Recent viewings

[dean]

Visions:

No terrible but somewhat forgettable horror movie about a pregnant lady who recently moved to a vineyard with her husband after a personal tragedy. Shot well, great sound design and an interesting concept. Decent cast as well, but the dialogue and effort put in by most is somewhat lacking. Solid 2.5/5 as it is somewhat original yet does so in a completely boring and forgettable way which is a strange mixture to have...

[indianasmith]

HUNGER GAMES: MOCKINGJAY PART TWO

   The final entry in the dystopian series based on the mega-hit teen fiction.  I was really sleepy, but still enjoyed it. Donald Sutherland is perfectly cast as President Snow, and Julianne Moore is sweetly sinister as his rebel counterpart, President Coin.  And of course, Jennifer Lawrence is back as Katniss, with the rest of the crew.  A satisfactory ending to an intriguing series.  4/5

ZOMBIE FIGHT CLUB - A Taiwanese flick I watched last night, with lots of guns, girls, and zombies throughout.  A fun waste of three bucks, with bonus points for extra gore! 3.5/5

[lester1/2jr]

Indochine (1992) - 2 and a half hours and very merchant ivory white people in safari hats vibe, but excellent and also timely as it relates to the end of colonialism. Catherine Deneuve runs a company that makes rubber from rubber trees. The workers called coolies are kind of quasi slaves and while their jobs are good for them the whole thing stinks I mean its colonialism. Communism in places like this was very different from the urbane, elite sort of ideological debate societies we know today. nationalism was a strong component the rhetoric was pretty much a fig leaf (until they actually started trying to use it to rule the people.)

Amidst all that theres another problem: Deneuve and her daughter are both hot for the same guy. He is very handsome but its a little odd how they both fall in love with him in like 2 seconds. Everyone gets wrapped up and pulled different ways in the revolution.

Someone told me Leonard Maltin thought this was bad. Maybe it didn't seem very apropros in 1992 but it certainly does now. Did it take me several days to watch it? Yes it did but I enjoyed it and it's romance in time of upheaval corniness and all the beautiful Vietnamese places

5/5

[FatFreddysCat]

"Lady Avenger" (1989)

http://youtu.be/JQN7_3Mvbz8
	Small | Large

A woman is given a weekend pass from prison in order to attend her brother's funeral, then goes vigilante against the gang of drug dealers who killed him. The frequent nude scenes by scream queen Michelle Bauer (who plays the heroine's slutty best friend) provide the main highlights in this generic slice of direct-to-video action junk directed by the infamous David DeCoteau ("Creepozoids," "Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-A-Rama").

[indianasmith]

This afternoon I watched a horror film called SOCIOPATHIA.  It reminded me a bit of MAY from a few years ago - shy but talented woman who works on sculpting special effects model, poor social skills, dreams of an ideal companion, but when all her dates fall short she kills them, sleeps with their corpses till they get stinky, then discards them in her guest bathroom.  The only twist in this one is that Mara, the main character in this story, is a lesbian, and so are all her dates/victims.  This is a sleazy exploitation flick and not really that great, although the cast members are all pretty easy on the eyes.  Still, I felt like I needed to take a bath after watching it!  3/5

[claws]

The Gallows (2015)

October 28, 1993: a prop malfunction kills a student at school during a stage play called "The Gallows". Twenty years later the school is preparing a The Gallows reboot, leading a small group of students being locked in at school with no cell phone reception. Soon enough they are being stalked by "The Hangman" who might be the spirit of the young man killed 20 years prior.

Independent found footage horror filmed in 2013. Blumhouse acquired the rights in 2014, and New Line Cinema released it to theaters in 2015 after tweaking and polishing the film to their standards. The Gallows has an interesting premise, but the way it plays out is rather unsatisfying. Too many familiar cliches presented by a bland cast filled with loud jump scares (to wake up the audience?). So basically you get plenty of hot air with minimal impact. I went into this with very low expectations and it felt half as bad as it really is, but I still can't rate it higher than 2/5.

[claws]

Prophecy (1979)

Trying to settle a dispute between native Americans and a paper mill company, a doctor and his pregnant wife soon discover that liquid mercury is the cause for freak-ism, affecting nature, animals and humans. Hindering their investigations is a giant killer bear, deformed, because mercury corrupted the animals DNA while going through the evolutionary stage (amphibian, feline etc) as a fetus.

Engaging environmental horror with good production values and acting. What made Prophecy a camp classic of some sorts are the practical monster effects. They aren't always convincing. For example the killer bear is obviously a man in a suit. Other than that this is probably one of the bloodiest PG rated movies ever. According to legend an R rated version was shown at test screenings, and Paramount trimmed a few seconds of gore to obtain a PG rating for theatrical release. 3/5

The Manitou (1978)

An evil native american medicine man chooses a young woman from San Francisco to be reborn. On the back of her neck. Thinking its "just" a tumor the woman contacts her fortune telling ex-boyfriend (Tony Curtis) before surgery, who soon discovers what's really going on. The hospital becomes a battleground when another native american tries to fight the manitou who is born deformed thanks to heavy use of x-rays.

