Recent viewings

[dean]

The Town That Dreaded Sundown [2014]

Awful awful awful movie. So much of the dialogue is crap and the shots seem like they were done by a film major trying every single pan/tilt in the book [whilst the cinematography looks so terribly lit most of the time]

Think soap opera lighting and dialogue that is so bland. I spent a good while laughing at how terrible it was but I'm still astounded that it has almost 5 stars on IMDB...

1.5/5

[FatFreddysCat]

"The A-Team" (2010)
The A-Team 2010 HD Trailer

The campy '80s TV action series is turned into a big, loud, dumb, expensive shoot'em up, blow'em up flick (were you expecting something else?). Enjoyable, disposable popcorn fun.

[indianasmith]

Last night I watched a movie called THE FEAR CLINIC, in which Robert Englund played a psychiatrist who helps people with chronic phobias overcome their fears by undergoing total immersion therapy in a chamber that actually stimulates and even alters the part of the brain responsible for creating the sense of fear.  But fear is more than an emotion, it is an entity that feeds on human terror - and Englund is taking food off its table!  This one had some really creepy parts and was overall quite enjoyable.
After that I watched THE ABC'S OF DEATH 2.  I didn't even know there was a first one, actually.  26 filmmakers are asked to produce a short (under 5 minutes) film emphasizing a single letter of the alphabet - and death!  Some of these were funny, some grossly offensive, and some just gruesome.  But, I will say I was entertained more of the time than I was not.

[FatFreddysCat]

Since today's bitterly cold/snowy/windy weather was declared dangerous to human health we hunkered down in the house and passed the time with a double feature of "Airplane!" (1980) and "Airplane II: The Sequel!" (1982). I've seen them both dozens n' dozens of times of course, but I never get tired of watching'em (or endlessly quoting 'em)!!

[Rev. Powell]

FUDGE 44 (2006): Dozens of residents of a Japanese suburb are interviewed about a series of sightings of little men, in a story that gets progressively wilder with every new detail that is revealed. The tallest of tales, this is an absurd parody of cryptozoological documentaries, and more; a little hard to recommend because of the complete lack of action, but an interesting experiment in low-budget filmmaking. 2.5/5.

The director put it up on YouTube so you can judge for yourself:

http://youtu.be/FbTT2DhdmdM

[indianasmith]

100 TEARS (2007) - An overweight clown kills a ton of people with a giant meat cleaver while seeking the woman he was falsely accused of raping twenty years ago - with two investigative reporters on his tail!  Holy cow, this was one of the goriest films I have ever seen, and I've seen some bloody crap!  When I looked it up on IMDB, I was not terribly surprised to see that it had an NC-17 rating - and that is ALL due to gore and violence.  Not  so much as a nipple to be seen as far as nudity goes, but decapitations, dismemberment, disembowelment, bludgeoning, you name it - if you like creepy clowns and LOTS of gore, you will enjoy this movie.  If you don't like splatterfests, RUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[indianasmith]

JEBADIAH'S AXE (2014) - I had been meaning to see this low budget shlockfest for awhile, for one simple reason - it was filmed about 20 miles from my house, on a piece of property where I have hunted arrowheads for years.  The area is a large wooded track on the north end of Lake Tawakoni; the only problem is that you can't really see the lake in the movie except for a glimpse in the background.
  As far as plot goes - Jebadiah is a simple old farmer who has lived on the same plot of land for many years, but he falls behind on his back taxes and the county tax assessors come to serve an eviction notice.  He shoots one of them, and the other one returns with the sheriff and Jebadiah is killed in the gun battle that follows.  A month later, a real estate agent is showing the property to two couples who are thinking about buying it.  They decide to walk around and check the place out, and Jebadiah emerges from his grave to deal with the "trespassers".
  Really not bad, it has a high body count (10 murders, I believe) in a runtime of an hour and seven minutes, and a couple of nude scenes.  Some of the gore effects are laughably bad, as is the acting, but overall, I kind of like it - plus I recognized every single location they shot on!

[claws]

Dogs (1976) (Blu-ray)

Somewhere in sunny California dogs are packing (not leaving), and randomly killing people. A biology teacher is investigating while students from a nearby University appear to be next on the dogs' menu.
Somewhere between Bug (1975) and Squirm (1976) lies Dogs barking for attention in a series of endless nature-runs-amok movies released in the wake of Jaws. I must admit the more I watch Dogs the more unintentional hilarious it gets. Once touted as a hidden gem for years by genre fanboys on horror message boards in the 2000s due to unavailability on home video. While in fact Dogs is just a step away from being MST3K fodder. The movie has its moments (the howling of the dogs is actually creepy) and thanks to fascinating but fugly 1970s fashion a somewhat fun time capsule worth watching. 3/5

[Jack]

Doom Asylum (1987) - horror comedy about some kids who go to an abandoned asylum where a Freddy Krueger type guy starts killing them off. Seemed like it was going for almost a Troma style of humor where idiotic = hilarious. Acting was beyond awful. Not my sort of thing at all, but I guess I've seen worse. 2/5.

[lester1/2jr]

Sorry, Haters (2005) - Robin Wright Penn stars as a lady who works at a stupid MTV type tv station. During the day she's some sort of executive, during the night she's a total psycho. I guess she is during the day too, she just hides it.

the main point of the movie is Penn's character and how awful she is. She's kind of like Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction but more depressed. Unlike, say, American Psycho there isn't much in the way of commentary about capitalism, New York, or really anything. her main victim is a Muslim cab driver so that adds "post 9-11" to the plot description but it could have been anyone really. It was an interesting choice but they don't do all that much with it. There are some sloppy quick clean ups as far as plot elements. like "here's this character and now she's dying okay let's continue " it's like but wait, why?

