Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973) Dir: J. Lee Thompson

It's the last of the original 'Apes' movies, and clearly the worst.

The plot:
Caesar, ostensible leader of the intelligent apes, has a dream. He wishes for the human 'animals' and the apes to live in peace and harmony. Trouble is, not all of his kind agrees with and, sure as chimps throw faeces at unsuspecting members of the public, factions begin to be forged.
One gorilla in particular (whose name escapes me) begins to threaten the stability, and it's not long before Caesar must decide whether to stand and fight or let his dream fall into tatters.

Low budget by this stage, this doesn't really have a whole lot going for it.
Gone are the super-animated facial features of the first couple of movies, the ape costumes, and masks in particular, now redolent of the kind of thing you'd hire from a novelty shop for a Halloween party.
Roddy McDowell, somewhat surprisingly, reprises his role as Caesar (he must have needed the cash) and does his best with some substandard material, but this was a project way beyond redemption.
The only vague positive here is that the script does tenuously hang on to the political allegory, with Caesar in full on Martin Luther King mode, which is fine but, unfortunately, you can't spin gold from navel fluff.
Deeply flawed, primarily by lack of budget, this is something of a damp squib for the series to end on.
Shame.

2 out of 5

Four Lions (2010) Chris Morris

Some controversy upon initial release, this comes from the wonderfully deviant, darkly demented mind of Chris Morris, he of Brasseye, The Day Today and Nathan Barley fame.
A British comedy about the extremist elements of the Islamic community, set in Sheffield?
That can't be any good, surely?

The plot:
3 young Asian Muslim men, and one older, white Muslim convert are hatching a plan. Instead of sitting back and allowing the infidels to continue in their sinful ways, why not strike back at the heart of British society?
Why not invoke fear in an already nervous population?
Only trouble is, they are utterly incompetent. Whether it's firing rocket launchers facing the wrong way, falling over a wall and accidentally blowing up a sheep, or dancing with the foxy next door neighbour whilst surrounded by all the bomb-making gear, if they can find a way to mess things up they probably will.
After some umming and arring, they select both target and method: Suicide bomb attacks at the London Marathon.

Sounds like a right barrel of laughs, and no mistake. And right there lies the problem.
It ain't funny.
Sure, it has its moment and occasionally raises a wry smile, but not consistently, and certainly not often enough.
As for the storyline, whilst decent at its core, the goofball antics of the characters quickly becomes irritating, and all too often veers over into Keystone Cops style bickering and head slapping.
And what about the message of the movie? Surely the only purpose of making a satirical comedy is to make a point, and here all I got from it was that all Pakistani men are fanatical religious crazies and bumbling imbeciles.
And I really don't think that was the point.
As a self-confessed Morris fan-boy, I must say I was a tad disappointed.

3 out of 5

Cypher (2002) Dir: Vincenzo Natali

NOTE: Known as Brainstorm in some territories.

What would happen if the James Bond and Matrix franchises collided?
Well, something a bit like this, I suspect.

The plot:
Set in an indeterminate time period, an office worker is tired of the tedium in his life. Middle of the road, mid-salary, middling prospects, his life takes a sudden turn for the unexpected when, almost unbidden, he is plunged headlong into the murky world of corporate espionage. Daunted but determined, he dutifully carries out his instructions, attending mind-numbing seminars about cheese and sewage and skirting boards, he 'activates' a device in his pocket; a listening device.
Slowly getting to grips with his new life, another unforeseen happening: Lucy Liu appears and tells him that the espionage he is conducting is in fact a lie, that the transmitter device doesn't even do anything and that he is a pawn in a game he doesn't even know is being played.
What's a man to do?

Part espionage movie, part sci-fi, the mood here is quite out there. With a trippy-dippy soundtrack, odd camera angles and awkward, stilted conversations on screen for the most part, this does its very best to unsettle the viewer, and it certainly achieves it.
The performance of Jeremy Northam as male lead Morgan Sullivan is rock solid, perfectly capturing the bewilderment of his predicament.
Relatively unknown, this one may have been a bit too deep for the multiplexes, which is a shame as it stands head and shoulders above ninety nine percent of the guff out there.
Genuinely hard to find a flaw.

5 out of 5

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011) Dir: Guy Ritchie

There was a time when the very mention of the name Guy Ritchie sent all genuine cinephiles running to the hills, screaming themselves hoarse, whether through gales of laughter or genuine, gushing, trauma-induced tears.
Then, a funny thing happened: he released a movie that people actually seemed to like when Sherlock Holmes hit the screens in 2009.
Could he pull off the same improbable thing twice?

The plot:
Everyones favourite vaguely demented, flawed genius super-sleuth is back, this time on the trail of arch-nemesis Professor Moriarty, played with genuine menace-filled glee by the sinister-faced Jared Harris.
The journey, inevitably, is a long and rocky one, that takes in fights on moving trains, Stephen Fry's buttocks and more knockabout violence than you could shake a mid-period Bond movie at.

And, blow me down with a jeweller's eye-glass, it's only really ruddy good fun.
I mean, really, ruddy good fun.
It's pap, of course it is, but pap's OK when it is delivered with a glint in the eye and the occasional knowing wink at the viewer.
Downey Jr. simply owns the role of Holmes, a buzzing ball of nervous, semi-sane energy, whilst Jude Law foregoes his comedy Cockney cum Aussie attempt at a British accent from Contagion (a curious blind spot for an actor who is, you know, British an' all) in favour of the more traditional tones of The Queen's English.
Clocking in over the two hour mark, usually that is a stretch of my horror '85 minutes, no more' blunted patience, but this passed in the blink of an eye and, truly, if it had lasted another twenty minutes I would not have complained.
Massively entertaining, this is the first Blockbuster of the festive season and, by all that is Christly, it's a damn fine start.

4 out of 5

Knowing (2009) Dir: Alex Proyas

A sci-fi movie starring Nicholas 'Equus' Cage.
Got to be good, right?

The plot:
Cage plays Alan Strang, a young man with a religious and pathological fascination with horses. Strang, you see, is a zoophile, though his proclivities are not sexually based, rather a tactile compulsion he finds so overpowering that, one day, to ensure the horses do not run away, he blinds them. Seven horses in all, one after the other; Strang sneaks up on the wretched beasts, penknife cupped in sweaty palm, jabbing the weapon into the eyes of the docile animals with a speed and level of savagery that renders them powerless.
Hang on.
No, sorry, got it all wrong.
I'm talking about the Peter Schaffer play.
Let's reset:
Cage plays John Koestler, a teacher and deep thinker (Cage. Right?!?). John's son brings home something from school; a sheet of paper, taken from a time capsule unearthed fifty years after the pupils at his school buried it and, on the paper, a sequence of numbers, apparently random.
Through a moment of genuine logical insanity, John spots that the numbers appear to be a series of dates and, after a quick dose of Googling, he discovers that each date is significant as a tragedy took place that day, involving the loss of many lives and, shock horror, the sequence of numbers also predict the precise figure of fatalities.
How could this be?
How could a pupil, fifty years prior, have predicted the dates and death tolls of so many horrific incidents and, more pressingly, how can John prevent the tragedies the numbers predict are yet to come.

