Shaun of the deas and Mirrors

Been to see the hobbit battle of the five army's again and don't know why I gave it such a low score, granted some of the CGI is awful and for me it was the worst of the trilogy but still a lot of fun to be had and the time flew by with some fantastic action. Think I'll have a middle Earth weekend and watch the first two movies followed Blythe Lord of the rings trilogy.8.5/10

The Witches (1966)

8/10.

Just watched I spit on you're grave 2

Now IMO I'm beggining to have a bit of a problem with these films now . there like becoming the bob geldof band aid song , no matter how different version there is there all the same in the long run except for different people .
Women gets raped , kept hostage escape gets revenge end of story.
The whole problem is its all exactly the same its like a unwritten rule they have to have or they can't make the film.
Its always someone they barely know or just met.
The women never have friends or relatives to report them missing .
They don't or refuse to report this to the police.
This bit always grinds me because you know in some point in the film its going to happen because 1000s of horror films are guilty of this.
When they escape first person they meet has got to be someone who ends up taking them back to where they just come from.
And at least one bloke has to be tortured by the penis or balls.
Its like suddenly the revenge part the women have become someone who has knowledge on torture , some of the torture a average Joe blogs wouldn't have the knowledge what to do.
And suddenly they become great fighters as if they been taught by chuck Norris or Steven seagal.

So why don't these films just slightly change and shake things around a bit ?
Why can't the rapist be a friend who had a crush and got fed up of being rejected.
Or a group of friends she known for years.
Why does it have to be 1 women why can't it be 2 .
Why do they have to rape them ( yes yes I'm aware that's object of the film ) but what was going to say is why can't they kidnap them and the kidnapers are using them because they are running a illegal porn site and blokes are paying to request the women to do things to each other while they jerk off.
They have friends or family who report them missing police raid them catch them in the act and some escape and their the ones they hunt down for revenge.
Or they get taken to court for some reason get of with it and vow to kill the women but she ready for them. Why does a bloke have to have his bits tortured why can't they arrange for him to be bummed so he can experience what its like to be raped ?
Why dont they do the opposite and have a women who kidnaps a bloke and ttorture him and use him as a sex slave for women who have struggled or to ugly to get a bloke.
There is loads of possibilities I could come up, just wish they would slightly alter the format or film a little instead of being a film you seen to often and to many times you know the plot of by heart before the scenes even happen.

You raised a number of interesting points there and it would be easy to say the same film is made over and over again due to be lack of imagination/ambition, but that's possibly because it is.

I watched Eurocrime on DVD last night for the first time since I saw it at Fright Fest. A cracking documentary, f only more of the movies it covers were available on blu-ray.

Going out this afternoon to see Taken 3, my first cinema visit of 2015.

The Cremators (1972)

An additional film on the same Retromedia disc as Octoman, apparently because it was made by the same director. My bet is this was the only way anyone would actually buy this turgid sci-fi mess.

The plot is basic - An alien life form arrives in backwoods town USA in the form of a large fireball and rolls over people to consume their energy leaving them as ash on the ground.

Although it has potential, after all it's not a story line too far removed from The Night of the Big Heat. The Cremators is so poorly executed with pacing all over the place as well as shoddy editing and an extremely dull script that seems to be a few short sequences of the fireball lazily rolling over someone intercut into long, deathly dull scenes of two scientists gawping into test tubes, with seemingly hundreds of shots of microbes on a slide.

The movie poster shown below is easily the best thing about the film meaning The Cremators is a serious case of i've watched this so that you don't have to.

