ALL NEW Video Reviews!
Video one looks at a couple of OzSploitation classics and one recent B-Movie dud
I review Wyrmwood: Road of the Dead, Wolf Cop and Fair Game
and
Video two is all Italian Exploitation movies from the 80s and 90s
I review 1990: The Bronx Warriors, it’s sequel, Escape From the Bronx and the legitimate cult classic Cemetery Man AKA Dellamorte Dellamore.
Please please please give us feedback and let us know what you think of these videos in the comments below! Thanks!
These videos were brought to you by www.fastcustomshirts.com
You can check out our music at miscplumbingfixtures.bandcamp.com
AND
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The Purge: Anarchy T-Shirt and Flashlight GIVEAWAY!
The New Founders of America invite you to celebrate your annual right to Purge.
The Purge: Anarchy follows an unlikely group of five citizens who, over the course of the night, are hunted across the city in a kill-or-be-killed series of survival scenarios during the annual Purge.
#PurgeAnarchy
#UnitedWePurge
@universalhorror
http://universalhorrorfilms.tumblr.com/
https://www.facebook.com/thepurgemovie
We have ONE official The Purge: Anarchy Prize Pack to award to one lucky reader!
The Purge: Anarchy Prize Pack includes:
- The Purge: Anarchy Promo T-shirt (size L)
- The Purge: Anarchy Promo Flashlight
Giveaway ONLY open to people in the U.S.
Each household is only eligible to win One (1) Purge Prize Pack via blog reviews and giveaways. Only one entrant per mailing address per giveaway. If you have won the same prize on another blog, you will not be eligible to win it again. Winner is subject to eligibility verification.
HOW TO WIN:
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Mortal Remains from Cryptic Pictures EAST COAST SCREENINGS
Then Listen here:
Or DOWNLOAD the show by right clicking HERE
And if you want to see the film then here are 2 upcoming
EAST COAST SCREENINGS
Film title: Mortal Remains
Running time: 94 minutes
Names of Film Directors: Mark Ricche and Christian Stavrakis
Brief synopses: An docu-thriller investigating the life and career of notorious Maryland filmmaker Karl Atticus, director of the original 1972 "Mortal Remains".
Venue address: Bizarre AC Convention - held at the Tropicana Casino and Resort 2831 Boardwalk, Atlantic City, NJ 08401 / (609) 340-4000
Event dates and time: Saturday June 14th (afternoon screening/ exact time is TBA)
Event price: Ticket price is $20 in advance and $25 Day of
Telephone number for more info: (301)257-9275
Website: http://bizarreac.com/screenings.aspx
List of artists on the bill: Mark Ricche and Christian Stavrakis.
An exclusive screening with the filmmakers in attendance!
Contact information: mark@crypticpictures.com
NYC screening info:
Venue address, including cross streets and nearest subways: Anthology Film Archives at 32 Second Avenue (at 2nd St.) New York, NY 10003
Telephone: (212) 505-5181
Subway: F train to 2nd Avenue, walk two blocks north on 2nd Avenue to 2nd Street; #6 to Bleecker St., walk one block north on Lafayette, then two blocks east on Bond St. (turns into 2nd St.) to 2nd Avenue.
Bus: M15 to 3rd Street.
Event dates and time: Sunday June 15th 3:00pm
Event price: Ticket price is $10
Telephone number: (301)257-9275
Website: www.mortalremainsmovie.com.
List of artists on the bill: Mark Ricche and Christian Stavrakis.
An exclusive screening with the filmmakers in attendance!
Contact information: mark@crypticpictures.com
To Jennifer
James Cullen Bressack's To Jennifer claims it is the story of a guy, Joey, who is convinced his girlfriend is cheating on him and so plans to travel to her home and catch her in the act, all the while making a video about his journey and how much she's hurt him. On the surface the film appears to simply be about Joey, played by the excellent Chuck Pappas, being hampered continually in this attempt by his two inane and annoying, party friends Steven and Martin, played by the director himself, James Bressack and, Bressack regular, Jody Barton respectively. The whole thing is shot on an iPhone 5.
Now, even in the first few minutes we can tell that maybe Joey is not all he appears and his slowly building tense energy and the occasional freak out hints at brewing psycho tendencies, that and the fact that you hope the film is leading somewhere.
Your enjoyment of To Jennifer will depend on three things,
1) if you can put up with his two, selfish, vulgar, stoner, party friends
2) if you can put up with constant hand held shaking and moving of the camera
and
3) if you care enough to find out what's going on that you can put up with the first 2 points.
What I can say is that I usually loathe found footage/handheld camera films and characters like Steven and Martin would, normally, be enough to make me switch off but with To Jennifer the writing is good enough, the performances believable and the storyline compelling that I pressed on. I'm glad I did too but more on that later.
Just to clarify something, when I say the characters are annoying that is not a slight against the actors portraying them, quite the opposite, I presume that they are meant to be annoying and James and Jody do a grand job of portraying this. In fact Jody Barton even manages to give the pot smoking, hard drinking, bizarre prostitute hiring annoyance that is Martin a sort of pathetic tragedy which really sells the character perfectly. This film does everything to help make us side with Joey, despite the fact we suspect, deep down, the man's a little unhinged. His friends are so teeth gratingly, selfishly obstructive to Joey's goal that you don't blame him for losing his temper occasionally. This was not a Blair Witch Project situation where everyone is a selfish idiot to no end and with no reason, this is not only a strong attempt to present realistic characters but also ones that serve the overall story.
Although the writing is good, one thing that was unclear was why Joey and Steven took a flight somewhere and then when they got there still had to drive a long way to Jennifer's house. For the first half of the film that confused me maybe more than it should, as I never fully understood where they were or what they were meant to be doing.
I am not going to spoil a thing but, if it encourages you to watch the film all the way through and put up with the, sometimes, almost unbearably shaky camera work and a road strip story line that seems, frustratingly, to constantly be deviating from the plot, please know that this film, quite out of nowhere, manages to pull the same trick that The Sixth Sense did. That's not to say that Joey turns out to be a ghost but I mean to say, that when you're done with the film and you run it back through your mind, you see just how clever the script was to hide its ultimate reveal. It's a great trick and means you definitely look back on the film again in a new light.
It's not so much an enjoyable experience watching the film the first time but, once it ends you realise, it's a wonderful exercise in proving that, at the end of the day, what you need is confidence in your plot, a decent script and a director who knows how to scatter the clues seamlessly throughout the film without ringing any bells the first time round. Your film can be made on an iPhone and filled with characters you might not want to spend 5 minutes with in an elevator, let alone 85mins in a car/hotel/bedroom etc. but be clever, tell a good story and allow tension to build and it's a wholly worthwhile endeavour and gets my respect. The performances were not bad either.
Prolific indie scream queen Jessica Cameron plays the titular Jennifer and, although she doesn't have an abundance of screen time, she does a good job in an emotionally charged climax.
Check it out!
13/13/13
Basically it's all something to do with leap years violating the ancient Mayan calendar and all those extra days in February, over time have created an extra month and on the date of 13/13/13 everyone who wasn't born on a February 29th goes completely nuts.
It's a wonderful, end of the world scenario that allows for lots of death, destruction, mayhem and the symbolism of the "unlucky number" 13. More importantly, I hadn't really heard of much like that before and it's always nice to hear a fresh idea.
Yes, ok, so behind the idea is the whole Mayan calendar hoopla that went around last year claiming that, in 2012, the world was going to end and, I'm sure that, The Asylum liked it for that reason, as they're always making B-Movie versions of big budget disaster films (or Mockbusters as I believe the affectionate term is for them) but this has a decent spin on that and actually attempts something novel with it. The idea that leap years added up would form this weird 13 month is just the kind of bonkers, surreal hokum I am drawn to. There was a bit of George A Romero's The Crazies mixed in there as well but it's, at least, a different Romero source to draw from than the interminable bad zombie films we've had to wade through lately.
The things that I enjoyed in this film were the slow build up to people going crazy, some good and, on some occasions, even darkly comic deaths, a nice, atmospheric, gory and weird hospital sequence and attempts to establish different types of craziness for different groups of people. There was a really strong bedrock here for a pretty decent end-of-the-world horror film and what the filmmakers were able to do with, what was, obviously, a limited budget was, also, very impressive.
What was a slight disappointment with the movie, for me, was the fact that, I didn't feel, the concept went anywhere or was explored as much as I would've liked. For example, it needed a crazy old professor, or someone, who knew about the old world and spouted Donald Pleasance-like doom filled one-liners. The film, definitely, could've done with some sort of further explanation of the situation or some place to go. Maybe a glimmer of hope to reverse the situation using a mystical rock, Mayan gold amulet or something, or, maybe the rising of old beings to establish their order again on earth.
As it was, while it was atmospheric, gory as all hell and nicely shot, the hospital sequence went on entirely too long and once our two, Feb 29th born, protagonists finally escaped there was little time for anything but a muddled and, I felt, rushed finale back at the house.
The acting was a problem in the film. I watch a lot of amateur and low budget films so it doesn't bother me a lot but the acting was pretty stale, unfortunately, and not one character really shone in the film. A lot of that might have been the script too because, while the idea was there and the deaths, gore and action were all there, the dialogue was, in places, dreadful. I thought that more creative ways could've been used to convey the craziness other than just rage and repeated uses of "fuck" said unconvincingly by actors struggling to act. Don't get me wrong, there were some creative bits of craziness, especially Quentin (Jody Barton) believing himself, suddenly, to be a Korean war general but overall the swearing and the anger felt forced in some of the performances. I liked the laughter and the random acts of violence but thought the opportunity to make that truly creepy was missed.
Without a few strong, decent lines of dialogue and the odd interesting character, the film did, very slowly, become something of a slog but there was, genuinely, some nice potential here.
Trae Ireland and Erin Coker were solid enough, but neither of them had very interesting characters. Calico Cooper is Alice Cooper's daughter but sadly didn't get to do very much but what she did was fine though. Jody Barton got the showy role and was, at least, enthusiastic with it and, probably, the strongest performer of the lot. Bill Voorhees, with the name made for horror film acting, was sort of funny in the role of sidekick to Jody Barton despite it being an underwritten, obvious, slob-friend role.
My favourite scenes in the whole thing were an early scene where Quentin decides to humorously run some people down with his car, the slowly escalating crazy in the hospital and its gore drenched walls and the news room scene with the comedy news anchors attacking each other. They were all, a genuine joy.
