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Horns

I hope you like a bit of magical realism with your small town murder shows. Reminded me a bit of It, Stranger Things and Stand By Me. A kid's on bicycles vibes, but everyone is much older.

Okay enough, but not a great ending.

Ready Player One
This movie has some ideas, and then makes it all kinda' okayish.

This must have cost a ton just for all the IP alone.

Terrible ending.

Saw the latest Turtles film. It was quite fun and well done. A good take on the turtles as a whole though Mikey felt like they really missed the mark compared to the others. Overall I absolutely enjoyed it, but it was pretty disposable. A solid 3/5.

 Easy E wrote:
...

Ready Player One
This movie has some ideas, and then makes it all kinda' okayish.

This must have cost a ton just for all the IP alone.

Terrible ending.

I really enjoyed the book, but I haven't managed to get all the way through the film yet.

 LordofHats wrote:
...
The weirdest thing about that one is that it's only found footage like 50% of the time? The other 50% it's just a regular low-budget horror flick. So that was weird.

Now that's an interesting choice on the producers' part.

 Sigur wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:
...
The weirdest thing about that one is that it's only found footage like 50% of the time? The other 50% it's just a regular low-budget horror flick. So that was weird.

Now that's an interesting choice on the producers' part.

I found it kind of refreshing in its own way. I’m a bit burned out on Found Footage, because the sub genre’s noise to signal ratio is predominantly noise. Even Blair Witch is….really dull, more notorious for being novel and popularising found footage than actually being particularly good. It kind of feels like if you’re incompetent at film making, and can’t frame or light a scene, just call the resulting debacle “found footage” and folk will watch it.

But when done right it can be very very good.

It is impossible to recapture the hype and aura that surrounded Blair Witch at the time.

Without that context.... yeah.... it is a suck film.

Puss in Boots - the last wish

This is a fabulously well put together movie. There isn't much about this film that isn't great. Story, characters, stylistic direction, blend of comedy and sentimentality. It's easily one of the best films I've seen recently.

 Easy E wrote:
It is impossible to recapture the hype and aura that surrounded Blair Witch at the time.

Without that context.... yeah.... it is a suck film.

I feel there should be some personality test that explains the sharp love/hate divide on Blair Witch Project, because there seems to be no in between.

I found the film very effective at engaging my imagination and escalating the tension. It lives in my head every time I go camping.

 Easy E wrote:
It is impossible to recapture the hype and aura that surrounded Blair Witch at the time.

Without that context.... yeah.... it is a suck film.

I remember being in school and we were lunging around in front of the classroom for drawing class and some of my classmates talked about how scary that film was. I've never seen it myself to be honest. But then again I never watched many horror films except for a phase around the time everybody's got their horror phase, I suppose. And I may be at the age at which you get a bit more squeamish again.

I just found it lame.

Without the marketing hype, it’s just an aimless, scriptless, plotless film which I fear was nothing but marketing hype.

Then again, I am one of those weirdos that when told I’ll enjoy something, I probably won’t. I dunno why.

It’s the same for anything that overly advertised. For instance, I understand Wall-E is a very, very good movie. Yet in the run up to its release, it felt like it was everywhere. Utterly inescapable.

But then, I am known for…erm…rather unique tastes in media.

Blair Witch however? Just utter, utter bobbins.

I think I’d actually rather watch overly rehearsed YouTube “big film trailer” reaction videos. You know the ones. Yes. Those ones. Where it’s abundantly clear it’s stage managed and carefully rehearsed, because the coming debacle displays reactions and emotions hitherto unknown to mankind outside of Stage School Kids. And not the good stage school kids. The crap ones. The ones that can’t control their eyebrows, and are coming to a travelling school theatre troop worryingly close to your kids soon, to be ignored and ridiculed by youngsters across the land.

It worked on me. I was at university at the time, and had trouble sleeping for a week after watching it on release. The scene at the very end would just keep intruding itself into my thoughts and freaking me out. It’s like Paranormal Investigations. That still tries to eat back into my thoughts about 15 years after I last watched it…

I’m just not that well wired for that kind of thing methinks

Wall-E though. Probably the best most evocative storytelling that has ever been done, especially the first 20 minutes or so

I won't say it is a bad film but it definitely wasn't for me. Saw it with friends when it came out and all the city dwellers and non-campers thought it was quite scary whereas I found it to be a tedious chore to sit through.

Joy Ride (2023)

This is a raunchy, R-rated road-trip movie about four friends traveling to China and getting into all kinds of trouble. There were some big laughs sprinkled throughout, except for the sentimental part of the ending. It was decent. I’d recommend it for fans of Bridesmaids or Girl’s Trip, that kind of movie.

 Ahtman wrote:
I won't say it is a bad film but it definitely wasn't for me. Saw it with friends when it came out and all the city dwellers and non-campers thought it was quite scary whereas I found it to be a tedious chore to sit through.

This is similar to my experience, although I didn't bother with the movie until it was on TV. It just falls apart if you can't buy into the setup of people getting lost in the woods and freaking out over it.

The "lost in the woods" thing is great, but I don't think it translates to UK experience as well. I mean small children yes, but we just don't have woods that are big enough for vaguely rational adults to get lost in

Not so much "follow the river" as "follow the noise of traffic"

Also, who heading out into the wilderness doesn’t take something as basic as a compass with them?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Also, who heading out into the wilderness doesn’t take something as basic as a compass with them?

I mean... famous British actors, for one.
I know you folks don't have real wilderness (I got to see a Welsh 'nature preserve' where all the trees were (re)planted in straight lines, which was just surreal), but we have semi-regular news segments about idiots lost on a hike, and have to be rescued in increasingly bizarre circumstances. Went on a hike 2 miles from home, slid down a slope and broke a leg is just a thing that happens.

We cut down all our trees to make the Royal Navy, to the point where a formal government body needed to be set up to make sure that we would have any trees in the future...



Basically everything in the UK is replanted managed forests (barring very few, rather small ancient forests).

Our wildernesses tend to be more moorland and mountains. Yes you can get lost in wilderness just not in forests, so unless there is massive cloud cover, the sense of enclosure and lack of visibility isn't there

Didn't care much for Blair Witch myself, even at the height of its popularity. Doesn't help that someone stumbled in drunk and made a scene during the ending of the film when I saw it. I've always heard that makes the film "worth it" but I've never felt the need to sit back through it and find out.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Also, who heading out into the wilderness doesn’t take something as basic as a compass with them?

Stupid (ok, also inexperienced) people. Wich is why they get lost....

 LunarSol wrote:
Didn't care much for Blair Witch myself, even at the height of its popularity. Doesn't help that someone stumbled in drunk and made a scene during the ending of the film when I saw it. ...

Well, at least you have a rather individual memory of the thing. Maybe that's worth even more than being able to say "ya, the ending was propa good like".

I thought the forest in Blair Witch has some supernatural properties that made it worse. Wasn’t the stream flowing in a big circle or something like that? Then there was the invasions of their camp site every night, which is scary whether it’s a witch leaving bloody twigs by your tent or a mortal stranger. I feel like saying Blair With isn’t scary because you spend time in the wilderness is like saying Cujo isn’t scary because you’re good with dogs.


And that’s leaving aside other dangers, like bears, mountain lions, elk, moose and coyotes. Most Americans aren’t going to have the woodcraft to avoid these threats with confidence.

ccs wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Also, who heading out into the wilderness doesn’t take something as basic as a compass with them?

Stupid (ok, also inexperienced) people. Wich is why they get lost....

In mountainous terrain you can still get lost even with a compass. You can know exactly which direction the car is, and even the distance, but if you can’t see your footprints or any identifiable marks to backtrack, you can have a hard time telling which branch of a narrow defile takes you back and which takes you deeper. That’s one reason why going off trail can be so dangerous even for prepared hikers.


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 Sigur wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
Didn't care much for Blair Witch myself, even at the height of its popularity. Doesn't help that someone stumbled in drunk and made a scene during the ending of the film when I saw it. ...

Well, at least you have a rather individual memory of the thing. Maybe that's worth even more than being able to say "ya, the ending was propa good like".

We had someone throw up just after the final shot of the film. At first we thought it was a splatter sound in the movie, but then it happened again during the credits. The worst part is it splashed all over my brother’s shoes.

Y’can’t go spewing on another man’s shoes! Only he can splash his own boots!

Booo! Foul play!

Children of the Corn

The 2023 version. Henceforth to be known as the crap version.

