Underworld: Blood Wars (2016)

Fast, frantic and largely plotless fifth and hopefully final installment in the Vampires v Lycans series in which Kate Beckinsale is seriously out vamped by the devilish Lara Pulver.

Shit blows up, sabres are rattled and bullet clips emptied in a film that just about holds itself together across it's 90 minutes. The Czech Republic location work helps no end.

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

A enjoyable piece of underwater sci-fi nonsense with sonny Chiba who plays a reporter who after witnessing a mysterious creature while reporting a new submarine , sets out too investigate with his girlfriend who both are promptly kidnapped by a bond villain with his own underwater liar who has plans for global dominance and is tinkering with genetic manipulation and robotics.

Fast paced and enjoyable , worth a look.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTWYKf5hXIg

Years since I've seen this and have to say I really enjoyed it it follows Earp ( Russel ) who has retired from law enforcement and had moved to the town of tombstone for a quite life , but that's not to be when he and his brother and friends get on the wrong side of a gang called the cowboys .

The real standout out off this was Val Kilmers performance as Doc Holiday which is easily his best role and should of gotten a Oscar.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr0cBp9s7c4

We follow a young Billy the kid and the regulators played by the rest of the rat pack who seek revenge for Terrance Stamp a farther figure for the boys who is brutally murdered by Jack Parlance and his goons.

I found this quite slow and dull and Billy being a boarder line sociopath didn't help.

Now watching

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


Might watch young guns two later.

I really like Young Guns.

It has an authenticity of the real west. Ramshackle saloons, dirty dressed people, that sort of thing with some genuinely nasty moments such as the gunning down of Stamp's Tunstall. A man who tries to improve his bratty young ranch hands through etiquette and reading poetry as well as sheer hard work. But despite all this when they are deputised it simply turns them into killers on the loose rather then actual deputies of the law and you know from the outset that our 'heroes' will be dead long before they become men. The quiet moments such as round the dinner table and Doc falling in love are what holds the film together and give it heart. We know Billy will turn into a renegade murderer but it's nice to see that when it comes to catching a pig he just ends up covered in shit as you or i would.

It's also a terrific young cast held together with a couple of western legends. At the time it was seen as a kind of 'Brat pack' western akin to The Lost Boys with it's young cast but i actually think it's so much more than that.

Young Guns II is a more fun film in a way. Perhaps helped by the excellent Blaze of Glory soundtrack album from Jon Bon Jovi which was huge at the time. Maybe you'll like that more.

"Yoohoo! I'll make you famous"

Ghost Ship. 2002.

A salvage crew find a lost ship, when they are on board the ship slowly reveals its secrets.

This has one of the decent gore openings of a modern day horror, you know what's going to happen yet you can't look away even with body parts getting sliced and diced. The setting off The boat is what you expect it to be after 40 years adrift, dark, rusty and very atmospheric. The acting is decent from Gabriel Byrne, Julianna Margolies, Karl Urban and Ron Eldard who eat the wrong things, Isaiah Washington who gets seduced by a female singer and Desmond Harrington and the Ferryman. As much as it's a good film it also has a decent soundtrack and background score.

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Private Benjamin. 1980.

A high society girl joins the army after her husband dies on their wedding night and realises it's not what it's cracked up to be.

Goldie Hawn shows that she can be a great leading lady with this comedy as the spoilt rich kid who is coerced to sign up by recruiter Harry Dean Stanton. At the barracks she is put through tough training by drill sergeant Hal Williams who eventually shares the women in their war game celebration and Eileen Brennan as the senior base officer and ends up being the butt of a joke or two. I haven't watched this in years and forgot how funny it can be especially when Benjamin is explaining she is in the wrong army, or the base captain taking a shower with some blue dye and mispronouncing names at the NATO base.

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Watches over last week, Blood tide was written by the guy who made Island of Death and is set in Greece as usual, It starts of well and is quite engrossing, with James Earl Jones being a stand out, has vibes that reminded me of the nun, Lovecraftian film Dark Waters, so I was getting into it, but the end falls flat with a 2 second shot of the creature, shame.

Slumber Party Massacre has some decent characterisation for it's female victims and has amusing moments but the underdeveloped killer and his basic drill executions make it a very slight slasher that doesn't stand out for me.

I've been rewatching all the Universal Mummy films recently which after the Mummy's Hand took a dive in quality with Lon Chaney Jr 's version being a slow paced shuffling dullard, Yet the last 'serious' film Curse picked up and was pretty enjoyable.
So next I watched Abbott and Costello meet the Mummy which I enjoyed, their film ..meet the Killer features Karloff but was a jumbled mess and not half as enjoyable for me, but it had a few funny moments.

Transylvania 65000 was a film that's always been on my radar but i've never seen, wasn't missing much, Geena Davis turns up looking hot as a vampire type and Carol Kane had a few moments that amused me, but otherwise it was a dud.

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Class of 1999 is a vague sequel to class of 1984 by the same director, hadn't seen this since it hit VHS and was a very enjoyable mix of the aforementioned film and Terminator/ Robocop style goofiness, shit blows up.

Def con 4 was a first time watch, it starts with 3 people on a satellite watching on as the earth destroys itself in a nuclear war, (a really strong opening) then they return to earth and have to deal with the low budget mad max inspired leftovers of humanity, ultimately kinda goofy but I enjoyed this one.

I agree. I've always loved the film ever since it's network premiere on...ITV I believe it was many moons ago. Easily the best role Emilio Estevez has ever had.
Love the soundtrack too. The main title theme is fantastic.

Roundup of last week's watches, was editing when others posted, didn't want it to get lost in the wilderness.;)

Also watched Spaced out and Playbirds a couple of softcore low budgeters that i'd never seen before.

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Spaced Out is a Norman J Warren film i'd never seen as I was only familiar with his Horror output, It's not a good film by any standards but a few things stood out, ahem, nothing to do with the acting obviously.
A passable time waster if you are in the mood.

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Playbirds on the other hand was an eye opener, yes it's a sleazy low budget rush job, but i found it surprisingly downbeat with a killer murdering models who pose for a men's magazine.

A kind of remake of Covergirl killer, and based around the real life mag Playbirds published by the producer (an odd bit of publicity), it features Mary Millington as a policewoman.

The thing that surprised me was that the stalking and strangling scenes are straight out of a horror film and the photo shoot set pieces include a devil worship type scene and a woman being burnt on a cross, whereas I was just expecting the usual T&A.

Also some really bad non PC dialogue, such as the jaw dropping moment when the killer burst in on a woman in bed and she exclaims
" Oh, I've never been raped before!!!" with a cheerful smile.

You what???

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Phantasm: RaVager (2016)

The fifth and final film in the Phantasm series. I rather enjoyed this. Much more than the previous sequels. It felt more focused and less shambolic allowing characters to develop and giving some real depth to Reggie Bannister's Reggie in what was a nice change of pace and a good character study.

Of course the second half of the film goes full on Phantasm with some welcome cameos and added craziness and although low budget i really liked the effects especially the landscapes and skies which were reminiscent in style of the final Doctor Who story Survival in the original run in 1989, which in turn gives some idea of RaVager's production values, for better or worse.

I never really got on well with this after the two viewings of it but after a third viewing I did warm upto it.

Kentucky Fried Movie

A series of Sketches with most of them hitting the mark. Ranging from Spoof Trailers and Adverts, the one that takes up most of the running time is a Spoof of Martial Arts Movies that is slightly too long but is funny. Released in 1977, it's not outdated.

Final Destination 3

After 2 successful Movies, the Producers dusted of the template and got a bigger budget as this time the Premonition Scene (Rollercoaster) and Death Scenes are more gorier. I found this to be the best one so far, even though it's similar to the others.

Once Upon A Time In Hollywood

Quentin Tarrantino's Story of a Actor's struggle as his Career is faltering. Along with his Stuntman/Friend, they encounter The Manson Family. This is one of those strange Films that is boring in places but there is enough in it for me to keep going back to it (Thank God for the forward button)

Doghouse. 2009.

A group of men head to the country to help a friend get over his divorce, only to find that the women have been exposed to a virus that turned them into zombies.

Danny Dyer leads his friends of Stephen Graham, Noel Clark, Keith Lee Castle, Lee Ingleby, Emily Marwa to a small country place in the middle of nowhere for a weekend of drinking until they can't speak only to find the women are out to get them. No matter how many times you watch this its still brings out the laughs. Atleast if you are tied up with a female zombie turn on the charm and hope she doesn't slice of a digit or two.

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The Missionary (1982)

Michael Palin's first film away from the Python team is a partly saucy comedy set at the dawn of the twentieth century. Palin plays a missionary recalled from Africa, where he'd been for ten years, charged with setting up a mission for the ladies of the night in London's docklands.

Palin is well suited as the innocent abroad, or in this case at home, in the petticoat jungle of Edwardian London prostitution, most of the smut going well over his head, if not the viewers.

Maggie Smith leads a top support cast and she has a lot of fun playing the frustrated aristo attempting to seduce the naive missionary.

This is all so very British and quite wonderful with it once you get a taste for the comedic tone. As with Palin's A Private Function a couple of years later this really plays out like an elongated episode of his mid seventies series Ripping Yarns and feels like a relic of a bygone era, more's the pity.

Excellent film. One of several top notch British horror films that came out at the time.

Spider-Man 3 (2007)

The final film in the Sam Raimi directed trilogy and a bit of a departure in tone as Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) aka Spider-man, now at ease with his superhero status is part taken over by an alien symbiote which unleashes the darkness in the web slinger.

What follows in this two hour twenty minute marathon is a look at the dark side of Spidey and of Peter Parker too. His cockiness at the hero worship, his neglect of girlfriend Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) and a vendetta of vengeance against one of three villains Raimi throws at us.

Visually this is excellent with a clutch of exciting set pieces amid the tale of despair for Parker, which needs to be and is prolonged in order for his redemption during the final half hour to be so satisfying. However the cluttered plot strands in between don't help and make the middle third a little unfocused.

Look out for Bruce Campbell doing his thing as a French maitre-d... I say look out. You really can't miss him.

The birth of The Sandman always sticks out as one of the strongest bit of this film for me. Even though it's CGI, and relatively early CGI at that, I think it's beautifully put together. As the sand slowly attempts to form a solid shape before collapsing, always makes me think of a baby's first steps. It's a shame the film as a whole is a bit of a mess.

Lose half an hour and it would hold up well.

I prefer it to any of the new Marvel Spider-Man films.

People seem to hate Spiderman 3, personally i don't mind it, rewatched it last year, the problem I have with it is they tie Sandman in with Ben's death, i think that is unnecessary and muddles the series continuity to a point that it distracts me from the story at hand.

I still prefer it to the Amazing Spiderman films that came after, especially number 2 which i found really hard to watch, Rhino and Electro were so far removed from the characters i grew up reading.

Friday the 13th. Sean S.Cunningham. 1980.

The first installment of the iconic slasher franchise. Years after a number of brutal murders at a summer camp a group of young new counsellors attempt to reopen the place. Everyone knows the story here and have probably watched it numerous times. I've actually only seen it two, maybe three times. First recorded off sky movies back in the late 90s. I thought it was ok nothing special.
The blu-ray shines new light on this classic with a beautiful transfer that really amps up this films atmosphere, felt like I was in the woods around Camp Crystal Lake watching events unfold.
The characters are all quite likeable, something that helps no end. I always think slashers sink or float based on the characters, if they're all unlikeable then why do I care what happens.
Also the fact that the franchise's legendary villain is here more of a plot mechanic than an actual character means the film at times ironically plays more like a Hitchcockian mystery or an American giallo than your traditional slasher.
I really enjoyed this rewatch and put the second film on only a few days later. Thoughts to follow.

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Most common line in the film - "Oh. It's you" - right before a murder takes place.

Maybe it isn't but it seems like it is to me. :lol:

I don't know if it is, but I reckon that had an impact on every horror made after [emoji1787]

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Almost as bad as Carol Anne in Poltergeist 3 :lol:

Act Of Vengeance. 2017.

