tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3881240583073278012024-03-13T16:59:30.179+00:00Anchorwoman In PerilBecause TV movies are movies tooRoss Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.comBlogger218125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-20151485132902523162017-06-05T22:50:00.002+01:002017-11-10T16:15:57.888+00:00Perversion Story<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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“Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly”... Yes, the Dalai Lama <em>really said that</em> in a chain email forwarded round and round the world in 1999 by people who probably also owned refrigerator magnets saying “Forget love, I'd rather fall in chocolate.”<br />
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Or perhaps he didn’t. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is that it’s generally good advice and, if you look at the evidence – Picasso painted realistically as a teenager; Stephen King was a high school English teacher – it also holds true. It’s certainly a good argument to use when you want to counter anyone who claims that “Godfather of Gore” Lucio Fulci couldn’t tell a coherent story.<br />
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Prior to his whirlwind run of insane splatter masterpieces beginning in 1979 with <em>Zombie</em>, Fulci crafted dozens of straightforward comedy, drama and action films – as well as a number of neatly-constructed gialli, including the widely-praised <em>Don’t Torture a Duckling</em> and, my favourite of his, <em>Lizard in a Woman’s Skin</em>.<br />
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But it’s his first giallo, <em>Perversion Story</em> (aka <em>One on Top of the Other</em>), which he also co-wrote, that shows him demonstrating his tightest grip on plot. It’s a kind of giallo spin on Hitchcock’s <em>Vertigo</em>, even set in San Francisco, and focusing on a man (Jean Sorel) who becomes obsessed with a woman who looks just like his dead wife. In this case, however, she’s a nightclub stripper fond of disrobing atop a golden motorbike in front of a screen covered in psychedelic blobs (ah, the Sixties) and he’s an adulterous surgeon who may have been responsible for his wife’s death in the first place (ah, the giallo genre).<br />
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While, naturally, the situation quickly descends into a complex web of deceit and murder, the perhaps surprising thing is that it never stops making sense and, particularly as it moves into its final third, becomes extremely tense. There’s no killer on the loose stabbing prostitutes in the eye with a melon baller but, what <em>Perversion Story</em> lacks in gimmickry, it makes up for with pacy plotting and a couple of genuinely surprising twists. And what it lacks in kitchen utensils, it also makes up for in fabulous Sixties fashion and decor (seriously, it’s one of the most sumptuously designed 60s flicks I think I’ve ever come across).<br />
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If there is a fault, it’s that none of the characters are particularly likable, although this is tempered by the fact that Jean Sorel and his co-star Florinda Bolkan are two of the best-looking stars in all of giallo, and together share a subtle but devilish kind of chemistry. The ending, while conclusive, also falls perhaps one scene short of being <em>totally</em> satisfying, but not in a way that spoils proceedings. Well worth checking out, it’s also the Dalai Lama’s favourite film... Honest.<br />
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<b>Rating: 4/5</b><br />
<b>Review originally published at <i>Retro Slashers</i>, 22 August 2011.</b>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-56789025110400175712017-05-16T22:04:00.000+01:002017-06-05T22:53:44.419+01:00Jack's Back<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong>I've beamed this review over to AiP from the <em>Retro Slashers</em> website, where it was published on 26 September 2011. Things have changed a little since then... <em>Jack's Back</em> is now available on Blu-ray. And, oh yeah, we now have Blu-rays. </strong><br />
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With its twins, dead prostitutes and copious dream sequences, you’d be forgiven for thinking that <em>Jack’s Back</em> is a lost Brian De Palma movie. In fact, it was written and directed by Rowdy Herrington, who – although probably best-known for the 1989 Patrick Swayzefest, <em>Road House</em> – specializes in hard-edged thrillers like <em>Striking Distance</em> (1993), <em>A Murder of Crows</em> (1998) and<em> I Witness</em> (2003), the latter of which reunited him with his leading man from <em>this</em> project, James Spader.<br />
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Spader plays rebellious medical student John Wesford, who splits his spare time between working at a free clinic and getting interviewed for the local news about the plight of L.A.’s homeless people. Also on the local news – and aggressively foreshadowed every time any character so much as walks past a TV set – is the ongoing police investigation into a serial killer who’s copycatting the crimes of Jack the Ripper one hundred years after the fact <em>to the very day!</em> Why he’s doing it in Los Angeles, however, is never actually addressed. Anyway, the gist of all this is that (a) prostitutes are turning up dead in very messy crime scenes, (b) a pregnant woman is probably going to be butchered next, and (c) Wesford is somehow going to get dragged into all this, along with his super-hot secret admirer and fellow med student, Cynthia Gibb!<br />
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That’s all you’re getting on the subject of the plot, however, because <em>Jack’s Back</em> is one of those films that works better the less you know about it on the way in. I’m tempted to draw a comparison with De Palma’s <em>Dressed to Kill</em> – not because this movie is anything like as good, but because the twists come satisfyingly thick even if you’ve guessed the identity of the killer (which, admittedly, isn’t a massive kick in the grey cells). That also means it’s good for a re-watch, making it all the more unfortunate that it hasn’t yet had a proper DVD or Blu-ray release. The closest is a full-frame video transfer put out on DVD in the UK a few years ago by a company I’ve never heard of before or since, called 111 Pictures.<br />
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That being said, <em>Jack’s Back</em> is a movie that really isn’t harmed by a VHS viewing. It’s one of those lumpy little late-80s gems like <em>I, Madman</em> or <em>976-EVIL</em> that takes place largely at night in a world of its own making, where common sense gives way to a kind of frenzied internal logic that carries you along on a suspense-high, despite the surfeit of silliness if you actually stopped to think about it.<br />
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There’s solid work from Spader, who’s always an interesting actor but never more so than when he’s asked to be ambiguous – a quality that this tricksy whodunit explores from all angles. Cynthia Gibb is also on fine, hyper-likeable form as the love interest who gets to be a little bit more than the standard woman-in-peril.<br />
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The <em>really</em> fun thing about this film, however, is a characteristic it shares with a handful of sometimes less-than-perfect slashers like <em>Cutting Class</em> and <em>Fatal Games</em>: the frequent use of plot devices requiring characters to sneak out in the middle of the night, leaving the safety of their homes to prowl around deserted buildings, strangers’ houses, and anywhere else the killer might be lurking in search of clues. To me, this “scary adventure” quality is the chief pleasure of a good midnight movie, and one that can sometimes even be heightened by the nostalgia factor of fuzzy VHS. If it’s that you’re after,<em> Jack’s Back</em> provides it in spades.<br />
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<strong>Rating: 3/5</strong>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-22048565226533716202017-05-15T22:29:00.000+01:002017-05-15T22:40:27.282+01:00Terror Stalks the Class Reunion<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Get a load of that title Did you ever hear anything that sounded more like a slasher movie? Unfortunately, <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Terror Stalks the Class Reunion</em> isn’t a lost slasher – for a start, there’s no slashing – but, while part of me is writing this review to stop others repeating my mistake, it’s also worth pointing out that there’s a little something here to entertain slasher fans looking for a fix slightly off the beaten track.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">First off, <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Terror Stalks the Class Reunion</em> (1992) is based on a Mary Higgins Clark short story and, as such, joins roughly fifteen other TV movies inspired by the works of “America’s Queen of Suspense”. Bar some atmospheric 70s offerings, the small screen isn’t exactly famed for its classic slasher output – and, fittingly, its thirty-year flirtation with Higgins Clark adaptations has resulted in nothing more than a barrage of glossy but middling potboilers that form the very definition of safe Sunday-evening viewing. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">It’s interesting to note, however, that when a certain Sean S. Cunningham was looking to follow up his breakthrough <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Friday the 13th</em> with something more mainstream but still in tune with his slasher sensibilities, he turned to Higgins Clark. Her novel <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">A Stranger Is Watching</em> was the basis for the 1982 thriller of the same name, which allowed Cunningham to indulge his nasty streak with a succession of showpiece deaths built around a hostage scenario played out in the deserted depths of Grand Central Station. </span></div>
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<em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Terror Stalks the Class Reunion</span></em><span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> is a similar tale of a kidnapped woman held prisoner by a lunatic. But where <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Stranger</em> had an incomparably brutish Rip Torn as said psycho, here we get Geraint Wyn Davies as the once “Fat Tony”, who’s lost 110 pounds – along with most of his marbles – over the course of an eight-year obsession with his old teacher Kay (Kate Nelligan). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">That’s where the class reunion connection comes in: Kay and her friend Virginia (Jennifer Beals) are in town for a get-together of staff and pupils from a US Army base school in Germany. Amidst the frivolities, Kay gets a message purporting to be from her husband and, heading back to her hotel, bumps into her former student in the parking lot except the meeting was no accident, and Tony’s plans for his favourite teacher involve handcuffs, humiliation and a harrowing stint in an escape-proof cabin deep in the woods.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">But don’t get too excited – <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Terror Stalks the Class Reunion</em> is no horror film. There’s no <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Misery</em>-style hobbling, no <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Captivity</em>-like poodle-killing mindgames. Instead, there’s the threat of an enforced “marriage” performed by a videotaped priest on a TV screen, and a lot of time spent on a largely unrelated subplot about an escaped killer thought to be stalking the area. Tension mounts in the sequences where Kay (predictably) tries to escape from her shackles while Tony’s truck (inevitably) pulls up outside; and excitement peaks as the climactic wedding ceremony turns into a violent fracas involving concealed nail scissors and a gun hidden inside a Bible. But then everything goes up in smoke in an explosive ending that stops somewhere slightly south of satisfying. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Nelligan whimpers convincingly throughout but doesn’t really do anything to make you care about her character – which is probably more of a fault with the writing, considering the feeble nature of her escape attempts. Beals on the other hand has even less to do but manages to come across as smoking hot in a slightly gutsier role. On a sad note, Werner Stocker, whose local detective, Franz, is the only character with any real charisma, died from a brain tumour a year after filming.</span></div>
