Friday, September 28, 2012

It's Father's Day...

One of my all-time favorite things is stories, particularly fairy-tales and fables and for that reason, I LOVE anthology movies.  Trick'r'Treat is probably the best Halloween movie ever made and I'm sure I'll get around to reviewing it sometime in the next month... 'cause... y'know... October.

Trilogy of Terror with Karen Black and the Zuni fetish doll.  Joan Collins and Donald Pleasance in Tales That Witness Madness.  Vincent Price spinning yarns of the South in From a Whisper to a Scream.  Anyway, I think you know where I'm going with this.

Possibly the best Stephen King movie ever made was the king of all horror anthologies. 

Creepshow.

I was somewhere around 11 when I saw it the first time and, I'm gonna be brutally honest, here, I can't see a shooting star without thinking "Jordy Verrill, you lunkhead!" or getting a shiver when I hear someone ask "where's my cake".

It's truly a classic and it's one that resonates with a lot of people.  Maybe it's because Stephen King and George Romero know how to push our buttons but each tale kind of hits a primal fear.  Yes, even Jordy Verrill.

I can't even get snarky on this movie.  I adore it.  From Adrienne Barbeau (who is the NICEST PERSON, EVER, and is still racktastic, even at age 67) getting her bitchy comeuppance in The Crate to E.G. Marshall's mysophobic misdeeds in They're Creeping Up On You and Billy... oh, yes, Billy... in the wrap-around.  Everybody forgets him but he's a symbol, even now, of the bullied and abused getting revenge. (Trivia:  Billy was played by Stephen King's son, Joe, better known as Joe Hill, author of Heart-Shaped Box.)  Yes, we know that revenge gets your soul all sticky but it's fun to watch it, even if we'd never act on it.

And it never takes itself too seriously.  Yes, it's dark, but it's still has humor and, in a strange way, heart which gives it a vitality that lasts even today.  It's not a kids movie but it makes you feel like a kid again.  It's like staying up past your bedtime reading comic books by flashlight which, I'm sure, was the intent.  It's not over-the-top gory but it is gruesome and it's got a nostalgic feeling to it that I don't think will ever go away.

This is a movie to pass on to your kids... when they're a little older.

Thursday, September 27, 2012

This Is Gonna Hurt

As I have mentioned previously, I am a glutton for punishment.  Today, I have descended to Hell.

In a fit of  "what the fuck", I watched Hellraiser: Revelations.

Yes, yes, I know.  I brought it on myself.

Within the first ten minutes we have the ubiquitous "Hey, we're going to Tijuana, let's go see a donkey show" reference because, apparently, it's OK to subjugate Mexican women and farm animals and American teenagers must capitalize on this.  Then we get the uncomfortable dinner party.  Why on Earth would someone wait until a dinner party to confront her parents about her missing brother?  Is this some kind of teenage ritual I missed out on?  The annual "ruining of the dinner party"?

Also, during trips to Mexico, is it required to cheat on your significant other, kill a hooker and videotape it?  Granted, dead hookers are often hilarious and we know that they're the standard unit of measurement for trunk space and the major export of Bolivia but why is a dead hooker the catalyst for wacky Mexican adventures that end in bloodshed and madness?

The rest is really just boilerplate.  Kid opens puzzle box, kid gets to be the plaything of Pinhead (who's gained weight... seems the S&M diet really doesn't work), kid needs to escape the Cenobites, kid ends up a skinless horror, kid betrays his girlfriend, his own family AND the family of his girlfriend to try and escape hell, girlfriend escapes but gets promised a spot in Hell when she gets bored.

Now, we know that this movie was made on a shoestring so that Dimension and the Weinstein brothers could keep the rights to the franchise and start on the remake of the original but there is just no excuse for this travesty.  It's really no wonder Douglas Bradley wanted no part of this.

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Paper or Plastic?

So... I got a wild hair and decided to watch the Child's Play series again.  All of them.  Yes, I am a glutton for punishment.

We all know that the first one is awesome and the second is OK-ish because, really, how far can the directors terrorize a 9 year-old before he snaps? Bride and Seed are both hilarious because I'm pretty sure they were meant to be comedies and Jennifer Tilly (AKA Tits McGee) can do no wrong in my book.

Watching the third one, though?  I'm fairly certain that it was written during a drinking game while watching Taps and huffing paint thinner.  This is a supremely bad movie.  And not in a good way.  This may as well have been "Chucky in Space", the terrain was that foreign.  For those of you who HAVEN'T seen this, yet, basically, it's Andy Goes to Military School with Voodoo Possession Kung-Fu Grip.  Justin Whalen has pretty much cemented, for me, the idea that he got into Hollywood by sucking a whole lot of dick and his scary 90's Wolverine hair just wigged me out.  Ya gotta remember, kids, I watched the Dungeons and Dragons movie on purpose and the only thing saving him there was a third-wheel Wayans brother.  This kid stinks on toast.

Add to that the kid who decides that it's OK to steal another kid's mail because it's a friggin' doll, the teenage R. Lee Ermey wannabe (who will never be R. Lee Ermey no matter what he does because R. Lee Ermey is a blue-tongued longshoreman secretary's wet dream who could bring down a fighter jet with the power of just one curse-word), the creepy school barber (military school: go fig, but at least he lent a little Hellraiser cred to the cast)  and the butchest love interest EVER outside of Rosie O'Donnell's private porn stash.