While it, sadly, does go nowhere, there was lots to like in this B-Movie. One positive on the acting was that I didn't feel anybody was winking at me or playing any scenes in a lazy, half-arsed manner. I felt that everyone was trying their hardest and playing the scenes straight and true. This is important because it's become all too fashionable these days, even amongst high-profile stuff like Tarantino and Rodriguez's later work, to knowingly and lazily play every scene just for puerile, pathetic and ironic laughter and, for me, that just takes me right out of the film. While the acting isn't always strong or dynamic, I am glad to say 13/13/13 doesn't do this. The key to making a fun, enjoyable, weird, silly, wonderful, cult or B-Movie is to believe in what you're doing, no matter how ridiculous and, again, this film does succeed in that regard.
While not quite there completely I appreciated this film for it's attempt at a different, creative take on an apocalypse scenario. It was an enjoyable romp, some great scenes, some good enthusiasm and a decent idea at its core.
The Conjuring Blu-ray Giveaway
The After Movie Diner is proud to be able to giveaway 1 copy of James Wan's The Conjuring on Blu-Ray!
Based on a true story, the movie tells the horrifying account of how famed paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren were summoned to help a family terrorized by a dark presence in a secluded farmhouse which they recently bought. In fighting this powerful demonic being, the Warrens find themselves in the middle of the most terrifying case of their lives!
For my money the film gets extra points for casting Lili Taylor, who's always a joy.
Here are 5 THINGS you NEED to know about The Conjuring as told to you through the medium of INTERACTIVE GIFS!
1) The Conjuring is directed by the acclaimed James Wan, the Australian-born director of the fright-fests Insidious and the Saw series. His Twitter handle is @CreepyPuppet. Say no more.
2) The Conjuring has been given an “R” rating by the MPAA. Not because of blood, gore, or violence, but simply because it’s just so scary from start to finish!
3) The Conjuring’s cast and crew experienced creepy events during filming. Scratches appeared out of nowhere on Vera Farmiga’s computer soon after she agreed to act in the movie, the crew were routinely woken by something in the “witching hour” between 3 and 4AM, and the real-life Carolyn Perron fell and broke her hip while visiting the set.
4) The Rhode Island farmhouse where The Conjuring is set once belonged to an accused witch, Bathsheba, who tried to sacrifice her children to the devil and killed herself in 1863.
5) Hold your applause! The Conjuring will make you terrified to clap! Whether it’s playing a traditional game of hide-and-seek by following the clapping sounds like the mother and daughter in the movie, or being terrorized by ghostly claps in different rooms of the haunted farmhouse, these claps throughout the movie will give you the creeps!
ENTER THE GIVEAWAY
a Rafflecopter giveaway
GOOD LUCK!
This contest ends November 6th, 2013.
Each household is only eligible to win 1 The Conjuring Blu-ray via blog reviews and giveaways. Only one entrant per mailing address per giveaway. If you have won the same prize on another blog, you will not be eligible to win it again. Winner is subject to eligibility verification.
GOOD LUCK!
This contest ends November 6th, 2013.
Each household is only eligible to win 1 The Conjuring Blu-ray via blog reviews and giveaways. Only one entrant per mailing address per giveaway. If you have won the same prize on another blog, you will not be eligible to win it again. Winner is subject to eligibility verification.
You're Next
Now I had the unabashed, joyful pleasure to interview Barbara Crampton last year about her work with Stuart Gordon in the 80s (some of my favourite of the genre) and the restarting of her career with Lords of Salem and You're Next.
You can HEAR that EXCLUSIVE interview HERE.
Sadly she was cut out of Lords of Salem but, thankfully, she remained very much in You're Next. So, of course, I was going to see it. It could've been a torture porn remake featuring a fast zombie falling love with a drippy teen made in the grindhouse style and I still would've been there with bells on. Barbara Crampton's return to our cinemas needed to be seen and supported. No question.
Well I couldn't be happier to report that, firstly, You're Next is none of the above and, secondly, it is a resounding success.
An entertaining, independently spirited, horror, comedy, action film that, although obviously has lots of familiar genre staple moments, is, thankfully, not knowing, winking, referencing or particularly derivative of any one thing.
The acting and direction are assured, the gore effects pleasingly devoid of CGI, the humour comes from a very real human place not a silly, contrived place and the tension is satisfyingly maintained throughout.
The best praise I can give this film is that it is just solid, decent, well made entertainment, the kind we so rarely get to see and, while none of it is exactly, what you could call, a huge surprise, to the initiated, I still had a tremendously good time with the film. I laughed out loud, I jumped, I felt nervous and was, on occasion, sufficiently creeped out.
I love that. So cool when a film can achieve that.
The cast, across the board, are great in their roles with stand out mentions going to Barbara Crampton, of course, Joe Swanberg, AJ Bowen and a tour de force from Sharni Vinson as the kick ass heroine ready to fight back.
The score and soundtrack, especially in the second half, is a sheer delight and was evocative of Goblin or Carpenter in just the right way.
Apart from one scene of heightened panic the camera did not veer into amateurish shaky cam, thank goodness and, in fact, I loved the way the film was directed, shot and edited. It has definitely made me want to check out Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett's other work and keep a close eye on what they do in the future. There's not a lot of flourishes or showing off, just strong, simple, clear direction. Fantastic job.
I can't urge people enough to go and see this in the theatre.
A lot of talk is thrown around these days about how horror fans need to support new, independent horror and quit their complaining that there is nothing new and good out there.
Well, seemingly, what horror fans actually end up doing, sadly, is throwing hard earned cash at remakes and then attacking anyone who says they don't want to see them because we shouldn't "pre-judge".
Justify it how you like but you are throwing money at marketing companies who make a tenth rate, weak sauce, copy of a previous classic, with no care or understanding as to what made the original so charming and ingenious, slap the same name on it, throw it into cinemas and sit back to watch the coin come rolling in.
One of the trailers before You're Next was the Carrie remake and oh dear oh dear oh dear that looks to be one of the most insipid, uninspired, pathetic looking, unoriginal and beige remakes yet. I think Carrie and Evil Dead are vying for the top spot of most redundant and pointless remake of 2013. The kicker is that, in the Carrie trailer, they even show, in slow-mo no less, the pigs blood at the prom scene and it's 'we-want-a-lower-rating-please' black. Sludgy, boring black.
Imagine my absolute sheer, fan boy, delight then when You're Next starts and the blood is thick, gooey, vibrant RED! YES! Hallelujah! YES!
So, please, GO SEE THIS FILM. NOW. Go and enjoy. This is what entertainment looks like. This is what new, independent, horror worth supporting looks like. Go out there, watch it and spread the word. Please. If the Carrie remake makes more than You're Next and if you bypass You're Next in the theatre but go and see Carrie, I don't care your excuse, you are a very very bad person and you should be utterly ashamed.
8.5 out of 10
BUY YOUR COPY TODAY!
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Butcher's Hill
We are big fans of independent film over here in the Diner and we are always on the look out for vibrant, interesting new productions.
In a career spanning over 40 years, Brian W. Cook has worked as a Producer and Assistant Director with some of cinema’s most respected talents, including five films with Michael Camino, three films with Stanley Kubrick and two with Sean Penn. His producing credits include ‘Colour Me Kubrick’, ‘The Pledge’ and ‘Eyes Wide Shut’.
Additionally, Award winning Special make-up effects studio Ill Willed Productions (The Amazing Spider Man, Piranhaconda) will provide effects for Butchers Hill. IWP Founder Tate Steinsiek quickly became a horror fan favorite on SYFY’s special effects competition, FACE OFF and has been featured in Fangoria, Rue Morgue, The New York Times, and Variety.
Award winning Composer Adam Balazs (The Butterfly Effect 3,The Secret of Moonacre) has also signed on to Butchers Hill.
“Butcher’s Hill is an homage to all the great Brothers Grimm tales of our child hood. We wanted to create an unflinching look into the world of dark tales in all its gruesome glory,” explains Kindersley. “And after the economic collapse we struggled like most indie filmmakers to find support but now we’re ready to go with new and exciting momentum to get Butcher’s Hill killing again.”
The production has launched the facebook fan page https://www.facebook.com/butchershillthemovie, which will track the development of the film with regular updates from Jason and Rory. It will feature videos of the films progress, including behind the scenes casting, production meetings, and interviews with key production staff.
Fans and supporters will also be able to connect to the Butcher’s Hill KickStarter campaign, (launching on July 1st 2013) which will enable them to to contribute towards crowd-funding in exchange for Butcher’s Hill themed gifts, such as credits and special edition DVD’s, and even participation in the films production.
Butcher’s Hill is scheduled to shoot in the fall of 2014. For more information on Butcher’s Hill visit https://www.facebook.com/butchershillthemovie.
Occasionally one such feature, short or web series falls into our inbox and intrigues us enough that not only do we, of course, take a look but then immediately after watching it we feel compelled to share it with everyone else and sing its praises.
In this case that short film is called Butcher's Hill and it's a wonderfully macabre and beautifully designed take on the Hansel and Gretel fairytale.
No annoying CGI monsters taken down by a crossbow wielding Hawkeye against a green screen here, oh no, just good old fashioned, atmospheric film making that is like a wonderful breath of fresh air.
Details:
Year made: 2008
DIRECTED BY: JASON NOTO & RORY KINDERSLEY
STARRING: TIMOTHY CHALAMET, JACKIE RHOADS and TATE STEINSIEK "You won’t believe where filmmakers Jason Noto and Rory Kindersley take you in this bloody twist on the Hansel and Gretel story that will leave you stunned. Left to fend for themselves, a brother and sister venture into a remote cabin where a bounty of treats costs more than expected"
The filmmakers are attempting to expand this to a full feature in 2014 and have a Kickstarter campaign starting July 2013, the press release and details of are below but we would urge anyone who watched the short and was inspired, surprised and excited by the talent and creativity on display to support the feature.
We here at The After Movie Diner wish them the best of luck.
PRESS RELEASE
APRIL 29 New York, New York (Monday April 29, 2013)
– From the Award winning writer and directors Jason Noto and Rory Kindersley, BUTCHER’S HILL, their short fantastical film, celebrates its online premiere today Monday April 29 2013 on FEAR.net. TV to over 40 million homes nationwide.
The infamous short film swept the genre festival circuit with its brutal decapitation scene in 2008 garnering wide acclaim from critics and bloggers internationally. Now for the first time ever it reaches its bloody hands across the nation in all its HD glory. And furthermore, the team has decided to re- launch their efforts to develop the short film into a heart pumping, blood curdling, feature film in 2014 with the support of London based content innovation studio, Fablemaze.
