What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[keirarts]

I was never that bothered by Serbian film. One of those films i thought was trying to be shocking for it's own sake then think of a meaning later. The infamous baby scene was (thankfully) fake as hell. I've not had the urge to revisit it. Personally I found August underground mordem to be more shocking.

I've just watched.....

The Crazies

After two 16mm features, season of the witch and there's always vanilla, Romero moved to 35mm with a DP and more of a budget. The film didn't set the box office on fire at the time but has built up a solid reputation over the years.
After the languid pace of his last two features, the crazies moves at a break neck pace. A biological weapon gets loose and the army must quarantine a small Pennsylvania town to prevent the contagion spreading. The army are neither fully equipped nor prepared as they should be. While things steadily fall apart a group of survivors try to escape the quarantine zone.
For me, the crazies feels like Romero's attempt at doing a Dr Strangelove type of film with biological warfare rather than nuclear weapons . It's got Romero's typically pessimistic view of authority as the government tròops end up killing people in panic, turning on their own and generally screwing things up from the get go. The cast are mainly fine. The standouts being Lynn Lowry and Richard Liberty, who would later steal every scene he's in in Day of the Dead.
Arrows transfer is the best I've seen. I like the Blue Underground release but this one really tops it.

[Rik]

[QUOTE=keirarts;562265]I was never that bothered by Serbian film. One of those films i thought was trying to be shocking for it's own sake then think of a meaning later. The infamous baby scene was (thankfully) fake as hell. I've not had the urge to revisit it. Personally I found August underground mordem to be more shocking.



/QUOTE]


I agree, AU Mordem is more shocking, I don’t think I made it to the end of that one and I never bothered with the third one

[Crimson Blade]

I prefer the charm of all the old school horrors. None of these modern torture porn films do it for me at all. It's not that i'm shocked by them, it's just that I find them dull and boring.
I remember when I stupidly bought Murder Set Pieces, the biggest pile of crap i've ever had to sit through.
Give me House on The Edge of The Park, any day!

[Nostalgic]

Watched The Conversation, it's ok but not the classic it's reputed to be.

Also watched Abbot & Costello meet Frankenstein! Classic, must watch a few more of those!

Next up more conspiricy fun with Blow Up and Blow Out!

[keirarts]

[QUOTE=Rik;562267]

Originally Posted by keirarts

I was never that bothered by Serbian film. One of those films i thought was trying to be shocking for it's own sake then think of a meaning later. The infamous baby scene was (thankfully) fake as hell. I've not had the urge to revisit it. Personally I found August underground mordem to be more shocking.



/QUOTE]r


I agree, AU Mordem is more shocking, I don’t think I made it to the end of that one and I never bothered with the third one

The ending of mordem crossed certain lines for me. In a way Serbia film tried and failed to do. I'm over shock cinema. Give me a plot, some sleaze and perhaps a little art..

[J Harker]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Sadly not, no. All i've heard is good things as well. I know the Inspector loves it, Keirarts as well i think.

Here too

[Dave Boy]

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WOMAN WHO CAME BACK (1945)

A woman, Lorna is returning home after two years away. On the way her bus is waved down by an old lady. The old woman knows everything about Lorna and begins telling Lorna that her ancestor burnt witches 300 years ago.
The bus crashes. Lorna is the only survivor and no one knows who the old lady was and never find a body. Mysterious creepy events surround Lorna and after a visit to an old crypt finds papers about the old lady. She was burnt at the stake, sold her soul to the devil and now inhabits new bodies through time.
Lorna now thinks she is possessed by the witch...

Atmospheric little chiller.
A good feeling of paranoia as Lorna feels enveloped by evil and the towns people, full of superstition turn against her. A nice sinister music score plays throughout. The movie lasts just over an hour but packs a lot in that time along with the thunder, rain and talk of witches. Good stuff

[Demoncrat]

Hunt For The Wilderpeople (Taiki Waititi, 2016)

From the director of What We Do In The Shadows and some Thor sequel comes this abrasively charming tale. Ricky Baker is the scourge of the local Social Services, so when he is 'farmed out', so to speak to Bella and 'Uncle' Hector ... it's a fresh start for everyone. Sam Neill great as the bluff outdoorsman and newcomer Julian Dennison is refreshingly unsympathetic. Worth a look imo.

