What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[Frankie Teardrop]

BAXTER – Ken Greenhall, now there’s an overlooked horror author if ever there was one. ‘Baxter’ is a late eighties French adaption of his book, ‘Hell Hound’. Like the book, ‘Baxter’ is based on the musings of a philosophical but murderous hound who finds the French suburbs a bit arid for his paw-dirtying tastes. He goes from owner to owner, eventually shacking up under the roof of a Nazi-fixated kid. Whimsical in a way at first, but ultimately this wallow inside humanity’s air conditioned trenches leaves you to wander away haunted.

99.9 – Agusti Villaronga is the arch-stylist behind ‘In A Glass Cage’, and some of his visual flair makes it into ‘99.9’. Don’t expect the edginess of his debut, though – ’99.9’ pretty much has both feet planted firmly in traditional ghost story territory. One of its strengths is the atmosphere of its setting, a remote Spanish village where a reporter has gone to investigate the supernatural slaying of a former lover.

TRAUMA – Even less than full-throttle Argento is still unmistakably Argento. Here he seems to be aiming for something like a formula nineties American thriller, but he can’t deliver anything remotely as linear – every few steps he takes, he does a weird little pirouette of stylistic excess. I enjoyed this ultimately stupid and baffling tale of hand-held wire guillotines, random inadvertent lizard squashing, forced vision-quests via red berry ingestion and Reggae-inflected eating disorder commentary, but Brad Dourif and Piper Laurie looked as flummoxed as I felt. Strange that another master of horror had a hand in this – the script seems to have been done by the brilliant author T.E.D Klein.

FLESHEATER – I’ve reviewed this a couple of times I think, but the recent VS upgrade gives me an excuse for another. There are many things to marvel at here, from Bill Hinzeman’s bizarre decision to reprise his role from NOTLD to the fact that the closest this movie has to lead characters spend most of their time off camera and hidden away as the zombie onslaught tears through the suburbs. It’s packed with non sequiturs, denim and mullets, not to mention mean-spirited and sometimes sleazy gore. The new version from VS looks predictably super. Trash classic – I don’t know any other way to describe it.

[Demoncrat]

[MrBarlow]

Furious 7. 2015

After defeating Owen Shaw the team go their separate ways until Owen's brother Deckard shows up wanting revenge. Meanwhile a government agent wants the team to find a hacker called "Ramsay" who created a programe that can turn any modern technology into a weapon that is being sought by a warlord.

Dom, Brian, Mia, Letty, Tej and Roman return with Hobbs appearing in a bit of a smaller role although he does have a more on screen role towards the finale. Jason Statham joins the cast as Deckard who wants revenge on those who put his brother in a comatose state. Kurt Russell shows up as "Mr Nobody" who wants the team to find the hacker. The stunts are done decently and Dom gets the demon love child between two cars that really can't go down a hill without smashing up and taking a car through 3 building in the name of honor in Abu Dhabi. The fight scenes are done decently between Deckard and Dom and good racing about in Los Angeles in a bid to stay alive.

Sadly this was Paul Walkers last film and has a great tribute that can still bring a tear to your eye...or was someone cutting up a onion again.

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[MrBarlow]

The Fate of the Furious. 2017.

In Cuba, Dominic is blackmailed into stealing a EMP weapon, Letty, Tej, Ramon, Ramsay are called to help Mr Nobody to trace a woman known as Cipher, Hobbs and Shaw are tasked to join the team and put their differences aside.

Apart from the start where honor is tested in a street race where Dom shows he can still win, and a chase in New York, this is where the series should have came to a close. Ramon thinking he has good car that does not do well on ice along with other cars in a shoot out in Russia trying to stop a nuclear submarine being hijacked by a computer. Charlize Theron plays the super hacker Cipher, Luke Evans returns as Owen in a small role and with Deckard able to hijack a plane with a good shootout and a bit of comedy.

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[MrBarlow]

The Batman. 2022.

I have only ever seen Robert Pattinson in one film and that was the Harry Potter movie...which ever one that was, been a bit hesitant about watching this and to be honest this was better than I thought. The costume probably isn't tight enough as his voice isn't changing much, Matt Reeves is able to capture the dark Gothic tone but is it just me or did this seem a bit more crime noir type? Certainly worth a watch.

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[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Luz: The Flower of Evil (2019)

A Colombian folk horror sort of thing about a mountain community who keep a young boy in a cage because they think he is God.

Gorgeous cinematography but it bored me to tears with it's incredibly slow pace and lack of anything happening at all really throughout it's 104 minutes run time.

for all it's worthyness there are quite startling flaws such as how does a cassette recorder found in the mountains from years previous actually still work especially as the community has no electricity. I guess somewhere in the woods there must be a shop selling tape recorder batteries just in case someone were to find one buried in the dirt.

Likened to Jodorowsky so if you enjoy his work then this may be up your street.

[MrBarlow]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Luz: The Flower of Evil (2019)

A Colombian folk horror sort of thing about a mountain community who keep a young boy in a cage because they think he is God.

Gorgeous cinematography but it bored me to tears with it's incredibly slow pace and lack of anything happening at all really throughout it's 104 minutes run time.

for all it's worthyness there are quite startling flaws such as how does a cassette recorder found in the mountains from years previous actually still work especially as the community has no electricity. I guess somewhere in the woods there must be a shop selling tape recorder batteries just in case someone were to find one buried in the dirt.

Likened to Jodorowsky so if you enjoy his work then this may be up your street.

Glad to see someone else found this slow pacing.

[Justin101]

I thought it was slow but I enjoyed it

[MrBarlow]

The Wind. 1986.

A crime novelist stays on a Greek island to work on her new book and thinks that the man she met may be a murderer.

Goes to show you don't need a big cast to make a decent movie, Meg Foster plays the novelist Sian who believes Phil the handy man played by Wings Hauser has killed his employer and her her landlord Elias during the start of high winds. This has good atmosphere and isolation and a nice game of cat and mouse with Sian and fisherman Kesner to outsmart the unhinged killer. while David McCallum is trying to alert the authorities. This was enjoyable and certainly worth a re-watch.

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[nicholasrope]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Nightmare at Noon (1988)

Island of Death director Nico Mastorakis clearly had a blast with this film. The script writing stage must have been a hoot for this sci-fi, horror, western, action movie. It really is everything you could wish for in a B-movie, Christ there's even a helicopter dogfight in Monument Valley.

Mastorakis got himself a fine 80's cast of the excellent Bo Hopkins, George Kennedy, Wings Hauser and Brion James for this tale about strange science types who poison a small desert town's water supply turning the residents into raving lunatics. Going into the stories finer details would spoil it for those who have never seen the film before. It's wonderful watching each plot development, even more jaw dropping than the last.

It's not entirely perfect, there seems to be some poor editing early doors, characters unexplained movements and so forth, however whilst being a niggle at the time they are soon forgotten about in this seriously fun escapade.

The budget dvd from Hollywood Entertainment has a very nice 16:9 widescreen picture with good sound quality. Could have sworn Arrow released this on Blu but can find no evidence of it.

Highly recommended.

To be fair, Arrow and 88 Films were releasing Mastorakis Films at a rapid rate,