I might have been supposed to say SPOILER ALERT right then, considering that quote I just typed is the final line of The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini. But anyone who's gonna be upset about spoilers for a movie called The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini isn't ready for The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini. Heck, anyone who's planning on looking at a movie and going "oh, I didn't like how they did that scene" or "I think the tone could have been different when Monstro ripped apart the bars of his cage" isn't ready for The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini. This is not one of them "thinking" movies.
I probably sound kind of silly, and I will continue to sound so for what is likely to be the rest of this article. But there is something in my brain - something I, like the quote says, just can't explain - that tells me that The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini is basically the greatest mindless movie ever made. The part of me that's researched cinema of the '50s and '60s and knows that there were tons and tons of beach party/haunted house/haunted beach party movies that came long before this one - which arrived at the tale end of that cinematic "movement" in 1966 - should probably dismiss the movie too, considering it's derivative of a lot of movies that came before it. But those parts of me just have to be content to shut the heck up right now. Because I've been in love with The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini for several years now, and they don't have the power to take that from me.
Just listen to this set up: A recently deceased rich old guy, Hiram Stokely (played by the late Boris Karloff) is woken from his coffin by his old lover Cecily, a trapeze artist/sex symbol who tragically lost her life in a circus accident. She lets him in on the secret of his passing, but informs him that she's here to help him "get up there". To achieve that, he has to do one good deed within 24 hours - which he parlays into a gathering of his heirs at his old, allegedly haunted estate. He can't leave the crypt - I guess that first day of being buried is kinda an incubation period? - but if Cecily can prevent his bad heir (a sinister guy named Reginald Ripper who's played by none less than Basil Rathbone) from getting the estate and help his good heirs gain the prize and his millions, then Hiram's headed to the pearly gates.
As the characters converge on the old haunted estate, a pool party - complete with band and musical numbers led by Nancy Freakin' Sinatra - breaks out. A seance happens, a biker gang starts to scope the joint, and a couple of circus workers show up with a giant ape in the back of their truck. Ripper's redheaded daughter, Sinistra, tries to use her assets to woo one of the young heirs, while the two less party-centric young heirs team up to try and find a positive solution to this night of terror. As you would guess, a mild form of madness follows.
As the characters all race around the house, crashing into each other and their surroundings, Cecily's ghost from the title moves among them - invisible bikini and all - manipulating the surroundings and causing a lot of confusion for the less morally driven partygoers. Primarily, this means we get to see a blue outline of Susan Hart - minus those areas that would have required a bikini - popping up on the screen and making some sort of silly thing happen. Sounds childish? Yep. But it's so ridiculously fun.
And, knowing that no movie is truly complete without some man-in-gorilla-suit action, the carnival star known as Monstro starts to make his way through the house - all the way into the "Chamber of Horrors" where the film ends as the mayhem escalates throughout the last 20 minutes of the film. I seriously want a guy in a gorilla suit in every movie ever, you guys. I know that's ridiculous, but I dang sure want it...and you can't take that from me. Guys in gorilla (or ape or orangutan or whatever they are) suits are ALWAYS welcome in my world.
If you can't have fun with The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini, I'm just not sure I can talk to you right now. It's basically like watching a live action version of Scooby Doo, except there's no stoner and dog and there's lots of girls in bikinis and there's goofy musical numbers and there's Boris Karloff getting hit on by a cute blonde who then becomes a ghost with no bikini. And that's really all you need to know. If you think that sounds like fun, you should probably check out The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini. I can't explain why...but I know I'm right. And that will help me to sleep well tonight.
The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini kind of completes me.
I have to admit, I've never finished the original Mother's Day, a 1980 cult film treasure - according to some - from the folks over at Troma. I remember trying to watch it a while back, but I was in the mood for something shiny and watching Instant Netflix is about my least favorite thing in the world, so I ended up moving on and saying I was gonna catch up with it later. And I never did. So, this review of Mother's Day - the recently released remake of said film - shall just focus on the newer, shinier Mother's Day.
Rebecca De Mornay - who I feel like we haven't heard from since like 1995 and something like Never Talk To Strangers - takes center stage in Darren Lynn Bousman's film, as the matriarch of a criminal family who take control of a private residence where a bunch of hip and trendy people are having some sort of celebration. It seems that Mother's three sons have just failed in crime, and need the safety of their old home - despite its new owners (a married couple with their own issues played by Jaime King and Frank Grillo) and their guests who appear to have just walked off the set of a Light Beer commercial.
What follows is a long and painful evening of torture, tears, and tribulations. With 5 criminals and about 10 hostages/victims, there's a lot of opportunity for varying kinds of madness and violence in the film, which runs for what feels like a terribly excessive 112 minutes. Most of that time is spent making sure each and every character is given some sort of unique torture while also being involved in one or more different attempts to escape or overthrow the family that is holding them hostage. Sometimes it feels like Bousman and writer Scott Milam wrote their script while playing Clue - Is it the husband in the upstairs with the clothes iron? Or is it the tattooed lady in the kitchen with the knife? - as they refuse to pass up any opportunity for a good bit of trauma. Surprisingly, there's evidence of more restraint when the film deals with gore - there's blood, but not on a Saw-esque level - than evidence of restraint in the editing room.
Despite its repetitive nature, the film doesn't wear out its welcome entirely. The cast is hit and miss, but the performers that shine - like King, Warren Kole as one of the brothers, and Deborah Ann Woll as the timid sister of the criminals - give very strong performances that hit all the right marks. Other cast members are less likeable - Patrick Fleuger has some bad moments as the alpha brother, while most of the folks who spend the movie whining in the basement grated me (except the always welcome Briana Evigan, who's...well...HOT) - but there's no one in the film who completely sucks life from the production.
