adamclark52
El Dandy
I'm one with the Force; the Force is with me
Posts: 8,139
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Post by adamclark52 on Jan 19, 2019 16:55:06 GMT -5
I tried watching Z Nation from the start last night but after four episodes I really didn’t like it. I liked the sniper kid and the old man. But the writing was pretty bad.
Netflix in Canada is so bad though I may keep watching on nights when I have nothing else to do.
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Nr1Humanoid
Hank Scorpio
Is the #3 humanoid at best.
Posts: 5,475
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Post by Nr1Humanoid on Jan 21, 2019 20:00:37 GMT -5
Humanoids from the Deep. 1980
Must say I got a real Jaws vibe from this one as it felt like you where back in Amity from the get go.
Snuffing out a young boy to begin proceedings was an unexpected surprise, then several dogs right on the heels of that shocker.
An early James Horner score was a wonderful surprise to see in the credits as was a female director.
Thankfully, the picture was made before Siskel caused the MPAA to bring hacksaws to work, giving us grisly special effects rather than just blood. Too bad most of the kills are telegraphed in advance but there are a few tense moments still. And after the ending I am more grateful then ever I can't give birth. The creatures I found excellent and very gross, but from master Rob Bottin what else can you expect.
As I hate rape scenes I'm grateful they're kept short and rather silly in this one.
As for nudity there is some naked titties on display if those gross bags of flesh is your thing. Actually, the film goes full Impact wrestling on the skin front.
The cast is nice and talented, and adults, for a change
Some stray observations:
Nice brawl for all.
And another guy I'd quickly go down on my knees for gets turned down by his girl.
I love stuntman on fire stunts. And a boy took down the monster no less.
The jump scare cat gets another acting credit.
How come people who live alone always act like they know they're in a horror picture?
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Post by DSR on Jan 24, 2019 1:40:12 GMT -5
THE OVAL PORTRAIT (1973), also known as ONE MINUTE BEFORE DEATH, was directed by a Mexican (Rogelio A. Gonzalez), stars and is about Americans, but somehow still feels like a cheapo Euro-horror flick. At the height of the Civil War, beautiful young Rebecca (Maray Ayres) the daughter of a Union commander has fallen in love with Joseph (Barry Coe) a Confederate soldier. The man gets taken away, Rebecca's father disowns her, and Rebecca dies as a result of complications with her pregnancy (I'm assuming that's what she died from, the film doesn't make it 100% clear). Several years later, Rebecca's father dies after years in an institution (he went catatonic shortly before Rebecca's death). The Union commander's elderly sister and her middle-aged daughter have come to the man's house for a reading of his will. But that middle-aged daughter, Lisa (Wanda Hendrix) believes Rebecca's ghost haunts the house and means to take possession of her body! The Lisa part of that synopsis is meant to be our main plot, but the Rebecca section which is actually an extended flashback takes up the bulk of the film's run-time. And it really isn't even a horror plot, it's overwrought melodrama about forbidden love! The final 20 minutes or so gets around to spook show theatrics if you're willing to tough it out for the first 70. Maybe "tough it out" isn't entirely accurate, as the story did hold my attention even if it wasn't as "HORROR" as I was hoping for. The flick is titled after an Edgar Allan Poe short story and there are elements of the original (an actual painting and a dead wife) but it's a very loose adaptation. I dunno. It's an okay movie, but nonessential.
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Post by DSR on Jan 25, 2019 2:43:54 GMT -5
THE DEVIL'S DAUGHTER (1991) also known as THE SECT, was the film Michele Soavi made in between THE CHURCH and CEMETERY MAN, both of which are probably better known. In addition to directing, Soavi co-wrote with producer Dario Argento. California, USA 1970: A Satanic Cult ritualistically slaughters a group of hippies. Frankfurt, Germany 1991: A pretty young teacher experiences supernatural shenanigans at and around her recently acquired house. People seemingly die only to spring back to life some time later, a mysterious blue goop oozes out of the water faucet, her bed fills with bugs in the middle of the night, a woman has her face pulled off by hooks, A RABBIT WATCHES TELEVISION!!! *DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN* Can our leading lady save herself from the Satanists and their insidious plot? And what exactly IS their insidious plot? The film is just under 2 hours in length, and boy did I feel it. Those moments of weirdness are sprinkled throughout the film, but the best word to describe the time in between them is "lethargic". I wanted to like this film since I enjoy Soavi's STAGEFRIGHT and the aforementioned CEMETERY MAN, but the few weird ideas and a handful of interesting camera shots aren't enough to save it. Also, NIGHT OF THE LEPUS already taught us almost 2 decades previous that rabbits are just not convincing monsters. Bummer.