Fablemaze is a brand and content experience studio specializing in forward thinking interactive ideas and distribution platforms for today’s marketplace. Launched in 2007 and helmed by Toby Cook and Matt Cook, Fablemaze brings together the vision and excitement of filmmaking with the innovation of interactive design to make unique experiences for brands, agencies and entertainment. Also on board, esteemed producer Brian W. Cook has joined the team as Executive Producer. Details:
Year made: 2008
DIRECTED BY: JASON NOTO & RORY KINDERSLEY
STARRING: TIMOTHY CHALAMET, JACKIE RHOADS and TATE STEINSIEK "You won’t believe where filmmakers Jason Noto and Rory Kindersley take you in this bloody twist on the Hansel and Gretel story that will leave you stunned. Left to fend for themselves, a brother and sister venture into a remote cabin where a bounty of treats costs more than expected"
The most striking thing about the short is the detail and design. So rich, so creative, so tactile almost that from the smoke in the trees, to the crumbs of the cakes, to the rough wooden floor boards of the house, you are completely immersed in this familiar yet stunningly strange and foreboding world. There are welcome overshadows of Terry Gilliam here and the better of Tim Burton's films, a tough thing to pull off but done with a wonderfully restrained elegance to the filmmaking.
As the tension builds and the short moves into its final moments there is a delicious sense of dark humour that I reveled in.
Lastly the performances of the two children in the production is fantastically unselfconscious, just the right side of playful and never annoying.
We'd be interested to know what you think, so please, watch for yourself.
FEATURING an Exclusive Introduction by Filmmaker Jason Noto
VIDEO is available at Fear.net
FEATURING an Exclusive Introduction by Filmmaker Jason Noto
VIDEO is available at Fear.net
The filmmakers are attempting to expand this to a full feature in 2014 and have a Kickstarter campaign starting July 2013, the press release and details of are below but we would urge anyone who watched the short and was inspired, surprised and excited by the talent and creativity on display to support the feature.
We here at The After Movie Diner wish them the best of luck.
PRESS RELEASE
APRIL 29 New York, New York (Monday April 29, 2013)
– From the Award winning writer and directors Jason Noto and Rory Kindersley, BUTCHER’S HILL, their short fantastical film, celebrates its online premiere today Monday April 29 2013 on FEAR.net. TV to over 40 million homes nationwide.
The infamous short film swept the genre festival circuit with its brutal decapitation scene in 2008 garnering wide acclaim from critics and bloggers internationally. Now for the first time ever it reaches its bloody hands across the nation in all its HD glory. And furthermore, the team has decided to re- launch their efforts to develop the short film into a heart pumping, blood curdling, feature film in 2014 with the support of London based content innovation studio, Fablemaze.
In a career spanning over 40 years, Brian W. Cook has worked as a Producer and Assistant Director with some of cinema’s most respected talents, including five films with Michael Camino, three films with Stanley Kubrick and two with Sean Penn. His producing credits include ‘Colour Me Kubrick’, ‘The Pledge’ and ‘Eyes Wide Shut’.
Additionally, Award winning Special make-up effects studio Ill Willed Productions (The Amazing Spider Man, Piranhaconda) will provide effects for Butchers Hill. IWP Founder Tate Steinsiek quickly became a horror fan favorite on SYFY’s special effects competition, FACE OFF and has been featured in Fangoria, Rue Morgue, The New York Times, and Variety.
Award winning Composer Adam Balazs (The Butterfly Effect 3,The Secret of Moonacre) has also signed on to Butchers Hill.
“Butcher’s Hill is an homage to all the great Brothers Grimm tales of our child hood. We wanted to create an unflinching look into the world of dark tales in all its gruesome glory,” explains Kindersley. “And after the economic collapse we struggled like most indie filmmakers to find support but now we’re ready to go with new and exciting momentum to get Butcher’s Hill killing again.”
The production has launched the facebook fan page https://www.facebook.com/butchershillthemovie, which will track the development of the film with regular updates from Jason and Rory. It will feature videos of the films progress, including behind the scenes casting, production meetings, and interviews with key production staff.
Fans and supporters will also be able to connect to the Butcher’s Hill KickStarter campaign, (launching on July 1st 2013) which will enable them to to contribute towards crowd-funding in exchange for Butcher’s Hill themed gifts, such as credits and special edition DVD’s, and even participation in the films production.
Butcher’s Hill is scheduled to shoot in the fall of 2014. For more information on Butcher’s Hill visit https://www.facebook.com/butchershillthemovie.
John Dies At The End - The NYC Premiere Jan 7th 2013
The Director himself and star Paul Giamatti were on hand afterwards to answer questions and even, graciously, shook people's hands, signed people's stuff and even pose for photographs.
It was a fantastic night.
I intend to cover the film in a little more depth over on the podcast and I have some exclusive content from the Q&A that I will be sharing very soon as well but I just wanted to get down my initial impression of the film here on the blog.
Let me begin by saying I am a big fan of Coscarelli's work, you can read my Phantasm and Bubba Ho-Tep reviews elsewhere on this site but I really dig his style and sensibility behind the camera. So couple that with the always reliable and likable Giamatti and a plot that promised some absolutely bonkers stuff and me wanting to see this film, from the moment it was first mentioned, became a no-brainer.
Having seen the film the first thing that came to my mind was 'I need to see that again'. It has a very definite vibe, a particular disjointed mindset and I am not just referring to the weird plot, I mean in the way it was written, shot and performed. If I am honest. I am not sure tonight I was always in the groove with it, maybe it was having spent the day at work in my mind-numbing 9 to 5 surrounded by beige and grey tedious indifference or maybe it was the fact that usually on a Monday I am operating on hardly any sleep but sometimes I connected with it and other times I didn't. Hence I need to see it again and soon. Clear headed, awake and ready to go anywhere with it.
I am not even going to bother to try and explain the plot in depth, as it would do the film a disservice, but it has something to do with a drug called soy sauce that makes you see into the past and the future, travelling to other dimensions, monsters, friendship, zombies, exorcisms and a magic dog. Anyway, this thing is different and I urge everyone to see it.
It's the mutant love child of Naked Lunch, Twin Peaks, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Phantasm and contains references to a dozen more cult genre favs.
In fact an ever so slight criticism of the film is that, while it clearly marches to the beat of its own drum, as much as it can, the script does, on occasion, have the distinct whiff of a fan boy's giggly, immature paws all over it but never to the annoyingly grating and smug extent of someone like a Tarantino (who has all the subtlety, where homages are concerned, of a 15 Ton, Monty Python, style weight).
On the plus side it has phenomenal, pleasing performances from almost the entire cast, it's directed and edited with Coscarelli's usual charm, flourish and delight in the downright weird or darkly comic and the script throws endless curveballs at you both clever, comedic and also sometimes just for curveballs sake. I am not someone who usually likes a film that tries to be all smug, clever and different for difference sake and I am pleased to report that John Dies At The End does narrowly avoid sliding into that territory.
There's also some great Bob Kurtzman practical effects and also some not so great B-Movie CGI but, to be honest, that they did it at all for the low budget, it's incredible.
I haven't read the book and from comments made in the Q&A I understand that a vast passage of it would be unfilmable, no matter how much money you had, but I can say that the film version could have, to please more pallets, attempted some level of coherence in it's third act. What it lacks in pleasing structure, however, it more than makes up for in vivid, intriguing and artful images.
Now is it ever going to be as successful or as much of a fan favourite as the Phantasm series? probably not and will it ever match up against the understated perfection of Bubba Ho-Tep? definitely not but that's not to discount it, when you have a resume as sparse but as cult and fan friendly as Coscarelli's, winning out over past glories becomes a fools errand and, with John Dies At The End, he, thankfully, doesn't try to. There is, however, plenty here that fans of his previous work will eat up with a spoon.
It has been 10 years since Bubba and 7 years since his Masters of Horror episode and in that time mostly all we've heard about was the ill-fated Bubba sequel. I, for one, am glad that John Dies was, eventually, the film Coscarelli made and not Bubba Nosferatu, while he will no doubt get a lot of idiot critics desperately trying to compare this film to the nuanced brilliance of Bubba Ho-tep, imagine how much harsher it would be if he had gone ahead with the planned, Campbell-less, sequel instead.
As much as I believe this film will divide his fans and have as many embracers as detractors, I am going to go ahead and say we NEED films like this and we NEED film-makers like Don Coscarelli. At the Q&A Paul Giamatti said that it's films like this that America should be embracing, he is clearly a passionate genre fan, and I couldn't agree more. Love it or hate it we just don't get enough films like this being made and so when one comes along I think we owe it to ourselves, as passionate genre fans also, to do what we can to make sure it's not the last time a film like this sees the inside of a cinema.
Me with director Don Coscarelli
Other photos from the Q&A
The Podcast from the After Movie Diner TURNS 1 on July 23rd
BIG SPECIAL EVIL DEAD SHOW!
We have fans of the series, friends of the show AND
So JOIN US won't you for the
BEST EVIL DEAD PODCAST ever produced.
It's BY the Fans, FOR the Fans!
E-MAIL YOUR EVIL DEAD AND BIRTHDAY MESSAGES TO
aftermoviediner@g-mail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/aftermoviediner
Website: www.aftermoviediner.com
Podcast Blog: amdpodcast.blogspot.com
Twitter: @aftermoviediner
We have fans of the series, friends of the show AND
SPECIAL GUESTS FROM THE FILM ITSELF!
Including
The Ladies of the Evil Dead
& Hal Delrich the STARS of the film!!
and the surprise interview with a pivotal and invaluable someone from behind the scenes on the film can now be revealed!!
I am so VERY HAPPY to announce we have special effects and make up wizard extraordinaire
Tom Sullivan!
on the After Movie Diner!
MONDAY JULY 23rd!So JOIN US won't you for the
BEST EVIL DEAD PODCAST ever produced.
It's BY the Fans, FOR the Fans!
E-MAIL YOUR EVIL DEAD AND BIRTHDAY MESSAGES TO
aftermoviediner@g-mail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/aftermoviediner
Website: www.aftermoviediner.com
Podcast Blog: amdpodcast.blogspot.com
Twitter: @aftermoviediner
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter - June 28th 2012
Yes, you read that correctly, it's really REALLY good and I can't urge people enough to go see it on the big screen this week before it is yanked from cinemas for unfortunately bombing and is resigned to the bargain blu-ray bin of history.
People (like me) who complain that there aren't enough good, fun, innovative ideas out there and people (like me again) who condemn the vast majority of CGI heavy films, need to see this film and be proved wrong but, of course, go see it in 2D (seriously I may be wrong about a lot of things but screw 3D, screw 3D in it's muddy, blurry pointless face)
It looks incredible, the cinematography is beautiful and hovers just the right side of something like Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow for example (Burton serves as producer on the film). The big strength of the film is that it's concerned not just with flashy set pieces (although there are plenty) but also with story telling, drama, emotion, loss, friendship and love.
It manages to walk the line so few 'geek/horror-fan' marketed-to films manage to traverse and that is the action scenes are genuinely thrilling, entertaining, laughably ridiculous but in a way great action cinema should be and everything a good fan-boy could want while also providing you with, wouldn't you know, characters you care about!
It gives the story room to breathe, it makes you give a crap, it makes you want to be part of it all and under lying it all, it even may 'shhh say this in a whisper' have something to say
GASP!
