What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[keirarts]

Robin redbreast.

Perfect example of what can be achieved on a low budget. Perhaps not as creepy or sinister as any of the ghost story for Christmas, this is still an odd little tale that delves back into Britain's pagan roots for its inspiration.

[Linbro]

Originally Posted by Make Them Die Slowly

WINTER'S BONE. A bleak mini masterpiece that feels like a myth unfolding in the rural American wastelands. Sparse, silent and menacing , this had me feeling anxious throughout, waiting for violence to erupt at any moment. Jennifer Lawrence is amazing in the lead role as a 17 year old raising her younger siblings whilst caring for her sick mother with the knowledge that their home will be taken from them if she can't locate her wayward father. I can't praise this one enough. Highly recommended.

Great film - such a shame Lawrence didn't make more indie/low budget films like this before going all Hunger Games on us.
The filming locations are real places, which was a real eye opener!

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

8mm 2. (2005)

An in name only sequel to the Nic Cage original. Unfortunately this isn't a patch on that underrated 1999 film from Joel Schumacher.

Clearly filmed on a much lower budget but utilizing the streets and sights of Budapest the film's problem is it just isn't sleazy enough. Sure there are a few sex scenes and a fair bit of nudity but it lacks the scuzzy, dangerous feel of the original and just seems like any direct to video erotic thriller from the late eighties.

I had no problem with the acting, Lori Heuring made for a decent lead actress, but she wasn't given enough to do by the unremarkable script, nor by horror hack director JS Cardone's inability to raise any levels of tension or excitement.

Another film that wasn't terrible, just terribly average.

[SShaw]

This weekends entertainment included:

Stalled
Upstream Colour
Demons 2
Blancanieve
Cold Blooded
Bird with the Crystal Plumage
Sweetwater

I still haven't made up my mind about Upstream Colour its either art house brilliance or pretentious shite. I am currently tending towards the former.

Stalled was a film that played at Fright fest in August that I failed to find an opportunity to see elsewhere. Its easy to see why it wasn't picked up by the festival circuit - its pretty dire.

On the other hand I had many opportunities to see Blancanieve but always found something more interesting to see. What a fool I was. This is a brilliant black and white silent take of the Sleeping Beauty story featuring a female bull fighter and her band of dwarves. Simply sublime.

Coldblooded is an interesting thriller that deserves a chance.

Sweetwater is a fantastic western dealing with religious extremism with generally good performances from all concerned.

I guess that Demons 2 and Bird with the crystal plumage don't need a cheerleader round these parts.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by SShaw

Sweetwater is a fantastic western dealing with religious extremism with generally good performances from all concerned.

Totally agree with you. A gritty violent piece featuring an excellent turn from January Jones.

It's known as Sweet Vengeance in the UK.

[JoshuaKaitlyn]

High Road to China - Magnum PI...In a Biplane! Good Fun

From 1949
Passport to Pimlico - Classic Ealing
Love Happy - Rubbish even if it does have Marilyn Monroe
Tarzan and the Magic Fountain - Lex Barker's first stab at the Jungle Lord is still formulaic
Fast and Furry-ous - 'Beep Beep' Road Runner and Vin Diesel (sorry couldnt resist I mean Wiley Coyote first outing)
Twelve O'Clock High - Bored me a little
Samson and Delilah - "Samson the Philistines are upon you" Classic DeMille
Africa Sceams - Apart from a few good gags this really didn't work for me
All the Kings Men - A Classic Oscar winner which again didn't do it for me
Ladies of the Chorus - early Monroe, technically 1948 but released generally 1949
The Third Man - Have to say this was my first time seeing this, the scene where we first see Lime lit up I though was great.
Late Spring - Yasujirō Ozu's 'Bansun' not a lot happens but I quite liked it.
Mighty Joe Young - Great movie! But you would have thought Robert Armstrong would have learn't his lesson by now Armstrong+Giant Apes=Trouble

[masdawg]

Finished watching the first series of a little show I stumbled across on Netflix called The Booth At The End. I really enjoyed it, and recommend anyone with Netflix/LoveFilm checks it out - I am gutted at finding out there is a second series, but it's only currently available on LoveFilm (I only have Netflix)

Also watched Winnebago Man. Enjoyed this one as well - started out a little slow and wasn't sure it was going to go anywhere, but that was the whole point of the hunt to see the real Jack Rebney. When they reluctantly drag Jack along to a screening of his outtakes at a local film festival, and he hears that applause...what a heartwarming moment!

Finally, watched S&Man last night. I wasn't too sure what I was going to think of this one - while I already knew before watching it that it was a "hoaxumentary" it was so much more than just a hoax. The "hoax" of the S&Man videos is interspersed with a lot of interesting interviews with Fred Vogel, Bill Zebub, Debbie D, etc.
I have never seen any of the August Underground films, and honestly never plan to - definately too far for my liking. I have never seen anything from Bill Zebub, so I am not a huge fan of the type of content discussed in this film. But even coming into this not knowing very much about the subject, I found it an interesting documentary on the type of people who make these films and what some of the stars of these films actually think of the content.
Quite like Cannibal Holocaust, I also enjoyed and found interesting the way this film mixes fact with fiction to create an added level of 'realism' to the faked footage.

