movie version. His personality doesn't extend much beyond being totally deadpan, even when making humourous remarks, but on the bright side he's talented in every ability ever, has an uncanny power over animals, dual-wields pistols, and has a strangely awesome costume. I can't say I argue with the Nostalgia Critic when he called him a giant purple condom, but come on, I think it's neat. Billy Zane's got a great superhero physique, but the guy doesn't really have much material to shine with outside of making dashing smiles to his love interest.
Speaking of the love interest, she practically steals the show - she's so badass! She takes care of herself without having to make groan-inducing remarks about her gender, she's got a mean right hook, and I'm totally entranced with her fashion sense. Everything she wears seems to be totally stylish - that hat! That coat! Those boots! It's not exactly what one would consider feminine attire, but I think it's an incredible outfit and combined with her general cute-but-hardass attitude, I'd dare say she's one of my favourite action movie love interests.
In fact, it seems a lot of characters solve only to stand out more than the main character. Xander Drax, played by Treat Williams (who I'm sure is familiar to me from some other movie but his IMDb appearances don't ring any bells) is as hammy as an aisle of bacon: every line he says seems to be played up to the best of his ability, and while I'm sure other actors would probably play him as a more sinister, scheming business man ala Xanatos from Gargoyles, I feel Treat played him just the right way - outrageously overblown. Heck, everyone of minor significance is great - the female villain isn't so much a villain as just a gossiping, jealous seductress (who ends up being a good guy!), all the gangsters are entertaining in their blowhardy ways, and even the taxi driver who escorts the Phantom around briefly is an awesome guy. He should've been the sidekick!
Despite the simple fast-paced fun of the movie, the story feels kinda... bare, though. Like, yeah, there are story scenes, but there's no fancy subtext or hidden agendas going on, it's really just the bad guys looking for these magical skulls and... that's it. That's the movie in a nutshell. Can't say I'm complaining, it's not like the action scenes were bad, but I admit I did feel a little like asking "are we going to get any scenes with substance anytime soon?" It's like if Jurassic Park only covered the part about creating the dinosaurs and making an amusement park out of them, but didn't bother covering the issues like the ethical nature of the plan and whether or not the world is ready for such an endeavour. But, really, it's not like The Phantom is trying to tackle issues like that. It's just about a purple dude riding a horse around and beating up greedy guys. You could try and be philosophical about it, but that's just no fun.
I'm still trying to figure out where I remember Treat Williams from. I've a bad feeling that I'm just mistaking him for Rob Paulsen's voice acting. They sound kinda similar!