What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[Slippery Jack]

Originally Posted by bizarre_eye@Cult Labs

Some nice viewings there, Frankie.

I'll second your recommendation of Clean, Shaven - a very powerful and thought provoking film.

Have you seen Kerrigan's Keane, btw?

Indeed. Think I prefer Keane to Clean, Shaven - Damien Lewis is astonishing in it! Both mini masterpieces though. Keep meaning to track down Kerrigan's other two films, Claire Dolan and Rebecca H. . . .

[Slippery Jack]

Originally Posted by gag

It's a nice break because now and again I got bored of watching films and sometimes I sit down to watch a film and get so far then turn it off because I can't be botherd even if I am enjoying the film.

You get bored of watching films?! What madness is this . . . ?

[SCM]

I just finished Black Sunday, absolutely brilliant

[Slippery Jack]

Watching late-70s Brit horror Killer's Moon in light of all these historical abuse cases, I was struck by this line from the male screenwriter:

"You were only raped. As long as you don’t tell anyone about it you’ll be alright. You’ll pretend it never happened, I’ll pretend I never saw it…"



The whole 'schoolgirls being stalked n' raped' plot left quite a bad taste. It's a shame, as the setup with the broken down schoolbus and haughty teacher had a certain campy charm . . .

[antmumford]

Just finished watching Shaolin and I thought it was superb. It really had quite an emotional wallop at times. Brilliantly cast with Andy Lau and Nicholas Tse performing as superbly as ever. The action, martial arts and set pieces were astounding too and the Cine Asia Blu-ray looks and sounds top notch. Highly recommended

[iluvdvds@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by troggi

The Creature from Black Lake is a completely different kettle of fish. The one dimensional characters and "hookey" sasquatch were pathetic. Loved it! 5/10 for corn.

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This is what I like to see, Troggi! Bigfoot movies! Black Lake is a great sasquatchploitation movie - lots of fun. Glad you enjoyed it

[Hawkmonger]

Originally Posted by iluvdvds@Cult Labs

This is what I like to see, Troggi! Bigfoot movies! Black Lake is a great sasquatchploitation movie - lots of fun. Glad you enjoyed it

[SShaw]

I watched The Rites of Spring for a second time (German blu-ray). This is a film shown at FrightFest Glasgow last year so you can read more about my thoughts over on my diary thread.

[bdc]

Haunted Tales (aka Ghosts Walk In) (1980)

"Acclaimed director Chu Yuan handles a newlywed bride's haunted house terrors in the first story while exploitation expert Mou Tun-Fei helms the second story, of a nasty lottery winner whose greed leads him to a grim fate."

Actually there's more to this anthology (two instead of the usual three stories here) as both were unfinished films:

"HAUNTED TALES (1980) is an interesting picture. It began five years earlier under the direction of Chu Yuan under the title HELLISH SOUL. Filming shut down at some point with reshoots being required. With original director, Chu too busy to redo some of the sequences (including a hospital scene), Ho Meng Hua was ordered to partake in the reshoots in late 1978."

"For whatever reason, the movie, now titled THE GHOST, was still problematic and was put on hold yet again. With a number of other Shaw pictures (most notably THE CRIMINALS series) being left unfinished and later turned into anthologies, Chu's ghost picture would share the same fate."

"Controversial director, Mou Tun Fei (MAN BEHIND THE SUN) had some of his Shaw pictures halted to be turned into shorter features for a multi-part movie, some of which became part of the above mentioned CRIMINALS series. His THE PRIZE WINNER was one of these proposed full length productions that was later cut back as a short feature."

"Finally, both THE PRIZE WINNER and THE GHOST were combined to form HAUNTED TALES, 93 minutes of spine-tingling terror about a newlywed couple moving into a haunted house and a greedy lottery winner who comes to a bad end." ( info from this wonderful site Cool Ass Cinema )

The Ghost starts off slow but gets much better as it progresses while the second tale,The Prize Winner,was a real revelation and would certainly earn a Cat III rating nowadays.

Both are tales set in the modern (70's) world btw.

Overall I liked Haunted Tales with The Prize Winner being the best tale imho.

[re.form]

The Black Panther - Another great release from BFI flipside. Some really great imagery here (the underground scenes are outstanding). I'm surprised this is the only film the director made, because he shows some awesome chops on such a low budget. It's a very no-nonsense depiction of a real life serial killer, almost documentary in it's approach, but still manages to be cinematic.

The Lords of Salem. I've always though Zombie to be a strong visual director, but always found his story-telling, characters and dialogue to be a bit try-hard and at times childish. This however, was a delight. The opening is a little too cheesy, but as this progresses I thought it was a wonderful love letter to Fulci and Argento movies of the 70's and 80's. In fact I'll go far to say this is the movie Argento was trying to make with 'Mother of Tears' but couldn't, for whatever reason, manage. I really enjoyed it and it will get a re-watch sooner rather than later. As I don't often say that about newer releases, it's fair to say I thought this was one of the best movies released so far this year.