Directed by Alex 'The Crow, Dark City' Proyas, I had reasonably high hopes going into this.
Yeah, it would be a special effects splurge and, yeah, Equus can't act his way out of a revolving door, but the pedigree of the man at the helm seemed a good omen.
Boy, was I wrong.
Blatantly silly in ways that are genuinely offensive to the viewer - I can suspend disbelief with the best of them, but I expect to be treated like a growed up - this is a movie that absolutely depends upon the gullibility, naivety and general stupidity of the viewer.
What's that?
Equus braying on about sequences of numbers?
And how did he spot it?
Because of a coffee stain?
Shut it, Mr. Ed. Get back in the stable where you belong lest I turn you into glue and food for things with sharper teeth than yours....
What's that?
Aliens, you say, communicating across the stars to teach humanity, and to save those worthy of saving?
I fucking warned you, Trigger. Take that. And that. And that. That'll teach you to have such spindly legs. Try and escape now, you pointy-eared little prick.
What am I doing?
I'll tell you exactly what I'm doing.
I've cut you on your flank and led a trail of sugar from the wound to an ant's nest.
Now we'll see who's laughing.
Stay down, you fucking worthless animal.
With lashings of 'family values' and sentimentalising, if this one doesn't have you spraying geysers of vomit across the room by the end, Linda Blair style, frankly, there's something wrong with you.
And the ending?
Clit-licking Jesus.
The ending.
With a schmaltz factor that even Spielberg couldn't tolerate, the icky-sticky-dickyness of a father's love for his son will send anyone sentient into paroxysms of exquisite agony as it goes on and on and on and on.
One of the worst movies I have seen in quite some time, I was left a quivering, raging mess of boiling hatred by the end of it.
Utter, utter shit.

1 out of 5

Don't you just love this two month hiatus from the blockbuster shite that Hollywood generally hurls at the screen?
Don't you?
Eh?
Well we do down here at Smell the Cult HQ and, though it may be drawing to a close for the time being, there was still time for one last hurrah.

The plot:
A young woman, celebrating gaining a place at the prestigious MIT, heads home after a party a little worse for wear. When a radio broadcast announces that a new planet is visible in the night sky, her astronomer's brain kicks in and, briefly, her attention turns heavenward, away from the road. Drink-addled, she loses control, and ploughs into a stationary vehicle, killing wife and child within, leaving the widower in a coma.
Imprisoned, she is released some four years later, the world now come to terms with the new planet in the sky, though still intrigued, as it appears to be an exact replica of Earth.
Desperate to gain some form of redemption, through a MacGuffin of reasonably huge proportions, the young woman gains the trust and friendship of the man whom she made a widower and, slowly, tenderly, over time, she begins to make amends.

Sounds like a right load of old wiffle, I'll grant you, but this is handled with such a gentleness of touch it's hard not to be enthralled. Mixing indie stylings with the sense of the epic majesty of our cosmos, this manages to at once warm the cockles and inspire awe at our insignificance.
With a genuinely beautiful relationship as the core of the story, in many ways this is reminiscent of last years excellent, excellent Monsters: the central, fantastical premise simply serving as a backdrop over which can be draped the actual decoration of the real storyline.
Heartwarming in a way that so little cinema manages to be, the soulless purveyors of rom-coms could do well to take a look at both the performances and the construct of the emotional narrative, here, and learn a thing or two about genuine human interaction.
There really aren't enough superlatives to describe this so
I'll stop.
Now.

5 out of 5

Giallo (2009) Dir: Dario Argento

Dario Argento on very familiar ground here.
For those not in the know, here's how it is: Giallo is Italian for yellow. It is also the term used to describe a very specific type of cinema. Giallo movies have a few common ingredients:
A mysterious killer, usually sporting black leather gloves and with a penchant for some close quarters knife butchery.
A police investigation.
Set-piece style slayings, usually accompanied by music from either The Goblins, Tangerine Dream or, occasionally, a spot of NWOBHM (prime era Motorhead or Iron Maiden).
One of the finest exponents of the art is, of course, Dario Argento, who stepped from the world of film criticism to start making the blasted things for himself, allegedly dismayed at the paucity of genuine quality. Interestingly, he also has a close association with Sergio Leone, having worked in part on some Spaghetti Westerns.
With undisputed Giallo classics like Opera, Tenebre, Suspiria and Phenomena under his belt, this should surely be like slipping on a tight, black, leather glove just before plunging a knife into someone's throat.
Right?

The plot:
Adrien Brody wanders around Torino sporting a truly dreadful mullet, nostrils flaring, looking vaguely bewildered by his surroundings. See, a woman has been murdered, and her sister has been sent to him looking for assistance.
As it happens, he does know a thing or two, despite his attempts at gormlessness, and soon they are on the trail of a sick and sadistic killer known only as Yellow.
Yellow. Get it? The film is called Giallo.
And that's yellow in Italian.
And the genre is also known as Giallo.
Aren't they ever so bloody clever?

It's ok, folks.
I can't say more than that.
Brody is frankly ludicrous in the lead role, which is unusual. He's an Oscar nominee, for God's sake, so he's got some chops but, here, he just seems out of his depth. Genuinely, like he doesn't have a bloody clue what's going on.
Argento occasionally gives us a taste of his directorial flair but, for the most part, the atmosphere here relies far too heavily on the washed out, green and brown style grunginess of the more recent slew of torture porn offerings, from the likes of Eli Roth and Danny Bousman.
For Argento completists this is a must watch, of course, but newbie's, stay away from it like the proverbial alien anal probe.

5 out of 10

Dream House (2011) Dir: Jim Sheridan

Ghost stories are ten a penny.
Haunted house stories are almost as common.
So could this one really stand out from the pack?

The plot:
A family move into a new home and all seems well. The kids don't like it too much but, you know, they're just kids so fuck them, right?
Soon, as predictable as rain on the morning of a wash day, weird things start to happen:
A sinister figure watching them through the window.
Footprints left in the snowfall.
Strange interest from local goth types.
When the man of the house, Will Atenton, hears rumour of a grisly murder in the home, he tries to keep it to himself but, inevitably, the lady wife finds out. None too impressed, she and the young girls begin to feel even more unsettled, to the point that Will decides he has to do something about it. Heading to the Mental Institute that now apparently houses the man responsible for the murders, Will doesn't know what he will find when he gets there, nor could he predict the terrible consequences of his discovery.

Ninety minutes, dead on, just as it should be, this cracks along at a fair old clip. With no time for much in the way of preamble, we're straight into it, here, and that's no bad thing.
Daniel Craig is in fine form, by turns angry and desperate and intense, and always those piercing blue eyes staring out of the screen, demanding your attention.
And he's ripped, too. By jove, he's got quite the physique.
Though fairly tame in terms of the terror levels, still this is intriguing, playing more as a psychological chiller than an all out creepfest, and it works just fine as it is. No need for gore, no need for blood, when the oddness of the situation will do very nicely, thank you.
With reluctance, I will make reference to a killer twist about halfway through. Reluctant because some bleat and bemoan when told there is a twist at all, but that's as far as I'll go.
Won't change the world, won't stick in your head too long, but for the duration this certainly entertained.
Liked it.

4 out of 5

The Thing (2011) Dir: Matthijs van Heijningen Jr.

Well, just back from The Thing '11 and, sad to report, it was fucking dreadful.
Dreadful, dreadful, dreadful.
Where Carpenter's remake original (sic) was all about a gradual sense of creeping menace, paranoia and escalating levels of insanity, as bodies split apart and spider's legs sprouted from human heads before scuttling along the floor, this one is about as subtle as a friction burn.
See, we have the prelude (about ten minutes), then the 'getting the new bods to Antarctica' bit (about ten minutes), then the monster emerges, and everything goes fucking nuts. The volume cranks up to 12, people shout and scream a lot, a CGI monster wibbles about on screen a bit.
Then it ends.
Talking of the monster, gone are the super-cool prosthetics and stretchy rubber nastiness, to be replaced with pixel perfect graphics, that dreaded lack of gravity and the overriding sense that it's not really there.
Seriously, it looks shit.
The cast are as bland as potato flavour crisps and the whole experience was so crushingly dull I fell asleep several times, only to be awoken by a crashing thump of music as something 'scary' took place and, frankly, I'd preferred to have stayed asleep.
The only moment of pleasure came as the end credits rolled, and not for the obvious gag factor, but because it was at this point that Carpenter's majestic score kicked in, and the set-up for the opening sequences in the 80's version was played out.
Other than that, a total waste of space.
Bloody awful.