THE INITIATION – An eighties slasher flick which feels like a box ticking exercise in genre cliches – nothing wrong with that, originality is definitely not required when it comes to this kind of heads down, no-nonsense boogie. You'll notice that I mentioned 'no-nonsense' there, whereas as in fact I should point out that 'The Initiation' is indeed total nonsense, albeit of a completely enjoyable kind. Nightmare sequences with stabby kids, vengeance-crazed burns victims escaping psyche wards, exposition heavy dream research subplots and climactic twists ripped off from other slasher movies are just some items on the endless conveyor belt of mindlessness in operation here. It isn't badly made in any overt sense, but badness is there, under the surface. It comes through in the tone, which has that glaringly dead eyed eighties ripeness about it, and is aided and abetted by acts of random bizarreness, like the frequent cut-aways to a statue of Kali (I think) during the more slasher orientated bits at the end. The pacing isn't always dead on, but for some reason I found it really absorbing, even during the lulls.

CURTAINS – Another eighties slasher curio, again plagued by strange shifts in pace and tone which ultimately somehow work in its favour and in the end give it quite an 'out-there' feel. I discovered, after I'd seen it, that the production was quite troubled, and that fundamental changes were made to the directorial approach midway through. It really shows, but happily this does not spell 'curtains' for 'Curtains'. Erm. 'Curtains' starts out in psychological thriller mode (actress commits herself to psyche facility to research a role and finds herself abandoned there by her director buddy / accomplice), shifts over to murder mystery / whodunnit territory (six actresses are invited to a house to audition for said role by said director, and one by one they get offed), whilst at the same time slowly mutating into something inexplicable and dream-like (sinister dolls appear out of nowhere and portend slasher murders: a killer in a wonderful hag-mask looks well freaky: the director and actresses randomly burst out into psycho-drama in some ludicrous but unsettling scenes: subplots and minor characters appear and disappear for no reason) before a randomly Bava-esque climax. Instead of all this appearing grating and random, it feels like the weird life trajectory of a constantly morphing organism. I'm not sure whether 'Curtains' is very good, but it's certainly interesting, entertaining and odd. Slasher / eighties / weirdness fans will quite dig it.

SAVAGED – A deaf woman is raped and murdered by some rednecks, only to rise from the grave when possessed by the spirit of an American Indian warrior chief. A supernatural revenge-spree ensues. Is 'Savaged' as awesome as it sounds? Not quite, but it is very good, and I recommend it to fans of latter day exploitation. It moves along really swiftly, is pretty gory, and delivers the goods when it comes to moments of high ludicrousness whilst maintaining a commendably serious tone. I liked the way it was shot – filtered, to make everything look diseased, washed out and dirty. Maybe just my projection, but I found it created a really strong ambience. Definitely worth some of your time, an enjoyably twisted modern day nasty.

GUN WOMAN – Despite having been shorn of a few seconds by the BBFC, there's still plenty of ickyness on show in 'Gun Woman'. An ex-addict is captured by the husband of a woman who was raped and murdered by an international serial killing perv. Ex-addict, after being subjected to a gruelling regimen of training / torture by grieving husband, becomes a killing machine hot on the tail of international serial killing perv, who likes to hang out in a desert based facility known as 'The Room', which caters for rich necrophiliacs. Cue lots of shooting etc. 'Gun Woman', with its shot on video cheapness and sleazy theatrics, is another number which will attract those into modern day exploitation. No grind-house visual augmentation or any of that bollocks, just an abiding sense of having crawled out of a gutter. I wouldn't normally advocate for the censored version of anything, but as far as I know it's the only one on the market, and there is definitely much to recommend about 'Gun Woman', not least the synth-metal soundtrack, which sounds like some kind of eighties hallucination (or maybe just something from a computer game with lots of fast cars in it).

ALLELUIA – You can't go wrong with Fabrice Du Welz, director of 'Calvaire' and 'Vinyan'. 'Alleluia' is his take on the Lonely Hearts Killers of forties America, although we find ourselves here in what feels like latter day Belgium, despite some anachronisms. The elliptical 'arthouse' (loosely speaking) approach of his previous films is once again evident, and this again gives way occasionally to moments of stylistic hysteria – the high point occuring, for me, when the female lead breaks away from doing a musical number to saw someone's foot off. Despite all this, the tone is mostly serious, grainy and sombre, and oozes the slow burning dread we recall from 'Calvaire' as we follow the deepening obsession at the heart of this film. Easily the strongest of the movies I've reviewed here today, I definitely recommend 'Alleluia', an excellently bleak downer to start the new year on.

Taken 3 more of the same but also less of the same. Its a passable action flick, but nothing special.

An improvement on the second one? The original is a great film but the sequel i thought was very weak.

I quite liked the second film so am probably the wrong person to ask.

Beach Red (1967)

Produced, directed and staring Cornell Wilde, Beach Red with it's often trippy sixties vibe feels like the stepping stone from classic war movies to the psychological nihilism that would assault our screens in the form of Apocalypse Now and its ilk.

Coming over as a cross between Saving Private Ryan's beach assault and The Thin Red Line even though it was made decades earlier than either film, Beach Red has a confident air about it with some innovative photography and a few mind bending visuals not to mention graphic scenes of war including a soldier staggering around on the beach in a daze searching for his arm.

The sixties weirdness comes in with the cut away's to fleeting memories of civilian life of both the American and Japanese soldiers and the trippy way Wilde integrates it into the general malaise going on around.

Visually excellent with some exciting battle sequences (The first forty minutes is all beach assault), Beach Red is highly recommended.

KILLING SEASON. Piss poor outing featuring De Niro and Travolta as casualties from the Balkans conflict fighting it out with bows and arrows in the woods of America. The film can't decide if it wants to be an all out action flick or a meditation on the psychological effects of war on soldiers from both sides of a conflict. What you actually get is Travolta doing a funny accent and De Niro doing his usual grimace.

Mirrors 2

Gratuitous gore and nudity. A fairly generic plot with a twist that can be seen from orbit. Mirrors 2 is pretty low rent, however its actually sort of enjoyable with its 'don't give a f***' tone of throwing everything in without blushing. Trash perhaps, but entertaining trash.

The lady in white.

Kid gets locked in school overnight and stumbles across a serial killer. There's some supernatural shenanigans and 60's racism as well. Its ok, personally I think I need to watch it again as I sat there thinking 'overrated.' I will however give it another chance at some point.

Never seen first 2 doesn't interest me . I might like them if I watched them who knows ?
But can't be arsed to.

I felt exactly the same, very overrated. The ghost sat on top of a cupboard just didn't do it for me.

It felt like the director was stuffing too many things into one movie that it couldn't possibly contain them all.

I just sat there feeling terribly underwhelmed by it all.

Wolfcop (2014)

An alcoholic down trodden small time cop is transformed into a werewolf in an occult ritual. Determined to get his life back on track he decides to hunt down the people responsible.

Horror website Bloody Disgusting had this to say about the film - "A perfect storm of creature action, the occult, gore, intrigue, humor, and lycanthropic puns".

And do you know what? They weren't wrong. The film is a hell of a lot of fun. Although billed as a horror comedy it isn't a comedy through silliness. It blends the black humour of An American Werewolf in London with some gross out nastiness and amusing dialogue to create a tasty cocktail that suited my palette.

Added to this the film utilizes some very good practical special effects which result in some impressive, and one rather original werewolf transformation and a plot and direction that rattle along at a fair rate of knots ensuring Wolfcop entertains all the way through.

Recommended.

Invaders From Mars (1953)

Very enjoyable 50's b-movie cheesiness and schlock until it drags out a bit towards the end with what feels like half n hour of tank stock footage.

7/10.

Dead End (2012)

A family at odds with each other decide to go to the country for a restful break. After stopping in a secluded side road the family find themselves strung up from the ceiling in an abandoned roadside cafe.

Dead End is a film populated by wholly unlikeable characters throughout with only the family daughter being someone you could even think about sympathizing with. The families captors are a deranged mob and come across like a watered down version of Rob Zombie's Firefly clan, but lacking the threat and dangerous seediness of Mosley, Haig etc.

Starring Eastenders 'bloke' Jaime Foreman as Dog, the leader of the gang and Jill Greenacre, who you may recall as the fresh faced, clean cut Linda in The Brittas Empire, as his lipstick smeared, smacked out, deranged lover, Bones, who i bizarrely found really attractive. The film is largely set in a single room and lurches from one sequence to another that every horror fan will have seen played out in fifty other probably better films.

