Logan-22 Reviews

Patrick: Evil Awakens (2013)

Another pointless, boring remake

[5/10 · 7 April 2014]

I watched the original 1978 Patrick for the first time the other day to prepare for the remake. It was rather boring, but had that certain vague 1970s creepy charm that kept me from turning it off. I watched the 2013 remake today and was equally bored. Production values are higher this time, but this version is full of stupid CGI and annoying false scares punctuated by a shrill, awful soundtrack.

The cast are OK, although the original 1978 actor who played Patrick was far superior than the new guy who looks like a gay male model. Charles Dance is normally a wonderful actor but given nothing to do beyond a bland rehash of every other villain he's ever played. Rachel Griffiths is horribly boring as the Matron (as with Patrick himself, the 1978 original actor was much better and creepier).

The script is the main problem, just like the threadbare original. The idea of a comatose telekinetic pervert possessed by erotomania for his nurse is an interesting idea, but it's never fully developed. There's too much else going on that takes away from that relationship.

To be honest, I saw the 1980 Italian pseudo-sequel, Patrick Still Lives (aka Patrick Vive Ancora), a few years ago, and I found that ridiculous gorefest much more fun than either the original or remake. It's worth a watch just for the levitating fireplace poker scene! Another Italian film that rips off Patrick (and is full of gore) is Lucio Fulci's Aenigma.

From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series (2014–2016)

Boring and pointless remake

[3/10 · 25 March 2014]

Loved the original movie, hate this new series. It's supposed to be a vampire show, but there are no vampires in the first episode, and barely any in the second. And then it turns out they aren't even vampires, but some kind of weird Aztec snake demon cult. The scripts suck. There's way too much filler, often in the form of flashbacks. The whole "time manipulation" gimmick has run its course (Banshee, I'm looking at you). It's lazy writing. There's way too much talking and not enough action, sex, or horror. No idea who would like this drivel. After two episodes, I'm done. Maybe it gets better, but it's taking way too long to get there. Also annoyed it's a remake instead of prequel or sequel or some other thematic continuation with new characters.

Like Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez hasn't done anything cool in a long time (nothing since Planet Terror, and before that, The Faculty). Instead, he just turns out more self-absorbed, ego-driven nonsense (Once Upon A Time In Mexico) and lame little kid money grabs like the dreadful Spy Kids franchise. I respect his business savvy and independent spirit, but as far as his once-bright talent goes, the bulb keeps getting dimmer . . .

Divergent (2014)

A boring, sanitized version with no chemistry between the leads

[3/10 · 24 March 2014]

I read the trilogy (which was nothing special and kept getting more annoying each sequel), but at least the first book had some kind of * something * to it. The movie sucks. It is boring and there is very little action (and what little there was is over too fast and not very thrilling). The violence is sanitized with the only real blood being when Four nicks Tris's ear with a knife toss. The two most horrifying scenes in the book are not even included: the attempted rape of Tris by Peter's gang and the transfer girl who jumps from the train and misses the Dauntless rooftop to splat on the street below. Tris doesn't have a "save the cat" moment early on and provides no real reason to ever like her.

The story takes too long to get going, then the training goes on forever, only to have the ending feel rushed. Not once did I feel anyone's life was in danger. Not once did I perceive any credible romantic chemistry between Tris and Four. Not once did I laugh, cry, or feel anything but bored. And it goes on for two and a half hours! Ugh. Sure, the production values are high, but who cares if I can't relate to any of the characters or the story? It's just a dumb waste of time. I didn't hate it (only because I scored a free ticket), but have no desire to watch the sequels.

However, I'm glad Divergent made a bunch of money opening weekend to pave the way for other YA books to be adapted into films, but they need to do a better job. The reason all the recent YA adaptations tanked at the box office is because they sucked (Vampire Academy, Beautiful Creatures, City of Bones). The only decent one I can remember was Warm Bodies.

Byzantium (2012)

One of the most boring vampire movies ever made

[3/10 · 3 January 2014]

This hype surrounding this movie made it sound good, but it was a boring mess, with a bloated run time and unlikable characters. No fangs, just a sharp thumbnail to open up throats is the only way to tell this movie is supernatural in the slightest. The vampires walk around in daylight with no problem. They don't even look pale. Would have vastly preferred the film to dispense with the painfully contrived modern day storyline and stay in the past. The mysterious vampire island shrine with the red waterfall and swirling flocks of bats was the only inspired touch in the whole film.

Neil Jordan's done some great stuff in the past (The Company of Wolves, The Borgias, etc.), but Byzantium isn't one of them. The only vampire movie more arty and boring than this was that awful one Abel Ferrara did back in the 90s.

The Motel Life (2012)

It will either put you to sleep or make you commit suicide

[3/10 · 21 December 2013]

Argh! The Motel Life looked like it might be a cool indie film thanks to the trailer with all the fun animation. Unfortunately, the cartoon segments are the only parts of this interminable snoozer that were enjoyable at all (and the only source of female nudity). The movie is a titanic bore, unremittingly depressing, with unlikable characters doing--well, not much of anything. They act like losers for the entire run time, bad things happen as a result, and there are no surprises how it ends, except how it took so long to get there. It reminded me of Leaving Las Vegas it was so utterly bleak and dull.