All in all, it's like an intense indy version of a pretty rote direct to tv thriller. Better acting but same overheated largely ridiculous scenerios. not hard to watch though and more or less engaging

2.5 /5

[indianasmith]

This week I watched a pretty fun low-budget piece called FRANKENSTEIN VS. THE MUMMY.
Not a bit of CGI, just two very clever monster costumes and lots of gore (with a tad bit of nudity, too!).
A pretty, perky Egyptologist comes back from the land of sand and pyramids with a cursed mummy, while her boyfriend Victor is trying to conquer death once and for all - by the time honored method of stitching together a human corpse and animating it with a combination of chemicals and electricity.  Right about the time the mummy wakes up and starts killing people, Victor animates his corpse puppet with the brain of a sleazy handyman who furnished him with body parts.  Of course both of them are after the pretty Egyptologist, and it's up to Victor to save the fair maiden and put down whatever monstrosity wins the titular showdown.  This was not a great movie by any means, but it was fun and campy and it entertained me.

[claws]

re-watch: Higher and Higher (1970) (Blu-ray)

Beautiful but naive Vicky (Ingrid Steeger) from England is a groupie - she follows and than hangs out with rock bands while trying to seduce every member, especially the lead singers. Soon enough Vicky is introduced to drugs and she hooks up with fellow groupie Vivian. The girls score marijuana and decide to sell it in Switzerland, so they can fund their trip to Berlin in order to catch up with another band. Along the way the girls engage in all sorts of arousing adventures including riding motorcycles in the nude with the Hell's Angels.
Swiss exploitation walking the fine line of cheesy hilarity, though the movie ends on a more serious note. 5/5

[JaseSF]

The Skydivers (1963): A jilted woman named Suzy (Marcia Knight) plots revenge on her former lover Harry (Anthony Cardoza), the married owner of a skydiving operation. Meanwhile Harry's wife Beth (Kevin Casey) finds herself getting attention from new mechanic Joe (Eric Tomlin).

Yes this is the Coleman Francis piece of film dreck. It's poorly made as can be with unnatural sounding dialogue, unexpected jump cuts  which leads to characters wearing different clothing, operating different boats and planes, etc in mid-scene. For the most part, this is kind of a bore mostly just showcasing skydiving. Things perk up a little with a lackluster love triangle, a skydiving death, a pre-skydiving dance party featuring lots of girls in bikinis jiggling and shaking 60s style (arguably the highlight of the entire film), and finally a murder plot. This is pretty much film-making along the lines of other hack masters such as Ed Wood and Jerry Warren. Coffee remains a connecting plot element throughout the film. All in all though, I'd still take this mostly painfully bad movie over stuff like Transformers II and Bucky Larson. ** out of ***** stars.

Pete's Dragon (1977): On the run from his abusive adoptive parents, a young boy named Pete and his mostly invisible dragon Elliott arrive in the town of Passamaquoddy, Maine where they befriend a lighthouse keeper named Lampie (Mickey Rooney) and his daughter Nora (Helen Reddy).

This classic 70s Disney movie was a favourite of mine as a child. While it seems a little strange to see traditional animation mixed with live-action today, this didn't seem so uncommon back in this time. This is a magical adventure sure to spark the imagination especially that of young boys IMO. It features some great moments of humor, some fun songs, an a memorable cast of characters played by some notable stars be it Dr. Terminus played by Jim Dale and his assistant Hoagy played by Red Buttons, The Mayor played by Jim Backus of "Gilligan's Island" fame,  or Lena Gogan played by Shelley Winters. Fun stuff although it's clearly aimed at youth. Some might find some of it a bit too tame and a tad too predictable but it's enjoyable nevertheless. ***1/2 out of ***** stars.

Gravity (2013): Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock), a medical engineer on her first mission in space, and veteran astronaut Matt Kowalsky (George Clooney) find themselves struggling for survival when an unexpected disaster event occurs during a seemingly routine space walk. Can they find some way to survive even following the destruction of their space shuttle?

While there are certainly some elements here that stretch credibility and believability and I know there are numerous factual errors, I enjoyed this nevertheless. It's a great survival epic, almost dreamlike in its execution, at other times it feels almost like a memory. There's a surreal quality to a lot of event unfolding here which adds to its feel and excitement IMO. Bullock does a nice job as the lead in this one which must have been a challenging part. Enjoyable escapist adventure from director Alfonso Cuarón. **** out of ***** stars.

[Jack]

Jabberwock (2011) - typical movie about a dragon that attacks a village, and the townsfolk have to work up the courage to combat it and eventually go up to its lair. Characters were okay, not good by any means but not terrible either. CGI was perfectly typical for a SyFy Original, and the battle scenes, well, they had a pretty hard time making it look like real people were interacting with the CGI. The dialogue was all sort of modern, they didn't bother trying to do any medieval stuff, which added a sort of lighthearted feel to the whole thing and was probably a good idea. 3/5.

Shriek of the Sasquatch! (2011) - a stoner dude and his cute girlfriend are on a road trip in their Olds' 442 (it's supposed to be the '70s) and meanwhile a guy in a gorilla suit tears the heads off of random people. The two leads weren't bad but the acting of some of the secondary characters left me wondering if they didn't just get friends from work to be in their movie. Pretty boring overall but maybe a little entertaining in its micro-budgetness. 2.5/5.

[indianasmith]

Last night I watched ALL HALLOW'S EVE,  a very boring and bewildering slasher film that felt as if some of the critical subplots were never finished, or else left on the cutting room floor.  Combine the puzzling plot elements with the seemingly unrelated opening scene, the rather tame gore, unlikable characters, and lack of nudity, and you are left with something that doesn't feel like much of a slasher flick at all.  Definitely not worth the rental fee, even with the early return refund!