What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[Frankie Teardrop]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

I'm not sure The Undertow has any sort of sheen.

I'm surprised you haven't seen it, Frankie. I presumed films like Scrapbook, Ice From the Sun, and I Spit on Your Corpse, I Piss on Your Grave would be in your collection already.

I generally like Eric Stanze films, being a fan of grungy camcorder destitution. I guess he's getting bigger budgets these days, but only by a little. I particularly dug 'Ice From The Sun' when I saw it years ago. Perhaps I should reacquaint myself, because I'm not sure whether I enjoyed the idea more than the reality if you know what I mean, and I seem to remember that it's a bit of a sit-through if you're just wanting to be mindlessly entertained, which, these days, increasingly, I am. Have never seen the uncut 'Scrapbook', although obviously I'm aware of its small scale notoriety. ISOYCIPOYG lies unwatched in a carrier bag at the back of one of my cupboards, and I think that's probably fitting from what I've heard.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop

I generally like Eric Stanze films, being a fan of grungy camcorder destitution. I guess he's getting bigger budgets these days, but only by a little. I particularly dug 'Ice From The Sun' when I saw it years ago. Perhaps I should reacquaint myself, because I'm not sure whether I enjoyed the idea more than the reality if you know what I mean, and I seem to remember that it's a bit of a sit-through if you're just wanting to be mindlessly entertained, which, these days, increasingly, I am. Have never seen the uncut 'Scrapbook', although obviously I'm aware of its small scale notoriety. ISOYCIPOYG lies unwatched in a carrier bag at the back of one of my cupboards, and I think that's probably fitting from what I've heard.

I have got the uncut Scrapbook and it's a pretty grueling affair. I watched the six or seven trailers on the Undertow disc and thought ISOYCIPOYG looked rather good in an extremely sleazy way. I haven't seen Ice From the Sun. The trailer looked a bit amateur hour if i'm honest.

[Rik]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

The Prestige (2006)

Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale are two stage magicians who engage in competitive one-upmanship in an attempt to create the ultimate stage illusion.

In the midst of his Batman trilogy director Christopher Nolan unleashed this piece of wizardry on the world. Albeit less celebrated than Gotham's superhero i do think this is the better film.

For anyone who hasn't seen it, i think it's a film well worth searching out. It has fantastic production design, a glorious 1899 setting, David Bowie and illusions galore.

The Prestige is one of those films where the viewer is endlessly searching for clues and tricks as to what is unfolding before our eyes but as Michael Caine says during the opening, "Now you're looking for the secret... but you won't find it, because of course you're not really looking. You don't really want to know. You want to be fooled". And that is why i much preferred it second time round - it's best not to get too involved as first time round i found it all rather disappointing but a repeat viewing, albeit a decade later, and everything fit perfectly into place.

Me and my eldest son just watched this, first time for him, second for me and it does work better on a repeat viewing, much like the Book of Eli, great film.

[iank]

The Russia House. Sean Connery is an author who gets a very intimate letter from a Russian woman (Michelle Pfieffer) he's never even met, along with a book purporting to expose Russian defence secrets, and soon finds himself embroiled in espionage. Well acted and moderately entertaining spy drama, if a bit on the slow side.

[keirarts]

Deepwater Horizon

A solidly made disaster movie telling the real life story about the worst oil rig disaster in history. If your going to watch it its worth considering a trip to the pictures as the films disaster sequences are very well realised and work as pure spectacle on the big screen. How well the film plays on repeat viewings remains to be seen.

Satans blood

Out with their dog Blackie, a young couple are approached by another couple, the husband insisting they know each other from college. In spite of drawing a blank the couple decide to head out into the middle of nowhere to an old mansion. Pretty soon we are in the hairy 70's sex, satanic rituals and murdered pets. The film is a lot of fun and manages to create a weird dream-like atmosphere which becomes a nightmare near the end. The UK Blu-ray is decent quality and gives the option to play with or without the odd into where some sleazy looking professor discusses satanism.

Black Candles

A horror film that ditches a lot of its horror plot and plays more as a sleazy soft core porno with some added goat shagging and satansim. Its pretty filthy but fun if you don't mind a film where almost every scene descends into some kind of 70's hairy shag fest.


Those who inhabit the dark

A bunch of rich doctors and businessmen head into the country to a large mansion to have a Marquis de sade themed weekend. The group (including Paul Naschy) are about to get down to business when nuclear war is triggered. Realising they are in a sweet position given the mansion has a cellar that would make a perfect fallout shelter the group decides to head into town to round up some supplies. Discovering that the townsfolk are all blind due to the nuclear flash, the group begin looting and when the locals object they end up killing some of them. Far from helpless however the blind townsfolk descend on the mansion looking for revenge.
It's a decent post apocalyptic thriller that plays as an allegory of class warfare as the wealthy seize all the goods and the townsfolk stage a revolution to get it back. Code reds blu looks a little iffy but I'm led to belive the materials are in a poor shape.


A Candle for the devil

A pair of spinsters overcome by moral outrage begin killing off young women guests who dont correspond to their moral standards. One of the victims sister (played by Judy Geeson) starts getting suspicious, but as she wears pantsuits and doesn't appear to get pissed the Whitehouse sisters (not their real names) struggle to find reasons to kill her off. Things come to a head as the sisters continue their moral crusade and Geeson decides to catch them in the act.
candle is a great little horror that skewers the moral hypocrisy of Francos spain, with the ultra conservative catholic facists killing off anything that faails to match their impossible standards. Director Eugino martin also made the excellent horror express.

[Demoncrat]

Watched a couple of oddities, The Interior (2015, Trevor Juras), about a young man who needs to find some purpose in life and decides to "rough it" in the great outdoors. Possibly the new It Follows?? Tee hee.
Then I perused Lake Mungo (2008, Joel Anderson) which is another mockumentary film about the ghost of a young woman who seems to return after a swimming accident??

This is in amongst watching the 3rd series of Penny Dreadful and that Preacher "thing".

[Demoncrat]

Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop

MUTILATIONS – Yesterday's real bargain basement stuff, especially from the seventies, eighties and nineties, tended to go two ways. Either you got really unabashed, punkish weirdness with no aspiration to conventional cinema – e.g 'Black Devil Doll From Hell', 'Alien Beasts' etc etc – or you got the kind of film made by, I guess, 'amateur professionals', the sort of people who didn't necessarily burn with outsider visions, but just wanted to do a good job to the best of their abilities. 'Mutilations' is in the latter category. It's the story of a college professor, his students, some cattle mutilations and some bad-ass aliens. You can probably tell already where it's going – professor and students head out into the wilds and before long they're trapped in a house by an unconvincing creature with a rubbish space craft. See, minimal resources, minimal story, it's kind of fitting. 'Mutilations' is awful. But it might be the kind of 'awful' that tickles your imagination. The performances, for a start: the level of actorly expression here is so deficient that everyone involved wouldn't seem out of place in some kind of specialist clinic. Wooden isn't the word. Blank isn't the word. I'm searching for the word, but it isn't coming. Already, 'Mutilations' is feeling like a whole world unto itself. The actual sci-fi horror aspects, the alien stuff, it's all pretty badly done, but it's the kind of 'analogue badness' that warms the cockles of today's movie geeks. I'm talking about rubbishly rendered stop motion claymation, lame but absolutely laboured over. Look, where else can you see a heavily mutilated plasticene cow flap about whilst everyone involved in the same scene suddenly becomes part of a really crude back-projection? Yes, they used back projection as a way of fitting in their obviously scaled down models, and it sucks, but it looks so strange. Will it take you out of the movie? I don't know if anyone can 'get inside' a movie like 'Mutilations'. In as much as a really well made, engaging film can become an immersive experience where you almost forget about real time, films like 'Mutilations' are the opposite, objects to be contemplated and beheld from the outside, films which have their own internal logic but which don't really ever let you 'in' because they seem too artificial – at every turn, the badness reminds you that you're watching a movie. 'Mutilations' might be badness personified, but it's at the very least endearing, and maybe for some (including me), really enjoyable. As with all films whose badness is so obvious that it has a distorting effect, you're never quite sure whether you've been had, whether it's all kind of deliberate, an attempt at camp. Is it ever OK for an old dude with a shotgun to yell “eat my biscuits, blood sucker” at a feeble plasticene alien before opening fire? Moments like that seem a bit too knowing, and make you question everything you've witnessed. After all, it's hard to truly like a bad film which is intended that way. But I'll defintely give 'Mutilations' the benefit of the doubt on that one.

Yet again, you've sold me, even if I have a really nagging feeling that I have seen it??
Curse my drunken binges
See also TU cough

[Nordicdusk]

Started my 31 days of unseen Horror and watched both of these so far will do some reviews when i get home. I have not picked my film for tonight yet.

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[Nordicdusk]

Film no.1

large_6vuxwCfBejPfUjMxrPgk0ANmVFq (1).jpg

A medical student goes on a journey in a search of a secluded beach that her recently deceased mother talked about when she was younger in an attempt to bring her closer to the spirit of her mother. When he is dropped of by a local her friend texts her saying that she has hooked up with a random guy and will not be joining her on the most personal and emotional part of the trip. Undeterred Nancy heads out on her board to surf the same waves her mother surfed many years before. Whilst just sitting on her board floating on the water Nancy is overcome by peace and tranquillity and a feeling of closeness to her mother she has not felt since she passed away. But these feelings of joy don't last long when not far from shore Nancy is attacked by a great white shark only metres from the shore. She manages to swim to a small cluster of rocks but she is only safe until the high tide comes.

With an influx of stupid shark movies over the last few years like robo-octo-zombie-ghost-shark-da-puss i was excited to see an actual real shark movie and right off the bat i was pretty impressed the acting was solid granted there are only a few actors but the few that were in on show were very convincing especially Nancy she really made you believe her pain ,fear,isolation and desperation. But the honeymoon period was short lived and what started out as a survival against one of nature's most deadliest predators just became ridiculous the jellyfish scene being one of the most ridiculous but i'll say no more to avoid spoilers.

The Shallows gets a 6/10 the first two acts are really good and interesting but sadly the third act was a major let down after such a promising start.

[trebor8273]

Originally Posted by Demoncrat

Watched a couple of oddities, The Interior (2015, Trevor Juras), about a young man who needs to find some purpose in life and decides to "rough it" in the great outdoors. Possibly the new It Follows?? Tee hee.
Then I perused Lake Mungo (2008, Joel Anderson) which is another mockumentary film about the ghost of a young woman who seems to return after a swimming accident??

This is in amongst watching the 3rd series of Penny Dreadful and that Preacher "thing".

Are you not enjoying preacher and if not why the hell not, its fantastic probably my favourite new show