The cast is fine, the direction and production values are fine, but the script, man! Oh, the script! Any comparisons to Midnight Cowboy, Drugstore Cowboy, or any other "once in a generation" movie (with or without "cowboy" in the title) are completely unfounded. The Motel Life will either put you to sleep (as it did me) or depress you enough to want to commit suicide.

Dracula (2013–2014)

Stupid, boring, gimmicky nonsense

[1/10 · 26 October 2013]

This was an awful reimagining with barely any relation to the source material and no likable characters at all. There was no "save the cat" moment for anyone, nothing to endear them or make them seem sexy or interesting. The only thing nice I can say about the pilot episode was the production values were high. It was pretty to look at, but absolutely worthless as entertainment. I have no idea who the target audience for this crap is--it's not vampire fans, not steampunk fans, not Downton Abbey fans, and the series skews to a vastly older audience than I would assume the network wants. I was bored, confused, and frustrated from start to finish, kept waiting for vampire action and barely got any, then promptly resolved never to watch another episode. Shame on the writers and everyone involved for making this brain-dead junk! Bram Stoker is rolling over in his grave.

The Battery (2012)

Slow, boring, art-house version of the zombie apocalypse

[4/10 · 11 October 2013]

This is a long, slow, boring indie movie that has little to no zombie action and what little there is fails to satisfy. It's more of an indie art-house movie with a little comedy thrown in than horror. The story is about two buddies trying to survive months after the zombie apocalypse. Unfortunately, it's super-easy to do when the budget can't afford any cool action scenes--not even one. The violence is all off-camera or way off in the distance.

The bearded guy (who is also the director) is a decent actor but looks like Zach Gillifinakis from The Hangover but with crappy forearm tattoos. The other guy is a weak actor who has a stupid, annoying character that deserves to get killed for constantly putting himself and his buddy at risk. For example, he listens to loud music with headphones out in the open, which is a really bad idea because he can't hear zombies sneaking up, and he never learns his lesson! I would leave that jerk behind if he tried that a second time. Unfortunately, the bearded guy lets his moron pal hang around with predictable results. However, in an attempt to both "prank" this jerk and teach him how to kill zombies on his own, the bearded guy throws a hungry zombie in his room and locks the door on him while the guy is sleeping, yelling at him to wake up and use the baseball bat he left in the room for that purpose. Wow. That is pure sociopathic evil, totally unlikable, and a whole lot worse than beating his ass and leaving him behind. So neither character ends up being likable. No likable characters = no likable movie. Screen writing 101, dude!

On a positive note, I will say I enjoyed most of the soundtrack, which is some kind of Johnny Cash-inspired weirdness. Unfortunately, it's used all too often as an excuse to drag scenes out into awful montages like the director dancing around in his underwear ala Tom Cruise in Risky Business. Um, no thanks, dude. Nobody wants to see that!

Liberal fast-forwarding is required to get through this snoozer's interminable run time. That's not to say The Battery is terrible in the way most SyFy Channel movies are, it's just not the kind of zombie movie most people want to see (then again, neither is Steven Seagal or Levar Burton vs. zombies, but at least those movies have gory action and decent zombie make-up). I found some of the "guy talk" dialog amusing, but the movie didn't seem to get going until a hostage scene over an hour in, then it was over and the two guys spent the rest of the movie (at least another half hour!) trapped in their car, peeing in bottles and eating tuna fish out of cans. The big action/revenge scene that was promised never pays off and the movie just ends.

Man, this movie needed tighter editing. Scenes drag on forever with nothing interesting happening. Also, during the trapped scene, they leave the windows partly rolled down so the zombies can reach into the car! WTF? And it's patently obvious the zombie actors are trying not to reach in very far and are acting all wimpy about trying to break in and grab the guys. One zombie, a bearded old man on the right-hand side of the car at the beginning of the siege, is a horrible actor who keeps looking into the camera for direction and is barely pawing at the glass. The zombie make-up is terrible, just some blood splashes and dark circles under the eyes. The only thing worse than crappy-looking zombies is crappy-acting zombies, of which this movie has more than its share of both.

The glowing reviews seem to be from the cast and crew and their friends and family. No doubt anyone voting this review "unhelpful" is one of them.

American Horror Story (2011– )

Self-indulgent tripe that deserves to be canceled!

[1/10 · 10 October 2013]

Season 1: "Murder House" had its ups and downs, but was overall fairly easy to follow, at least by comparison to the next seasons. It had a few great episodes, a few boring/confusing and lousy ones, but was OK overall.

Season 2: "Asylum" was a mess cramming in too many unlikable characters with too many, distracting go nowhere subplots and became a monster mash, only with occasional awful musical numbers thrown in. The entire writing staff should have been fired and replaced by competent ones who understand that likable characters and a straightforward narrative structure equal a better, more focused show and happier viewers.

