If you have the same blu-ray set as me then you can watch the un-dubbed original Aussie version.

I really should look at the special features and set up before before pressing play, will know next time I go to watch it :lol:

Still have the "Wide Screen" vhs of MM. That had the original dialogue track cough. Mate hated it as he'd grown up with the vapid US dub. :rolleyes::laugh:


Rewatched ]The Black Hole, as I discovered a friend hadn't seen it. His reaction was rather priceless. He was rather taken with that ending ahem. :nod:
We then watched Little Heroes, which turned out to be a Canuck Home Alone ..... with dogs. A hoot. A first for us, as we usually end up watching Things when we get together :lol::hail::hail::nod:

Tonight ..... Army Of The Dead. Bet you all can't wait to see what I think of that now :pound:

I also perused the new Guy Ritchie flick, which is a remake apparently of a French film. Some fun here, though it didn't amount to much in the end ahem.

The Raod Warrior. 1981.

Max wonders the desert of the post-apocalyptic world, scavenging for food and gasoline, he helps a band of people fend off the last of the gasoline from a horde of bandits.

This one seems to get mentioned a lot and gets high praises, growing up I never knew why and re-watching it I can understand why. George Miller's follow up to Mad Max and delivers one heck of a great science fiction action film that never gets boring just better and better as it goes on.

Film critic Leonard Maltin gave a nice introduction to the film and gave it all the praises, I think Miller's favourite/lucky number was 65, as 65 vehicles were used and a stunt sending a character 65 feet along a road, or something like that. The finale car/lorry chase scene was amazing to watch with the cinematography was done brilliantly by Dean Semier who never misses a moment, there is some comedy element in it from Bruce Spence and Mel Gibson knows how to be a hero and make a decent bargain with the survivors.

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Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. 1985.

Max, alone and drifting is exiled from a town run by a ruthless queen, with the help of children and rebels against her.

I have always been in the middle with this entry of the Mad Max films, yes its decent but sometimes I felt it was drifting off the rails a bit and goes in a different way that seems to drag on. Tina Turner does play a decent part as the ruthless leader Aunty Entity who didn't mind showing off her chest almost. This does seem more apocalyptic with the desert scenes but I felt the chase at the end never really matched up to the previous film.

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Rollercoaster. 1977.

A man threatens to blow up various theme park attractions if he isn't paid $1 million dollars.

A nice decent suspenseful 70s disater movie with some good acting from George Segal as park safety inspector who's theme park was targeted and sets out to stop anything further happening to other parks and is drawn into a cat and mouse game with a young man played by Timothy Bottoms. From start to finish there is some tense scenes that may not make you sit in the edge of your seat but are certainly entertaining.

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My Grandad had an ex rental copy of Mad Max in the mid 80s and I used to pop it on regularly. I do remember Mad Max 3 being rented in our house and no one thought much of it apart from me.
I took it upon myself to rent a battered looking copy of Mad Max 2 in about 87 from the local video shop. The owner had a devil may care attitude towards age ratings and would gladly rent out anything from porn to horror to anyone with a quid.
I can honestly say that I have never enjoyed a film more than that first viewing of Mad Max 2. Even now after seeing it many times if i see it advertised on ITV I will either watch it in full of at least catch the final act with the chase through the desert. Masterpiece of action and film making with sparse dialogue unlike today's garbage.

Poseidon adventure
Towering inferno
This
Earthquake
Airport and many others are a fine eg of why I prefer most disaster movies over today’s.

The Phantom Light (1935)

Michael Powell's The Phantom Light isn't so much a horror film as a crime thriller with spooky elements. Starring Gordon Harker as a new Lighthouse keeper at the lonely North Stack lighthouse on the Welsh Coast. Upon arrival he discovers the last keeper was murdered and the lighthouse is supposedly haunted. He isn't alone however as the lovely Binnie Hale (Legs up to her neck) wants to visit the lighthouse as she's from a psychic society.

Not surprisingly for a Powell film it's beautifully photographed and he achieves the paranoid claustrophobic atmosphere with ease but it soon comes to light the film is about wreckers rather than spooks. Still the film proves a nice blend of suspense and comedy with the delightful ms Hale ready to disrobe at the drop of a hat. I was quite surprised to see her wearing nothing but a slip then a towel amid a crew of hairy Welsh lighthouse keepers.

