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 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I’m just stuck watching spooky stuff.

Entirely by choice.

Yeah, I mostly watch documentaries about horror films on youtube or documentaries about horror literature and such. Also rather wholesome local tv station spooky documentaries. I lack the mental fortitude to watch horror films any more I think. Used to watch a lot, not so much any more. I watched a documentary about a spooky house in Switzerland three times because it was very nicely made (mostly more about how to make documentaries about spooky houses and how the crew reacts to working there for weeks, thus portraying how spooky myths come to be) and even that had me scared a little at night.



Right now I found the excellent German miniseries on Wallenstein from 1978 on youtube, which I watch now. It probably requires some knowledge on the period, but it's rather cool to watch. Lots of men sitting in chambers, talking to each other how they dislike each other and like god a whole lot and how this Wallenstein dude is really, really good at administrating things, but also a pain in the backside. Classic thirty years war story, ie classic gangster story. Oh, and everybody talks GREAT. Very 60s style stage German.

The Eternals

It had to happen eventually, but I've finally watched a Marvel movie that is, IMO, pretty bad.
There's always been weaker Marvel films, those that run a little too long, get a bit boring in places or just have certain elements that don't land for me, but never before has there been one so unrelentingly dull as this.
The characters, the plot, even the fight scenes are extremely lacklustre.

Even if, like me, you're one of those people who need to see everything MCU related, I can't really recommend watching it.

My teenage kid watches Eternals all the frikkin' time. That and Birds of Prey are her "comfort movies" that she just puts on in the background or when she doesn't know what else to do.

No idea why those two, but I have seen parts or them so many times now.

V/H/S 99

Sigh.

It's always disappointing when a movie that you think is going to be good lets you down. It's especially disappointing when you were looking forward to it.

For those unfamiliar, the VHS series is a collection of horror anthology films, the central thread of which is that the various tales are found on VHS video cassettes, normally as a consequence of events of some overarching bonus story that knits the various disparate elements together.

99 does away with that overarching story in favour of dropping in and out of something that appears to have been recorded on the tape previously, although this apparently random stop motion student animation project does ultimately prove to have more involvement with one of the stories.

Anthologies by their very nature tend to vary in quality, the trouble with 99 is that none of the elements really shine. Shredding is a largely uninspired zombie story, Suicide Bid does have a pretty decent monster, but ultimately does nothing new with the buried alive trope, Ozzie's Dungeon tips it's hand far too early, any half serious horror fan will see the way the winds blowing in seconds, and again does little new with the trope. The Gawkers is fun in that it evokes the high school sex comedies of the 80s and 90s very well but suffers from the same issues in that it broadcasts it's intentions to any fan watching far too early and does nothing to disrupt them. Lastly, To Hell And Back is not a particularly remarkable story, but does feature one of the best on-screen depictions of hell I've yet witnessed, it would be great to see someone pick up the ideas here and populate them with more creatures and lost souls in the same way, sadly I suspect budget limited hell's population here, but the concept is great.

So a movie I was excited to watch disappoints with a lack of originality in both story and largely in execution. A VHS film with nothing new or interesting to say is a real shame.

 Easy E wrote:
My teenage kid watches Eternals all the frikkin' time. That and Birds of Prey are her "comfort movies" that she just puts on in the background or when she doesn't know what else to do.

No idea why those two, but I have seen parts or them so many times now.

Ah. But we all have our preferred comfort movies. That in itself requires no further explanation.

Yes some of mine are of questionable quality. Maybe even kwalitee with a Kapital K (the only seel of apruhval nided). But they’re comfort movies. Movies I enjoy greatly and everyone else can just…..Bugger off. No bugger off further than that style Bugger Off

Whilst I’m not a parent myself, and have all the parental instinct of….I dunno….a brick made out of incel badgers? I’m pretty sure a kid enjoying mass media of any type is not to be sniffed at

All Quiet on the Western Front

The new one on Netflix.

Very capable and well-executed war flick in the vein of Platoon and Full Metal Jacket (war is hell). Nothing new here, or particularly mindblowing.

