Glad he didn't totally stuff it up despite his own best efforts (whining about being typecast before his first Bond film is out, the look - although he can't really help that!, the blond thing when he has had dark hair for other films, and the traditionally inverse relationship between quality of actors and reception as Bond - q.v. excellent actor Timothy Dalton), but there's no doubt this one would make an absolute shedload no matter what anyone thinks of Daniel Craig or the new direction - it's the next film that will suffer if the audience reacts badly! Also encouraged by the comments about the music, after the horrifically un-Bond theme song by that Audioslave guy... and still pimping for the use of All Mine by Portishead one day, the best Bond-sounding song to have nothing to do with the franchise!
Hadn't been holding up for the car chase after the hideously done crash in the trailer, glad the rest of the action makes up for it! Only question is, when to see it that won't be full of annoying chavs? As is, will probably going to have to pay stupidly over the odds for deluxe screen if its 2 1/2 hours as won't survive the torture that is standard Cineworld seating up here...
Also thoroughly enjoyed Feast, but would contend that it's better the less you know about it!
films we just saw
-
streetrw
- Frightfest Hardcore
- Posts: 1560
- Joined: Sun Mar 27, 2005 5:54 pm
- Location: A hell of my own making
- Contact:
Red Road I took this one in at the Cineworld Haymarket whilst in London for the FF all-nighter. One day Glasgow CCTV operator Jackie sees a face on her monitors that she hoped she never would again. She locates him and worms her way into his life in an act of anger and revenge.
It's quite absorbing, but pretty grim and depressing viewing as well - there are no laughs in the film; and Glasgow looks to be the most miserable hellhole in the civilised world. And it doesn't seem to want to follow the expected steps of a thriller, it's more of a psychological drama. We're not told until late on in the movie why this man is so important to Jackie that she'll commit very surprising, disturbing acts against him. Interesting to watch though. (Note: it does also contain one of the most graphic sex scenes in a mainstream release in recent years, almost veering on porn at some points.)
It's quite absorbing, but pretty grim and depressing viewing as well - there are no laughs in the film; and Glasgow looks to be the most miserable hellhole in the civilised world. And it doesn't seem to want to follow the expected steps of a thriller, it's more of a psychological drama. We're not told until late on in the movie why this man is so important to Jackie that she'll commit very surprising, disturbing acts against him. Interesting to watch though. (Note: it does also contain one of the most graphic sex scenes in a mainstream release in recent years, almost veering on porn at some points.)
I recently watched Night of the Demon on the horror channel. I don't know why the title says Demon, it's about Bigfoot and is a prequel to Bigfoot and the Hendersons.
Actually it was pretty good, very gorey and very funny. Bigfoot pulls men's willies off and reaches into tummies to pull guts out. Just cos he can. It's one of the video nasties I think and apparently the version I watched was uncut.
Weird, tuneless music too. Anyone seen it?
Actually it was pretty good, very gorey and very funny. Bigfoot pulls men's willies off and reaches into tummies to pull guts out. Just cos he can. It's one of the video nasties I think and apparently the version I watched was uncut.
Weird, tuneless music too. Anyone seen it?
Bring her to me, you bum. I'll take care of business.
This was one of the best films in our infamous 4-film Night of the Night of Movies Night Zombie Club...
Night of the Demon (1980)
Plot
Professor Nugent and his students embark on a journey to locate Bigfoot. After a whole load of flashbacks, they find him.
Rawshark
Suitably loosened up, both in liquid refreshment and by the last screening of Creeps, we headed straight into Night of the Demon. All I knew of Demon was that it was originally on the 1984 UK Video Nasties list, it includes one scene where a Yeti rips off a motorcyclist’s penis and that it features lots of flashbacks (and flashbacks (within flashbacks) !) Sounds dodgy, I know, but Night of the Demon ended up being fantastic fun, and a little gem of a Yeti movie, prompting Zomblee to mourn the fact that there really aren’t enough good Yeti movies out there. It’s true, because apart from this and Legend of Boggy Creek, there really aren’t.