Why, oh, why did I watch this again?  Why did anyone think that a kid proclaiming that a doll kills almost everyone around him is suitable for foster care and not a mental hospital?  Why did the school bully not destroy the doll like any normal bully would instead of keeping it for his kid sister and what did she ever do to deserve Chucky?  Why would a military school keep live ammunition where 9 year-olds can access it easily?  Where the hell did the carnival come from?  How did Chucky pull the pin on that grenade and get it to wait 15 minutes before going off?

Much like the proverbial Tootsie Pop, the world may never know.


Monday, September 24, 2012

More Proof That Australia Wants You Dead

I have a secret.

I have a soft spot in my heart for shark movies.

Don't get me wrong, sharks freak me right the fuck out and I blame that firmly on Steven Spielberg and my parent's poor choice of going to a drive-in double-feature of Sleeping Beauty and Jaws when I was a toddler.  Ask my mom.  She thinks it's fucking cute.  Yeah.  Maleficent and sharks.  What a lovely, non-nightmare-inducing night of family fun, there, parental units.  I love you, too.

ANYWAY, we all know that the wildlife Down Under carries a grudge.  Really, if you're visiting Australia, you may as well just stay in the hotel room and order postcards from the gift shop downstairs instead of actually going outside and taking pictures.  Better yet, don't go to Australia in the first place.  I would love to visit but I rather like my extremities where they are.



So, there's that.  NOW, let's take everybody's favorite natural disaster, the tsunami.  A wall of water, wiping out miles of tourist-friendly coastline and the occasional nuclear power plant.  (Too soon?)

You want to know what lives in water?  Go on.  Guess.

Yes, ALL of this gets tossed like a house salad in the Australian indie-film BAIT.

Don't get me wrong, it comes together not nearly as lame as it sounds.  It's actually kind of a fun concept.  Survivors of a natural disaster are trapped in an underground grocery store with a Great White shark.  Not only that but, of course, one of the survivors (Julian McMahon) just tried to rob the place and two of the characters have had run-ins with sharks before (with disastrous results).  I will say that I enjoy Xavier Samuel in his role of Josh, the ex-lifeguard.  It's not nearly as bleak as his showing in The Loved Ones (which was great in context and highly recommended) and it's nice to see him take charge.

I'm not saying this is a great movie by any stretch of the imagination but the acting is good and the premise is at least somewhat fresh.  They switch between two groups of survivors, both dealing with what is presumed to be the same shark, and this is largely to provide some comic relief and that's a welcome thing.  If they just focused on the main characters, this movie would sink like Shelley Winters on the SS Poseidon.

There's a LOT of borrowing from the Jaws series, though, and, while they did try to give us some character development, there were very few characters I cared about and what development they gave us just wasn't enough in most cases.  Some of the dialogue felt off, but that could be because it's an Australian film so I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt.

My other big beef is the special effects.  They did a nice mix of practical and CGI but the CGI they used was REALLY obvious.  Yeah, I know.  Indie film.  Whatever.  They know better. 

All in all, though, it's a decent popcorn flick.  Don't expect too much out of it and it's a fun watch. 

I'm still not going anywhere near murky water.

Sunday, September 23, 2012

And Away We Go...

So, I've been singing this movie's praises for a while now but I truly think that everyone should see it.  I'm not even sure that I'd call it a horror movie but it does involve vampires so it just barely falls within the genre.

Now, I'm pretty sure I'm going to be lynched over this but I warned you that bad movies were gonna get preference over here.

Please sit down.  No, really.  You're gonna want to sit for this because I truly think this is one of the best movies ever made.

Sitting?  Good.

The movie I'm talking about is... Blubberella.

I KNOW, RIGHT?  Not ONLY is it made by Uwe "Raging" Boll,  but it's making fun of perhaps the second-most decent film he's ever done, Bloodrayne.  (Yes, I am quite aware of the implications of that statement.  Please note that I'm only comparing it with his other works, not the works of any other director.)

But here's WHY I love it.  I love it because not only does it star Willam Belli (Of RuPaul's Drag Race fame) as the sassy sidekick "Vadge", but it looks, acts, feels and just about tastes like failure.

It is some serious B-grade, micro-budget crap that in no way, shape or form takes itself seriously.  It KNOWS that the reason it was made is because Boll had all of these Nazi uniforms made and they were just going to go to waste.  It KNOWS that it exists solely to have a fat half-vampire with a salami sandwich kick the crap out of krauts... badly.  It is a giant slap in the face of political correctness and if you're easily offended you should probably just walk away now because you're not gonna like me OR my blog.

I mean, seriously.  Willam in blackface doing cheesy "Precious" dialogue?  Clint Howard as "Dr. Mangler"?  When the main villain gets an injection of her blood he gains a hundred pounds?  I mean, she literally escapes the Nazis by pointing and saying "Hey, isn't that Hitler" AND ROLLING AWAY ON HER SEGWAY!  This is pure, cheesy fun.  It's not polished by any stretch of the imagination but it has some great moments and it's worth the watch.

No, seriously.

What are you doing with that rope?


Welcome!

OK, so it has come to my attention through the auspices of the most awesome boyfriend, EVER, that I write well.

It wasn't really NEWS, but I should probably do something with it, right?  I mean, my old Livejournal account is still open but that's really for personal stuff and, seriously?  I haven't touched it in, like, a year.

SO.  This happy, little corner of the web.  Snazzy, no?  I like it.

What I'm intending this to be is a repository of all things "Horror Movie" in my head.  (In particular, BAD horror movies but I will not be discriminatory).  I love horror movies.  And I love you.  And I love to WRITE about horror movies in such a way as to make you love them, too.  Because we hurt the ones we love.  Let me love you.

Now.

I want to play a game...