The final third is a tense ride as Harker and Hale have to go all out to stop a ship being dragged onto the rocks by the phantom light. There are better examples of thrillers from the time, yet all the same The Phantom Light is a worthy addition to any collection of British films.

Jackie Brown. 1997.

Air stewardess Jackie Brown is arrested with money and cocaine, she is released on a bail bond By Max Cherry who is paid by Ordell Robbie, Jackie plans on setting up Ordell to the police in exchange for her freedom.

I'm not a huge fan of Quentin Taratino except for Kill Bill movies and Pulp Fiction but this one I thoroughly enjoyed with the way he is able to make a homage to the film noir genre without any one doing the voice over as the movie generally speaks for itself with a great assortment of actors and how a double cross is paced out three different view points with some dark humour mixed in and plenty of Samuel L. Jackson swearing and Pam Grier playing homage to her exploitation movie years.

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One of his better films. Tremendous soundtrack i thought. I've seen all his films apart from the recent one. I like this, Pulp Fiction and the Hateful Eight best.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0j4qcPyNSsQ

A strange creature creature is killing the residents of a small town. A local police detective sets out solve the killing which could be linked too dumping of toxic waste. Martin Landau co stars . Enjoyable z movie nonsense.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIuT4HT8IMg

Blind watch which I wasn't expecting much but was pleasantly surprised. In the near future the West is in a decline as it battles China, a scientist is working in a government facility who is working on androids and AI for the military but is secretly working to cure his young daughter. Tobey Stephens plays the scientist , Caity Lotz plays the "machine " whom gives a great performance and we have Wedge Antilles ( Denis Lawson) himself as the government official who runs the base. Slow burning and worth a watch.

Now watching.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vsANcS4Ml8

Zombieland. 2009.

A student, a guun totting zombie killer looking for a twinkie and two sisters looking to get to a theme park travel across a zombie infested America.

Aside from Cockney's vs Zombies, Shaun of the dead, this is one had me in stitches, aside from the rules that help you survive a zombie apocalypse, Woody Harrleson makes this film comical with his antics on how he kills and makes attention. Bill Murray appears as himself in a small comedic role that brings more laughs and plenty blood splatter. Jesse Eisenberg plays the young student Columbuswho manages to create the rules to survive and manages to break one or two.

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Sputnik (2020)

Excellent Russian sci-fi horror film. Similar in feel to classic Quatermass, it takes in the story of a young Russian psychiatrist, under review for her controversial methods, recruited by the military and taken to a secret base where a newly returned cosmonaut is housed after surviving a mysterious accident whilst out in space.

There's some genuine tension and creepiness that i simply wasn't expecting together with an awesome creature design. It's a simple enough story and features a great dynamic between the doctor (Oksana Akinshina) and the cosmonaut (Pyotr Fyodorov) as they try to make sense out of what happened as well as battling against the controlling authorities who have other nefarious plans in store.

Anyone wanting a well made sci-fi horror could do far worse than Sputnik. I really enjoyed it.

Nice one Trebor, for bringing this to my attention.

This is my Fav Taratino by far, perhaps it's quite telling that he didn't write the story (just adapted it for the screen) :lol:

Definitely top three for me. Dogs and Hollywood being the other two.

I've not watched ...Hollywood yet. I think I should sort that out soon. A lot of people really like it. I think I held off because when it came out I had recently watched the Coen Bros Hollywood film, the name of which escapes me right now :lol:

Hail, Caesar! haha

Zombieland: Double Tap. 2019.

Columbus, Tallahasse, Little Rock and Wichita, are still travelling through zombie infested America and trying to make a life for themselves, but the zombie population is growing and getting smarter, while trying to find a save haven in a small population called Babylon.

Do sequels work and become more entertaining than it's predecessor, sometimes they do and others fall flat on their faces and fail, this one did work. The group have names for their zombies as to which is smart and dumb, Woody Harrleson is just as wacky as ever which makes it more enjoyable even if he has no weapons at hand to use and tends to be creative even with some sarcastic comments with Emma Stone about new comer Madison. Jesse Eisenberg still lives by the commandments of the apocalypse and Abigail Breslin seems to find a new friend Berkeley. Entertaining but does go off the rails a bit then back on track.

