I just watched Death Walks In High Heels and quite honestly that was one of the most boring Giallo films I've seen. Even for this type of film the plot was just weird and I didn't get the comedy of the 2 coppers. I don't know if I should even bother with ...Midnight. I'll be selling the set anyway. Ugh.

Demonic Toys
So some Full Moon schlock, the story sets around a gun bust gone wrong outside a toy factory, a dying crook summons a demon who was dumped at the site years before and brings the titled demonic toys to life, these ddemonic toys (more like vampire toys) need blood, one of the cops, a crook, some runaway and a chicken delivery guy have to try to escape the factory or die. the plot is stupid, the gore effects are fun, and the evil toys are the only redeeming factor. the bear is awesome.

Burning a fantastic cult film that's a must have in anyone collection .
Im Glad they didn't ruin it with a sequel or two or ten :lol:

Thanks for all the encouragement and support guys :lol:

As soon as Hellraiser II finished i passed out thanks to MTDS helping me across the line giving advice of hair care my hair is so vibrant alive and so so soft to the touch right now. :hail:


:lol:

soft hair is important to having a good day of course

The Burning is one of the best vintage slasher films.


The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)

Extended Edition.

****1/2 out of *****

The clooney Solaris is a better film imo!

:behindsofa:

I've not seen it but I was quite disappointed by the Tarkovsky version after all of the praise it has. It's not a bad film by any stretch but it's not even Tarkovsky's best film.

Glad to say the Spanish bd of Graveyard Shift ain't a BD-R.
Looks pretty impressive in fact.

I saw this in the cinema back in the day.
One of the better 'King short story' movies I reckon.
Brad Dourif is great in it.

Imagine the Tarkovsky film with all the pretension removed and reduced to a 90 minute run time while retaining the essential core of the original film. Neither were especially great adaptations of the Lem novel but the Clooney version wastes less time making the same points.

:lalala: Not listening! :lalala:

To quote Radiohead:

"When I am king, you will be first against the wall
with your opinion which is of no consequence at all"

;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHiGbolFFGw

I prefer the Tarkovsky film (then again I'm often called pretentious) but I kind of agree with Keirarts, the Soderbergh version is a much more concise and, I suppose, palatable adaption of the novel (Isn't the book only 200 pages roughly ?).

I really like both films, the Soderbergh film is vastly underrated though.

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What Films Have You Seen Recently?
 

1408

2007 film starring John Cusack and Samuel L Jackson, loosely based on a short story by Stephen King.
Cusack stars as a writer who specialises in writing books about haunted places, with titles such as 10 nights in 10 haunted houses etc, and being a sceptic he makes a habit of debunking the myths surrounding these places. Upon receiving a postcard of the Dolphin Hotel in NYC, with the only writing being "Don't stay in room 1408", he decides to check it out for himself, despite the protests (almost begging) of the hotel manager, played by Jackson in a pretty shitty wig :lol:

What follows is a series of strange experiences as he attempts to stay the night in 1408, the sceptic in him slowly disappearing.

I read the story back in 2002, as part of Kings Everything's Eventual collection, and enjoyed it enough, and have had the film sat on my shelf for years without watching (cheap impulse buy from CEX), and for whatever reason it popped into my head yesterday, so I thought I'd give it a watch.
I'm glad I did because the film is excellent, despite barely resembling the source material (which, as you know pisses me off about The Shining), there are some genuinely terrifying moments throughout, I jumped several times (which is rare for me these days) and there was an overall sense of dread during the bulk of the film, which perfectly captured a Stephen King type of feel, hard to explain unless you're familiar with his work.
Cusack gives a great performance, I really felt for his character (a troubled past literally coming back to haunt him) and Jackson was convincing as the hotel manager, no muthaf***ers from him, but he did throw in a single F word :lol:

4/5 Highly recommended

I don't think I have seen the Soderbergh version since it was first released on DVD or was on Sky Movies, but didn't think the 'stripped down' approach to storytelling worked when compared to the overall 'experience' of Tarkovsky's movie. Perhaps I would feel different if I had read the story and seen the Soderbergh film first, but my point of reference will always be the Tarkovsky adaptation.