But the film's really all about De Mornay and her wicked turn as Mother - which, thankfully, is the best thing about the movie. The character is one of the more interesting and disturbed that we've seen in horror for a while, and the actress plays off her past work - like her unhinged turn in The Hand That Rocks The Cradle - to balance between brutal and loving throughout the film. There's some fantastic dark comedy inside the motives of Mother, which also allows De Mornay's performance to offer a tiny reprieve from the other terrors on screen. To put it simply, she's the main reason I can even come close to recommending this film.
There are some good moments throughout the film - an interaction between one of the aggressors and two ill-fated women at an ATM was fantastic, and plenty of other brutal scenes are handled with surprising grace - but another edit and a little more grit would have gone a long way to making Mother's Day feel like something more than just another run-of-the-mill home invasion film. I wanted to like the film a lot - several moments and one fantastic lead performance gave me hope - but the full package fell a little short of being something I feel comfortable suggesting to others. I guess you could give it a rental if you're really interested, but don't get your hopes too high for this one.
Being a kid on a farm is really friggin' boring sometimes. Much like the kid at the center of The Fields, I was once a kid on a farm too - I feel his pain. Granted, I was a kid on a farm who had to do farm work and who had a satellite dish and a Super Nintendo Entertainment System at his disposal. But, when I wasn't busy winning Home Run Derbys with Ken Griffey Jr. and when Wayne's World 2 or Last Action Hero weren't on HBO and when I didn't have to help my dad castrate pigs or lift bales of straw - well, then I sometimes got bored.
Since this kid is on a farm in 1973 and comes from a broken family (who'd have guessed that Tara Reid wouldn't be the world's most stable mother?) - he has to deal with a lot more boredom than I did. Which means he decides to not listen to his grandma, played by one of the greatest Iowans of all-time Cloris Leachman, and starts playing around in the fields that surround their farmhouse. We know that's a bad choice - partly because the movie makes it seem pretty ominous, partly because it's the damn title - but it takes a long time for us to figure out why.
Instead, we get a prolonged look into the psyche of young Steven, the real star of the film, a curly haired kid who I kept expecting to shout "O'Doyle Rules!". (Yes, it's a Billy Madison reference. HE LOOKED LIKE THOSE KIDS, alright?) But then again, I'm not entirely sure what we learn about Steven, except that he likes Godzilla and Ultraman (WHO THE HECK DOESN'T?) and runs around in corn fields while his Grandpa is nice to him and Cloris Leachman watches horror movies - if nothing else we get glimpses at Carnival of Souls and Night of the Living Dead during the film.
The Fields thinks it's a lot more dramatic than it appears to be. Everything is presented with a kind of graceful and subdued tone, and the film does a good job of giving everything an autumnal color scheme that goes along with the mood the directors seem to desire. It's all well and good in the looks department - even if those looks are rather drab and unappealing - but that doesn't really matter when very little drama actually happens.
Look, it's OK to try and be something bigger and more interesting than your standard indie horror film - I definitely appreciated the fact that The Fields wasn't another gorefest full of torture and teenage idiocy - but you gotta offer the viewer something more than a half-cocked story about kinda crazy folks that look like the family from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre's normal cousins from Ohio. Seriously, if this movie was set in a desert the title would be The Hills Have An Unstable Temper But Really Aren't Scary.
It can't have that title though, because there's those darn Fields.
The Fields is now on DVD via our friends over at Breaking Glass Pictures, so feel free to learn more about it at their site or at the film's official site. It's not the worst thing I've seen in a long time, but it did little more than remind me of how boring farm living would have been without Schwarzenegger, Griffey Jr. and Wayne & Garth.
I hate to go all smear campaign right at the start, but here's the thing. If you put The Legend of Hell House and The Haunting in front of me - which are probably the two classic haunted house movies in my mind - I'm gonna pick The Legend of Hell House at least 4 out of 5 times. And most people go the other direction. The Haunting is revered as the king of haunted movies and Legend of Hell House is seen as kind of its kooky cousin...and that saddens me. The reasons for my sadness are twofold: a) I REALLY love The Legend of Hell House, and b) Julie Harris' narration of The Haunting makes me want to put drumsticks through my eardrums like a Spinal Tap drummer on a drum kit (before combustion).
The Moment That Changes Everything:
One thing I absolutely love about Hell House is that this house is a vile, foul-mouthed, and often perverse muddertrucka. Perhaps the most intense example in the film is when the straight-laced wife of a scientist played by Gayle Hunnicutt gets a little bit possessed and starts ranting about sadistic sexual fantasies to the terrified Benjamin Franklin Fischer, portrayed be the always scare-able Roddy McDowell. The intensity shown from the character is one of the clearest indicators in the film that this house is not playing Scooby Doo with its inhabitants.
It Makes a Great Double Feature With:
Well, The Haunting, obviously. I know I was dogging on it earlier, but a double feature of these two films could basically be called The "Everything You Ever Need To Know About Old Dark Haunted House Movies" Double Feature. So what if the voiceover makes me want to staple my ears to my cheeks and bring out the crazy glue, the rest of the movie is bloody perfect.
What It Means To Me:
I learned how much I love Richard Matheson from the movies - to be honest, I'm just now finally reading his novel Hell House for the first time(!) - and The Legend of Hell House represents exactly what I love about the writer. There's a mixture of science and supernature, a balance between physical and mental struggles, and a heck of a lot of wonderfully drawn scenes that don't hold anything back. To me, Hell House is a prototype for a lot of the things I want to see in any horror movie/story.
I seriously don't get Phantasm. I've seen Phantasm a bunch of times - like, 12 or 37 times, at least - and I swear that every time I watch it again for the past 15 plus years I've been like "Wait a minute, what in the name of Franklin Delano Roosevelt was THAT?" at least once. (Sometimes I don't curse FDR, sometimes I say Amelia Earhart...depends on my mood.) But what I do quickly realize whenever I take a gander at Phantasm, is that few films have ever mimicked an actual nightmare quite like this one does.
In a way, one could argue that much of Phantasm plays out as the nightmares of a slightly pathetic young boy named Mike (this post has been edited because I'm stupid sometimes, act casual) who looks and talks in a manner that isn't traditionally masculine. His parents are dead, his brother might leave him behind, and he's certainly not cool enough to be popular at school - we can tell that even though we never see him in that setting. About 87% of the film is about realizing just how helpless Mike is, by my estimate.