[Frankie Teardrop]

SILENT NIGHT, BLOODY NIGHT - From the newish Code Red double bill with "Invasion of the Blood Farmers". I've always given up on this one in the past because all available transfers had been irredeemably shite. Now it looks a hundred times better (albeit still pleasingly roughed up and scratchy) and reveals itself to be a nice bit of grindhouse weirdness. It's messy and slipshod and in some ways doesn't make much sense, but none of that matters - it's big on atmosphere and subtle wonkiness, and features my all time favourite speed diva Mary Woronov (in a role that admittedly doesn't do her all that much justice, but it's just enough for me to know that she's in it). It's about an big house with a bad back story and has an arguable claim to be proto-slasher in a US Giallo type way. In truth it feels like a wannabe arthouse director tried to make a genre potboiler which he couldn't really be bothered to finish, but what comes through is the bleak, disconnected ambience and the strange stylisation of some of the scenes - the sepia 'asylum' flashback needed an entire film to itself. Watch out for Mary's Factory crowd moonlighting as mental patients - Candy Darling, Jack Smith and even a young Susan Rothenberg are in there.

MUTANTS - French new splatter take on the tried and tested theme of zombie apocalypse. Actually, this goes a quite different route at first, and ventures more into 'I, Zombie' / 'The Fly' territory - it follows the sorry dissolution of an infected guy as his doctor gf tends to his suppurating wounds in a creepy abandoned hospital. This is the strongest, and most disturbing part of the film - after a certain point, we get some obligatory zombie action, but this is well handled and vicious and doesn't detract from the downbeat, nihilistic tone. 'Mutants' put me in mind a little of things like 'The Road' and 'The Day' - films which chart the fragility of humans trying to stay human in an environment which no longer permits humanity. I recommend it, it's not the usual zombie action fest, and it looks really nice as well, the cinematography really captures that icy, post-society desolation.

EXORCIST 3 - I really liked this worthy sequel to one of the all time greats. I'd seen it a couple of times before, but couldn't remember much about it (apart from one very obvious bit). It doesn't quite capture the atmosphere of utter doom which makes 'The Exorcist' feel like the prelude to someone's psychotic episode - but it comes close, with layers of ominous, repetitive imagery, sudden lurches into abstract horror (the confessional murder) and THAT show stopping moment which never fails to grab me (it's that cut away to the headless statue, it just seems such a disturbing, potent image). Some have commented that the ending is clunky and over the top - well, it could've done with something a bit lower key, but it's the serious, dark ambience that makes the greater impression and marks 'Exorcist 3' out in retrospect as one of the high points of the dried up nineties genre scene.

BULLET BALLET - I'm generally a big admirer of Shinya Tsukamoto's stuff. 'Tetsuo' still feels really raw and a bit underground, whilst 'A Snake Of June' gives me goose pimples and feels a bit like taking a long bath on a rainy day (admittedly quite a disturbing bath. Sorry, I don't know what I'm going on about either). I didn't really connect all that much with 'Bullet Ballet', but it was my first viewing, and sometimes I forget that with some films, you really have to see them a few times and I think this is one of them. Tsukamoto stars as a bourgeois director guy who becomes obsessed with a gang of punks after his wife commits suicide. Eventually violence reigns and ruins everything. It's a monochrome, French New Wave-y type world and it's really well realised and... I could see that it was good but I think I'm going to have to give it another go. On the other hand, I usually instantly like his other stuff ie. I thought the recent 'Kotoko' was great and I haven't seen it since it first came out.

TAETER CITY - If you like gore, you'll love this. If you've seen 'Adam Chaplin' then you'll know what to expect, because here the dudes behind AC pummel home the brutality with even more gusto. 'Taeter City' has a theme, characters and a semblance of a narrative, but it almost feels like 'visual media' rather then cinema. The object is pretty much simply to showcase as many gore effects as possible in the running time, and the aesthetic is not far off from games console. I for one am well up for this approach - I doubt the filmmakers had any conscious intent to expand the boundaries of film, but it feels almost like the next stage of something. Interesting. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, though. It certainly has enough blood and guts to keep even the most demanding happy. For those who are into pesky specifics, it's about a totalitarian future where cannibalism is corporatized and enforced by Dredd-style fascist coppers. It's low, low budget, but I truly commend its dedication to excess. There's a weird purity to it all, and it's really well made for what it is. The filmmakers' follow up, 'Hotel Inferno', which is also available from their 'Necrostorm' website, promises to be similarly hardcore.

[The Reaper Man@Cult Labs]

Today I watched all on Blu Ray;
DEATH WISH-Superb pic quality worth the upgrade.Just a pity for an anniversary edition that Paramount only saw fit to include a trailer.

12 ANGRY MEN-Criterion.Superb film.Has any other film ever kept you so engrossed in one room with a bunch of squabbling men?

CUJO-A bit dated now,but looks good on Blu.Felt more sorry for the mutt actually....

LEON-New studio canal steely.Looked great.Prefer the theatrical cut.It's a lot more to the point.

PRISONERS-Had read about this,but it passed all expectations and kept me glued for two and a half hours.Superb.In fact,best film I've seen yet this year.
I take it this is Hollywood's venture into those subtitled Scandinavian cop series on BBC 3 or 4?

For once they have succeeded....

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop

MUTANTS - French new splatter take on the tried and tested theme of zombie apocalypse. Actually, this goes a quite different route at first, and ventures more into 'I, Zombie' / 'The Fly' territory - it follows the sorry dissolution of an infected guy as his doctor gf tends to his suppurating wounds in a creepy abandoned hospital. This is the strongest, and most disturbing part of the film - after a certain point, we get some obligatory zombie action, but this is well handled and vicious and doesn't detract from the downbeat, nihilistic tone. 'Mutants' put me in mind a little of things like 'The Road' and 'The Day' - films which chart the fragility of humans trying to stay human in an environment which no longer permits humanity. I recommend it, it's not the usual zombie action fest, and it looks really nice as well, the cinematography really captures that icy, post-society desolation.

I saw Mutants a few years ago and expected the same old, same old. As you say it's really different and once they set off in the ambulance you don't really know where its going which was really refreshing. Normally a small cast in a zombie film isn't particularly promising as it tends to mean a lack of zombie action however, this was a pleasant surprise all round.