2 out of 5

Second in Command (2006) Dir: Simon Fellows

There are few things that quicken the pulse of a red-blooded, red meat munching, testosterone fuelled, pussy-pounding ultra male more than a new Jean Claude Van Damme movie appearing on the V+ hard drive.

The plot:
The movie starts with a gaggle of twats sitting at a bar, discussing the imminent arrival of 'the hardest man they've ever met.'
Who could it be?
Yes, it's Long Cord Man Slamme.
See, Long Cord is a Special Forces type, eager for some fighting, so he's headed into this country, a none-specific Eastern Communist kind of place with Islamic overtones - think Chechnya, but with less of a sense of humour.
As it happens, the very day after he appears, the local militia stage an uprising and, before you know it, Man Slamme, the country's ex-president, and a bunch of assorted perishables are holed up in the US Embassy, awaiting rescue by either the US forces, or the army still loyal to the president.
Will they be able to withstand the militia's onslaught?
And, crucially, will they be able to understand a single word Man Slamme is saying?

It's utter nonsense. Of course it is, but you know that going in.
The plot is derisory.
The acting atrocious.
The script laughably poor.
Even the lip-synching is about as precise as a really substandard edition of Swedish Erotica, but who gives a fuck?
It's got Long Cord Man Slamme in it, and that's all anybody cares about.
He may be knocking on in years, but he is still a glorious sight in full flow. Sure, he can't pirouette with the same frequency as before, but he's still got some chops: this motherfucker moves like a panther on occasion.
With marks deducted for the lack of the requisite buttock shot - age related again, I suspect, but I reckon he'd still look joyous with a soft filter and a decent application of boy-oils - this is certainly latter period Man Slamme, but that don't make it wrong.
A terrible film, really.
I thoroughly enjoyed it.

4 out of 5

Urban Legend (1998) Dir: Jamie Blanks

Scraping the bottom of the Scream barrel, this was dull as pond scum.

The plot:
A college campus, infested only with beautiful young things, is suddenly traumatised when mysterious deaths begin to occur. There seems no connection between the victims, until someone realises that all of the murders are played out in the guise of one sort of urban legend or another.

And that's it.
That's the hook.
No Indian burial ground.
No ancient curse invoked when a gypsy women is run over by an 18 wheeler.
Hell, not even an entity from a parallel dimension sent through to experiment on mankind, to weaken us, ready for the invasion.
Nope, instead we have a killer who wanders around in a grey parka, with the hood up.
Ooooohhhhh, I'm really scared.
Mommy, mommy, come hide me from the nasty man in the Parka with the woolly hood.
Insufferably safe and middle of the road, this really is aimed at the amoeba end of the cinema digesting spectrum.
This spawned two sequels, incidentally and, rest assured, they will remain unwatched.
Rubbish!

2 out of 5

Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995) Dir: Joe Chappelle

It's part 6 of a slasher franchise, so you pretty much know what to expect, and there are no real surprises.

The plot:
Six years after Michael Myers' initial killing spree in Carpenter's classic original, the masked maniac is back to finish off what he started: kill all the Strode's.
Along the way we encounter a dysfunctional family unit, a vaguely Satanic radio broadcast and more gore than we've seen before.

That's all folks.
The only points worth noting here are one super-cool back reference to Halloween 2, as Michael wanders around a spooky hospital at night, and the fact that his sinister mask seems to have had a make-over, so he now looks even more chilling than usual.
Average slasher fodder, then.

3 our of 5

Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972) Dir: J. Lee Thompson

Movie number four in the original series, and the one that would be used some 29 years later as the basis for the recent Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

The plot:
In 1983, a mysterious virus eliminates all of the cats and dogs in the world, leading humans to take in apes as pets and it's not long before the animals are being used by their masters to assist with household chores.
Skip forward eight years to 1991, and the world has taken to exploiting apes as slave labour.
Caesar, the offspring of Cornelius and Zira, is a lone speaking ape, though this is a secret known only to his friend and master Armando.
Witnessing the brutalising of apes by humans in SS style uniforms, Caesar can hold his tongue no longer, and calls out an insult.
Identified now, Caesar becomes a target for the authorities - a talking ape is a dangerous precedent - and Caesar is forced to go into hiding but, secretly, he begins to train the rest of his kind, before leading them in an uprising against their former masters.

And it's captivating stuff.
Roddy McDowall, though caked in ape make-up, does a sterling job of wringing every last drop of pathos out of the plight of poor Caesar.
The realisation, though minimal due to the tightness of the budget, is nonetheless effective, as human society is portrayed as a fascistic, cold-hearted construct, humiliating and taking advantage of those who are weaker.
With a rousing finale that really does catch the breath in the throat, for a fourth outing in a franchise this is quality stuff indeed, and it's easy to see why this one was selected as the basis for a 21st century reimagining.
A genuine cult classic

4 out of 5

Doomwatch (1972) Dir: Peter Sasdy

Massively over-wrought full length feature version of the paranoid seventies BBC classic.

The plot:
Pollution watchdog agency Doomwatch are drafted in when something strange seems to be affecting a small island community.
The fish the locals rely on for their livelihoods are getting ever larger and, more troublingly, it seems anyone who eats the produce begins to transform: skulls thicken, jaws begin to jut, limbs begin to change shape.
What is it that is causing the mutation to both fish and people alike?
And could it have anything to do with the stretch of water sealed off by the Ministry of Defence?

Whilst the TV show from which this spawned was brooding and melancholic, this is instead melodramatic and plain irritating. Coming across more like a slightly higher budget 'Play for the Day' this seems frankly amateurish on occasion and the lead actor, Ian Bannen, playing Dr. Del Shaw is utterly absurd.
As an avid fan of British 70's sci-fi, I had high hopes for this, but those with similar interests would do better to give this a miss and instead check out The Doombolt Chase, or Pertwee era Doctor Who.
Dismal and dreary, this bored me, I'm afraid.

2 out of 5

Puppet Master III: Toulon's Revenge (1991) Dir: David DeCoteau

There are some horror franchises which really make you glad to be alive.
The Puppet Master series is one of them.

The plot:
It's World War 2, and Hitler is running rampant across Europe. Not by himself, admittedly, but you take the point.
A puppeteer of extraordinary talent, André Toulon, performs a show that makes a mockery of The Führer. When evil Major Krauss - played by the wonderfully deviant-looking Richard Lynch - gets wind of this, the show is shut down, Toulon imprisoned. But Toulon's journey does not end there, as one sharp eyed Nazi spied that his puppets seemed to have a life of their own and, upon further investigation, discovers that Toulon was injecting the wooden creatures with a mysterious, life giving substance.
Well, as sure as a sense of deep guilt and profound disappointment follows masturbation, Krauss wants to get his hands on the substance, to please Herr Führer and, possibly, to win the war for Germany.

Patent nonsense, of course, but it's all done with such a knowing sense of mischief that it matters not one jot. Everyone involved clearly knows it's a load of old cobblers and decide, to hell with it, let's just enjoy the ride
Made by Full Moon Productions, you can expect pretty low production standards and dodgy acting, just as we have come to know and love.
For those not familiar with the Puppet Master series, this is really just about the dolls, and specifically their powers:

Blade - Sinister looking MoFo who, yep, slashes everything in sight with a knife.
Jester - Harlequin doll with a head split into three parts that rotate independently. Doesn't really do much, but looks pretty cool.
Pinhead - Massive body. Tiny head. Very strong. Much like my cock.
Tunneler - Atop the head is a rotating drill that can be used to burrow through things: walls, mattresses, human flesh.
Leech Woman - Once the victim is immobilised by the rest of the gang, Leech Woman leers over them and regurgitates a leech straight down their food pipe.

They're a crazy bunch.

With ten films in total in the series, they can't all be good but, truth be told, I'm yet to see a bad one.
Like this!