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Post by DSR on Jan 30, 2019 21:52:42 GMT -5
RIP to frequent Roger Corman and Joe Dante collaborator and all around swell guy Dick Miller.
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Post by DSR on Jan 31, 2019 2:01:47 GMT -5
With a lot of talk in the past year or so about Zack Snyder on these forums (mostly in threads relating to DC Comics films), I decided it was time to re-watch and re-evaluate 2004's DAWN OF THE DEAD remake. The last time I watched it was back when it first hit DVD.
The story is familiar enough. A small group of people wake up one morning to find that all Hell has broken loose: zombies running all over the place attacking any still-living person they can find. This small group meets up by happenstance and takes shelter in a shopping mall, partaking of the food, clothing, and comforts of the now-abandoned stores. When help refuses to arrive, they devise a plan to escape.
Special effects are well-handled save for one dodgy looking fire. And a game cast (including Ving Rhames, Mekhi Phifer, Ty Burrell, and Matt Frewer, among others) works well with material written by James Gunn (who would go on to become a big name director in his own right).
Zack Snyder's direction is actually really good here, devoid of a lot of the overly masturbatory slow motion that would plague his later films. Which leads me to the conclusion a lot of others have about Mr. Snyder that he works best when he's reined in. His background up to this point was music videos and commercials, so understandably the producers wouldn't give too much control to an untested feature director. A producers list, I'll add, that does not include Deborah Snyder, Zack's wife. Her name would feature in the credits of every Zack Snyder film afterward. And most importantly, Zack is working off of the aforementioned Gunn's script. Snyder would wind up writing or co-writing a lot more of the films he directs as his career goes on.
I'll probably wind up adding this whole write-up to another thread here, but since we are talking about a horror film, I figured I'd drop it in here as well. 2004's DAWN is a well-made picture, with excellent gore work, and plenty of pathos for the still-living characters in between zombie scares.
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Paul
Vegeta
Posts: 9,243
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Post by Paul on Feb 1, 2019 13:55:40 GMT -5
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Post by DSR on Feb 2, 2019 1:56:18 GMT -5
ZOMBIE GENOCIDE: LEGION OF THE DAMNED (2006) appears on Mill Creek's Freakshow Cinema 12 movie collection. Written by/directed by/starring/music by Gary Ugarek, it is based on a short story also by Gary Ugarek. It was originally titled DEADLANDS: THE RISING, and is not to be confused with an Irish film titled ZOMBIE GENOCIDE from the early 90s. A terrorist attack on 5 major metropolitan areas results in a zombie outbreak. The inhabitants of a small Maryland town seek shelter and answers, receive non of the latter and then stupidly abandon the former. Seriously, the zombies are never shown crowding around a building, never pounding doors or breaking windows. The main character's wife and son spend a good portion of the film in their house looking perfectly safe, but they decide to leave for seemingly no reason at all. ZOMBIE GENOCIDE was made on a shoestring budget, and you can easily tell. The cast is full of non-actors, cameras look blurry/grainy, and the script could obviously use some work. It's clearly inspired by George Romero's classic NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (you could tell well before the "Special Thanks" notice in the end credits), but it doesn't add anything new to zombie cinema whatsoever. And it really doesn't have an ending, it just kinda stops (there's a sequel out there, but I'm not hunting it down). Gore effects and zombie makeup are decent enough. I dunno, I can't really hate the movie. It's amateurish and dumb, but never in funny or infuriating ways. And the edit on the Freakshow Cinema DVD is 63 minutes long, INCLUDING a five minute end credits scroll. This movie...exists. The first zombie in ZOMBIE GENOCIDE. Our Bill Hinzman equivalent, if you will.
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Ultimo Gallos
Grimlock
Dreams SUCK!Nightmares live FOREVER!
Posts: 14,357
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Post by Ultimo Gallos on Feb 2, 2019 13:30:01 GMT -5
I own that Freakshow Cinema set. Only wAtched one film off it. Was some UK made horror anthology.
