Welcome to the Final Edition of this round of Double Feature Friday, a weekly competition in which I challenge YOU to pair the week’s new releases with your favourite older or classic films.
Each week I name the new theatrical releases as well as a few other bonus picks of my choice. Your job is to comment with what other movie you’d like to screen in a double bill with the given films, and why. You can pick any movie you want – recent, classic, whatever – just be sure get your answers in by Thursday May 24, so the judges have enough time to make their decision.
This time next week there won’t be any new films. Instead, I’ll be annoucing the innaugural Double Feature Friday winner, at which point the game board will be reset and fun the will begin again.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. There’s still one week left; time enough for anyone to snatch the lead and the (purely imaginary) trophy. I’ll get to this weeks films in just a second. But first…last weeks winners:
Helen Geib, who paired Dark Shadows with High Spirits.
Andrew Robinson, who paired God Bless America with Red State and The Great Dictator with Downfall.
Steve Honeywell, who paired Girl in Progress with Girl, Interupted.
Dan Heaton, who paired The Big Lebowski with Brick.
Well done winners, bad luck losers, and go get ‘em future competitors. Your films for this week are:
Battleship
The Dictator
What To Expect When You’re Expecting
Polisse
Bonus: Dungeons and Dragons
Time to sound off! Leave your most clever or creative pairings in the comment section below!
DOUBLE FEATURE FRIDAY LEADERBOARD:
Courtney Small (9)
Nolahn (6)
Squasher88 (6)
Dan Heaton (5)
Glen H. (5)
Andrew Crump (4)
Andrew Robinson (4)
Andy Hart (4)
Helen Geib (4)
Simon Columb (3)
Sam Fragoso (2)
Steve Honeywell (2)
Jandy Stone (1)
Andrew (8)
Wayne (8)
Jessica (6)
John (6)
Josh (6)
Justin (5)
Lauren (5)
Steve (5)
Dave Enkosky (4)
Sir Phobos (4)
Twitter: T_Lawson
May 18, 2012 7:33 am
Battleship & The Enemy Below (1957)
One of the great American naval combat films, The Enemy Below is not sci-fi, but it inspired various sci-fi writers in the 60s, as it provided the style and structure for both the Star Trek episode “Balance of Terror” and the Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea episode “Killers of the Deep.”
The Dictator & Coming to America
Pairing The Dictator with Chaplin’s The Great Dictator strikes me as too obvious. However, I think Coming to America offers a different spin on the ‘foreign leader as a fish out of water in America’ plot.
What to Expect When You’re Expecting and Junior
I don’t know much about What to Expect… except that it’s a comedy about pregnancy. What better pairing than Junior, which inverts the expected events in a pregnancy comedy and makes Arnold Schwarzenegger the pregnant father-to-be?
Polisse and The Choirboys (1977)
Both films are about the pressures of police officers, although I often see Choirboys listed as more of a comedy-drama. In any case, I recommend it in part because I think the movie is better than its reputation (critics weren’t kind), and that the more comedic elements might compliment the presumably more serious, straightforward account in Polisse.
Dungeons & Dragons and Dragonslayer
Dungeons & Dragons is a bad movie. So-bad-it’s-funny at times, but still bad. To cleanse the palate after such an experience, I chose my favorite dragon-related film of all time, Dragonslayer. The cast and plot are entertaining, but the real star of the film is Phil Tippett’s work on the go-motion Vermithrax Pejorative, THE best cinematic dragon ever created.
Battleship with Clue (board games)
The Dictator with Lost in Translation (people in new places)
What To Expect When You’re Expecting with We Need To Talk About Kevin (struggling with parenthood)
Polisse with Gone Baby Gone (protecting children)
Dungeons and Dragons with Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (fantasy)
Twitter: fandangogroover
May 18, 2012 7:51 am
Gone with no explanation needed answers this week:
Battleship with Transformers
The Dictator with The Great Dictator
What To Expect When You’re Expecting with Nine Months
Polisse with 21 Jump Street
Bonus: Dungeons and Dragons with Eragon
Twitter: agracru
May 18, 2012 7:59 am
Battleship and Clue (two movies based on board games!)
The Dictator and Coming to America
What to Expect When You’re Expecting with Knocked Up
Polisse with any two episodes of The Wire
Dungeons & Dragons with In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (a marathon of fantasy game adaptation awfulness!)
Twitter: ptsnob
May 18, 2012 8:18 am
Battleship with U-571
The Dictator with The Man Who Knew Too Little
What to Expect When You’re Expecting with Baby Boom
Polisse with The Other Guys
Dungeons and Dragons with Krull
Battleship | Star Trek (cleanse the pallate of watching Battleship with another movie about people on a big boat shooting big guns)
The Dictator | You Don’t Mess With The Zohan (people from the Middle East in America and not wanting to be found or getting lost)
What to Expect When You’re Expecting | Rosemary’s Baby (nine months of hell)
Polisse | The Skin I Live In (doctors & patients)
Dungeons & Dragons | GI JOE (just as stupid, both have Wayans)
Battleship with Bambi Meets Godzilla – what would really happen if aliens with super-advanced tech and a will to destroy decided to step on humanity
When You’re Expecting with Parenthood – before and after
Polisse with Police, Adjective – burnish your contemporary foreign cinema credentials with two different takes on police work
Dungeons and Dragons with Dragon Wars: D-War – how not to do dragons
Damn, this is what I get for swinging by late… I’m gonna have to dig deep.
BATTLESHIP with SPACE CRUISER YAMATO (let’s fight aliens with our best WWII warships!)
THE DICTATOR with THE INFIDEL (though Coming to America is the correct answer)
WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN YOU’RE EXPECTING as the second half of the double-feature with EVERY THING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT SEX* (BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK)
POLISSE with TRUST
DUNGEONS & DRAGONS with the upcoming KNIGHTS OF BADASSDOM
Twitter: smallmind
May 19, 2012 3:47 pm
Battleship – Skyline (whether by sea or air, these alien invasion movies are silly)
The Dictator – Bananas (comedies that feature dictators)
What to Expect When You’re Expecting – Look Who’s Talking (comedies centered around having kids)
Polisse – Under Fire (films where a photographers get involved with the subjects they are assigned to document)
Dungeons and Dragons – Krull (Sword and sorcery films that involve a quest to save a princess)