Recent viewings

[indianasmith]

Last night I watched TRACE, a low budget ghost story in which six friends go into a sound studio and try to make an EVP recording of a demon.  Of course they summon something that then kills them all one by one as ritual sacrifices so it can incarnate into the world in physical form.  Not great but it took my mind off of stuff for awhile.

[claws]

Cinema Perverso (2015)

Documentary about the rise and fall of Germany's train station movie theaters. In order to get co-financing for rebuilding demolished train stations after WW2, they included movie theaters inside train stations with the intent to give passengers something to watch while waiting on the next train. Those theaters would show movies daily non stop from 9 AM to 1 AM, and the price of admission was the train ticket. However, box office was also open for non-travelers.

In the early years those theaters would show matinee kind of features, but in the 1970s the main focus was "Grindhouse" type of exploitation regular theaters didn't show. Cheap entertainment like the notorious Housewives or Schoolgirls series, but also Bruce Li knockoffs, Mondo movies and local junk like Macho Man (1985) or Roots of Evil (1979). Train station cinemas slowly died when VHS took over and most cinemas were replaced with porn theaters, but they also went extinct from train stations in the 1990s.

Interesting piece of German history. 5/5

[FatFreddysCat]

RedBox sent me a "Rent One, Get One Free" text so we had a double feature last nite...

"San Andreas" (2015)

http://youtu.be/23VflsU3kZE
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As a massive earthquake tears apart California, L.A. rescue chopper pilot Dwayne Johnson must fly into the chaos to save his wife and daughter. A pretty typical CGI mass-destruction disaster flick - not quite as ridiculous as "2012," but close. There's nothing here you haven't seen in a zillion other movies of this type but it was entertaining in a disposable sort of way.

"The Final Girls" (2015)

http://youtu.be/zreNh78kTjg
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A group of 21st century teens attend an anniversary screening of an '80s slasher flick, and suddenly find themselves trapped in the movie. Now  they need to figure out how to get back "home" without falling victim to the masked maniac. This affectionate ode to '80s horror has the look and vibe down pat, but the humor isn't quite as go-for-broke as I'd expected.

[diamondwaspvenom]

Feeders (1996)

Horrendous acting aside, I actually enjoyed it. The wretched visual and creature FX were quite fun and I found the whole shot on video look very appealing. The best part had to be when the two main characters hid in the abandoned home. It actually had some good atmosphere to it despite the really bad Halloween gore FX. Won't watch it again for a long while, but I'm glad I saw it.

Animal Farm (1954) and (1999)

Both very enjoyable movies in their unique ways. I always knew hogs were evil, now their true diabolical nature has been exposed. 

[claws]

Tales of Halloween (2015)

Somewhere between Chillerama and Trick 'r' Treat lies Tales of Halloween - touted as the new modern Halloween themed horror fave. It certainly has its moments but is nowhere near being a modern classic. Ten tales of terror loosely connected taking place in one town. The stories range from average to very good while a few suffer from a strong build up with a weak conclusion. However, it is never boring and is worth checking out. Rating: 3.5/5

[Rev. Powell]

ALOFT (2014): A documentary filmmaker convinces a falconer to accompany her on a trip to locate the mother who abandoned him, now reclusive a new age faith healer working the frigid Canadian Arctic. This boring movie about healing proves a lofty theme does not always soar. 2/5.

[indianasmith]

Last night I watched STUNG, a stirring film about a swarm of giant mutated wasps that interrupt an outdoor dinner party and in the process help spark a burgeoning romance between two caterers struggling to survive the chaos.  I can honestly say that this is the finest giant wasp movie I have ever seen.  Sadly, it's not the only giant wasp movie I have ever seen. 4/5

[lester1/2jr]

"two caterers" were they giant gay WASPS?

Doom Asylum - Jack wrote and directed this totally ridiculous USA up all night classic. A Troma -lite script filled to the brim with corny jokes and inane innuendo, some very cute girls, and cheap looking gory murders make for a light, bad, but certainly colorful affair.

A bunch of twenty something teenagers are hanging around an abandoned school for some reason. There is a rival group of weird, punk (I guess), darkly dressed girls and they taunt each other back and forth. On top of that there is a disfigured psycho who wants to kill all of them so there's a lot of tension in this random building in the middle of nowhere. The dialogue makes everyone seem like they are insane.