That's right not only is there satisfying action, vampires, historical figures, an understandable plot, great characters, interesting performances and it's all stunning to look at but somewhere buried deep beneath everything it has a teeny weeny message that makes you leave the cinema feeling something! and what a WONDERFUL experience that is for a change!
The trick they had up their sleeve the whole time was they played it completely straight. There are chuckles in there for people who either know the period, the characters or the quotes and there are laughs of glee as something brilliantly ludicrous happens a-top a speeding train or something but the best thing about the film is that it tells the story like what you are watching really happened once. Oh yes and like I said, it cares about its characters in an endearingly charming and commendable way.
That's not where the finely tuned excellence of this piece ends because it actually manages to throw in all the big, over simplified or falsified historical, patriotic and heroic stuff without, for one, this cynical, tired and jaded movie goer ever feeling anything less than riveted and swept along, all with a big dopey 'this is f'ing cool' smile plastered firmly on my face.
A quick word about the vampires. I have not been one for this recent spate of vampire related films and TV, in fact you could say that the mere mention of Edward from Twilight or that potato faced, thick-foreheaded, vacant pillock from the Vampire Diaries is enough to send me into a fit of vomitous rage but the vampires in this (a very very nice mixture of make-up, practical effect and cgi) are genuinely scary and very well done. Plenty of jumps in the first half of the film can be had as you get used to their impressive appearance, slathering jaws, black eyes, veiny skin and all.
It's closest film predecessor, it being a famous story from history re-told in comic-book format with added supernatural elements, a gothic horror style and then made into a hip flashy film, would be 'From Hell'. Now 'From Hell' has problems with its stars it's true but look past Depp's atrocious accent and inability to drop Hunter S Thompson's mannerisms and ignore entirely the blight on the cinematic landscape that was the brief reign of Miss.Brain-Fart herself, Heather Graham and actually 'From Hell 'was remarkably well done, engaging and gruesome. Well AL:VH is that but with some strong, likable, earnest central performances.
Look if you had told me 4hrs ago that I'd be sat here hurriedly and excitedly racing to extoll the virtues of a film called Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter I would've scoffed at you, in that way that I am wont to do, and a little bit of you internally would think I was an arse, probably right but still a bit of an arse.
It's still surprising me, even sat here wracking my brain to find something negative to say about it, I really can't think of much!
Well, except that Mary Elizabeth Winstead, despite being cute, is a bit flat but it doesn't derail the film, it's perfectly fine and she even has a couple of moments that border on better-than-average which, for her, is an improvement!
So apart from that, this film, for me, on the big screen, in glorious 2D, with a very empty cinema, on one of the last showings my local multiplex is having sadly, it was a resounding and air thumping success.
9 out of 10 bloody steaks (see what I did there)
A FISTFUL OF DOHLERS
It's HERE - to Listen to the show click the link below!
PRESENTS
'A Fistful of Dohlers'
A look at the life & films of one Mr. Don Dohler
FEATURING
AN EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH JOHN KINHART DIRECTOR OF 'BLOOD BOOBS & BEASTS'
available on Hulu or to rent and buy from Amazon
available on Hulu or to rent and buy from Amazon
Nick, Phil and Myself will look at 3 of Dohler's early Sci-Fi and Horror films
Alien Factor (1978)
Fiend (1980)
and
Blood Massacre (1991)
Those not familiar with Don Dohler he is a no-budget Baltimore based Horror and Sci-Fi director who, since watching the EXCELLENT documentary and 4 of his 5 early films, I have become hugely enamored with.
We discussed Nightbeast (another of his films) on an earlier podcast
I can't suggest him too highly for fans of B-Movies, schlock, creature features and horror.
Get ready because a FIST FULL OF DOHLERS is coming your way!Friday 13th Part 4 'The Final Chapter' - 5th June 2011
Anyway
Many people credit Psycho with being the first slasher film, then Halloween established the set-up and rules of the modern day slasher but if you ever wanted to know where the template of teenagers, sex, nudity and doing something so common sense defying and horrendously stupid that the audience is screaming 'No turn around, put your clothes back on and fucking run!' was truly tested and then pushed to illogical and hilarious levels then look no further than The Friday The 13th Franchise.
Part 4 is particularly stupid in this regard. There are scenes in this film of such heroically idiotic ineptitude as to boggle the mind.
In one instance a girl leaves everyone else she knows in the warm safe glow of a rental house and wanders out into the dark woodland towards a lake, all the time shouting the name of her boyfriend and despite no reply, no evidence of him anywhere or no reason to believe he'd be out in the woods by himself in the small hours of the morning, she gets to the lake, removes all her clothes (you know as one does), calls his name a few more times and then swims to a semi inflated rubber dinghy in the middle of the lake. It is then and only then that she realises, you know what, he's probably not out here and I got all naked, wet and cold for nothing. It is these moments of clarity that happen seconds before some hockey wielding maniac leaps from the lake and kills you with a machete.
Featuring odd performances from such randoms as Crispin Glover and the creepy little boy role filled by none other than Corey Feldman, the film is the standard horror fair with a bunch of kids renting a house from a Mother, daughter and her son (Feldman), who despite being no older than 10 maybe, inexplicably has a hobby where he makes masks and make-ups for horror films (possibly a nod to Tom Savini who's make-up and special effects started the franchise) just down the road from where Jason hacked all those people to death in part 3. In fact the beginning of this film follows on exactly.
Not content, obviously, with the carnage and mayhem he brought about in the previous film, Jason staggers down to the next pack of stupid, alcohol swigging, fornicating teenagers and decides, for no apparent reason what so ever, to do them in as well.
As well as the bizarre addition of Feldman's character, which, at least, plays a relevant part in the final showdown, there is also a seemingly endless scene of one of the, quite frankly, nondescript and tedious teens watching a super 8 projector of 1920s burlesque dancers.
Which is what every sad male did in the 80s when all of his friends either hooked up or, unbeknownst to you, got hacked up. You break out the old whirring projector, string up a sheet and seemingly amuse yourself (but not abuse yourself) to a grainy black n white image of topless women from a bygone era. Standard Saturday night for most I would imagine.
This where the slasher horror genre became like porn, in the sense that you sit slack jawed in amazing boredom during the dialogue scenes waiting for the money shot, or in this case, deaths. Unfortunately the deaths are heralded about 5 minutes in advance so you know exactly what's going to happen and it's all over way too quickly. There are some good effects though, I guess and the odd inventive death, still it all gets a bit ridiculous when you see that Jason has had time to arrange some of the bodies, and in one case nail one of them up to a door frame, apparently in no time at all. Where got the hammer and nails from is anyone's guess!
However, you know, these are minor niggles at the end of the day, you either like silly slasher fair or you don't. I watched this in a cabin by a lake late at night and I loved it. I laughed, I clapped when one of the annoying ones got killed, shouted at the stupid people in disbelief as they made basic blunders and the ending, not unlike the ending of Halloween 4 that would come 4 years later, was genuinely affecting and a bit creepy, if for no other reason than a tiny Corey Feldman in a bald cap with a knife will always be affecting and a bit creepy.
Is it the best of the series? no but it's not the worst (say hello Jason takes Manhattan) and I had a ball watching it. If you like to laugh and you like your slasher films to have their fair share of nudity then this is one of the ones for you!
6 out of 10 blood oranges or something...
Trick 'r Treat - 4th June 2011
Like any of the aforementioned forerunners to this film it is heavily laden with a macabre sense of humour rather than being genuinely scary.
In fact the title sequence of this film is done like a comic book and that is very apt because the whole thing has a sort of comic-book feel, despite the graphic novel of the stories (originally meant to be a 4 issue run) wasn't published till after the film was made.
Also, like any of these films some parts inevitably work better than others and I would say that the beginning and end of the film is considerably better than the middle section. Still it is put together slickly, with a nice fun but frightening Halloween feel, good cinematography with a definite leaning into Tim Burton territory and features its fair share of semi-famous faces, no doubt enjoying themselves immensely.
If you are a hardcore horror fan looking to be scared I wouldn't suggest it but this sort of film works perfectly as an introduction to horror or just something to crank out every Halloween for a bit of a sick dark laugh.
7 out of 10 poisoned pumpkins
Points from the Wife 7 out of 10
Horror Remakes. The Case Against. Featuring the Evil Dead remake....
This comes on the heels of the recent statement release from Ghost House Pictures and Sam Raimi, Rob Tapert and Bruce Campbell that there is, finally and unfortunately going to be an Evil Dead remake. Read the press release here.
Now for regular readers of my blog you should know that I am a huge Evil Dead fan and a rabid Bruce Campbell fan. I may also have mentioned in the past that I hate 99.9% of most modern, recent, horror remakes and let me make this clear, before you all bring up The Thing or Scarface or something, that's what we are talking about here.
I will start with my feelings on the Evil Dead remake as it's the freshest in my mind and then I am going to re-post an updated remakes blog I wrote back in 2007 on MySpace (yes that relic of a bygone era! ha!)
If you didn't read the Press Release link yet, this is the message Sam, Rob and Bruce put out yesterday:
"We are committed to making this movie and are inspired by the enduring popularity and enthusiasm for the ‘Evil Dead’ series. We can't wait to scare a new generation of moviegoers using filmmaking techniques that were not available to us thirty years ago as well as Fede (the new director) bringing a fresh eye to the film’s original elements."
Almost everything about this statement annoys me! So much so that I have to break it down and analyse it line by line:
Scare a new generation of moviegoers?
Ok, now even if Sam and Rob are too busy descending into the sad corporate abyss, Bruce should know, as he has been to conventions and also frequently connects with the fans, that there are hardly any Evil Dead fans now who were even alive when the original came out, let alone old enough to see it! Could this possibly mean that the film is ALREADY "scaring new generations of moviegoers" ??! and I like to believe that those who were around and old enough to have seen the original when it came out are, like Star Wars fans, dedicated and definitely don't want a remake.
Using filmmaking techniques that were not available to us thirty years ago? - What does this even mean? REALLY think about it. CGI? 3D? Digital Cameras? what?? sure there are new gadgets, bells and whistles but basic film making technique hasn't changed in 50 years or more! How does The Evil Dead, a story about 5 kids who go to a cabin and get possessed by demons because they stupidly can't stop playing the same tape recording of readings from something called 'The Book of The Dead', benefit from the application of anything from the above list?
Also, the thing that MAKES the entire first film, the reason any of them have a career, is Raimi's technique. That's really all it is. Bruce is good in bits yes of course and there are extreme scenes, you don't believe you are watching, that can now whip an audience up into a delighted frenzy but it all hangs on Raimi's technique.
Creativity, inventiveness, imagination and intelligence don't need to be updated they continue to shine, they are the reason for its success.
