Insidious Review

Insidious, 2011
Reviewed By: Dan. S
Directed By: James Wan
Written By: Leigh Wannell
Starring: Patrick Wilson, Lin Shaye, Rose Byrne, and Darth Maul.
Lanuage: English

Plot: A little boy goes into a coma and cliches appear.

Despite having some magnificent lighting that turns every shadow of an average suburban home into unpenterable black abysses, Director James Wan could care less about sustained atmosphere or suspense, he's all about barraging the viewer with cheap thrills and jumps scares, and to his credit he's not bad at it until the film completely falls apart in a ludacris second act that borrows liberally from "The Sixth Sense", "Poltergeist", "A Nightmare On Elm Street.," and even those fun Dark Castle movies from the late 90s. It doesn't help that when the ghosts finally reveal themselves...oh boy, they look hysterically bad, especially the big bad demon who is apparently Darth Maul from the Star Wars prequels, hanging out in a boiler room, sharpening his Freddy Kreuger gloves while listening to "Tip Toe Through the Tulips"; I shit you not. Not much acting to speak of, Lin Shaye does her weird old lady thing and does it well. Patrick Wilson continues to be the most bland unlikable leading man of our generation, and the emaciated Rose Byrne is more terrifying than any ghost.

Rating: **

Return of the Blind Dead Review

Return of the Blind Dead, 1973

Reviewed by: Dan s.

Director: Amando de Ossorio

Written by: Amando de Ossorio

Starring: Tony Kendall

Language: Spanish

Unlike its slow moody predecessor, Return of the Blind Dead aka Return of the Evil Dead is all about non-stop action and mounting suspense. Despite once again working with a very limited budget, writer/director Ossorio gets some good milage out of the cool Spanish locations and stages some impressive mayhem as his iconic Templers crash a fiesta with swords swinging. Utilizing more B-level gore, the zombie knights freely slice and dice their innocent victims with blood and severed limbs flying. There’s even a cool car vs. horse chase sequence through narrow atmospheric streets and a couple cheesy fist fights for the hell of it.

After the wild first act, the script settles into a Night of the Living Dead scenario with a small group of survivors held up in a besieged old church. Despite being cliche caricatures, the colorful characters are surprisingly effective, especially the sleazy overweight mayor who manipulates and uses others without remorse; a far cry from the boring non-characters of the original film. The unique “blind dead” gimmick is also much better exploited this time out as villagers frequently attempt to sneak past these cloaked menaces in sequences of almost unbearable suspense. Surprisingly, Ossorio even smoothly weaves some rather amusing dark humor into the script. And just in case this sounds to classy for you, plenty of busty women have their shirts ripped open for no other reason than to expose their breasts before their gory death.

Rating:

Tombs of the Blind Dead Review

Tombs of the Blind Dead, 1971
Reviewed By: Daniel S.
Directed By: Amando de Ossorio
Written by: Amando de Ossorio
Staring: Cesar Burner, Lone Fleming
Language: Spanish

Tombs of the Blind Dead" aka Night of the Blind Terror is a lengthy uneven mix of European exploitation and well executed gothic horror. Despite riffing on Hitchock's amatuer detective formula, the script boils down to attractive women and sleezy men doing stupid things and getting killed. The film's modest attempts at character development look and feel like a campy 70s Soap Opera. And while director Amando de Ossorio may let the slow parts drag and drag, the film's three major horror sequences are long and masterfully staged.

Anton Garcia Abril's unsettling score of monk chants sets the mood effectively while the authentic runied castle the movie revolves around is a geniuenly creepy location. Draped in heavy cloaks and always silent, the skeletal Templar Knights are truly frightening as they relentlessly stalk their victims through claustophobic ruins or chase them through the countryside on horseback in slow motion. Ossorio keeps the gore limited to modest blood letting but curiously doesn't shun away from erotic violence and rape. With such a strange combination of atmosphere and exploitation there is definetly something for everyone, however it may also leave viewers conflicted.

Rating:

A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010) Review

A Nightmare On Elm Street, 2010

Reviewed by Dan S.