The film opens with Professor Nugent in hospital, all bandaged up after having only just survived a Yeti attack, as he tells his story of his encounter to the surrounding doctors. Cut to the first flashback of the film as we get a first person camera view of the Yeti, complete with red circle (“DemonVision!” – Jim) as it attacks and kills a man by ripping his arm off. It’s not great gore, but the scene is certainly effective enough and sets up the trend for the film, which is mostly a series of flashback clips of stories of the Yeti’s slayings.
These clips include a couple fucking in a camper van, a sleeping camper swung around the Yeti’s head in his sleeping bag and thrown onto a tree branch (yeah, go figure – but it got the most cheers!), an axe-killing of a woodsman, two girl guides grimly forced to slash each other to death, and the afore-mentioned penis rip (which really didn’t need to be rewound and watched again, but hey…)
It’s not the best film ever made, not by a long shot, but it does bundle along with terrific gusto, and it’s hard not to get carried away with the fun of it all. Some great gore, a hypnotised spooky girl called Wanda (“Well, officially this is a hypnotised flashback…” – Jim), a brilliantly laughable Yeti (in slow-motion no less in the final attack scenes!) and Professor Nugent’s bandage-mouth which had all of us in stitches, especially Steve. Night of the Demon is a true guilty pleasure; just what we love here at Zombie Club.
“Certify this man as criminally insane!”
For the rest of the comments on this film and the other three films (Night of the Comet, Night of the Creeps and Night of the Bloody Apes) visit the Zombie Club article at;
http://www.eatmybrains.com/showzc.php?id=39
Night of the Demon (1980)
Plot
Professor Nugent and his students embark on a journey to locate Bigfoot. After a whole load of flashbacks, they find him.
Rawshark
Suitably loosened up, both in liquid refreshment and by the last screening of Creeps, we headed straight into Night of the Demon. All I knew of Demon was that it was originally on the 1984 UK Video Nasties list, it includes one scene where a Yeti rips off a motorcyclist’s penis and that it features lots of flashbacks (and flashbacks (within flashbacks) !) Sounds dodgy, I know, but Night of the Demon ended up being fantastic fun, and a little gem of a Yeti movie, prompting Zomblee to mourn the fact that there really aren’t enough good Yeti movies out there. It’s true, because apart from this and Legend of Boggy Creek, there really aren’t.
The film opens with Professor Nugent in hospital, all bandaged up after having only just survived a Yeti attack, as he tells his story of his encounter to the surrounding doctors. Cut to the first flashback of the film as we get a first person camera view of the Yeti, complete with red circle (“DemonVision!” – Jim) as it attacks and kills a man by ripping his arm off. It’s not great gore, but the scene is certainly effective enough and sets up the trend for the film, which is mostly a series of flashback clips of stories of the Yeti’s slayings.
These clips include a couple fucking in a camper van, a sleeping camper swung around the Yeti’s head in his sleeping bag and thrown onto a tree branch (yeah, go figure – but it got the most cheers!), an axe-killing of a woodsman, two girl guides grimly forced to slash each other to death, and the afore-mentioned penis rip (which really didn’t need to be rewound and watched again, but hey…)
It’s not the best film ever made, not by a long shot, but it does bundle along with terrific gusto, and it’s hard not to get carried away with the fun of it all. Some great gore, a hypnotised spooky girl called Wanda (“Well, officially this is a hypnotised flashback…” – Jim), a brilliantly laughable Yeti (in slow-motion no less in the final attack scenes!) and Professor Nugent’s bandage-mouth which had all of us in stitches, especially Steve. Night of the Demon is a true guilty pleasure; just what we love here at Zombie Club.
“Certify this man as criminally insane!”
For the rest of the comments on this film and the other three films (Night of the Comet, Night of the Creeps and Night of the Bloody Apes) visit the Zombie Club article at;
http://www.eatmybrains.com/showzc.php?id=39
It's horrible... I love it... What is it?
-
giles edwards
- Undead Horde
- Posts: 425
- Joined: Sun Apr 02, 2006 7:01 pm
As a Kevin Tenney fan, I thought it was going to be about his Halloween night opus (that picture picture, Witchboard and its first sequel and Witchtrap are sharp, pacy b pictures in the best sense. And Peacekeeper plays a great double bill with Craig Baxley's Dark Angel.)
Sadly I was mistaken.
But this sounds pretty swell and anything that sits on a bill more than happily with the rather wonderful Night Of The Creeps is fine with me.