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<em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Terror Stalks the Class Reunion</span></em><span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> is available on DVD in the UK under the far less fun but generally more apt title <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">For Better and for Worse</em>. Picture quality is pretty poor; in fact, if the DVD hasn’t been ripped from an old VHS (most likely the 90s US release) I’ll eat my hockey mask. The film’s just about worth a look if you like woman-in-peril movies but don’t go looking for slasher-movie thrills There’s more to be found in<em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> National Lampoon’s Class Reunion</em>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><strong>Rating: 2/5 </strong></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><strong>Review originally published on <em>Retro Slashers</em>, 25 March 2010</strong></span></div>
Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-49408150201930329172017-05-14T22:01:00.000+01:002017-05-15T22:42:46.513+01:00My Dear KillerItalians would use the term “giallo” to describe <em>any</em> mystery or thriller story, particularly those tales in the tradition of Agatha Christie, whose novels were originally published in the yellow-backed format that gave the genre its name. In fact, it’s only amongst us film fans that “giallo” has come to refer exclusively to the particular brand of violent, titillating shocker of which Tonino Valerii’s <em>My Dear Killer</em> (1972) is often cited as an example. But <em>My Dear Killer</em> also falls firmly into the first camp, being driven by a traditional whodunit narrative that some might say outweighs the lurid thrills. So which is it? A gruesome <em>giallo</em> or a more conventional mystery?<br />
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Show me an over-the-top, style-heavy thriller full of gruesome murders – like <em>Tenebrae</em> or <em>Dressed to Kill</em> – and I’m a very happy slasher-fan, although I’m just as likely to be found pondering over the more reserved convolutions of a drawing-room puzzler like <em>The Honey Pot</em> or <em>Sleuth</em>. Thankfully, movies like <em>My Dear Killer</em> prove that you can have it both ways: while carefully and densely plotted, it’s also one of the more fast-and-furious <em>gialli</em> I’ve seen – one that whistles briskly through its dark twists and turns like an underground train hurtling down a tunnel, before bursting out into the light with a clever and satisfying resolution.<br />
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George Hilton plays Inspector Peretti, called out to a flooded quarry to examine the decapitated body of an insurance investigator, but soon drawn into an older case involving the kidnapping of a little girl called Stefania, whose body was found nearby. Convinced the two cases are related, he visits the family of the dead child, only to initiate a further string of increasingly nasty murders. As Peretti probes further, the killer proves always to be one step ahead.<br />
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I’ve seen Hilton in several other <em>gialli</em> – and, having made around ten, he probably qualifies as the male equivalent of Edwige Fenech – but this is the first time he’s struck me as an irremovable part of the film. Definitely not just a serviceably bland leading man, he seems fully in charge of this investigation, revealing and explaining each new clue for the audience in such a logical way that you can’t help but be drawn in. In a romantic subplot that for once doesn’t feel extraneous, we also see the effects his workaholic nature have on his relationship, culminating in a confrontation with his girlfriend that indirectly breaks the case.<br />
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Though more concerned with plot than many a <em>giallo</em>, <em>My Dear Killer</em> also has the requisite visual touches: the quarry location returned to again and again is always bleached in eerily harsh sunlight; the camera whirls around the apartment of a victim in an extended POV scene, before closing in on a blood-spraying murder using a circular saw. There’s even a little <em>homage</em> to Orson Welles’ celebrated hall of mirrors scene from <em>The Lady from Shanghai</em>, as Peretti encounters the killer in a darkened room full of smashed glass. Like all the best <em>gialli</em>, the most important clue involves looking at a picture in a new way – in this case, a child’s drawings (an element that also effectively incorporates another of the genre’s obsessions, childhood trauma).<br />
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Fittingly for a film that juggles whodunit and slasher elements so well, we arrive at a double-climax: the first is a gruelling stalking sequence with an unlikely (and likeable) final girl; the second a traditional unmasking, with all the suspects gathered in one room in the manner of an Hercule Poirot mystery, and Peretti beginning by announcing, “The story of Stefania is also the story of your insanity, my dear, sick killer!”<br />
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Whilst not quite on the level of some of the classic <em>gialli</em>, which transcend the genre to become horror/mystery masterpieces, <em>My Dear Killer</em> is a more-than-solid outing and one that’s a good introduction for anyone interested in getting into the genre as a whole. Just bear in mind that things can get <em>much</em> more crazy and colourful than this.<br />
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<strong>Rating: 3/5</strong><br />
<strong>Review originally published on <em>Retro Slashers</em>, 11 August 2011</strong>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-35369276603391521692017-05-13T11:44:00.001+01:002020-08-11T11:45:34.032+01:00Skull Mountain Symbolism<p>Seventies horror film <i>The House on Skull Mountain</i> doesn't seem to draw much praise these days, other than for a <a href="http://brightlightsfilm.com/horror-origins-ron-honthaners-house-skull-mountain/#.WUwWqGjyuM8">clever recreation</a> of Charles Allan Gilbert's visual pun, <i>All Is Vanity</i>. But here are <b>three more great shots</b> that gave me pause -- or at least made me <i>press </i>pause. (Also includes spoilers!)</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-F1e2F0ESvQI/WUwVciUFOmI/AAAAAAAALYk/Hyr5DZRDYkkjCgs-1KNA44ZpJv6XWmFIACEwYBhgL/s1600/vlcsnap-2017-06-11-23h28m42s493.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="853" height="225" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-F1e2F0ESvQI/WUwVciUFOmI/AAAAAAAALYk/Hyr5DZRDYkkjCgs-1KNA44ZpJv6XWmFIACEwYBhgL/s400/vlcsnap-2017-06-11-23h28m42s493.png" width="400" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>The sequence where Lorena and Andrew scoot into town for a somewhat inappropriate cousins-in-love musical montage comes off as a bit of a mood-breaker, considering it's also one of the few set outside the ol' mansion. But this layered composition rescues it for me. Dried-up old terrarium thingies -- like the one Andrew picks up in a shop here -- are a major motif in the film, their glass domes and murky contents representing the deathly bubble the characters find themselves trapped within. And what do the couple do after their morning of happy-go-lucky freedom? Buy themselves another little trap, of course -- a queasy reminder of the inescapable evil surrounding them. I also like that Lorena watches the transaction from behind yet another layer of glass... Is the real trap inside or <i>outside </i>the bell jar? Shudder! </div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cbqhA2mxVNk/WUwVdcEUs7I/AAAAAAAALYk/E4T9Wnqk5OYPmL6QuJsdX3WtzHKXe8G9wCEwYBhgL/s1600/vlcsnap-2017-06-11-23h28m55s749.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="853" height="225" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cbqhA2mxVNk/WUwVdcEUs7I/AAAAAAAALYk/E4T9Wnqk5OYPmL6QuJsdX3WtzHKXe8G9wCEwYBhgL/s400/vlcsnap-2017-06-11-23h28m55s749.png" width="400" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>Snakes appear throughout <i>Skull Mountain </i>(even inside a terrarium at one point) but, most notably, coiled around the vertical wooden posts in the subterranean voodoo den. This kind of snake-on-a-stick treat also goes by the name of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rod_of_Asclepius">Rod of Asclepious</a>, a Greek symbol associated with medicine and health care -- and also resurrection. In this shot, Harriet stumbles over a shrine riddled, as shrines tend to be, with religious imagery. The centrepiece is a Virgin Mary figurine wearing a not-so-feathered boa (of the constrictor kind), which conjures up all kinds of associations with resurrection and the return from the grave... all of which very nicely foreshadows the climactic reappearance of Mrs Christophe, whose death set the story in motion. </div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2ITAzyVXyDE/WUwVcmV3LoI/AAAAAAAALYk/z9C_yfEUXIwAWAIY5U1NHj3Kd2h_FzWtQCEwYBhgL/s1600/vlcsnap-2017-06-11-00h01m57s103.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="853" height="225" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2ITAzyVXyDE/WUwVcmV3LoI/AAAAAAAALYk/z9C_yfEUXIwAWAIY5U1NHj3Kd2h_FzWtQCEwYBhgL/s400/vlcsnap-2017-06-11-00h01m57s103.png" width="400" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>Finally, notice the machetes stabbed into the ground around the body of poor Louette at the film's climax. I don't <i>think </i>we see how they get there but what they do achieve is a neat reference to the <a href="http://www.tarotteachings.com/eight-of-swords.html">Eight of Swords</a> tarot card. (I know we're four blades short but this sort of symbolism doesn't happen accidentally.) The Eight is a card of hopelessness, <i>helplessness </i>and fear, and dealing it out at this point marks the grisly fate of one character and the agonizing powerlessness of another -- the scene's main protagonist, Andrew, who's forced to stand by and watch it happen. </div><div><br /></div><div>A bit of a cheesy film, perhaps, but with its rich symbolism of death in the Deep South, <i>Skull Mountain</i> is well worth another visit.</div>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-49844869368811591372017-05-12T20:54:00.001+01:002017-05-15T22:37:10.960+01:00Red Mist<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YNn1xY7GM_I/WRYR8vJu0-I/AAAAAAAAKyw/fSkAojpoHBsaGQnYpIScaVVRCzyfyKauQCLcB/s1600/090618110141_l.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YNn1xY7GM_I/WRYR8vJu0-I/AAAAAAAAKyw/fSkAojpoHBsaGQnYpIScaVVRCzyfyKauQCLcB/s320/090618110141_l.jpg" width="228" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial";"><strong>Here's another review rescued from the depths of the Deep Web... originally published by <em>Retro Slashers</em> on 22 July 2009.</strong></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial";">I never thought I’d live long enough to see a remake of <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Aenigma</em> – Lucio Fulci’s blending of <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Carrie</em> and <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Patrick</em>, which featured killer snails and death by Tom Cruise poster. But that’s essentially what the recent British horror <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Red Mist</em> (known as <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Freakdog</em> in the </span><span style="font-family: "arial";">US</span><span style="font-family: "arial";">) is, albeit one that’s short on molluscs and big on <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Jason Goes to Hell</em>-style body-hopping. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The premise is simple: What would happen if you inadvertently sent a mentally retarded hospital janitor into a coma when a hastily organized prank designed as retaliation for a blackmail plot went wrong, only to discover that secretly injecting him with an untested wonder-drug gave him the ability not only to astral-project into the bodies of your friends, but also to stalk and kill your friends in a variety of gruesome ways while seeking misguided revenge for a crime you weren’t entirely responsible for in the first place? </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Yes, we’ve all been there, and in <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Red Mist</em> it’s the turn of junior doctor, Catherine, played by highly likeable Katherine Heigl-a-like, Arielle Kebbel, who’s since gone on to star in the uninvited remake of <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">A Tale of Two Sisters</em> (itself called <em>The Uninvited</em>, aptly enough). Since it’s not until the halfway point that Catherine actually gets handy with the hypodermic, it’s a bit of a wait before the horror kicks into high gear but, with car-door head-slamming, forced acid-drinking and naked stomach-slicing in the middle of a busy nightclub, it’s certainly worth it. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">What’s less attractive is the last-act lull, which puts Catherine in a very reactive (as opposed to <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">pro</em>active) position and, in these post-Sidney <span style="font-family: "arial";">Prescott</span><span style="font-family: "arial";"> days, means she doesn’t quite cut it as a top final girl. That’s not to say the movie peters out, though; in fact, it all ends quite satisfyingly – especially in comparison to director Paddy Breathnach’s previous horror effort, the hallucination-themed <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Shrooms</em>, which didn’t so much <em>peter out</em> as <em>flatline</em> during an epileptic fit of meaningless, are-they-tripping-or-not jump scenes. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Breathnach is Irish, and you’ll remember I described <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Red Mist</em> above as a British film, which it <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">is</em> despite being set in <span style="font-family: "arial";">America</span></span><span style="font-family: "arial";"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">. With a couple of exceptions, it appears the cast is a mixture of English, Irish and Scottish actors, all valiantly attempting American accents with differing degrees of success. The movie, too, is a tag-team of styles and subgenres, mixing the morbid medical school hijinks of <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Pathology</em> and <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Unrest</em> with torture scenes, guilty drama, and supernatural slashing. It’s as the latter it delivers most wholeheartedly, however. That, and as a gory <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Aenigma</em> variation.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";"><strong>Rating: 2/5</strong></span></div>
Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-83772639689367791642017-05-11T15:28:00.002+01:002017-05-14T22:05:10.051+01:00Amsterdamned <strong>This review was originally published on the now sadly defunct <em>Retro Slashers</em> website on 21 October 2009. I'm archiving it here at AiP for the sake of <em>all humanity...</em></strong> <br />
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You have to hand it to <em>Amsterdamned</em> – it’s got one hell of a gimmick. By 1988, the slasher genre had given us killers who hid their faces behind hockey masks, gas masks, clown masks, William Shatner masks, owl masks, pillow cases, chunks of stitched-together human skin... It was only a matter of time before one came along in full scuba gear. But <em>Amsterdamned’s</em> killer isn’t just in it for the Lycra and heavy-breathing. He (or she!) actually swims around the canals of Amsterdam, popping out to drag victims to a watery grave! Yes, you read that right. There is popping, there is killing, and there is also a giant knife in case the victims aren’t in the mood for a dip. <br />
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<em>Amsterdamned</em> is basically a Dutch giallo, but one that’s as much informed by slashers as it is Italian sleaze. As the murders mount up via a series of violently effective, <em>Jaws</em>-like set pieces, Detective Eric Visser (Huub Stapel) is called in to catch the underwater killer. Visser gets results – he’s the kind of cop who jumps out of his car when stuck in traffic and thwarts a hold-up in a pastry shop (this is Europe) before getting back behind the wheel and driving off. He also looks a bit like Greg Evigan and has a smart-mouthed teenaged daughter who, in a genius subplot, is tracking the killer herself, with the help of a psychic friend.
It’s all terrifically fast-paced, being mainstream enough to appeal to thriller fans but just perverse and nasty enough to satisfy slasher aficionados (check out the killer’s souvenir-stocked lair, as well as the final gruesome reveal of their identity). <br />
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Fittingly, it’s also swimming with red herrings, the most devious of which is a psychiatry motif that calls the sanity of a number of characters into question.
Dozens of startling stunts, seemingly performed in real-time, lend a genuine sense of danger to the proceedings – none more so than in the first of the movie’s two climaxes, which famously finds cop and killer tearing around the tight waterways of the city in speedboats. The second, equally effective final sequence brings <em>Amsterdamned</em> back to its slasher roots with an unbearably tense bit of hiding-from-the-killer on the part of the film’s final girl. <br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-YchBRp4nfNs/WRR0AAID94I/AAAAAAAAKxU/UhK5olKmVv85Scox4_cpvITs35dJULXdQCLcB/s1600/amsterdamned1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-YchBRp4nfNs/WRR0AAID94I/AAAAAAAAKxU/UhK5olKmVv85Scox4_cpvITs35dJULXdQCLcB/s1600/amsterdamned1.jpg" /></a>
For anyone wishing to pick this up – and you should be – the UK’s Nouveaux Pictures/Cine-Excess label has recently released a fine region 2 DVD, featuring an uncut widescreen transfer (the previous UK release on video lost a few seconds of a knife appearing between a girl’s legs) and a front cover that makes it look like a UFO movie. Special features include a nice making-of documentary from the 80s, but best of all is that fact that you can choose from the original Dutch language track with English subtitles or an English dub. The latter has taken some criticism for that fact that many of its actors speak with a sort of vaguely Dutch accent, but I consider it one of the best and least distracting dubs I’ve ever heard (in fact, I even forgot I was watching a dubbed version at times). Either way, with both language options available, everyone should feel catered for. The fear-soaked <em>Amsterdamned</em> is definitely one to splash out on.<br />
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<strong>Rating: 4/5</strong> Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-42804640542465164782011-11-17T13:53:00.001+00:002011-11-17T13:57:59.051+00:00Coming soon... in 1978<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cYaMSJiXAH4/TsUSbfOHMAI/AAAAAAAADeo/JhW4PtXUgng/s1600/comeback.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cYaMSJiXAH4/TsUSbfOHMAI/AAAAAAAADeo/JhW4PtXUgng/s1600/comeback.jpg" /></a>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-23998755422699304842011-11-08T19:54:00.000+00:002017-06-05T22:58:06.151+01:00It's a Twin/Thing<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SlFJzmWU6PM/TrmFXkvcUZI/AAAAAAAADeY/1z0cGdIsmuU/s1600/things.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SlFJzmWU6PM/TrmFXkvcUZI/AAAAAAAADeY/1z0cGdIsmuU/s1600/things.jpg" /></span></a></div>
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</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">There’s something about 1982’s <strong>The
Thing</strong> (rating 4/5) that affects me now in ways that failed to grab me back when I
first encountered it as a teenager. It’s a cold, draughty and dragging film.
It’s sludgy, unforgiving and a bit of an effort. It’s, well... brilliant,
really. If you never thought a monster movie could feel in any way realistic,
this one’ll leave you sprawled face-down in the ice. I’ve heard that winter
crews at Antarctic outposts watch it when all the home flights have left for
civilization. That’s pretty brave! We’re talking about a film where the only
comic relief is the borderline hysteria brought on by its ever more extreme and
disgusting developments. Kurt Russell is incredible in it, delivering a
performance that’s 87% beard and cowboy hat, but which somehow holds the whole
thing together. Not that it’s in danger of falling apart: the idea’s neat, the
script solid, and John Carpenter’s direction note-perfect in its mixture of
chilly observation and steaming relish. You’ll probably have questions
afterwards, but that’s one of its strengths. It’s a film that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">encourages</i> debate; that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">wants</i> you to work at it and pick it
apart. And then it wants you to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">puke</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The new <strong>The Thing</strong>
(3/5) slavishly fills in the backstory of Carpenter’s original, attempting to explain
how each snowmobile came to be standing in which particular snow-covered
parking spot of that abandoned Norwegian base; how each individual icicle
formed on each particular overhang; and many other thrilling enigmas barely
worth wasting another semicolon on. One thing it <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">doesn’t</i> explain is why the Thing itself – formerly an unutterably
squelchy dollop of melted face and hyperactive spaghetti – is now a smooth, shiny
digital effect that never stands still long enough to let you get a decent look
at it. Neither does it explain why the Thing doesn’t just give all that
mutating a rest for, like, five minutes and pass itself off as a dog long
enough to escape triumphantly into the wilderness like a more evil Littlest
Hobo... Hey, Miss Thing, I found myself thinking in a sassy voice, just rent <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Invasion of the Body Snatchers</i> if you
want to see how a self-replicating pod-person <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">really</i> gets shit done!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">All of which got me wondering why this <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Thing</i> had to be called “The Thing” again, when even “The Thing
Again” would’ve been a better title. This is, after all, a proper prequel rather
than a remake – a touch of mild novelty surely worth pointing out by way of a
more imaginative title. I suggest <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The New
Thing</i>... Oh no, that’s wrong. Technically, it’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Old Thing</i>... although that makes it sound like the original
film again. How about <em>Before the Thing?
First Things First? The Thing-ummy? Baby Thing? That Thing You Do?</em> (Hmm, maybe <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Thing</i> wasn’t such a bad title, after all...) </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">It’s not a bad film, either, being enjoyable in the manner
of a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Resident Evil</i> movie, and
challenging us to accept Mary Elizabeth Winstead as a leading 1980s palaeontologist
in a way that’s so serenely audacious it’s actually entertaining in itself. As
a monster movie, it’ll likely be as much of a relic as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Relic</i> in ten years’ time, having had as much deep impact on the
sci-fi genre as, er <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deep Impact</i>. But,
if the worst it does is drive you back into the squiggly arms of the original <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Thing</i>, then that’s no bad thing. (Hmm...
