Stop or My Mom Will Shoot Blu-ray Review

And Shoot She Does

The story goes Arnold Schwarzenegger feigned interest in Stop or My Mom Will Shoot to lure action rival Sylvester Stallone into an obviously dead-end project. It’s too perfect to imagine it as anything but truth, and grounds this production in appropriate absurdity.

It’s easy to dismiss the concept as ridiculous, but the idea of pairing Stallone – in his prime – with Golden Girls’ Estelle Getty is dopey enough to work. To Getty’s credit, she’s a softened joy, charming, but ludicrous even by satirical comedy mom standards. Imagine that against Rambo. The buddy cop genre needed this… if only to finish the bloated genre permanently.

Stop or My Mom Will Shoot is a sitcom episode Universal pushed to theaters

At best, Stop or My Mom Will Shoot is a sitcom episode where a tough detective is forced to contend with his elderly, visiting parent. Somehow, Universal pushed the movie to theaters because stars sell tickets.

Some nonsense about weapons dealers provides a minuscule backdrop for Getty’s badgering mother character who seems oblivious to, well, everything. It’s heartfelt and goofy when she’s scrubbing a gun with Clorox, not so much when she’s openly wandering into combat zones. At that point, she just needs medical help to ensure she’s still cognizant.

Stop or My Mom Will Shoot’s issue is how little movie there is in this kooky idea. Any laughs come early when Getty attempts to replace the gun she ruined, doing a back-alley deal with leather jacket-clad bikers. Getty’s adorable in the fish-out-of-water segment, a short story in a feature length film. On that note, it’s barely 80-minutes, because even the people responsible realized how little material this one offered.

Every action star needs one of these on their resume. Schwarzenegger got his not long after in Kindergarten Cop (then Twins and Junior), same as Dwayne Johnson took The Tooth Fairy or Vin Diesel’s The Pacifier. Considering how a few of those turned out, the listlessness of Stop or Mom Will Shoot seems less of an entertainment crime.

Video

Carrying signs Universal sat on this one before dropping it in Mill Creek’s lap, this dull master lacks recency. It’s processed enough to notice the smoothed textures, given how little texture is left. Noise reduction is a killer. Ringing proves a bother too. Encoding isn’t doing Stop or My Mom Will Shoot any favors either. Detectable artifacts add to oily look. Forget any signs this was film.

Whenever this master was struck, it was done at a time when the print still looked exceptional. There’s no damage or dirt, or maybe the filtering wiped that out too. Color saturation doesn’t lose anything, organic, bright enough, and pure. There’s nothing remarkable, but sufficient.

Crush causes problems in shadows. The effect is minimal, while the overall depth proves a winner. Primarily, that’s thanks to the contrast, hearty and rich.

Audio

Restrictive DTS-HD stereo lacks range. Action stays limited by way of the era, smooth enough, but lacking dynamics. Low-end energy comes entirely from the playful score.

Small moments split the track, gunfire and ambient traffic running back-and-forth. Stop or My Mom Will Shoot is active enough to recall an era driven entirely by stereo theaters, right on the fringe of Dolby 5.1 breaking in.

Extras

Nothing,

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