If you disagree, name a modern horror film (or any genre for that matter) that is as good as or better than its 70s/80s counterpart or predecessor. Name a good modern film that rests entirely on its 'New Film-making Techniques'. This is not like The Thing where between the Howard Hawks original and John Carpenter's 80s version there was an enormously massive leap in what they were able to show, this is like picturing The Thing but instead of the incredibly innovative and creative practical special effects it's CGI and in 3D. Is that honestly any better? well they are, predictably and annoyingly, about to remake it so we shall see! (CHRIST can't they leave shit alone?!!!)
Fede bringing a fresh eye to the film’s original elements - Evil Dead doesn't need a fresh eye. It had Sam Raimi's eye. A fantastically inventive, guerrilla film maker at the time who achieved camera angles, special effects and all manner visual wizardry using sheer brains, determination and will power that no other first time, 20 something director has ever achieved before or since. Yes they have tried, imitated and failed but really, without Raimi directing and without Bruce starring, there is no FRESH eye to put on proceedings. Like I said, without them it's just a story about 5 kids who go to a cabin and get possessed, it's not like the story screams to be reinterpreted. Plus I think Eli Roth and about 100 other directors have already tried.
Raimi and co, drawing on influences wide and various from the past, practically invented a whole new form of shooting, editing and sound design that you could argue gave rise to the hyper kinetic, over the top style that studios apply heavy hand-idly and irritatingly to almost every flaccid turd of a movie they produce while also inspiring legions of film students everywhere to attempt the same thing (I know, I was one!)
The reason it is as popular today as it is and, in fact, grows in popularity every year is down to all of that. I firmly believe there is nothing a film maker could do to make it better, make it their own or even just compliment it. It survives and is cherished, like most of these original films, because of the time, the place but mostly because of the people involved. I don't want to see new people involved and I don't understand people who do.
This whole thing STINKS. They can't even come up with a decent excuse for a remake in their own press release!! Like all modern horror remakes, this is for the cash and cash alone as, creatively, the idea is bankrupt and that would be fine if the three of them were still struggle to forge out a career but Bruce is on a hit show going into it's 5th season, Tapert has produced a multitude of TV and Film including the highly lucrative Hercules, Xena and Sparticus: Blood and Sand and Sam made 3 Spiderman movies for fucks sake! Three of the biggest hits ever produced!
None of them need the money and as for this first time director if he really wants his first feature to be a remake of a film that was made by a handful of dedicated guys from Michigan slogging it out through endless muddy night shoots in the woods of Tennessee to eventually emerge months and months later with an original classic of horror, instead of something that he too can lovingly pour blood, sweat, tears and his life into then he isn't worth a damn in my book.
Also it has been revealed that Diablo Cody is doing a re-write.
Why the hell is this good news?!
Diablo Cody? Didn't she write a horror movie already that bombed harder than Halle Berry following up her Oscar with Catwoman? instead of the news being "Don't worry, it's going to be good, we have an Oscar Winning writer working on ED Remake" shouldn't it be - "I can't believe former Oscar Winner Cody is scraping the bottom of the writing barrel by helping to fix an already bad idea?"
If they already need a script re-write then that is a terrible sign. While I know this is a standard practice it could possibly mean the director is not the auteur of the piece, is not passionate about it or does not have faith in his ideas. I am not sure why a first time director wants to do a remake anyway, doesn't make much sense, doesn't he have his own stories to tell?
I am SO dissappointed. I thought the fans had squashed this idea when they first brought it up almost 10 years ago! I guess they just had to wait for the populus to become so appathetic and jaded they didn't care anymore.
The other reason I am so very disappointed, as a fan, is that they have dangled Evil Dead 4 in front of us like a carrot for years and years and years. Now I personally don't want an ED4, I want Raimi to take his Spiderman money and make an all new film with Bruce as the lead and with Rob producing, just like Rob Tapert SAID they were doing almost 10 years ago but I will take ED4 over a remake any day of the week. On the subject of ED4 Bruce said, as recently as the Philly Comic-Con (18th June 2011), that one of the reasons they have backed off the idea of doing it is that they would spend a year of their life making the thing, Bruce would go through the horrible and uncomfortable procedure of actually playing Ash post 50 and when it came out the fans would criticise it and compare it negatively with Army of Darkness etc.
Well I absolutely hate to say it because he's still my favourite actor but that's utter bullshit. If that's how you feel about the 4th one then why the hell do and endorse so positively, a remake? doesn't the same reaction, only potentially worse, still apply?
God the whole news is just too depressing, I had to get it all out of my system with a blog. Which I know makes me some whiny, loser fan boy frantically typing away under fake internet stars to an audience of none but it's cheaper than therapy and more fun than vomitting.
I honestly feel that they forget that while show business is, indeed and understandably, a business the SHOW part comes first. Remakes don't anger me so much for the present because I know the originals exist, I watch and own them and I boycott most of the remakes. However it's future generations who will either be confused, not know about the originals or not care... how will these classics survive? Well I for one will keep the original home (or in this case cabin) fires burning.
The End of Evil Dead Remake related rant.
______________________________________________________________
OLD REMAKE BLOG FROM 2007 -
This is a blog I did a while ago and as it's relevant, it may explain a few opinions and is still basically what I think I thought I would include it here.
Movie Remakes.
Everyone who cares about movies and probably even casual viewers have an opinion.
In fact, I would go as far as to say that everyone probably owns at least one movie that is counted as a remake.
probably Scarface or ..maybe Cape Fear and everyone has seen Dirty Rotten Scoundrels... right....
That's not a remake I hear you cry!
well it is... and it isn't....
It's actually a re-telling of the story of the film 'Bedtime Story' from 1964.
An Online encyclopedia defines a remake as -
"a remake is a newer version of a previously released film or a newer version of the source (play, novel, story, etc.) of a previously made film."
well with that definition we can throw Dirty Rotten Scoundrels into the mix but with my definition, you can't, my definition is this -
A Modern film remake is a film that bares the same name as its still very popular or cult predecessor, that takes a few iconic plot points, maybe a character or two on which to hang a weaker story and simply for the purpose of making some money.
Now with my definition, which I appreciate is specific and designed to attack a certain group of films, you could throw out Scarface, Cape Fear and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.
Why?
Scarface – despite being made by the late, great Howard Hawks in 1932, was the original so popular by 1983 that it didn't need a second telling? In fact the stories are fairly different (one being about bootleg alcohol in the prohibition era and the other being about cocaine) and if anything the 1983 version is still, today the one we remember and is a classic in its own right. Also, was it trading off the name to make money? Nope, not really, not much argument to back that up.
Cape Fear – this one is the closest to being shitcanned by my definition, there's only one thing that stops it and that is it is a true remake. It takes the exact character names, plot points, settings and almost script on occasions and just updates it – more gore, more sex, more suspense and that's it… at no point does it needlessly sully the original or try and 'better' it. It takes the story and just runs with it.
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels – is the least like a remake, they changed almost everything, including, crucially, the title and no one remembers the original except maybe the film-makers widow….
So lets talk about what we REALLY are here to talk about –
MODERN FILM REMAKES
I am, of course referring to –
Dawn of the Dead
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
The Omen
Alfie
The Italian Job
The Amityville Horror
Assault on Precinct 13
The Fog
Black Christmas
The Pink panther
Charlie & the Chocolate Factory
Cheaper by the Dozen
Fun with Dick and Jane
The Hills have eyes
And so on and so on and so on – too much SHITE to list
And they show NO sign of stopping-
the soon to be made –
Escape from new york
Halloween (2011 update: 2 have now been made)
Evil Dead (see above)
The Birds
Day of the dead (2011 update: this one too)
AGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
I HATE absolutely HATE these remakes. (I was angry 4 years ago too apparently!)
I don't care if you liked some of these films, I don't care one bit. I will tell you right now not one of those films should be called what they are called and not one of those films is a patch on the original!
If the remake had never been made – would you EVER watch any of the originals and have the arrogance to say that it should be remade? No… would you watch the original and be able to come up with other stories in the same setting, or stories involving the same characters – of course! And that would be cool if those movies got made but CALLED something different.
It actually all comes down to perception and marketing – not film making or creativity.
What they do is they think - oh yeah Zombies - Shopping Mall - cool idea... but wait IF we do that AGAIN people will JUST say we are imitating Dawn of the Dead and they'll just get angry. So, how do we make a film that fans won't kill us for AND new audiences will go and see? Hmmmm I know we'll SAY it's a remake and somehow people will tolerate this. As long as we include the idea (zombies, shopping mall) we have a VERY thin and wonky frame on which to hang a whole new movie and it doesn't even have to stand up to the original because it's a remake, so people's defenses are lower they are not even necessarily expecting a good movie because it's a REMAKE.
So if a film doesn't ENTIRELY suck and throws some gore or tits or both into the mix – it gets called a 'good' remake…. Hence the unusual popularity of the Dawn of The Dead remake…. Which, had it had normal speed Zombies (uber-fast Zombies are FUCKING AWFUL), had one more pass at the script in a rewrite and been set in another building other than a shopping mall, I might have even liked it – as it is, AFTER Johnny Cash stops singing over the opening credits, the movie is a big pile of gash…. Real gash…
it is
– stop it
– stop saying you like it
– it is a big pile of gash
– get over it, watch it again
– Oh Look running zombies! they're shit.
– Oh look obtuse arrogant and badly written security guards!
– Oh look a zombie baby!
Oh yeah it's utter shite…. What was I thinking… oh look it's a lovely day outside… la la la la
This next bit sort of repeats what I said up top, sorry...
As for the proposed remakes of bonafide classics such as Halloween, Evil Dead and Escape movies the big problem is this - Those movies are made good and amazing because of THE PEOPLE INVOLVED IN THEM. Take Sam Raimi, Rob Tapert & Bruce Campbell away from Evil Dead and it's 5 teenagers go to a wood and get picked off by spirits - zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz snoresville...
and if you take John carpenter and ESPECIALLY Kurt Russell away from Escape from New York and you still have a fairly groovy plot but you loose the charisma and the character.
Both John C and Kurt R have spoken MANY times about how Snake Plisken is their statement about a certain time and place and a certain type of masculinity and politics. They have also said how it is kinda based on the two of them.
How, then, can you replace the people who gave life to the character? because anyone else, absolutely ANYONE! would either do their own thing and therefore not be Snake OR merely be imitating what Russell expertly did before because they wouldn't understand the character and play it with the depths that Kurt does.
Wouldn't you just watch the movie thinking "oh my god I miss Kurt Russell, even Captain Ron was better than this!"
And don't even get me started about the Halloween remake which is apparently a prequel of sorts…..
Ya
Right
I shall say this only once - IN THE FIRST MOVIE DONALD PLEASANCE EXPLAINS THAT BETWEEN BEING A BOY AND KILLING HIS FIRST SISTER AND BEING AN ADULT AND COMING AFTER JAMIE LEE CURTIS, THAT MICHAEL MYERS SPENT 15 YEARS COMATOSED IN A MENTAL INSTITUTION…..
Makes no sense does it!
Certain films belong to certain filmmakers, these remakes are fruitless, pointless HACK films.... made by weak pathetic scum and I hate them.
I am at war with remakes....
The battle will be fought on the streets, in the cinemas and up in the trees (mainly by ape creatures)
I urge EVERYONE to boycott these types of remakes NOW
I am serious
I am fucking furious
Enough is enough
As an update to this blog in 2011: The Halloween remake has been made, I didn't see it and have no idea if it was a prequel or whatever. This was based on internet chatter back in 2007. What I can tell you is they are doing a REMAKE of the THE THING but calling it a prequel by focusing on the Norwegian team who first discover the alien site. Neat way to get around the 'remake' tag right while still doing essentially a remake, right?
WRONG
If you have seen John Carpenter's THE THING we KNOW everything that happens to The Norwegian group. We know they ALL die and the alien is in the dog. We even know how they discover the spaceship because there is VIDEO footage of them doing it in John Carpenter's The Thing!!! It will be the most pointless film since Titanic!
So that's it then, my full rants on remakes. Basically almost everything I have ever had to say on the matter. Normal service will resume with the next blog but boy did that feel good to get out there. I welcome ALL comments and discussions on this topic. Thanks again for reading.
Halloween 4 & 5 - 13th May 2011
You might also have guessed that Evil Dead was what really cemented the horror genre for me because in that trilogy there is so much diversity and innovation that it pretty much sets you up for anything.
My first love though, in a lot of ways, was the original Halloween and by extension, therefor, John Carpenter films. I would've been a teenager when I discovered a lot of this stuff and I can remember at least one halloween night where Halloween one and Carrie were a notable double bill.
I am also a big lover of franchises, anything where the original people try, in some way, to forward the story, develop the characters, increase the gore and create new and innovative kills. Apart from maybe action, horror seems to be the genre where franchises thrive and why not give the audience more of what they want, you can't have too much of a good thing in my opinion.
Now purists and cynics will scoff, say it waters down the original and the sequels are only done for the money but I say nonsense, the original remains for those who want it and the sequels are there for people who want to get into the mythology and detail of the characters.
The same argument can not be used for remakes, if I have to explain in a conversation again that I mean the ORIGINAL Dawn of the Dead or the ORIGINAL Halloween, I may seriously snap, run out into the street and set fire to the first group of arseholes who look at me funny.
Now for all those who know the Halloween franchise you know that it breaks down like this:
There's the Laurie Strode Trilogy - 1, 2 & 7
There's the Jamie Lloyd Trilogy - 4, 5 & 6
There's the one that has nothing to do with Michael Myers - 3, Season of the Witch
and There's the atrociously crap one that we don't speak about in my house - 8
As for the two Rob Zombie remakes, I haven't seen them, I won't ever see them and there is a very special place in my make-believe hell for Rob Zombie next to child molesters, the CEOs of drug companies, Republican talk show hosts and Simon Cowell.
In a small side note the actress who played Jamie Lloyd in Halloween 4 & 5 then went on to be in the Rob Zombie remakes (Danielle Harris how could you!! You break my fucking heart...)
So with this blog we are dealing with parts 4 and 5 which take place 10 and 11 years respectively after the first night (parts 1&2 take place on the same night) and work from the premise that Laurie Strode and an unknown guy (someone LLoyd) had a child, Jamie, who was then fostered out into care when her parents were killed in a car accident.
Jamie now grows up in the Carruthers house hold, back in Haddonfield, where everyone is aware of who she is and, more importantly who her uncle is. Well done letting that one slip, whoever.
In the meantime Michael has been laying dormant on a gurney in the dark and spooky basement of a psychiatric hospital facility. I suppose it didn't cross anyone's mind that killing him, cutting his arms, legs and head off, sealing them in lead containers and burying them at the four corners of the globe, would have been a good idea then.
Then one dark and rainy night he is, of course, to be transported to another facility (when will bureaucrats learn!) in a rickety old ambulance where Michael, finds his moment, sits up, takes the opportunity to kill everyone and then heads off to Haddonfield to find and kill his niece.
Donald Pleasance as Dr. Sam Loomis then shows up, still scarred from the fire that you thought consumed him and Michael at the end of the second one, walking with a stick, wearing the same old raincoat and babbling like a lunatic about Michael not being human and predicting precisely where he'll go and what he'll do.
The rest of the film then plays out as an exciting and tense cat and mouse story between the whole of Haddonfield (this time the police and a gang of beer swilling, gun toting, lynch mob rednecks are in on the chase) and Michael Myers with predictable results (i.e. Michael kills almost everyone).
I personally really like Halloween 4 and I think real care was taken crafting something with a feel and mood of the first two, including a script which is peppered with very Carpenter sounding dialogue. Starting right away with the hospital orderly, who makes the most of a small role, rolling his eyes about like he's in an old Hammer horror and saying stuff about 'you never get used to their faces', through to the old preacher in the beat up pick up going on about hunting evil and of course in every single hokey warning that spews forth from Dr.Loomis' lips and which Donald Pleasance makes sound like effortless Shakespeare.
He is the reason I stick with the series, I could watch Dr.Loomis chase a plastic bag around in a garden for days as long as he kept muttering brilliant things about it being an inhuman plastic bag or possessed or something.
Other good things about the fourth part are:
The set up for the new family is nice, the interplay between the sisters works well and the little girl is not too annoying.
It's great how they bothered to explain Michael's attire of a boiler suit and a mask too, especially the latter allowing to have a neat little scare sequence in the costume dept. of a local drug store.
Lastly the idea of involving the police and the yahoos is a nice touch and feels quite authentic, even if when they do finally confront Myers, it is a little weak. Had that been the only ending I think it may have finished the franchise off right there but thankfully the proper ending, which harks back intentionally to the very beginning of the first one while setting up part 5 is absolutely brilliant and Pleasance's hammy cries of Noooooo! and the ludicrous slow motion are worthy of the price of the DVD alone.
The few downsides to this sequel are:
The pacing, there are some really slow bits in places; the acting, some of it is unforgivable in a relatively high profile film like this; the fact that they show way too much of Myers himself (although not as much as in future entries and at least there's some attempt to keep him in shadow) and yet some of the best kills are annoyingly off screen and, lastly, while the opening act has some very nice eerie feeling to it and a couple of good scares, the rest of it feels a little low on scares. These are minor quibbles, however, in the end it is a surprisingly good entry to the franchise and better than any part 4 has any right to be.
7 out of 10 pumpkins
It's a real shame that the same team behind 4 didn't then go on to make 5 because they had it right, they had the Halloween mood and feeling down and they seemed to be good at putting a story together.
That's not to say that Halloween 5 is bad, it just doesn't quite live up to the promise of the ending of number 4.
Basically Jamie is in a children's psychiatric hospital, Haddenfield has one for all ages and all occasions apparently, and she can't speak. She has endless crazy nightmares where she can physically feel, see or sense what Michael is doing, which is basically killing everyone he sees in a variety of increasingly gruesome ways. When her sister and her rampantly annoying, highly 80s friend aren't visiting and being teeth gratingly murderable, jolly mad Uncle Loomis is hanging around waiting to see if he can use the child's visions to find and capture Michael.
Nothing much happens for a while until some numb skull decides to host a party and this gives Michael the perfect excuse to splatter some red on the barn walls while he waits for Jamie to decide to talk again and then break free from the hospital with her mentally challenged boy friend and hunt him down instead, I am still not sure why. Neither do I understand why it takes him so long to kill the dark haired, crazily, hideously annoying one either.
After much shenanigans, using Jamie as bait, Loomis plans to lure Michael to his old house where the cunning old raincoat fancier has strung up a big heavy net. After spending the whole movie wandering just what the hell Loomis is doing hanging round the old Myers place and what is his grand master plan, it amounts to nothing more than what you might do to stop a bear, a tranq gun and a big net. I personally think even being in the old Myer's place is probably irrelevant.
Also Michael seems to have been redecorating because up stairs he has gothically laid out some coffins and lit about 35 dozen candles.
The film ends with them not, as I said previously, just hacking the fucker up into tiny pieces and feeding him to the birds but putting him in prison where... oh yeah the weird 'man in black' who has been wandering around following Michael ominously but who is never really explained (how threatening can he really be he travels by Greyhound bus for christ sake), has ample opportunity to blow up the police station and make his escape with Michael thus setting up part 6.
Ok so the film is mundanely directed and at no point really scary, the plot is somewhat confusing because it seems to have been scripted and edited by a mad man, or possibly by the directors ponytail, there are way too many shots of Michael, hardly any moody lighting, annoying, needless and very french moments of surreality (can anyone tell me who the very old woman in the chair, looking weird, at the party was?) and the soundtrack is utter balls.
On the upside, however, it includes a lot more gore in the far more inventive death scenes, a fairly tense laundry shoot sequence that is well done, includes the edition of the 'thorn' symbol that will be relevant in later parts and, of course, lots more Donald Pleasance genius, including him roughing up small children in a highly unsuitable way and that fearsome ending battle with Michael.
While 8 will always stand as the weakest of the series for me, mainly because it completely destroys the perfect ending of H20, 5 is probably the second weakest entry in the franchise (if my memory of 6 serves, I will have to re-watch it and add it to this blog).
Still it's better than most part 5's of anything, that I can think of, and it's important if you want to follow the mythology of Myers.
5.5 out of 10 big cookies (watch the movie and guess the reference)
Rabies/Kalevet - 27th April 2011 - The After Movie Diner goes to the Tribeca Film Festival!
Basically, as far as I could figure it, the plot involved a brother trying to free his sister from a trap when she is kidnapped by a serial killer. At the same time a park ranger enters the woodland with his dog and I think, if I am remembering correctly, after his dog is killed by the psychopath, manages to tranquilise the killer and save the girl. Then the brother, not privy to all this information, is hit by a car containing your typical horror crew of four bickering, horny teenagers when he runs out in front of them in a blind panic trying to get help for his sister. Predictably enough the two boys follow him into the wood while the two girls stay behind until two policemen show up. It turns out that one of the policemen is having marital difficulties and is distracted leaving messages for his absent wife while the other is a sick, sexist crazy ready to feel up and possibly rape at least one of the girls while attacking the stronger, more mouthier one for being a lesbian. It is this second girl that grabs his gun, holds both cops at gun point before shooting off the sick ones fingers and running into the woods with the other girl, who is still, understandably, in shock. The sick cop then handcuffs the other cop to the steering wheel of the police car and follows into the woods behind them. Anyone who has now entered the woods, we find out, ends up coming to a creative but horrific end, mostly because they turn against each other in increasingly bizarre and violent ways.
It's at this point while it is treading, partly, a some-what well known path, albeit in a slightly odd and extreme fashion, that I suddenly began to question what I was watching.
For a start the threat of the serial killer, who you never really get to know or realise who he is, isn't there as he is asleep having been tranq'ed. Secondly the cops, who should be a force of good and safety turn out to be exactly the opposite, well one does at least. Thirdly, everyone starts dying in quick succession without much explanation or suspense and lastly no one has mentioned rabies or exhibited any of the symptoms during the whole damn film.
By this middle section I was quite confused by a lot of the random and drastic mood changes that I wasn't expecting, mainly because with a title like Rabies I thought it possibly could be a zombie film. So, I put my misreading of the film down to it being from a foreign culture I didn't understand or possibly that I had missed something in the quick passing, white subtitles, which very often were on a light or bleached out background and just sort of let it all wash over me thinking that I, at least, vaguely got what was going on (people were dying) and that would have to do.
Luckily I saw a screening of this at the Tribeca film festival, obviously, knowing little to nothing about it and so it was lovely, informative and entertaining to hear the directors speak afterwards. If anything it helped to add layers to the film that, for the reasons I explained, weren't always easy to read into it.
They talked a lot about the political significance of some of it, to them and how they were influenced greatly by the slasher and horror films from America in the late 70s and early 80s. It came as no surprise that one of the directors was a film student and the other a film studies lecturer because they delighted in pointing out both the cliches they had employed and then how they had subverted them. For example we are meant to realise and it's meant to be obvious that this is a slasher flick in which the killer doesn't murder anyone but a dog and that usually in these films no ones phone works and so they had everyone's phone work.
It left me thinking that I would give it another shot now that I understood it and see if it played better this time. What follows are merely my thoughts based on this initial viewing.
The good points first.
It had a really good look which very much harked back to the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, it looked like it was intentionally made on 16 millimeter with very bleached out colours and bright hazy whites. This gave it a very interesting and grainy look, so that artistically, at least, it was pleasing to the eye.
The death scenes were spectacularly realised and very gruesome. There was definitely no skimping on the claret.
The scene, amongst all this confusion, that worked very well and was very violent was when the stabbed and run over brother stumbles upon who he thinks is the killer outside a trailer and smacks him extremely hard and repeatedly with a large mallet around the jaw, only to discover later that it was the park warden and he was just getting some water for his sister who is just waking up inside. It's a scene that a horror audience loves because they know what is about to happen but are unsure if the protagonist is going to realise in time and when he doesn't you are left feeling really bad for all concerned but in a good way, if that makes sense, because it's how you're meant to feel.
It's mostly well acted too with the characters, at least, well written and defined so, despite the language barrier, I felt I understood who everyone was and their initial motivations even if my understanding of their actions later became muddied and confused.
The whole thing reminded me a great deal of the french film 'Haute Tension' (High Tension or Switchblade Romance if you live in the UK) in the sense that it looked great, there was some excellent bloodletting but overall, even with the explanations from the directors, it didn't make a whole lick of sense. Where High Tension succeeds over Rabies is that it has an excellent eerie and tense feel to it that is genuinely scary and that I was able to really get into, where as Rabies failed to grab me with anything more than a relentless series of grizzly deaths and a vague numbing confusion by the end.
The downside:
I was lucky enough to see the film with a fairly satisfying explanation, sort of, given by the two directors (even if they did make a very tenuous leap in saying that the dog they chose to get killed was intentionally a German shepherd because, well you know right? because of the war, you know, it's an in-joke because the dog is German) but I presume, unless you listen to the possible commentary on the DVD first, most western viewers will not see it like that. As much as I applaud them for attempting to make something that has some cultural and political implications, some art, humour, traditional entertainment and shock value, if it's all lost because no one has the first clue what they are watching and why anything is happening then what good is it?
Firstly they could've picked a better English language title. They called it Rabies apparently because it's a disease that attacks the nervous system or something but it was never really clear. Secondly they need to re-edit it with dark black lines around the subtitles and slow them down a bit, I am not stupid and I can read but if I am busy reading acres of text (the script is quite wordy) and trying to fathom out what they all mean rather than becoming embroiled in the mood and action of the piece then the point is somewhat lost in a horror movie.
It's all very well to subvert genre traits and do something a bit clever but make sure you are doing it for a reason that is relevant to the plot and not so that you can try and look clever in front of the class. By getting rid of the killer in the first act and establishing that anyone can attack and kill anyone for any reason, where is the tension? Like I said, the best scene in it is where we, the audience, know he's about to get the wrong person and hope he realises in time but the rest of the kills happen so quickly and with little to no reason that apart from being a spectacle there seems to be little to no point, no matter how well you film it and execute it.
Lastly, as great as it is that they have attempted to give the characters depth and a back story (again bucking the genre convention of simplistic stereotypes), for the short running time it is a lot to take in and as there are so many characters it is almost like too much is going on all at once. There is a reason why horror, especially, is simple and focussed more on mood, style and sometimes plot than it is on in-depth character studies. It doesn't help the development of the scare if you're thinking about who is sleeping with who, who is related to who and what all their dilemmas are that have to be resolved.
I liked that it was challenging and I am not dismissing that aspect, I just think there is a thin line between challenging an audience and confusing the hell out of them, to the point where they become a little turned off by it all.
All that said however I don't want to be too critical of what was not only a first attempt but what was clearly a well thought about film that tried to do something not only new to it's country of origin but to the genre as a whole.
I generally did enjoy it and now that I think I have it straight what exactly is going on, I would watch it again to get more involved in the emotion and to see if they also managed to create a mood and a cohesive film.
I am just not sure that most audiences would do the same, it is, I think, one of the few films I have ever watched where there were some obvious walk outs and before the house lights could even raise on the credits, half the audience up and left.
Had they stayed they would've seen two directors who were funny, humble and polite and who have, at least, done the clever thing and didn't wait around to see why nobody had made a horror film in Israel before, they just went ahead and did it. Ensuring that Rabies will always be first at something.
6 out of 10 nicely tenderised but slightly unfocussed, face meat steaks
Points from the Wife - 5.5 out of 10
Red State (live at Radio City Music Hall) - 5th March 2011
I have been a fan of Kevin Smith since seeing Clerks and apart from Cop Out, which I don't feel necessarily counts, I have pretty much enjoyed, liked or loved everything he has ever been involved in and yes, that includes Jersey Girl.
There are many reasons to like the man and his work: he is funnier and cleverer than he or any of his critics give him credit for, his candid, foul mouthed honesty, he keeps his friends close, the fact he can seemingly turn his hand to anything (Film making, blog writing, shop owning, podcasting, stand up, hockey, TV & Radio show hosting and now distributing), he gets the best from the casts he works with especially Ben Affleck who is rarely better than when working with him, his films attempt to and very often achieve a balance between crude comedy and a heartfelt message without being sentimental and, after Red State he may just have shown himself to be a better writer than Quentin Tarantino.
Yes, when I hear a detractor or critic of his I can see where they are coming from but very often they have either missed the point or a simply not wired the right way to appreciate Smith's little corner of the entertainment business.
I first heard of Red State as this horror movie idea he had been kicking around for some time, it seemed odd because while he is vocal about many things, politics was not one of them and yet, to me the idea of a film that was seemingly going to go after the extreme religious right got my liberal leaning atheist saliva glands excited but then with another thought I wondered how Kevin Smith could even pull it off, not being a director known for dark, moody, horror films.
Then, I had been ferociously absorbing the myriad of podcasts on his ever expanding Smodcast network for the past couple of years. Years which certainly seemed to be a bit turbulent for Mr.Smith, I don't know how much the public are even aware of any of it or if they care but for dedicated Smod listeners like myself it has been a hectic soap opera of dashed hopes over the box office for Zack and Miri make a Porno, of Kevin Smith doing the unthinkable and directing a film he didn't write with a star who turned out to be anything but helpful and of being kicked off a plane for being too fat to fly. Then, seemingly as if his life was an inspirational film about a schlubby kid from New Jersey who made good and because an audience demands a happy ending, he bought a bus to continue touring, built an entire network of increasingly popular podcasts that included getting a theatre, a regular spot at a famous comedy venue and which are soon to become a live streaming radio station, announced that he had the funding for Red State, makes Red State with an all star cast, gets Red State into Sundance 17 years after he debuted there with Clerks, confounds, confuses and amazes people by announcing that he will distribute the film himself (why that upset anyone I have absolutely no idea, that was just plain weird) and finally on March 5th, only a few months since they started shooting the thing, Red State premiered at Radio City Music Hall in New York City.
Pretty bloody incredible by all accounts and the fact that he did it without, seemingly, stepping on anyone's neck, I personally think is admirable. I honestly scratch my head when people criticise him. You can criticise his work, of course, you can debate his talent and you don't have to like his films or shows but nitpicking, bitching and moaning about the man himself and his actions when he is a fairly shining example of the American dream that everyone bangs on about and getting stuff wrong about him when he is also a completely open book who is always explaining himself clearly and eloquently, is just plain odd.
Now, during all this time, listening to the podcasts on my daily commute I have attempted to keep up with all this stuff but without finding out too many spoilers about the film itself. I have to say, with all honesty, I turned up at the theatre last night with very mixed thoughts and not knowing what to expect. I wanted to be there to have the experience and then see the Q&A but I was not expecting a brilliant film.
For me the warning bells started sounding way back when it was obvious Scott Mosier would not be involved with first Cop Out and then Red State, couple that with the fact that I had been lead to believe it wasn't at all funny, that it was Kevin Smith working outside of his usual genre and some of the reviews out of Sundance that I just glanced at (so as not to get any spoilers) seemed to be less than stella and I have to say my expectations were, by no means, high.
Well, of course, I was dead wrong, it is a fantastic film.
I don't want to give away too much at this point because I really want people to see it but basically it is a horror, action, religious satire that is both completely unlike anything Kevin Smith has ever done and yet, through the script, decidedly and obviously Kevin Smith.
Actually, scratch that, what Red State ACTUALLY is, is a brilliant independent spirited exploitation film, the kind which Tarantino and Rodriguez have been desperately trying to make these past few years and have failed miserably because they keep screaming at the audience through the films "look at how grind-house this is! look we are making ironic exploitation films, aren't we clever!" well Red State doesn't do that, it doesn't have to because it IS an exploitation flick that harks back to the amazing gritty B-Movies of the 70s instead of trying so desperately to be that. I call it an exploitation film because they were the ones that had the freedom to happily blend genres, tackle taboo subjects, could feature violence and black humour, looked different and took chances. Well that's what Red State does and a whole lot more. Yes, of course, like an exploitation movie, there are parts which are cliche but it also succeeds in being dark, disturbing, violent, exciting, unflinching and also, surprisingly, hilarious. From saying it wasn't a comedy but a horror movie what Kevin Smith does is set aside the dick and fart jokes that were Jay & Silent Bob's stock in trade and reveal himself to be very clever and even, in places, witty.