As Season 2 progressed, I began growing more and more bored, confused, and angry at how stupid the show kept getting. Aliens, Nazis, mutants, demons, and maniacs all in one place? That's retarded and just way too much. Every new episode was torture, but I kept hoping it would get better. It didn't. I didn't even bother watching the last two episodes for ten months, that's how much I didn't care what happened, and only bothered to finish them because Season 3 was coming and I wanted to be caught up even though I know the seasons aren't connected story-wise.

Season 3: "Coven" began last night, and after watching the premiere, I have to say it is just more self- indulgent tripe from the same morons behind Season 2, only now we have ZERO likable, interesting characters. The witchcraft is not authentic, the special powers are stupid, and as much as I like Jessica Lange (she was great with Jack Nicholson in "The Postman Always Rings Twice"), I never want to see her dancing around again after Season 2. Everyone is hamming it up unbearably, especially Frances Conroy, who is just awful in her one scene and looks ridiculous. It's like the show is trying to appeal to older viewers with all these "Whatever Happened To Baby Jane" old ladies trying to make a career comeback AND to the idiot YA "Twilight" crowd who want to see teen girls doing dumb teen stuff. Seriously, who is the target demographic for this show now? It's not horror fans. So is it targeting "Murder She Wrote" old people? Middle-aged soccer mom Lifetime network viewers? The "Twilight" teen crowd? It's all over the place!

There's way too much estrogen going on this season, not enough female eye candy, and too much male-bashing. I just hope Kathy Bates doesn't get naked like in that creepy "Family Guy" hot tub sketch.

I almost didn't make it through the first episode of Season 3, and have no intention of wasting my time on this series ever again. And the preview of episode 2 begs the question, do we really need witches, zombies, AND Frankenstein? Why do all the same actors have to be crammed into each season even if they don't belong? It's like they're just writing roles to squeeze them in regardless of whether it advances the plot or not. Stupid, lazy writing.

The entire writing staff should be fired and the show runners/creators removed (yes, that means you, Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk for signing off on this brain-dead garbage), but I'd go one better if I were an FX executive and cancel the series. It's creatively bankrupt and has nothing new to say. It's not scary, not funny, it's nothing but junk that isn't doing the horror genre any favors. Honestly, it's like whoever's writing this isn't a horror fan and just wants to make it into a soap opera for weirdos, but without any of the charm of the original "Dark Shadows" TV series from the 1960s (not the crappy '90s reboot or the Johnny Depp/Tim Burton cinematic abortion).

Mockingbird Lane (2012 TV Movie)

Dumb, not funny, and insulting. Glad it got canceled.

[1/10 · 27 December 2012]

Completely pathetic, terrible re-imagining of The Munsters that can't decide whether it's a comedy, drama, or horror. Badly miscast in every role except Marilyn, badly written, and not funny, there's nothing to recommend it. It's an insult to the genius of the original and to its fans.

Loved Bryan Fuller's previous series, Dead Like Me, Pushing Daisies, and even Wonder Falls (once it finally got going), but this Munsters reboot was a painful misstep in his otherwise brilliant career. Fuller is better off creating his own quirky stuff from scratch than trying to slap his ideas onto someone else's work.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012)

Another groan-inducing pathetic money-grab typical of Hollywood

[1/10 · 17 December 2012]

This was a terrible, boring movie with all the awful comic relief, one-liners, and cartoonish, over-the-top retarded action typical of brain-dead Hollywood blockbuster garbage. The magic of the original trilogy is gone, replaced by Phantom Menace stupidity. This is a movie not even worth watching once, except for the only highlight, which is the riddling contest between Bilbo and Gollum--the rest of the movie is pointless drivel.

I almost fell asleep so many times only to open my eyes to yet another groan-inducing action scene or musical number. The Goblin King looks like Jar-Jar Binks on acid with a skin condition and goiter and about as much intelligence and personality. The three trolls behave like the Three Stooges. You only see Smaug the dragon for a few seconds and the Necromancer for less than that. Radagast the Brown is a crazy magic mushroom-tripping wizard with bird-poop running down his face and crusted to his beard who drives a magic sled pulled by giant bunny rabbits. Retarded!!! Hated all the new annoying characters except the main dwarfs (Thorin, Balin, and Dwalin, IIRC). Bilbo didn't get to do much. Other characters (Elrond, Galadriel, Saruman, Frodo) have pointless cameos and add zero to the story, just drag the unendurable running time out even further. There's some lame attempt to connect this story to the Lord of the Rings, but that amounts to a couple lines in a boring round-table conversation between the cameo cast.

Despite all the stupid action, nobody on the team ever dies or is in any real danger as they get saved at the last minute by Gandalf every time things don't go their way. So there's zero suspense. The action is so impossible to believe at times that it makes most cartoons look realistic by comparison. I suppose it's better than the god-awful Phantom Menace (which also only had one cool scene with Darth Maul's fight), but not by much. It feels like a parody of the original LotR trilogy. Shame on everyone involved for drinking the Kool Aid and signing off on this pathetic money-grab.