Normally a film about such a character would be difficult, but we get the sense early on that the world of Phantasm isn't quite right. So many sequences throughout the film feel like nightmares that the characters might be having. At the beginning, a beautiful woman kills her lover and then morphs into an old man/cryptkeeper. Later, another sexual encounter adds a bit of voyeurism and some kind of critter that looks like one of those Star Wars Jawas. (Sorry, you will never get me to talk about Phantasm and NOT mention Jawas.) But primarily, bad stuff starts happening to Mike, and most of it feels like something we can't be sure is dream or reality.
The thing we learn pretty quickly is that Mike is one of those kids who's a) got a heck of an imagination and b) doesn't seem content with the simple parts of life. Heck, his bed is next to a giant wall sized photo of the view of Earth from the moon - how much more "out of this world" can a kid be? But it doesn't mean that Mike's dreams are all ridiculous. Some moments - like the one when we see Mike chasing his brother who is always just out of reach and mysteriously can't seem to hear Mike's effeminate shouting - are pretty realistic human nightmares that let us in to the kid's troubled mind. These aren't exactly unconscious thoughts in his mind - he vocalizes to a fortune teller (his only counselor, I guess) that he fears his brother is planning to leave him behind, but the signs are clear: Mike doesn't know how to deal with his fears, and they're seeping into his dreams.
There's a catch in Phantasm, however. Writer/Director Don Coscarelli never really lets the viewer in on the gag. Very few scenes are really played straight up as straight out "dream" sequences, but so much of what we see doesn't seem possible in a real world. And a lot of the events that happen don't tie in to later scenes, leaving the viewer - or maybe it's just me, but for the sake of my own sanity I'm going to assume this happens to other viewers - pretty confused as to what really did just happen.
When Coscarelli and the film are on top of their mysterious and dark game, the images on screen seem completely surreal. Many scenes feature pitch black backdrops, showing only the things the director wants us to focus in on. Other sequences, like a strange antique shop late in the film, seem to embrace clutter and try to obscure our vision. Each change in perspective seems intentionally drawn - and is usually punctuated by one of my favorite horror movie musical scores ever - it just doesn't always make sense from a storytelling perspective. Especially when it gets all intergalactic planetary. (Or is it planetary intergalactic? RIP MCA.)
I could drive myself mad trying to put together the pieces of Phantasm - I haven't even mentioned the chilling performance from Angus Scrimm or the iconic-if-not-ridiculous "silver sphere"! - but I don't really want to. There's enough here, from Mike's gender issues to the Jawas from Mars with Banana Pudding blood (Can I trademark that moniker? "Jawas From Mars with Banana Pudding Blood" would make a great rock band!), to make the sum of the parts one of the most interesting and incessantly watchable horror movies of all-time. If I could have nightmares that look like Phantasm, I'd be really friggin' proud of my nightmares. Why should I try to bring little things like "making sense" into that equation?
(One more thing, and it's a GIANT FREAKING SPOILER. So stop reading if you haven't seen Phantasm. Seriously. Stop it!
OK....the ending of the movie. You know how awesome it is when Angus Scrimm shouts BOOOOYYYY. But y'know what I really love? The sound effects right after that. Mike goes through the mirror into dreamworld, and all we can hear is this crazy cacophony (I just had to say cacophony...it's a real word, and I love it. It's used to describe that sound when a bunch of noises are fighting against each other, like jazz music or Oprah Winfrey eating a canned ham.) of noises that sound like a bunch of dogs and demons (I swear one of those sounds in there is straight outta The Exorcist.) fighting over the girly boy's bones. I swear, it's one of the coolest sets of sound effects out there. Check it out.)
Are you freakin' kidding me? Any list of any kind of movies that has to do with me has to include Army of Darkness. It's pure, unadulterated, awesomeness. It's pretty much the most fun movie to watch. Ever. I don't really have to explain Army of Darkness, at least not to myself.
The Moment That Changes Everything:
When that chainsaw gets tossed into that pit and Bruce Campbell leaps into the sky and everything clicks into place...well, that's when my soul really starts dancing. Of course, there's about 97 moments in the short film that create the same feeling, but that's the first one that comes to my mind tonight.
It Makes a Great Double Feature With:
Well, there's two films that OBVIOUSLY go so well with this one - but I just might end up talking about them later in this list. So, if we're gonna pair something else up with Army of Darkness, we're gonna need something funny, exciting, monstrous, and good looking. Something like....Tremors. Yeah.
What It Means To Me:
I think I've written about my evolving favoritism in regard to the Evil Dead series before, and how my appreciation of each film differs by the year. (Yup, I have.) But Army of Darkness has always won me over as the most accessible film of the trilogy, the kind of flick I could put on even with my least horror-friendly friends and still get plenty of smiles and laughs. It's gotten me through a lot of bad moments, too, and no amount of age and recognition of the film's lesser qualities will ever take that from me.
Over the past week or two, I've really struggled to make peace with It's in the Blood. But I want to make one thing quite clear right now - that struggle is not, in any way, a bad thing. I think. I'm not really sure, but after two viewings and a large amount of thought, I'm relatively sure that it's not a bad thing.
One of the easiest things to do when you watch a ton of movies is to start comparing them to each other. The Cabin in the Woods gets compared to Shaun of the Dead because they're both horror comedies, Friday the 13th gets compared to Halloween because they both have masks and knives and what not. And when you're trying to gauge how effective a film is, your mind goes straight to whatever you can compare it to. It's no different than when you go shopping and compare prices/qualities of other products, really.
So why have I struggled so mightily with It's in the Blood? Because I couldn't think of anything I've ever seen that is quite like it. Some of the themes and images are familiar, to be sure, but the way in which the whole film comes together is incredibly unique.