Nice B grade film of revenge with Antonio Banderas as a fast talking lawyer who's wife and daughter are murdered. When copper Karl Urban informs him the case is going to be sided down he begins his own quest to seek revenge. Both male leads are great in other films but in this it seems to be macho vs macho with each of them in their cage fights and both are not scared to take a beating and far better than what Seagal could deliver in a film. Worth a watch for something different in the action revenge genre.

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Every time anyone mentions Carol Anne The Shining by Misfits hits me straight away worming it's way round my brain.

So thanks for that. :D

'Carol Anne the beast is calling'

You listen to it and see if it grabs you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npIouDk6J2g

American Psycho (1997)

Friday the 13th Part 2. Steve Miner. 1981.

Now it's hard to pretend this sequel delivered anything different to the first film.
So I won't. However it is again a great film, a likeable bunch of young folk rock up at a summer camp just through the woods from Camp Crystal Lake. What happens simply beggars belief....
What I will say is again I felt like I could smell Hitchcock. There's even a shower scene at the beginning, albeit a clever twist. There's just something about the atmosphere or vibe of these first two films that has really grabbed me and I thoroughly enjoyed them both. Add to that the blu-ray transfers are superb.
Roll on part 3.

Have you got the £30 UK set or the Shout Factory box set?

I have the UK one and thought the transfers were all excellent.

The UK set same as you Dem. I got it during HMVs 20% off deal so I paid about 22 for it. So far I'm well pleased.

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There's more than enough extras as well for each film.

Blade: Trinity. 2004.

Blade is teamed with a group of vampire killers called "Nightstalkers" while their enemy has unearthed Dracula.

I have never been a fan of this instalment, Dominic Purcell as Dracula (Drake) may have cast for a bit of eye candy for some and taking away the dark tone from the character we often familiarize with the Stokers creation. Jessica Biel steps in as the new Whistler (As it's explained why she wasn't wiped out with her family). Ryan Reynolds as the fast talker sarcastic former familiar who is now a hunter. Parker Posey is the bad tempered vampire vixen wih brother Triple H who has a soft spot for small genetic crossed dogs that have the Reaper strain. Wesley Snipes is Blade but doesn't seem to be the main star as he seemed to be side lined, dispute with the director was the talk of the behind the scenes. The weapons are kicked up a notch and the kills are what we expect to see with the bodies burning up and turning to ash but to me this seemed a bit more talky talky than the previous two films.

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Bullet To The Head. 2012.

A New Orleans hitman and a detective join forces to take down the person responsible for killing their partners.

Sly Stallone stars as the hitman who doesn't always abide by the rules very much and Sung Kang as the detective who does the rule book and seems to think his new partner should think things through before becoming trigger happy. This feels like a throw back to the mid 80s-90s buddy cop films with the sarcastic comments and wit that can churn out a laugh or two then the violence parts come up that reminds you that your watching a movie made in 2000s as it would never get shown. Walter Hill done a decent job directing this fast paced action flick.

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My God. Did you actually like that?

I thought it was genuinely awful.

I thought it was decent :behindsofa:

Me too MrB. Far, far, far from the best of either Walt or Sly but it was watchable enough.

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I remember thinking "What the hell have i just watched?" and getting rid of it shortly after. :lol:

How long ago did you watch it Dem?

I won't pretend it was anything special. I certainly didn't think it was awful though. Just disappointing, given one of the greatest action directors ever teamed up with one of the greatest action stars. Its like two michelin starred chefs got together and made a 'decent' cheese toastie.

I agree it's not the best film by Walter Hill or Sly Stallone but certainly better than what I have watched in the last few months.

When it first came out on dvd. I seem to recall that, Escape Plan and The last Stand came out around the same time, in the wake of The Expendables 2 and Bullet to the Head was definitely the worst by a long way.

The Last Stand is certainly one of those films that's not great but not terrible either, Harry Dean Stanton's death scene is one of those that your expecting it but don't know when it will happen.