Corpse Eaters (1974)

Hilariously awful, incompetent, yet strangely compelling

[4/10 · 12 August 2012]

*** THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS ***

I thought I'd seen just about every zombie movie ever made, and especially everything from the '70s and '80s. Lo and behold my surprise when I stumbled across The Corpse Eaters, a 1974 Canadian crap-fest. I had to watch it. To say it starts off slow is an understatement. We get 12-minutes (including credits) of two boring old guys working at a funeral home. Nothing cool happens, but we do get a lot of voice-over narration as one of the old dudes drives his hearse around talking to himself about how he hates dead people.

Then we cut to a big long summer boating trip with four twenty-somethings (two boys, two girls--one uglier than the other, but neither is any great prize). After boating around the lake with cheesy music and no talking for minutes, they land on a deserted beach and are stared at by an owl in close-up for like 30-seconds. Then they get it on and the tops come off for some soft-core sex while a surprisingly not bad '70s rock instrumental plays over it. Then the hilariously awful dialog begins and we're almost 20-minutes into the 57-minute running time!

The girls wanna go to a rock concert, but the guys wanna spend the night in the graveyard on account of it's Friday the 13th. The guys win by drawing straws and so we're off to the graveyard. But it's rainy out, so the gang seeks shelter in an old mausoleum where the girls scream over a skeleton they find. Then the guys decide to invert a a crucifix and summon Satan because they are bored. "Lucifer, Lucifer! Barrabas Barrabas! By Santanis, Santanis!" (And yes, I know it should be "Satanis" but apparently the people making the movie don't.)

Lightning flashes and the dead rise from their graves with lots of gray fingers scrabbling up through the dirt. All right! Now the action can really begin! It's almost 30-minutes in and we've (finally) got zombies up and walking. About time.

*** WARNING! SPOILERS FOLLOW (BUT NOT THE FILM'S ENDING) ***

The first zombie attack comes at the 30-minute mark, but it's all in slow-mo with awful music playing over it. The better-looking girl dies under the zombie horde and the rest run for their car. One dude tries to hold the pursuing zombies back to help his friends escape, but gets bit in the process. The three do manage to speed away in their car, however.

This would be a good time to mention the film's cheap shock gimmick (explained at the beginning of the film). Every time a gore scene is about to happen, the film cuts to some old man holding a handkerchief over his mouth like he's gonna vomit. That's your cue to close your eyes if you've got a squeamish disposition. OK, soon after the first warning, we get to see zombies eating the girl's guts, but it's all rather dark and murky-looking. It does go on for a long time, however, and looks reasonably decent as far as zombie make-up, groans/eating noises, and gore FX go.

The three survivors head to the nearest hospital to get their bitten friend treated. Cue more boring stuff as doctors talk about nothing and we cut to random hospital equipment and clocks while a heart monitor beeps in the background. The bitten guy dies on the operating table. The doctor breaks the bad news, puzzled because his injuries weren't that bad, but nothing they did worked to save him. Then the ugly girl has bad dreams about zombies and making out with a dead dude, getting blood all over her lips. Her boyfriend comes to comfort her and she bites out his throat! Lots of spurting gore here! She then begins laughing in a deep voice like she's possessed. A fat blonde nurse comes in and screams at the mangled corpse, then gets stabbed to death by the possessed girl. Only this turns out be another dream, and the ugly girl and her boyfriend are still alive and OK.

We're 45-minutes in and suddenly cut back to the boring old guys at the funeral home talking about nothing. I won't give away the incomprehensible shock ending, but I will say there is one more zombie attack scene and somebody's eyeballs get ripped out of their head and eaten, so it's not all bad. But it's not good, either.

The Corpse Eaters is hilariously awful, incompetent, yet strangely compelling in that way only bad '70 movies can be. Then again, I'm a die-hard zombie fan, so I'll put up with just about anything to get my fix. Compared to normal movies, this gets a 1 out of 10, but compared to other low-budget '70s grind-house horror, I'll give it a 4. It does deliver on the zombie gore and some nudity. Probably the closest film The Corpse Eaters compares to is Bob Clark's Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things, but that looks like Dawn of the Dead compared to this.

Dead Season (2012)

Mediocre rip-off of Romero's Day of the Dead

[6/10 · 19 June 2012]

Dead Season is a mediocre rip-off of George A. Romero's Day of the Dead (1985, not to be confused with awful Sean S. Cunninhgam remake in name only from a few years back). We've got the tropical island (check), stupid, horny military dudes (check), mad doctor experiments (brief, but check), fenced-in compound (check), and zombie gore (check). What we don't have is a good movie. Oh, and the other film it rips off is Romero's terrible Survival of the Dead (by setting people up to go to an island of presumed safety).

The acting is okay, as are the zombie makeup and gore effects, and the music and cinematography are pretty good (a little too much shaky-cam here and there, however).

The weak link is the script, which is not only slow and predictable, but frequently makes no sense. The most egregious example being that the cast spend the whole movie fighting slow zombies and then, for no reason at all, all the new zombies that get made out of the survivors at the end are super-fast 28 Days Later-style killing machines (complete with bloody eyes). This would have been okay if it were explained, but it isn't. It's just sloppy writing.