Strangely, come the twist finale which i didn't see coming, i had that feeling of satisfaction and despite it's many cliches actually rather enjoyed the thing in spite of or possibly because of it's general British shoddiness.

Looks like we've pegged down Dem's 'type'. :tongue1:

Great reviews as always, Dem. :nod:

Things just slip out don't they?

Thank you by the way. :thankingyou:

I strangely fancied Julia St. John, who played Laura.

Agreed, excellent reviews.

After a bit of puzzlement i realized you were talking about The Brittas Empire rather than Dead End. :lol:

Thanks for the complement too Nos. :thankingyou:

I probably should have been a little more specific!

Attachment 153933

Sir Robert Cargrave is a Neurosurgeon who seems to have everything in life he has recently been knighted and his name is well known throughout the world. The one thing that escapes him is love and his heart remains with his ex lover he left behind in Europe.

Out of the blue Robert receives a letter from his ex lover to summon him to the home of her husband Baron Sardonicus with the upmost importance. At once he gathers his belongings to be at the Baronesss side. On arriving in the village of the Baron Sir Robert notices that the very mention of the name of the Baron puts fear in the peasants very soon Sir Robert will see why.

Its does not take long for things to take a strange turn when Sir Roberts enters the home of the Baron he is greeted with the screams of a woman who is tied to a chair and her face is covered in leeches. After a quick reunion with the Baroness they are both summoned to dinner where Sir Robert will meet the Baron for the first time. Baron Sardonicus enters to room wearing a mask that he never removes which we later discover is because his was a poor farmer in his past and when his father died he was buried with a winning lottery ticket. Under a lot of pressure from his then wife he digs up his fathers grave and on sight of his fathers face his face is permanently disfigured after the shock. The Baron and his servant Krull have been experimenting on the young woman and servants of the house trying to get a cure for the curse inflicted upon the Baron but without success. The last option is Sir Robert using a special massage he has developed that relaxes the muscles. At first Sir Robert refuses to help because of the cruelty of Baron Sardonicus towards the Baroness but the Baron holds all the cards and in order to save the life of the woman he loves he must do as he is told.

This came as part of the Brotherhood Of Satan Blu Ray double pact i picked up awhile back both films i had not seen before and this is the best of the two. For me this is a hidden gem i loved the story and there were plenty of dark moments of torture and coldness from the Baron himself. I enjoyed the performance of Krull the most his character progressed through so many emotions through the film from humble servant to a man blinded by his loyalty to his master and then a man filled with a lust for revenge. This is one i will revisit from time to time a big :thumb:from me.

It's a brilliant film isn't it Nordy.

I saw it last year thanks to the same dvd set. I too bought it for Brotherhood (Complete let down imo) but this was easily the outstanding movie.

A quite underrated classic.

It really is a great film i didnt expect much from it when i bought it but as i said it will be getting many repeat viewings.

Bit of a mixed bag this time....
The Machinist (Brad Anderson, 2005).
Before he went Hollywood Bale pulls out all the stops in this tour de force performance. Who hasn't seen this? Rectify that post haste!!

The Signal (William Eubank, 2014).
Sci fi hokum of the highest order, I felt they faffed about too much in the intro, which makes you think it's going to be a FF film. Maybe this will impress someone, it left me cold ahem.

Stranded (Roger Christian, 2012).
Christian Slater appears in Canadian tax loss venture. the moral being....when your moonbase is hit by a meteor, don't take it inside to "investigate these spores" haha.

Dolls (Stuart Gordon, 1987).
Certainly the sweetest film from Yunza/Gordon imo. Never bothered with this at the time, as twas all dolled out by this point. Silly me, as this has much to offer. Miles better than Puppetmaster imo.