Nice work as ever, fellas. I'll have to track this and Night Of The Comet (which I've been searching for for a while) with due alacrity.
Sadly I was mistaken.
But this sounds pretty swell and anything that sits on a bill more than happily with the rather wonderful Night Of The Creeps is fine with me.
Nice work as ever, fellas. I'll have to track this and Night Of The Comet (which I've been searching for for a while) with due alacrity.
[i]"Would you like to take a closer look ?"[/i]
-
streetrw
- Frightfest Hardcore
- Posts: 1560
- Joined: Sun Mar 27, 2005 5:54 pm
- Location: A hell of my own making
- Contact:
SAW III. Well, nobody fainted, threw up or went into spasms. This is the film that has supposedly people passing out in Cineworld Stevenage. I've been to Cineworld Stevenage and it's the only cinema where I've got my money back TWICE (once because they were unable to control their clientele's insatiable need to jabber like baboons throughout the entirety of Tobe Hooper's Toolbox Murders, and once because a little things like power outages didn't stop them from selling tickets to films which would be plunged into total blackness at random intervals due to intense summer heat, so they took two of their "staff" off the tills to issue refunds to all their customers while still having just one person selling tickets to an ever-lengthening queue sweltering to death in the aforementioned intense summer heat). Said cinema being clearly managed and run by the leftovers of botched genetic experiments involving haddock, I've refused point blank to ever set foot in the damned place again.
SAW III, to be fair, is pretty intense stuff; even nastier than the last Texas Chainsaw movie and as gleefully sadistic as anything I can recall in the last few years - probably even more twisted than the first two Saw movies though I'd have to see them again to be sure. Games within games and a typically nasty, downbeat ending - but there's several of those sequences that play a bit like trailers, with separate lines of dialogue strung together to connect them, and rapid montages of subliminal single-frame shots against discordant crescendos on the soundtrack. Also, I think you really need to have seen the first two, otherwise a lot of this won't make any sense as it refers back to and restages events from both. I was taken aback in places by the bloodshed and splatter, but I did enjoy it.
SAW III, to be fair, is pretty intense stuff; even nastier than the last Texas Chainsaw movie and as gleefully sadistic as anything I can recall in the last few years - probably even more twisted than the first two Saw movies though I'd have to see them again to be sure. Games within games and a typically nasty, downbeat ending - but there's several of those sequences that play a bit like trailers, with separate lines of dialogue strung together to connect them, and rapid montages of subliminal single-frame shots against discordant crescendos on the soundtrack. Also, I think you really need to have seen the first two, otherwise a lot of this won't make any sense as it refers back to and restages events from both. I was taken aback in places by the bloodshed and splatter, but I did enjoy it.
-
giles edwards
- Undead Horde
- Posts: 425
- Joined: Sun Apr 02, 2006 7:01 pm
I thought it was pretty awful.
An entire picture predicated on the off-chance your unpredictable disciple is going to go off the rails at the exact moment your new victim breaks free ?
Urgh.
A new victim, by the way, who you must have been able to keep awesomely close tabs on from your hospital bed and labyrinthine lair while the rest of your waking moments were spent setting up massive iron-wrought contraptions ?
Kudos to Bouseman for duping some hefty dough out of the cinema-going public, but I hope beyond hope this doesn't get him some rep as a 'good' horror director. Nothing that works in the picture (which is very little) is anything to do with the direction. Good f/x work though, that's for sure (aside from the glaringly obvious fake head in the surgery sequence).
Hostel may be a relatively grim, if lightweight, romp, but it has leagues more style, wit, verve, pace and heart than this awful, pointlesly nihilistic series which started pretty well and went downhill faster than Police Academy: Assignment Miami Beach.
There's a Kevin Smith-circa-1994-style observational skit in there somewhere about the skilled iron-monger population of the West coast that has unwittingly assisted Jigsaw since whenever-it-was-his-plan-started (and whatever length hair Shawnee Smith had at the time):
"You want what? A 3 ton crucifix with a rack attachment for twisting limbs? What's this for now?"
Thank the youth of America and capacity for lapping gratingly edited, hideously reductive gore-porn. I can't wait to see what "the new Saw" will be. Don Murphy's recently announced Faces Of Death picture, probably.