There is pretty much zero character development. Unlike Romero's Day of the Dead, where even the lamest of the military goons had at least a scene or two spent developing their personalities and maybe giving them a memorable line or two, the goons here are completely forgettable, interchangeable zeros. So who cares when they die? And the two leads aren't very interesting. The redhead is annoying, and the paramedic dude is too nice. They don't grow or change or do anything cool, at least not enough to make me root for them. The screenwriters need to read a copy of Blake Snyder's Save The Cat! and/or Jeffrey Schechter's My Story Can Beat Up Your Story! to learn how to write a good screenplay.

Dead Season takes itself seriously (a bit too much so, as there are not enough lighter moments to give you a break from the overall grimness). It's not a bad movie, just not a very good one. It's better than any of the nonsense the SyFy Channel produces, but that's not saying much. Zombie fans will no doubt be able to sit through this film and be moderately entertained if they have nothing better to watch.

Anti-hero (1999)

Bizarre and obscure superhero film

[7/10 · 5 June 2012]

This obscure, no-budget superhero movie tells the story of Ace Baldwin, who plays WonderBoy on the "Magna Max and WonderBoy Super Power Hour" TV show. Ace is fed-up with his life as a D-list celebrity in tights, and sick of his leading man co-star getting all the chicks and fan mail. So Ace decides to drown his sorrow in booze, drugs, and bad decisions.

Things get bad when Ace steals a gallon of "synthetic heroin" (which looks suspiciously like watered-down milk) from a local drug lord and tries to sell it for some quick cash. The middlemen he uses to front the deal all get killed, but not before ratting Ace out. A trio of bumbling hit men are hired to murder Ace, and they try to snipe him off the set of his TV show. This leads to a brief high-speed car chase between the criminals and the two actors playing Magna Max and WonderBoy (both in costume and driving their Magna- Mobile super car). The TV heroes hit a dead-end and are forced to bail out on foot in the woods. There's a bloody shoot-out and then it seems like the movie just ran out of money by the abrupt way it ends. Then we get like 10 minutes of the slowest-scrolling credits in film history. I don't even think the rest of the film's an hour long.

It's a bizarre, uneven movie that's never quite sure whether it's supposed to be a comedy, drama, or action movie. Still, it has a weird kind of charm to it (even if sometimes you are laughing at it instead of with it). The best parts are the random cutaways to clips from the superhero TV show. These are hilariously cheesy and pay obvious heartfelt homage to the old Adam West Batman series from the 60s. Honestly, if the whole movie had been about the superhero show (or better yet, a real superhero movie) instead of obsessed with so much lame drug angst, this would be a much tighter, more focused film.

To be fair, there are a few other good parts to the movie—the three hit men are pretty funny but don't show up until about 45 minutes in, which is when the pacing finally speeds up. The action-packed shootout at the end is probably the most dynamic and polished section of the film. It's also surprisingly gory. For example, there's a great juicy head shot that takes one of the killers out using old school gore FX, not CGI.

The film was made by some of the same cast and crew who did The Necro Files (1997). It is also the last film the director, Matt Jaissle, shot before 300 Killers (2010).

Exit Humanity (2011)

Slow, boring and arty

[6/10 · 2 June 2012]

This is pretty slow and boring. The zombie makeup isn't that great (and washes off during the water attack scenes). The gore is mostly just off-screen (head smashing sound effects) or CGI, which is lame. The acting is OK, but I could not connect to any of the characters. There's too much voice-over narration and too many scenes of the lead screaming and crying and wanting to kill himself. He comes off as kinda pathetic and not hero material. The film reminded me of a pretentious art-house movie disguised as horror. It's shot well and I enjoyed the animated segments, but there's just not enough action, gore, or compelling dialog to make this a good film. Pretty much wanted to shut it off by the halfway mark as it was putting me to sleep. It takes itself seriously, which is good, but then it goes a step too seriously. There's no sense of humor, no light moments, so the unrelenting negativity becomes a real turn-off. To be a really great zombie movie, there needs to be a balance between adventure, doom, and humor like George A. Romero's original Dawn of the Dead. Even the misguided Dawn remake understood this. Unfortunately, Exit Humanity doesn't and that's why it fails.

Soul of the Demon (1991 Video)

Surprisingly fun cheesy gore-fest!

[8/10 · 15 April 2012]

First off, this is a bad movie, but so bad it's good! The characters are so hilariously terrible, the script so relentlessly boneheaded, that the movie actually becomes enjoyable. This movie has more heart and soul than the last ten Hollywood blockbusters put together. You totally get that the people who made this little SOV horror flick really believed in what they were doing (even if they didn't always know what they were doing).

It's also a really fun time capsule movie that takes us back to a time when everyone had big stupid hair and called each other "Dude!" every few seconds. The gore ain't bad, either, considering the budget. Would have liked a little nudity, but I guess you can't have everything.

If you love cheesy 80s horror, this is pretty much a prime example of it. It gets a solid 7.5 stars from me, and I would definitely call this one of the best shot-on-video horror movies of all time ('cause we all know how rotten most SOV flicks are--especially the ones made back in the 80s and 90s).

The basic plot has two junior high morons dig up a possessed satanic statue. One kid's older metal-head brother and his lunkhead friends (complete with mullets) decide to hold a séance with their girlfriends on Halloween night in a haunted house. Naturally, they call upon the soul of the demon from the statue, who then possesses the little brother. He gets all demonic looking (like a bargain basement Freddy Krueger) and uses black magic to kill the head-banging morons and their girls, but fortunately, he does this without spouting off any stupid one-liners. Who will survive and what will be left of them? Can the soul of the demon be put back into its statue prison?

Typical dialog: A stoner dude goes to take a leak in the woods behind the house (talking to himself the whole way like he just stepped out of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure), and says, "Whoa! This tree looks fine. I think you been drinking too much beer, dude! Oh, man! Smells like some righteous doo-doo, man!" And then the demon kills him. Hysterical!

For all you gore fans, here's the scoop: All but the final death scene are of the black magic levitating object/telekinesis variety. In no particular order: a girl is cut open by a wood saw (from between her legs), girl's eyeball punctured by tree branch (comes out the back of her dead), dude gets his head twisted all the way around to break his neck, girl levitated off bed and ripped in two, dude's head explodes after complaining of headache and nosebleed (which he attributes to all the "rough sex" he's been having, LOL), another dude gets levitated and pinned to a wall then ripped in half so all his guts fall out, and yet another dude gets his spine ripped out and thrown away.

Some of these scenes are more suggestive than explicit (like the wood saw between the legs, although we do get a panty shot), while others (like the girl ripped in half) are quite graphic. But the absolute best, most awesome gore scene (worthy of Tom Savini) is the meat cleaver to the face one girl gets. It cuts the top half of her head off at an angle, gore spews out, then we see her upside-down, chopped off head with its big gold hoop earrings still looking around, just like that one zombie shovel scene in George Romero's Day of the Dead (1985). There are some obvious nods to Sam Raimi's Evil Dead (1981) and Lucio Fulci's Zombie (1979) as well: bedsheets pinning a girl down to be sawed in half and sharp wood slicing through a girl's eyeball. This flick is definitely a cult classic and real guilty pleasure. Well worth hunting down if you're into this sort of thing.

The Mad (2007)

Garbage!

[1/10 · 22 May 2007]

This movie totally sucks!!! It's not funny, it's not scary, it's just a bunch of brain-dead crap with unlikeable characters in one of the dumbest scripts I've ever seen. A shameful waste of time and money that even die-hard zombie fans will most likely fail to appreciate. Zombie hamburgers attack people. People eat the infected hamburgers and turn into foaming-at-the-mouth "zombie" killers. The acting is okay, the directing is okay, but the script is the foundation and this should never have been produced. It is just so unbelievably rock-bottom bad! The Mad is confused as to what it wants to be, and in doing so, fails to satisfy comedy or horror fans on any level. Then there are the constant marijuana references and smoking that were completely unnecessary. Avoid this like the (zombie) plague!

Mulva: Zombie Ass Kicker! (2000 Video)

Absolute Garbage!!!

[1/10 · 4 February 2007]

Mulva is awful. Possibly the worst movie ever made, and not in a good way. The girl on the DVD box is sexy--too bad she ain't in the movie! The girl in the movie is, IMO, a disgusting troll whom no amount of intoxication could make attractive. The whole thing stinks and looks like it cost 50 cents to throw together in a couple hours--the fact that it probably cost more and took longer does a further disservice to the reputation of cast and crew. Filthy McNasty (included on the double-feature DVD) is also pure crap. These no-talent, backyard films from Tempe, SubRosa and EI Cinema are the reason most people hate SOV. Anyone who regards this garbage as anything even remotely entertaining is delusional or being paid off to say so.

Necro Files 2: Behind the Screams (2003 Video)

Super Funny!!!

[10/10 · 30 July 2006]

This hilarious eight minute "behind the scenes" short was a special feature on the Necro Files 2 DVD releases in the USA, France and Germany. It features all kinds of wacky stuff going on--and going wrong! I'd tell you more but I don't want to give away any surprises--let's just say you won't believe your eyes! You can really see how much fun everyone on the cast and crew had making Necro Files 2, and you get a real feel for what the cast and crew are like in real life--as well as some of the pitfalls of making a low-budget horror movie. It contains copious nudity, gore and bad language that would put John Waters to shame. I've never laughed so hard in my life!

Dead Meat (2004)

One of the best low-budget zombie movies I've seen!

[7/10 · 17 February 2006]

If you ever wanted to see a low-budget shot on video flesh-eating zombie movie that takes place in rural Ireland, Dead Meat is for you! The director moves his camera around constantly; as a result, it's shot with more style than most SOV flicks. The zombie make-up is passable. Gore FX are good and plentiful, but the idiotic comic book way the heroes kill some of the zombies knocks the film down a peg (such as the heroine throwing her high-heeled shoe into the eye of a zombie). There are some major inconsistencies in zombie mythology: The heroine bites a zombie on the ankle to get it to let her go -- why isn't she infected? Why does the zombie react to such a minor wound? Many zombies use weapons (yet none can figure out how to break into a car), and one runs away to avoid getting killed! Dead Meat alternates between taking itself too seriously and not seriously enough. This ends up being its major flaw (that and sometimes the accents are so thick you can't understand the actors). The film is jam-packed full of zombie action so you won't be bored. I'm looking forward to seeing the director's next film; he shows a lot of promise. Dead Meat is definitely worth a look for zombie and low-budget horror/gore fans, as well as anyone interested in low-budget film-making. DVD includes the director's cool short film Brain Eater, trailers and a making of.

Dead End (I) (2003)

Finely crafted, intelligent horror with excellent cast

[8/10 · 20 November 2004]

Dead End is an excellent example of what you can do on a low budget with a small cast and just a few locations. Mystery and horror are perfect genres to excel under these conditions, and the filmmakers here take full advantage, crafting a wonderfully paranoid, claustrophobic and eerie dream-like atmosphere. The movie is totally character driven, and we spend a lot of time getting to know and care about the main characters. The gore was minimal, but effective, and there is one truly horrifying gore effect (you will know it when you see it).

The plot involves a family of four (plus the daughter's boyfriend) on their way to the mom's relatives for Christmas Eve. The father (Ray Wise) decides to take the "scenic route" and after a near head-on collision with another vehicle in the first few minutes, they pick up a ghostly hitchhiker, and soon after, the horror begins. The family is seemingly trapped on a deserted, heavily forested country road, unable to find their way out... Saying anything more will spoil your enjoyment of the film. Watching the characters react to their steadily worsening situation is a true pleasure, as they convey the film's sense of horror, shock and panic far better than any cheap gore effects or man in a rubber monster suit ever could. As the story progresses, the characters reveal dark secrets about themselves that really add to the fun... things they would not have said were things not looking so grim!

I really loved this movie, up to a point. The ending was predictable, clichéd and a big letdown after spending so much time invested in the characters trying to escape their fate. However, almost everything up to that point was a lot of fun, especially the dialogue, which was FANTASTIC. The main cast was GREAT, especially Ray Wise and the actress who played his daughter. Everyone was great except Steve Valentine, who apparently cannot act any different (or better) than his character on TV's Crossing Jordan. The female doctor at the end wasn't very good, either (I thought it was Shannon Tweed until I read the end credits!). Thankfully, these two don't appear until the end, which kind of sucked anyway (though their rather poor acting didn't help matters, it was ultimately the script's fault).

The minimalist instrumental music is really creepy and worth mentioning.

I give Dead End an "8" out of 10. With a revised ending, it could have easily garnered a "9" or "10." In a sea of brain-dead garbage "B" and grade "Z" horror movies, Dead End stands out at the front of the pack. I wish more low budget horror movies could be this finely crafted and intelligent. This movie is definitely highly recommended viewing for aspiring low budget filmmakers and horror fans.

Ali G Indahouse (2002)

Ali G Gets No "Respek"

[1/10 · 3 November 2004]

As a fan of "Da Ali G Show" on HBO, I had high hopes for this film. I should have known better when it went straight to video.... and then none of my local video stores carried it! The problem with this film is it simply tries too hard. I did not not want to see the Ali G character in his home environment or running for parliament or saving England. In my opinion, the "Ali G" character only works when he is operating OUTSIDE his environment --- so we can laugh at how unbelievably stupid he is and laugh even harder at the frustrated, often angry reaction his sincere stupidity arouses in all those unfortunate to encounter him. This movie bombs horribly due to the throwaway script, and as a result, it is an interminable exercise in sheer boredom with maybe 3-4 genuine laughs to be had in TOTAL. I well and truly HATED it from frame one and it just NEVER got any better (despite crossing my fingers and gritting my teeth). I think Sascha Baron Cohen has talent (his TV show proves it), but this movie shows absolutely NONE of that talent.

Dawn of the Mummy (1981)

The last 15 minutes are insanely gory fun!

[6/10 · 30 October 2004]

This film is a bit of a clunker, slow-paced until the mummy and his flesh-eating zombies go on a rampage near the end. Then the movie turns into one of the most entertaining, enjoyable bloodbaths ever filmed! The real trick is sitting through the rest of the film to get there, though I just watched it again TWICE! Once with audio commentary, which explained a lot about what the director went through trying to sneak in gore and nudity while shooting in an uptight Arabic country with a Government Film Censor standing over his shoulder. The film is not quite as bad or boring as I remember it being from watching it cut on cable back in the 1980s. Now that it's finally out on DVD (in a nice remastered, uncut print with cool audio commentary by the director), we can skip past the wafer-thin plot about fashion models in the desert entering a cursed Pharaoh's tomb and get right to the good stuff... the last 15 minutes of the movie, which I guarantee you'll watch over and over again in amazement. A great Arabic horror soundtrack by Shuki Levy (Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers) adds immeasurably to the fun. This is one of only a few mummy gorefests ever made. The other big one (which is often badly censored on video if you can find it at all) is Paul Naschy's "The Mummy's Revenge," which is a slightly better and more consistently gory film, IMO, though still no great prize. What makes Dawn of the Mummy so special is that it has a small army of diseased flesh-eating zombies IN ADDITION to the killer mummy, ultra-gory intestine-ripping violence, a great soundtrack, a hilariously cheesy rip-off title (George Romero's Dawn of the Dead had come out a few years earlier), and---surprise--it is actually shot in Egypt, unlike just about every other mummy movie ever made. Dawn of the Mummy is cheap enough on DVD that die-hard splatter fans and/or zombie completist (when aren't they the same?) won't feel guilty for adding this moldy oldie to their horror collection.