<em>The Bad Thing?</em> No... stop that now!)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Let’s turn our attention instead to <strong>Seconds Apart </strong>(2/5), a sort of telekinetic torture-porn slasher movie
that weds <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Carrie</i> and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Willard</i> in ways that make less sense
than this sentence. The film features Edmund and Gary Entin as twins – both
evil, both psychic, and both able to command other people to kill themselves
against their will – and Orlando Jones as a detective who’s scarred both
physically and mentally after leaving his wife to frazzle in a house fire. Said
detective is investigating said twins following a spate of suspicious suicides,
while said backstory allows flashbacks that pad out the running time.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Yes, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Seconds Apart</i>
has interesting ideas but fails to do anything very appealing with them. Its
idea of style could be described as “tones of decay and some stuff with a
snowglobe” – which is probably a direct quote from the script. What it really
could’ve done with is the colourful, black-humoured histrionics of a Tim Burton
rip-off like the aforementioned <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Willard</i>
(and I believe that may be the first time <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Willard</i>
has <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ever</i> been aforementioned) or <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">May</i>. Or an <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">actual</i> Tim Burton film like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Edward
Scissorhands</i>. Or perhaps any film that takes its title from the name of its
main character, with the possible exception of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rocky</i>. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Ooh! And <em>The</em> <em>Thing!</em></span></div>
Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-42234372879336767692010-03-25T17:35:00.005+00:002011-11-08T20:12:25.742+00:00Dean Koontz's IntensityBoy, it’s just <em>amazing</em> what you’ll get up to in your efforts to put off doing something you don’t want to do, isn’t it? Namely, avoiding working on the book you’re writing, which is the reason you haven’t updated your blog for 64 million years, give or take a century. So here I am with a little look at <strong>Dean Koontz’s Intensity</strong>. Yup, not only have I sought out a <em>three-hour TV movie</em> to watch, but now I’m actually <em>writing about it</em>... Can you say “procrastination”? Of course you can! But can you <em>spell</em> it? Ha!<br /><br />Things got so bad on the putting-off-work front today that, besides shampooing my carpets with Head & Shoulders – surprisingly tough on rug dandruff – I also managed to watch a Mary Higgins Clark TV movie... you know, the kind where a woman’s kidnapped, her fretful friend falls in love with the detective, something explodes (probably a yacht) and you wish you’d watched a proper thriller instead. The one I picked was <strong>For Better or for Worse</strong>, aka <strong>Terror Stalks the Class Reunion</strong> (now you see why I gave it a go) and you can read <a href="http://retroslashers.net/blog/terror-stalks-the-class-reunion-1992-review">my review</a> over at <em>Retro Slashers</em>... But hold your horses there, pardner! I haven’t even started <em>this</em> review yet!<br /><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/S6uf7SsisxI/AAAAAAAADHU/MaGBwrLYzS4/s1600/intensity2.jpg"><img style="WIDTH: 400px; HEIGHT: 284px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5452627614841877266" border="0" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/S6uf7SsisxI/AAAAAAAADHU/MaGBwrLYzS4/s400/intensity2.jpg" /></a><br /><br />Funnily enough, <strong>Intensity</strong> is also about a kidnap but, believe me, it’s a whole lot better than the Mary Higgins Clark outing. The clues are in the titles. Where <strong>For Better or for Worse</strong> has little of the former but lots of the latter, <strong>Intensity</strong> lives up to its name with a smattering of prolonged suspense sequences and a running time that, far from dragging everything out, actually gives it the feel of a decent novel. (This is probably the part where Dean Koontz fans point out that that’s because it’s based on one.)<br /><br />And – oh – <strong>Intensity</strong>... there’s another reason you’re interesting, and that’s down to the fact that you’re basically a blueprint for the 2003 French horror film <strong>Haute Tension</strong>/<strong>Switchblade Romance</strong>. (This sent the blogging world into a frenzy seven years ago, so I’ll let you do your own Google search.) <strong>Haute Tension</strong> is basically the jacked-up, hyper-gory, streamlined version, and a safer bet for horror fans, I guess, but taking the trip with <strong>Intensity</strong> is well worth the ride too.<br /><br />What are you in for if you do? Well, Molly Parker stars as an emotionally damaged waitress called Chyna, who can’t flip an egg without having a disturbing flashback of her awful childhood, in which she was apparently raised by Mickey and Mallory Knox whilst being pursued by a camera mounted on the back of a bee with balance problems. Chyna is visiting the family of her friend, Laura, at Thanksgiving when a serial killer played by <em>Scrubs’</em> John C. McGinley (slightly distracting) breaks in and kills everyone... Everyone, that is, except for Laura, whom he decides to tie up and kidnap, and Chyna, who sneaks undetected into the back of the killer’s getaway vehicle (a mobile home) and tries to think of a way of freeing Laura without getting captured and killed herself.<br /><br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/S6ugA3ZbidI/AAAAAAAADHc/xV62QIQlaxA/s1600/intensity.jpg"><img style="WIDTH: 400px; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5452627710593173970" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/S6ugA3ZbidI/AAAAAAAADHc/xV62QIQlaxA/s400/intensity.jpg" /></a><br /><br />The whole home-invasion is a great piece of sustained tension, as is almost every ensuing scrape Chyna manages to get herself into, from dodging the killer during a blood-splattered stopover at a gas station, to mounting an escape from the his home past a pack of hungry guard dogs. Piper Laurie pops up as a motorist dragged into the chase, and there’s also the small matter of a kidnapped child who needs rescuing from the monster’s lair. If it’s woman-in-peril thrills you’re after, you can’t go wrong with this one, really. It’s twice as suspenseful as most similar offerings, not to mention twice as <em>long</em>.<br /><br />Intense procrastination material, then.<br /><br /><strong>Rating: 4/5</strong>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-65840028905817519082009-10-18T22:00:00.003+01:002009-10-18T22:06:06.158+01:00Bloodbath at the House of Death<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/StuDJXikHJI/AAAAAAAADAg/nCPsdStO_RE/s1600-h/vlcsnap-112028.png"><img style="WIDTH: 400px; HEIGHT: 225px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5394049175667350674" border="0" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/StuDJXikHJI/AAAAAAAADAg/nCPsdStO_RE/s400/vlcsnap-112028.png" /></a><br /><br />If you’ve ever wanted to see Vincent Price bang his hand on an axe-head and shout “Oh shit!” then this British horror spoof is the movie for you. Price appears as “The Sinister Man”, parodying his roles in various Roger Corman films, and is for a while the best thing about <strong>Bloodbath at the House of Death </strong>(1984), until his unceremonious exit about halfway through. Amongst the rest of the cast – most of whom play scientists and other experts investigating the titular mansion – Pamela Stephenson (<em>Not the Nine O’Clock News</em>) probably comes off best, despite enduring copious fart gags, Kenny Everett’s dubious attempts at physical comedy, and being stripped naked by an invisible force <em>à la</em> <strong>The Entity</strong>.<br /><br />Yes, the standard of jokes in <strong>Bloodbath</strong> is about on a par with <em>The Kenny Everett Television Show</em>, meaning that you’ll likely either love it or hate it depending on your taste for innuendo-strewn, frequently incoherent grossness. If anything, however, the freedom to push the gore and nudity to the limit results in a lazier approach, meaning that the writers are too often content to rely on the aforementioned fart gags, while anything approaching a clever spoof of horror clichés falls by the wayside.<br /><br /><strong>Bloodbath</strong> works best through a haze of nostalgia, recalling a time in British history when increasing permissiveness on TV collided head-on with escalating concerns over violent “video nasties” – and this feels like the bloody aftermath. Call an ambulance... Or, better still, a coroner.<br /><br /><strong>Rating: 1/5</strong>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-26873240511728341412009-10-17T14:43:00.003+01:002009-10-17T14:49:02.449+01:00Wet Gold<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/StnKmOx8zVI/AAAAAAAADAQ/a9-C2oRkh0I/s1600-h/vlcsnap-222242.png"><img style="WIDTH: 400px; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5393564786904321362" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/StnKmOx8zVI/AAAAAAAADAQ/a9-C2oRkh0I/s400/vlcsnap-222242.png" /></a><br /><br />Does DVD picture quality reflect the quality of a film? I’ve often wondered, but no more so than when I got about halfway through<strong> Wet Gold</strong>, a 1984 TV movie that tries to do for underwater adventure stories what <strong>The Deep</strong> did for underwater adventure stories. And fails. (I’d like to say “spectacularly” but putting that word anywhere near a review of this film would be misleading.)<br /><br />So, anyway, the DVD’s picture quality – if you can call it that – is not good, but that’s not always a problem. A bigger one for <strong>Wet Gold</strong> is the fact that it very quickly descends into a quagmire of dull double-crossing between people you care very little about. There’s Brooke Shields as a Florida waitress who dreams of bigger things (shame she turns out to be so lazy and self-centred, then); Burgess Meredith as a drunken seadog who knows the location of a fortune in sunken gold; and Thomas Byrd and Brian Kerwin as the deckhand and diver competing for Shields’ affections.<br /><br />The four of them head out to sea, they find the treasure, they see a SHARK! (at this point, I thought things were going to get interesting... alas not) and they have a run-in with some pirates. But mostly they go skin-diving and argue about their shares in the loot. It’s all quite dreary, really, although there is a nice moment involving the underside of a boat and the topside of a character’s skull that redefines the term “propellerhead”.<br /><br />I’m easy to please when it comes to underwater action movies. There simply aren’t enough of them (unless you count submarine flicks, which to me are as interesting as films set in warehouses) but <strong>Wet Gold</strong> isn’t a good example of one, despite some decent scenes inside a sunken shipwreck. If you’re looking for a schlocky oceanic crime story along the lines of <strong>The Deep</strong> and <strong>Into the Blue</strong>, try <a href="http://anchorwomaninperil.blogspot.com/2008/03/shark.html"><strong>Shark</strong></a> or <strong>Night of the Sharks</strong> instead. This one sunk without trace for a reason.<br /><br /><strong>Rating: 2/5</strong>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-63422385716932416902009-07-22T11:23:00.025+01:002017-05-12T21:21:02.416+01:00AiP’s annual post<div align="left">