4 out of 5

Near Dark (1987) Dir: Kathryn Bigelow

Kathryn Bigelow's vampire horror / Spaghetti Western fusion is an enjoyable beast.

The plot:
Caleb Colton is an everyday sort of schlub. Working as a farm boy in the Midwest, there's not much going on in his life, save for the ridiculous squareness of his jawline and the fact he will one day turn into Nathan Petrelli from Heroes.
One night, idling away some time, he spies a beautiful woman by herself, eating ice cream and, being the kind of smooth operator that makes you want to throw acid in his face, he wanders over. Seeming interested, the pair spend the night together, though in a Platonic sense for the most part. As dawn approaches the girl, Mae, becomes agitated and, in one last moment of intimacy, bites him on the neck before fleeing.
Now, Caleb's world is turned inside out.
He attempts to find his way home, but struggles, the sunlight beaming down seeming to scorch his body and, just as he nears the farm, a blacked out caravan appears and he is bundled inside, surprised to find Mae within, along with her' family' of vampires.
Turned, now, Caleb must join the bloodsuckers, but his reluctance to take a life for himself will inevitably cause trouble in the not too distant future for the group.....

Played pretty low-key, this is an interesting take on the vampire mythos, as here we are afforded a glimpse within the world of the nocturnal ones. Indeed, the PoV of the movie is that the vampires are our heroes, the ones we root for, even as they are committing appalling crimes.
Bigelow is renowned as being one of the most muscular directors in the business, despite her profound lack of a penis, and it's in evidence again here, with more testosterone in places than you could shake a tiny blue pill at. It's also worth noting that she was, at this point, married to one James Cameron. Nothing unusual about that, I guess, but the connection is clear on screen. Several scenes either relate to The Terminator, or would go on to be effectively replayed in Terminator 2. Also, three of the main cast from Cameron's own Aliens make up the vampire clan (Hudson, Bishop and Vasquez, for the geeks out there).
As Firefly would several years later, here the Western genre is successfully fused with an alternative, less predictable format, and the strangeness of that adds a real visual appeal, and is played with on occasion; lingering shots of spurs; riding into a deserted town on horseback; bandits with a price on their head.
Though certainly not a movie for gore-hounds, as the bloodshed is minimal in the extreme, this is interesting enough to be a recommendation to anyone wishing to see an alternate take on two different genres.
Splice-meisters, if you will.
So yeah, if you consider yourself a Splice-meister, check this out,.
If not, well, just bloody piss right off, then.

4 out of 5

Bronson (2008) Dir: Nicolas Winding Refn

A UK movie based on a true story?
Not usually the kind of thing that floats my boat, but encouraging reviews and a lead actor of interest made me dip my toe.
I'm glad I did.

The plot:
Michael Peterson was a troubled lad. Never really getting on at school, he seemed to have no grasp of right or wrong. Where others would blanch at the idea of punching out their teacher, Michael barely batted an eyelid.
After leaving school, Michael lands a job peeling spuds at the local chippy, when the serving wench catches his eye. Having no money, he decides to rob the local post office to get the money to take her out, and swiftly finds himself incarcerated.
So begins a career in prison that, for the most part, would be spent in solitary confinement.
Changing his name to Charlie Bronson, in honour of the Death Wish star, Peterson is comfortable with life on the inside, enjoying the physical confrontations with fellow inmates and prison warders so that, with the help of the alter ego, it's not too long before his record breaking time inside becomes all that can possibly define him.

And this is thought provoking stuff.
Director Rifn chooses an unusual mode to deliver his message, as Bronson is on a stage, addressing an enraptured audience, who cheer and gasp at appropriate places. It's a fantastical approach, and one that very nearly serves to sever the umbilical between engaged viewer brain and on screen action, but he just about gets away with it due to Tom Hardy's mesmerising performance as Bronson.
Last seen in Warrior, as the enigmatic Tommy, Hardy is fast becoming quite the favourite down here at Smell the Cult HQ, and here his is an all engaging presence. Muscular, powerful, charismatic and, on occasion, utterly unreadable, this is a character study with real depth. At least twice, his performance is so convincing it freezes the blood: "What the fuck do you know about what I need?"
Demanding answers to questions that can never be given, this is a movie that makes the viewer question the very concept of the penal system: what purpose does imprisonment serve for one who enjoys being imprisoned?
With his journey through the correctional system charted in ludicrous detail, from normal prison, to an insane asylum, back to the real world before the whole cycle begins again, taking in a period on the roof of a prison, mid-riot, captured for a nation's entertainment by circling helicopters, all sides of his existence are explored.
Talking of cyclical, there are patterns here, too. As the real life Peterson was informed by Charles Manson, so too director Oliver Stone was informed by Charlie Bronson when crafting his Mickey and Mallory tale in Natural Born Killers as, here too, all Bronson is really interested in is infamy. And, if you don't believe me, just check out Woody Harrelson's choice of sunglasses.....
Gripping, intelligent, with a truly epic performance at its heart, this is rock solid stuff, only docked a point due to the strange 'on stage' choice of the director.

4 out of 5

Immortals (2011) Dir: Tarsem Singh

"From the producers of 300" screamed the billboards and posters on the sides of buses, a proclamation that should surely freeze the blood in your veins, not because of the association with 300, a fine example of swords and sandals splatter that thoroughly entertained, but because any film whose most laudable claim is it is made by people who have, you know, made something else, must surely be viewed with suspicion.
Still, into battle we plunged, regardless, Mrs. Mo and I, to test our mettle against the finest Ancient Greece could throw at us:

The plot:
Theseus, an everyman sort who just happens to be built like the proverbial brick shithouse, is a man on a mission. Protected by Zeus - though he is unaware of this - he feels it is his destiny to save his people from the evil tyranny of King Hyperion, a man with a mission of his own: to get his grubby, steroid bloated mitts on The Epirus Bow, a weapon so powerful it can be used to unleash The Titans, imprisoned beneath a mountain by the Gods, there to dwell for all eternity.
So, the Gods observe the mortal struggle beneath, forbidden by Zeus to intervene unless The Titans are indeed released, but Athena and some other God are none too keen to follow the rules....

Confused?
Well, you should be, but it matters not one jot as the plot is the purest nonsense, and merely serves as a vehicle for much chest-beating and pompous speech-making and rabble rousing, as well as the occasional burst of the old ultra-violence.
Whilst everything about this is a load of old cock-rot, I couldn't help but be swept along by the sheer theatre of it all, as muscular, oiled men and buxom wenches paraded around in togas, the ensemble completed by the fake, epic backdrop that 300 made such splendid use of.
Talking of oiled young men, in one moment of genuine post-modern genius, the plot calls for a bunch of swarthy sorts to swim through an ocean of oil so that, when they emerge, they are glistening and smeared, compelled to drench their forms in water to rid themselves of the slick. I laughed out loud at the audacious home-eroticism of the whole thing.
Marvellous.
My personal deviances aside, this is a rollicking good swords and sandals fantasy that, with just a shade more action, could have easily reached the bombastic heights of 300.
It didn't, but it wasn't a million miles away, either.

4 out of 5

Friday the 13th (2009) Dir: Marcus Nispel

Remember the good old days?
Eh?
When horror was either about atmosphere or campy silliness.
When you could go into your local video store and tell from the cover whether you were going to like a movie or not.
When the aim of every horror film was not simply to be more nasty than the last one and when, here's a thought, the genre didn't take itself so damned seriously.
See, Friday the 13th was a slasher film. And not a particularly classy one, being a fairly transparent attempt to cash in on the phenomenal success of Carpenter's Halloween.
But it was a whole lot of fun.
Parts 1 and 2 are good, with part 3 being a genuine slasher classic, as Jason dons the hockey mask for the first time (Jason wasn't the killer in part 1, and in part 2 he wore an old sack over his head to hide his identity, just so you know) and sets about trying to kill everyone Corey Feldman holds dear. Indeed, the Feldman "Die, die, die" sequence is something quite remarkable to behold. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpUJqXud9zI
Sure, after that the franchise went on an inexorable slide into hideous awfulness, but let's not dwell on that.
Now, some 29 years after the release of the original, the dreaded remake and, horror upon horror, it's exec. produced by that cinematic shit-sprayer Michael Bay.