Hell Comes to Frogtown and even Dr Alien are better in terms of story and basic entertainment value but nothing captures the essence of badmovies.org better than Doom Asylum



5/5

[Rev. Powell]

THE LOOK OF SILENCE (2014): An Indonesian optometrist confronts the men---one now a politician, one his own uncle---who helped slaughter his brother during the anti-Communist purges of 1966. Obviously very powerful on its own terms, but sad to say this more conventional documentary suffers in comparison to Joshua Oppenheimer's previous shocking masterpiece on the same subject, "The Act of Killing." 3/85.

[lester1/2jr]

Love Crime (2010) - this starts out as a rather nondescript Working Girl type younger woman vs mentor office drama thing and isn't all that compelling as such. Eventually though it turns into something more along the lines of Fatal Attraction and is a lot more fun. I wonder if many people did not stick around longer than the sort of clunky first half though.

If this were in the video store it would be an obvious rental choice but now that video stores have 100,00+ titles this will likely get lost in the shuffle. If you do end up watching it though it's entertaining albeit with some plot holes as and a director who appears to know very little about the corporate business world and even less about police procedure.

3.75 /5

[alandhopewell]

     The wife and I watched this for breakfast today....

     BLOODY PIT OF HORROR (1965)

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     One of our all-time favorite slices of Italian cheese; I posted the full flick for those who haven't seen it.

     Also, although we didn't see the entire film, we were unpleasantly suprised to find that someone made a sequel to 1980's HERCULES....

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[JaseSF]

Just watched Grudge Match (2013) with Stallone and Deniro as two aging former fighters who decide to come out of retirement for one more grudge showdown between each other (and because they both need the money). Really enjoyed this one. Definitely a plus is having stars I usually really enjoy watching in the leads. ***1/2 out of ***** stars.

Last week, I also saw the film Rudy (1993) for the first time about a football player everyone thought was too small to ever get a chance to play for Notre Dame...talk about a great underdog, never give up fighting spirit movie, this is it! Terrific performance from Sean Astin who's become yet another one of my favourite actors over time. **** out of ***** stars.

Also revisited an old Disney childhood favourite - Blackbeard's Ghost (1968) about the ghost of the dreaded old pirate being forced to help out someone selflessly if he's ever to lift a curse placed upon him by a former wife who also it appears was something of a witch. This one didn't hold up as well as I fondly remembered it. Oh, I still enjoyed it on some levels especially Peter Ustinov's performance as Blackbeard but other than that, it's basically just another Disney movie about a team of sports underdogs who magically get helped somehow (they did the same with the Absent-Minded Professor and some of Kurt Russell's Disney films). Still, I'll give this ***1/4 out of ***** stars.

[indianasmith]

I just finished watching DESECRATED, an interesting little "teenagers go to the woods and run into trouble" horror film starring Haley Duff, the sister of former Disney teen star Hillary Duff.

Basically, Haley and her friends take off for spring break and decide to go party at her Dad's cabin in the woods.  They check in with the ex-marine caretaker, Ben, then set out to have fun. Two of them looking for a private place to get high and get lucky break into an old trailer and find a bizarre shrine with two human hearts in a jar.  From that point, their spring break goes downhill pretty rapidly.

Not bad overall, nice cameo by Michael Ironside as Haley's character's Dad.

[FatFreddysCat]

"Exterminators of the Year 3000" (1983)

http://youtu.be/VKBYHQZFnIQ
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Post-apocalypse settlers battle with barbarians to claim the water supply in this laughably cheesy Spanish/Italian "Mad Max" wanna-be. Enjoyable nonsense.

[JaseSF]

Watched The Day the Earth Moved (1974) last night. It's a disaster TV movie. It's pretty creaky and slow-moving and the first fifty something minutes seem to drag on and on especially when compared to more modern fast-moving action films. Also a few moments here and there come across as being a bit perhaps unintentionally racist. There was some thought and effort put in to get us to get to know and care about certain characters, particularly lead Steve Barker (Jackie Cooper) who becomes an hero to a little girl in a small town where Steve gets arrested for speeding and basically is forced to work off his debt in said town. The last 25 minutes are a bit better when an earthquake hits the town and Steve and his co-pilot Harley Copeland (Cleavon Little) [they're aerial photographers who stumble across a pattern that can accurately predict earthquakes] try and convince the reluctant and doubting townsfolk to leave. Stella Stevens is also on hand as Steve's ex who deep down he still seems to have feelings for. Her tight jeans is honestly one of the best things about this film. Other notables on hand in the cast include Beverly Garland, William Windom, and Kelly Thordsen although their roles are basically little more than bit parts. Overall this film is mostly a bore and most probably won't be able to sit through the first 50 minutes to get to the slightly more exciting film climax. *** out of ***** stars.