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I've only seen it the one time and thought it excellent. I had a buzz watching it and it's kinda stuck in my head ever since.

I'd like to watch it again. Dvd or new blu-ray though? Decisions, decisions...

I really liked this too, I want to re-watch them both soon :)

Army Of The Dead

Stoopid. Not as Stoopid as The Mummy or WWZ or Blackhat even :lol: ... but nonetheless it's a veritable laugh riot. Bautista ... that face wasn't made to emote no siree ... did like the tiger I will admit. Didn't feel like 150 minutes either, so that was something at least. What it did feel like was "highlights from a mini series" tbh. As none of it seemed to gel .... and he's "expanding" this world? Pass.

AVP: Aliens Vs Predator. 2004.

A satellite over the Antarctica picks up a heat signature, a team is sent in to investigate and discover it's a battle ground for two alien species.

This was panned by critics and fans of the franchise, a film that should never happen, how can it be possible for these two aliens to fight? This had to be toned down and think that's what got the fans and myself less violence and not much going on, when I saw the uncut version I changed my views and enjoyed it.

There is either a few flaws or some questions unanswered who was Charles Weyland, is he the guy who designed the Bishop android or a clone or is it just a coincidence and whatever happened to the queen, did she die or did she survive? With the ending the way it happened it did leave a possibility for a sequel and when that happened I didn't enjoy the film. This has very little suspense, it builds up on who is the superior race and a dreaded fear of claustrophobia as the battle ground opens up new levels for hunting and nowhere to hide.

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Thanks. Like you I was pleasantly surprised by it well worth a watch and it's on Netflix for those interested who have it.

Yes, one i'm more than happy to own on dvd. Not bad for a fiver from Asda.

Oz The Great And Powerful. 2013.

A circus magician is swept away to the land of Oz, where he is mistakenly to be a great prophet that was predicted by three witches and the inhabitants of Oz.

Having never read the books even though I have been trying to get my hands on them for a decent price, I can't compare the film to the book even though they are meant to be darker. Hat's off to Sam Raimi for trying his best to visualise the prequel and probably being told what to do by the heads of production.

James Franco plays the circus magician Oscar Diggs who is forced to flee and lands in Oz and is greeted by Mila Kunis and is told the prophecy and meets Rachel Weisz and Michelle Williams, who only one of them seems to be telling the truth. This seemed to be a good idea as it starts off black and white then goes to colour like the 1939 film, but we enter the age of forgetting how the original film works and goes to CGI which works at times and then spoils it at other moments, Enjoyable enough to a point.

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North Sea Hijack (1980)

Roger Moore plays against very much against type as an eccentric underwater saboteur who can't stand women but loves cats who is enlisted by the British government and Naval commander James Mason to come up with a plan to stop Anthony Perkins and his band of terrorists who hijack a cargo vessel with the aim of blowing up the largest oil rig in the North Sea unless his ransom demands are met.

Absolutely terrific high seas adventure which although lacking in action is more than made up for by the level of suspense which rises with every passing minute. Often quirky and offbeat with a strong air of British humour, North Sea Hijack is one of the best thrillers of the decade.

One of my favourite action / adventure films that i can always go back to. The 88 Films blu-ray looks great i'm delighted to say.

THE STRANGENESS – I know I always wheel out the ‘people wandering around in the dark’ trope when I’m in the middle of a review and feeling slightly irked (by the movie, or maybe just by the fact that I don’t have anything very interesting to say), but ‘The Strangeness’, well, it’s THE ‘people wandering around in dark’ movie. That darkened, shadowy wandering itself could almost have been the film’s true theme, cos it’s pretty much all that happens. Prospectors in a mine shaft are… Wandering Around In The Dark on the lookout for gold (or something), until a big Harryhausen-esque Cthulhu slime phallus monster has a go at them. Note back in time – guys, you needed to include a bit more of the latter. For all the non-event, ‘The Strangeness’ still manages a certain atmosphere courtesy of its location and scrungy early eighties 16mm aesthetic. This rough-hewed real-indie charm bypasses elements (ie the boring ones) which would have me reaching for my DVD player had they been present in a slightly more polished affair. I’m a sucker for a bit of grain and bad lighting, it seems.

RUSH WEEK – I’m a forgiving soul when it comes to eighties slasher trash. I can watch stuff like ‘Rush Week’ till the f*cking cows come home, but I’d be the first to say that it probably isn’t very good. It’s another campus based horror where someone with a mask is moidering some frat boyz (and girlz). A bit of a cheat this one, as there really isn’t much blood, and the array of potentially exploitative elements (such as the naughty photographer’s necrophilia ‘speciality’) never progress beyond the tease. However, old punks will get their shiny little tear’s worth of nostalgia in with an impromptu appearance by The Dickies and a couple of others, and it’s all fairly well put together.

BEYOND TERROR – Strange Spanish flick seems to condense early eighties continental street-hustle vibes with something that looks like it might have stepped from the furthest recesses of De Ossorio’s fruit cellar. A small gang of hoods is on the lam with kidnappees in tow – they make the mistake of burning down the house of someone involved in black magic, then come a cropper in the ruins of a haunted church. I really enjoyed ‘Beyond Terror’, having seen it (and, it saddens me to admit, dismissed it) on an awful bootleg years ago. The restoration by Cauldron is very good, and now a film that has never been served by home based media is watchable at last. ‘Beyond Terror’ is at its best when the crime element makes way for a subtle pile-up of weird imagery and atmosphere (exemplified by a scene in the gang’s careening car on the way to the ruins, when eerie, celestial music pours from the radio). There’s also quite a lot of other eccentricity, such as sacrilegious in-church wanking before a be-cobwebbed undead-heavy gothic blowout at the end. Disjointed and uneven but fascinating and mysterious, it’s nice to see ‘Beyond Terror’ finally getting its due to some extent.

DEVIL TIMES FIVE – I’ve seen DX5 a few times over the years, and strangely enough my impression of it seems to change from viewing to viewing. The last time I saw it, I didn’t like it. I changed my mind again when I watched an upgraded version on blu-ray the other day. Maybe it was just my mood, but I found the film mysterious and intoxicating. It’s about some nasty kids who terrorise some nasty adults in a house that happens to be surrounded by acres of snowy wilderness. The claustrophobic atmosphere is also quite off-key and has that ‘seventies semi-art house’ feel about it. I liked the slippery dialogue, the devious characters, the arbitrary malevolence of the psychotic kids, the dreamlike feel of it all. That there is no-one to route for lends the film quite a doomed, nihilistic accent. Very recommended.

CASTLE FREAK – Whatever possessed the re-animators of Stuart Gordon’s ‘Castle Freak’? I mean come on, what the f*ck was the point, really? Maybe they realised they were already on to a winner, relatively speaking, given that no film could be as dismal as the original ‘Castle Freak’, even its remake. Am I exaggerating? Maybe, I’ll never like the original though. But this one boasts a fair amount of lubricious splatter, sexual violence, and attempts to inject a bit of Lovecraft in a rubbery tentacular way. Pretty good, all in all.

As always F ... :hail::hail:

Have a soft spot for Dx5 myself.

...and I quite like the original Castle Freak :lol:

It's funny (for me), my dislike of 'Castle Freak' borders on the irrational. I'm at a loss as to why, as it's not 'objectively' a particularly bad film. And Jeffrey Combs is in it, so I always thought I'd like it.

The Stud (1978)

Joan Collins plays a wealthy owner of a night club who hires Oliver Tobias to run it as long as he satisfies her nymphomaniac demands. All goes well until Tobias is introduced to Collins' wealthy step daughter.

This is so of it's period it hurts. The many night club scenes burst with classic disco anthems from the seventies - Hot Chocolate, Sweet, Smokie, KC and the Sunshine Band, Roxy Music, Heatwave - It's like a K-Tel album in movie form. However it is quite an influential movie. Reinvigorating Collins flagging career and proving an international box office hit giving some respectability to it's bastard cousins seventies British sex comedies.