The scene with the tanks is especially well done though and really hammers down the shock these weapons caused when first used. There's a very short scene where no punches is pulled on what it's like to see a man get crushed under a track.

Sad thing is that the world today is largely desensitized to the upfront and brutal depiction of war that made the original novel so iconic. Or at least, it doesn't hit with the shock the novel itself caused nearly a century ago.

As a result, while this adaptation is faithful to the spirit of the novel and very well done, that's kind of all there is to say. Good movie. Worth a watch.

Yus, surprisingly this one seems to be actually good (against all odds). I'll watch it some time.



I gave Rango another whirl, because I adore the visuals in that film. The story is a bit meh, the humour is so-so, but the centre idea is ok, everything is so alive and animated (no pun intended) and the characters just look great. Everything looks great. And I like people talking all Western or Southern USA like.

I was curious on new AQWF, as the original is sooooo good.


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I managed to catch Day of the Dead 2: Contagion as a Halloween treat (or trick).....

You know, I think Zombie Horror movies are popular because, frankly they are not scary... like .... at all. They follow well worn tropes and story beats that makes them a bit of a "known entity". Now, of course, this has some exceptions but they are basically gruesome action flicks for the most part.

Oh, this movie..... yeah..... it exists.

White Zombie
The original zombie movie.... except the Zombies are Voodoo style! You have to have a certain taste for these types of older flicks as the pacing, story beats, and style are very different than what we are used to. Plus, what was considered fresh and breathtaking then.... well.... it has changed a lot.

It wasn't a waste of time, but I would have preferred to watch The Most Dangerous Game instead.

House on Haunted Hill
The Vincent Price version has become some what of a tradition in my household. Like watching White Christmas or The Ten Commandments when their holidays come around.

Some cracking dialogue between Price and his wife in this one. The pacing is all over the place, and the plot makes 0 sense, but I always enjoy it. Even though I watch it every year, I still never recall the ending 100% so it is always a surprise to me.

Vincent Price is so incredibly entertaining.

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

A delightfully silly movie. Very well suited to the lead!

Suspiria

This is Dario Argento's 1977 version.

Say what you will about this film, but it is amazing to look at, and great to listen too. The music and lighting really set the stage and the mood.

You can see its heritage as an Italian Giallo film, as they try to play it a bit as a mystery. However, it is a mystery with a murderer reminiscent of the Orient Express. Things are much darker than just a simple murderer on the loose.

Always great to see Udo Kier on screen as well. My family was amazed he was the same guy as in Blade.

Hell's Angels

No, not the bikers; but the 1930's movie about WWI pilots by Howard Hughes. This movie was made before the Hayes Code came into effect, so it is old.

This picture has all the tropes we would come to know and love about airplane movies, but it was there first! Off course the pacing is a bit strange to our modern eyes, but the footage of airplanes dueling is TOP NOTCH even today.

The Zeppelin scenes are chilling. The reminded me of sequences from Submarine films. However, the efforts of the German crew to escape the pursuing fighter craft are horrifying.

Overall, the pacing is wonky, the make-up is odd, and it is in black and white. If you can get past those items, it is pretty impressive and the aerial antics are jaw dropping.

Edit: Looking into the film further, several stunt pilots were killed and injured making this film. Hughes himself crashed during a stunt and severely messed up his face.

Never seen Suspiria, but it's on the list!

Hell's Angels surely was a very interesting film to be around for the shoot. Think of all the amazing aerial shots they ended up not using.





Well, I watched Retro Puppet Master (1999)

I'm not too familiar with the series, but familiar enough to know that there's a ton of sequels, that it got dragged though a LOT of different time periods, but mostly stems from the puppets fighting good people, then bad people, then nazis, now mummies.

This direct-to-video film takes place in Paris in the early 20th century and kinda tells the story of the first series of puppets getting into the possession of the old dude (the puppet master). There's a lot of different accents in that film, which is very amusing, but it takes place in Paris, so everybody tries their best to do an Americans-doing-French-accent accent. And some German accents. And Egyptian. And some just don't care and sound like they're straight out of Arizona or some place.

The pacing is meandering and slow, the main guy sadly is really boring.