Don’t joke! If not <em>quite</em> my only post this year, this is certainly my first in over a month. And I feel bad about that, I really do. I could write a list of excuses, I could tell you how busy I am with my other blog, <a href="http://myfirstdictionary.blogspot.com/"><em>My First Dictionary</em></a>, I could ’splain it all to you over croissants and a mint julep, but I sense none of those would do any good anyhow. And pastry with cocktails is never a good idea.</div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana"; font-size: 85%;"><em><strong>A bunker like that from which I emerged today</strong></em></span></div>
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Perhaps the main reason I’ve not been updating recently is that I simply haven’t watched anything in an AiP vein to write about. I’ve hardly watched any films at <em>all</em>, in fact, since I last reviewed the new <a href="http://anchorwomaninperil.blogspot.com/2009/06/next-house-on-left.html"><strong>Last House on the Left</strong></a> a few weeks back, although the ones I have seen (<strong>Gran Torino</strong>, <strong>Bolt</strong>, <strong>Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince</strong>) – mainstream as they are – have all been quite good. There’s also been <strong>Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff</strong>, which I hope to write about here shortly (because it’s really quite interesting, y’know) and something called <strong><a href="http://anchorwomaninperil.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/red-mist.html">Red Mist</a></strong>.<br />
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<img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5361231379700767506" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SmbriOm92xI/AAAAAAAACyw/XIV1Qb648NA/s400/bunkerfish" style="cursor: hand; display: block; height: 213px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 320px;" /> <span style="font-family: "arial";"><strong><em><span style="font-family: "verdana"; font-size: 85%;">Bunker fish. I saw lots of these in my bunker.</span></em> </strong></span></div>
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What about the stuff I <em>haven’t</em> done? Well, I’m mad, mad, mad, <em>MAD</em> with myself for missing the submission deadline for <a href="http://vinceliaguno.blogspot.com/">Vince Liaguno</a>’s mouth-watering upcoming slasher book, <a href="http://swingingmachetes.blogspot.com/"><em>Butcher Knives & Body Counts</em></a>. Not that I expect to have had anything accepted but – damn – it would’ve been worth it to get the <em>chance</em> to have something included in the kind of good company that’s been announced so far.</div>
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And, speaking of good company, I happen to know that super-scribe <a href="http://madefortvmayhem.blogspot.com/">Amanda By Night</a> is working on something pretty special at the moment, which she asked me to be a part of but which I’ve unforgivably neglected of late. Let’s see if I can get back on track a bit and enable her to get it finished before AiP’s <em>next</em> annual post.</div>
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In the meantime, I highly recommend becoming a follower of <a href="http://towerfarm.blogspot.com/"><em>Tower Farm Reviews</em></a>, in my opinion the natural successor to <em>Anchorwoman In Peril</em>, where Billy and JM have an uncanny knack of picking the movies <em>I</em> keep meaning to be review... Seriously, can you think of any other site that could segue effortlessly from <strong>Ticks</strong> to <strong>Roller Boogie</strong> in the space of a few reviews? I rest my case (and hopefully not on your foot).</div>
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See you intermittently!* </div>
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<em>*No guarantee of intermittent reader-writer reunion is implied or should be inferred.</em></div>
Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-29533941367346291512009-06-14T21:18:00.004+01:002011-11-08T20:12:25.674+00:00Next house on the left<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SjVci79R7wI/AAAAAAAACo4/WhjwljWTN4Y/s1600-h/lasthouse.bmp"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5347281887852359426" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 216px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 320px" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SjVci79R7wI/AAAAAAAACo4/WhjwljWTN4Y/s320/lasthouse.bmp" border="0" /></a>Because I generally like films about rape and murder – and because, as we all know, remakes are always just <em>great</em> – I decided to rush out and give the new <strong>Last House on the Left</strong> a try on its UK opening day. So I sat there in the dark with about eight strangers – some of whom gasped at the graphic stabbings, sexual assaults and miscellaneous mutilations – and thought: <em>Why am I doing this? Am I sick?</em> But you know what? This film is <em>just great</em>. And I’m <em>not</em> sick, I assure you... Although I guess I would say that.<br /><br />I’m a fan of Wes Craven’s original. What horror fan isn’t? It’s not perfect (I’m sure you’ll have your own reasons – possibly several – as to why) and Craven would come on leaps and bounds as a filmmaker throughout the rest of the 70s, but it works by succeeding at everything it’s trying to do and, crucially, horrifying the hell out of you three decades on.<br /><br />The <em>new</em> <strong>Last House</strong> actually smoothes out a lot of these imperfections both plot-wise and stylistically. Which isn’t to say it’s a superior film; I think the original holds its own just because it got there first. But it certainly doesn’t insult the original, unlike many a recent remake, and it stands alone in a way the <strong>Friday the 13th</strong> and <strong>Halloween</strong> remakes don’t.<br /><br />Quality films about rape and murder are usually foreign, and sometimes quite boring and pretentious. <strong>The Last House on the Left</strong> is certainly quality – it’s got a lush, orchestral score, beautiful cinematography and a capable cast – and it drags you in on the weight of your own gloomy expectations that its initial idyll can’t last. Of <em>course</em> bad things are going to happen to its teenage protagonists, although I can’t say whether or not you’ll find them more disturbing that those in the original (I found them less so – just slightly – thanks to the high production values and reduced sense of humiliation).<br /><br />Pretentious it definitely isn’t, however. While it’s sensible enough to make you believe it, it’s also plenty pulpy when you just want that revenge-kick. It doesn’t pussy-foot, but it’s not tactless either. By dishing out dollops of nasty mayhem in its final third it does what <strong>Funny Games</strong> (the original <em>and</em> remake) denies – that is, allows you to wallow in the horror. After all, it’s a <em>horror</em> movie. It’s supposed to be chock-full of horrible, and it’s supposed to be a cathartic experience... In fact, now that I’ve seen the new <strong>Last House</strong>, I think I’ll be able to get through the next three weeks without kicking a single kitten.<br /><br />It’s <em>that</em> good.<br /><br /><strong>Rating: 4/5</strong>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-1477082487790412922009-06-01T23:30:00.011+01:002011-11-08T20:12:25.610+00:00Bad day at the office?Some recent gallivanting around Europe has put me in possession of a couple of obscure horror films with a workplace theme. But without visiting the IMDb and spoiling all the fun, I know next to nothing about either, other than what’s written (in Dutch) on the DVD covers...<br /><br /><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SiRZQMRvUfI/AAAAAAAACjg/EByhh-JpGaY/s1600-h/officeparty.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5342493192676659698" style="WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 266px" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SiRZQMRvUfI/AAAAAAAACjg/EByhh-JpGaY/s400/officeparty.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br />First up, there’s <strong>Office Party</strong>, a “psychologische thriller” starring Michael Ironside and David Warner, one of whom appears to be wearing a scary mask in the stills on the box. While Ironside is touted on the front cover, however, it’s Warner who’s mentioned in the plot description on the back, so I can’t really tell which is the hero. I’m guessing it’s Warner because his character appears to be called Eugene, and I can’t imagine a masked killer going by that name (oh, how quickly we forget <a href="http://anchorwomaninperil.blogspot.com/2008/01/phantom-of-mall-erics-revenge.html"><strong>Eric’s Revenge</strong></a>). From the looks of things, I’m thinking Eugene and his co-workers are trapped inside an office building by a deranged murderer and must fight to survive the night!<br /><br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SiRZZJYRGcI/AAAAAAAACjw/7khE_iBwtNQ/s1600-h/officekiller.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5342493346517555650" style="WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 267px" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SiRZZJYRGcI/AAAAAAAACjw/7khE_iBwtNQ/s400/officekiller.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Then there’s <strong>Office <em>Killer</em></strong>, which – joy of joys – stars Carol Kane. Judging by the cover (a dubious practice, I hear) she’s in mousy mode, but don’t be fooled, as <em>“she will kill her way to the top!”</em> apparently... Just like Michael Caine in <strong>A Shock to the System</strong>, perhaps? Quite frankly, I’ll be happy enough if this is simply better than the disappointing <strong>The Temp</strong>, which it also appears to resemble. But I can’t get enough of stationery-item-related violence at the moment (<strong>Drag Me to</strong> <strong>Hell</strong>’s stapler and ruler antics had me in fits) so, if Carol gets handy with a letter opener – or even just a few paperclips – I’ll be pleased as (a hole) punch.<br /><br />I’ll be scheduling <strong>Office Party</strong> and <strong>Office Killer</strong> for their performance appraisals just as soon as I find a free slot in my Filofax.Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-59643883384599493712009-05-27T15:04:00.010+01:002009-05-29T12:25:31.089+01:00It!It’s no secret that my goal in life is to watch every movie Roddy McDowall ever made. But did you also know that my <em>other</em> goal in life is to watch every <em>giant killer statue</em> movie ever made? Well, it is. And I made this life-altering decision about two minutes after I watched the 1966 Brit flick <strong>It!</strong> – which not only stars Roddy McDowall but <em>also</em> features a giant killer statue. Talk about everything clicking into place!<br /><br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sh1JlElUrhI/AAAAAAAACiY/HI-HrcYeMpY/s1600-h/IT.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5340505634365550098" style="WIDTH: 355px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 278px" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sh1JlElUrhI/AAAAAAAACiY/HI-HrcYeMpY/s400/IT.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br />You want to see the Rodster overacting like he’s never overacted before? Watch<strong> It!</strong> You want to see giant killer statues punching holes in London landmarks? Again, watch <strong>It!</strong> In fact, we could all save a lot of time if you just switched off your computer right now and went and watched <strong>It!</strong> – but I understand you come here for in-depth critical analysis and film theory, so let’s plough on.<br /><br />Roddy plays Arthur Pimm, a curator’s assistant who lives at home with his elderly mother. And, when I say “elderly,” I mean old... <em>Cobwebby</em> old. Yes, Mrs Pimm is actually a rotting corpse sitting in a rocking chair in her son’s bedroom. (I know... where have I seen this idea before, right? It’s on the tip of my tongue...) Anyway, Pimm talks to her, dresses her, and carries her around the house, but mostly she just sits there rocking quietly in her chair. Quite <em>how</em> she manages to rock is never actually explained. She is, after all, <em>dead</em>. But rock she does, and very spooky it is too, thankyouverymuch.<br /><br />One evening sometime in Scene 2, Pimm is called out to the museum’s storage warehouse, the scene of a devastating fire that’s destroyed almost everything the museum owns. Oh, except for a large, scowling stone figure, which may – or may not – be a giant killer statue. I’m giving nothing away. Pimm gives it the benefit of the doubt but, when his boss gets an unseen whack to the back of the head whilst standing near the statue, things aren’t really going in its favour. Particularly when the curator dies as a result.<br /><br />Was it the statue that delivered the fatal blow? All we know is that, where once its arms were in an extended position, one of them now seems to be pointing downward, and Roddy does to great lengths to illustrate this using an umbrella and a range of puzzled facial expressions. I tell you: you don’t know what acting <em>is</em> until you’ve seen someone using a brolly to mime the motions of a giant killer statue.<br /><br />Let’s cut to the chase, anyway, because <strong>It!</strong> doesn’t keep you guessing for long. It’s a <em>Frankenstein</em> story at heart and the statue is actually a golem, which is to say it’s an ancient, folkloric monster of unlimited strength, compelled to do the bidding of its master. In the right hands, it could be the most lethal WMD the world has ever seen. In Mr Pimm’s hands, it helps steal a few bracelets and smack anyone round the head who stands between him and the job of head curator.<br /><br />Around about this point, I’d love to provide you with a screen grab of the golem but, since I watched <strong>It!</strong> on TV, I can’t do my usual high-tech wizardry – and there don’t even seem to be any good pictures online, either. But I will say it’s quite an effective-looking monster and I’m sure would’ve caused me a nightmare or two when I was younger. Oh, hang on, here’s a likeness from an old print ad... Prepare to shudder!<br /><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sh1Jf0uenDI/AAAAAAAACiQ/Vw9HEMQ7v64/s1600-h/it-logo.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5340505544209636402" style="WIDTH: 250px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 385px" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sh1Jf0uenDI/AAAAAAAACiQ/Vw9HEMQ7v64/s400/it-logo.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Golems aside, I had to marvel at Pimm’s <em>other</em> secret weapon: his marvellous filing cabinet. Whenever he needs anything (or, alternatively, needs to <em>hide</em> anything) it’s straight into the top drawer and the problem’s solved. It’s <em>so</em> good, in fact, and so devastatingly <em>handy</em>, I actually began to wonder if that filing cabinet was really the “It!” of the title. Again, a screen grab would be wonderful here, but you’ll just have to make do with this randomly-sourced image... Prepare to marvel!<br /><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sh1JYk4nO2I/AAAAAAAACiI/1mZs69405MU/s1600-h/filingcabinet.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5340505419698092898" style="WIDTH: 275px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 366px" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sh1JYk4nO2I/AAAAAAAACiI/1mZs69405MU/s400/filingcabinet.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Sheesh! Look at that thing <em>go!</em> Anyway, I don’t want to spoil the rest of the film for you but I can’t <em>not</em> mention that the last twenty minutes of <strong>It!</strong> are so insane, they make the build-up look like a serious documentary about dangerous stonemasonry. There’s motorbike stunts, old ladies being torched, and the dropping of a nuclear bomb somewhere in the Home Counties. Those sweet, <em>sweet</em> 1960s!<br /><br />Wheel out your Wondrous Filing Cabinet of Wonder and file under “<strong>It!</strong>’s awesome!”<br /><br /><strong>Rating: 3/5</strong>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-3069725864763111322009-05-07T16:50:00.006+01:002011-11-17T13:59:03.165+00:00Don't be a dummyYou’ve seen <strong>Dead Silence</strong>. You’ve seen <strong>Magic</strong> and <strong>Dead of Night</strong>. If you’re a real straight-to-DVD masochist, you may even have seen <strong>The Dummy</strong> and <strong>Triloquist</strong>. But can anything prepare you for...<br />
<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SgMD_lBBNpI/AAAAAAAACdc/RRqIvK5zMcw/s1600-h/dummy.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5333110774539826834" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SgMD_lBBNpI/AAAAAAAACdc/RRqIvK5zMcw/s400/dummy.jpg" style="height: 400px; width: 265px;" /></a><br />
<br />Now <em>tell</em> me that’s not the scariest ventriloquist’s dummy you’ve ever seen. I’m not sure about Melbourne Ales putting <em>life</em> into you, so much as <em>The Fear Of God!</em><br />
I found that newspaper ad in a copy of the <em>Yorkshire Evening News</em> from 1955. The reason behind me posting it? Um... yeah, ya got me there. Although I <em>have</em> been watching 1967’s <strong>It!</strong> which is all about a murderous statue come to life. So that’s <em>kinda</em> like a deadly dummy, no?<br />
<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SgMKJtE5qcI/AAAAAAAACdk/zPF7pMErtTM/s1600-h/it.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5333117545572051394" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SgMKJtE5qcI/AAAAAAAACdk/zPF7pMErtTM/s400/it.jpg" style="height: 400px; width: 268px;" /></a><br />
<br />Okay, no. But it does have Roddy McDowall in it... Therefore <strong>It!</strong> equals automatic joy! Review on the way.Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-82669007279615128662009-05-01T23:23:00.009+01:002009-05-01T23:36:23.626+01:00Slaughter High<p><strong>Slaughter High</strong> is a slasher that goes straight down the middle. It’s not great, it’s not crappy and, when I watched it, I forgot why I supposedly like slashers so much in the first place. In fact, I felt like any <em>normal</em> person watching a slasher. I was mildly entertained, yet I was unmoved. I felt no affection towards the genre, nor any great loathing of it. I wondered why I wasn’t watching something with more famous people in it. Or <em>any</em> famous people. Or some explosions. It was <em>weeeeeird</em>.<br /><br />The movie itself hasn’t been put together with any great thought. It starts with a prank that goes predictably wrong... Well, I say “predictably” but I’m not sure if anyone who hasn’t seen this would be able to imagine how said prank goes from humiliating the school nerd in the locker room to said nerd having his face blown off by an exploding jar of nitric acid. I guess It’s just another sad incidence of violence in our schools...</p><p><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sft3Lc4XEFI/AAAAAAAACas/ingZDCfZx18/s400/slaughter2.jpg" /><br /><br />Anyway, the nerd is Marty (Simon Scuddamore) and he’s not particularly likeable, which might be detrimental to the plot if this were a straightforward tale of feelgood revenge (but it’s not). His taunting classmates aren’t especially appealing, either, although they do eventually become tolerable simply due to the fact that the film spends most of its time with them. Where? Back in the school, five years on from graduation, where the guilty gang have arrived to celebrate their reunion. Funny thing is: no one else from the Class of Nineteen-Eighty-Whenever has turned up. It’s just them. The school’s been closed down but their lockers are still there, and each contains an item they thought they’d lost long ago. Spooky, huh?<br /><br />Faced with a desolate, cobweb-strewn building, some creepy props and no one around, you’d think the teens would blow the joint and find somewhere worth partying in, but they stay to down a few beers – a plan that quickly goes awry when one of their number drinks from an acid-spiked can and finds his intestines bursting from his stomach with the projectile force of the creature from <strong>Alien</strong>. Most of the teens flee – only to find the doors and windows blocked by electric fencing – while one decides to take a bath, naturally, in the school’s, um... student bathtub? Again, not a good plan, in any case, as acid comes churning out of the mixer tap and bath-girl promptly dissolves like a giant Alka-Seltzer®.</p><p><img src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sft3TiDJXMI/AAAAAAAACa0/uJGcyw77yWQ/s400/slaughter1.jpg" /><br /></p><p>An acid-base slasher, then? Nope. I think that’s it for the chemistry-related killings, although the remaining death scenes <em>are</em> fairly memorable, especially one involving electrocution and dirty talk. It’s not that <strong>Slaughter High</strong> doesn’t <em>try</em>. It just doesn’t seem to impress. That’s even more surprising when you take into account the climactic chase scenes, which I have to admit are quite brilliantly filmed using a Steadicam. It’s a great technique, and it throws you right into the action... but, again, you probably won’t care enough to get <em>too</em> worked up.<br /><br />Until recently, <strong>Slaughter High</strong> was considered something of a lost slasher, having had no DVD release and drifting about in rated and unrated versions on video in the US, and a heavily cut version in the UK. Lionsgate’s new DVD puts out when it comes to being uncut, but is also the most blatant case of poor-quality VHS transferred straight to disc I think I’ve ever seen from a reputable distributor. Now, I wouldn’t have minded <em>at all</em> if I’d been watching on video, but I wasn’t, and that sucked. It’s distracting, disappointing and reeks of cutting corners to cut costs.<br /><br />On the other hand, the disc’s trivia track invaluably informed me that, when one character donned a hockey mask, it was a tribute to <strong>Friday the 13th</strong>. Not a <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">total</span> waste then.<br /><br /><strong>Rating: 3/5</strong> </p>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-37546026758780554422009-04-14T22:45:00.006+01:002011-11-08T20:12:25.723+00:00Kicking against the pricks<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SeUFqi9h-eI/AAAAAAAACUY/K0D_7Q-2cB0/s1600-h/splinter1.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324668362933008866" style="WIDTH: 142px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SeUFqi9h-eI/AAAAAAAACUY/K0D_7Q-2cB0/s200/splinter1.jpg" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SeUFq1owIPI/AAAAAAAACUg/_Fs-S5dYBhg/s1600-h/splinter2.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324668367946129650" style="WIDTH: 142px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SeUFq1owIPI/AAAAAAAACUg/_Fs-S5dYBhg/s200/splinter2.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Toby Wilkins knows a thing or two about visual effects, having been in the business for the last ten years, and his first feature film as director bears this out. You can see the proof there on the cover of <strong>Splinter</strong>: he’s created “the year’s best beast”, according to <em>LA Weekly</em>. And, you know, I’m not going to argue. <strong>Splinter</strong>’s figure-skating fusion of amalgamated body parts is downright horrific and perfectly realized (I know because I watched the special feature on the DVD and they way they brought it to life really <em>is</em> clever).<br /><br />Wilkins himself is British, which may explain why we got <strong>Splinter</strong> on DVD a few weeks ago, while it’s only out in the US today. As a low-budget monster movie, it’s pretty fantastic. The creature’s great, the story works, there’s loads of gore, and the characters’ actions are fairly reasonable. In fact, if there is a flaw, it’s that there aren’t <em>enough</em> characters. We’re more used to seeing superfluous extras picked off left, right and centre, whereas the action here centres almost entirely around three people trapped inside a gas station convenience store. But don’t be put off by the location – there’s plenty of exciting stuff going on (none of which involves beef jerky or porn mags) and when characters meet their ends, they do so in spectacularly nasty fashion.<br /><br />That’s the US DVD on the left above, with the UK release to the right... One-nil to us Britishers, I say. Give <strong>Splinter</strong> a go.Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-77642669090100209172009-04-05T16:11:00.015+01:002009-04-05T17:45:36.800+01:00ManhuntThere’s backwoods, and then there’s <em>backwoods</em>. And, by the latter, I mean 1970s Norway... Is there anyplace worse to find yourself in a slasher movie? <strong>Manhunt</strong>, known as <em>Rovdyr</em> in its home country, sets out to answer this question – and does so with a decent amount of gory panache but nothing in the way of originality.<br /><br />That surprised me, actually. My most recent encounter with Scandinavian cinema was the blindingly unique <strong>Let the Right One In</strong>, which does things to the teen-vampire genre that would make an Eastern European hooker blush. And, before that, there was <strong>Cold Prey</strong>: also Scandinavian, also snowy, also bloody brilliant. <strong>Manhunt</strong> doesn’t have the snow. Nor the brilliance.<br /><br />It’s 1974, the year of <strong>The Texas Chain Saw Massacre</strong>, but Tobe Hooper’s film obviously hasn’t made it as far as Norway yet because the four teenage protagonists of <strong>Manhunt</strong> don’t seem to realize it’s not really a good idea to drive somewhere remote in a camper van, make fun of the locals, and pick up a half-crazy hitchhiker. Pretty soon, the hitchhiker is dead, one of the <em>teens</em> is dead (shotgunned graphically in the heel, and then – oops – the head) and the survivors are on the run from some scruffy, possibly inbred hunters who prefer human prey to woodland wildlife.<br /><br /><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5321227002428657410" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 170px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdjLxAD6DwI/AAAAAAAACSA/USaqpOMya9s/s400/mh1.jpg" border="0" /><br /><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5321227143478901314" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 170px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdjL5Ng5-kI/AAAAAAAACSQ/t-HB7yFw6PI/s400/mh2.jpg" border="0" /><br />That’s pretty much where the <strong>TCM</strong> referencing stops and, unfortunately, the story along with it. <strong>Manhunt</strong> offers nothing else beyond running and hiding in the woods for the rest of its scant, 75-minute running time. We never get to understand, or even <em>meet</em>, the killers in any detail, there aren’t any actual set pieces (like <strong>Wrong</strong> <strong>Turn</strong>’s masterful keyhole, treetop or waterfall sequences) and it’s not even particularly suspenseful. But then, I wasn’t bored, either... Damn you, <strong>Manhunt</strong>! You should be a pointless retread but there’s something – <em>something!</em> – about you that keeps you interesting. I’ll be damned if I know what it is, though.<br /><br /><p><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5321227373567427026" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 171px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdjMGmqSQdI/AAAAAAAACSg/Yp1U7qJH1B4/s400/mh3.png" border="0" /> </p><p>Quite simply, there’s no justice: the use of <strong>The Texas Chain Saw Massacre</strong> goes way beyond a simple jumping-off point for <strong>Mannunt</strong>. It’s more like a straight remake-cum-rip-off, only without the second half. Sorta like this: </p><p><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5321248271002283394" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 212px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdjfG_rArYI/AAAAAAAACSw/wuIM3gRf2mY/s400/DIAGRAM.png" border="0" /></p><br />Is it <em>really</em> feasible, however, that someone would virtually remake a 35-year-old film and not only fall far short in comparison, but also chuck out all the accumulated slasher learnings of the past three decades? <strong>Manhunt</strong> does <em>nothing</em> new. It doesn’t even <em>try</em> to do anything new, except set itself in Norway.<br /><br />Speaking of which, I think I’ll remake <strong>Halloween</strong> and set it in the Maldives. That Michael Myers could really use a nice tan.<br /><br /><strong>Rating: 3/5</strong>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-40060641735959505062009-04-01T08:14:00.006+01:002011-11-08T20:12:25.730+00:00Put your hands up<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdMZqE3t4dI/AAAAAAAACPA/jAfnA10bwtA/s1600-h/hands.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5319623795507323346" style="WIDTH: 142px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdMZqE3t4dI/AAAAAAAACPA/jAfnA10bwtA/s200/hands.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div><br /><div>If you’re in any way interested in the development of the slasher genre and haven’t yet read Snake Oil’s <em>Proto-Slashers</em> take on <strong>Hands of the Ripper</strong>, get yourself over to the <a href="http://retroslashers.net/blog/proto-slashers-hands-of-the-ripper/">Retro Slashers Blog</a> and have a gander, as they say in period London. The 1971 Hammer horror is the latest in Snake Oil’s fascinating look at the films that paved the way for the modern slasher, and if this appetizing review doesn’t have you gagging to see it... <em>YOU’RE ALREADY DEAD!</em> Or something.<br /><br />I’ve also just discovered there’s a <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B000I0QSVC?ie=UTF8&tag=slasherbase-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=19450&creativeASIN=B000I0QSVC">special edition DVD</a> available, at least in the UK. (That’s the cover above, see?) Yes, for once, we Brits get the, er, longer end of the stick, the one without the poop on it.</div><div></div><div>Previous previews in the <em>Proto-Slashers</em> series (and try saying that in a hurry) include: Francis Ford Coppola’s <a href="http://retroslashers.net/blog/proto-slashers-1-%25e2%2580%259cdementia-13-1963/">Dementia 13</a> (1963), the PG-rated sickie <a href="http://retroslashers.net/blog/proto-slashers-2-blood-and-lace-1972/">Blood and Lace</a> (1971), and the British babysitter-in-peril movie <a href="http://retroslashers.net/blog/proto-slashers-3-fright-%25e2%2580%2593-1971/">Fright</a> (also 1971... What made the world so <em>angry</em> that year?). </div></div>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-8445772422421760102009-03-31T00:58:00.007+01:002009-03-31T01:10:18.293+01:00Mum & Dad<p>Well, really! Who wants to see knitting needles going into places where they definitely shouldn’t? Or chunks of human flesh used as masturbatory aids? And Christmas decorations made from mutilated corpses?! Not me! BAN THIS SICK FILTH, I say... I’ve had enough!</p><p><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5319136167228274658" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 225px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdFeKX-S9-I/AAAAAAAACOQ/2UTemsDpfGA/s400/md3.jpg" border="0" /></p><p style="TEXT-ALIGN: left">Hee! Gotcha. Although <strong>Mum & Dad</strong> quite obviously goes out of its way to disgust you with its depravities, it’s actually <em>nice</em> to see a torture-porn-type flick that’s clearly aimed at seasoned horror fans, as opposed to shock-me-once teenage moviegoers. It’s also pretty well acted, creepily convincing, and astonishingly good-looking considering its £100,000 budget.</p><p>Oh, and the BBC stumped up some of the money to make it, so it practically counts as Public Service Broadcasting... Just call yourself a responsible adult.</p><p><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5319135940442134610" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 225px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdFd9LIRGFI/AAAAAAAACOI/P8t8NbKXqDE/s400/md1.jpg" border="0" /><br />At the outset, <strong>Mum & Dad</strong> reminded me a bit of 2004’s London Underground chiller <strong>Creep</strong>, although it’s nothing like it, really. The reason I thought that was because it also has a foreign-girl-in-London lead – in this case, Lena (Olga Fedori), a young Polish woman working as a cleaner at Heathrow Airport. Where <strong>Creep</strong> pitted its heroine against a sort of over-the-top monster-human in a gothic setting, however, <strong>Mum & Dad</strong> takes Lena into what <em>seems</em> like a very ordinary suburban home. Of course, it’s anything but... The run-down house beside the airport, which Lena ends up in when she misses her last bus one night, actually has more in common with the home of Fred and Rosemary West.<br /><br />In fact, it’s home to two “children”, Birdie and Elbie, who spend their days ransacking lost luggage for electrical items to sell at the car boot. Then there’s their “Dad” (Perry Benson), who wears a blood-soaked vest and does dubious things in a dark room with a dirty hammer, and finally “Mum” (Dido Miles) who prefers a scalpel. It’s the kind of place you’d run screaming from. And Lena would have probably done just that if she hadn’t already been injected with tranquilizer and tied to a filthy bed. It seems the family are looking for a new daughter...