Wednesday 29 February 2012

The Great White Silence


Had to constantly remind myself that most of what I was watching was a) totally real and b) 100 years old.
Awe inspiring to say the least.

Sunday 26 February 2012

Cell 211 [Celda 211]


Dull where it should be tense, quiet & thoughtful where it should be loud & garish and anti-climactic where it should be explosive.

Saturday 25 February 2012

Demons [Dèmoni]

A cursed cinema spreads its evil through an audience that includes a lot of pretty italian girls, a pimp and a blind man (only in Italian horror would a blind man be in a cinema) turning half of them into ravenous, slime spewing monsters and the other half into squealing victims. King.

Bedevilled [Kim Bok-nam salinsageonui jeonmal]


Heavy-handed social commentary becomes protractedly nastier until everything finally snaps and suddenly you're watching an absolutely brutal slasher movie.
Supremely viscious little film.

Wednesday 22 February 2012

Paprika [Papurika]


An amazing piece of work about people walking around in each others dreams, the result being a riotous cascade of dream imagery rendered in sumptuous anime.
I think Christopher Nolan may have watched this.

Monday 20 February 2012

A Dangerous Method


Cronenberg's scalpel precision makes for the most gently spoken, quietly intellectual shitstorm I've ever witnessed.

Sunday 19 February 2012

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider


It would appear that everybody involved totally missed the point of Tomb Raider and tried to cover up by pumping this ill-conceived shit out instead. Idiots.

The Muppets


Hit all my nostalgia buttons.
For the briefest of moments Charlotte's cinematic opinions aligned with my own: "Yeah, I really liked the songs, it was awesome. But Journey 2: The Mysterious Island was better".
Moments don't get much briefer.

Thursday 16 February 2012

The Last Lovecraft: Relic Of Cthulhu


A head-on collision of slacker comedy and the Lovecraft Mythos. Works better than expected.

Wednesday 15 February 2012

Day Of The Dead


A total masterpiece.
What every zombie movie wishes it could be when it grows up.

Tuesday 14 February 2012

I Saw The Devil [Akmareul boatda]


The message behind this one was "Revenge will make you become the monster". That, or "I think I may be getting bored of South Korean revenge thrillers". Or it could equally be "Doesn't graphic head trauma get a bit samey after a while?".

Monday 13 February 2012

The Woman In Black


Best straight-up ghost story without subtitles that I've seen in some time.

Dinosaur Island


A bunch of soldiers crash land onto an island inhabited by mostly naked women who pass their time washing each other, wrestling and lounging in hot tubs full of special water that keeps them young forever. The soldiers must then fight badly blue-screened, rubber, hand puppet dinosaurs.
Complete shit.

Holy Flying Circus


Brilliant comedy dramatisation of the hysteria that surrounded Python's Life Of Brian, viewed through a kaleidoscope of pitch perfect Python homage. Superb script, superbly acted and all rounded off with some overt commentary on modern comedy and free speech.
Excellent.

Sunday 12 February 2012

Bruiser


A massive, non-stop 'What the fuck?' and rarely in a good way.

Monday 6 February 2012

The Fourth Kind


An occasionally unsettling, genuinely original way of presenting fiction as fact.

Chronicle


A cut price, found footage Akira with one foot in 'retarded' and the other in 'very retarded'.

Sunday 5 February 2012

Cafe Flesh


A very Cronenbergish plot, concerning the impact of nuclear fallout on the libido of humankind, occasionally lapses into graphic displays of unerotic, art-school pornography juxtaposed with people crying. Mercifully short.

Saturday 4 February 2012

Asylum


The Amicus box set ends on a high with another Bloch penned portmanteau.
Highlights would be a lady trying to remove a severed arm from her face by repeatedly chopping at it with an axe (an ill thought out move) and a man transfering his conciousness into a tiny robot just by concentrating on it really fucking hard.
King.

The Cat In The Hat


I was quietly contemplating whether this was the worst film I'd ever seen when suddenly there was a chase sequence through a rave. "Hang on a moment", I thought, "This is based on a book by Dr Seuss. Why the hell is there a chase sequence THROUGH A FUCKING RAVE?"
I hastened to a conclusion, worst film I've ever seen.

Space Buddies


First line of the movie: "Dreams are like stars. You can't touch them, but if you follow them, they will lead you to your destiny." spoken by a russian 'dogmonaut'.
My first thought of the movie: "Fuck off."
It kind of went downhill from there for me, whereas Charlotte positively revelled in having wedges of her intelligence shorn off with every passing minute.