Don't Watch. It's probably the low point of the franchise, but who knows. IIRC there#s been another puppet master film being released every now and then ever since the series started. I never found it too interesting. The whole killer puppet thing is always intersting to an extent, but somehow these puppets which are very much made to be characters or recognizable and marketable don't really do it for me. Oh, and it's not scary. It's a mix of boring and goofy.

 Sigur wrote:
Vincent Price is so incredibly entertaining.

So true.

Those Roger Corman films based on Poe's stories (very, very loosely so) starring Price, Lorre, the occasional Boris Karloff and others are great to watch.



Now for something completely different - yesterday I zapped over the Dragon Quest TV show. I haven't played a single DQ game, but I do very much like Akira Toriyama's character and world design. Instantly recognizable, very nice and cosy looking. In general I think that anime tv shows made digitally I find to look horrible. I was all the more surprised to see that that show actually looked alright. Still a bit too clean, still entirely antiseptic, but for what it is is looks surprisingly nice. That's all I can report.

Causeway

This debuted on Apple TV yesterday, starring Jennifer Lawrence as a returning veteran from Afghanistan with a brain injury. This is definitely a very slow burn film, so if that's a deal breaker for you stay away. I personally loved it, but I generally like my slow burns. It's got some stellar performances from the two leads. Without spoiling anything, the film is less about her deployment and more about finding a new life for herself at home in the aftermath of her injury.

If you're looking for a break from CGI spectacle and wanna watch something low stakes and heart felt, I would highly recommend.

Ninja Assassin - 2009.

To me this is a better version of Aliens vs Predator. Well, sort of. This movie is full of bloody ninja action with some over the top, almost 3d cgi. The plot isn't bad the story ties it self together well enough. The Ninja stars are crazy.
From some of the historical Ninja stuff I have seen recreated from texts over the years this movie gets a few things right and it may not be obvious things to the casual viewer but they are there in a few places which is fun.




Ninja III the domination - 1984

This one was both better than expected but also a bit cringe in parts. It feels like the Spaghetti Western equivalent of a ninja movie. That's not really bad or good but noticeable. The first maybe 10 minuets are Ninja power madness on full display with an assignation in full daylight on a golf course 4 bodyguard, some lady and a guy who looks like he belongs in the cast of SNL from the 80's slain followed directly by the fastest police response ever. And an action packed chase ensues. The Ninja wrecks at least 4 motorcycles and possibly two cop cars and a police helicopter and slays something like 20 or 30 cops. Before being nearly gunned down and some how he pulls off a ninja vanish escape in a cloud of flash and smoke. Only to have no escaped but have buried himself exactly where he was standing. The police believe he's run off. And if that wasn't enough as he's about to die he brainwashes a woman who at first is trying to help this man she is trying to help. Now the story begins.

The cringe is bit of a plot hole as the brainwashed woman ends up in a fight with 4 men who were trying to harass her friend then her, right in front of the a cop. The cop tells her she is in trouble for beating up 4 men who had put hands on her and all that... Groan. I love a lot of 80's movie but this was ignorant even for the 80's.
Past that it's a paranormal possession ninja revenge thing. Kinda fun. The actress lead seems to be very competent when she's doing scenes as the ninja but some times you can tell when she has male a stunt double. It's not hugely obvious, they tried.
It's a tad clumsy at times but over all fun.
Love me some ninja movies!

Edit. I just realized that yes as expected Shô Kosugi is in fact in both of these movies. Because of course he is! I didn't recognize him in Ninja assassin! Weirdly none of his kids are in Ninja assassin... Talk about a twist.

Ernest Saves Christmas

My son insisted we watch another Ernest movie, and this was the last of the big four we had access to. It’s got some funny stuff, but it’s as much a Christmas movie as it is an Ernest movie. It also feels more dated than the others so far.

Definitely worth a watch alongside Home Alone and A Christmas Story. And Die Hard.



Keanu

Key and Peele made a comedy movie full of violence, drugs and nudity, and boy did they look like they were having fun. The action scenes especially had the old Key and Peele magic. The middle of the movie had a lot of people-embarrassing-themselves humor, so I wouldn’t rank this as highly as the best Key and Peele skits, but it was still a good time. The kitten was adorable.