We'll start with the easy stuff. The film follows a son (played by writer/producer Sean Elliot) who returns to the country home of his father for a bit of wilderness adventure. As the son and father head out into the woods, they run into things like dead dogs, strange visions, and ominous spirits - the kind of things we've naturally come to expect (and accept) from horror films. His father is an old-fashioned, gruff, alcohol-swigging sheriff, played by none less than genre icon Lance Henriksen. We know what we can get from Henriksen, the same powerful presence that was harnessed by films like Aliens and Pumpkinhead, and his performance in this film is up to snuff with the rest of his storied career.
While the pieces of the film are common, the path that Elliot and co-writer/director Scooter Downey is one-of-a-kind. The film's official website promotes the story as a "psyche-saga", and even provides a fancy definition of that term. Now, I read that definition, and I even went and got a degree in psychology from a relatively credible university one time, and I'm STILL relatively confused to what that term means. But I think I like it.
It's the mindset - or maybe I'm supposed to say psyche - of It's in the Blood that sets it apart from so many other horror films. Elliot's character has a dramatic personal journey to make throughout the film, and his survival depends on his ability to stand up to his current predicament and the demons of his past. This sounds like another cliche too, but the manner in which Downey and Elliot present the story is so well done. There was a little bit of confusion early on, I must admit, but the story becomes much easier to follow as it rolls through different events and times. You're going to have to think a bit - if that's not your cup of tea, there's a Nightmare on Elm Street sequel somewhere out there for you - but I think that makes the journey through It's in the Blood all the more worthwhile.
I've written a lot about this movie so far, and I feel like I could go on for days. I haven't mentioned the fantastic special effects, I haven't mentioned the dynamics between Henriksen and Elliot, I haven't mentioned some cool and practical gore. I haven't mentioned many of my quibbles with the movie either, like some of the monstery scenes near the end or a few changes in tone that don't quite flow evenly. The trouble is, I'm still not done thinking about It's in the Blood and everything it offers the viewer. I'm not sure I love the movie yet, but I'm dang sure loving my experience with it.
More information about It's in the Blood, which is currently awaiting wide release, can be found at that official website or in a glowing review by FMWL's buddy Cortez over at Planet of Terror. I think you should look into it, obviously, because I've already watched the movie twice and I'm still looking into it. If you want a horror movie that asks you to think, It's in the Blood might be the unique horror movie for you.
The "long-haired Japanese ghost" craze of the early 2000s took over the horror scene in the blink of an eye. Films that made an impact in the Far East, like Ringu and Ju-On, became American remakes like The Ring and The Grudge before many Americans even knew their predecessors existed. I gotta admit, I wasn't a big fan of several of these films due to their repetitive nature - sometimes it seems that if you've seen one creepy Asian woman with hair in her face, you've seen them all - but Dark Water (which would also be quickly remade into a Jennifer Connelly thriller) has always stood out to me thanks to a deep story, good acting, and a boatload of creepy images.
The Moment That Changes Everything:
First of all, since when can schools let kids play hide and seek? Is that just a Japan thing? Do I have to move to Japan now so my imaginary kids can play hide and go seek in school? I just may.
Now that that's said, Dark Water takes a game of hide and seek and makes it scary as heck, as the young girl that our story follows sees a ominous approacher from her secret location. A rain coat and a wet child have never been more effective.
It Makes a Great Double Feature With:
I'm gonna pimp my other favorite Asian horror flick here, Kairo (aka Pulse), which was also horribly remade but stands alone as an incredible effective technohorror film. It's horror on a much bigger scale - the final scenes are mind blowingly grand - and maybe I'm being racist by pairing it up with another Japanese horror flick (couldn't I have just said some American ghost/child/mother tale like The Others?), but oh well. If you want the best modern horror that Japan has to offer, I say you go with Dark Water and Kairo.
What It Means To Me:
I was barely 20 when The Ring happened to America, and - thanks to this gosh darn internet thing that opens up possibilities that have no end - learning about the horrors of Japan was my first real foray into horror from other continents. I saw a lot of decent J-horrors before I finally fell in love with Dark Water, but it inspired me to dig even deeper into horror from new sources and places. That's kind of a big deal for a horror nerd like me.
My mission, should I choose to accept it, is to convince you that you should see The Avengers. It's one of the easiest missions I've ever had, and one of the most difficult missions I've ever accepted. I'm sure most folks out there see ads for a movie that throws a bunch of super heroes who have won big screen acclaim into a blockbuster-building-blender and think something to the effect of "Well, duh, I'll see that." Those people have my eternal respect. But there are some other folks out there who look at The Avengers and see a comic book cinema vending machine and think something like "Man, there can't be anything substantial in such a convoluted concept". I dig those folks too - the skeptic always has something good to say, no matter how crazy - but I aim to convince them that they are dead wrong.
I have to admit, I was almost one of them skeptics. I adore comic book mythology to a fault, and have dug at least 87% of the Marvel adaptations to come down the pipeline in the past decade. (Even Daredevil. I regret nothing.) But I was really unsure that The Avengers could hold the weight of Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, The Hulk, and friends without falling apart and slipping away from the filmmakers. Really, the whole project needed its own hero. When cult icon Joss Whedon - the dude behind Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Firefly, and plenty of other nerdy favorites (Like The Cabin in the Woods, which is now my second favorite thing I've seen in theater this year) - took over the project, I should have put my doubts to bed. But I had to see it to believe it.
Now that I have seen it, it is certain in my mind that Joss Whedon is the true hero of The Avengers. His script, which is filled to the brim with scenes that are honestly hilarious, is also incredibly faithful to the heroes as they've appeared in the comics and films that led to this point. I really didn't know how someone could make all these characters fit together in one place - you are mixing Asgardian demi-god with 1940s soldiers and billionaires with fancy toys, after all - and anyone with a passing knowledge of Avengers comics knows that personality clashes are par for the course with Earth's greatest heroes. Whedon deftly handled each character with this in mind, using the differing personalities to create a lot of humorous interactions that build the characters while keeping the audience engaged in a lighthearted manner. In a great way, Whedon even manages to turn some jokes, like a modern SHIELD agent's "fanboy" love of Captain America, into dramatic events that advance the plot. And he does all this comedic styling - I honestly can't remember the last time I've laughed so much in a theater - while keeping the action going and making a 140 minute film fly by the viewer's eyes in a flash.
Whedon's masterful ability to bring a bunch of legendary heroes together in one film wouldn't work if the cast didn't meet or exceed the viewers expectations, and pretty much everyone in the film is on top of their game. Robert Downey, Jr., Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth and Scarlett Johansson all reprise the roles they held in Marvel's latest wave of superhero films (Iron Man 2, Thor, Captain America: the First Avenger), as does Jeremy Renner, who expands his Thor cameo as Clint Barton (Does the film ever actually call him Hawkeye? I don't think it did.) into a pivotal role in the plot here. Samuel L. Jackson and Clark Gregg return on the SHIELD side, alongside newcomer Cobie Smulders of How I Met Your Mother, on the side of SHIELD, the agency who brings the group of heroes together. Everyone is right back on track, picking up where they left off in the previous films, which means Downey chews up the scenery, Evans looks heroic, Hemsworth hams it up with a chiseled jaw, and so on. But none of them are the most impressive returning cast member.
That honor has to go to Tom Hiddleston, who returns as Loki to play villain to not just his half-brother Thor - but to all six Avengers. It's a gigantic task that worried me as I watched the film coming from a distance. I wasn't that impressed by Hiddleston's Loki in Thor - the best thing I had to say about him in my Thor review was that he was "serviceable" - but his power-hungry turn as the man who may destroy Earth here is really fantastic. The London born actor manages to be physically imposing, despite his diminutive stature, and it's pretty easy to buy into him as the God of Mischief (with a Zod complex) from his first appearance in the opening scenes. He's aided by an alien force - make sure you stay through the end credits for more info, as is common for Marvel films - but the film doesn't feel like it needs anything more than this one well-drawn villain to make us feel like the world needs heroes.
The biggest winner in the film, however, is the hero who's played by a new face to the Marvel universe. Dr. Bruce Banner and The Hulk - formerly represented by Eric Bana and Edward Norton and a bunch of CGI creations - are now represented by Mark Ruffalo (and some more CGI) and are better than we've ever seen them on the big screen. Ruffalo plays the scientist Banner with a nerdy charm that's kinda pitiful, but kinda charming, and interacts very well with his peers, particularly in some science lab interactions with Downey's Tony Stark. Though Ruffalo's banner is sufficiently nerdy - this is the closest anyone's been to recreating the beloved/pathetic Banner character that Bill Bixby portrayed on the famous TV show of the late '70s (I so wanted to hear the lonely man theme with Ruffalo's character) - it's his Hulk form that really steals the film. Once "the other guy" is released in this universe there is no turning back, and a combination of breathtaking choreography and fantastic special effects make this Hulk the best visualization of the character that's ever been seen. Though the film's final battle sequence showcases all of these heroes, everything really boils down to Hulk smashing things - and he does so in an incredible manner. This is his movie, the rest of our heroes are just living in it. (Also living in it, and making my nerd face smile? Harry Dean Stanton. You'll see why.)
With very few missteps - I wanted a little more Thor because I didn't feel he was used as well as he was in his own film, that's about the only quibble I had with the film - and so much humor and action and so many general awe-inspiring moments, I can't complain at all about The Avengers. Heck, I want to see it again right now. It's the prototype for what a summer blockbuster should be, because it's written for nerds by nerds and is still incredibly accessible to any filmgoer. Heck, this is more than what summer movies should be....this is what movies should be. Don't miss it.
If you were to ever walk on up to central Iowa and find The Mike's Lair and be like "Hey, The Mike, I was wonderin' who you think the scariest on screen villains ever are", you'd probably hear me mention Greg Stillson. It's a name that gets little publicity in the horror scene - though there are some smartsy, politically knowledged types who throw the example out whenever important elections come up - but it's one that has chilled me for a long, long time.
Greg Stillson, who we'll get to in a minute, is just one of the things to love about The Dead Zone. Whether you prefer books (it's definitely one of my very favorites from Stephen King), TV shows (some give it a bad name, and sometimes it deserved it, but I dig the Anthony Michael Hall led USA Series), or movies (the 1983 adaptation by David Cronenberg that I hope to focus on here) - there's a dose of Dead Zone for just about everyone who loves a bit of telekinesis or "second sight" or whatever you want to call the powers of someone who touches people and sees into their life.
Christopher Walken - only a few years removed from his Oscar win for The Deer Hunter and still looking rather young - stars as Johnny Smith, the ill-fated teacher who enters a coma as a simple young man and wakes up five years later with the power to see. This power - which allows him to see important/tragic events in peoples' lives - could go a lot of ways (Walken himself famously spoofed the role on an episode of Saturday Night Live), but the film narrows them down to three key points. These days, you get the feeling a trilogy would be made out of this material - as the TV series showed, there's plenty that could be done with the character - but this film does a more than adequate job of following King's novel and wedging Johnny's story into 103 minutes.
It would be easy for the film - directed by generally abstract filmmaker David Cronenberg - to have gone off on tangents and radically altered King's story. It worked so well for The Shining, so why not let Cronenberg explode some heads or turn non-vaginal body parts into vaginas? I have to wonder - did Cronenberg have full control over the movie? Was the studio watching over his shoulder? Or did he really like King's story that much that he didn't want to mess with it? Whatever the answer is, I'm pretty glad that he - for the most part - stayed true to the novel. Anyone who watched all six seasons of the TV show - I can't be the only one, can I? - knows that that thing dragged out the most interesting part of the story and never really found closure.
The most interesting part of the story, as I hinted earlier, is Greg Stillson. Though Johnny's first encounters with his powers and his time assisting a local sheriff (Tom Skerrit!) with a murder investigation are interesting enough, there are few characters in horror that provoke the same philosophical dilemma that Greg Stillson does. When we see what Johnny sees - a real world terror the likes of which man has (thankfully) only imagined - Greg Stillson immediately becomes one of the most dangerous men in horror.