[Frankie Teardrop]

ACROSS THE RIVER – Picked this up after I read Dem’s recent review – cheers, Dem! I think I probably get more out of your recommendations than you do out of mine at the moment! So anyway, ‘Across The River’ is really good. It’s about some kind of biologist who, tracking data and doing field recordings out in the wilds, stumbles across the ruins of a village. Hidden in the dilapidated shell of one of the houses is a secret that brings the film to a pretty creeped out conclusion. Whilst it doesn’t do anything massively new, ‘Across The River’ brought it home to me how lacking in atmosphere, creeps and chills most contemporary horror fare is. There is a genuinely ominous vibe to this one that you just don’t get very often. Part of this comes from the sheer sense of isolation – there’s not much dialogue, nor many interactions. Just this vaguely Jamesian researcher who’s trying to make sense of something inexplicable and malevolent in a really bleak, cut-off place. What happens when it all comes to the boil is surprisingly brutal and, yep, in a few scenes quite scary. Not through recourse to jump-scares, but in a ‘cold hand milking my fear gland’ kind of way. When did you last see a horror film that was actually a bit scary? Even a bit? It’s not an easy thing to do. Definitely one to see if you like grim ghost stories.

BRAWL IN CELL BLOCK 99 – From the director of ‘Bone Tomahawk’. Or should I say, from the director of the massively overrated ‘Bone Tomahawk’, as I didn’t really get the latter film. I don’t like Westerns and it just seemed really long. ‘Brawl In Cell Block 99’ is really long, too, but is actually superb. There’s quite a lot of set-up to this one, with Vince Vaughn as a drug runner with a slightly rigid ‘honourable man’ type persona that makes him ‘do the right thing’ in a highly relative way (go to jail after killing drug dealers who are shooting at cops… get into the bad bit of prison to kill another inmate after his wife is threatened on the outside etc etc). Anyway, ‘Brawl In Cell Block 99’ follows Vince’s journey through the American penal system as he closes in on the ‘bad guys’ responsible for his predicament, one of the latter being creepy Udo Kier, still doing it after all these years. The main thing about it is, it’s not a ‘prison movie’. It is literally, but not aesthetically. It’s not a rugged actioner about one man’s fight for justice inside. It’s a dreamy, stylised piece that ratchets up into Kafka-esque gothic rather than Guy Ritchie / J Statham bloke vibes. There’s a fair amount of violence, but the surrounding atmosphere is one of estrangement rather than of a meat-and-potatoes beat-‘em-up, which is how I thought it might play before I actually watched it. In truth, ‘Brawl In Cell Block 99’ reminded me much of Winding-Refn, maybe just at the level of style alone. Whatever, I thought it was excellent.

WEREWOLF WOMAN – Psycho-sexual Euro-horror from the mid-seventies, ‘Werewolf Woman’ has a vaguely incoherent storyline about the traumatised descendent of a countess being possessed by the spirit of said countess, who, back in the day, also used to be a werewolf. Or something. It feels more sensible when you’re watching it, although that’s because, with films like this, sense isn’t particularly under scrutiny (or, not when I’m watching). More important are those Euro-vibes – the imagery and atmosphere that cut through the woodenness of the characterisation and the plotting. On this level, ‘Werewolf Woman’ delivers quite well. The only other time I’d seen it was eight or so years ago, and I couldn’t remember it much. I was kind of worried that it’d turn out to be one of those disappointments with a few good scenes surrounded by plodding dullness – face it, a lot of mid-seventies European horror flicks end up playing a bit like that these days. ‘Werewolf Woman’ is, by contrast, relatively crammed with incident, sleaze and weird shit, so it’s a winner in my eyes. One of the strongest sequences is the opener, where the original werewolf-countess is hunted and killed by some torch-bearing townsfolk types – really atmospheric and dreamy, with an eerie soundtrack echoing across nocturnal scenes. From there, we follow the lead’s descent into murderous insanity as she takes to the road and does some sex-related killing. There are dream-like bits such as the one where an armadillo crawls up protagonists leg towards her crotch and various other smidgeons of strangeness before it all takes a left turn at the end and becomes a rape-revenge flick. I was kind of impressed with the pacing, as there were only a few wordy excursions into slightly numbing exposition. Yeah, overall pretty good. See it if you haven’t already.

[Demoncrat]

Sterling stuff as always F!!
Liked Brawl despite my Vaughn handicap.
ATR is a definite purchase