Attack the Block

“What if Predator, but also Menace 2 Society, with a dash of Goonies?” Well-written and constructed little story about aliens invading the wrong part of London. Lots of swearing and drug abuse, so not kid friendly. Recommended.






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Oh, and subtitles are mandatory!

Weird Science

A perennial favourite in my crypt, and a classic for good reason.

What always impresses me is how little Mucking About is involved. The opening scene establishes Gary and Wyatt as bottom of the social pecking order. Within minutes, we know their motivations, we get to empathise with them, we learn some of their background. Then they make Lisa and the shenanigans begin.

That lack of mucking around establishing backstory could’ve gone wrong, leaving us with hollow protagonists. Yet…not a bit of it. Their tale builds as the movie moves along, learning more and more about them.

A decently charismatic cast too!

If you’ve not watched it? Get it watched.

Whilst I rank it in the lower tier of Mr Hughes' effort the f/x when the boys clothing changes as they move between rooms seemed way ahead of its time

The House That Dripped Blood

So many of these types of movies have really great titles, but fail to deliver on them.

This is an anthology film supposedly written by the guy who wrote Psycho. It has some very famous British faces that you will recognize from a lot of movies and TV shows.

None of the stories are particularly good, even for their time.

A Virgin Among the Living Dead... or something like that.....

Wow, this one is very Italian and very sleazy. There are a couple of interesting shots, but it is not worth wading through all the sleaze and leering camera.

Also, it makes no sense.

Nine deaths of the ninja -1985

The title is completely misleading. There are ninja in this movie but it's at best a sub plot that goes nowhere. That said this movie is basically a live actin GIJOE movie with a good guy team that seems reasonably set up with a Ninja, a tough guy commando/ army guy and an foxy intelligence and communications officer. Shô Kosugi was our ninja and his kids were also cast as kids in the movie as was they style at the time.
Our bad guys were wacky horrible and over the top tropes hell bent on being evil and selling drugs in southeast Asia.

Not a very good movie more like a live action cartoon but there are a few gems in there. Spike played by Shô Kosugi uses several disguises including masquerading as an old man and stays in characters as the old man in his fight scene which was good fun.
One of the memorable lines was delivered by our commando. " If only I wasn't so desperately rich" He is keeping some "probably sex workers" distracted while holding them at more or less gun point And they are very interested in helping him spend all of this supposed money he says he has.
Oh and one of the bad guys has only about two lines in the movie the rest of his 'speaking" is him laughing and that's 95 percent of his speaking in the entire movie in every scene he's laughing. And he's a "really bad dude". You'll feel no pity for any of the bad guys.

You might find it fun but it is very cheesy.

I love all the Ninja movie reviews! Keep them coming!

Makes me want to go back an revisit the old Gladiator movies again!

 Easy E wrote:
The House That Dripped Blood

So many of these types of movies have really great titles, but fail to deliver on them.

This is an anthology film supposedly written by the guy who wrote Psycho. It has some very famous British faces that you will recognize from a lot of movies and TV shows.

None of the stories are particularly good, even for their time.

Gasssssssssssspppp! How very dare you Sir! I demand to speak with your Manager or Responsible Adult!

You take that back. I will not have Amicus Portmanteaus…..besmirched…in my presence!

Booo I say, sir. Boooooo!

Disgusted, Formerly of Tunbridge Wells.

 Easy E wrote:
I love all the Ninja movie reviews! Keep them coming!

Makes me want to go back an revisit the old Gladiator movies again!

Well, I'll do what I can. Thanks!
I think it's part of my mid life crisis...
I think I have two more for sure I can add.
I love these old Ninja movies they were a lot of fun and so cool when I was a kid.

All Hallows Eve

Given the release of Terrifier 2 made me realise there's a whole cluster of movies featuring one of the most interesting villains since the 80s heyday that had passed me by, I went back to the start.