The plot:
In a series of flashbacks, movies 1 and 2 are dealt with so, within five minutes, Jason has the mask and within twenty, he's dispatched a whole gaggle of teenage types.
Skip to present day, and another bunch of imbeciles rock up at Camp Crystal Lake for some weed and booze and sex related hi jinx only to be picked off one by one.

All very much as we would expect, then.
But there's one massive issue here.
It's utterly, utterly shit.
I mean, inexcusably so.
Director Marcus Nispel, the hack behind the Texas Chain Saw remake and the Conan the Barbarian remake - see the pattern? What a wanker - delivers something so dreadfully lifeless, no matter the pain and misery inflicted on the mobile planks of wood on screen, you really won't give a damn one way or the other.
The colour palette selected by the Nispel moron is a hideous combination of greens and browns, all muddied together so that you can barely see a fucking thing that's happening
Worse, the whole format is warped. By seeing the events of part 2 played out in flashback, then starting the movie proper, he's just repeating himself. Now, admittedly the original movies were pretty repetitive, but at least they were self-contained dullathons, and didn't echo in some grotesque feedback loop within their own runtime.
This does.
Deliberately.
With more gore in the first twenty minutes than the original three movies managed combined, the objective here is plain: throw some blood at the camera to hide the woeful lack of atmosphere and soul.
Anyone who tells you this is any good really understands nothing at all about horror, and really should have their eyes gouged out for their own good. They clearly don't need them.
Marcus Nispel, Michael Bay, I hate you and everything that you stand for.
Please. Just. Stop.

1 out of 5

In Time (2011) Dir: Andrew Niccol

Here's how it works:
Twice a year, for a few months, Hollywood churns out a bunch of old guff. Big budget, high concept, massive special effects movies that are as soulless as a fluffer three years into the job. It happens over summer, from May to mid-August, then again over the Christmas / holiday period, so December to February.
These movies are usually offensively poor, whose single intention is to squeeze money from people too stupid to know any better.
Then, happily, they go away for a bit and, in their place, come interesting, modest little curios such as this, from the mind of writer, producer, director, coffee maker Andrew Niccol, the man previously behind the equally good Truman Show and Gattaca.

The plot:
It's the future, perhaps, and people live for 25 blissful years free of worry. Then, the second they turn 25, their clock switches on, and they only have a year left to live. To earn more time, they must work, steal, beg and, to buy goods or services, their precious time must be spent.
See, if you haven't figured it out already, time is the currency.
The amount of time an individual has left is displayed digitally on their forearm, for all to see, acting as a constant reminder of their own mortality.
One man, Will Salas (Lustin' Jimbertake), decides he has had enough of the current system, his rebellion prompted by witnessing the death of his own mother, the delectable Olivia 'Thirteen' Wilde.
His actions trigger a response from the authorities, with Time Keepers sent in to put a stop to his meddling.
But, as we all know, time stops (sic) for no man......

It's a great premise, Niccol once more delivering a bleak, semi-real sci-fi environ that would make Blake 7 proud.
It has to be said, Niccol is always one to watch as, though he delivers few movies, they do tend to be interesting, the only real blot on his copybook being the ultra-bland Al Pacino vehicle S1mone.
Here, those looking for laser battles and gibbering alien nasties will be sorely disappointed, but if something a little more cerebral gets your sexy juices flowing, this could be worth a goosey.

4 out of 5

Let the Right One In (2008) Dir: Tomas Alfredson

The original, Swedish offering, remade 2 years later for the illiterate, subtitle-phobic English speaking market as simply Let me In. Given that the storyline is identical, which is better? The plot: A teenage boy, Oskar, is a sensitive sort. Bullied at school, with no obvious friends, his is a solitary existence. One day, outside his block of flats, he encounters a young girl named Eli; mysterious, reclusive, she captivates him at the same time as scaring him just a little. Eli, it seems, has no parents, living instead with her grandfather, a man who loves her so unconditionally that, when hunting for her and failing, he is prepared to pour acid over his own face to disguise his identity. Estranged, Eli now has no-one to turn to but Oskar and, he in turn, has no-one in his own life save for Eli. So, an unlikely union is forged, one born of virginal inquisitiveness, utter desperation and sheer, total isolation. Beautifully captured, this is a study in subtlety and understatement. The two young actors are magnificent, the chemistry absolute, and at no stage does any of this feel forced, artificial. A horror movie? Well, yes and no. It certainly plays with horror themes, but in a way that will clearly disappoint those interested purely in gore and violence. Studied, intelligent, introspective, this is just a shade above the remake which, though worthy, was ultimately an exercise in futility. This is very, very good indeed. 5 out of 5

Contagion (2011) Dir: Steven Soderbergh

Ever worried about the number of times you touch your face each day?
No?
You might after this.

The plot:
A previously unknown virus manifests, clustering in various spots around the world: Hong Kong, London, Chicago, with no apparent link.
A team of scientists, foremost amongst them Dr. Erin Mears (Kate Winslet) are tasked with determining the cause and, crucially, the potential ramifications of a true epidemic. Slowly, as science loses the battle against a microscopic foe, the question becomes not how many will die, but how many will survive?
Countering the official position, some decide that the world governments are in collusion and that a cure already exists, and spread the word via the Internet, online bloggers with a voice far louder than that any minister could ever hope to garner.
So who will win?
The authorities?
The bloggers?
Or the disease?

Played for real, this is intelligent stuff that taps into primal fears, specifically those of a parent: it's a dreadful, corrupting force that has but one purpose - to destroy that which you love.
The cast, though A-list - Matt Damon, Kate Winslet, Gwyneth Paltrow, Laurence Fishburne et al - are treated just like regular folk so that at no point does anyone feel 'safe.' Indeed, the movie begins with nought but tragedy bestowed upon one of our usual heroes, as first Damon's wife, then his son succumb to the illness and, given that his wife is none other than Gwyneth Paltrow, from that point on bets are off as to who will survive to the end.
When a movie is ballsy enough to kill off an A-lister in the first five minutes, who fucking knows what they will do next?
The realism adds an edge to things but, truthfully, by the end, it is also something of a flaw as, in order to instill the hyper-realism, Soderbergh resists the urge to blow his load at any point. Noble, but it means at times the movie lacks too much of a punch.
All that being said, the theatre was pretty packed when I watched this and, perhaps it was all in my mind, but there did seem to be a palpable sense of horror as our own physical vulnerabilities were laid bare, which is no bad thing.
One last thing: this is a zombie movie, really, and anyone that thinks otherwise deserves a vicious beating around the scalp.

Liked this.

4 out of 5

The Lovely Bones (2009) Dir: Peter Jackson

One third of a good movie, here, no more.

The plot:
It's 1973, and 14 year old Susie Salmon, on her way back from the mall, is tricked by local paedophilic murderer, George Harvey, into venturing into his underground lair, specially constructed for his evil aims.
Once there, she has little hope of escape and we, as viewers, are then compelled to watch on as she gazes down from heaven at her family torn apart by grief.

