What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[vincenzo]

Yes I agree. The ending is more of an anticlimax after the tense build-up. William Sanderson and Robert Judd give excellent performances though, and the BBFC would have no problems with it today.

[42ndStreetFreak]

Originally Posted by TGGPodcast

The Last Horror Film: Being a big fan of Maniac I've always wanted to see this. Big let down unfortunately. Total mess of a film.

Bit harsh. It still has a goodly amount of gore (sadly the inserts of the extra gore are very dark...my old pre-cert VHS has a better picture), some GREAT Canne's footage, Munro looks yummy and Spinell's (real life) Mother is a total joy in every scene!
She's like a trash movie version of Scorsese's Mum.

[42ndStreetFreak]

"Cash on Demand"

A generally forgotten, outside of 'Hammer' devotes, thriller/drama from Britain's highest profile horror studio that sees Peter Cushing's cold, dour, stuffy and bitter Bank Manager having a very bad day indeed when a sly and icy cool Andre Morel arrives at his bank one morning and announces he's going to rob the place...with Cushing's help.

A slight tale this may be, but the (mostly set in two rooms) tight script, top class acting by Morel and Cushing (morel especially has great fun), some genuinely tense set-pieces and a couple of mostly very effective twists ensure this fast paced little film (about 70 minutes) always entertains

And if the ending is rather twee thanks to another late twist you have to remember that the film is set just before Christmas and you don't always need 'spirits' to make people see the error of their ways.
Dickens' would have approved.

[Stephen@Cult Labs]

Watched Tombs Of the Blind Dead last night and enjoyed it immensely.The alternate Revenge From Planet Ape prologue is THE single most bizzare attempt to connect two unrelated films I've evers seen.I know the BBFC still have a problem with sexual violence but honestly,I've seen them pass worse rape scenes than the one in Tombs.

Would people think too bad of me if I say that I actually preferred the shortened ending from the U.S. version?

[Gojirosan]

The Mafu Cage

A wonderful film, I thought. Like Bergman via Corman with a great performance from Carol Kane. I got angry that the only available DVD of this splendid film seems to be the awful R2 Avenue release - pointlessly retitled "Don't Ring The Doorbell" (it has nothing to do with anything and isn't even the print title! The print says "The Mafu Cage" with the new title added as a subtitle at the bottom of the screen!), mastered from a dark, soft tape source and with video interference throughout (waving, rolling lines, herringboning etc). One of the best films I have ever bought in Poundland, but in a dreadful presentation! It needs a restored reissue.

[42ndStreetFreak]

"Chocolate"

Great stuff.
The lovely JeeJa Yanin, as a mentally handicapped martial arts genius, is a mini marvel to behold.
She may occasionally (purely because she's still relatively new to fighting and that she's a very slight young lady) lack the power and speed of Tony Jaa (who pops up on TV to help with her moves)...but let's not be mistaken here, this is still a truly amazing, if still blossoming, talent.

Numerous fight scenes (some slightly knockabout, though bruising, some far more violent and serious) entertain throughout the perfectly attuned plot that embraces full on melodrama, light comedy, tragedy and tough drama.
JeeJa Yanin handles all the stunt heavy (no doubles of course) but generally realistic looking action to perfection and leaps, ducks, dives, kicks, elbows, punches and smashes various hard objects over people's heads with a skill truly belying her age.
And you can't deny that an extra wow factor and an extra layer of balls-out fun comes into play simply because this is not a big muscled guy doing this stuff, but a slight, pretty young woman

The finale packs the high melodrama, multiple violent deaths and driven revenge action together with clinical precision and JeeJa Yanin's superb fight/stunt work during an extended chase/battle sequence up and down and back and forth between a bridge and the side of a sign strewn building is tiring and bruising just to watch.

Highly melodramatic, with a few little speed/power issues for JeeJa Yanin to train through, but overall "Chocolate" is a wildly entertaining slice of martial arts dramatics with a truly wonderful and genuinely impressive young fighter at the helm who should become as big as Tony Jaa and then some.

[DeadAlive]

Those fight scenes towards the end of Chocolate on the side of the building are incredible. Some of those stunt men must have got hurt a few times.

The Blade Spares None - Early seventies Golden Harvest sword fu with Nora Miao acting pretty mean in action mode. The film features a very young looking James Tien and Sammo Hung worked as co action director. I've read that Jackie Chan and Lam Ching Ying also had stunt man/extra roles on this, but I didn't notice them on first viewing. Some gushing blood spurts almost seem to be taking their influences from Japanes chanbara films.

[antmumford]

Just watched Trailer Park of Terror and thoroughly enjoyed it. It was only a fiver in HMV so thought I'd grab it as the cover looked pretty cool and it contained a little comic book. It's based on the comic series of the same name (obviously).
I expected it to be some stupid low budget tack that the americans so often produce and I was right but this time it was a good thing. It didn't take itself seriously and the gore was pretty cool too. A mix of CGI and prosthetics made things look quite real in places. The acting you'd expect to be a shamballs but it wasn't at all, everyone was actually quite good. Some annoying characters which come as standard in a film like this but overall, very impressed.
The soundtrack was all southern american rock and it played really well with the theme.
The camera work was good too, they weren't all static shots from different angles, it had movement and it worked well with the pace of the film.
Check it out, it's not that bad at all. I'd give it 3 stars.

[42ndStreetFreak]

Yeah..."Trailer Park" was fun 'n' nasty. Groovy soundtrack too.




"Flashpoint"

Donnie Yen vehicle that has highs and lows.
Lows are the lack of any action scene over a minute long until about 55 minutes (Yen's first real action scene!) in with 30 minutes to go. This seems to be a problem with many newer Hong Kong actioners.

HK used to make action films that had (perhaps melodramatic, but hey) solid and interesting plots but still managed to cram in numerous, memorable (even iconic) smaller set-pieces into the running time at strategic places.
They didn't used to leave almost everything until the last 20 minutes.

This seems to have changed recently, with straight action films seemingly 'below' HK film makers so much so that they feel the need to only make serious drama/thrillers for 60 minutes and only succumb to full on action film making until the finale because they have to.
Woo's "The Killer" had a layered, solid, melodramatic plot-line but contained numerous action scenes, that have gone one to be classic, even before the jaw dropping church finale.
It remained a pure action film throughout the entire running time...As did the likes of "Tiger Cage 2", "In the Line of Duty", "Full Contact", "Iron Angels" etc etc.
This skill at combining lots of action within a still solid plot seems to have been thrown away.

That being said, the action that there is is well done and nicely bruising and the finale features some top class Donnie Yen (looking and moving extremely well for his age) martial arts mayhem that looks bone crunching and thudding and grounded in more reality then normal.
Yen may never reach the heights of "Tiger Cage 2" again...but he's looks damn impressive here. and he has some nice support from all involved.
The finale is let down a bit by a lack of 'canon fodder' characters though and so we have only around 6 bad guys for the big showdown. Again...HK seems to have moved away from the glorious excess that made its very name.

What we have is entertaining, is superbly made and very impressive at times, but it is a shame the action is so sparse and the unashamed, wonderful, excess that made Hong Kong action cinema so unique has been toned down and forced to 'mature' and put a suit on. The fact is, for all the rough edges sometimes as far as budget and equipment went, the glory days of wildly entertaining excess and abandon were better days for the audience.

[pedromonkey]

Pandorum

i recently sat down to watch this sci-fi horror film with next to no information about the film only the trailer and the back of the box to give me anyform of information. What i witnessed was essentially a cross between Ghost of Mars, Pitch Black and Titan A.E, and boy was it good. There has not been a sci-fi film this good since Sunshine. The twists are a little obvious but that's not the point, Dennis Quaid, Ben Foster and Cam Gigandet (twilight) give pretty good performance, The creatures look like the Descent monsters with weapons and the gore is pretty good, my only hang up with this film is it's strange lack of an explanation, sure the plot is easy to follow but some things are not exactly explained. All in all a terrific sci-fi horror well worth a rental....