Review of Capone (1975)

Capone (1975) is a crime/drama/biographical film, loosely based on the life of Al Capone.

Directed by Steve Carver (Lone Wolf McQuade (1983), Big Bad Mama (1974)).

Written by Howard Browne (The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre (1967), Mission: Impossible (1966 TV)).

Starring: Ben Gazzara, Susan Blakely, Harry Guardino, Sylvester Stallone, Harry Guardino, John Cassavetes and others.

So here’s a Roger Corman produced Al Capone biopic. It is about as accurate as Death Race 2000 was a prediction of the year 2000.

Doesn’t happen so often with American movies, I was pleasantly surprised to see Vilis Lapenieks, a director of photography from my small home country, Latvia, appear in the opening credits. Had it been the closing credits, I would be unpleasantly surprised, because the movie excels at looking totally bland.

In the first scene I noticed that the sound editing was not so great, often the background noise cuts with the shots, it is a bit jarring, but it either improved later or I got used to it, so I wasn’t that bothered by it. It’s far from Birdemic levels of sound direction incompetence.

It sort of is a biopic, but it explores Al Capone’s life as much as the original Scarface. I would have liked if they had spent a little time developing and showing more Capone’s backstory and character, instead of instantly throwing him in to rapidly climb the mobster career ladder by punching and shooting select people.

Also there’s very little sense of passing time because they don’t really manage to make Ben Gazzara look much younger in the earlier scenes.That is not to say Gazzara is bad here. For this larger than life portrayal of the person he is ok. He achieves a convincingly menacing performance, selling the simmering anger even when he is smiling and being polite. Since he’s not provided with any redeeming qualities, he serves not as a complex anti-hero, but a one-note villain pushed into the protagonist’s position.

At times he seems to be drifting through the movie only to engage in instances of outbursts of rage, otherwise taking a step back to various mob dealings, that I failed to care about. Some of the scenes are delivered just as plot progressions being explained, leaving the viewer uninterested and distanced.

If you, like me, decide to watch this because Sylvester Stallone is in it, be aware, he appears pretty late into the movie and is not featured as prominently as you might imagine. He briefly manages to breathe some life into the movies, but it’s pretty much a lost cause.

“Wow, Stallone playing Al Capone? That should be interesting!”

 

However this is not at all surprising because it is after all a Corman movie and could be classified as exploitation (mobsploitation, if you will), than an actual historical retelling. But the problem is that it takes itself too seriously, no doubt inspired by The Godfather films.

So it’s not cheesy enough to be entertaining as a B-grade gangster flick. I kept tuning out during the dull dialogue scenes and not getting excited at the repetitive drive-by shootouts. At some points even using footage from another movie, which is of obviously lower, both sound and image quality.

Overall, this is a shitty gangster flick, that except for Sly being in it, fails to have anything remarkable about it to make it worth watching. Not recommended.

“That’s right, smile, Ben. One day, I’m going to be the reason people watch this movie.”

Review of Abraham Lincoln vs. Zombies (2012)

Abraham Lincoln vs. Zombies (2012) is a historical horror/action film, that is produced by The Asylum, a film studio specializing in mockbusters.

Directed by Richard Schenkman (The Man from Earth (2007), The Pompatus of Love (1995)).

Written by Karl T. Hirsch (Green (1998), Clown (2005)), J. Lauren Proctor and Richard Schenkman (Flower Girl (2009), Went to Coney Island on a Mission from God… Be Back by Five (1998)).

Starring: Bill Oberst Jr., Kent Ingleheart, Jason Vail, Debra Crittended, Bernie Ask, Canon Kuipers, Chris Hlozek, Richard Schenkman and others.

Is there really any better way to learn about American history than from a movie that depicts a dead president killing zombies.

Bill Oberst Jr., who is playing Lincoln is really good. The performance would fit just as well in a serious movie. Spielberg’s Lincoln could have him playing the lead role. It wouldn’t be as acclaimed as Daniel Day-Lewis, who is loved by everyone, but he could do it.

It is almost sad that a great performance like this is wasted on a silly B-movie. But I suppose in some oscar-bait piece we wouldn’t get Abe driving his scythe into the skull of a zombie, while yelling „Emancipate this!”.

