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  #61181  
Old 1st June 2023, 07:48 AM
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Originally Posted by peter alex View Post
i prefer the hong kong version from 2008 dir by benny chan it's more intense and the acting is far better there is more action than the original film i have seen the original not as good as a thought it would be kim Basinger is great in it she's probably the best thing in the film
Thanks for that Peter, will have a look for it
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  #61182  
Old 1st June 2023, 04:55 PM
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ENYS MEN – On Enys Men (it’s Cornish for ‘Stone Island’), we watch an isolated woman in a loud red cagoul tend to a flower patch. She also takes careful note of soil temperatures, drops stones down a mine shaft and makes cups of tea. She does all this rather a lot. She might be part of an under-the-radar science experiment, or perhaps just the victim of some awful compulsion; either way, her silent repetitions are pretty much the meat of this film, the second from Mark Jenkin, here playing with a similar MO to the one he used in the celebrated ‘Bait’. ‘Enys Men’ is destined to alienate with its stretches of non-event, but this is clearly, to me at least, A HORROR FILM, one where narrative is less important than the profound feeling of unease that creeps in at the sides, in the sound, the shots, above all in the edit. There’s a story of sorts, maybe something about trauma, lost loves and accidents, but it doesn’t really matter with such a suffocating mood. Highest recommendation. I don’t think everyone will be into it, but personally I doubt I’ll see a better film this year.

VACATION OF TERROR – You’re meant to talk about feelings and stuff in horror movies these days. But I’m also a big fan of ‘the ghost train approach to horror’, which, if it exists as a real thing in the world outside this review, is basically just an excuse to bugger the story and turn a film into a load of special effects, one after the other. ‘Poltergeist’ might be the posh version. ‘Vacation Of Terror’ is the cheapskate option. Here, you get a haunted doll and a spooky house – after a leisurely intro, VOT suddenly cranks it up to pile sight gag on sight gag, all of them admittedly a bit rubbish; witness the sudden appearance of a fridge full of rotting fruit, then someone floating through a room on the least invisible of movie strings ect ect… all the while, those creepy doll eyes go clickety click via the same shot, which must be repeated at least a thousand times throughout. Genius. I love shit like this. It’s old fashioned, but it is what it is, a horror show relic from when the approach was more about spectacle. From one of the Cardonas.

VACATION OF TERROR 2 – See the above, only revved up to boiling point with the inclusion of more stuff about magical amulets, bloody and bizarre goings-on beneath the world’s most pointlessly elaborate Halloween Cake (that came out so easily but obviously remember that Halloween Cakes don’t actually exist), mullet heaven, Mexican pop singers from 1990 who sound like they’re really from 1987, an impressive but profoundly empty fake film set, an hilariously overstated revolving room that brims with page 3 and car posters, and monsters that look like they’re from the crap bits of ‘Demons 2’ but are secretly better than anything in D1&2 combined. Another Latin American phantasmagoria that I had a lot of fun with, so approach with open arms if you have a hankering.
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  #61183  
Old 1st June 2023, 05:05 PM
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The System. 2022.

A marine is caught up in a drug bust and given a choice, go undercover in a notorious prison and uncover what is going on or face 10 years in jail.

Tyrese Gibson shows he can be a main lead and also bad ass in the fighting circuit, this has all been done before, corrupt warden organising fights between the prisoners, concealing a drug operation and siding with the prison fighter champion. This was nothing spectacular, the fight scenes are decent, the guy playing the Warden tends to over act alot and by half way through you know how it will end. Decent enough for background noise.

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  #61184  
Old 1st June 2023, 05:08 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop View Post
ENYS MEN – On Enys Men (it’s Cornish for ‘Stone Island’), we watch an isolated woman in a loud red cagoul tend to a flower patch. She also takes careful note of soil temperatures, drops stones down a mine shaft and makes cups of tea. She does all this rather a lot. She might be part of an under-the-radar science experiment, or perhaps just the victim of some awful compulsion; either way, her silent repetitions are pretty much the meat of this film, the second from Mark Jenkin, here playing with a similar MO to the one he used in the celebrated ‘Bait’. ‘Enys Men’ is destined to alienate with its stretches of non-event, but this is clearly, to me at least, A HORROR FILM, one where narrative is less important than the profound feeling of unease that creeps in at the sides, in the sound, the shots, above all in the edit. There’s a story of sorts, maybe something about trauma, lost loves and accidents, but it doesn’t really matter with such a suffocating mood. Highest recommendation. I don’t think everyone will be into it, but personally I doubt I’ll see a better film this year.
As that other fella would say.

Sold!!
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  #61185  
Old 1st June 2023, 06:22 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MrBarlow View Post
The System. 2022.

A marine is caught up in a drug bust and given a choice, go undercover in a notorious prison and uncover what is going on or face 10 years in jail.

Tyrese Gibson shows he can be a main lead and also bad ass in the fighting circuit, this has all been done before, corrupt warden organising fights between the prisoners, concealing a drug operation and siding with the prison fighter champion. This was nothing spectacular, the fight scenes are decent, the guy playing the Warden tends to over act alot and by half way through you know how it will end. Decent enough for background noise.