High camp factor and unintentional humor made The Manitou a favorite among bad movie lovers. This is still a solid production, and I always loved the plot and think it would be interesting if this was ever remade. 3/5

Watching both back to back I was surprised to find a few similarities, other than having a native american "folklore" theme. Both deal with deformed terror. In "Prophecy" the paper mill has been polluting nature for 20 years. In "The Manitou" a doctor explains he has been dealing with tumors for 20 years. In both movies there's a shot of the main actors standing on a wooden bridge. Coincidence but still worth noting 

[Rev. Powell]

MON ONCLE D'AMERIQUE (1980): A psychologist(Henri Laborit, portraying himself) describes his theories and offers the interconnected stories of an aspiring politician, a failed actress, and a textile mill middle manager as case studies, calmly and clinically comparing their behavior to that of rats in a cage. This is a case where the frame, which might be described as behavioral fatalism, overpowers the stories; whoever thought that evolutionary psychology would inspire compelling drama? No idea why the powers that be decided to never translate this title from the French, but it's traditional now. 4.5/5.

[SynapticBoomstick]

Patch Town (2014) - Babies are removed from cabbages and turned into dolls, then stolen back when they're no longer wanted, turned back into people, and brainwashed to work in the factory that produced them making cabbage vodka. One of these "dolls" learns that he has a "mother" out in the real world and escapes to look for her.

WHAT?!

I went into this movie with a complete misunderstanding of even its most basic idea due to a misreading of the synopsis. I was expecting a black magic horror movie, what I got instead was a... I don't even know if I want to call it a horror movie, regardless of it being listed under such on Netflix. It's some sort of comedy/musical/pseudo-Christmas/1950's cartoonesque chimera with just about the flattest logic and action/consequence scenarios that I've ever seen. It also moves at breakneck speed, causing each scene to feel like things just kind of happen; even at nearly ninety minutes the movie manages to feel like a cartoon short.

I can't properly do justice to the turmoil currently spinning in my head. If you've a fan of the undefinably weird, this is probably a movie for you.

[Rev. Powell]

If you've a fan of the undefinably weird, this is probably a movie for you.

Nah, it wasn't. I think I might have liked it if I went into it knowing nothing about it and got blindsided like you did, though.

[lester1/2jr]

Story of a Junkie aka Gringo (1985) - cruddy Troma re release of this NYC "classic" I don't know how many people there have actually seen it but...if you like stuff like Wild Style and that whole pre Guliani "loveable hellhole" feel of Manhattan you should check this out. I can't tell if it's a documentary and I don't even really care. edit : yes it is.

This starts off a little too loosely. We eventually learn the guys story but the first 45 minutes or so are colorful but a little aimless. There are some interesting things here and there like one junkie explaining how the drug trade is vital to the city's economy. I'm not sure that's true but it was an interesting argument. another one is a cokehead with a bizarre speaking style who talks about how he loves cocaine and it's "very beautiful" and repeats himself constantly actually it's a little disturbing.

Troma of course took no pains to clean the print up and it's murky and dull in some places. Some of it is really good though, like when the main guy is skateboarding around Manhattan while Grandmaster Flashe and furious five's then current The Message plays. not bad and you have to give the film makers credit for "keeping it real"

3/5

[Rev. Powell]

THE FOUNTAIN (2006): A scientist searches for a cure for his wife's brain tumor; two other stories are interspersed, one about the search for the Fountain of Youth and one about a bald-headed space guru stuck in a Mayan nebula. Darren Aronofsky's ambitious attempt to fashion a mystical parable about Life doesn't come together satisfactorily, but it works intermittently as a trip movie. 3/5.

[FatFreddysCat]

"Mercenaries" (2014)
An entertainingly silly gender-swapped "Expendables" knockoff from the Asylum. When the President's daughter is kidnapped in Kazakhstan by an uber-psycho female warlord (Brigitte Nielsen, who has aged terribly!!), the CIA (led by '80s kung-fu queen Cynthia Rothrock) assembles a team of warrior women with nothing to lose (including Kristianna "Terminator 3" Loken and Vivica "Independence Day" Fox) to go on a rescue mission. Bullets fly, stuff blows up, much ass gets kicked, yadda yadda yadda.
As Asylum movies go, this one is actually not half bad... but of course that's still a long way from "good."

[lester1/2jr]

Abandoned - The late Brittany Murphy's final film. Her lip injections are rather ostentatious but she puts in a decent performance and her flighty/ out of it ness actually plays into her role pretty well. It's the Flightplan thing with is she crazy or did they really kidnap her boyfriend Dean Cain? How weird would it have been if he had been kidnapped from the set?

Right of the bat, it's apparent this is not a big budget affair. the acting is community theater level. I considered turning it off it was so bad, but it ended up being pretty compelling for all its faults. The plot "keeps you guessing" in part because it's clever and in part because the level of detail in the plot is thin. How is that no one in the entire hospital had seen the boyfriend? the cop asked everyone where they all in a stupor?

I watched it all in one sitting though and that doesn't happen often. I don't know what compels big stars to do these types of movies. I saw a J Law movie a while ago that was the most useless horror movie ever made and should have starred Tara Reid. what are you gonna do though

4/5

[SynapticBoomstick]

If you've a fan of the undefinably weird, this is probably a movie for you.

Nah, it wasn't. I think I might have liked it if I went into it knowing nothing about it and got blindsided like you did, though.

I considered saying as little as possible about the story but I quickly realized that without that, there really wouldn't be anything to say.