It's not as lavish looking as you might expect. More often than not it's low lit, giving it a seedy feel rather than of the Collins sisters usual decadence (Jackie wrote the original novel and produced the film). There's a good support cast - Sue Lloyd, Walter Gotell and The Devil Rides Out' Sarah Lawson, who get to perform some choice Jackie Collins dialogue -
"There are two sorts of women in this world. The first sort pick you up and screw you, the second sort pick your brains and screw you up." - But it's most memorable scenes involve shagging. Whether it be in elevators or posh swimming pool orgies, it's not long before someone's getting laid.

Nowadays The Stud is highly entertaining camp schlock, a time capsule from a disco era of hedonism and free and easy sex.

The Wizard Of Oz. 1939.

Young Dorothy Gale is swept away in a tornado to the land of Oz, and embarks on a quest with her new friends to find the wizard and return home.

This is one of those feel good movies to return every so often with amazing acting from Judy Garland as the young Dorothy, Ray Bolger as The Scarecrow, Jack Haley as The Tin Man and Bert Lahr as The Cowardly Lion. Margaret Hamilton is memorable as The Wicked Witch of the West which probably terrified kids back then and young ones of our generation. Frank Morgan has some small roles but more noticeable as The Wizard who likes to throw insults at The Tin Man.

There was a few adaptations made before this film, a stage production in 1902, then in 1908 with Radio Plays, in 1910 there was a 15-20 silent play of it. In 1914 Frank Baum created his own studio and had a logo made of Princess Ozma which looked creepy, which produced short films which have gone missing over the years.There was a version made in 1922 and another in 1932 which also seems to be lost.

Growing up with this film and hearing all that gone on in the background, Judy Garland was given a strict diet to follow, the cast playing the Munchins got drunk and tried to hit on Judy, Margaret Hamilton was badly burned involving a trap door and pyrotechnics going off early, Buddy Ebsen was originally to play The Tin Man but due to the make up he suffered health problems.

What's amazing abou this film it starts off Black&white then goes full colour that the makers look like they are in a real land and not a studio with the Munchkin Land, The Wizard's and Witch's Castle with some good background score and good dance sequences, that never seems to make the film slow or boring just more entertaining.

Attachment 233618

100% a film that was way ahead of its time, classic film in every sense .

^^^

Hold on a minute, Buster!

When Dorothy meets the Scarecrow, they are at a crossroads, so there isn't "only one flipping road"!

KILLDOZER – From the pen of Theodore Sturgeon comes ‘Killdozer’, a bleak account of said mechanical digger’s victimisation of a bunch of men stuck on an island. In our world full of so much real-life horror, it may be difficult to frame a rampaging bulldozer, supposedly possessed by an alien entity, as a truly unnerving prospect. But the film has an odd atmosphere by virtue of it being played straight, whilst at the same time little touches like the psychedelic sound effects that blare whenever the dozer is about to get tasty cut in the other direction. I doubt it was ever a real influence on John Carpenter, but it’s partly about the fraternity of grim, slightly paranoid men who all seem damaged by the war in some way, in fact ‘Killdozer’ as a whole seems to work metaphorically to evoke the threat of systemised, mechanised brutality. Yesterday’s trash TV is today’s food for thought.

SYNCHRONIC – Being a fan of Benson / Moorhead, I was full of anticipation for ‘Synchronic’, which seemed as if it would perhaps be loose continuation of the shadowy themes of ‘Resolution’ and ‘The Endless’. That’s kind of true in that ‘Synchronic’ is about the effects of a trippy new designer drug that seems to translocate people back in time. I was a little disappointed, though – hard to say why exactly, there was just something a little too conventional about it, with its ‘relationships / human angle’ aspects taking precedence over the bizarrerie and diminishing the other worldly paranoia familiar from some of the directors’ other stuff. Slick, well made and decently entertaining though, so give it a shot.