A movie anthology strung together by the conceit of a babysitter and her charges watching a tape that had mysteriously appeared in the kids' trick or treat haul, the individual stories are clearly cheaply made, in most cases fairly derivative, but are entertaining enough.

They serve a purpose of allowing the film's real standout, Art the Clown, to make his way into "our" reality, with each story watched allowing him to get closer to breaking through.

Wrapping up with a suitably bleak ending, the whole movie would be instantly forgettable were it not for the inclusion of Art, but his presence essentially carries the whole movie, and make it worth watching, if only to see the origin of one of the only great slashers to make it to screen since Freddie, Michael, Jason et al made their debuts decades ago.

 Azreal13 wrote:
All Hallows Eve

Given the release of Terrifier 2 made me realise there's a whole cluster of movies featuring one of the most interesting villains since the 80s heyday that had passed me by, I went back to the start.

A movie anthology strung together by the conceit of a babysitter and her charges watching a tape that had mysteriously appeared in the kids' trick or treat haul, the individual stories are clearly cheaply made, in most cases fairly derivative, but are entertaining enough.

They serve a purpose of allowing the film's real standout, Art the Clown, to make his way into "our" reality, with each story watched allowing him to get closer to breaking through.

Wrapping up with a suitably bleak ending, the whole movie would be instantly forgettable were it not for the inclusion of Art, but his presence essentially carries the whole movie, and make it worth watching, if only to see the origin of one of the only great slashers to make it to screen since Freddie, Michael, Jason et al made their debuts decades ago.

That's a very fair review, Art's the real deal! We saw Terrifier before we saw All Hallows Eve. And Art the Clown may be in another movie called The 9th circle which I believe is a short film not a full length feature. you might be able to find that on the Youtubes. I have it book marked I think but haven't gotten around to watching it.

 Easy E wrote:
I love all the Ninja movie reviews! Keep them coming!

Makes me want to go back an revisit the old Gladiator movies again!

Were you introduced to them by a kindly airline pilot?

 warhead01 wrote:

Spoiler:

 Azreal13 wrote:
All Hallows Eve

Given the release of Terrifier 2 made me realise there's a whole cluster of movies featuring one of the most interesting villains since the 80s heyday that had passed me by, I went back to the start.

A movie anthology strung together by the conceit of a babysitter and her charges watching a tape that had mysteriously appeared in the kids' trick or treat haul, the individual stories are clearly cheaply made, in most cases fairly derivative, but are entertaining enough.

They serve a purpose of allowing the film's real standout, Art the Clown, to make his way into "our" reality, with each story watched allowing him to get closer to breaking through.

Wrapping up with a suitably bleak ending, the whole movie would be instantly forgettable were it not for the inclusion of Art, but his presence essentially carries the whole movie, and make it worth watching, if only to see the origin of one of the only great slashers to make it to screen since Freddie, Michael, Jason et al made their debuts decades ago.

That's a very fair review, Art's the real deal! We saw Terrifier before we saw All Hallows Eve. And Art the Clown may be in another movie called The 9th circle which I believe is a short film not a full length feature. you might be able to find that on the Youtubes. I have it book marked I think but haven't gotten around to watching it.

There's more All Hallows Eves as well, but don't know if they feature Art or they're just a bunch more shorts strung together.

I feel I should also add that if the babysitter in the original AHE had even the slightest amount of authority over the kids she was allegedly looking after, the whole thing would have never happened!

Bliss

An artist gets hooked on something that isn't drugs in order to fuel her crazed painting sprees.

The movie does a great job making normal everyday things actively nausea inducing with odd sounds, strange angles, cuts, and other tricks. The city also looks very lived in thanks to good location shooting.

The concept is nothing we have not seen before. However, I was half expecting Blade to show up in the closing minutes to end the film. He did not, but the movie does end with a bang.

Probably not worth watching, and seems pretty "film school" or "early film project" but the production is slightly too good for that.

I, too, love hearing about ninja films.

Have you been following GoodBadflix’s obsession with bad ninja movies? He might have some good recommendations.

Also, I recently heard about New York Ninja, a modern reconstruction of an 89’s ninja film from a warehouse full of unedited footage. RLM cover it in their way here: