What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Dave Boy

THE STEEL BAYONET (1957)

Is this available on dvd Dave?

[Dave Boy]

No Dem, I'm afraid not. This is from my collection. It's calling out for a dvd/blu release as this gem is never seen anymore and would look great in full Hammerscope.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Dave Boy

No Dem, I'm afraid not. This is from my collection. It's calling out for a dvd/blu release as this gem is never seen anymore and would look great in full Hammerscope.

A shame. I didn't think it had been released but perhaps i'd missed hearing about it.

[R-T-C Tim]

Finally the last of my poundstore sword & sorcery crapfests. But this one was extra bad. Stupid storyline, horrible effects, surprisingly good make-up effects but with no particular motivation.

Can't say any more about this without vomiting. If a film ever needed gratuitous nudity to make it watchable, it was this one.

Journey to Promethea review.

[MacBlayne]

I watched Dream Home on the Horror Channel last night.

One of the better premises for a slasher film - Josie Ho sneaks into an apartment complex and begins murdering tenants so she drive the rent down and afford a place herself.

It's pretty damn nasty (one murder scene is almost too much to watch) but what makes it really interesting is how the film employs a nonlinear structure. After witnessing a brutal murder, the film goes back to follow Ho's character struggling on the breadline. Her only dream is to have a place of her own. At first she tries saving her money, but with the economic crisis and inflation rising, it simply isn't good enough. Add to that a load of personal woes (including a pathetic dissent into prostitution) and you have a character who you sort of want to see succeed. It gives the film such a disturbing tone that you feel rather dirty by the end.

I really do recommend this. Despite the murder sequences crossing into the ludicrous, the film does resonate as its themes are very easy to relate to. We all struggle somewhat and we all fear the day that it may become too much to deal with. Dream Home shows just how we may handle such a situation.

[Susan Foreman]

Originally Posted by Rik

Anyone else watch Evil Dead (2013) on UK Channel 4 the other night and notice it contained scenes not in any other version?
I noticed a few extra bits, like the "We're gonna get you" song and the epilogue, but I've since learnt there was more than that!
Hopefully this means an extended cut is on the cards

Originally Posted by suziginajackson

From Melon Farmers: "An extended version of Evil Dead, the 2013 remake, has just been broadcast by Channel 4.

This unheralded version has sparked interest on forums, but is something of a puzzle. The version featured about 4 minutes of additional material and seemed complete in terms of violence. This rather disproves theories about it being a US TV version. It is a common pattern for US TV to add in deleted material to replace or compensate for the cutting of any sex and violence.

Director Fede Avarez has been asked about the current extended version but wasn't able to throw any light on the matter.

Before the release of the original release of the film the director spoke of brief cuts to achieve a US R rating and also of the possibility of an extended version. But shortly before the premiere, Alvarez proclaimed that the Theatrical Version was his Director's Cut and no more was heard of an alternative version...until now."

An update from Melon Farmers regarding this:

"On Sunday 25th January Channel 4 kindly broadcast a mysterious extended version of Evil Dead. It featured about 4m:40s of mostly additional material and includes a little more gore.

And it does seem that this version is an unreleased Director's Cut or Unrated Version. Anthony wrote to Channel 4 who returned a fascinating reply:

Thank you for contacting Channel 4 Viewer Enquiries regarding Evil Dead.

We apologise for the delay in responding to you, after investigating with our distributor it seems that the incorrect version of the film was supplied, and subsequently broadcast. Unfortunately this means we have had to send the version back and we will not be able to broadcast it again, nor do we have any further information regarding the incorrect copy."

A German site has also made a pictorial spread of the new material here - Evil Dead - Schnittberichte.com (Detaillierte Fassungs- und Zensurinformationen zu DVD, Blu-ray, Games ...)

However, for those of us who do not speak German, there is also an English translation here - https://translate.google.com/transla....php?ID=240330

[nosferatu42]

Paranorman

para.jpg

I really enjoyed this,i'm a bit hit and miss with kids films, but i thought this was well made and entertaining.
It's pretty dark for a kids film and i could imagine some very young kids being frightened by it. Basically a young boy can see and speak to ghosts which are everywhere in town, everybody thinks he's weird, so he just keeps himself amused watching horror movies.
So first scene has him watching a zombie film with his dead grandmother, see what i mean about dark, there are a few references to horror films so you can tell the makers are fans, the kids ringtone is the Halloween theme.
But there's also a lot of humour which lightens the tone and some is quite black, at one point he has to retrieve a book from a corpse that won't let go of it, the corpse ends up falling on him with it's lolling tongue being draped over the kids face, and he repeatedly ends up banging the corpses head on a table to finally retrieve it.
The plot centres round a curse from a girl who was tried as a witch by the towns ancestors and wants revenge, this brings back to life the ancestors bodies who shamble about the town as zombies and it's up to Norman to save the day.
I thought the sets and figures were really well animated, if you think Coraline in terms of animation you're not far off although this isn't as weird.
If you like kids films that are a bit dark then this is well worth seeing.
Recommended 8/10

[Frankie Teardrop]

DARK TOUCH – Marina De Van's latest has attracted some not so great reviews, but this seems a bit unfair. If it doesn't scale the heights of 'In My Skin', 'Dark Touch' is still a creepy and at times intense exploration of a disturbing theme. It follows the difficulties faced by an orphaned girl in the aftermath of the massacre of her family, who, it turns out, were horrible abusers. Worryingly, the dynamics from which she escaped begin to surface in her new foster home... 'Dark Touch' is not pitching from a wholly social realist angle however. Telekinisis is the well worn device by which De Van probes her troubling scenario, so scenes where social workers interview and assess are followed by ones more reminiscent of eg. 'Carrie'. For me, this is the crux of 'Dark Touch's problems – it struggles to juggle the not particularly compatible registers of subdued art-house drama, standard B-movie horror, and imagery which is much more intense and redolent of the transgressions of her first feature. Weirdly though, I was torn between finding these discrepancies a bit grating and actually quite liking them. I mean, I love that king of thing in trashier movies, but here it seemed a little more awkward. Ultimately, 'Dark Touch' may have been better served by downplaying its genre elements or ramping up even further the kind of strange and disturbing imagery of (for example) its climax, but the film overall looks great and manages to convince despite some fragmentation. Interesting and affecting, and worth watching for sure.

THE MIAMI CONNECTION – Thanks to anyone who's mentioned this recently, you have inspired me to track down a reasonably priced copy of the recent Drafthouse refurbishment (which took ages as it seems quite scarce now). 'The Miami Connection' is amazing, and certainly the most fun I've had in the last two years – which is either a testament to the redemptive power of tae-kwon-do as delivered by the awfulness of grade z eighties action moves, or a measure of how sad I am these days. The plot, which is vaguely coherent, is about a martial arts aware synth-rock troupe 'Dragon Sound' and their feud with a narcotics gang and some ninjas. It truly is a joy to behold, a schizophrenic tumble through endless tonal shifts, excruciating performances, mad dialogue and bad mullets. The musical numbers are astounding, as is the manner in which 'Miami Connection' segues a heartbreaking / hilarious subplot involving a dude's search for his long lost father into a climactic ninja massacre. One thing I've noticed when reading a lot of 'Miami Connection's reviews is that many mention the sense of sincerity and warmth on display – the film's mastermind, Y.K Kim, was a Tae Kwon Do evangelist who seemed to really want to convey a message to society (possibly about world peace) through his entirely self-financed B-movie. That's interesting, because watching films from the ultra-bad club, which is where 'Miami Connection' most assuredly belongs, is often quite a cold experience – a possible travelling companion, 'Mad Foxes', is mesmerising but slimy and sometimes jarring for example – but this one doesn't have a nasty bone in its body. It genuinely is a feel-good movie! 'The Miami Connection' is essential viewing. There are plenty of awful movies out there, but how does a film manage to be so, so bad on virtually every level and yet still totally exhilarate? A question worth pondering.

[keirarts]

Kingsman.

Given the recent scathing opinions on here I actually decided to give this one a go. It's a Roger Moore era Bond 'homage' set in an England where everyone is either an unemployed Chav or an upper class twit. Colin Firth plays an Kingsman agent who does a pygmalion on a yoof whose father saved his life. Meanwhile Sam Jackson plays a Billionaire environmentalist with a murderous scheme.

Since the classist critique seems to have already been well covered, its worth mentioning the terrible individualistic neo-liberal, behaviour and attitudes have nothing to do with where your born propaganda that seems to be pumped through the film, presumably to curry some sort of favour with an American audience and a certain Australian newspaper tycoon whose papers feature prominently in one scene.

The Kingsman agency itself is a private non regulated agency that operates outside of the 'beauracracy of government' because the milton Friedman worshipping, Atlas shrugged reading buffoons who seem to promote this ideology would approve, and naturally Government oversight of a secret service organisation would be extremely silly because we can rely on their patriotism to ensure they don't become a danger; they have pictures of the queen on the wall after all! That said the film itself actually answers my own critique in the 3rd act, but no spoilers here!

Get past the tabloid level politics on play, Kingsman actually does have things to reccomend it. Firstly in an era where even Bond has become a dour, ultra serious, edgy and realistic spy franchise it's nice to see someone putting out a film a little more daft and somewhat fun with plenty of gadgets on display. The church scene is probably one of the best single sequences i've seen in a film this year (and probably beats a lot of action films from the previous year as well) and will take some topping.

Overall its a somewhat politically dubious piece of fun that's no kick-ass but worth a go.

[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

Excellent review, keirarts – it's good to read another's opinion which (more or less) reflects my own thoughts about the film.