Kind of a prequel in terms of its plot, but not actually a prequel. This deals with the kids taking over the town rather than the original story of adults bumbling into A Situation.

What a boring, dull film. Made all the worse because a prequel of sorts has so much potential.

And it’s all the worse because our antagonist kids are so young. And they don’t even have shooters. Yet nobody just sort of…beats them up.

Not that I’m an advocate for punching downward in general. But if a prepubescent wee scrote is coming at me with a farming implement, I can’t see me (as an avowed and self confessed wuss) having a great deal of trouble sorting them out, and giving them what-five* up the bracket.

Kids are kind of inherently weedy. Yet not even the older kids try so much as giving them a slap.

Also the main kid just isn’t anywhere near as creepy as Isaac was (is, I guess) in the original. Which is a big old problem, because they’ve replaced Isaac with a wee girl maybe 12 at the most. And not at all intimidating.

Even the gore lame, and understated.

It does however star Bruce Spence. And promptly wastes his many talents. Which is a cinematic crime in itself.

*it’s like what for, but more.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Wait it gets worse. So much worse.

Not only does it confirm He Who Walks actually does an exist? But He Who Walks exists as a crappy CGI monster.

The short story confirms He Who Walks Behind the Rows exists. It’s a pretty good story, though. I tried to watch the first movie once, but checked out halfway through.

Still, one of the great Stephen King stories to reference on road trips, along with Mrs. Todd’s Shortcut.

Theatre of Blood

An actor takes revenge on his critics.

Vincent Price gets to ham it up in a proto-Saw. Also has Diana Rigg!

One over-the-top fencing scene so that is a +1. However, I am not sure I can really recommend it.

I’ve got the remake of that on DVD. Will need to give it another watch.

 Easy E wrote:
Theatre of Blood

An actor takes revenge on his critics.

Vincent Price gets to ham it up in a proto-Saw. Also has Diana Rigg!

One over-the-top fencing scene so that is a +1. However, I am not sure I can really recommend it.

Oh, that sounds like something I should look up.


I switched through tv channels last night.
.) Found out I can't watch Punisher:Warzone dubbed any more. On the plus side: Wayne Knight has the most macho German dub voice on this one.
.) Mortal Kombat 2 still isn't very good.
.) Watched the last few minutes of the The Hills Have Eyes remake. Which I saw at the cinema at the time and did NOT care for.

However, given how these are the films which were on tv as I turned it on means that not everything is lost.

I think I also saw some other things, but I can't quite recall.

Matriarch (2023 British film)

One from Disney+’s horror collection.

It’s hard to explain this in a PG Friendly way, and to be honest being a Horror, probably best not to comment on the overall plot. Well. A competent horror. I’ll spoil crap horror to spare the time and minds of others.

Jemima Rooper and Kate Dickie star in this folk horror movie. And….it’s pretty entertaining in a disturbing way.

On the extreme off chance you’re into 2000AD deepcuts, this has rural shades of Cradlegrave. Which is a good thing.

Performances are solid, and there’s a good amount of atmosphere and tension.

If you’re in the UK, like creepy horror and have Disney+? Give this a whirl. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Plane

Starring Gerard Butler. This is an odd fish. It’s a thriller, involving a plane making an emergency landing, and a rebel army trying to hold the passengers hostage. And it plays out like someone was carrying the scripts for Miracle on the Hudson and Rambo, dropped them and managed to muddle up the pages.

Whilst not dire? At no point did I feel like I particularly cared about any of the characters, because it never really bothers to tell us anything about them. And so I’m afraid this is pretty forgettable. Certainly I have no particular scene to recommend. Except perhaps where the weasely Scrote rebel who thinks having a gun makes him a man cops one in the coconut. That was pretty fun.


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Wishmaster

Well. What to make of this. Because it’s genuine mixed bag.

The plot is thin, but mostly fine. And it has some genuinely solid moments. Mostly based in Djinn type shenanigans.

Frustratingly, whilst fun throughout? It’s just so uneven. The Djinn could have been on the same par as Pinhead, but the performance isn’t match by the script. And everyone bar the Djinn is just sort of phoning it in.

But I don’t want a do-over. No mulligan here. It’s pretty ropey, but the central premise and villain still carry it just far enough over the line.