Some Mini-Reviews Since Time Flew By

Yeesh, I had no idea it had been that long since I'd posted anything.  I've got to stop getting distracted by shiny objects.

Let's get caught up with some "mini-reviews," shall we?

Almost Human (2013) - Definitely a shoestring budget and an attempt to recreate the magic of 80's VHS horror and slasher flicks.  It tells the story of what happens when a UFO abductee returns years later and has gone from kindly bearded fellow to homicidal maniac with some new alien body parts.  Good effort but the execution fell a bit short.  Any intrigue melted away and it needed more story.  Nice practical effects, though.

Red State (2011) - Kevin Smith takes an effective journey into non-comedy with a suspense thriller about sees some local boys run afoul of the town's crazy church/cult leader that oddly seems like the funeral-protesting wack-a-doos in real life.  Not as talky as a lot of Smith's other offerings, and don't look for a cameo by Jay and Silent Bob.  Tense storytelling and good performances, especially from Michael Parks as the frustratingly smug leader.

Haunter (2013) - A pleasant surprise, this haunted house mystery sees the story told from the ghost's point of view, much like the awesome I Am A Ghost.  In this case, Abagail Breslin turns in a great performance as the ghost of a murdered girl who comes to the realization that she's dead and tries to awaken her family to the fact as well as prevent an evil spirit from his eternal murder spree.  Good tension and a good story.

Jug Face (2013) - This one really started off on the right foot but didn't go as far as I hoped.  It's the story of a young girl who's part of a backwoods community that worships a pit that has healing properties but also demands a sacrifice.   The likeness of who is to be sacrificed is carved onto a clay jug, but when the girl hides hers, the pit expresses its displeasure.  Fine acting and a creepy vibe made it good but the story felt like it lost steam.

Frankenstein's Army (2013) - A crazy Dutch-American-Czech production set in World War II that follows a group of weary Russian soldiers who follow a distress signal to a small town.  What they find there is insanity as the descendent of Victor Frankenstein says "the hell with it" and sets his insane creations on Ally and Axis alike.  The monster design is tremendous and there's no shortage of blood and guts as the movie descends more and more into utter madness.  I dug it because it wanted to be nuts and it got its wish.

My Bloody Valentine (1981) - Remade just a few years ago, this cult classic came from the old school of matching psychotic killers with holidays.  The residents of a town relive an old nightmare that took place on February 14 when grisly murders pile up as the day grows closer.  Add to that the Eternally Doomed Teen Party and you know the body count rises.  Good 80's wackiness and a murder mystery to boot.

Insidious: Chapter 2 (2013) - While I felt the first one went off the rails a bit, yet still told an intriguing story, I felt the second chapter was a little stronger.  The poor Lambert family is back and just when they think they dodged an astral bullet, it's the father who becomes the center of a spiritual attack.  Just the right amount of ghostly and strange, I enjoyed it like I usually enjoy seeing Rose Byrne.

+1 (2013) - An interesting take on a sci-fi standard of what duplicates would do if they met.  A meteor crashes, causing a nearby party to experience a little glitch in the matrix.  Time splits and people meet themselves from a few seconds behind.  An interesting story set on a strange premise with decent performances.  Not a bad choice if you like being weirded out by time and space.

Hellbenders (2012) - With a good cast and a premise that borders on sacrilege, this movie was more fun than it had a right to be.  The Augustine Interfaith Order of Hellbound Saints are a ragtag group of badasses who also happen to be priests of various faiths that sin on purpose on orders of The Pope so that if a demon possesses them during an exorcism, they can kill themselves and drag the demon to Hell.  Good guys who do bad things to prevent the really bad things.  In this flick, they have to stop a runaway Norse demon from pulling Hell up around the world.  Funny and with a touch of honor, the cast is headed by the reliable Clifton Collins Jr. and Clancy Brown.

Willow Creek (2013) - Oh, Willow Creek, how I wanted to like you.  A good director in Bobcat Goldthwait and some really suspenseful moments still added up to a movie that was a hair below "OK."  It's a found footage style movie about a couple setting out to make a documentary about the Patterson Bigfoot sighting and getting much more than they bargained for.  Admittedly, the tent scene is suspense at its best, but the ending left me feeling like the whole thing was meant to be a tongue-in-cheek joke.  Maybe it was, but I was hoping for a little more.

OK, that should just about do it for now.  I gotta stop taking so long between reviews.  Maybe some caffeine would help.

Until next time!

Back In The Chopper With Some Capsule Reviews

You just witnessed one of my "oh, yeah, I should probably write a blog entry today...hey, look, a shiny object" phases.  I didn't slow down watching horror/suspense films, I just didn't commit to sitting down and getting some writing done.  Plus, other writing endeavors took center stage.  But, hey, let's get down to business.  I took in quite a few movies, but wanted to highlight a few here with some capsule reviews, a few stray thoughts about a few flicks.

All Superheroes Must Die (2011) - Wait, a superhero movie in a horror blog?  Here's the thing, see:  it's a horror/suspense movie with superheroes as protagonists.  Also, I don't like making this blog too restrictive.  Anyway, this low-budget offering plants a group of de-powered superheroes in a desperate situation:  win unwinnable challenges put forth by a fed-up arch-nemesis (Dexter's James Remar).  It plays out like a Saw episode, with the heroes having to solve their own issues as well.  It wasn't bad, and I can't help but think how much better it would have been if the characters were slightly more well-defined.

John Dies At The End (2012) - Whenever you get a film from Don Coscarelli, you just know it's going to be tons of fun.  And this film doesn't disappoint.  Freaky, trippy, and playing the rules of space and time as well as throwing a few buckets of blood and guts at you, this film flies loose and fast and it's a thrill.  Poor David needs to convince a reporter (Paul Giamatti) of an incredible story involving insane elements like strange demons, a powerful drug, portals between dimensions, and a kick-ass dog named Bark Lee.  It's bizarre and has a film swagger that makes it incredibly charming.

Evil Dead (2013) - In a remake of sorts (there's apparently more than meets the eye), Sam Raimi's innovative 1981 low-budget screamer gets a modern makeover as a group of old friends gathers at the infamous cabin to stage an intervention for one of their own.  Unfortunately, they discover a few grisly secrets about the cabin, including that old chestnut, The Necromonicon.  Demonic possession galore and buckets of blood everywhere should please many fans.  It was actually a decent effort that had a touch of uniqueness about it.  Oh, yeah, and wait until the credits are done.

The ABC's of Death (2012) - This ambitious collection of 26 short films - each corresponding to a letter of the alphabet and created by 26 different directors - saw a lot of support and derision in the film community.  I could see reasons for both opinions.  Definitely a challenge to create, it obviously moves quickly.  Most of the entries are in the "OK" range, while there are some that are better left not talked about.  Some I really liked, including A is for Apocalypse, which leaves a little to the imagination as to why a woman is trying to kill a bedridden man; C is for Cycle, offering an odd little loop of time; D is for Dogfight, a wordless short about an actual dog fight with interesting changes in perspective and a good ending; R is for Removed, a strange bit about a man's skin being removed to be used as film and his escape from the hospital in a surreal world; and V is for Vagitus (The Cry of A Newborn Baby) in which it's illegal to have unregistered babies in a futuristic world and where one police unit finds more than it bargained for with one group of rebels.  It's interesting to see what these established and aspiring filmmakers came up with for their respective letters, and there is something here for all tastes - both good and bad.

Devil's Pass (2013) - Inspired by an actual mysterious incident in 1959 in which several experienced Russian hikers died on their way through Dyatlov Pass, Renny Harlin's 2013 film sees a group of college students filming a documentary retracing the same path.  Filmed in first-person, it shows the students discovering strange followed by disturbing followed by terrifying things that make escape look more and more unlikely.  What I thought might be a throwaway film turned out to be somewhat good and with an ending that makes sense.  It ran off the rails towards the end, but unlike other films that go crazy, it got right back on the tracks and said "See, that's what I'm talking about." 