For the budget the production value is pretty good. You can tell it’s cheap, but it tries to have a style. Which is more than most The Asylum movies have going for them.

The dialogue is also some of the best I’ve heard in an Asylum movie. Sadly, some/most of the actors aren’t really able to deliver it convincingly.

Lincoln gathers a group of people to go and… well, fight zombies, I guess. In this group of people there is a black guy named Mr. Brown. Obviously. The plot is kind of confusing, I don’t know if I must have some previous knowledge of American history, but I seriously doubt that the problem lays there.

As usually Asylum uses CGI in their movies and here we get some CG blood and it is kind of sad that even in a B-movie today, we have to watch the shitty looking CG blood spurting about, since it used one of the main attractions of  B-grade cinema that we got to see some realistic practical effects. I guess it’s easier to put in some cartoon violence afterwards. But judging by the really unconvincing fake facial hair on everybody, I doubt there was a great potential for any special effects artistry.

This is probably the best Asylum movie I’ve seen and not even in the so-bad-it’s-good category, more in the low-budget-we-did-what-we-could pretty competent B-flick. It would be unfair to compare it to Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, the blockbuster this is mockbusting.

Overall, I enjoyed the movie quite a bit. Of course it’s not a good movie, but as far as The Asylum goes, this was one of the best ones they can offer.

“I feel like going to theater! You’re coming with me John ‘not Wilkes Booth’ Wilkinson!”

Review of Hobo with a Shotgun (2011)

Hobo with a Shotgun is an action/comedy/exploitation film, based on one of the trailers appearing in the Grindhouse double feature.

Directed by Jason Eisener (Treevenge (2008 Short), The Pink Velvet Halloween Burlesque Show! (2006 Short)).

Written by John Davies (Hobo with a Shotgun (2007 Short)).

Starring: Rutger Hauer, Molly Dunsworth, Brian Downey, Nick Bateman, Gregory Smith, Robb Wells, Jeremy Akerman, Pasha Ebrahimi and others.

What? Rutger Hauer going around and blasting everyone away with a shotgun? Count me in!

Right from the first moments you know what kind of movie this is. The acting is over-the-top, the gore is gratuitous, the humor is blacker than tar and a lot of the things happening make little t0 no sense. I am not complaining.

It starts off with homeless Hauer wandering into the city and witnessing various acts of mindless violence. The streets are filled with hobo’s pushing shopping carts full of junk and standing around burning barrels. No stereotypes here. Hauer makes a sign that says “I am tired, need $ for lawn mower.”, here we learn that for some reason Hobo thinks if he can buy a lawn mower, he can open a mowing business. That’s the kind of logic that fuels the movie.

The bums are used by youth for having violent fun. One guy pays homeless people to do humiliating stuff and films it. A big part of youth life is hanging around at the arcades. So it’s 80’s? I guess it’s not, the movie goes more for the way how 80’s movies portrayed dystopian future. The movie is really heavy on trying to be this over-the-top cheesy 80’s B-movie, but I think it succeeds. I wouldn’t believe if someone told me this was from the 80’s, but it has the feel pretty damn close.

The movie is packed with entertaining shit. Starting from that not a minute goes by that there’s not something bad happening on the streets to the intentionally bad dialogue like “So, how many people have you killed?”, “What am I? A mathematician?”. Then there’s the B-movie cliche – the hooker with a heart of gold.

Then at one point, the Hobo gets enough money for the mower, but in a heart-breaking scene, gives up his dream and buys a shotgun and goes on a killing spree, clearing the streets of scum. He even makes newspaper headlines, which are all puns like “Hobo stops begging, demands change.” This upsets the local crime-lord.

I wish they made all the Grindhouse trailers into feature-length movies. Can’t wait for Werewolf Women of the SS, Don’t and Thanksgiving to become real movies. Though, admittedly the movie is in a way a one-note gimmick, a spoof of sorts, but it’s also a very energetic, fun and entertaining movie. Almost all of the dialogue is quotable and even more hilarious out of context. Rutger Hauer gives a legitimately good performance and plays it completely straight.