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mystermystery
Dennis Stamp
Still in the White Hummer
Posts: 4,362
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Post by mystermystery on Feb 2, 2019 15:18:04 GMT -5
Into the Dark: Down 2019 ★★★½
Two workers at a big fancy law building get trapped in an elevator before a holiday weekend and what starts up like a Hallmark meet cute starts down a dark path.
Another addition to the Horror a Holiday Hulu series of films from Blumhouse.
The nice thing about a mainly one-location movie is that it forces a more interesting story or it falls apart quick enough to let you know it's okay to bail. The pacing and reveals and escalations are all really well done in DOWN. It uses every bit of its location for proper drama.
Without going too much into it, I enjoyed how the film establishes the impulsiveness of Jennifer to later explain some seeming horror movie cliche decisions she makes. There are some serious P2 vibes at some points in the film (a reference that doesn't work when most people haven't seen P2).
Overall,. I enjoyed it. I think it's my favorite Into the Dark's thus far.
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Post by DSR on Feb 2, 2019 21:55:15 GMT -5
I own that Freakshow Cinema set. Only wAtched one film off it. Was some UK made horror anthology. I'm guessing TALES OF THE DEAD. I watched that one a couple years ago. Didn't care for it. I also watched THE CURSE OF BLANCHARD HILL almost 4 years ago...AND DIDN'T CARE FOR IT. Here's my old-ass review of that particular picture: THE CURSE OF BLANCHARD HILL (2006) - A long long time ago in these here Horror Threads, I used to make these kinda dickish self-congratulatory posts about the number of horror movies I own on DVD. In fairness to me, this was back in the day when you usually got one movie on a disc. Now you can walk into any Rite Aid in the country and walk out 5 minutes later with a 50 film collection for pocket change. Sure, ten years ago, you might get a collection of public domain flicks. But now it's like any thing ever recorded can be thrown in a ten movie set for 3 bucks. Have I got you guys psyched for this review yet?! Two completely average looking guys and their dumpy girlfriends wander into the woods to roast wienies, drink beer, and share theories about a relative of one of these hikers, a man named Victor who went missing 22 years ago. One of the guys suggests that the Spirit of Nature took over Victor, and he's been living in these woods, stalking and killing any white man that crosses his path. Cut to some horny kids (with the worst attempts at southern accents ever recorded), rubbing up against each other, only to have the obscured figure of a man rub his machete up against their innards. The next day, the Park Ranger shows up, finds the corpses of the rednecks, and the next thing you know, two drug addicted asshole detectives (meaning detectives who are assholes, not proctologists) are on the case (by the way, they've got a big ass newspaper clipping of George W. Bush on their wall, and a bumper sticker that says "REPUBLICAN" on their refrigerator... OOOH POLITICAL COMMENTARY). You guys know the drill by now. Killer in the woods, frightened campers, blah blah blah. Would you believe someone made a spiritual successor to DON'T GO IN THE WOODS?! Seriously, 4 campers, a sort of feral man, characters are introduced simply so they can be killed off a minute later, a score that sounds like someone hit random buttons on a casio, a nude scene featuring people that should in no way ever be involved in a nude scene, inane dialogue delivered like the actors had never seen scripts and were reading from cue cards for the very first time AS THE MOVIE WAS BEING SHOT. Actors have different haircuts in different scenes because no one gives a f*** about continuity. The gore effects usually amount to throwing karo syrup and red food coloring on somebody and calling it a day. The filmmakers made one attempt at a machete wound, and they're obviously proud of it because they show it for a full minute. Which reminds me that there's a shitload of padding to this "movie." Plenty of generic nature shots, and a 7-minute long end credits sequence when there's basically 10 people that did everything in the movie. Their names just get re-cycled through, and there's an extended special thanks section. Every single person in this movie looks like their 19 years old. And every single element of this movie feels like it was made by 19-year-olds. They even have the nerve to wink at their "influences" by having posters for films like NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, ZOMBIE, and CITIZEN TOXIE: THE TOXIC AVENGER IV on the walls of the detective characters' apartment. But these kids made a horror comedy that is neither scary nor funny. So...why am I sitting here writing all of THIS?! Because, this movie is the kind of awe-inspiringly stupid that you can't look away from it, not unlike the aforementioned DON'T GO IN THE WOODS, or further back, an un-MST3Ked MANOS: THE HANDS OF FATE. The jokes aren't funny, but they're so not funny that you're fascinated that someone had this for a sense of humor. Every single second of this movie is amateurish and inept. But this movie...is a thing. It exists. You can BUY THIS on Amazon, for Christ's sake! There are jerks like me that say they want to make a horror movie, but never get around to it because we're afraid it won't turn out perfectly. THE CURSE OF BLANCHARD HILL is willing to lower the bar for all of us. ANYONE CAN MAKE A MOVIE. ABSOLUTELY F***ING ANYONE. 1 star for the actual movie + 2 stars for this shocking revelation = 3 stars out of 5. Somehow.