And sweet stroking Christ, we suffer along with them.
Based on a highly acclaimed novel, I think this is one of those things that works well on paper, but less so on screen.
The depiction of heaven is a multi-coloured, special effects riven orgy of puke-inducing loveliness, as patterns swirl and shimmy across screen, stars blossom in the night sky and Suzie strolls through lush meadows festooned with daffodils.
Think of the most evil thing you can.
Now think of the exact opposite.
It's like that.
And, fuck me, it's long, too, clocking in near the two hour fifteen mark which, frankly, was about an hour and a quarter too much.
The third that is compelling involves the perverted Mr. Harvey, and his attempts to evade justice but, that aside, this is painful to endure.
Big fan of Jackson down here at Smell the Cult HQ, this is the first time he has truly disappointed.
Nauseating.

2 out of 5

The Hills Have Eyes II (2007) Dir: Martin Weisz

Sequel to the surprise 2006 horror remake hit.

The plot:
A group of trainee National Guard soldiers are sent on a mission to collect some equipment from an area known as Section 16, a secret military location positioned somewhere in New Mexico.
Upon arrival, they find the camp deserted and, yep, it's not too long before the mine-dwelling mutants pop up once more to start picking them off one by one

It's a tried and tested formula, and is handled efficiently enough.
The mutant design is pretty decent, albeit vaguely reminiscent of that weird looking thing from The Goonies, and there's plenty of gore for the sick minded amongst you.
Nothing special, though, but it passes ninety minutes well enough.

3 out of 5

Wrong Turn 2: Dead End (2007) Dir: Joe Lynch

Straight to video for this sick horror sequel.

The plot:
A reality TV show called Apocalypse is under way, filming taking place in an American forest, where six buff and attractive twenty somethings must do all they can to survive. What they don't know, though, is that alongside the tricks and traps from the production team, they will also have to do battle against a family of inbred cannibals, who stalk the woods, looking for fresh meat.

So, it's Charlie Brooker's Dead Set, effectively, only instead of Big Brother we get Survivor, and instead of zombies it's mutant hillbillies.
The second redneck movie we've watched today down here at Smell the Cult HQ, following The Hills Have Eyes II earlier and, have to say, this was the superior, despite a cast of unknowns and obviously lower budget.
One of the goriest films I've seen in a while, this really chucks it all at the screen during the last fifteen minutes, and that's very welcome, as too many modern horror movies don't have the courage of their convictions.
For cinephiles, there are some nice knowing references, too: The Battle Royale T-shirt, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre meal sequence, and others that I missed, I suspect, so keep 'em peeled.
With the franchise now up to part 4, I'm pretty sure it will be downhill from here but, blood-fiends, you could do much worse than this cult offering.
Liked it.

4 out of 5

Jaws: The Revenge (1987) Dir: Joseph Sargent

Widely regarded as the worst movie ever made - it's not. That honour falls to Tranformers 1, 2 or 3 - this is still certainly a duff old clunker.

The plot:
Ellen Brody, erstwhile wife of hero Chief Brody from movies one and two, is still living on Amity Island.
Her son, now all grown up, seems to have replaced Chief Brody as the go to guy for all things marine related, and is called out one night to clear some driftwood from a buoy. Reaching down into the murky depths, wouldn't you know it, a Great White attacks, ripping his arm clean off at first before returning to finish the job.
Ellen, of course, is devastated and, along with her only surviving son, heads off to The Bahamas!
That's right.
Living in the grip of a constant fear of the ocean and of sharks, she heads to a tropical island surrounded by fucking water and, once there, immediately starts swimming.
I'm not making this up.
Well, this being a shark movie an' all, seems the shark somehow senses she has moved from Amity and, yep, it follows her to The Bahamas where it's quest for vengeance can resume as, believe it or not, the shark somehow knows she was married to Chief Brody and he was responsible for this current shark's mother's death!!!
Seriously.

I really like shit movies as a rule, not least because they are generally nowhere near as bad as people think they are.
See, you have to take into account budget and talent and time taken before deciding how truly awful something is. That's why the Tranformers movies are so monumentally awful, because of the vast amount of money taken to produce something so cripplingly dreadful.
You know, think about Nymphoid Barbarian in Dinosaur Hell, if you would. It's a rubbish film, but it probably cost the same amount to make as was spent on shoelaces in the Transformers movies, so to compare the two is unfair.
Here, though of a moderate budget, it's hard to excuse the flaws, the primary one being an overdose on the saccharine. Honestly, the family are so fucking perfect it makes you want to puke, and there's even a 'cute' little girl thrown in who, frankly, I just wanted them to feed to the gulls whilst still alive.
See if she's so chipper then.
With a plot as ridiculous as this, there's no point taking it seriously, so for those claiming it the worst mover ever made, think again.
It's bad, but it's no SS Hell Camp.

2 out of 5

Straw Dogs (1971) Dir: Sam Peckinpah

Sam Peckinpah's gritty rural thriller is insular, frightening stuff.

The plot:
An American mathematician, David Sumner (Hoffman) moves into a small village in rural England. There, the locals seem to take an interest, particularly in his beautiful wife Amy, played by Susan George.
Working on the Sumner's farm building, the men seem far too keen, and spy on her at every opportunity. Becoming increasingly frustrated, Amy accuses her husband of being a coward for not confronting the men, and tells him they wouldn't be having the trouble at all if he weren't so useless when it comes to matters practical.
One night, when a young girl goes missing from the local pub, the Sumner's inadvertently run over a man who may have been involved in the young girl's disappearance.
So begins a night of fear and tension than will escalate into brutal, cold-blooded murder.

It's an unusual film, that's for sure, starting out as a character piece, with themes of isolation and claustrophobia before a big, all action blow-out for the last fifteen minutes or so.
Dustin Hoffman is a magnetic presence on screen, perfectly capturing the role of neutered male confronted by burly, muscular sorts, not quite knowing how to communicate with them.
Famously banned in the UK due to a rather disturbing rape in which Amy's character initially struggles, but then gradually seems to come around to the idea, this was only released unedited in 2002.
Powerful and effective, if overly long in the build-up, this is certainly one to add to your list, cinephiles.

4 out of 5

Paranomal Activity 3

So, October comes and, like dark and dingy evenings, gusts of wind and fine drizzle, so too arrives the new Paranormal Activity movie.
Part 3 this year and, after the heights of 1 and 2, it's really got a lot to live up to.

The plot:
It's 2005, and Katie from part 1 delivers a box of old VHS tapes to her sister Kristi, from part 2.
You following?
On the tapes, we as viewers witness the events in 1988 that introduced the demonic menace to the lives of the then two young girls.
Things go bump in the night, doors open and close by themselves and, occasionally, pieces of furniture are flung around the house.
That's it.
For 86 minutes.

Continuing the stripped down, ultra realistic style of the first two, this time the focus shifts to the children in the house and, crucially, this is an origins story, as the pieces are put into place that reveal how the malevolent force came to be. With the occasional moment of genuine terror, there is slight shift in tone, too, as humour is used for the first time, though dark humour at that.
Perhaps not quite as gripping as 1 and 2, still the people in the cinema seemed to be having a good time, with some even screaming out loud at some of the more jumpy moments.
Decent stuff, then, but a part 4 might be pushing things too far.

4 out of 5

Død Snø (2009) Dir: Tommy Wirkola

The first Norwegian movie I've ever seen and, if this is anything to go by, not the last:

The plot:
Eight medical students decide to take some well earned holiday time and head off into the wilds of Norway's Arctic region, well off the beaten track. Traversing some difficult, snowbound terrain, they arrive at their cabin and begin to settle in.
Unexpectedly, a stranger arrives, and warns them about the region:
During World War 2, the Nazi's occupied Norway and, as The Allies gained the upper hand, knowing they were beaten, some headed into the area where, apparently, they vanished.
The vacationers laugh it off but, pretty soon, they start to get picked off and, heh, it doesn't take them too long to figure out that their adversaries are none other than the very folk the stranger told them about: Nazi Zombies!!!

