the original tcm is absolutely one of my favourite horror films of any era. it has a truly grimy, ugly style & tone that i can't get enough of.
the sequel you watched must have been the one from 2013, not 2003, no? the 2013 one with alexandra daddario is the one currently streaming on netflix in canada. i found it kinda dull.
my week:
fast, cheap & out of control (1997) 4 errol morris doc on the obsessions of four unrelated men that winds & twists their stories together in a pleasingly headspinning way. you may not think you're interested in anything these guys are interested in, but i will bet you'll be interested by the end of this doc.
tell me who i am (2019) 4 documentary on a twin who completely loses his memory & has his persona rebuilt based on his brother's stories. sad but really fascinating & very sober doc that poses a very intriguing question: if you could do a real life 'eternal sunshine of a spotless mind,' would you and should you?
the unthinkable (2019) 3 sweden faces a terrorist attack. incredibly good as far as effects & style goes. i certainly would never have guessed that this a relatively modest $2m or so film. so hats off to the guys who made a very slick, professional looking movie.
but it's a bit too long & a bit too cluttered storywise. there's a real lack of through-lines & overall tension. a bit of a shame, all things considered. but it's absolutely worth checking out just to appreciate the accomplishment.
hitchhiker massacre (2017) 1.5 the camera does a nice job of eye-humping the actresses, but this is awfully incoherent & mostly dull.
honestly, i'm fascinated by films by these types of films.
who makes them?
do they know anything about film? have they done even trivial amounts of studying storytelling or film-making? are they proud of the product they produced?
i have so many questions. & i don't mean that to sound pissy. i love amateurism, crudity, ugliness in my movies.
but why make something so lifeless & shambolic?
sweet sixteen (1983) 2.5 girl tries to make friends, but everyone keeps getting inconveniently murdered. not very distinguished as far as gore goes, but it's fun & weird & slightly sleazy enough for me to declare it worth watching. also appreciated how the film takes pain to tell us the girl is only 15, yet we get to see her naked at least twice. was that legal in 1983? is it legal now?
sleepaway camp (1983) 3.5 most of this is pretty run of the mill 80s slasher.
would be just one of many middling films of this type if it wasn't for some wonderfully weird acting & a all-time ending.
that is one hell of an ending.
el camino: a breaking bad story (2019) 4 it's really more of an epilogue than a true movie, but it's a hugely satisfying watch.
dude bro party massacre III (2015) 4 this movie is a god-damned delight through and through. genuinely witty & clever & inspired. not just a retread of horror cliches.
fresh meat (2012) 2 i usually love spacey, quirky new zealand comedies, but this went into annoying territory just a bit too often. & it just wasn't enough of any the things it was trying to be. not funny/quirky enough, not lesbian sexy enough, not gross enough. why make a comedy with all these potentially incendiary elements, but only take them about 40% of the way?
has a few laughs, & the girl is cute.
timecrimes (2007) 4 Makes no sense I am fairly certain.
Don't care!
bag boy lover boy (2014) 3 extremely weird. even for me. brought to mind some elements of gummo, maybe. a bit too worried about being self-consciously odd , but it made me uncomfortable at times in a way i mostly enjoyed.
don't fuck in the woods (2016) 2 sex comedy/horror that is not funny or scary, but is just a tiny bit sexy at times, so it's not quite a strike-out.
the lighthouse (2019) 5 imagine if guy maddin took a stab at being a commercial sell-out.
willem dafoe has one of the greatest freakout moments i've ever seen. he should be shot bug-eyed, underlit in black & white in every movie going fwd.
i think i only understood ... let's say 45% of what he said in the entire film, but he tore into his rants with such deranged glee, it mattered not one bit to me.
don't ask me what this means. i'm no good at stuff like that. all i know is that i loved every single minute of it, and i can't wait until we get youtube clips of dafoe's rants posted.
pity (2018) 2 starting with a premise of a man resenting losing the benefits of having a wife in a coma after she recovers ought to produce a movie designed to make me happy, but i never quite found myself on its wavelength. it plodded & poked about, & by the time we get to the end my only mood was one of complete indifference. extra points for originality & for being daring, but if i'm bored, i can't go too far with any kind of praise.
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5 years ago
see no evil 2 (2013) 2 any combination of the soska sisters & katherine isabelle ought to be all i need to be happy, but i found this to be a disappointingly standard modern slasher. not awful by any means, but very ordinary & undistinguished.
arsenic and old lace (1944) 3.5 cary grant yells very loudly, and the guy who thinks he's roosevelt screams 'charge' about 15 times, & it doesn't get funnier every time he does it.
but every second peter lorre was on the screen was incredibly fun.
the gore gore girls (1972) 2.5 as with every other hg lewis film i've seen outside of 2000 maniacs, his trash masterpiece, this plods along for stretches.
but it has some pretty fun gore shots, and some delightfully trashy women. that's enough to cross into the 'worth my time' boundary.
day of the dead (1985) 3.5 i 'think' this is the first time i've revisited this since my high school days. i recall not thinking too favorably of it, & that i much preferred the undeniably funnier & grosser 'return of the living dead' that came out around the same time.
while i'd rather watch return... any time, i've gotta say i dug this quite a bit, & in fact think it might be a wee bit superior to dawn... . things undeniably do get bogged down in chatting & talking & the soldiers being dicks & the woman being the only reasonable human being. but it has some great looking zombies & some terrific kills towards the end.
bordello death tales (2009) 2.5 ultra-cheap horror anthology.
i wish that girl in the second story would blink more.
the first two stories are fairly snappy & reasonably fun if you have low standards, though not particularly imaginative. the last one is a bit of a snooze.
the women are all reasonably foxy.
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