This is why I liked Adam Mason's Boken quote a bit - judicious grimness with at the very least (and really, it's a lot more) a concession to depth.
An entire picture predicated on the off-chance your unpredictable disciple is going to go off the rails at the exact moment your new victim breaks free ?
Urgh.
A new victim, by the way, who you must have been able to keep awesomely close tabs on from your hospital bed and labyrinthine lair while the rest of your waking moments were spent setting up massive iron-wrought contraptions ?
Kudos to Bouseman for duping some hefty dough out of the cinema-going public, but I hope beyond hope this doesn't get him some rep as a 'good' horror director. Nothing that works in the picture (which is very little) is anything to do with the direction. Good f/x work though, that's for sure (aside from the glaringly obvious fake head in the surgery sequence).
Hostel may be a relatively grim, if lightweight, romp, but it has leagues more style, wit, verve, pace and heart than this awful, pointlesly nihilistic series which started pretty well and went downhill faster than Police Academy: Assignment Miami Beach.
There's a Kevin Smith-circa-1994-style observational skit in there somewhere about the skilled iron-monger population of the West coast that has unwittingly assisted Jigsaw since whenever-it-was-his-plan-started (and whatever length hair Shawnee Smith had at the time):
"You want what? A 3 ton crucifix with a rack attachment for twisting limbs? What's this for now?"
Thank the youth of America and capacity for lapping gratingly edited, hideously reductive gore-porn. I can't wait to see what "the new Saw" will be. Don Murphy's recently announced Faces Of Death picture, probably.
This is why I liked Adam Mason's Boken quote a bit - judicious grimness with at the very least (and really, it's a lot more) a concession to depth.
[i]"Would you like to take a closer look ?"[/i]
Just come back From Scenes of A Sexual Nature.
This was enjoyable fluff film. Some good shots of Hampstead. Some of the couples and stories were hit and miss. The best story was the old couple.
For the chaps on the fourm. There is another Lynx advert which I thought was amusing. Stampeding ladies!! Shame there is not a female version with stampeding Daniel Craig lookalikes!!!!
This was enjoyable fluff film. Some good shots of Hampstead. Some of the couples and stories were hit and miss. The best story was the old couple.
For the chaps on the fourm. There is another Lynx advert which I thought was amusing. Stampeding ladies!! Shame there is not a female version with stampeding Daniel Craig lookalikes!!!!
"We Who Walk Here Walk Alone"
-
streetrw
- Frightfest Hardcore
- Posts: 1560
- Joined: Sun Mar 27, 2005 5:54 pm
- Location: A hell of my own making
- Contact:
****** SAW III SPOILER ALERT ******
How many times have we seen the maniac loom up behind his victim from out of the darkness, when there was no way he could predict that's where s/he would be? Leaping out of a closet just as s/he comes wandering past? In SAW III specifically, the maniac is hiding in Dina Meyer's bedroom - though not in the closet - but it only works if Meyer decides to watch the video in her bedroom and not the lounge, which would presumably leave the maniac standing upstairs waiting for her. Really, if they've got to be a bit implausible to get the characters where they want, that smacks of dodgy writing, but if they move fast enough with enough verve and energy you might not notice, or even if you do you might not mind so much (at least until afterwards). I didn't mind, but I guess you did.
The other thoughts about Saw III - It was Amanda rather than Jigsaw who did all the work capturing Jeff and the others, and setting up all the traps and designing the machines. Probably under the direction of the dying Jigsaw, but she did build the exploding collar so she's not incapable. Besides, it's entirely possible that as the whole thing is really a test for Amanda, Jigsaw might not have been quite as sick as he made out.
Granted. But a whole load of films, some of them genre classics, are predicated on a level of coincidence and implausibility. Halloween is based on the idea that Michael escapes from the asylum on that particular night AND manages to drive a car all the way back home AND all the parents are conveniently off at a party or something.giles edwards wrote:I thought it was pretty awful.
An entire picture predicated on the off-chance your unpredictable disciple is going to go off the rails at the exact moment your new victim breaks free ?
Urgh.
A new victim, by the way, who you must have been able to keep awesomely close tabs on from your hospital bed and labyrinthine lair while the rest of your waking moments were spent setting up massive iron-wrought contraptions ?