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Post by DSR on Feb 4, 2019 1:14:54 GMT -5
I'm still going through this Freakshow Cinema set.
Last night I watched IDOL OF EVIL (2006), which is the most competently made feature thus far (low bar to clear, I know). It's kinda like an Indiana Jones picture without any of the set-pieces and riddled with cliches, which is why I won't do a full review. Actors are decent enough given the circumstances. I still wouldn't recommend it.
Tonight's viewing was BELOW GROUND (2011) yet another no-budget shit-show written, directed, edited, executive produced by AND starring one guy, this time his name is William Victor Schotten.
Schotten plays a horror film director who notices people in his neighborhood have turned into demons and as random non-turned people show up at his doorstep, he lets them in: a stripper and her douchey ex-boyfriend, a bible-thumper and his pregnant-out-of-wedlock girlfriend (the hypocrisy doesn't go unnoticed by the rest of the characters). The characters all gather in the film director's basement, argue like a bunch of idiots with some seriously cringey dialogue, and then bare their souls to one another like it's THE BREAKFAST CLUB (except THE BREAKFAST CLUB is an actual good movie).
Also, the film director has decided to document all of what's going on with his camera, so there's a found-footage angle to this garbage. Problem is, even if you somehow get past the characters being completely annoying, when they finally get to their "tragic backstories", music kicks in. So, like, I'm guessing in the universe of this story, whoever found the footage said "It wasn't compelling enough, let me add a little score in there".
Also, during his speech, our film director main character reveals his son died yesterday, despite acting before and after his monologue like a completely unaffected kinda-dudebro-even-though-he's-in-his-thirties. It doesn't feel like he's been putting on a brave face in a time of crisis and finally lets it slip, it really feels like Schotten is trying to get together his Acting Reel to see if he can work on a higher budget film someone else is making.
Five movies down, seven still to go. As it stands I would not recommend this set. I got this as a Christmas gift from my older brother a long time ago, and finally getting around to it, I'm wondering if back then I did something to piss him off. Can't think of another explanation for why THIS was my gift for that year. Oy.
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Post by DSR on Feb 4, 2019 1:17:20 GMT -5
Sorry to double-post, but RIP to Julia Adams, who will always be remembered as Kay Lawrence in THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON. She was 92 years old.
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Nr1Humanoid
Hank Scorpio
Is the #3 humanoid at best.
Posts: 5,475
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Post by Nr1Humanoid on Feb 4, 2019 18:10:38 GMT -5
It's Alive. 1974. Finally tracked a copy down.
Not the picture I expected at all. Instead of a pure monster on a killing spree you also got Sophie's Choice of the horror genre.
A role reversal would have been nice with the Dad accepting the baby and Mom being the freaked out one, but that being said it was great seeing the father coming around and accepting his child, despite it being a monster.
Nice touch to have everyone know from the start that a monster exist and is on the loose, rather than have characters desperately trying to convince everyone else.
Great performance by John Ryan as the Dad, he truly played all the emotions to perfection.
Loved the baby creation the first time I saw it in Fangoria and it was used to great effect here by the directing choices.
There really isn't and nudity and gore to speak of but then this just wasn't that kind of a picture.
Looking very much forward to the sequels as I understand the creator of the trilogy is there throughout. Lucas aside, always a good thing.
Also I recently caught a showing of Hospital Massacre. Nice seeing the evil little girl from Bloody Birthday in a sympathetic role. Even her killer costar is in this one, still playing one here.
The killer reveal isn't much of a surprise. The kills themselves are bloody, some quite gory and other effectively leaving things up to the imagination. Most of the victims are also just plain fun to watch die, especially the over the top, would never get through medical school, hospital staff.
There's a seriously gratuitous medical examination of the main star, who has a very impressive pair of mammaries if you can overlook the ridiculous nipples. To her credit, Hef's former glove does a great job in the lead role so kudos. She has such expressive eyes.