Played with a ton of sleaze by Martin Sheen - who seems to partially channeling his future Mass Effect 2 & 3 character and partially mimicking his son Charlie's future crazy eyes - Greg Stillson represents a man who might tear the world apart. And he's not a dude who might tear the world apart because he's a monster or because he's a physical terror or because he's supernaturally affected. We don't really get a full "why" Greg Stillson might tear the world apart in this movie - the book and show each do more to establish Stillson's mental issues and lust for power/control - but when we see Johnny's vision of Stillson's future there's no questioning that he's more than a bit mad.
With a series of interesting segments (featuring killers, children, politics, and more) and a powerful lead performance by Walken, The Dead Zone is always an interesting story. It's not the most ambitious story that Cronenberg or King ever put together, but it manages to inspire a lot of thought without diving too far into "crazy about science" territory. I suppose reading the book would be a bit more rewarding than watching the film - DON'T TELL ANYONE I JUST SAID THAT - but if you're in a pinch for time you'll surely enjoy The Dead Zone as an intelligent and well-made '80s horror film.
OK, I'm gonna be pretty blunt here. The only thing anyone really cares about when it comes to these found footage films is the ending. Go out there and find someone who doesn't like Paranormal Activity or The Blair Witch Project or The Last Exorcism, and dollars-to-donuts they'll probably mention the ending. Last night, when I kickstarted a copy of Area 407, I joked that I was watching another found footage film because I didn't know how this one ended abruptly. (OK, I was only half joking.)
You guys know I'd never go Mr. Spoilerman on you - I'm not about to throw any kind of plot details at you - but I'm gonna start out this review by talking about the ending. Not the ending itself, but my reaction to the ending.
Basically, here's what happened: I'm sitting here, watching Area 407, having a good enough time with its standard found footage cliches, when the ending happens. As soon as the sudden final reveal happened, I screamed out a profane exclamation...and I kind of started doing one of those wimpy "get away from me slap fits" that people do when they're kind of scared but mostly excited. You know, like when a cute girl gets you in a tickle fight when you're in grade school and you "fight" back in a manner that wouldn't harm a pillowcase. I'm not proud of my response to this ending, but it was so unexpected and unlikely that I was basically giddy about how silly it was. I think maybe that should be an insult, but I was honestly kind of thrilled by the utter ridiculousness of this ending. Like, the fact that this movie dared to go where it went was so welcome to me that I've been randomly laughing about it - and my extremely ridiculous reaction to it - off and on throughout the last 24 hours.
Let's back up a minute, before my silly smirk about this ending overtakes my mind entirely and sends this review into a massive derailment. The plot! Ah yes, the plot....
Area 407, from directors Dale Fabrigar & Everette Wallin (Why do these movies always need two directors? They already make the actors hold the camera!), follows a few folks with awful bad luck as they're involved in both a plane crash and a good old fashioned night stalking. Thanks to two vociferous teenage girls, there happens to be a camera on the plane/crash site, which means the night of tension and drama is documented for our viewing pleasure.
To be perfectly honest, there's not a lot of original stuff going on for Area 407. It's got a few well drawn characters - the angry fella played by Brendan Patrick Conner stands out - and plenty more that are boring and standard. The fact that the film is controlled, at least in storyline, by two young girls who aren't old enough to drive will certainly grate on some viewers, but I was less annoyed by them than the other dull survivors. There's adequate amounts of shouting and everyone is covered in blood and shadows and darkness are used as well as they are in other found footage films, but none of it's really unique.
And yet, I found myself having a lot of fun as I soaked up what was going on on screen. The formula has usually worked for me, and I was very receptive to another go with them as Area 407 went on. It didn't do anything with incredible flair, but it never felt inept either. I shouted at the screen a little bit, trying to figure out just what the creatures that were chasing the plane crash survivors were, and primarily found myself interested in finding out what would happen next.
Area 407, to me, played like found footage comfort food. It's got more faults than it probably should, but it gave me the thrills I needed, all the way up to that ridiculously enjoyable - or maybe just ridiculous - ending. This isn't a best of the year candidate by any means, but I'll gladly watch it again. If you're not looking for something earth shattering - and if you're prepared for an ending to a horror movie that will showcase things you loved in second grade - you might find yourself enjoying Area 407 like I did.
If you're interested in the film, you can check it out via IFC Midnight On Demand services, and other digital outlets like ITunes & Amazon. There are worse things you could do.
(PS - Don't look up the trailer, there's spoilers in there!)
The zombie genre has been pretty much ruined during the last decade, despite fantastic outliers like the Dawn of the Dead remake, The Walking Dead, and (depending on who you debate) 28 Days Later. The films by Danny Boyle and Zack Snyder that I mentioned above - which propelled both directors to mainstream success and critical acclaim - also led to a slew of boring or inept or even insulting zombie flicks. Hidden among them is a true treasure, Pontypool, which turns a radio DJ's booth into ground zero for the zombie apocalypse. Led by dynamite turns by Stephen McHattie and Lisa Houle (a real life husband/wife team), Pontypool provides a thoughtful and unique perspective on horror that is extremely welcome.
The Moment That Changes Everything:
As McHattie's Grant Mazzy often repeats, Laurel-Ann Drummond - a young war veteran who now helps at the studio - is the pride of the small town of Pontypool. When she becomes directly involved with the infection - and when Mazzy has to recount what he's seeing to his listeners and the viewers, the film really starts to hit home.
It Makes a Great Double Feature With:
Really I just feel like the best thing to go along with Pontypool would be the amazing radio production of War of the Worlds that the great Orson Welles put together back in the day. I suppose Spielberg's movie would be equally apocalyptic, but the radio connection to Welles' harrowing account of the story was too good to pass up.