Attachment 246545
I've been looking at this one, trailer didn't thrill me
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  #61186  
Old 1st June 2023, 06:33 PM
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Originally Posted by nicholasrope View Post
I've been looking at this one, trailer didn't thrill me
I took it on a blind watch, it is one of those now seen it that's it movies moving on. What appealed to me was Tyrese, aside from Fast AND Furious, he has done other decent films but this was a bad mistake for him.
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  #61187  
Old 1st June 2023, 06:42 PM
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Walking Tall. 2004.

We got The Rock playing a ex soldier Chris Vaughn returning home, getting into a fight, beaten up and left for dead. After the investigation closes he decides to run for Sheriff and wages a war on his old buddy who is using the old saw mill as a drug lab.

Johnny Knoxville is the best buddy and convicted felon who is deputied, so now Vaughn is wanting to clean up crooked cops and now has a felon as a deputy...sticking with the tradition of been crooked...way to go. The original may not have been the best with Joe Don Baker but showed more drama as it did action, this is basically action that is inspired not based on real events. The film does seemed rushed instead of taking time. I was never a fan of this at first but still i enjoyed it.

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  #61188  
Old 1st June 2023, 07:13 PM
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A excellent , well acted and chilling gothic horror. We follow Nichole Kidman who plays a woman living with her two children waiting for her husband to return, strange things are happening in the mansion they live in and things get stranger when she hires some servants . As I said very enjoyable and atmospheric even if I saw the twist coming.




Next to Spiderman 2 this is my favourite Spiderman movies. It's a fantastic tale that looks great and has very unique artstyles . We follow Miles who has too take up the mantle of Spiderman after Peter is killed and has too save the world from the kingpin luckily he has the help of some other spider people .

Off too see the sequel tomorrow hope it's even half as good as this.


Next .
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  #61189  
Old 1st June 2023, 10:33 PM
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Crime on the Hill (1933)

A classic British murder mystery in which the local vicar turns sleuth in order to find out who poisoned the local squire.

Crime on the Hill is one of those films that borders on old dark house horror as much as it is a look at quaint village life and idle gossip in the early 1930's with red herrings galore and it all comes together in a tightly constructed script.

One of the films plus points is it's one of only three speaking movie roles credited to Phyllis Dare who was a leading Picture Postcard Beauty at the turn of the 1900's

Network's dvd looks really pretty for such an obscure film.
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  #61190  
Old 2nd June 2023, 12:09 PM
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M3GAN – I’m sure you all know what it’s about. I saw it, I liked it. I didn’t love it, but I thought it was enjoyable enough, even slightly moving at points, and to be fair there aren’t many places you can take sub-‘Child’s Play’ rip-offs these days without getting deep, which this doesn’t. At first I thought it might, with conveniently topical AI supposedly poised to give us all a good hammering and thus perhaps prompting a host of meditative Alex Garland style reflections, but this goes more for the emotional side of things, being an orphan story at heart. But it doesn’t really plumb any depths on that level either, stretching only as far as hamfisted metaphors (a hole in someone’s fence is used to comment on a central character’s lack of mature boundaries), but again, aside from the carnage, there is a mawkishness about it that works as quite an effective hook. There you go, it’s basically slick, well-oiled mainstream cheese about a killer robot, happy to serve up popcorn thrills with a slightly dead-eyed smirk. In other words, I was entertained.

GHOST IN THE MACHINE – More techno-horror, this time from back when t’internet was crossing over from the jealous clutches of hippie tech goblins and it was all supposedly quite exciting for anyone who suddenly wanted novelty porn at the touch of a button. I just remember feeling profoundly resentful when I had to use email for the first time. Anyway, GITM is a bit overlooked these days and would probably get a proper AI-generated kicking if it ever came anywhere near to a legit boutique release, but it sets out to do what exploitation films are meant to – “sod the moral and social consequences of this new technology, what would happen if the ghost of a serial killer got inside the world wide web and made everything look like Evil Tron?” I wish the film WAS whole heartedly that instead of just sort-of. But sometimes ‘sort-of’ is ‘good enough’; there’s the 2oth century movie cyber imagination’s clunky visuals, a few splattery moments, “gosh was that the past oh shit oh god I’m getting old will I die please give me some more booze” type nostalgia for us olds, and, of course, general nineties horror values. It’s OK. It reminded me a bit of ‘Brainscan’. The German Blu ray looks sehr gut imo.

BURIED ALIVE – A reform school, improbable outpourings of swarming ants, wonky-angled hallucinations of the least convenient variety, really stupid devices that contrive to plunge people into cellars, John Carradine moaning in the night, Donald Pleasance in a bad wig… in the beginning it seemed to have all the ingredients of a killer bad film. Halfway through something happened and it became a slightly rote exercise in trying to find out about a slasher’s dull plot; people are bricked up and there is a black cat wandering around, but in all honesty EA Poe would NOT give a toss about this dreck. The good points still stand, but it needed at least a couple more of them. Robert Vaughn looks absolutely delighted to be included; Pleasance witters and Carradine’s only in it for the moaning and to stick his hand out from behind some bricks. The director’s ‘Edge Of Sanity’ was another nearly man that needed its nice style and weirdness amping up and rescuing from the plod.
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