What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[nosferatu42]

I prefer the Others myself.

[Linbro]

Biggest problem with 'The Others' was Nicole Kidman - another poor performance, in my opinion.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

The Hospital (2013)

A trio of sicko's lure a group of amateur porn stars, er,' girls, to an abandoned hospital in the pretence of participating in a televised ghost hunt. Once there it becomes clear there are no ghosts (or are there?) and the girls are at the mercy of the raping, mutilating and murdering predators.

This low budget shocker has gained notoriety recently after it was taken off the shelves at Tesco due to customer complaints of the films graphic content and depiction of rape. I suppose even in this heavily cut form (17 minutes were trimmed by the distributor prior to it being classified 18 uncut by the BBFC) some of the scenes are a little too strong for supermarket shelves. The first rape while brief is sort of strong as it's played out with a, lets say, unconventional looking girl for this type of film, followed by numerous scenes of her hung up naked. This is as grimy as the film gets though. Virtually everything else is cut before it's really begun or has the worst blood and gore effects i've ever seen. Death on the Sega Megadrive looked more convincing. I kid you not.

As for the film itself. Well the acting is cringeworthy in places and the storyline so thin i covered it in my opening sentence. There are a couple of twists along the way and some quite impressive ghostly effects, well a lot more impressive than the blood effects anyway.

It is unfortunate that the film is so heavily cut, as a full length version may produce a grimy, scuzzy little gem that low budget scholars may enjoy. As it is in this truncated form The Hospital isn't really worth bothering with, but i will be on the look out for the uncut US release at a reasonable price.

[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

The Hospital (2013)

This low budget shocker has gained notoriety recently after it was taken off the shelves at Tesco due to one customer's complaint about the film's content.

Really good review, Demdike, but I've amended the quote for you for accuracy!

[Make Them Die Slowly]

WILDERNESS. Brit revenge/slasher/survival horror that's not too bad but not that great either.

STITCHES. Ross Noble plays a killer clown in this Irish horror that punches well above it's weight. The film opens with a scene that feels like an outtake from the TV show "The League of Gentlemen" before switching to a teen comedy vibe before switching to full on horror. Recommended.

THE FINAL PROGRAMME. Released in 1973, this take on the work of Michael Moorcock must have seemed dated at the time as it is way too swinging 60s for it's own good. That said, it is an excellent curio and a lot of fun.

SOME PEOPLE. Bristol 1962 and rebellious youths, Ray Brooks and David Hemmings, form a band and join the Duke of Edinburgh's Award Scheme! This is fantastic on so many levels: as propaganda for conformity; as social document and a record of Bristol in the early 60s. In fact the City of Bristol plays an unwritten character throughout the film as there are tons of scenes set in various parts of the city both inside and out. I can't recommend this highly enough, my favourite film so far this year.

[keirarts]

Originally Posted by Nosferatu@Cult Labs

Really good review, Demdike, but I've amended the quote for you for accuracy!

Still not accurate.

One journalists complaint in order to generate a story as he was stuck for something to write about and is a lazy yellow journalist with no integrity so most likely to end up working for one of the red tops or more likely the Daily mail...

PHEW! Rant over..

X-men: Days of future past.

Keeps up the momentum of First class and the last wolverine film of actually being pretty decent. Its perhaps not as good as first class and certainly not as a good Captain America or The avengers but better than those rotten spider-man films (which isn't hard.)

My only complaints with the film involve comic nerd specific stuff like the design of the sentinels (no master mould?!) and stuff added for plot convenience including a whole new power for one of the characters.

On the plus side its managed to retcon the the whole series so now X-men 3 and origins wolverine never happened. If only that was true in real life. Also theres an end credits sequence that should be a treat for anyone who is familiar with the comics.

Still. Roll on Guardians of the Galaxy!

[Linbro]

'Argo' - pretty tense stuff, and very enjoyable, though I'm not sure it deserves to be an Oscar winner. The cast were terrific, and the direction pretty good. Dipped into sentimentality a bit, which I didn't like, but I'm sure the 'Academy' loved.

[Frankie Teardrop]

SATAN’S PLAYGROUND – I really like the films of Dante Tomaselli, especially ‘Horror’. ‘Satan’s Playground’, a forest based slow crawl into satanic territory, is less weirded out than his previous two, but it’s definitely worth seeing. It’s not very graphic, but carries itself more through atmospherics. Another instance of many going on about someone “capturing the essence of seventies horror” etc etc – I can see where they’re coming from (a bit), but it’s a far cry from the latter day wannabe grindhouse trend. Really looking forward to his latest, ‘Torture Chamber’, which arrived the other day.

THE JEKYLL AND HYDE PORTFOLIO – You can tell you’re in for something special from the opening credits alone, which run across a badly made collage of felt tip pen drawings of infamous murderers covered in red paint. It gets even better, with acting so stiff, dry and dead it’s practically mummified, random frog dissections (I’m assuming they weren’t killed by the makers), electronic soundtrack noise and bad edits… no, I’m not being sarcastic, I love this kind of shit. Unfortunately there must always be a downside to such splendours, and the film does tend towards padding, of either the “walking around, waiting for things to happen” or the “let’s throw in a really boring sex scene, again” variety. ‘The Jekyll and Hyde Portfolio’ will definitely be of interest to anyone into zero budget regional American indie horror from the seventies. It reminded me very slightly of Andy Milligan, but don’t let that put you off.

LOVE LETTERS OF A PORTUGUESE NUN – Another Jess Franco number from that Dietrich collection. It’s basically a nunsploitation flick set around the time of the inquisition, and follows a teenager in the grips of a corrupt church. Franco always really loves to have a go at Catholicism, and LLOAPN is no exception. It’s also an interesting example of the director’s more serious, subdued style… there are moments of sleazy intensity, but it does feel slightly ponderous at times. Apart from occasional longeurs, also, I have to ask – Jess, what were you doing with that devil costume? The satanic ass-shovelling of a terrified novice is one thing, but somehow that demonic gravitas just doesn’t happen when you stick a horn on the forehead of a middle aged guy in a red catsuit and ask him to toddle away.

F – From the director of ‘Hellbreeder’. I really like ‘Hellbreeder’ – this may be down to my love of lost causes, because I’m pretty sure that it sucked on so many levels. And yet, despite or because of its ‘badness’, it had a certain surreal intensity. ‘F’ is a much more polished piece of filmmaking. It takes place in a school after hours, where a burned out teacher has placed his estranged daughter in detention. The school is beset by ghostly hoodie kids with blacked out faces. I thought ‘F’ was pretty good, actually – it manages to sustain a bit of tension and atmosphere, and goes for an early Carpenter / J-Horror kind of thing. Given the nature of its antagonists and theme of urban strife, it manages to avoid being as precariat – dissing as other examples of the Hoodie Horror subgenre, maybe just by being elusive. Probably the best thing about it is Brit TV stalwart David Schofield, who plays the pathetic lead with aplomb. Also, I liked the fact that it doesn’t attempt to explain and really doesn’t make much sense. But guys, even Frankie Teardrop has a limit, and that ‘ending’ – did they just run out of film?

THE DENTIST – I’m not a great fan of Brian Yuzna and I always think his films will be a bit pedestrian, but then I usually find something to like about them. ‘The Dentist’ is good, solid B-horror from a time (the nineties) when the genre wasn’t really doing much. I have over the years come to quite like that ‘direct to video’ feel of a lot of late eighties /nineties stuff. A certain slick, synthetic linearity. Maybe it’s just nostalgia. Anyway, ‘The Dentist’ is about, you’ve guessed it, a dentist who loses it and does some bad stuff to people’s mouths. As with a few other Brian Yuzna films, there are some Cronenbergian ideas which are watered down and left in a very standard meat and potatoes set up, with none of the chilly ambience or thematic resonance of the doyen of medical horror’s work. Actually, even the whole oral horror thing isn’t pushed as much as I thought it might be here. Still, there’s some gore, mean spiritedness and sleaze and a good performance from the lead, plus some nice stylistic quirks at points which made me want to grope for some dead sophisticated cinematic reference point which just wasn’t within my grasp, so I’ll fumble it and say “Hitchcock or Lynch or something” and hope that makes some vague sense. Anyway, ‘The Dentist’, I enjoyed it.

[keirarts]

Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop

SATAN’S PLAYGROUND – I really like the films of Dante Tomaselli, especially ‘Horror’. ‘Satan’s Playground’, a forest based slow crawl into satanic territory, is less weirded out than his previous two, but it’s definitely worth seeing. It’s not very graphic, but carries itself more through atmospherics. Another instance of many going on about someone “capturing the essence of seventies horror” etc etc – I can see where they’re coming from (a bit), but it’s a far cry from the latter day wannabe grindhouse trend. Really looking forward to his latest, ‘Torture Chamber’, which arrived the other day.

THE JEKYLL AND HYDE PORTFOLIO – You can tell you’re in for something special from the opening credits alone, which run across a badly made collage of felt tip pen drawings of infamous murderers covered in red paint. It gets even better, with acting so stiff, dry and dead it’s practically mummified, random frog dissections (I’m assuming they weren’t killed by the makers), electronic soundtrack noise and bad edits… no, I’m not being sarcastic, I love this kind of shit. Unfortunately there must always be a downside to such splendours, and the film does tend towards padding, of either the “walking around, waiting for things to happen” or the “let’s throw in a really boring sex scene, again” variety. ‘The Jekyll and Hyde Portfolio’ will definitely be of interest to anyone into zero budget regional American indie horror from the seventies. It reminded me very slightly of Andy Milligan, but don’t let that put you off.