How many times have we seen the maniac loom up behind his victim from out of the darkness, when there was no way he could predict that's where s/he would be? Leaping out of a closet just as s/he comes wandering past? In SAW III specifically, the maniac is hiding in Dina Meyer's bedroom - though not in the closet - but it only works if Meyer decides to watch the video in her bedroom and not the lounge, which would presumably leave the maniac standing upstairs waiting for her. Really, if they've got to be a bit implausible to get the characters where they want, that smacks of dodgy writing, but if they move fast enough with enough verve and energy you might not notice, or even if you do you might not mind so much (at least until afterwards). I didn't mind, but I guess you did.
The other thoughts about Saw III - It was Amanda rather than Jigsaw who did all the work capturing Jeff and the others, and setting up all the traps and designing the machines. Probably under the direction of the dying Jigsaw, but she did build the exploding collar so she's not incapable. Besides, it's entirely possible that as the whole thing is really a test for Amanda, Jigsaw might not have been quite as sick as he made out.
Well, I hated Broken because it was ugly, tedious, badly acted, and basically consisted of the abuse and subjugation of the auteur's wife for almost the entire running time. I didn't find any depth, any light relief even of the most macabre variety, any visual flair. It hasn't provoked thought beyond how the hell Adam Mason continues to get his films made and screened. Saw III hasn't really provoked that much thought either, but the bottom line is that it was more fun while it was on.giles edwards wrote:This is why I liked Adam Mason's Boken quote a bit - judicious grimness with at the very least (and really, it's a lot more) a concession to depth.
-
thesavageintruder
- Running Zombie
- Posts: 144
- Joined: Sun May 14, 2006 8:00 pm
Well said streetrw - i have never understood genre fans who criticise something for being unbelievable or too reliant on coincidence, given that so many of horror's greatest movies and greatest movies rely on the viewer's acceptance of implausabilities and carefully contrived coincidences. Surely the whole point of these things is that they are larger than life, that they are not particularly believable - i dont want real life when i see a SAW movie, i want something powerful, pacey and twisty. I also resent the labelling of the SAW movies as "gore porn" - the kind of derogatory label (along with "video nasties") that i would expect to hear from a dumbass tabloid or a Mary Whitehouse-type rather than a horror fan on a horror movie forum. If SAW III is indeed gore porn, it certainly isn't just the "youth of America" who have made it a massive success - the screening i attended in this country had a range of different ages, and i happen to think the series is clever enough to appeal to more than just the gorehounds like myself. And, if it is "gore porn", then surely you must also use the same label for HOSTEL and BROKEN, the latter of which i liked but would hardly make any claim for it possessing more "depth" than any of the aforementioned U.S. flicks.
-
streetrw
- Frightfest Hardcore
- Posts: 1560
- Joined: Sun Mar 27, 2005 5:54 pm
- Location: A hell of my own making
- Contact:
It's not really my kind of movie (not enough chainsaws, I suppose) but I saw ICE AGE 2 this evening. (It's my sister's and for some reason she didn't want to see THE WICKER MAN!) I did enjoyed it; it's clever, fast and funnier than a lot of live-action movies (I think TALLADEGA NIGHTS had three laughs). And some of the animation is astonishing even though it's ultimately just files on a hard drive somewhere. Plus I ordered the soundtrack CD just this afternoon, and it sounds good in the film.
But there are so many computer-animated movies out there now and a new one pops up every two or three weeks. I can't really keep up with them even And there's an underlying feeling I get with these movies that they're for kids, and as a grown adult (or as near as I'm going to get) I think I'd feel uncomfortable seeing them in a cinema. So I'll see a few of them on DVD at family get-togethers.
But there are so many computer-animated movies out there now and a new one pops up every two or three weeks. I can't really keep up with them even And there's an underlying feeling I get with these movies that they're for kids, and as a grown adult (or as near as I'm going to get) I think I'd feel uncomfortable seeing them in a cinema. So I'll see a few of them on DVD at family get-togethers.
-
Team Banzai
- Braaaains!