What It Means To Me:
Pontypool, like many of my favorite recent horror films, is groundbreaking, original, and interesting. Those qualities are missing from so many modern horror films, but it's a favorite for more reasons than just its uniqueness. Pontypool is like a good book, letting us imagine much of the horror as it's told instead of shown, and that opens up a world of possibilities for the horror lovin' mind.
The final known days of Edgar Allan Poe are...reinvented, perhaps is the word?...in The Raven; a modernized twist on the classic author that seems kind of like a cash in on the success of the recent Sherlock Holmes updates. One part horror tale, another part prime-time murder mystery, The Raven offers John Cusack as the legendary author and more references to Poe's work than you can shake a stick at.
The film opens with a title card explaining how Poe was found ill on a Baltimore park bench in 1849, and states that much of what occurred in his final days is "a mystery." That's about the only tie to reality, so anyone expecting a Poe biopic should steer elsewhere. This isn't the first film Poe had been fictionalized and tied in with his work - for example, Jeffrey Combs got to play the tortured artist in a Masters of Horror episode for Stuart Gordon - but The Raven certainly works to cover as much of Poe's work as possible while telling the tale of a copycat killer who fashions his crimes after Poe tales. Many of Poe's most famous stories are involved, though the story mostly just refers to them and doesn't re-enact many parts of Poe's macabre visions.
The plot is catchy enough, though there's little depth to the script and I would have liked a little more focus on the crimes and a little less of Cusack and the police inspector played by Luke Evans playing Poirot. It's a repetitive game - body, clue, chase, repeat - that is most interesting when the Poe tales that inspired the murder are relayed by the distraught author. The chase scenes are effective enough - there's a lot of pounding music and some fine camerawork whenever the action picks up - and the film doesn't skimp on the violence (even if it does often settle for computer-generated blood).
The cast do what they can to salvage the simple tale, and are probably the film's biggest asset. Cusack is fine in the lead, though there are some moments where the snarky angst we've come to expect from his comedic roles shines through and takes the film to a modern place. Evans is a nice addition, an actor who seems somewhere between Orlando Bloom and Joseph Gordon-Levitt on the "I'm young and have slick hair and maybe I can act" scale, growling plenty of lines that add to the tension when the chase picks up and playing off Cusack well. The gorgeous Alice Eve (She's Out of My League is still one of the rare romcoms I can dig, so I salute her) shines as the woman Poe desires, as does Brendan Gleeson as her disapproving father. None of the performances are great, or even very good, but they all fit into the roles that the film requires and no one is out of place. A misstep in casting could have sunk the film entirely, but these four leads all meet expectations.
Director James McTeigue, who once wowed me with V for Vendetta, takes charge of the production, though the pacing feels a little bit off to me. I have to wonder if there was some control taken out of his hands before the final cut was approved, because there are times when The Raven just doesn't flow quite like I'd expect it to. The film all builds up to a final reveal that is frankly a disappointment, though the film's biggest problem might be that there was nothing in the script that could lead to a satisfying ending. If you have a murder mystery that focuses primarily on four or five characters - and if you are shown that none of them are the killer by the final act - you're setting the viewer up to scoff at what you do reveal.
The Raven is watchable and entertaining enough, but there's really little that stands out about it. Those with a knowledge of Poe - I hate that I have to type that, because I'm implying that there are poor souls who don't know the writer's dark masterworks - will find some enjoyment in the nods to his life and works, yet that and a serviceable cast are about the only reasons to recommend this movie. Fans of powerhouse actors in period mysteries - think From Hell or those recent Holmes flicks - could enjoy The Raven in passing. The more I think about the movie, the more I think I might have enjoyed it a tiny bit too. Yet it mostly made me want to read some Poe or watch some of the beloved Poe adaptations that Roger Corman produced in the '60s. If the best a movie can do is inspire you to find something better, I can't get entirely behind recommending it.
If you didn't know, the folks over at Kindertrauma are pretty much the bee's knees. With more horror knowledge than at least 37 states and a willingness to dig up the dirt on any trauma that a viewer has stuck in their mind, they have horror covered like a first round cornerback. (I'm watching the NFL Draft, apologies for the mixing of passions!)
So, when they put together a little horror fan questionnaire (which you could go find and take by clicking right about HERE), I jumped at the chance to join the cool horror kids' party. With no further ado, let's do this.
It's a Horror to Know You! - The Mike; From Midnight, With Love
1. What is the first film that ever scared you?
I can't really remember my first reaction to The Phantom of the Opera, but when I consider that I'm still afraid of the reveal of Lon Chaney's gnarled face, I find it hard to believe that it didn't scare Little The Mike. One of the first scares I do really remember came from Pumpkinhead.
Fun The Mike Story: I remember being absolutely terrified of a fella with a huge jack 'o lantern mask at one of those dreaded small town "Haunted Hayride" events when I was 8 or 9 years old (if you've never gotten in on a small town Haunted Hayride, you're SOOOOO missing out. They chase you with real chainsaws!), so the title Pumpkinhead alone gave me willies. So imagine my surprise when the grotesque monster and the dark setting were even worse than that literally pumpkin headed townsperson! I refused to revisit the film until deep into my teens.
2.What is the last film that scared you?
Much like a gimmicky haunted house, the gimmicky Grave Encounters got under my skin quickly. Everything in this found footage film seems slightly off and incredibly uneasy and just creepy. The film's most successful when it stalls and lingers just before creeping us out, and I might have taken a couple of breaks during tense moments the first time through. Good times.
More recently I was creeped out again by a repeat viewing of Absentia, which creeped the heck out of me last summer and still carries some scares on home video. It might be the most effective "scary" movie of the last five years.
3. Name three horror movies that you believe are underrated.
In no particular order:
The Devil Rides Out - This one's been my baby for over a decade now, but I never get tired of singing its praises. Christopher Lee vs. the occult in the funky late '60s!
Horror Hotel/The City of the Dead - A little more Christopher Lee. This one came out the same year as Psycho and Peeping Tom and - though it's not as expertly crafted - features some similar twists. It's atmospheric and creepy, too.