Also I wanted to note that I loved how they concealed the crystal clear quality of the Red cameras by using some heavy oversaturating and color correction, which made it look really interesting and cool.

Overall, I found it more entertaining than Macheteand if you like totally insane exploitation mixed with dark comedy, recommended.

“Order your shotgun today and receive this stylish sewer-lid neck-brace for free!”

Review of Battle of Los Angeles (2011)

Battle of Los Angeles (2011) is a sci-fi/action film from The Asylum, a film studio that specializes in mockbusters.

Directed by Mark Atkins (Alien Origin (2012), Halloween Night (2006)).

Written by Mark Atkins (Dragon Crusaders (2011), Princess of Mars (2009)).

Starring: Nia Peeples, Kel Mitchell, Robert Pike Daniel, Theresa June-Tao, Stephen Blackehart, Dylan Vox, Gerald Webb and others.

To be fair, while no one is stupid enough to pick up 200 M.P.H. instead of Fast Five, here they’re just shameless with the title. It starts with the traditional bad CGI expected from The Asylum, we get some explosions, an alien ship, some airplanes, you know, the stuff that makes a movie great.

Soon we are introduced with some military characters, one of them being Robert Pike Daniel, who just shouts the most cliché military dialogue you can possibly write and then backs it up by blowing up an alien ship by shooting it a few times from a revolver. Some time later, he does this again, but this time it doesn’t explode, letting him take a weapon from it and shoot another spaceship.

It isn’t strictly a Battle: Los Angeles rip-off, it’s mostly just various alien-related movies, for example the alien mothership looks a whole lot like the one in District 9. Of course then they have to push it even further and by adding this absurd subplot about this pilot from 1942, who is oddly unphased by all the weird shit around him.

This might be one of Asylum’s better made films, since the action sometimes makes sense, it looks decent, has some nice shots, before they’re ruined by bad CGI, the acting is also bearable. Actually with this one I got the feeling, they knew what they were making and totally embraced it.

There are a bunch of hilarious scenes, for instance, when the military guys encounter an alien, which looks like it’s made out of garbage bins, they throw a grenade at it, yet this being of extreme intelligence throws it back to one of the guys. What does he do? Run? Oh no, he has the great idea of falling to the ground and rolling 10 feet sideways. Then they decide to push a car as a cover, but fail to ignore the fact that the alien is shooting it from the side.

Nia Peeples has the most awesome entrance imaginable: she jumps off a building, free-falls like 15 stories, then lands on a spaceship stabs it with a katana and then just walks away, while it explodes in the background in slow motion. Obviously revolvers and katanas are extremely effective against those spaceships. Someone should try just punching them.

Then another big moment is when the characters reach some kind of shelter, where there’s a captive alien, so the 40’s pilot just walks up to it, let’s out a high-pitched screech, punches a guy in the throat/ear, glass brakes, he jumps in, pulls in two underground-base-military guys, throws out the alien, jumps out, kills two guys with stretchy Mr. Fantastic arms, spits green goo, is decapitated by Peeples’ katana, only to be revealed as a robot, with some orb robot thing in his head, which everyone starts chasing. Now who the fuck came up with this insanity?

The alien itself is some sort of ET-like gentle creature, who groans, which is understood only by Peeples, who now has an eye-patch. Looks cool with her katana. This is a very diverse movie, the 3 leads are an asian chick, a black guy, and the somewhat latino Nia Peeples.

Overall, I really did enjoy this, probably more than Battle: Los Angeles, which I didn’t think was bad either. As far as The Asylum films go, this is definitely the best you can wish for. Completely cheesy, nonsensical and over-the-top, if that’s your thing, recommended.

Pictured: The most awesome sight, you probably don’t care to see.

Review of Wrong Turn 4 (2011)

Wrong Turn 4 also known as Wrong Turn 4: Bloody Beginnings (2011) is a direct-to-video horror/slasher/thriller film and the fourth film in the Wrong Turn film franchise.

Directed by Declan O’Brien (Wrong Turn 3: Left for Dead (2009), Sharktopus (2010)).

Written by Declan O’Brien (The Snake King (2005), Savage Planet (2007)).

Starring: Scott Johnson, Sean Skene, Tenika Davis, Victor Zinck Jr., Terra Vnesa, Jennifer Pudavick, Dean Armstrong, Dan Skene and others.

You know what I really wanted while watching the previous Wrong Turn movies? To know how the inbred freaks started out. I guess, that’s what the filmmakers thought, but who the fuck cares? They’re not interesting characters and you know what they did before they killed people? They killed other people. I didn’t need another movie to make it clear.

So the inbred kids are taken to some asylum, but, as we know, in movies every lock can be picked with a hair-pin. The inbreds break free and turn the place upside down.

You might think this is going to be some trashy horror flick after the previous movie being pretty shitty, but this one is way classier, since we get to see the gratuitous nudity only after 11 minutes. But the wait is rewarded by some interracial lesbian sex. Definitely worth it.

For some reason the budget looks bigger than in Wrong Turn 3, I guess, it’s just that the HD cameras have improved in the two years. It can’t be anyone put high hopes for this movie. I must give it credit, there’s some scenes in snowy landscapes, where the photography is beautiful, it’s sad that the movie keeps getting into the shot. Also the gore effects are much better.

By now I really care what happens to these important inbreds and I hope to god they won’t get hurt. Wait. It’s a prequel, so they’re going to survive. And to think I was getting worried.

So it’s like 30 years later and a bunch of college kids go skiing or something, but they take the „wrong turn” and have to stay at this asylum I mentioned earlier. Thankfully, it has been kept tidy for all this time and the kids get to have some fun. There is the one douchebag, who scares his friends, so we can get some false jump scares as well. I thought to myself „None of my friends is that guy. Oh dear god. I’m that guy.” You know what? I probably am, but since me and my friends don’t usually stay in some desolate, creepy places, I hopefully will never know.

I’m also a positive guy, when I’m watching a slasher movie, I always think „Maybe this group of young people doesn’t consist from total morons.” And then one of them says „Hey, guys, I think we should split up in this spooky abandoned hospital.” and everyone is like „Ok.” and then Shaggy is like „Zoinks, Scoobie!” as eventually the cannibalistic inbred freaks appear.

They continue to make the most idiotic decisions possible. They get the freaks locked up. But they decide they wouldn’t be able to live with themselves if they killed them. Sure I would definitely be rolling around during sleepless nights thinking „Oh, my conscience is eating me alive, I killed these human eating psycho mutants, that killed my friends.” They leave a guy to guard them, but apparently it is incredibly easy to fall asleep when you’re sitting right in front of a cell full of crazy, disfigured people full of your dead friend.

And the girl who delivered the speech about not becoming monsters like them and being humane needs just 5 minutes to completely change her mind and go stabbing one of them like he’s Janet Leigh.

What I did like about it, was that I didn’t know who the final survivor(s) will be right from the start.

Overall, it’s a bland and idiotic movie in an unconventional setting for a redneck killers flick. Definitely not recommended.

“Oh, what have you been up to, you rascals? Three Fingers? Did you rape your sister again? Who put you up to this? Saw Tooth, how could you?”

Review of Wrong Turn 3: Left for Dead (2009)

Wrong Turn 3: Left for Dead (2009) is a direct-to-DVD horror/thriller/slasher film and the third film in the Wrong Turn film franchise.

Directed by Declan O’Brien (Rock Monster (2008), Wrong Turn 4 (2011)).

Written by Connor James Delaney, who hasn’t done anything before or after.

Starring: Tom Frederic, Tamer Hassan, Gil Kolirin, Borislav Iliev, Jake Curran,  Janet Montgomery and others.

Let’s jump ahead 3 minutes into the movie. We get naked boobs. Already a mark of a quality film. There’s other marks as well. For example, it was released straight to DVD, which means you shouldn’t be fooled by the shitty “shot on digital video” look into believing that it is going to be the worst part of the movie. Because once you get used to it, there’s a whole lot of crap in the movie itself.

The effects are sometimes practical, but don’t worry,  because you still get to see a guy getting CG sliced in 3 pieces and another guy getting his face sliced off in effects shots, that even The Asylum would work harder on. But don’t get me wrong, the practical effects suck as well, one guy cuts another one’s leg off, because the inmates are chained together and he just goes through it like he was slicing a big cucumber. The inbred make-up also doesn’t look very good.

Of course, there’s the typical slasher movie set-up, where a group of characterless teenagers appear for a few minutes, just to be killed. Then we switch to our actual characters. In prison. I’ll give the movie that, it is an interesting concept than just some young people, I didn’t expect it. In this prison the inmates seem to be allowed to wear whatever they want, yet they all dress in the same prisony way. Then a group of them is transported in a bus by three prison guards, one of them being our bland protagonist. And we can enjoy some awful green-screen bus driving.

We get to see Three Fingers again, although he got shotgun-blasted in the chest in the last movie, shit, those inbreds sure know how to heal fast, due to the shitty make-up he looks like some kind of goblin. They are actually some amazing creatures. They’re all like idiot savants. They can’t really talk (or choose not to?), but they can master archery, trap-making, knife-throwing and be inhumanly strong and not feel pain. Three Fingers is an amazing archer, he shoots people in eyes all the time, he even shot a chick in the nipple, so when they decide he should miss someone completely, it instantly feel very unconvincing.

However, the interesting thing is that Three Fingers and the gang aren’t the villains of the movie, they’re like zombies, a big threat, but the real villain is one of the prisoners, who at one point is unconscious and everyone hates him, but do they kill him? Of course, not, because otherwise he couldn’t be back a few minutes later and keep being evil.

The bus falls of a cliff, the prisoners gain control and so they all just walk through the woods in search of a truck containing bags of money (no, they didn’t have huge dollar signs on them). Oh, no, that isn’t true, they just walk through the woods and stumble upon the truck. I think I’ll have to go exploring the woods.

They throw in a final little twist, which had me fooled for one second and I thought “Oh, ok, that happened.”, but then I realized how incredibly idiotic it was and got pretty pissed off..

Overall, a stupid and badly made movie, but it isn’t totally awful, if you for some reason like the Wrong Turn franchise (although, I did like Wrong Turn 2), then you might find it almost competent entry in the series. Still, not recommended.

Hey, turn a bit, at least then I’d feel like I’m watching Friday the 13th Part III !

Review of Halloween: Resurrection (2002)

Halloween: Resurrection (2002) is a slasher/horror/thriller film and it’s the eighth film in the Halloween movie franchise and the final one before Rob Zombie’s remakes.

Directed by Rick Rosenthal (Halloween II (1981), Bad Boys (1983)).

Written by Larry Brand (Christina (2010), The Drifter (1988)) and Sean Hood (The Crow: Wicked Prayer (2005), Cube 2: Hypercube (2002)).

Starring: Jamie Lee Curtis, Brad Loree, Busta Rhymes, Tyra Banks, Bianca Kajlich, Thomas Ian Nicholas, Katee Sackhoff and others.

I won’t waste much time, this movie is a piece of shit. I wish I felt like my job here is done, but I have to pretend that I have at least a tiny bit of professionalism in me.

So we start with Jamie Lee Curtis in a mental hospital with long hair (she looks younger already). Wait, what? I didn’t know she was in this movie. Why? But, of course, because she fucking dies 15 minutes in!

It is explained that Michael didn’t die at the end of the previous movie. Well, the explanation for it I thought wasn’t bad, except that the final shot of H20 doesn’t make sense, however, it still made a lot more sense then this movie’s existance as a whole. So Curtis is in the loony bin, killed an innocent man, waiting for Michael to come after her and growing hair. And he does come and kills Laurie Strode. That’s it, his job is done. Naturally there’s nothing better left for him to do, than to come and hang around in his old house, because it surely doesn’t make more sense that he would go after Laurie’s son.

Then we switch to some stupid college kids and then I realise why this is a horror movie as I see Tyra Banks and Busta Rhymes in the same frame in a Halloween movie. I thought „Oh god, what have I gotten myself into?” and the answer was the steaming pile of anal-raped whore shit that Resurrection is.

And the fucking title. Yes, H20 was a stupid title, but this is definitely at the top of the most generic sequel subtitle list.

We find out that Rhymes and Banks has the genius idea to have a live reality show (ah, yes the early 2000’s when people would actually watch a show that is in lower quality than that of the built-in modern laptop webcams) in the old Myer’s house. I guess they didn’t know that the owner is home.

And that’s the main problem here, you should care about the teenagers, but here they are just so completely unlikable and also trespassing while Michael just wanted to chill after almost 25 years of going after his sister. I’d be pissed off as well. When back in the 80’s Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert were concerned with people identifying with slasher villains, they talked about this movie, because here the other characters are so despicable, that I couldn’t help but root for good ol’ Mike.

Sadly, soon you realise that Busta Rhymes is nowhere near the worst actor in this. That is until, of course, he runs into a burning room, spewing bad one-liners and throwing Wat Chun Lee inspired karate chops at Michael. In a way this sounds equally absurd as Jason in space. “Oh, shit. Who’s knockin’ on my door this late? Whoever this is, is distracting me from seeing Wat Chun Lee whoop some ass. ” I’d also rather see this, I guess, made up actor whoop ass than this.

I have to mention this as well, when did cellphones display text messages letter by letter? Who has ever been stuck waiting for the end of their message to finish appearing? No one, that’s who, you stupid assholes. That is not how you create suspense.

Overall, this is a really bad movie. From all the Halloween, Friday the 13th and A Nightmare On Elm Street movies, this is the only one, that I just completely despise and plan on never watching again. It’s a worthless fucking movie equivalent of an abortion gone wrong and still living as a disfigured shadow of what it could have been. Not recommended.

"Michael? You know what, he's a douchebag! All these years going after me in his stupid onesie and that shitty Star Trek mask. He's standing right behind me, isn't he?
Hey Mikey, wait, you know I didn't mean those things!"

Review of Halloween 5 (1989)

Halloween 5 (1989) is a slasher/horror/thriller film and the fifth film in the Halloween franchise.

Directed by Dominique Othenin-Girard (Omen IV: The Awakening (1991), Crociati (2001)), whose name is misspelled in the opening credits.

Written by Michael Jacobs (Boy Meets World (1993 TV), 3:15 (1986)), Shem Bitterman (The Job (2009), Play Dead (2009)) and Dominique Othenin-Girard (After Darkness (1985), Henry Dunant: Red on the Cross (2006)).

Starring: Danielle Harris, Don Shanks, Donald Pleasence, Wendy Kaplan (Foxworth), Ellie Cornell, Beau Starr.

During the opening credits we get some brutal pumpkin carving, which leads to a recap of the previous movie’s ending, except they show how Michael Myers survived. So it picks up straight afterwards the previous one for a bit, even showing the twist ending. But then it cuts to Jamie Lloyd waking up from a nightmare. At first it isn’t clear is she just dreaming about what happened or is it her horrible nightmare. Turns out it did happen.

It picks up like a year later and little Jamie Lloyd is in some hospital/mental institution place. And she has lost her voice. Oh, those kids and their strange ways of coping with their uncle being an invincible serial killer. Actually I kind of liked that she had become mute, because otherwise I’d have to listen to her screaming and crying all throughout the movie. So again they succeed at making Jamie one of the least annoying kids in horror movies.

Meanwhile Michael shows off both his amazing ability to just wait out his injuries and his impeccable timing as he wakes up on October 30 after lying still for a year. He’s been staying at some bum’s weird shack and when he wakes up just kills the guy. Michael isn’t good at showing gratitude.

Does Loomis still have his medical license or does he just like hanging around hospitals? And nobody cares that he now acts like a complete lunatic and repeatedly screams at and shakes Jamie. He’s like a sitcom character now, who doesn’t know he’s in a sitcom. Everyone is like „Oh, look at that silly old man with a burnt face, who just keeps coming here and yelling at patients and raving about this Michael Myers guy.” And again he goes after Michael equipped with just a handgun. Seriously? Have you learnt nothing?

By the way, there’s also a little homage to Last House On The Left, when two silly cops have their own wacky theme.

There’s way too many scenes that turn out to just be dream sequences or false jumpscares.

Since he wakes up a day early for Halloween, Michael starts just creeping around, he’s very good at it, because no one ever notices the tall guy in a Shatner mask standing behind a bush. Then comes Halloween and Michael has a plan, he kills a guy, puts on his mask and takes his car. Now, I don’t know where Michael learned to drive so well, but he meets the dead guy’s girlfriend, one of our main characters, Tina. Wendy Kaplan’s Tina is considered one of the most annoying characters in Halloween movies (all the others are from Halloween Resurrection, but I’ll get to that), but I actually liked her over-the-top performance.

Then some more killings happen and Michael goes after Jamie (not mute anymore) and Tina, but turns out he’s not the best driver in the world after all and eventually hits a tree. Here we get a great scene, where they think „great, Michael couldn’t ever survive a car crash, right?”, but then the car horn stops blaring and we understand that he is lying against the steering wheel no more.

And then the action goes to the Myers house, where Loomis has organised a welcoming party consisting of a bunch of cops. Michael doesn’t exactly fall for this as his spidey-sense is tingling while Admiral Ackbar yells „It’s a trap!” in his head. But he still ends up in the house and we get a scene, where Loomis finally gives up with the shooting of Michael and proceeds with beating him with a wooden board, certainly a more effective method.

And the ending is just something unnecessarily random. Oh, and I have to mention the subtitle of this movie The Revenge of Michael Myers. I’ve never really understood Michael’s motivation for killing people, except that he’s fucked in the head. So if he kills just for the sake of it, how can you tell apart revenge from his usual „I’m going after someone I’m related to, while killing a bunch of people on the way” routine.

Overall, I enjoyed it, one of the more entertaining Halloween movies. Nothing great, but I’d recommend it.

"Hey, everybody, I'm going to blow this guy! On the street! ..."going to stab me"? Oh, you say the silliest things."

 

Review of Freddy Vs. Jason (2003)

Freddy Vs. Jason (2003) is a slasher/horror/thriller film, which is the crossover of the A Nightmare On Elm Street and Friday the 13th film franchises.

Directed by Ronny Yu (The 51st State (2001), Fearless (2006)).

Written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift (Friday the 13th (2009)).

Starring: Robert Englund, Ken Kirzinger, Monica Keena, Jason Ritter, Kelly Rowland, Chris Marquette and others.

Ah, yes. This is a special review for me since it concludes both the Friday the 13th and A Nightmare On Elm Street film reviews. That is, of course, until they decide to make a sequel to any of the remakes.

Jason Goes To Hell left us with a promise of Freddy Krueger going against Jason Voorhees and then ten years passed until we actually got it. I’m kind of surprised it happened at all, because the only other modern big franchise crossover I can think of is AVP: Alien vs. Predator a year later and I don’t really have much good to say about that.

Then we get some insight into Jason’s psychology as Freddy has a plan to get Jason out of hell (which isn’t all that hard) and make him do his dirty work so people would start fearing him again. So he disguises himself as Jason’s mom and starts realizing this contrived plot.

I wish they would’ve let Kane Hodder play Jason, this one doesn’t look quite right. Sure, Ken Kirzinger is tall as shit, but there’s nothing some platform shoes couldn’t fix. Maybe they got that lanky geek to make the scene, where Jason can’t pull his machete out of a table more believable. Also for me there’s only one Pamela Voorhees and that’s Betsy Palmer.

It’s surprisingly not anywhere near as gimmicky and comedic as I had imagined it, but I guess it helps to make the movie more believable since it is about a guy killing people in their dreams teaming up and then going against a guy who is an almost invincible zombie retard, that kills people with a machete, and they both get out of hell.

Where did Freddy find out about Jason? Is there a message board in hell that says „most awaited serial killers”, or did he notice him in the 80’s-slashers-with-declining-quality-sequels meetings?

Every slasher movie has some bad acting, but since here two slasher franchise come together we get one of the worst I’ve ever seen in the body of Kerry Rowland from Destiny Child. She is so awful I kept hoping she would die already, but no, she fucking stays almost until the very end. And her playing an incredibly unlikable character doesn’t help either. Also at one point she basically calls Freddy a faggot in a Christmas sweater. Not cool.

The CGI is mostly bad and I don’t know why it was necessary. It hit the bottom with some lame CG Freddy maggot creatures.