We Still Kill The Old Way (2014, Sacha Bennet).
Even more right wing than Harry Brown, this hoot shows some "old school" gangsters taking on todays yoof. Ian Oglivy!! Need I say more, geezer??

The Bay (2012, Barry Levinson)
Watched this on Film4. Sue me, but I liked it. Moral? Don't dump chicken shit in the water!! Ahem.

Just a curious Q? Why do some film titles have 2 3 alternative titles and other films don't ?
Once its got a title that's the title it should be worldwide after all Evil dead , warriors or bigger name titles like star wars E T etc don't have alternatives titles so why do other films ?

The Rage: Carrie 2 (1999)

Sequel to the original 1976 horror classic but set 22 years later. The film see's Amy Irving reprise her role of Sue Snell from the original and a couple of related flashbacks help relate the story.

Despite other people's criticisms i still think The Rage is a decent film. It does have flaws i agree. The high school jocks were cardboard caricatures at times and the main plot is one you'll have seen before, not least in the original film, with sub plots used in many high school movies before and since.

Emily Bergl is very good as the misfit Rachel although she is far too pretty for the role of a supposed ugly duckling sneered at by other so called better looking students.

The final set piece where Rachel utilizes her telekinetic powers out of revenge is nicely done with a few gory deaths which make you remember that it is a horror film you're watching and not a high school drama.

On the whole i wouldn't say those who dislike the film are wrong, but i feel anyone who enjoys Hollywood high school movies (not just the creme de la creme ala Mean Girls, Heathers and the original Carrie) would find something to like in this film.

Exploitation gag, pure and simple. Reissuing films with different titles, in order to cash in on various trends was a staple of unscrupulous producers 2back in the day"....and it doesn't end......Anyone got Carnosaur 3 aka Primal Species??

Also watched Birth (Johnathon Glazer, 2004). Hmmmmm.

The Scissors Massacre aka Kuchisake-Onna 2 aka a Slit Mouthed Woman 2 (2008, Kotaro Terachui). Been a while with the asian stuff. Apparently a sequel to Carved, it makes nae difference, as I haven't seen that either. Somewhat like an asian Ken Loach film imo (but nothing like Bedevilled), a popular athlete's world is turned upside down by a siblings vengeful ex. It gets quite grim in places, and a few misdirects lead you to believe you will be getting the usual fare, but you ain't....! Far better than most of the Occidental crap I've watched in last 6 months ahem.

I really really enjoyed the Bay, it's genuinely a good movie in my opinion. Like As Above So Below (which I'll review eventually), it threw away normal found footage conventions in order to present a unique story in, in the Bay's case, a unique manner.

I too really enjoyed it.

Some people might suggest that's not saying much though. :D

I'l be intrigued to read that Fuzz, as I HATED IT ahem. ;)

Nah, I trust pretty much everyone's opinion on here.

Except anything on 90's or 00's DTV action films. I don't know what it is, nothing will ever convince me to watch any.

I'll get around to that and everything else I've seen recently tomorrow morning then, because I expected to hate it and was very pleasantly surprised. Can see why people would hate it though, it's not very defendable

http://mondo-esoterica.net/title_img...2047/title.jpg

My brother is a fan of WW2 films and picked up the DVD for this at Tescos. As all too often these days, a deep, insightful war film is packaged on DVD with a different title and explosive art-work (for some reason the DVD cover includes an exploding Corsair and fight of B-17s).

Fortunately the film print itself is pristine and has some good subtitles, since this is a film well deserving of a proper release. A Estrada 47 is set among the Brazilian Expeditionary Force, 25,000 Brazilian soldiers sent over during the latter half of WW2 and who saw service on the Gothic Line.

This isn't a conventional war film though, instead it ruminates on the pointlessness of war and its emotional cruelty. With languorous pacing and a bare minimum of action scenes it is certainly a cerebral experience that is not for everyone, but I would certainly recommend it if you like intelligent cinema.

My illustrated review of A Estrada 47.

I must be in the minority that thought The Bay was rubbish, I'd rather watch a film by the most hated director in Hollywood, who's name the film shares!