COME TRUE – Hey, this is more like it. A heavily stylised descent into dream-horror, which I know is a bit of a hoary one, but I’m proud to proclaim myself a sucker for that stuff. And ‘Come True’ ticks all my boxes, from its manicured visuals of corridors full of shadowy figures to a Ballard / Cronenberg institutional aesthetic which has to be the final word in sterile chic. It having been made these days, the eighties are never very far away, though it’s maybe riffing on stuff like ‘Jacob’s Ladder’ more than ‘Nightmare On Elm Street’. In that sense it’s more in the vein of more recent films like ‘Beyond The Black Rainbow’, another eighties OD that privileges trippy visuals over narrative. Speaking of narrative, ‘Come True’ kind of derails a bit when it settles on a relationship angle as a way of wrapping up (admittedly one which unravels in a highly enigmatic way in the final act) and so loses a bit of momentum to convention, but overall I thought it was highly effective and far more vivid than the last few Netflixy horror/sci-fi clones I’ve seen. Great electro soundtrack, too.

QUEENS OF EVIL – Stupid hippy Ray Lovelock is waylaid by a trio of witchy sisters (are they sisters? I have to say I can’t remember, Frankie do some research to make it look like you’ve actually seen it) who beguile him with their charms until he’s ready to be a plaything of the evil bourgeoise who live in the big gothic castle next door. Decked out like a vaguely trippy fairy-tale, QOE is a seventies Euro-horror that feels like a parable of the coming-of-age of its epoch’s post-68 counterculture (maybe), and is closer to a shoddy version of the arthouse cinema of the time than many of its contemporaries in ‘the genre’. Quite liked it, but felt it needed to be a bit… don’t know. Just a bit more full-on, maybe. Anyway, good, and good for Mondo Macabro for turning out these neglected oddities.

CRIMES OF THE BLACK CAT – All the strengths and weaknesses of the Giallo are summed up by ‘The Crimes Of The Black Cat’, a movie that’s at its best when mind bogglingly stupid and yet falters when it tries to be sensible. Some loosely connected people are being murdered by a cat with poisonous claws – innumerable subplots evolve to try and sort it out. Points on for the wacky conceit, a couple of typically pop-psychedelic visuals and even a bit of vicious gore – points off for just about everything else, but then again, I am learning to be a bit more patient with these films these days. One for people who are into gialli.

Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum.
Found footage, which I love. Not a guilty pleasure, I just love it. And, this Korean film is a great example of it, IMO. I mean, it's all been done before, but this does it very, very well. If you don't care for f/f, then you probably won't get much out of it, but if you do - highly recommended.
4 out of 5.

Friday the 13th (1980)

The one where it all began, the film that kick started the slasher genre, despite lacking the iconic killer - Jason Vorhees - of the other films in the series this isn't actually a bad little slasher in it's own right but it stumbles a bit in having a middle aged woman as the killer, in fact the most memorable lines of dialogue come just before a kill when the intended youth councilor victims all seem to say "Oh, it's you" as she approaches them. This may not actually be true but it seems like it.

Tom Savini's gore sequences still stand up today, especially the harpoon twisting it's way through Kevin Bacon's neck, and the final scene is still a shocker if you are that one person reading this who hasn't seen Friday the 13th..

Harry Manfredini's score remains memorable all these years later and it's famous "ki ki ki, ma ma ma" motif would become legendary.

The film itself, surprisingly, given the theory that all sequels get worse the further along they go, isn't the best in the series by any means, nor is it the worst.

The UK Blu-Ray version from the eight film set looks and sounds very good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ltBBtSFEn8

A very gory Brazilian supernatural slasher that uses mythology of the region.

After a strange mask is found it possesses people turning them into a unstoppable supernatural killer with the munchies for human hearts . Great use of practical effects with some trippy nightmare/dream scenes. Worth a watch.


After Frankies review decided to watch Castle Freak but have went for the last drive in version.

After that was thinking of watching the Dentist with that guy from L.A. Law , is it anygood?

Rewatched the Twilight Zone movie. This is one of my most prized blu-rays as it's long out of print and I love the film. Obviously contraversial due to children and actor deaths during filming which probably explains why it's not readily available now. But whilst distressing, that doesn't actually affect the viewing experience for me. You wouldn't have bet money on the Steven Spielberg quarter being by far the weakest but it doesn't hurt the film too badly (and I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't touched when the old man asks the child to also take him). Love this 80's movie.