Rogue - It's either the follow up to Wolf Creek or just-another-giant-reptile-movie to many, but I really think Greg McLean's Rogue is as good as any giant monster movie in a long, long time. And the effects are Jaws good. Yeah, I said JAWS.
4. Name three horror movies that you enjoy against your better judgment.
Dead Snow - I think I'm supposed to call this nazi zombie flick out for being full of cliches and stupid characters. But I just can't do it. It's fun.
Dr. Giggles - Parts of this thing are PAINFUL to watch. But man, Larry Drake as a psycho dentist is just plain GOLD.
The Devil Within Her/I Don't Want To Be Born!/Sharon's Baby - The combination of Joan Collins and Donald Pleasence and Caroline Munro should not be this...bad. But when you have a demon baby and a dwarf sex curse...well, you've got something incredibly watchable.
5. Send us to five places on the Internet!
OK, this one's hard to narrow down. Am I really supposed to pick just five great places to read great stuff?
Fine. Off the top of my head, here's five. If you're not one of them and I love you, I still love you!
Fascination With Fear - Christine always has something good to say about something good. She's one of the few still fighting on behalf of old-school Gothic horrors while still appreciating a good bit of gore, and she also rocks.
Planet of Terror - Cortez the Killer is a straight-up warrior when it comes to breaking down the latest in indie horror. Always a great read and honest perspective, for better or worse.
All Things Horror - Mike and Chris are also great champions of indie horror, and I never grow tired of their reviews and rants. Plus they do everything in their power to bring indie horror to theater screens, and I can't commend that enough.
Daily Grindhouse - There's about 10 billion things to love about this fast paced haven for all kinds of midnight pleasures. Lists, interviews, trailers, news, DVD coverage - they have it all, and they know how to use it.
Atomic Domino - I've just recently found this baby blog, but it reminds me that I need to spend a lot more time on sci-fi here. To the point and effective, Dominique has a great style going for her and I look forward to reading more.
Oh, and of course, I need to mention KINDERTRAUMA! Oh wait, I already did. But hey, head over and tell them they're awesome anyway, and check out plenty more It's a Horror to Know You posts from horror lovers like you today!
39 years later - heck, it's been six years since the remake came out! - Robin Hardy's sequel to The Wicker Man is finally seeing the light of day. Distributors have spent the better part of the last decade (at least) promoting the original film with one critic's quote that called it "The Citizen Kane of horror movies", and for good reason. But as I look at The Wicker Tree, it's really hard to see that film - which was truly a one of a kind horror/musical/parable - in the background.
Hardy tries very hard to recapture the same balance that he did in The Wicker Man, but Edward Woodward and Britt Ekland are not walking through that door any time soon. A digitally enhanced Christopher Lee shows up for a 20-second long cameo, but that's about the only thing that connects the film to its predecessor.
The plot is pretty similar to the '73 film, though everything's blown up a little bit to modern standards. This time we have two young born again American evangelists, a wholesome God-Pop singer and her "cowboy" boyfriend, heading to the Scottish countryside to spread God's word. It's pretty obvious from day one that the two youngsters are targets of the society, who are now "ruled" by a nuclear power plant owner who compares himself to Mr. Burns from The Simpsons. (I'm not even joking. Can you imagine a reference to a TV show in the '73 film? Pop culture has infected EVERYTHING.)
Newcomer Brittania Nicol - to date this is all she's done on film - takes the lead as the Christian songstress, and, along with Henry Garrett as Steve the Cowboy (they'll repeat the word cowboy about 7,348 times to make this point clear to you), presents an "aw shucks, look how naive we are" front that is painful for the viewer to endure. The characters are one note and ridiculous, even when the film haphazardly tries to draw on their past and present "sins", while the people of New Summerisle - from Graham McTavish as the Patriarch to the aptly named Honeysuckle Weeks as the oft-nude poison fruit of temptation - are laughably over the top. Even the extras overact grandly, and I often found myself laughing at the people on screen simply because they looked so ridiculous as they tried to sell this story.
I don't know if I'd call the original Wicker Man subtle, but its certainly not as blunt as this awkward sequel. There's little to no suspense - even if I hadn't seen the original film and/or the remake I'd know that these "pure" characters are, for lack of a better word, screwed - and the satirical approach to religions of all types is handled without any semblance of a delicate touch. Scenes like the one that reveals our pop star's impure past career inspire more unintentional laughs, and the use of a church hymn in two different roles during the second and third acts had me rolling my eyes. Music was a key part of the original film, but that too drops off here - the use of music within the film is as annoying as anything else The Wicker Tree throws at us.
I can't believe I'm typing this, but the most unfortunate thing about The Wicker Tree is that its mistakes aren't even memorably bad. Neil LaBute's over-the-top remake of The Wicker Man has at least made an impact and brought attention to the original thanks to an awful script that Nicolas Cage turned into a pop culture phenomenon. I'm in a minority, but I've championed that film for its unintentional comedy value before, despite the fact that I know it misses the point the original made. The Wicker Tree misses the point just as badly, but there's no way I would even recommend someone pick up this film if they enjoy such ineptitude.
By the time The Wicker Tree rolled into its truly ridiculous (and still very over-the-top) final scenes, I was physically upset that I wasted my time on this movie. It's not the worst thing I've seen, but it's got next to no redeeming qualities - I can't think of an example of one right now - and it's clear that Hardy doesn't have the same vision that he did when he made The Wicker Man. By bringing the story to modern times and playing off of modern born again stereotypes, The Wicker Tree becomes grating and unwelcome quickly.
If you're a fan of the original, avoid this one at all costs. If you're not acquainted with that film, don't start here either. And if you're a fan of Cage's Wicker Man and its hilariously clumsy ways - you're not going to find them here either. This might be the rare film that truly has no audience...and that's probably a good thing.
If you have questions or suggestions not regarding a specific review, or would like to recommend a movie to The Mike, feel free to email him at frommidnightwithlove(at)gmail(dot)com!
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