Most of the movie Jason turns up from time to time, kills someone and slides back into the shadows, so it’s mostly A Nightmare On Elm Street. But on the other hand, the filmmakers seemed to favor Jason a bit more.

This movie has the same thing that really surprised me in Rob Zombie’s Halloween II, I mean, seriously? There’s two guys who think it is a good idea to make fun of a six-foot five guy in a hockey mask. You can afford it if you know, for example, some kung fu, but not if you’re just a drunk and stoned moron.

It goes into a bit of overexplaining itself, having the characters come up with exactly what happened going through some absurd leaps of logic, which would be all fine and dandy if we hadn’t seen it happen in the movie in the hour before.

When Jason starts going against Freddy (or is it the other way around?) we are presented a curious case of Jason being afraid of water. What? Was this inspired by the stupid ending of Jason Takes Manhattan? Does it matter that Jason has gone willingly into water a shitload of times before?  He’s even spent years in a lake. I guess it doesn’t.

The showdown between Freddy and Jason still might be one of the best things ever brought to screen and makes sitting through the rest of the movie worth it.

Overall, mostly painfully bland and mediocre, but not insultingly bad. Recommended, if only to see Jason and Freddy’s epic fight.

"Smile, Robert!"
"Oh, I'll smile, but don't think I forgot about your faggot remarks, you bitch."

Review of Jason X (2001)

Jason X (2001) is a slasher/sci-fi/thriller film and the 10th film in the Friday the 13th franchise.

Directed by James Isaac (The Horror Show (1989), Skinwalkers (2006)).

Written by Todd Farmer (Drive Angry (2011), Messengers 2: The Scarecrow (2009)).

Starring: Kane Hodder, Lisa Ryder, Lexa Doig, David Cronenberg, Barna Moritz, Todd Farmer and others.

So who had this brilliant idea? Where would Jason feel most out-of-place? In space! So there he goes. But let’s backtrack a bit.

We start with him being shackled in some military/science facility. It might sound not too far-fetched, but trust me, it doesn’t make any fucking sense. Have they seen any of the previous films? So there he is all fine, just standing there, with his now fuzzy hair and weird-looking hockey mask. Then he kills a bunch of people and is free, he has pulled a machete out of his ass and all, when he is frozen.

A couple of hundred years later he is found by some people and he wakes up in what looks like a bad SyFy channel movie. I thought just seeing Jason in the age of CGI is weird, but seeing him in the 25th century on a spaceship, is a bit too much.

There’s some nice kills, like smashing of a frozen face or an homage to the classic sleeping bag kill, but most of the time I was at a constant cringe state. Mostly due to the acting, the robot chick was just unbearable.

But despite it’s blatant stupidity and ridiculous concept, it is kind of fun and entertaining movie, if not in the traditional, then in the so-bad-it’s-good sense. I hate to admit I enjoyed something as awful as this, but I sort of did.

If I had to describe this in movie in comparison to another one, I’d say it is a brightly lit Alien with Jason as the monster, unlikable characters and no suspense. So basically it’s nothing like Alien. And if that is the benchmark of space horror, then you can see what’s the problem here. You rarely get a slasher flick in space, but if this is it, then it’s not a great loss.

The gore is decent at times, but it lacks any Friday the 13th feel to it, since the spaceship is like Star Trek sterile. There’s barely any nudity.

You sure can’t blame the filmmakers for not trying anything new, but you can blame them for trying the most idiotic new thing possible.

Apparently Jason isn’t so bullet resistant in the future, since they manage to shoot his extremities off. And a minute later we get a cyborg-Jason. Even in this movie, it seemed pretty damn ridiculous. He looks kind of cool, but at the same time totally fucking idiotic.

While a character is in danger, she says „this sucks on so many levels”, clever right? See how she got her little review of Jason X in the movie? That’s some meta-humor right there. Unless she’s just referring to the fact that she is being sucked into space.

The best part of the movie might be a little sequence of Jason walking into a simulation of 80’s in the woods. You feel some sweet nostalgia and then you get the rest of the stupid movie.

Overall, it is ridiculous and idiotic, looks cheap and has bad acting, but I’d recommend seeing it, just because I think this is something that you just have to see to believe it and you might have some fun as well.

Pictured: Even Jason feels nostalgia.