Ready OR Not Trivia Quiz

Answer: Ready for Love (1934)

Ida Lupino made this movie when she was only sixteen years old. Incredibly, she had already been making movies for almost three years. It is a cute case of mistaken identity, in which a teenaged girl (Lupino) travels to a small town in the USA to live with her aunt. En route on the train, her dog Booboo escapes, and Ida's character arrives distraught and crying inconsolably. Newspaper reporters are there to cover the death of a gangster whose corpse is being transported on the same train for burial in the town, and when they see her crying, they assume that she is the lover of the dead man.

A cast of great character actors helps make this well-written comedy hit the mark. Beulah Bondi (better known as George Bailey's mother in "It's a Wonderful Life") is a stand out as one of the town's small-minded and judgemental women who subject Lupino's character to a dunking contest to determine if she is a witch or not.

It all ends well, with Ida falling for one of the young reporters who knows she is being mistreated.

Answer: Ready to Rumble (2000)

This comedy spoof of the farce that is professional wrestling stars David Arquette and Oliver Platt. Two wrestling fans go through many zany experiences trying to help their favorite professional wrestler escape from the hands of a shady promoter. The movie doesn't take itself seriously and provides a funny depiction of the world of professional wrestling and its over-the-top fans and athletes.

Answer: Ready Player One (2018)

This Steven Spielberg film is visually pleasing, though somewhat muddled in its plot. Players of a wildly popular game are promised the chance to become rich and famous if they are able to discover the "easter egg" (hidden programming) in the game, which is thought to be the key to hidden treasure. Nothing is as simple as it initially seems. Ready, Player One?

Answer: Ready, Willing and Able (1937)

This madcap musical comedy starred Ruby Keeler and Ross Alexander as a couple of actors wanting to make it big in musical theater. The best scene in the movie is also one of the sadder ones, where Alexander's character speaks the lyrics of the soon-to-be-famous "Too Marvelous for Words" to Keeler's character.

The song did become wildly popular, but the movie suffered at the box office, due to the suicide by gunshot of the male lead, 29-year-old Ross Alexander, only two months before its release. Alexander's own wife had killed herself using a gun less than two years earlier.

The movie had big musical numbers with song and dance, and also featured Lee Dixon, Jane Wyman (the first Mrs. Ronald Reagan), and Allen Jenkins. I'm sure you know the story without even seeing the movie, Keeler's unstoppable talent makes her a huge success on Broadway.

Answer: I'm Not Ready for Christmas (2015)

This Hallmark made-for-TV holiday movie is a little trite, but still hits the right notes for fans of the genre. Alicia Witt stars as a hard-working aunt who misses her niece's music recital, only to have to tell the truth in all things (in a female version of the plot-twist already examined by Jim Carrey in "Liar Liar").

The woman finds herself unable to tell the most innocuous of white lies because her niece had wished for her to be absolutely and brutally honest from a magical Santa she met while leaving the recital.

The writing is stilted, and Witt's character overexplains all of her strange but honest comments, which makes the movie wear out its welcome before the end credits roll. Rest assured everyone is more than ready for Christmas at the end of the story.

Answer: Ready For Anything (1977)

The movie was released in Italy as "Disposta a tutto" and in the US and the English-speaking world as "Ready for Anything". The standout in this mediocre film is star Eleonora Giorgi, who plays a young stenography student who gets involved with a married man, who is sorting through his own difficulties with his feminist wife and overly-spoiled daughter.

The sex scenes are mildly erotic, and though the affair is ill-fated from the start, the audience wishes that Brando would come in and show them how to make this kind of soft porn, but with style.

Answer: Ready to Wear (1994)

Starring Kim Basinger, Tim Robbins and Julia Roberts, this tale of interconnected lives during fashion week in Paris, and the consequences that each person's actions have on the lives of those around them, should have been more interesting than it ended up being. Part of the plot centers around the exploits of Basinger, Roberts and Robbins, who abandon their official duties as model and reporters, so that they can engage in antics in a hotel bedroom.

The best part of the movie is the encounter between aging former lovers, Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni, who long to rekindle their love and find new meaning to life. Like other Robert Altman films, the series of linked vignettes add up to the story as a whole, with some coming off better than others.

Answer: Ready or Not (2009)

Like "The Hangover" and other guy-comedies similar to it, "Ready or Not" has its moments. Writer/director Sean Doyle brings together Christian Oliver, Seamus Dever and others in a series of slapstick scenes. The four college buddies have a little too much to drink at the bachelor party of one of them, daring each other to do successively stupider things. One thing leads to another, and when the four wake up, they are stuck in Mexico.

As they try to get home, they are chased by the police and criminals; some fall in and out of love; all four fight and make up, predictably blaming each other for their predicament.

They finally get the groom back to the US, just in time to marry the bride.

Answer: Ready or Not (2012)

As is the case with many horror films, the actors are unknown and the budget is low. Six people find themselves locked inside an eerie mansion, supposedly for the filming of a reality show, which promises to leave the winner with a million dollars. The villain here is the "cameraman", who really isn't making a show, but who wants to kill all six of them off, one by one.

Answer: Ready, Steady Charlie! (2003)

It is hard to believe that this ill-conceived mess of a movie is the best that Switzerland can produce. It is often touted as the most famous Swiss movie of the 21st century. Directed by Mike Eschmann, it tells the tale of a man who is removed forcibly from his wedding reception because the Swiss authorities need him to serve his time in the Swiss Army.

The humor is physical, broad, and overacted, but all ends well when the groom makes it back to his wife after suffering trivial indignities that aren't worth retelling.