</p><p><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5319136243515062194" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 225px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/SdFeO0Ke97I/AAAAAAAACOY/quMCnf5IWj4/s400/md2.jpg" border="0" /><br />Ohhh, <strong>Mum & Dad</strong> is so sick! I’ve often wondered if you could make a decent horror film set mainly in one location, with just a small number of characters and some nasty ideas. Well, you can, and here’s the proof. It’s sort of like <em>The Royle Family</em> gone hideously wrong: not much more than a few characters sitting around in a dingy house – but here the TV shows hardcore porn, you can’t see the wallpaper for blood, and the suspense as Lena tries to escape is stifling.<br /><br />What <em>really</em> works is the disturbingly short journey Lena takes from dull routine to incomprehensible terror. <strong>Mum & Dad</strong> pulls the strange trick of not letting you see much of the exterior of its house of horror, but this only serves to strengthen the point that it could almost be next-door to yours. Now, are you <em>sure</em> you need that cup of sugar?<br /><br />TV licence fee revenue well spent.<br /><br /><strong>Rating: 3/5</strong></p>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-21690814285941283252009-03-25T22:48:00.007+00:002011-11-08T20:12:25.628+00:00Pssst!Check out some of the new titles made available as downloads and “custom-made DVDs” from the recently opened <a href="http://www.wbshop.com/Warner-Archive/ARCHIVE,default,sc.html">Warner Archive</a>...<br /><br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq14KiTMyI/AAAAAAAACJI/qhXgPycJKJk/s1600-h/2224278.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5317262286569812770" style="WIDTH: 142px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq14KiTMyI/AAAAAAAACJI/qhXgPycJKJk/s200/2224278.jpg" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq1sB4wWoI/AAAAAAAACIY/hQ90KbFj1Xk/s1600-h/2207069.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5317262078089648770" style="WIDTH: 140px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq1sB4wWoI/AAAAAAAACIY/hQ90KbFj1Xk/s200/2207069.jpg" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq1ykByMwI/AAAAAAAACIo/qW5I3znOYIU/s1600-h/2224267.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5317262190333539074" style="WIDTH: 143px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq1ykByMwI/AAAAAAAACIo/qW5I3znOYIU/s200/2224267.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq1yuA6rsI/AAAAAAAACIg/LHZLxaNTlEg/s1600-h/2224194.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5317262193014255298" style="WIDTH: 142px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq1yuA6rsI/AAAAAAAACIg/LHZLxaNTlEg/s200/2224194.jpg" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq1y5PVXCI/AAAAAAAACI4/Ci2Zx_ehinI/s1600-h/2224341.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5317262196027513890" style="WIDTH: 142px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Scq1y5PVXCI/AAAAAAAACI4/Ci2Zx_ehinI/s200/2224341.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br />So let’s see, that’s:<br /><ul><li>Kristy McNichol in a dream-vs-reality psycho-thriller directed by Alan J. Pakula (and the <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/75/Dream_lover_1986.jpg">poster</a> is fantastic!)</li><li>An extremely offbeat-looking doggy-dunnit, starring James Garner and Katharine Ross</li><li>Another of Hammer’s post-<strong>Psycho</strong> mind-warpers (you may remember I enjoyed <a href="http://anchorwomaninperil.blogspot.com/2008/02/hysteria.html"><strong>Hysteria</strong></a>)</li><li>A nasty-looking noir featuring the brilliant Dana Andrews and some heavy psychological undertones</li><li>Troy Donahue + Reincarnation + A killer on the loose!</li></ul><p>I’ve not seen any of this lot but, unfortunately, Warner won’t send their DVDs to the UK so it may be a while before I do. Something to do with region-coding or something. Grr. If <em>you’ve</em> seen any of them, be sure to let me know what I’m missing (if anything).<br /><br />Let’s hope I don’t have similar problems catching up with the new “slasher TV series” <em>Harper’s Island</em>, as previewed by <a href="http://vinceliaguno.blogspot.com/search/label/TV%20Tidbits">Slasher Speak</a>, which promises “13 episodes, 13 murders!”.</p><p>And, if you <em>are</em> in a slashery mood today, you could head over to <em>Retro Slashers</em> and read my recent articles, <a href="http://retroslashers.net/blog/great-slasher-mysteries-vol-1/">Great Slasher Mysteries Volume 1</a> and <a href="http://retroslashers.net/blog/great-slasher-mysteries-vol-2/">Volume 2</a>... Who knows? Maybe you can solve ’em!</p>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-30705097189935453322009-03-24T12:23:00.014+00:002011-11-08T20:18:12.310+00:00Let some good ones inIf you think things have gone a little quiet here at <em>Anchorwoman In Peril!</em> of late, that’s because, well... <span class="Apple-style-span" style="FONT-STYLE: italic">they</span> <em>have!<br /></em><br />Seems I’m afflicted with what Lucy Ricardo called “the mauves” – not quite the blues, but arguably less appealing to the eye, and certainly not good for the blog. I’ve been getting the feeling recently that <span class="Apple-style-span" style="FONT-STYLE: italic">life’s too short for shit films</span>. I know... unthinkable! What’s come over me? Is it age-related? Should I be thinking about taking out some kind of life cover plan? And will I get a free gift just for applying? (I do need a new carriage clock, after all.)<br /><br />This has all meant, anyway, that I’ve started watching three different films recently and, to put it bluntly, just <em>given up on them</em>. The first, <strong>Mirror Images II</strong>, wasn’t even that bad. Sure, it was nothing like as good as the <a href="http://anchorwomaninperil.blogspot.com/2009/02/mirror-images.html">first film</a>, but anything about evil twins is worth watching as far as I’m concerned (I mean, you need to prepare yourself in case it happens to <em>you</em>!). Still, despite the movie’s good intentions, I only made it through to the main character’s fourth therapy session-turned-steamy lesbian romp...<br /><br /><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5316730995266514290" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 163px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 280px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/ScjSq8MrbXI/AAAAAAAACHk/MfvBt1l5F84/s400/mi2.jpg" border="0" /><br /><strong>Zombie Strippers!</strong> fared less well. In fact, I think it holds the record for the shortest amount of grace-time I’ve given a film before switching it off. Tacky photography, lame-o zombie make-up, annoying “characters” and the threat of Robert Englund... I think I gave it all of 50 seconds. Classic case of “great poster, shame about the movie”:<br /><br /><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5316730814902864850" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 215px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 320px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/ScjSgcSoi9I/AAAAAAAACHc/lQ3YI2yWW-8/s320/zombiestrippers.jpg" border="0" /><br />I then made the mistake of trying <strong>Nature of the Beast</strong>, which is a made-for-TV (yay!) horror spoof (hmm...) starring <strong>American</strong> <strong>Pie</strong>’s Eddie Kaye Thomas (oh dear) as a soon-to-be-married werewolf. This one got a full 30 <em>minutes</em> of my attention, but only because I was feeling guilty about giving up on <strong>Zombie Strippers!</strong> so quickly.<br /><br /><div style="TEXT-ALIGN: center"><img src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/ScjSx2dvauI/AAAAAAAACHs/rZEuiqqyvkU/s320/natureofbeast.jpg" /><br /><br /></div><div>So there you have it. Is this the end of <em>Anchorwoman In Peril?!</em> No, of course not, silly! I think I just need to spend some quality time with some quality <span class="Apple-style-span" style="FONT-STYLE: italic">films</span> – ones that aim high and think hard – in order to appreciate the gutter trash again. It’s not all doom and gloom: I’ve actually seem some pretty good films recently too. I watched 1939’s glorious <strong>The Women</strong> back-to-back with its Meg Ryan remake and enjoyed them both on different levels. (While the original’s like being taken for a spin by a clever friend, the remake’s like that same friend coming round with a load of free booze but refusing to leave when you get tired.)</div><div></div><div>Controversially, I really thrilled to the good-looking, hard-work <strong>Watchmen</strong>, with its dallying storyline and weirdly terrific cast. And, unlike <a href="http://finalgirl.blogspot.com/2009/03/eden-lake-shmeden-lake.html">Final Girl</a>, I had a pulse-pounding time with <strong>Eden Lake</strong>, despite its unsympathetically stupid main characters (yes, she napped; I know). I even watched a Hungarian film called <strong>Kalandorok</strong> (or <em>Adventurers</em> to you) which didn’t have a special effect in sight. That last one was screening at the Bradford Film Festival, where I’m also seeing <strong>Let the Right One In</strong> later this week. So... yeah, I’m getting there. Just give me some quality time with the freaky foreign vampire kids.<br /><br /></div><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5316730505838834690" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 264px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/ScjSOc8BtAI/AAAAAAAACHU/hL2C-2SHZqY/s400/lettherightonein_ban.jpg" border="0" />Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-388124058307327801.post-31159112214306103902009-03-17T00:10:00.005+00:002009-03-17T00:43:05.623+00:00Dardos 2!<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sb7yE99LmOI/AAAAAAAACF0/e9EpMrV2YXk/s1600-h/800px-Mus_Musculus-huismuis.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5313950777508337890" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 108px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 105px" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CQUVBaE1_hU/Sb7yE99LmOI/AAAAAAAACF0/e9EpMrV2YXk/s400/800px-Mus_Musculus-huismuis.jpg" border="0" /></a>While I’m currently taking a little time off to recover from my <em>second</em> dose of psycho-clownified terror in less than a week (thanks to <a href="http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0476958/"><strong>Amusement</strong></a>, which is really rather good), I couldn’t miss saying a big thank-you to Friend Mouse of the aptly named blog <a href="http://friendmouse.blogspot.com/">Friend Mouse Speaks</a> (or “squeaks”, surely?!) for sending another Premio Dardos award my way. Now, if only someone would turn these things into actual golden statuettes, I’d really have something to dazzle the neighbours with.<br /><br />In this case, it’s a particular honour, as Friend Mouse is a fellow <a href="http://largeassmovieblogs.blogspot.com/">LAMB</a> and, from the looks of things, all-round good egg, whose utterly charming and knowledgeable blog mixes witty TV recaps, reviews of all sorts of movies, and a genuine love of chocolate bacon. And how could anyone <em>not</em> love a blog whose label list manages to incorporate <em>Eighties music</em>, <em>Gorillas</em>, <em>Martinis</em> and <em>Nathan Fillion</em>?<br /><br />Anyway, be good, stay out of trouble, and I might post a review of <strong>Amusement</strong> for your, er, amusement... Isn’t life just <em>thrilling?!</em>Ross Horsleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08789417379450194170noreply@blogger.com2