Cracking review Rik. I haven't seen this one since it came out but I remember quite liking. The sense of increasing hopelessness gets under the skin after a while. Personally I find Stephen Kings writing to be quite frustrating and I'm not convinced sticking to the source material is necessarily a good idea when it comes to film adaps of his work.

Mars Attacks! (1996, Tim Burton)
Had forgotten how sneakily nasty this actually is. Easily a higher body count than Braddock and The Burning combined :nod:;) Ahem. Burton's tribute to 50s SF is still a goer imo. And absolutely NO whimsy. :clap:

Humanoids From The Deep (1980, Barbara Peeters*)
Would that it be possible to see the original film before Corman "sexed" it up* cough .... but then I've always hankered after the original Fog for the same reason.
Regardless ... half eco warning/half monster movie aint too bad ... the bad guys are bad (headed by Vic Morrow at his most bull headed) and Doug McClure captains the good guys.

Nina Forever (2015)

Nina Forever is a highly unusual British film. A young man, Rob, a year after losing his girlfriend, Nina, in a horrific road accident meets Holly and they strike up a relationship. Rob is still partly in shock and has 'Nina Forever' tattooed on his back. As his relationship with Holly develops and becomes physical, Nina, in a moment of Clive Barker type sickness, comes back into their lives, still blood soaked and sliced up from the accident. Holly who is a trainee paramedic isn't as strung out by this as she should be and slowly develops a sexual relationship with Nina as well as with Rob. What follows is a pitch black comedy about getting through tragedy and a sexual relationship where one of the lovers is dead.

I thought Nina Forever was brilliant. A far cry from a typical Hollywood ghost story. The couple don't try and drive Nina out of their lives with the usual exorcisms, in fact in time they embrace her, especially Holly, and it all becomes very 'Grittish' as bed clothes are changed following every sexual encounter due to the amount of blood involved and Rob has to come to terms with Nina actually seemingly being forever, as well as having to approach the subject of his new found love for Holly with Nina's still grief stricken parents. These scenes which involve Nina's parents (David Troughton and Elizabeth Elvin) are very poignant as well as being awkward in the extreme.

Making their first feature, the writing/directing team of Ben and Chris Blaine create believable yet far out scenarios that are written and acted especially beautifully. Abigail Hardingham as Holly is a real standout as is the wild eyed Fiona O’Shaughnessy as Nina. In a way Cian Barry as Rob is understated but he has to be in order for this to work so wonderfully well.

Nina Forever is a hauntingly beautiful piece of film making. It's strong sex and gore aspects verge on the extreme but it has to be that way for the whole thing to work as well as it does in this unpredictable and unforgettable British horror movie.

Duly noted. :nod:

Sidekicks (1992, Aaron Norris)
A bizarre blend of Walter Mitty and chicken soft core. Asthmatic teen struggles through life with Mako spouting wisdom and dumplings in reality and El Chuckie grooming him in his heid. Quite simply the strangest 'kids' film since Return To Oz. Joe Piscopo obviously never changed his haircut at all ... :lol:

It's not often Rik and i disagree over horror... but in this case we do.

I thought 1408 was a typical run of the mill ghost story, bland, instantly forgettable and as scary as a doormat! :thankingyou:

Attachment 189436

:lol:

I'm with Rik on this one. 1408 is really well scripted and directed, with fine performances by the main characters. I think it's a really tense and atmospheric film without the cheap, fake jump scares which blight so many recent films.

Lake Eerie (Chris Majors, 2016)
Moving can be traumatic. But finding that your new abode may just be a hellgate?
Bummer.
Low budget horror can often be a battle betwixt intention and ability...in this case both may be overreaching themselves somewhat. Plus it commits the crime of being quite dull....ho hum ...

Now watching the rather loonier Witch Bitch (1990, Michael Fischa)
More later today as the battery is fading again ahem ....nighty night all!!

Morning!!
AKA Death Spa, this fetching tale of revenge from beyond the grave gives lie to the phrase "til death do us part" :lol:. The Starbody Health Center (:rolleyes:) is the place to be it seems. But not for long...featuring some nasty demises and the actual cause of all this sorrow could be put down to the worst case of post partum depression yet!! Always had a soft spot for this one, mainly due to one of the characters being called Moray :laugh:. Ahem.

so me and one of my mates (just because it was Easter Sunday) decided to watch Passion of the Christ.
Mel Gibson's controversial film, kinda blows what you were taught at school (well what i was taught anyway).
The film portrays the last hours of Jesus and depicts the torture he went through up to and including his crucifixion. even if you're not religious it is a very fascinating film to watch, however while watching it there are moments where it tries to be horror but fails.
6/10

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)

Extended Edition.

****1/2 out of *****


My rankings of the Middle-earth saga:

The Two Towers
The Return of the King
The Fellowship of the Ring
The Desolation of Smaug
An Unexpected Journey
The Battle of the Five Armies

Zombie Flesh Eaters

Seen it tons of times before, first via the cut 1992/3 Vipco VHS, then via the slightly less cut Stonevision UK DVD in the early 2000's, finally uncut a couple of years later with the Italian Shock DVD (as Zombi 2), and again fully uncut with the Mediablasters R1 25th Anniversary DVD. A few years back Blue Underground released it on Blu Ray, so I saw in HD for the first time and finally Arrow released a great 2 disc set 5 years ago (I won't mention the missing 6 seconds, or the piss about I had getting my copy)

Despite seeing it many times in various versions on various platforms, last nights viewing of the Arrow BD was ruined slightly.
The reason for this is because back in October (and again a couple of weeks back) a certain moderator called Demdike reviewed the film and pointed out all the glaring mistakes, mistakes I'd known about and seen previously, but now I found myself watching out for them and realising just how much they stand out :lol:

It's certainly not Fulci's best film, but it is definitely my favourite of his and the one I tend to watch the most, so thanks Dem for ruining it for me every time I watch it, most appreciated :pound:

*It is a bit shit really, but I ****ing love it :lol:



Note to self, I must watch Casablanca and TRY find some mistakes to pay Demdike back :nod:

Attachment 189457

While I'm at it

Zombi Flesh Eaters movie mistakes, goofs and bloopers

What? A B movie elevated to classic status by legions of adoring fans? That's certainly never happened before cough :laugh::rolleyes:
ZFE is what it is. No film is perfect (opens floodgates.....:lol:). suspension of disbelief is part of the basic kit surely??

It's in a King box set I had delivered the other week and after Rik's review I feel like watching it, so I'm going to give it a go later on :) I've wanted to watch it for ages to be honest and just not got around to it.

Glad i'm not the only one who thinks Two Towers is the best one.:woot:
Although i've still not sat through the final Hobbit film.
I found the original trilogy much more engaging, the overuse of CGI in the newer films makes me zone out. The first three use CGI but it's mixed with a lot more props and sets which made them seem more real.:pop2:

with battle of 5 armies, you're not missing much

Im not a big fan of the hobbit films, Give me Lord of the rings trilogy over hobbit trilogy ..

Funny enough I've not watched Battle of the Five Armies myself despite owing the trilogy box set. I can't imagine how they've made an entire film from what is essentially a chapter in the book :lol:

:pound:

I really like The Hobbit trilogy. While obviously not on par with the three TLOTR films, they’re still terrific entertainment. The Battle of the Five Armies is the weakest of all six, but I still really enjoyed it. It’s just one long battle sequence with set-piece after set-piece, but despite the lack of story, it still manages to be emotional and rousing, due to its solid execution in resolving everything that was set-up in the first two films.

The Two Towers doesn't require the lengthy introduction of characters and story that hampered the start of Fellowship. Nor does it suffer with the ridiculously overblown multiple endings tacked onto Return of the King. That said all three are fantastic films, unfortunately they require so much time I can get through two normal films in the time it takes to watch one of them and therefore inevitably never watch them. I like The Hobbit trilogy and have no problem with the fact a trilogy was made from what could have clearly been a single adaptation. I say clearly as I've not read The Hobbit but the rather slim copy I have doesn't suggest nine hours worth of cinematic adaptation was necessary. Even watching them they feel intentionally stretched out. But again I don't mind as they are still highly entertaining. Five Armies is the weakest purely because it really does go into cgi overload feeling as if George Lucas secretly directed it not Jackson. I still would have loved to have seen what Guillermo Del Toro would have done with these films.

I still haven't seen any of the Hobbit films.

Do the extended versions add anything significant?

Basically if you were to buy them would you get the extended versions or the theatrical cuts?

I'm not fussed about extra discs and features as i won't watch them, just based purely on the films themselves.