Listen, if there are two things in this world I think are cool it's Nazi's and zombies, so to put the two things together is a sure fire winner here at Smell the Cult HQ. And don't get on your fucking high horse. I know Nazi's did terrible things: I've read multiple books about it, which is more than most of you dullards will have done, but they are still fantastic stylistically. Their uniforms are amazing and, let's be honest here, Prada and Gucci admirers would be compelled to acknowledge just how damned stylish they were.
And just because I say they looked cool doesn't mean I want to kill all Jewish people.
I do, but for very different reasons than Herr Führer.
Anyway, then you throw in some zombie chic, and you're onto a winner.
Incidentally, the Nazi zombie is not totally original to this film as, always bubbling under, there was something of a sub genre involving the theme: Zombie Lake, Shock Waves and Oasis of the Zombies, to name but three. Look 'em up on IMDB.
Here, the references are to more generic zombie movies, though no less important: Evil Dead is mentioned, Romero can be detected in certain camera angles, and one of the prey is sporting a pretty cool Braindead T-Shirt.
Clearly a niche market, if you are into your zombie movies, this one offers something that little bit different. Personally, it takes a lot to convince me these days when it comes to the living dead, as I tend to think it's all been done 'to death' as it were, but this was skewed enough to pique the interest and, with the odd moment of true class in terms of gore, I thoroughly enjoyed this for what it was.
There's the odd moment of proper black humour too, and this element can be evidenced by the great tagline: "Ein! Zwei! Die!" as well as the quote the DVD distributors chose for the cover: "One of the 25 best zombie movies of all time."
If that doesn't amuse, don't bother with this.
Zombie buffs only need apply, then, but if you're of a mind, this will certainly entertain.

4 out of 5

Eraserhead (1977) Dir: David Lynch

Blimey, what do you say about this movie?

The plot:
Henry Spencer is a man so ordinary he is in danger of vanishing in a cloud of blandness.
Interested in a woman, he agrees to visit her parents house for dinner and, once there, is confronted in secret by the mother. She demands to know if he has had sexual intercourse with her daughter and,reluctant to admit it, Henry hesitates. The mother lunges in, attempting to get frisky whilst simultaneously repeating the demand. Luckily, the daughter shows up, sparing Henry's blushes but, before she does, the mother announces that Henry now has a child - an impossibility given the timescales.
Now, Henry is a father, but of no ordinary baby. A mutant, with sucking lips and stretched skin, grotesque, the mother soon abandons the pair and Henry is forced to deal with his own sense of disquiet along with the perpetual squeals of his malformed offspring.....

Sweet Jesus, this is tough going.
Filmed in black and white, this has a film noir style, with much use made of shadow and smoke to truly unnerve.
The monstrous baby is genuinely frightening, ET in a pushchair, and Henry's world is painted as one surrounded by nought but bleakness and horror.
Disturbing, mind-melting and utterly one of a kind, this is a movie to test the nerves of even the hardiest horror fan.

Fantastic.

5 out of 5

Dread (2009) Dir: Anthony DiBlasi

Psychological horror is what we have here.

The plot:
Four media college students begin work on a project to study the nature of fear. Interviewing subjects, the project seems to be going well until one of their number, Quaid, flies off the handle when an interview subject lies to them about a past trauma. Enraged, Quaid smashes up the recording equipment.
Distanced now from the rest of the group, Quaid decides to continue by himself, though now his thoughts turn to the nature of dread itself and, to conduct his research, he needs live victims.....

Though intelligent in premise and execution, this is just a wee bit flat and sterile.
Well made, certainly for the budget, this is a movie that seems almost afraid to be labelled as horror, the director clearly working with the idea that his film is above all of that silliness, which is a shame as, frankly, what this really needed was a dose of the twisted and sadistic.
Exploring some interesting themes, identity foremost amongst them, there are solid enough ideas here, so it's a touch disappointing that the end product feels so damned clinical.
Not sure if I'd recommend this, but I can't say that it's no good either.
Average fodder, then.

3 out of 5

The 'burbs (1989) Dir: Joe Dante

Similar in tone to Dante's most famous movie, Gremlins, here's another blackly comic genre piece.

The plot:
Ray Peterson lives in a regular suburb in a regular house with a regular lawn and regular neighbours. One day, a new family move into his street, and Ray and the locals begin to suspect that all may not be as it seems within their home.
Are the new family regular people, just like everybody else, or could they in fact be a pack of flesh hungry cannibals, eager to feast on the local population?

A simple enough premise is brought to life by some excellent cinematography and direction, as well as believable, engaging performances from all concerned.
Though reasonably mainstream, the spook factor is escalated as the movie progresses, the dark heart gradually exposed and, as ever, Dante's cine-literacy is in clear evidence.
Something of a box office flop at the time, this was Tom Hanks' first relative failure following his break out role in Big, but the movie has since developed a devoted cult following on VHS and DVD.
Horror and comedy are not always ideal bedfellows, but Dante manages to pull it all together with some style.
A good film, indeed.

4 out of 5

Real Steel (2011) Dir: Shawn Levy

From the director of Night at the Museum 1 and 2(!) this couldn't be as bad as it looked, could it?

The plot:
It's the near future, and Huge Ass Man plays Charlie Kenton, a man who earns his crust competing in robot boxing tournaments, legal or otherwise. We meet him as his luck is very much on a downward spiral. He's out of cash, people are chasing him for money and, worse still, his robot cash cow is destroyed by a very angry bull, quite literally.
An absentee father, Kenton finds a way to earn some money out of his estranged son, and purchases a new robot - Noisy Boy - and enters it into a competition way above its ability level. Soundly thrashed, this robot too is destroyed.
Now, with son Max in tow, Charlie seems all out of options, until his son discovers a robot abandoned, buried, unwanted.
Any guesses what happens next, folks?

With a plot so trite it made the recent Warrior seem positively ground-breaking, this suffers from the blight of Spielberg in exec. producer role, with so much schmaltz and saccharine hurled at the screen you may very well want to hurt yourself.
Ass Man sleepwalks through the movie, truly delivering his lines as if someone told them to him moments before he had to be on set, but the major irritant here is the son, played with upperty smugness by youngster Dakota Goyo or, to give him his true alias, Smackable Shitface. Seriously, if one so young behaved like this around most sentient adults, the belt would be off before two minutes had elapsed.
The little prick.
Incidentally, I have a confession to make. I endured thirty minutes of this before heading back to the car, leaving Mrs. Mo to it in the theatre whilst I listened to a football podcast, before heading back for the climatic battle which, in itself, was about as riveting as back to back episodes of Dad's Army.
Pathetic in every single regard, this is the worst film I've seen at the cinema this year.
Avoid.

1 out of 5

Texas Killing Fields (2011) Dir: Ami Canaan Mann

Invoking the word Texas in a movie about murder and mayhem is sure to cast one's thoughts back to a seminal movie from the mid seventies, but any connection between Chain Saw Massacre and this release begins and ends there.

The plot:
A pair of homicide detectives team up to attempt to solve a series of murders and disappearances in The Bayous, all of them involving young women.

Nothing else to add, plot wise, but that should in no way suggest any kind of deficiency with the movie.
Quite the opposite, in fact.
Eschewing gore and sensationalism, here the focus is entirely on atmosphere, as a haunting and incredibly tense tapestry is woven, pulling you in to the story.
Based on a true story - though we all know what a shady term that is - the events depicted are grisly in the extreme, and the terrifying and sinister underbelly of society is exposed as a dreadful, sickly thing, teetering on the brink of insanity.
Danny Boyle was initially on board as director, but walked away, declaring the subject matter 'so dark it will never be made' but, thankfully, he was incorrect.
Sam 'Avatar' 'Clash of the Titans' Worthington puts in a decent performance for once, but one point of complaint is the woeful under use of Chloë 'Hit Girl' Moretz who, essentially, was only in the movie to play the role of victim. A shame, as she is an actress worth paying attention to in future. For someone so young, she seems incredibly wise.
Whilst the pace and general tone will be off putting to some, those who like their movies dark and brooding could do a lot worse than to check out this understated movie but, if you are interested, I'd hurry along, as it won't be on screen for long.