- Posts: 599
- Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2004 3:13 pm
so since ica
the prestige - well worth seeing, good perfs and great atmosphere, the big reveals aren't quite as left field as expected but a good solid night out
42nd street forever vol 2 the deuce - an extraordinary trailer comp inc some absolute gems - that MUST be sought out swayze in boogie town usa (or somesuch) kiss the girls and make them die, the list goes on, for trailer trash lovers an essential track down
the royle family - laughter and tears, full of pathos that we brits when it works in our comedy it works in spades
the woods the loonng on the shelf lucky (may) mckee slice of suspiria lesbian witchery - well worth a view
the prestige - well worth seeing, good perfs and great atmosphere, the big reveals aren't quite as left field as expected but a good solid night out
42nd street forever vol 2 the deuce - an extraordinary trailer comp inc some absolute gems - that MUST be sought out swayze in boogie town usa (or somesuch) kiss the girls and make them die, the list goes on, for trailer trash lovers an essential track down
the royle family - laughter and tears, full of pathos that we brits when it works in our comedy it works in spades
the woods the loonng on the shelf lucky (may) mckee slice of suspiria lesbian witchery - well worth a view
-
Team Banzai
- Braaaains!
- Posts: 599
- Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2004 3:13 pm
oh and the departed
good scorsese cinema relegated after just a few short weeks to a shitbox cinema in darkest c roydon, watched by me n julian and just 2 others on a wet orange wednesday afternoon
music, perfs, violence all perfect (except for wahlberg) and some nice surprising twists (it's been a while since i saw infernal affairs) i thought the 2 pretty boy leads were very good indeed
and i finally saw the 2006 ff thing on zone horror which was quite fun - saw lots of the regs and some cool guillermo, chris smith etc stuff..brought back some memories
apparently they have hundreds of hours of footage which they were supposed to be sending to us.. we'll see and i guess they'll show more stuff in due course
good scorsese cinema relegated after just a few short weeks to a shitbox cinema in darkest c roydon, watched by me n julian and just 2 others on a wet orange wednesday afternoon
music, perfs, violence all perfect (except for wahlberg) and some nice surprising twists (it's been a while since i saw infernal affairs) i thought the 2 pretty boy leads were very good indeed
and i finally saw the 2006 ff thing on zone horror which was quite fun - saw lots of the regs and some cool guillermo, chris smith etc stuff..brought back some memories
apparently they have hundreds of hours of footage which they were supposed to be sending to us.. we'll see and i guess they'll show more stuff in due course
-
ghouldrool
- Frightfest Hardcore
- Posts: 1448
- Joined: Tue Aug 17, 2004 1:38 pm
- Location: London
- Contact:
personally the prestige stank worse than rotten skunk shit. The "twists" were so obvious right from the start and the story then relies on an absurd sci fi machine (but of course the Nolan fanboys will claim this film is no sci fi flick).
its capably performed however and looks marvelous, but its so obviously one of those films that sits smugly satisfied that it will twist peoples heads when really we have seen these premises over and over again, most recently in season 4 of Farscape. However it is worth seeing for Jackmans second role as the drunk down at heel actor
The Host, well this was slightly better but not by much. The dysfunctional family take on the traditional monster movie was refreshing. This was by far one of the most real feeling families ive seen in a film for a long time. However the story is very choppy with the Virus threat serving only to pad the film out and weave a hefty amount of politics and paranoia into the mix.
Anti Western intervention in other nations problems is clearly on the agenda in these scenes and just like in Battle Royale 2 it harms the picture overall. I would have preferred to see more of the effect the hunt of the beast was having on this family and a tighter pace. Great European styled instrumental music
its capably performed however and looks marvelous, but its so obviously one of those films that sits smugly satisfied that it will twist peoples heads when really we have seen these premises over and over again, most recently in season 4 of Farscape. However it is worth seeing for Jackmans second role as the drunk down at heel actor
The Host, well this was slightly better but not by much. The dysfunctional family take on the traditional monster movie was refreshing. This was by far one of the most real feeling families ive seen in a film for a long time. However the story is very choppy with the Virus threat serving only to pad the film out and weave a hefty amount of politics and paranoia into the mix.
Anti Western intervention in other nations problems is clearly on the agenda in these scenes and just like in Battle Royale 2 it harms the picture overall. I would have preferred to see more of the effect the hunt of the beast was having on this family and a tighter pace. Great European styled instrumental music
"Just what the world needs; a schizophrenic toaster!"