V/H/S/2 (2013) - The sequel to the original first-person anthology, the framework is much the same, but this film - to me, anyway - delivered a more solid group of short films with a stronger surrounding narrative. A pair of investigators break into a home to find out what happened to a young man who disappeared.  While their own story unfolds, they watch various tapes the student has lying around.  The videos show stories about a man with a "camera-eye" seeing things he doesn't want, a biker in a park experiencing the beginning stages of a zombie apocalypse, a news team investigating a strange cult leader predicting the coming of a deity in Indonesia, and an alien invasion of a family's slumber party.  I found the zombie and cult leader stories to be the strongest and most intriguing, but the entire film was quite good and a step up from the original.

 

The Conspiracy (2012) - More of a thriller than a horror film, there are plenty of creeps in this neat little flick.  Two guys making a documentary about conspiracy theorists go from the frying pan into the fire when the subject of their documentary disappears and they decide to track down the elusive Tarsus Club to find out what happened.  You definitely know what will happen as everything unfolds, but that doesn't take away from a fine, suspenseful "mockumentary" that leaves you thinking about the consequences.

Well, dear readers, this old helicopter is back in the sky.  I'll try to keep up better, and expand the blog to include more "adjacent" genres to the horror field.  Hey, even more comedy.

Enjoy and thanks for reading!

The Caller (2011) Astronomical Phone Bills

I actually stopped myself from making a "Who was phone?" reference in the title.  I should treat myself to a cookie.

The Caller is a neat little bit of Rod Serling-esque horror and suspense that creates a seriously interesting "how is she going to get out of this?" atmosphere.  There's nostalgia surrounding the trusty old rotary phone.  I remember the smooth whir of the dial as it spun, the restriction in movement thanks to the curly wire that always needed to be untangled, the bell ringer...I'm not that old, but I was a kid in the 70's and grew up into the 80's.  Portable phones still weighed as much as a set of small dumbbells.

Written by Sergio Casci and directed by Matthew Parkhill, The Caller tells the increasingly-tense story of Mary Kee (Rachelle Lefevre), a new tenant in a quaint old Puerto Rican apartment building.  She's also a grad student trying to get away from her abusive ex-husband, Steven (Ed Quinn), and developing a relationship with John (Stephen Moyer of True Blood), a professor at the college.  In her apartment is an old rotary phone that soon starts receiving wrong number calls from a lonely woman named Rose (Lorna Raver of Drag Me To Hell).  At first it seems innocent, but then Rose becomes obsessive, especially after she implies that she's killed her husband.  What really creeps Mary out is the fact that Rose claims to be calling from the past.  And like the frightening Steven, Rose isn't willing to let Mary go.  That brings me back to the original question, "how will she get out of this?"  If she's really in the past, then she can affect Mary, but Mary can do nothing.  But really, you'd have to see how it turns out, because I'm not spoiling it here.

While the very end of the movie wasn't what I'd hoped for, the fact remains that the rest of the movie is a fine study in suspense and tension.  Mary is in a hugely frustrating situation:  she can't just change her number or even move because if Rose is truly stationed in the past, and she can affect events that affect Mary.  On top of that, she's got Steven continuing his abuse even after a restraining order is in place.  Mary has two allies in John and the apartment building's caretaker, George (Luis Guzman), but are they enough?  It's a valid question.

The Caller could easily have been written by Rod Serling or been an episode of Outer Limits as its premise is simple, but relies on the viewer's feelings of frustration for Mary because she's in a seriously helpless place.  It's moody and tense with great onscreen acting by Lefevre and chilling voice work by Raver.  I mean, Rose sounds like a sweet old woman at certain times, but boy, does that evil creep into her voice when she's angry.  Honestly, I didn't want to answer my phone for a few days after this movie - even though I don't have a rotary phone, and there's nothing scary about my cell's generic ring tone.

Here's the trailer for you to enjoy:

Outpost (2008) The Punisher Meets Some Evil Nazi Zombies

When you need a villain, you really can't go wrong with those evil Nazi bastards. There's a built-in hatred for those master race jerks that allows you to cheer when they're mowed down by the dozen. Make them zombies or ghosts or whatnot, and *bam*...instant supernatural villain. They're villains in the truest sense of the word. No cheering for them because it's "edgy" or "cool" (see World Championship Wrestling's 90's faction The New World Order). If you're cheering for the Nazi, then get off my lawn now.

Much in the same way Dead Snow brought scores of superhuman, very undead Nazi zombies to battle against innocent Norwegian vacationers, the 2008 British horror offering Outpost has a group somewhat more prepared for battle going up against undead Nazi super-soldiers. Throw in a slight touch of sci-fi, and you have an interesting premise.

Soldier of fortune DC (Ray Stevenson of Punisher: War Zone) and his band of merry men have been hired by secretive corporate fellow Hunt (Julian Windham) to open up and explore a bunker deep in some war-torn Eastern European forest. DC's got quite the international team of mercenaries, with guys from the USA to Belgium to Russia. The USA's representative, Prior is played by Richard Brake. You may remember him as my favorite part of Perkins' 14.

And imagine my surprise and delight when I find out that the Irish representative in this team, McKay, is played by none other than Michael Smiley, the rave-obsessed, mood-swinging bike messenger Tyres from my favorite Brit-com, Spaced.



I kept waiting for him to spout his trademark, "Oi-oi! You lucky people!" But alas, this was a more serious role.

The team enters the bunker and find some weirdness right off the bat. Radios don't work very well, and on top of possible snipers bearing down on them, they find someone somewhat alive. A strange, silent bald man lies among a pile of bodies in a mysterious room. No one knows how he could've arrived there, since the bunker was pretty much sealed and hadn't been touched in decades. Upon further investigation, they discover not only is the bunker very old, and not only was it used by the Nazis in World War II, but it was used for some of the more bizarre experiments.

In this bunker, the Nazis apparently tried creating the perfect soldier: one with tremendous capacity for physical strength and cruelty, as well as being virtually indestructible. Not only that, there's the whole reason that Hunt guy is there. Seems the Nazis were also experimenting with reality and time distortion, and there's a machine there his bosses want. The closer he gets to deciphering and understanding the machine, the worse it gets for him and the merc team. Shadowy figures appear on the perimeter. Members of the team go missing and then turn up, tortured and murdered.

Like evil undead super-ninjas, the Nazi super-soldiers get inside the bunker and then the kicker: the helpless, catatonic guy they found at the beginning. Not so helpless after all. While watching one of the films found in the bunker, it's discovered that Silent Bald Guy is really Ultra-Evil Nazi General Guy. He survived the experiment, plus a shot to the head, and is looking to reclaim his mantle as leader.

It comes down to The Punisher DC doing his best to mow down the advancing undead superhumans, but to no avail. Everybody goes, and they don't go pretty. When a recovery team arrives to assess the situation and maybe rescue who might be left (um, no one at this point), the silhouettes appear again at the treeline and we know everyone is pretty much screwed.

This was another movie that didn't wow me, but didn't totally disappoint. The notion of space and time being slightly warped intrigued me. The thought that there was possibly more going on there than what we actually saw. Exactly what could that machine do? I'd like to know more, and it looks as though I may get to, as a sequel is in the works for later this year. This film looked good and had some nice performances. While Richard Brake again played a loony, which he does very well, it was nice to see Michael Smiley show range since I mostly associate him with his wacky character on Spaced. So, mixed feelings on this one, mostly positive, though. I say show me more - there is more that can be done with this story, and it could be tightened up into a nice package.

Still, when all is said and done, The Punisher would have had a field day on those supernatural goose-steppers.

Until next time, fellow survivors, don't mess with the space-time continuum. It makes a mess.