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Post by Jumpin' Jesse Walsh on Feb 5, 2019 11:03:17 GMT -5
My review of Carnival of Souls (1962)
Carnival of Souls lends itself to deeper interpretations of its plot than director Herk Harvey could’ve ever intended. It follows a simple yet haunting story on a practically non-existent budget, but it’s the stylistic flourishes and mood that give the entire thing some level of spiritual meaning. So, with that in mind, please bare with me as put my own totally off-base spin on the film’s plot. Yay?
For all its boogeymen and creepy organ music, I’ve always been stricken by how much of the film is essentially about a young woman’s struggle to find her identity in early ‘60s America. Second wave feminism was just bubbling under the surface at the time of the film’s release, but Mary’s journey is fraught with the kind of existential tension that women across the nation were grappling with during the JFK era. It tackles, however unintended, several of ideas later expressed in Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. Right from the beginning, Mary is depicted as an independent woman who doesn’t have much room for men in her life and sadly, and just as true now as it were in 1962, this comes at a price.
The moment Mary breaks out on her own and embarks on her new life in Utah is right when she starts getting haunted by the ghoulish man who is there to dissuade her at every turn. It works as a metaphor for the way men are ready to scrutinize women who declare agency over their own life. When she’s not pursued by the ghoul, she’s pursued by her massive creep of a neighbor, whose come-ons become increasingly cringe-inducing as the film progresses. He expresses befuddlement at Mary’s refusal to be attached to a man, as the idea of single women who weren’t mothers or housewives was still an eyebrow-raising one at the time. In many ways, he’s much scarier than any ghoul, mainly because his character is much more rooted in real life.
This makes it all the more tragic when Mary is readily labeled as “crazy” or “delusional” by her peers the instant she voices her fears of the men preying on her. She’s gaslit by an unhelpful psychologist, who writes off her story as a product of her imagination. There are a lot of parallels to be drawn here between the doubt given to Mary’s account and the way women, even in the #MeToo era, are immediately met with doubt when they report harassment. Worse, there are parallels to be drawn between the way it’s implied Mary is partly to blame for her situation and the way people look for reasons to blame victims of harassment and assault.
Some closer attention can also be given to Mary’s profession as a church organist. It’s a job that expects her to maintain a wholesome, girl-next-door image and any time she threatens to step outside of that holds potential for ridicule and suspicion. This is best exemplified in the scene when she’s chastised by the paster for playing “the Devil’s music,” which is coded with misogyny. On the surface, it really is just dialogue about the music, but the amount of vitriol the pastor hurls at Mary suggests she’s getting punished for daring to venture outside “a woman’s place.” Then there are the scenes of her suddenly becoming invisible, which results in her being unable to communicate with anyone. It’s probably just supernatural hokum, but it can also be easily read as Mary’s inability to fit in with the world around her, if only because she’s not conforming to the gender roles of the day.
I could write a separate review on the film’s ending alone, as there’s a thousand different hot takes you could make with it. The main takeaway though is that much of the film is simply just a dream, but for a lot of women out there, an ordeal like Mary’s isn’t just a dream; it’s a reality.
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Post by Jumpin' Jesse Walsh on Feb 5, 2019 11:04:59 GMT -5
By the way, I watched the Suspiria remake yesterday so you can expect my review on it to be posted here in about 10-15 years from now because that's probably when I'll finally be able to articulate my thoughts on it.
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Chainsaw
T
A very BAD man.