4 out of 10

The Unborn (1991) Dir: Rodman Flender

Prime American horror from the early nineties.

The plot:
A desperate couple, childless after five years of trying, select a gynaecologist of some repute to assist them in their bid to spawn. With alarming swiftness, the treatment he advises is successful and the woman becomes burdened. All should be good with the world but, before too long, she begins to experience strange side effects; a rash on her neck that won't stop itching, the overpowering compulsion to eat and sporadic moments of sadistic, violent tendencies.
When another woman contacts her and makes claims about the gynaecologists practices, the pregnant one begins to uncover the terrible truth: that her body is being used as a vessel to carry something more than human.

And this is proper horror, kids, with not a teenage twattling nor CGI gribbly in sight.
The moments of grossness are infrequent, but that's ok, as the focus here is more on creepy build-up and mental dischord rather than pure gore. That's not to say there's not the odd bit of gristle, which is welcome and, let's be honest, folks, images of pregnant women jabbing themselves in the belly with kitchen knives are always good for a chuckle.
Brooke Adams in the leading role is solid as ever. No surprise given her status as something of a cult movie stalwart (The Stuff, The Dead Zone, Invasion of the Body Snatchers).
Playing on the Cronenberg notions of body horror and treating pregnancy as a condition that mutates and deforms as a parasite bloats within the amniotic sac, the subject matter will of course be troublesome for the wilfully offended but, frankly, fuck them.
Though the movie does drift into the absurd during the climatic ten minutes, this was nevertheless a very satisfying dose of horror how horror used to be done.
Liked it a lot.

4 out of 5

Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (2010) Dir: Troy Nixey

When the name Guillermo del Toro is above the title of a movie, even in the capacity of producer, expectations are high.

The plot:
A wealthy couple, one an architect, the other an interior designer, move into an imposing new home, ripe for renovation. With them, the daughter of the man from another marriage, reluctantly forced to move by her natural mother to start a life with half a new family.
Got it?
The house seems strange to her, forbidding and, soon, she discovers an old outhouse at the rear of the property, buried through years of apparent neglect.
Excavating the building, the family are astonished to discover an artists studio from a previous owner and, besides that, the young girl suspects that there are things alive in there, things that creep and crawl and come to play mischief whilst everyone is asleep.
What is the connection between the building and the human teeth the young girl finds?
Why are the voices whispering to her?
And there aren’t any such thing as fairies, are there?

It’s a promising premise and, from the trailer, looked as if this would be a riot of imagination, the dark side of fairy tales explored.
The reality is quite different.
Formulaic horror tropes are trotted out: creaking floorboards, creepy music boxes, small creatures moving through the shadows.
At no point is there a genuine surprise.
The performances of the adult cast are not so much phoned in as sent by carrier pigeon, including the usually excellent Guy Pearce.

Spooky on occasion, but nowhere near as involving as it needed to be, this disappointed quite severely.

2 out of 5

Red State (2011) Dir: Kevin Smith

Kevin Smith is an enigmatic creature.
After the heights of indie sensations Clerks and Mallrats, he went into something of a nosedive creatively, with each movie dropping off in terms of quality compared to the last, culminating in Cop Out, a real 'Hollywood' movie that reeked of corporate interference and a total lack of heart.
Here, Smith sets out to redress the balance.
But does he succeed?

The plot:
Three young men, bored with college and lack of success on the woman front, decide to pay for what they desire. Heading out into the sticks to meet a woman they have contacted via the Internet, the three instead wind up being drugged, bound and gagged.
Later, one of the three, Jared, awakens to find himself in a cage being transported to a church hall of some kind. There a preacher, Abin Cooper (Michael Parks), delivers a hate filled sermon to a small but rapturous congregation before revealing a man lashed to a cross.
Shortly, the man is dispatched, a bullet through the skull.
Suddenly, John Goodman arrives on scene and, before you can say The Taking of Pelham 123, you've got a siege movie on your hands.

This is bloody great.
Smith manages to deliver three movies in one here, each one handled effectively and with real verve.
Movie 1: Teen sex comedy.
As ever with a Kevin Smith movie, there is vulgarity, but only for the briefest time.
Movie 2: Torture Porn movie.
Violence, bloodshed and an unflinching camera are all present and correct.
Movie 3: The siege movie, with the stakes raised somewhat in a dramatic sense by the Biblically apocalyptic nature of the religious fanatics' dialogue.
After the underwhelming Zack and Miri Make a Porno and the frankly atrocious Cop Out, this seems to be a movie where an indie director once more decides to flex his muscles.
Sharply scripted, brilliantly shot - the shaky cam is a departure for Smith, and he handles it very well - this is a movie that will confuse the hell out of some, but is an entertaining, rewarding thrill ride, with a punchy ending that throws a real curve ball at you.
Unpredictable brilliance, then

5 out of 5

Shark Night 3D (2011) Dir: David R. Ellis

See, I live in The Midlands, UK.
I am, physically, about as far as it is to get from salt water (fnar, fnar) as it is possible to be in this nation.
And yet....
Sharks.
Man, they fill me with a fear only equalled by wasps and burly builders.

The plot:
Six highly attractive twenty somethings head into the Bayou for a weekend of fun and frolics. Feeling safe, the last thing they expect from an inland lake is to be picked off by man eating sharks but, wouldn't you know it, that's exactly what begins to happen.
How did the sharks get there?
What's with the inbred local sorts seeming to thrive on the attacks?
And why do the big fish seem to be rigged up with cameras?

By every logical measurement, this is awful.
The actors seem to be bewildered for the most part, probably wondering how they ended up doing 3 years at drama school to end up in shit like this.
The direction is lacklustre, almost comical at times.
The script is derisory, the plot nonsensical.
But, let's be honest, no-one's going into this hoping for the next Schindler's List.
Despite the many, many flaws, I have to say I enjoyed this.
Sharks attack, people get dragged around on the surface before disappearing in a spunk of blood.
My only real complaint is that it was way too tame.
Not enough sharks.
Not enough blood.
Not enough limbs being ripped off.
In fact, the shark action, at times, reminded one of Sean Connery era James Bond.
Not utterly awful, but nowhere near as graphic as it needed to be in order to be really, really cool.

3 out of 5

Chasing Amy (2001) Dir: Kevin Smith

Kevin Smith's third full length feature sees the writer/director in more reflective mood.

The plot:
Holden McNeil (Ben Affleck) and Banky Edwards (Jason Lee) are moderately successful comic book artists. Their comics bring droves of adoring fans but, for all their success, the pair cannot find true love. Banky, for his part, behaves like a child, repelling women at every turn, whereas Holden has the misfortune of falling for the one women his good looks seem unlikely to appeal to: the local lesbian, Alyssa Jones (Joey Lauren Adams). Well, this being a movie an' all, she begins to fall for the dubious charms of Holden and, now he has precisely what he wants, his sabotage behaviour kicks in, as Alyssa reveals a past filled with sexual adventure and thrill-seeking that Holden is not entirely comfortable with.....

More mature than his previous two offerings, this is the point where Smith really feels like he has grown up.
And what a crying shame that is too.
For the most part, gone are the outrageous vulgarities, in their place adults discussing sexual conquests and sexual positions and their low-self esteem with regards their own love lives and, frankly, it just got on my nerves.
Jay and Silent Bob put in appearance, but even this isn't right, as Bob begins to speak. Now, I get the joke, but it killed the character stone dead, primarily because Kevin Smith, the director, plays Silent Bob and, once he opens his mouth, he can't act for shit.
More mainstream, less disgustingly ribald, this seemed to be pitched more towards the multiplex drones than genuine Kevin Smith fans and it really suffered as a result.
Disappointed.

3 out of 5