LOVE LETTERS OF A PORTUGUESE NUN – Another Jess Franco number from that Dietrich collection. It’s basically a nunsploitation flick set around the time of the inquisition, and follows a teenager in the grips of a corrupt church. Franco always really loves to have a go at Catholicism, and LLOAPN is no exception. It’s also an interesting example of the director’s more serious, subdued style… there are moments of sleazy intensity, but it does feel slightly ponderous at times. Apart from occasional longeurs, also, I have to ask – Jess, what were you doing with that devil costume? The satanic ass-shovelling of a terrified novice is one thing, but somehow that demonic gravitas just doesn’t happen when you stick a horn on the forehead of a middle aged guy in a red catsuit and ask him to toddle away.

F – From the director of ‘Hellbreeder’. I really like ‘Hellbreeder’ – this may be down to my love of lost causes, because I’m pretty sure that it sucked on so many levels. And yet, despite or because of its ‘badness’, it had a certain surreal intensity. ‘F’ is a much more polished piece of filmmaking. It takes place in a school after hours, where a burned out teacher has placed his estranged daughter in detention. The school is beset by ghostly hoodie kids with blacked out faces. I thought ‘F’ was pretty good, actually – it manages to sustain a bit of tension and atmosphere, and goes for an early Carpenter / J-Horror kind of thing. Given the nature of its antagonists and theme of urban strife, it manages to avoid being as precariat – dissing as other examples of the Hoodie Horror subgenre, maybe just by being elusive. Probably the best thing about it is Brit TV stalwart David Schofield, who plays the pathetic lead with aplomb. Also, I liked the fact that it doesn’t attempt to explain and really doesn’t make much sense. But guys, even Frankie Teardrop has a limit, and that ‘ending’ – did they just run out of film?

THE DENTIST – I’m not a great fan of Brian Yuzna and I always think his films will be a bit pedestrian, but then I usually find something to like about them. ‘The Dentist’ is good, solid B-horror from a time (the nineties) when the genre wasn’t really doing much. I have over the years come to quite like that ‘direct to video’ feel of a lot of late eighties /nineties stuff. A certain slick, synthetic linearity. Maybe it’s just nostalgia. Anyway, ‘The Dentist’ is about, you’ve guessed it, a dentist who loses it and does some bad stuff to people’s mouths. As with a few other Brian Yuzna films, there are some Cronenbergian ideas which are watered down and left in a very standard meat and potatoes set up, with none of the chilly ambience or thematic resonance of the doyen of medical horror’s work. Actually, even the whole oral horror thing isn’t pushed as much as I thought it might be here. Still, there’s some gore, mean spiritedness and sleaze and a good performance from the lead, plus some nice stylistic quirks at points which made me want to grope for some dead sophisticated cinematic reference point which just wasn’t within my grasp, so I’ll fumble it and say “Hitchcock or Lynch or something” and hope that makes some vague sense. Anyway, ‘The Dentist’, I enjoyed it.

Didn't realise torture chamber was released! (shame on me as i'm on Tomasellis facebook page!) Agree about Yuzna. I like his stuff but his reps a little inflated by folk like me who remember the 90's drought and the fact he was the only guy delivering horror for a chunk of that decade. Society his still his best work imo, I like his re-animator films but neither live up to the Stuart gordon original. (aside from the wretched 'integral cut' I caught at a friends last night that ruins the films pacing.)

[Frankie Teardrop]

Originally Posted by keirarts

Didn't realise torture chamber was released! (shame on me as i'm on Tomasellis facebook page!) Agree about Yuzna. I like his stuff but his reps a little inflated by folk like me who remember the 90's drought and the fact he was the only guy delivering horror for a chunk of that decade. Society his still his best work imo, I like his re-animator films but neither live up to the Stuart gordon original. (aside from the wretched 'integral cut' I caught at a friends last night that ruins the films pacing.)

'Torture Chamber' is on the pile, and Amazon will vouch for me on this. I too was surprised by the lack of foreword, and had to check out the credits list on my copy to be sure. Yup, it's Dante.
Agree again on Yuzna. I've never really rated Stuart Gordon, either. All of that mid eighties stuff stands as a Shibboleth now, but in years to come it will never be seen to possess the power of eg. Cronenberg, or even Carpenter etc etc. For a horror hack, his films occasionally snatch at ideas which are never fully realised. That elevates them a bit for me, and he knows how to turn a script competently enough. I've just ordered that one of his about a cybernetic dog. Maybe my life will suddenly change and things will be amazing.