It is what it is
Posts: 90,480
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Post by Chainsaw on Feb 6, 2019 19:08:42 GMT -5
With a lot of talk in the past year or so about Zack Snyder on these forums (mostly in threads relating to DC Comics films), I decided it was time to re-watch and re-evaluate 2004's DAWN OF THE DEAD remake. The last time I watched it was back when it first hit DVD. The story is familiar enough. A small group of people wake up one morning to find that all Hell has broken loose: zombies running all over the place attacking any still-living person they can find. This small group meets up by happenstance and takes shelter in a shopping mall, partaking of the food, clothing, and comforts of the now-abandoned stores. When help refuses to arrive, they devise a plan to escape. Special effects are well-handled save for one dodgy looking fire. And a game cast (including Ving Rhames, Mekhi Phifer, Ty Burrell, and Matt Frewer, among others) works well with material written by James Gunn (who would go on to become a big name director in his own right). Zack Snyder's direction is actually really good here, devoid of a lot of the overly masturbatory slow motion that would plague his later films. Which leads me to the conclusion a lot of others have about Mr. Snyder that he works best when he's reined in. His background up to this point was music videos and commercials, so understandably the producers wouldn't give too much control to an untested feature director. A producers list, I'll add, that does not include Deborah Snyder, Zack's wife. Her name would feature in the credits of every Zack Snyder film afterward. And most importantly, Zack is working off of the aforementioned Gunn's script. Snyder would wind up writing or co-writing a lot more of the films he directs as his career goes on. I'll probably wind up adding this whole write-up to another thread here, but since we are talking about a horror film, I figured I'd drop it in here as well. 2004's DAWN is a well-made picture, with excellent gore work, and plenty of pathos for the still-living characters in between zombie scares. I think the DOTD remake was the movie I did the hardest 360 on of any movie I've ever seen. I went into it hating the fact that they were remaking one of my favorite horror movies, but after positive word came out about it, I was willing to give it a try. By the time it was done, I walked out of the theater in a daze. I felt then that the movie was such an assault on the senses, seeing the sheer butchery of the first 17 minutes of the movie, and everything that follows after it, I was stunned to say the least. I bought the DVD when it came out, and then...I didn't watch it. At first I thought it was my usual problem of watching movies, committing to them but then never making time for them. Then I got a chance to watch it again, about a year later, during a Halloween party. The first 17 minutes still got me. It was visceral, it was heartbreaking, and then they get to the mall and...the whole movie falls apart. What I never noticed about the movie the first time I saw it was that the writing of the characters are absolute dogshit. Most of the characters range from boring to incredibly unlikable, which stands so much in contrast when compared against the cast of the original movie. Characters make some of the dumbest decisions I've ever seen in a movie. Mekhi Phifer keeps his wife's getting bit and subsequent death a secret because he wants her to deliver her baby. The two kids endanger everyone twice when trying to rescue their dog when they send the dog to Andy's Gun Shop to help him...I started seeing so many frays in the movie that I was able to overlook in the visceral experience of seeing it in a theater. And I feel like a lot of that is on Gunn as much as it's on Snyder. This wasn't his finest hour, but for a guy who went from writing Troma movies to a big gig like this, it's understandable, and I'm glad he was able to right the ship and make a much better movie in Slither. And there were some really good setpieces. The stuff with Andy was actually kind of a cool thing, and the scene where we find out what his fate is is heartbreaking. But the rest just didn't hold up to me on a second viewing. And now we see so much of those tropes from that movie in zombie movies and even non-zombie movies, that even more of it's lustre has worn off.
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Post by DSR on Feb 6, 2019 21:55:38 GMT -5
With a lot of talk in the past year or so about Zack Snyder on these forums (mostly in threads relating to DC Comics films), I decided it was time to re-watch and re-evaluate 2004's DAWN OF THE DEAD remake. The last time I watched it was back when it first hit DVD. The story is familiar enough. A small group of people wake up one morning to find that all Hell has broken loose: zombies running all over the place attacking any still-living person they can find. This small group meets up by happenstance and takes shelter in a shopping mall, partaking of the food, clothing, and comforts of the now-abandoned stores. When help refuses to arrive, they devise a plan to escape. Special effects are well-handled save for one dodgy looking fire. And a game cast (including Ving Rhames, Mekhi Phifer, Ty Burrell, and Matt Frewer, among others) works well with material written by James Gunn (who would go on to become a big name director in his own right). Zack Snyder's direction is actually really good here, devoid of a lot of the overly masturbatory slow motion that would plague his later films. Which leads me to the conclusion a lot of others have about Mr. Snyder that he works best when he's reined in. His background up to this point was music videos and commercials, so understandably the producers wouldn't give too much control to an untested feature director. A producers list, I'll add, that does not include Deborah Snyder, Zack's