Directed by: Samuel Beyer

Written by: Wesley Strick and Eric Heisserer

Starring: Jackie Earle Haley

Much like its 1984 predecessor, “A Nightmare on Elm Street 2010” is the tale of four teens terrorized by a disfigured serial killer in their dreams. Cutting most of the memorable meat from Craven’s original narrative, screen writers Wesley Strick and Eric Heisserer’s version of the classic film dully unfolds as a series of predictable jump scares and unimaginative death scenes. In his feature film debut, veteran music video director Samuel Bayer’s vision of Freddy’s dream world is a lot like your average studio horror movie complete with the now standard digitized blue/green color scheme and sloppy hyperactive editing. His occasional CGI enhanced recreations of the franchise’s signature visuals only serve as a reminder of how much better executed the scenes were in the original film. The musical score is equaly uninspired, lots of cliches with a sporadic keyboard nod to the original theme

Prestigious, Oscar-nominated actor Jackie Earle Haley struggles to make any kind of lasting impression as Krueger. Buried behind convincing, but stoic make up, with a toneless, digitized voice. It is only during a very brief flash black sequence that the make up-free actor hints at the complex ambiguity he could have brought to the role. Speaking of wasted potential, cult favorite Clancy Brown has maybe two lines that he can’t do much with. Unfournately, the audience is forced to spend most of the movie's running time with an ensemble cast of forgettable pouty face teens as they struggle to remember if human Freddy touched them in their special areas or not when they were little...

10 Disturbing Kids' Movies

1. The Garbage Pail Kids Movie - Those miniature abominations were sure to haunt your eight year-old dreams.

2.Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory - "There's no earthly way of knowing. Which direction we are going..."

3.The Dark Crystal - Giant, nightmarish versions of Big Bird...

4. Return to Oz - Oh my god, those goddamn Wheelers were just the worst part of a movie filled to the brim with creepiness.

5. The Last Unicorn - The Red Bull running in slow motion = pretty terrifying.

6. The Secret of NIMH - Nicodemus!

7. Watcher in the Woods - This is a kids' movie?  Seriously?  Didn't go into the woods next to our house for WEEKS after seeing this one.

8. The Neverending Story - Holy crap, even the good guys were creepy in this one.  Especially that Willy Wonka-ish dude who rode the snail.

9. Labyrinth - Pretty much everything Bowie-related in this one will creep you out.

10. Dumbo - Those pink elephants and that music...

Street Trash Review

STREET TRASH, 1987

Directed by: J. Micheal Muro

Written by: Roy Frumkes

Starring: Mike Lackey, Vic Noto, Bill Chepil, Marc Sferrazza, Jane Arakawa, Nicole Potter, Pat Ryan Jr., Clarenze Jarmon, Bernard Perlman, Miriam Zucker, M. D'Jango Krunch, James Lorinz, Julian Davis

"Things in New York are about to go down the toilet..."

A liquor store owner decides to sell a case of cheap wine, ("Tenafly Viper") that he finds in a hole in the wall of his building. The stuff is decades old and way past its sell date. Of course, he does what any responsible businessman would and sells it cheap to the local vagrant population. The few  unlucky enough to drink the stuff disolve into a mess of primary-colored goo.  All the while, a crazy Vietnam vet and self-styled king of the hobos reigns over the local junkyard, murdering his subjects at will with his sharpened femur-bone knife.

Throw in a few subplots about a psychotic cop, a local mob boss's doorman, and the kind-hearted junkyard secretary and you've got a giant mess that is still somehow endlessly watchable. For every bad actor, cheap looking set, and horribly delivered piece of dialogue, you've got a ton of amazingly fascinating crazy going on here.

And if the gut-churning scenes of melting hobos and genuinely funny (if oftentimes awkward) social commentary weren't enough, you get the most horrific game of keep away in movie history.  I won't ruin it for you here as it's truly something you need to experience. If you like your trash   cinema with huge doses of humor and plenty of gore, you really can't go wrong with this one. 

It's a cruel movie full of cruel characters, and there are several scenes that seem over the top and unnecessarily violent, but that's kind of the point.  If you go in ready to take STREET TRASH seriously, you'll be in for a huge disappointment.  Just remember, you're supposed to feel like you need a shower after watching this thing.

REASONS TO WATCH: Melting hobos, gratuitous violence, genital mutilation played for laughs. 

BEWARE: This movie contains plenty of melting hobos, gratuitous violence, and genital mutilation.

RATING: