I really enjoyed Rouge. Yes it’s a croc flick, but the acting seemed more honist and CGI didn’t ruel the show until the end. And event then they stayed true to how a real croc might behave (according to what I would think…)
No where near as fun as Lake Placid, but I think all the stars just happend to line up for that one. It will alwasy be a fave of mine. Much better than Primevil.
Any how, problably worth watching for typical horror fans, but maybe not for the likes of F13, who has a serious distaste for american/hollywood horror. :)
I watched Recycle on Friday whilst the furnace guy was cleaning out the boiler. God - what a stink.
Anyway, Recycle is a Pang brothers film and it was pretty enjoyable. I didn’t love the ending or the “reveal” which isn’t much of a twist, but whatever. It’s like an evil Alice in Wonderland and I guess there’s something cool about that.
Great visuals and I thought that Angelica Lee was pretty remarkable. It was easily worth the price - free on demand.
Watched Walter Hill’s The Warriors. I remembered when I saw this as a little kid, I was actually a little bit scared by the film. It has a lot of horror-movie like elements—the freaky music, the haunted, empty street scenes at night, and the look of some of the gangs (ie The Furies). Anyway, this is an excellent late 70s exploitation flick w/a simple plot, good script and characters, and lots of action. The fight scenes are damn good. It’s too bad that films aren’t made like this anymore.
Watched also, First Blood. This one was made at the cusp of the big-budget action movie explosion. There was a little bit of thought put into this flick. Amazing how the filmmakers attempted to genuinely integrate societal and political themes into the movie. Stallone plays a psycho-Vietnam veteran to perfection. Crenna and Denehey give terrific performances. The action scenes are v. well done, to say the least. The second film would go on to provide the blueprint for the 80s big-budget actioner—minimal script, lots of explosions, and one-liners, etc. Don’t get me wrong, First Blood, made me laugh out loud numerous times. It’s still a exploitation flick. ;)
Finally, to wrap up the late 70s, early 80s viewings, watched Terror Train. This one would’ve been totally buried, except for the inclusion of Jamie Lee and a v. flamboyant David Copperfield. Not nearly as enjoyable as it was when I saw it as a kid, it’s a film that really lumbers until the end. Not really much even goes on in the film. V. few attempts at scares. The filmmakers were way too conservative w/this material. It could have been a lot of fun. Late.
Okey-doke. Been having a little bit of insomina, so I’ve been watching…
2 from Paul Naschy:
A Dragonfly for Each Corpse: dir. Leon Klimovsky. Naschy does a giallo w/Erika Blanc. He plays an inspector on the trail of a killer who leaves a dragonfly at the scene of each murder. Naschy looks the part as a hard-nosed police inspector, but the real standout of the film is Blanc, who plays his inquisitive girlfriend. She’s the real reason to check this one out.
Werewolf vs. the Yeti: dir: Miguel Iglesias. Daninsky is a psychologist, who is invited on an expedition to hunt for the dreaded Yeti. Me, personally, I’da left the Yeti alone, but Daninsky runs into Tibetan bandits and vampire women and gets turned into werewolf to top it off. The showdown, which the English title refers, happens at the end PPV-style. Guess who wins.
Deadly Triangle: dir. Joaquin Romero Marchent, who directed the nasty, gory western Cut-Throats Nine. Erika Blanc is a wealthy business woman who is having an affair. Her husband is the president of her corporation and prone to having heartattacks. This thriller involves the trist between the three and plots to knock one or the other off. Silly fun.
Armageddon: dir: Alain Jessua. A would-be terrorist plans on turning the European continent on its head. Alain Delon plays the psychologist hired by the police to track him down. Quite an interesting film. It’s really a portrait of a sad and lonely man who goes to extreme lengths for attention.
Expulsion of the Devil: dir. Juan Bunuel, son of Luis. Gerard Depardieu has a small part as a member of a tv crew, who are invited to investigate the goings on in a so-called haunted house. A quiet and creepy movie, which predates a lot of similar movies to follow.
Shock Treatment: dir. Alain Jessua. Alain Delon plays the head doctor at a health resort/clinic. Anne Giradot comes to the resort to cope from exhaustion from work and relationship problems. Well, of course, there are many bizarre and surreal happenings at the resort. For example, all of the staff are brought in from Brazil or Portugal. They have to drink alcohol throughout the day to cope w/the climate. WTF? So there are a lot of scenes of the staff of the resort falling out into the pool. I watched this not knowing what would happen next.
Creation of the Damned: dir. Jose Ulloa. Massively low-budget nuclear war thriller set in an underground bunker, which looks like an efficiency apartment. Two couples, one w/a son, attempt to ride out the nuclear war in the bunker. Things like cabin fever, drug addiction, insanity, and affairs get in the way.
I watched Nil by Mouth a few days ago.smurfin amazing. All the acting is tremendous especially Ray Winstone, who I think gave one of the best performances ever. Hard to understand so I had to put subtitles on. It would be a good film to watch with your Dad. And I plan on watching Night of the Hunter for the first time tonight.
THE GREAT SILENCE, an exceptional Sergio Corbucci western. Somber stuff.
Lucio Fulci’s THE PSYCHIC. Meh.
GI BRO from the underrated Enzo G Castellari. I didn’t realize this was a retitled INGLORIOUS BASTARDS until later. I was thoroughly entertained. Must find more Bo Svenson movies.
THE QUIET EARTH from Geoff Murphy. I’m not sure I “got” it, but I liked it.
THE GREAT SILENCE, an exceptional Sergio Corbucci western. Somber stuff.
Lucio Fulci’s THE PSYCHIC. Meh.
GI BRO from the underrated Enzo G Castellari. I didn’t realize this was a retitled INGLORIOUS BASTARDS until later. I was thoroughly entertained. Must find more Bo Svenson movies.
THE QUIET EARTH from Geoff Murphy. I’m not sure I “got” it, but I liked it.
Yeah, Corbucci’s the man. I love the Great Silence but I’m partial to Companeros—I mean who doesn’t like Jack Palance as a villian, smoking weed throughout the film. Nero and Milian are never better. It also has one of my favorite Morricone scores—Vamos a Matar, Companeros!
I like Fulci’s gialli, pretty much all of them. I’d rate Don’t Torture a Duckling and New York Ripper up there w/the best from Martino, M. Bava, and Argento. Late.
A Black Ribbon for Deborah. Dir: Marcello Andrei. Would-be giallo about a woman w/psychic abilities. She witnesses a car accident involving a pregnant woman. She later becomes pregnant herself. This little riff on Rosemary’s Baby is not really standout but it was definitely weird.
Giallo All Regola. This is a late-80s mystery, which I believe was made for Italian TV. Dir: Stefano Roncoroni. A quiet and conservative dude witnesses a police shootout from the window of his Rome apartment. He sees the assailant drop a briefcase and the dude later picks it up. It’s full of cash. He becomes involved w/both the police and the gangsters. Fun, not much to write home about.
Don’t Open the Door for the Man in Black. What an excellent English translation of the title for this made-for-tv Italian film. Dir: Guilio Questi, the man who helmed the classics, Death Laid an Egg and Django, Kill…If you Live, Shoot! Guiliano Gemma and Aurore Clement star. Clement is a psychiatrist, who has a young patient who is having an affar w/an older man. She later dies. The police think suicide; Clement believes its murder. The mystery unfolds. I chuckled at some intentional laughs here, but this is not the Questi of the older classics.
Fatal Violation: dir: Leon Klimovsky. A writer goes to a secluded inn to work, which is run by a smoking-hot young lady and her disabled husband. Folks check in from time-to-time, but they keep getting knocked off by the black-gloved killer. Decent flick which takes a major riff from Hitchcock’s Psycho.
Human Cobra (aren’t these titles something?). Dir: Bitto Albertini. Fairly decent revenge/giallo-like flick, co-scripted by Ernesto Gastaldi. Giorgio Ardisson, Erika Blanc, and Janine Reynaud star. Ardisson’s twin brother is killed. He follows the trail from New York to Kenya, looking for his brother’s killer. Really fast-paced and entertaining, and Ardisson gives the best performance I’ve seen from him yet.
Killing in the Flesh. Dir. Cesare Canevari, the infamous director of Gestapo’s Last Orgy and the surreal western, Matalo. This is a giallo set in a hotel where a group of relatives meet for an uncle’s funeral. Really a lot of softcore sex and dreamy camerawork than mystery. Marc Porel and Moana Pozzi star.
Suspicion of Murder: Dir. Jean Chapot. The body of a young woman is found in the snow in the French countryside. Alain Delon plays a city cop out to investigate. He becomes involved w/ a family, whose secrets slowly become revealed. Decent flick.
i recently watched “Brutal Massacre-A Comedy”, its a total rip off of “This is Spinal Tap” which is a top ten of all time for me. I liked this movie alot. It stars David McNaughton as a washed up movie director who has one more chance to make a good film. Its fimed like a documentary and it is hilarious. I netfixed this film and liked it so much that I went out and bought it. Be sure to watch the deleted scenes, they are funny as hell. I dont know why they cut them out. Brian O Hallorhan and Gunnar Hansen are also in the film. I cant recommend it enough.
Tv Carnage Presents A Sore For Sighted Eyes - Canadian made party tape collage of various bad television clips. Edited together with some sense of irony, and featuring some magnificent badness. This is the fifth in a series of tapes, and they are all highly recommended.
Diggstown - 1992 Michael Ritchie con-man boxing movie which was a favorite of mine as a teenager. Holds up really well with James Woods, Oliver Platt and (especially) Bruce Dern giving some of the slimiest, sleaziest performances of their career. Lots of good humor, and a nice twisty ending.
Mr. Vampire - First in a famous series of Hong Kong action/horror films. This is one of the originators, and though I had to take a visit to Wikipedia to understand the rules for Jiang Shi (aka hopping vampires), this one is supremely entertaining and features some awesome action scenes. Anyone who thinks hopping vampires are lame monsters have to check this out to see how bad-ass they can be. Makes me wish the guys at Cinema Diabolica or Outside the Cinema dug the kung-fu stuff a bit more.
On the Edge: Dir. Herman Yau. W/Nick Cheung, Anthony Wong, Francis Ng, and Rain Li. I wasn’t the world’s biggest fan of Andrew Lau’s Infernal Affairs trilogy or Martin Scorsese’s equally-mediocre The Departed, so I didn’t know what to expect w/this undercover cop/triad story. It was quite the surprise. Cheung plays a cop who attempts to assimilate back into normal life after a multi-year stint working undercover as a triad. He can’t go back to his old haunts and he can’t cope w/his current partner, Wong, who acts more like a bully than a cop. V. good film—character-driven w/excellent performances from all involved.
In a similar vein, the Andrew Lau-produced, Undercover, dir. Billy Chung Siu-Hung, the plot is nearly identical to On the Edge. A former undercover cop tries to step back into normal life. One night he snorts some coke w/an old buddy. They are confronted by a police officier, who is killed by his friend. The cop attempts to track his buddy down throughout the film. Does he want to help him or lock him up? This film is really: “I had a lot more fun snorting coke, singing karoke, and sleeping w/prostitutes, as a triad, than I do having to work for a living as a cop. Pity me.” Not the greatest movie.
Chaos: Dir. Herman Yau. Yau’s latest is about a cop and a criminal who accidentally enter a enclosed part of a city. The enclosed part of the city is a prison, where the criminals run the area, a la Escape from New York. They meet up w/a pretty lady and her daughter and attempt to flee the prison. Btw, either the criminal or the cop is the daughter’s father. Massively low-budget w/a real artificial look to the film—it’s either really dark or lit w/neon colors. The sets look obvious as movie sets and the background is poor CGI. So there was a lot to potentially love about this film, but it’s v. talky and rather boring. Surprisingly conservative for Yau—if he would have pushed this one, it could have been a cult classic. Just a curiosity for now. I’d skip it.