So, it centers around a small nondescript, fairly redneck town in the south where there is a family of religious extremists that are modeled on both the Westboro Baptist church (those vile hate mongers who protest the funerals of gay people) and the Branch Davidians from Waco. Three boys from the local high school, who are looking for sex in all the wrong places, answer an ad online from some dodgy website and through a series of circumstances actually end up inside the church's fortified land and in deep trouble. From there all hell breaks loose and the film takes a number of unexpected turns. I really don't want to go on because the fresher you can see the movie the so much better that it is.
Overall it has a vibe that I would pitch somewhere between the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Fargo, if you can imagine such a thing. Now, pretend those two films got in bed with the more serious parts of Dogma and you're probably half way there.
The cast in this film, which includes John Goodman, Stephen Root, Kevin Pollack, Academy Award winner Melissa Leo and the sublimely perfect Michael Parks, are, each one of them, just wonderful.
On his Red State podcasts, Kevin Smith was saying that he used to think he had to work actors like a puppet, give them line readings and instruct them what to do, especially when he was working with initial amateurs like Jason Mewes but on Red State he just took a step back and watched the monitors, trusting his professionals to bring their best game to the screen. Well whatever he did it worked, I mean you can always trust these actors, which include some of my favourite of all time, to be marvelous and this time they were fairly flawless, wringing every drop of either dopey innocence in the case of the boys, charming malevolence and brainwashed insanity from the church folk and anger and sarcasm in the case of the cops out of the well crafted words on the page. The younger cast members too are uniformly excellent and watchable, more than up to the task of keeping up with their older, more established cast mates.
To see them all up on stage last night and to hear Goodman drop 'Shut the fuck up Donny' onto the crowd was a joy.
A lot has been made about the look of the film and it would be fair to say that this is Kevin Smith's grainiest and grubbiest looking film since Clerks and I mean that in a good way, that's what they were obviously going for, the colour palette of the movie also is very interesting tonally, being filmed on what seemed to be exclusively overcast and grey days but the real revelation here is the camera shots and movement in this film. When it needs to be the camera work is frenetic and exciting, other times, when it's called for, the camera is hovering and eerie, like a fly, almost, buzzing about inside this gloomy, foreboding church trying to find some sort of light or warmth.
If I have one criticism of the film at all, it is that it almost zips along too quickly, after it finished, I personally felt I could've spent at least another 20 minutes with these characters.
In fact, in an alternative reality, an HBO style gritty TV Show about the subject would not have been a bad idea, plenty of things could be stretched out to fill a 10 show run. You've got a possible murder mystery, religious extremists, people's reactions to the antics of the church, the horny teenagers and John Goodman's agent and his relationships with the bureau, his men and his home life. Sort of like Big Love meets True Blood meets Homicide. Just a thought.
The opening build up and the 'horror' section of the film could've been expanded, the film could've been more violent and more suspenseful before the second act gets underway.
A lot of critics, especially after Sundance, who appear to critique Kevin Smith and his fans rather than the film itself, do go on and on about the changes in tone and plot that take place in the film but like I said earlier, it's an exploitation film with a heavy dose of satire, it's meant to cram a hundred unfinished ideas into it's running time and bombard the audience with different imagery, that's its genius. To call it a mess or uneven is to entirely miss the point. These are the same people who probably went on and on about the Social Network being the greatest work of cinema last year. The films structure is actually solid and while it raises more questions than it answers, the few it does answer, it does with style, wit, charm and good grace.
It all basically boils down to good writing being said by good actors with a camera pointed at them and I don't know about anyone else but I find that refreshing nowadays and when I come across it, I could watch it forever.
Lastly, to the family, friends or whatever the four muling, brain dead, arse clowns were in front of me that apparently thought Radio City Music Hall was the best place to go in New York just to drink beer and text, I hope you all suffer slow and agonising torment possibly involving some garden implements and your rectums. They didn't spoil the movie so much as not really watch it, leave half way through for beer, then come back to their seats for the start of the Q&A only to talk very loudly through it, some of which involved repeating jokes and comments to the person sitting next to them who would've heard them by themselves if these flappy-mouthed bastards had shut up for a second.
I wouldn't mind but the tickets weren't cheap, all in all I worked out the probably spent about $20 a beer and sat in their seats a grand total of an hour out of the three. I wish their drinks had sedatives in them!
Suffice to say we moved seats quickly so as to watch the Q&A in peace.
9 out of 10 strawberry flavoured communion wafers (well they are red and religious right?)
Points from The Wife 9 out of 10
SEE MY PHOTOS FROM THE NIGHT
B-Movie Double Bill: It's Alive and Blazing Magnum - 4th March 2011
He stared out a writer and series runner for run of the mill TV Shows such as 'Branded' but when he did branch out into directing features it was with 'Black Caesar' one of the famous Blaxploitation films of the early 70s. It wasn't long after this and 'Hell Up In Harlem' that he penned and directed the demon baby classic that spawned not one but two sequels, 'It's Alive'.
Basically the film revolves around a family who own possibly the most ludicrously decorated 70s house ever, the mother tarts herself up to go into labour and the husband wonders around the hospital waiting room with other would-be Dads, smoking heavily and lending morons money for the vending machine. His wife then gives birth to a deformed, crazy baby that kills all the attending staff and escapes through the roof. Just another normal Friday night in a Larry Cohen film.
All this mutant baby hullabaloo leads the mother to be branded as crazier than bucket of miniature Piers Morgans, which, let's be fair, she is and she spends most of the rest of the film wondering around her home in an orange paisley nightie strobing with the olive green paisley wall paper while her husband, who is inexplicably fired from his job for having a ugly, violent offspring (surely that would result in 80% of the human race being unemployed but anyhew...), believes himself to be in a serious melodrama and, with the police, goes on the hunt for the demented sprog, over-acting his weirdly odd little face off.
The beginning and end of the film are rather exciting, dealing, as they do, with the birth of the malevolent little quisling and then of course the inevitable capture of the mutated, toothy brat. In the middle, however, not much happens. This is most likely due to budgetary restraints, as we hardly ever see more than just bits of the deformed, veiny headed, midget oik and it doesn't so much run amok as it does occasionally leap out of hedges and kill milkmen.
The film is played more as a family melodrama than an out and out horror and in order to drag the thing out to the requisite 90 minutes the police have to do ineptly stupid things like wonder into a school where they know it is for certain without turning any lights on, also it doesn't quite have the intelligence, beyond an obvious 'child-birth is hell' subtext, that it appears to be reaching for.
Still, that said, when watched with a rowdy group at a B-Movie night it's a bit of good fun and while it isn't exactly The Brood or Rosemary's Baby, it has it's own sort of demented charm and John P. Ryan, the lead actor is a pleasure to watch as he mugs and grimaces throughout the proceedings.
6.5 out of 10 very hammy sandwiches
Points from The Wife 6 out of 10
At first glance this is a B-Movie Dirty Harry rip off written and directed by some nutty Italians and filmed, no doubt for monetary reasons, in Montreal and it's interesting to note that everywhere but America sold it under names that hinted as such: Blazing Magnum, Tough Tony Siatta, The 44 Specialist and Big Magnum 77 (Which, in Britain, sounds like a new addition to the ice cream brand and everywhere else sounds like a ridiculously large sex aid). In America, however they sold it more as a horror/thriller, calling it 'Strange Shadows in an Empty Room' which I mention because, while there are certainly elements of Dirty Harry, Bullet and French Connection in there, the plot is also typical of Giallo, which is an Italian form of cinema, dabbled in most frequently by Dario Argento and his ilk, that deals with twisty turny murder and crime thriller stories, usually featuring nudity and gore, which Blazing Magnum has too, just not in abundance.
The truth of the matter is that it's a bit of both, part 70s, ruthless cop caper, part bizarre crime drama. It is curious and certainly interesting to note, however, that America and not Italy sold the film with a much more authentic Giallo sounding title and with a poster that depicts a blind woman and the feet of an obviously hanging corpse.
The plot, as far as I could figure it and not that it is relevant, had to do with a hardbitten detective, Stuart Whitman, whose wayward younger sister is killed at a party where she is being implausibly sleazed all over by Martin Landau's lips and, with John Saxon in tow, he must find out who killed her and why. Along the way they meet a blind girl, do battle with transvestites, lock up a doctor without any evidence, have one of the most ridiculous foot chases in the history of cinema, abuse possible suspects only to find they know absolutely nothing, turn up some information about some expensive and mysterious Oriental black pearls that may or may not be important, trash apartments, damage several cars during a chase sequence that is completely and utterly legendary, putting many modern big budget films to shame and, eventually, shoot down a helicopter over a city full of people with a hand gun.
In the end, the detective learns the deep, dark truth about his not so perfect sibling, they save blind Mia Farrow's sister and Martin Landau's lips are free to continue practicing medicine and dribbling all over healthy young co-eds. The city, I presume, foots the bill for all of Whitman's ridiculous and destructive crime solving methods.
So what we are talking about here is a film that has some of my favourite elements of all time: crime, mystery, horror, action, car chases, ridiculous one liners, stern men in brown 70s suits not taking shit from anyone all wrapped up in a crowd pleasing B-Movie bow. They honestly don't make them like this anymore, they would try but it would be hapless, self-referential, obvious, soulless pap and there'd be no slow motion shots of tits either.
Stuart Whitman's performance is a suitably snarling, gruff, heavy handed affair and as he is the only one with anything to do really, he makes the most of it. He seems to be literally one step away from actually chewing some scenery. John Saxon and Martin Landau, however, while it's always a bizarre pleasure to see them in a mad movie like this, don't have a whole lot to do at all and the less said about the somewhat drip-tasticly bland and weak performance of Tisa Farrow the better.
It is just a fantasticly ludicrous film, with absolutely no real morality (except it's wrong to kill Whitman's sister), a good dollop of over the top, brilliantly done action and a phenomenal 70s soundtrack complete with a funky full orchestra, perfect to watch in a group as a seriously amusing evening's entertainment but I suspect also a bit of fun as a Sunday afternoon action caper to watch by yourself.
The real shame is that it only seems to exist in a bad video to DVD transfer on the "Grindhouse Experience, Vol.2 Box Set" someone needs to do a special edition of this, possibly as a double bill with Gone With The Pope. It has completely whetted my appetite to just hunt down and watch more and more of these brilliant, old, curious B-Movies.
I will arrange another night like this one soon I think!
9 out of 10 gravelly voice creating shots of hard liquor
Points from The Wife 7 out of 10