Baadasssss! (2003)

Wanna make a movie? Watch this film!

[10/10 · 29 October 2004]

Badasss really shows the struggles independent filmmakers go through to get their visions up on the screen... Mario does an inspired job of portraying his father, Melvin van Peebles, as he goes through complete and utter hell to get his grand cinematic vision "Sweet Sweetback's Badasss Song" made. It turns out the behind the scenes story is a million times better than the original film! To top it off, a great supporting cast puts in some of their best and most memorable performances: Adam West, David Alan Grier, Vincent Schiavelli, Sally Struthers, Saul Rubinek... Lots of great characters pop up in this film!

If you are a fan of independent film-making, or enjoy '70s black action cinema, you will LOVE Badasss! This film has a lot of truth in it about both subjects. I gladly give it a "10" and would watch it again. Kudos to everyone involved, and especially to Mario, who finally gets it right both as an actor and director! This film is so damn good it's a CRIME that more people won't see it. Rent or buy it NOW!!!

13 Seconds (2003 Video)

Pretentious Nonsense Devoid Of Entertainment Value

[1/10 · 29 October 2004]

This movie stinks!!! What is all the hype about? It deserved no awards, no festival fanfare, no attention whatsoever. It's so boring, pretentious and incompetent it doesn't even deserve to be released! 13 Seconds is just another shot on video, no budget loser put in a nice, shiny box to fool you into thinking there might be some production value or creativity behind it. But... nothing happens in this film (certainly nothing interesting or remotely scary). The special effects are laughable and few and far between. The acting is terrible (especially the hillbilly fat guy with the funny hair cut) and to top it off, everyone is so badly DUBBED in post it looks like a kung-fu movie from the '70s whenever anybody opens their big, ugly mouth (and they sound like their dialogue was rerecorded in an empty warehouse for all the echo on it). Do we really need another rotten horror movie about a rock-n-roll band? Did we learn nothing from the 1980s and films like Hard Rock Zombies or Black Roses? Watching this movie for even "13 seconds" is a waste of time. Shame on Lion's Gate for releasing this timid, wet fart of a horror movie! I give it a "1" only because the rating system doesn't go any lower... Avoid 13 Seconds like the plague!

Salem's Lot (2004)

Missed Opportunity

[5/10 · 22 June 2004]

I had high hopes for this, but TNT let me down... badly. The original Tobe Hooper miniseries moved quickly, had a memorable theme song, and delivered up some decent scares. This version makes stupid changes for no good reason... turning characters black and gay (just to be "PC"), making the vampires spin around and turn to dust ala Buffy and Blade (through ridiculous CGI), drastically changing the ending, and reducing Straker's death to a pointless offscreen one --- as one of only two main villains, making his death a "throw away" is a terrible idea. The music is overblown and sounds like it belongs in a different movie --- the film ends with an awful cover of the Rolling Stones's "Paint It Black". Not terribly creative. At least The Devil's Advocate had the good sense to use the original Stones version, not some cheap cover by a talentless but trendy metal band.

Rutger Hauer is good (but poorly dressed) as the vampire Barlowe, playing him more like the eloquent Count Dracula of the book than the silent (but scary as hell) Nosferatu of the original miniseries. Many parts are badly miscast --- most of the acting is bland and does nothing to inspire you to care about the characters --- particularly Rob Lowe. Donald Sutherland (looking more like Santa Claus than a credible villain) is nowhere near as good at inspiring fear as James Mason was as Straker in the original. James Cromwell is great as Father Callahan.

This new miniseries is banal, boring, convoluted and insulting to Stephen King's greatest book. I wasn't scared once during this bloated mess, yet jumped out of my seat at least twice when watching the original, and felt unnerved throughout --- even though it wasn't a particularly faithful adaptation. This one tries to be more faithful but then throws it all away by making stupid changes --- the same kind of "Politically Correct" nonsense and "ooh, let's make it dark and gritty and throw in lots of junky CGI effects" that ruined the new Battlestar Galactica miniseries. Doesn't Stephen King have enough clout to get script approval? Where is the quality control? The TNT version of Salem's Lot is a travesty of missed opportunities... all it makes me want to do (besides tear my hair out in bored frustration) is reread the book or watch the original Tobe Hooper version... Nosferatu and all.