wife. Her name would feature in the credits of every Zack Snyder film afterward. And most importantly, Zack is working off of the aforementioned Gunn's script. Snyder would wind up writing or co-writing a lot more of the films he directs as his career goes on. I'll probably wind up adding this whole write-up to another thread here, but since we are talking about a horror film, I figured I'd drop it in here as well. 2004's DAWN is a well-made picture, with excellent gore work, and plenty of pathos for the still-living characters in between zombie scares. I think the DOTD remake was the movie I did the hardest 360 on of any movie I've ever seen. I went into it hating the fact that they were remaking one of my favorite horror movies, but after positive word came out about it, I was willing to give it a try. By the time it was done, I walked out of the theater in a daze. I felt then that the movie was such an assault on the senses, seeing the sheer butchery of the first 17 minutes of the movie, and everything that follows after it, I was stunned to say the least. I bought the DVD when it came out, and then...I didn't watch it. At first I thought it was my usual problem of watching movies, committing to them but then never making time for them. Then I got a chance to watch it again, about a year later, during a Halloween party. The first 17 minutes still got me. It was visceral, it was heartbreaking, and then they get to the mall and...the whole movie falls apart. What I never noticed about the movie the first time I saw it was that the writing of the characters are absolute dogshit. Most of the characters range from boring to incredibly unlikable, which stands so much in contrast when compared against the cast of the original movie. Characters make some of the dumbest decisions I've ever seen in a movie. Mekhi Phifer keeps his wife's getting bit and subsequent death a secret because he wants her to deliver her baby. The two kids endanger everyone twice when trying to rescue their dog when they send the dog to Andy's Gun Shop to help him...I started seeing so many frays in the movie that I was able to overlook in the visceral experience of seeing it in a theater. And I feel like a lot of that is on Gunn as much as it's on Snyder. This wasn't his finest hour, but for a guy who went from writing Troma movies to a big gig like this, it's understandable, and I'm glad he was able to right the ship and make a much better movie in Slither. And there were some really good setpieces. The stuff with Andy was actually kind of a cool thing, and the scene where we find out what his fate is is heartbreaking. But the rest just didn't hold up to me on a second viewing. And now we see so much of those tropes from that movie in zombie movies and even non-zombie movies, that even more of it's lustre has worn off. I was annoyed by the poor decision-making of the characters when I first watched the film way back when. But I think in real life people often make poor decisions in crisis situations or when they're in a state of fear, so I kinda let it go.
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Post by DSR on Feb 7, 2019 1:27:02 GMT -5
PARANORMAL EXORCISM (2010) - Also known as COLD CREEPY FEELING, seemingly retitled to cash in on the success of the PARANORMAL ACTIVITY franchise. And it's yet another no-budget film from a person whose name appears multiple times in the credits. This feature's multi-hyphenate is named Keith Kurlander.
A struggling writer and his struggling actress of a girlfriend move away from the hustle and bustle of LA to live in the desert town of Joshua Tree. In their new house, they're experience weird shit like doors opening/closing by themselves and dreams about a middle-aged woman and her scared daughter. After spending one night in the house, the couple calls on a friend with experience contacting the spirit world. Can their medium friend help them solve this large problem?
The problem I'm having with the Freakshow Cinema collection is that the flicks in it aren't ambitious enough. The makers of these movies were content to retread well-worn territory and offer nothing novel. Okay, you have no budget, but you can still come up with an idea, can't you? "What if NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD had a character with a rat-tail?" is not an idea. Give me something weird and stupid and crazy and bold so there's at least something about your movie that stands out. These movies are already bad, they don't have to be boring, too.
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Post by DSR on Feb 8, 2019 0:58:41 GMT -5
INDEMNITY (2010) - Yet another no-budgeter from the Freakshow Cinema set. Our writer/director/producer/editor/star is David Dietz.
David plays William, a man on the run from his ex-girlfriend. He spends the duration of the film drowning his sorrows in a bar and telling snippets of his story to bartender Joe. Meanwhile, in some grainy, blurry, practically unwatchable footage, William's ex, Angela, makes her way to the bar. And any shithead who crosses her path will find out just way William is keeping Joe in the dark about details of their break-up: Angela is a vampire!
Story here isn't too terrible, but it could be tightened up. The movie is only 50 minutes long, but it feels like it could've been presented as a half-hour in an anthology and not lost anything. Gore is minimal: a couple lines of blood down Angela's mouth, that's it. Most of the run-time is spent with Joe prying William for info, and William being a bit of a douchebag. Dialogue gets cringey at times.
Really, the only enjoyment I got out of this is the fact that it was made in Pittsburgh. I recognized signs and bands on flyers from the bar, and even a couple extras (independent wrestlers "Fabulous" John McChesney and Facade, pre-"Neon Ninja"). It's still not worth seeking out, though.
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