Movie Appraisal: The Collective (2008) (2006?)

"Evil is not traced back to the individual...
But to the collective behavior of humanity."
- Niebuhr

The Collective is yet another odd indie horror film. I say "odd" but what I truly mean is that it is a bit obscure. I say that because I cannot find the exact year it was released. I believe it was released in 2008, but a few websites place it as being released in 2006. It could be that it was shown at some film festival before 2008. I'm not sure. If I get any more research done on this movie before I post this review, I'll update my knowledge.

That being said, it's a bit of a crawl of a movie at times. I won't say it's boring, but it moves very slow with a great deal of tension. I have to say that I enjoyed that aspect of the film. I watched with rapt attention through the front half of the movie, as the lead character Tyler (played by Kelly Overton) tries to find her sister, Jessica, through a network of contacts that Jessica had had in the weeks leading up to Tyler coming to find her and that she has subsequently dropped out of her life.

The camera work in the movie is absolutely great. I have to point that out first. The directors (Kelly Overton and Judson Pearce Morgan certainly knows how to use a camera correctly. It has a very artistic feeling without being pretentious, which I appreciate. The acting in the movie is also quite good. I love these indie ventures because sometimes the acting just feels like regular people interacting, which is what I love in these movies.

BUT! And I hate to be the harbinger of bad news, BUT while the front half of the film is tense and extremely good, once the mystery is out, the film takes a dramatic turn into the mediocre lane. It becomes a case of New York City is too small. The antagonists are around every corner even though there are only four of them searching for the two sisters once they meet up and decide to split the group that's holding Jessica.

I don't want to be a jerk here. The first half of the movie with its intrigue, questions, and ultimate mystery is extremely well done. The feeling of not being able to trust anybody and being paranoid constantly are so well put together. Tyler's first meeting with Jessica is also really well portrayed and acted, showing tension that I wasn't expecting.

But once the story is all put out there, it is much less interesting and much less horrific than it starts out being. I figured the whole cult-group had undergone some kind of "groupthink" thing, hence The Collective, but that wasn't true at all. It's just some shitty name for a group of thirty-somethings who meet up at a random man's cathedral and play-worship and take drugs. And that disappointed me. Why set up everything so nicely only to have it be the simplest and most boring explanation? There is no horror there and the tension only just exists at all.

And when I say that, I mean that because the movie makes NYC into this small place, there is more tension than there would be if NYC had been treated as how it actually is. I live very close to NYC. I'm in the city about once a month or so. It's BIG. If you've never been there, it is so much bigger than you expect it to be, what with the subway tunnels, the vertical building littered constantly all over the city, and mostly the amount of people that exist. NYC is extremely populous. If you dive into a large group of people, you are EXTREMELY LIKELY to not be found. And somebody showing up on the same subway you're taking accidentally is almost beyond the realm of reason.

This is something to focus on because it is a flaw. These four people who are going after our protagonists are not omnipotent. They shouldn't be able to find the girls as easily as they continue to in the last ten minutes of the movie or so. It breaks me right out of the movie and frustrates me completely. They had a perfectly good beginning of a plot, and they ruined it by using the most boring and laziest conclusion possible.

Eh. I don't have much else to say. I wouldn't recommend watching beyond the halfway point of the movie. The front half is really good, but the back half will just make you angry.

Oh, but I do have to admit that I think this is the only movie I've ever seen that portrays the Metro North in a positive light. I love that simply because I used to use the Metro North every once in a while when I lived in Connecticut. So, it's great to see that hope resides in some of the shittiest cities in Connecticut, if only for my own personal amusement.

Movie Appraisal: Butterfly Dreaming (2008)

"Ordinary representation of stable thoughts"

So, first of all, I couldn't even find the picture of my DVD box cover art anywhere online. I wanted to include the specific art for my version of the film, but I must own the only copy of it or something. Very weird. Anyway, getting that odd bit of trivia out of the way, let's get this movie started.  I'm hoping for a trippy and creepy movie with some psychological twists. But let's see...

Butterfly Dreaming  is directed, written, and produced by Rufus Williams, who only has one other credit to his name as far as I can tell. I kept thinking that this movie has another name somewhere along the line, that the version I have is named Butterfly Dreaming, but the "real name" of the movie was Man Who Falls Down Stairs  Amusingly or Chickens: You Can't Keep 'Em Caged. But no, this is the only title of the movie I can find.

I'm being a bit silly with my last sentence, but I'm having a very hard time finding anything out about this movie. I've seen two reviews online. One is glowing. The other is extremely negative. And nothing else at all. This is weird. Reviews of movies exist everywhere. And this being an American movie, I would have thought somebody who reviews indie horror films would have scooped this up and talked about it, especially owing to how readily available I thought it was.

My inability to find all that much about the movie really makes me that much more interested in the film itself. Why is nobody talking about it? I found it easily (and cheaply) enough. Why does it have fewer reviews than tiny budgeted obscure Japanese horror movies that nobody but like five people in the US has even heard of? I don't have answers, but my questions will linger.

I brought up the DVD box art before because my specific copy of the movie says on the cover: "For fans of Memento and Mulholland Dr." These two movies are extremely different types of films with only pieces of the filming style being even somewhat similar. Memento (which is an okay, but extremely over-hyped noir-ish thriller movie) and Mulholland Drive (which is nothing like Memento with more of a psychological mystery feel, with it being David Lynch and everything) are weird movies to have people be huge fans of. This whole thing intrigues me though. How does a movie hit a middle ground between those two very different films?

We'll see if it does, I suppose.

The movie starts off with some mediocre music over an interesting credit sequence. Not a terrible start. And then the movie itself hits. My first thought is, "Was this actually made in 2008? It looks like an early 1990s film." I'm not sure if this is a good or bad start. And this will be a theme going forward.

The movie stars Andrew Bowen as Rob Pollack. He is our main character whether we like him or not. I'm still unsure of what to think about his performance. It lies somewhere between extremely subtle and over the top. But the character of Rob is a good one. While not a character one can relate to, the performance is extremely genuine. I'm just unsure if that is a good thing or a bad thing.

The movie skips around a greta deal of the time. We skip from one time period to another with no real moment in between. Flashbacks happen throughout scenes. And some scenes go right from reality to dreams or vice versa. By the end of the film reality and fiction have blended together to the point that there is no longer a dividing line anymore. I have no idea what ended up true and what ended up completely made up dream reality.

My personal interpretation is one that requires the end of the movie to explain. So, if you don't want spoilers, don't read on.

I think that the whole movie was an amalgamation dream after Rob got into a car crash. I think the passenger was obscured and never truly shown at the end of the movie because the movie itself wanted to be vague about just how much of the movie did or did not happen. I found the move somewhat clever, and I hope I'm not just missing something obvious in the meanwhile, reading deeply into pieces of the film that just aren't there.

Officer Lowry appearing multiple times in the film before he is "formally" introduced in the ending, kind of helps me with my interpretation, but that's about it. If I'm reading the movie correctly, it would be similar to Stay and Jacob's Ladder, but is probably most similar to something somewhere between Memento and Mulholland Drive-





-well, fuck-

Rufus Williams pulled it off, didn't he? This movie is the perfect weird blend of those movies. It never gets as noir-y as Memento, nor as logical. And it certainly never gets as weird and depressing as Mulholland Drive. But it does a good job at walking a tight middle road between the two. I'm impressed for the most part. I was not expecting that.

Anyway, the movie is about a man (Rob) whose wife has just died in a car accident. He is deeply in debt, cheating on his wife, and is losing track of reality with some severe memory issues. The whole movie kind of plays out as a psychological way of interpreting his life and his relationship with his wife. He has deep-seeded guilt that has left him both emotionally stunted and absolutely paranoid for no reason.

The emotionally-stunted comment comes from the death of the chicken. He never truly grieves for his wife. There are no tears shed, no true sadness over the death of someone he promised to love. Instead everything about his wife Katrina is shown and interpreted through his guilty conscience. He doesn't want Katrina's things moved (as shown with her toothbrush). He wants to blame himself for her death (even though he was nowhere close to her when she died). His debt and cheating cost them their relationship, but it also seems to have cost him his own mind.

Most of the movie is just that, collections of scenes that don't always make sense together (especially in the beginning of the movie) that all add up to a single revelation that we never really see as a viewing audience. Now, I like movies like this, but I can definitely understand when somebody doesn't. It makes the whole movie into this weird otherworldly story, which, in the end, may have very little to do with anything.

So, that's about it with the plot. The only other thing that I enjoyed was the main character of Rob starts running down a variety of stairs towards the end of the movie, Eventually he falls down one of these stairs. The main character running and falling down stairs may be the best part of this movie. It's just humorous in a very stupid way. Even though him falling down is supposed to be handled seriously, it just looks so silly. But that's just my opinion. I'm probably being mean.

Dr. Timothy Baldrica played by James McDaniel is a highlight of the movie. The rest of the actors vary only a small amount in how well they act in any given scene. I suppose you can say that I wasn't impressed with the rest of the actors at all. But none of them were terrible either. James McDaniel did a good job at both being very slightly antagonistic while being amusing and a bit of a straight man all at the same time. It was pretty good in general.

Okay, I think the last thing I have to mention is that this movie, at times, feels very similar to Secret Window, the Johnny Depp movie based on a Stephen King novella. I think it's mostly Lowry that gives me that impression. His odd words and personality, as well as the main character focusing his annoyance at this character kind of hits the same beats as Secret Window. But maybe I'm the crazy one here.

I wouldn't call this a horror movie per se. It's more psychological with some heavy mystery vibes thrown into the mix. But it does have a few somewhat unsettling moments, mostly involving Rob staring. Would I recommend it? Eh. It's better than its budget and resources should have allowed it to be. It can be compared to gaints while not being a giant at all itself. That's not a terrible thing.

It's a movie that plays around its limited budget in clever ways. Even the acting, which isn't always great, works well for the film's dreamlike quality at times. Hell, I liked it all right. While not a perfect movie, what with the hilarity of Andrew Bowen running down stairs like a madman, cinematography that looks like it happened twenty-five years ago, and odd acting from some of the actors, it still is pretty solid. I would say I recommend it with a caveat. If you do not like some of the movies I've mentioned earlier in this review, you should probably stay far away from this one. Other than that, try it out. It's a decent indie film that plays with reality in an interesting way.

Movie Appraisal: Mirrors (2008)

Mirrors is the American re-imagining (rather than a straight remake) of the South Korean film Into the Mirror, which I reviewed a few days ago. That movie, the South Korean one, was an absolutely brilliant film, full of both subtext and interesting moments that kept me both interested and intrigued from beginning to end. I enjoyed the subtlety of the movie, the intelligence of the film, and ultimately how it handled both the horror and the mystery of its story. Mirrors is an incredibly different film, taking very little from Into the Mirror besides a starting horror premise, a few select scenes, and the main character. Oh, and the ending, even though it doesn't make any sense for that ending to be there like it did in the South Korean film, where it was foreshadowed throughout. Ah well, let's get this thing started, shall we?

Directed by Alexandre Aja and starring Kiefer Sutherland literally just being Jack Bauer, it is a movie that doesn't know what it's trying to do, and also clearly doesn't understand the source material.

You know what? No. I won't even say that. Redact that. Take it back, and forget about it. This is a movie that kind of and sort of understands that Into the Mirror was a good movie, had some great scenes, had some great philosophy, and ultimately thought that an intelligent movie couldn't translate to American audiences. Because, ultimately the story feels forced. It feels like whole storylines were tacked on. It feels like the original intention of what the movie meant was put on the back-burner for gore effects, a relationship, and highlighting actors and actresses that literally did not know how to act.

I want to blame Aja here, but I feel it probably is a much deeper problem than just him. The film is directed competently. That's what I don't get. I don't get how it can be directed decently but written like a five year old trying to translate the original film. It's so simplistic, losing both subtlety and nuance until nothing is left of the original plot but scenes ripped straight from the Korean film.

If you read my synopsis of the plot of Into the Mirror, this plot is vaguely similar. Kiefer Sutherland plays Ben, a detective who shot someone (which never comes up again) and is off the force because of reasons. The only reason this backstory of the character is kept is so that Ben can grab up information from his old detective friend and be good at investigating THINGS and STUFF. It's so convenient it's stupid.

Ultimately the first half of this movie is pretty solid. I liked it as an opposing way of telling the same (or a very similar) story. Large sections of the first half involve Kiefer Sutherland alone and dealing with hallucinations in mirrors in a burnt out department store where he works as a night security guard. I like this a bit as it owns a different kind of story than the Korean film. And, in all honesty, I found the reopening of the department store in that movie to be pretty overdone and a little silly at times.

This movie sticks with a mystery premise, but instead of crime and money being at play here, we instead get demons and a psychiatric hospital. And mostly we get a psychomanteum (a room with all the walls being mirrors). And that's the big difference. It's primarily an Americanized difference. Of course the old department store was built over a psychiatric hospital where the patients all killed one another. THAT'S OBVIOUS.

The Americanization stuck out to me like a sore thumb. The gore, the relationship pieces of the plot, and the complete disregard for the source material really showed me how much I sometimes can loathe these remakes. While this one had its moments, there were times when I was literally seething with anger watching this movie. And I guess I should get into why.

Gratuitous gore? Did I mention there was gratuitous gore? Holy shit, do I have to mention that. All of the gore scenes are hard to watch (all two of them). My bile was rising when Amy Smart's reflection (Amy Smart playing Angie, the sister of Kiefer Sutherland's Ben) decided to pull apart her own jaw. I don't know what the point of that scene was unless it was just there to horrify, in which case, sure, it succeeded. I was made uncomfortable and creeped out by the scenes. I just don't know quite what the artistic merits of that scene were supposed to be. I assume there were none, and it was all about just being as scary as possible- even though the CGI effects were both obvious and somewhat poorly done at times. I kind of wish there would have been more gore in the film, if only so the movie would have had a second half that might have been scary or interesting in the slightest. Alas though, why would the gore continue in the second half?

Another gripe I have is that the ghosts from Into the Mirror (or the reflections or whatever you want to call them) simply didn't attack innocent people. They went after the guilty, those who were involved in murder, covering up a murder, or refusing to compensate victims of the arson. The victims all were guilty of a terrible crime or two, with none of them being upstanding citizens being punished by the spirit in the mirror. But this film has the innocents being punished, which seems to literally go against the premise of the initial film, and maybe go against what ghosts are supposed to be. Then again, Mirrors doesn't have a ghost in it. It just has a weird mirror-bound demon that somehow can go into any mirror without explanation. It's really dumb and nonsensical and completely tears aside the plotting and well-thought out pieces of the original. I could just keep saying that. This movie doesn't live up to the original. It's not a good movie. It insults the original by existing.

Shots are way overdone. Wow. While there is a focus on artistic shooting at times, the shots become overwhelming in this simple horror film. In the beginning of the film they kind of work a bit, but eventually they just start taking the focus away from the interesting bits of the story, and focus instead on the most obvious. There are some pretty well done shots though, again in the first half of the film, like Ben going down the stairs his first night as a watchman in the burnt out store or some of the night shots in the department store. Amy Smart's death was also quite well done, as is the subsequent reveal of her death to Kiefer. That was the final good shot in the movie though, and with the second half focusing more on Ben's family than the story, the good shots fell aside, replaced instead with insipid dialogue and vacuous scenes.

There is no subtlety here, just jump scares galore, something I am less than fond of. It takes the creeping menace of the Korean film and completely dumbs it down to something that is very American in its horror. It does this rather than focus on character moments and dimensions of the horror universe that we see. Instead the focus is on set-pieces, jumps scares, and long scenes with nothing really happening. The mystery of the movie has disappeared, replaced instead by dumb moments of what I believe the filmmakers think of as "psychological horror." Even more egregious are the times when characters simply come out and say the obvious for the benefit (and only the benefit) of the audience, who they think must be far too stupid to understand what their brilliance is trying to say. "Water creates reflections." No, I would have never guessed that. I WOULD HAVE NEVER GUESSED. It's not obvious to me at all. It needed to be stated in my directed as if I were a simple baby-child who has never heard languages spoken before. In fact maybe I'm not even a human at all, but an insect-person who does not understand your simple language or the subtleties of performance. This is why I need things stated at me. I need the relationship between Kiefer and his estranged wife because I wouldn't understand a story about a man searching through a department store for ghosts if he also weren't successful at one point and had a romantic interest. I needed the relationship because if he didn't have one, I simply wouldn't understand. I would be lost and confused. A single man? A single man in MY MOVIE that I AM WATCHING? I simply can't handle that. It's too much. I'm about to have a breakdown.

The relationship is the biggest failure of the movie, and also the largest original addition to it. I can't begin to state how much I loathe it, how much I despise it, and how much it shouldn't be there. Taking that out takes out a big problem with this movie, the problem of Americanization of a great premise. A straight remake would have made too much sense... and obviously would have been too intelligent for audiences here. And that's why all the philosophy and interesting concepts are dumbed down or removed entirely and why a relationship is added and horror and terror are taken away. This movie is designed to appeal to everyone, and instead it is mediocre at best and forgettable even on a good day.

Kid actors are terrible. I have to mention that because nearly all of the actors besides Kiefer and the brief appearance by Jason Flemyng as Ben's detective friend are universally awful. The child actors are especially horrid to behold, but even Paula Patton as Ben's wife Amy and Amy Smart are terrible. Their acting makes me want to cringe. And with Kiefer doing his best jack Bauer impersonation, he isn't much better. The thing is, at least he seems to be trying. He has enough charisma to make up for a bad plot or bad writing or whatever. Feature him throughout this movie and it might work. Feature other uninteresting and bland character whose actors can't act, and the movie falls apart. And that's exactly what happened. The plot with the family of Ben is completely superfluous to the actual plot. It being added into the story makes the story feel very bloated and frankly boring in response. The end of the movie feels like two different movies are playing out at the same time. And that is simply unacceptable for me.

When the ending comes around, and the mirror ghosts are just demon(s) and Kiefer Sutherland kidnaps a nun-

Wait.

Give me a second.





...



I need a moment to collect my thoughts.

Thoughts collected.

Did Kiefer Sutherland just kidnap a nun? Is this movie seriously culminating in Jack Bauer kidnapping a nun? This is literally the best movie. I take everything back. Nun kidnapping makes this movie more unique and greater than anything else. Every movie should involve the protagonist kidnapping a nun. I know Indiana Jones would have been miles better if he had been kidnapping nuns instead of fighting the Nazis.

I don't know what else to say. The nun gets possessed and Jack Bauer kills the demonified nun to death, in the process rehashing the ending of Into the Mirror without a fundamental understanding of that film. And that's it. I have a bad taste in my mouth. So, I want to wrap this review up.

Mirrors has its moments. At times it can almost be a decent film. The first half isn't terrible. Hell, it's almost good at times. The gore, although outrageous, was also quite creepy, effective at putting me into a creeped out mindset. The problems though, are too many to name, even though I certainly named quite a few. Comparing this movie to Into the Mirror will just make you sad. I suppose on its own it might be serviceable at times, but ultimately I think it fails as both a horror movie and an interesting one. I found the plot far too bloated, the story silly and over dumb at times, the characters flat and uninteresting, and the mirror possessions nonsensical. It is a movie that is fascinating though, in a way, because it shows how a movie can be bastardized to something sick and twisted for American audiences. I do not recommend this movie. Stick with the original Korean film.

Mirrors is a real stinker even with its few good scenes.

B-Movie Appraisal: Plaguers (2008)

The cheapest movie you will ever see.

So. This is something, let me tell you. This here is a movie among many other movies. It is a horror film. It is, in a word, something. I can't say if it's a good something or a bad something. All I can say is that it is something and leave it at that. I call this a B-movie as well, even though it isn't necessarily such because of the acting, the way the movie is shot, and, mostly, because it absolutely is. Unlike many of the movies that I review that are put into this October month of reviews, this one is wholly terrible. It rips of Alien and Aliens so bad it is actually physically painful. There is nothing good in this movie. There is no dialogue that is worth your time, money, or effort. There are no characters that are going to give you new thoughts and motivations throughout your life. There are, in fact, no redeeming features of this movie. It is, quite possibly, the worst horror movie I have ever seen. I would even go so far as to say it definitely is the worst horror movie I've seen, even worse than those crappy Japanese horror movies I review sometimes while I sigh and hate myself.

And yet.

I think I must have something wrong going on in my head. I think I must be seriously deranged and damaged. Because despite all the negatives about this film (and the film is nothing but negatives remember) I had a goddamn great time watching this movie. Its effects are laughable. The "zombies" or plague victims or whatever are laughable. The acting is literally almost painful. The script is terrible. The premise is simply awful. But there is something under the surface that makes it interesting despite the fact that it is a movie made of flaws. It is an enjoyable trainwreck.

Is it ever scary? No.

Will you ever have nightmares over the gore, the make-up, the situations, or anything else? No. Nothing is scary. The characters are never fleshed out enough to be interesting. The dialogue is so wooden and flat that it sounds like these "actors" for the most part are just reading off of a half-finished script. Steve Railsback is good as the android character. I'll give the movie that. It did have one legitimately decent actor in it.

But I think calling this movie terrible goes against all of my instincts. Is a movie terrible if it still entertains? Is it terrible when it is absolutely memorable? Yes, everything about this movie is bad. But at the same time I was never bored, never uninterested. Hell, I watched some scenes more than once simply because I wanted to laugh at them again. And some scenes played twice in the movie because the editing was literally that terrible. I'm looking at you, scene(s) where Riley's chest gets pulled open. The same shot of his rip-cage being exposed twice? Wow, movie. Did you really think I wouldn't notice? You must have. And yet, I still loved it.

There must be something wrong with me.

I will say that you'll know exactly what you're getting into in the first scene. Oh boy is that opening scene terrible. As soon as you see that you'll know what this movie is. It's schlock, pure and simple. It's a "horror" movie with terrible dialogue, terrible acting, sexy women because why not, an android because if they're going to try and rip-off Alien thirty years after the fact they'd better damn well use an android. Who is even going to notice? Besides everyone?

Oops, I meant to say syndroid there. Syndroid. Yeah.

There are moments of actual interest to me as a human. I think there is something to be said of each female character being strong in various ways and each male character being weak in various ways. The women are the strength of this movie and the male characters are paperthin and very horny caricatures of what a man might look and act like if sex were the only thing on his mind constantly.Which some might argue is completely true. I simply found that interesting. The male characters are in the background, with only Tarver the android (not really male) being interesting or compelling in any way. The rest of the characters who are interesting are all female. The captain who is the tough one. The psychotic pirate. The pirate who wants to be in charge. And... yeah... I'm sure there are others.

This movie makes me need a drink.

Any movie I've complained about before is nothing compared to this. This is the single worst horror movie I've ever seen. Why I enjoyed it I will never know. Why I can complain about and hate The Innkeepers and like this movie I will never know. That movie was at least shot competently and for its budget. This movie was not. And yet I liked this movie so much more. It had so much more to offer despite crappy visuals and everything else. It never talked down to me or asked a ton from me at all. It was a gory fun stupid horror film. I mean, no, it was never scary, but it had some life to it.

I don't know. I don't even know where to start. Or end. Or whatever. I guess the story is about these spaceship people who take aboard a mysterious object they found one day. They thought it was heading to a planet named Thanatos. Don't ever call a planet Thanatos. Seriously. You're just asking for trouble. Why it was called Thanatos nobody will ever know. Because that place has been dead for two years. Thanatos. Ugh. WHY? (For people who don't know Greek, Thanatos mean Death, usually in reference to the personification of Death.)

Anyway, these spaceship people find another spaceship in need of help. On board that ship they find four "gorgeous" women who appear dirty and awkward in terms of acting. These women turn out to be pirates who activate the zombie effects of the mysterious device. Then everybody turns into an awkward zombie (and some are awkward alien zombies for some... reason that none of us will ever understand). And that's it.

I have no idea what to say about this movie. I thought it was really something. While terrible in every way, it made me laugh. I had a good time watching it, and I get the feeling that watching this movie with friends would be really enjoyable. It's never scary or horrific, but it is substantially gory. There's no nudity even though parts of the movie look exactly like what a porn film looks like. You know, those stereotypical bad porn films about the pizza man coming into the house awkwardly asking to show the barely dressed bored woman his big sausage or whatever they do these days. Yeah, with how this movie was shot, I was literally expecting that. Anyway, we have Brad Sykes to thank for the way this movie was filmed and directed. I guess, good job? I have no idea. I said way too much about this movie already.

Movie Appraisal: Splinter (2008)

Well, this sure was a movie. Why did I want to see this again?

For whatever reason I had bought this movie, clearly intending to enjoy the hell out of it. For reasons unknown I didn't watch it until now and have completely forgot the reason I wanted to watch it in the first place. Not that it's a bad movie at all, it isn't, but it's also certainly not the kind of movie I usually enjoy.

It's another movie with few scares, little true fear shown, and much more about characters, zany snarky lines, and gore effects. And yes, the gore effects are good. No, the CGI is not. And oh man, is that Ax from the Animorphs TV show as an adult?

Ax

ADULT

Man. He's exactly what I expected him to be. He looks almost literally exactly the same. He has almost the same face on and everything. That's freaking uncanny. Wow. I like the film for him alone. Him as an actor. Not him as a character. Because his character, Seth, is a dumb person. PhD in Biology, my ass.

Anyway, while this was a fun film to watch, it was incredibly frustrating. As you may or may not know, I am a biology man. I did biology in school, specifically microbiology. So, it's kind of my thing. This movie either does not understand biology or has a character who has forgotten everything about being a biologist. I mean, seriously. Wow. This kind of incompetence is inexcusable.

The premise is simple. There's a biology experiment gone awry. A spiky mold fungus of some sort or another has gotten loose and is infecting animals. Enter Seth (Paulo Costanzo (Ax)) and his girlfriend Polly. They are a nice normal couple who fails at camping in the woods and succeed at getting their car hijacked and getting kidnapped by a strange couple: Lacey, who is addicted to some drug or another, and supercopetent Dennis (Shea Whigham). Well, eventually their shared kidnap car runs into a spiny beast on the road, setting up the whole idea of the "splinter" as seen in the title. Dennis gets the splinter in his finger while moving the tire away from the car.

The splinters and the creatures seem to be some kind of mold or fungus of some sort. They take over the biological elements of a body and can live completely independently of a brain. While this is wholly in the realm of science fiction, it's kind of an interesting idea. Technically a mold could infect something and use nerves, temperature sensors, and biological elements of the "body" or "limb" to reanimate it. You would expect a brain to be the focus of an attack (and with mind-altering parasites this is ALWAYS the case in real life), but these can and do reanimate limbs, fingers, and pieces of the body.

Okay, scientifically suspect, but I'm interested.

Continue.

Anyway, eventually they get to a gas station where the rest of the movie takes place. Lacey and a cop who comes to "help" them get killed by the murderous mold. The other three hold up in the gas station's convenience store and are completely ineffective at doing anything for most of the rest of the movie.

It's here that I should mention that mold has a few things that can easily dispose of it, which would probably exist in a convenience store. One is bleach. The other is fire, which they use at the end of the movie to kill the mold zombies. The problem is, why didn't Mr. PhD in biology Andalite Bandit figure this out? I know it from the biology I've seen, which should be quite a bit less than a PhD student. Mold doesn't like fire. Well, most things don't like fire. Why didn't they make a torch, or douse the creatures in flames and watch them burn? Why did he have to go to a complicated plot of having his body temperature lowered nearly ten degrees when all they had to do was burn things until they no longer moved? It just seems so needlessly complex and idiotic. I would have gotten in there, seen that the things were mold or fungus based, looked at the lighters, matches, kerosene and GAS STATION, and went, "Let's burn these fuckers."

I was screaming that most of the movie. It was a bit annoying that they didn't figure it out until almost the end.

Well, those are my complaints about the biological elements of the plot. Besides that I actually had a good time watching it. While it is basically a zombie film, it handles the situation differently enough that it stays fresh and interesting, being reminiscent of Pontypool in that respect. The movie also somewhat reminds me of The Last of Us, that new-ish video game by NaughtyDog that I'll be reviewing shortly. Both have "zombies" based off of molds or fungi, even though both are incredibly different in the way that they behave. I like how the spines work here, basically as syringes to inject into hosts. It makes sense to work that way.

One other thing I should mention is part of the movie reminded me of The Evil Dead movies, specifically when Dennis' hand/arm starts going haywire and needs to be chopped off. I liked that scene a great deal, and it was the only piece of the movie that actually made me uncomfortable in a good way. While incredibly gory and completely expected, it worked very well from a viewer's standpoint.

I do have one other complaint before I get into performances. I did not like the directing of this movie at all. I understand that there was probably a conscious effort by the director to hide the budget (or lack thereof) by any means necessary, but shaking the camera every which way and clearly not showing important details like WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON IN EVERY ACTION SCENE is a pretty big problem. I did not like that one bit. So, Toby Wilkins, the director of this movie, shame on you for using such terrible shots in this fine movie. I would recommend this movie if it weren't for that.

The acting is pretty solid though, and does a lot for this movie that other elements simply cannot do. While there is very little tension in the film, and even fewer scares, the characters are interesting to watch, and each of the main three actors' performances are really fun and full of energy. Shea Whigham and Jill Wagner are both very good in their roles, with Paulo Costanzo being more of a silly buttmonkey, but he is Ax, so... no surprise there, I guess.

Anyway, I won't recommend this movie even though I liked it just fine. I think it's a solid film, but I have no idea who it would be made for. Gore fans would think nothing of it. Horror fans wouldn't be scared. And normal people would avoid it. Maybe biologists would enjoy it? Maybe that's the demographic it's trying to appeal to. Well, if that's true then I hope every biologist goes out and watches this movie. I recommend it to biologists and only to biologists.

Movie Appraisal: Pontypool (2008)

Hello listeners. This is Saquarry coming to you from any corner of the earth you're listening from. Today we're going to read an analysis of a very interesting film out of Canada. I guess you could consider this a psychological film, a zombie film, or really anything in between. (There's a lot in between, I know, but bear with me. I haven't been on the radio that long.)

Listeners, there's a something I have to get off my chest about this movie: It's really good. Fascinating really. It's effective- yes, effective- as both a movie and a horror movie, something that I think you'd all agree is pretty difficult to find in this darkened and drastic age of sterile special effects, terribly written screenplays, and critics who think that the only movies that matter are the ones that involve historical figures of one sort or another or A-list actors. Let me tell you listeners that those things have never been true.

You have been lied to your entire life, thinking  big names and Hollywood actors are the only people you should be watching movies from. You've heard that horror movies are scum, drivel, pieces of undercover and disguised excrement on a bleeding sidewalk. And you want to know something: everything about those statements might be incredibly true, but that doesn't mean that a horror movie can't be just as good- nay- better than any other kind of film out there.

I love horror movies. I love the feel of them, the look, the style. Everything about them works so wonderfully. Of course not every horror movie is great, good, or even okay, but Pontypool, well here's a gem if I've ever seen one.

The film is all about tension, plot, and the characters. It's effective as a horror movie despite having very little gore, blood, or brains spilling out on sidewalks. Most of the tension comes offscreen where you, as listeners, can only hear what's going on, imagining it as it happens rather than being shown all the garbage gore in shocking detail. And by the tone of my voice, I'm sure you can tell that I look down on the idea of showing every detail. The horror sometimes comes from not understanding and from not seeing, and this movie takes that to heart by showing a radio station and very little else. No explanations beyond some very vague hints as to what's going on. No reason to believe that the world hasn't gone to hell.

Now, listeners, I don't feel like I should spoil this movie. It's good enough and straightforward enough that I don't think it deserves that treatment. It's slow-paced, and builds on both the characters and the plot in such a way that you actually feel for them and want them to succeed. The horror comes from the realization of infected words and phrases, especially those that infect some of the words closest to your heart. Can you imagine a world where you can't express a pet name like "honey" or "sweetheart" for your lover, friends, or children? It seems impossible, but simply imagine a world where your own language has been turned against you, that even in the understanding of a word you may get infected by it. It's horrifying in it's own kind of silly way, and I think it's wonderfully executed even if the idea is a little out there.

This is a movie that could really only be Canadian with their dual languages and historic fight over which language should be spoken and et cetera. I even remember going to Canada a few years ago, seeing the signs in both French and English and thinking that was pretty cool, but I digress. It's a serious issue over there, and this movie certainly touches upon it.

Pontypool is an easy movie to make up theories about as well. I mean, the epilogue certainly leaves a few questions. But there are even questions as to how the "virus" started and if it involved anti-English terrorists or was just a naturally occurring thing. Did the two leads, Grant Mazzy (played by Stephen McHattie) and Sydney Briar (played by Lisa Houle) end up in that epilogue? And how would they have done that? I think it has to do with the fact that most seem to point this movie out as being a psychological horror movie. I do see some elements of that, but despite the people infected with the virus not really being zombies, they're basically zombies. So, this movie really seems to be a zombie film more than anything else... until you start thinking about it. The whole idea of changing reality, the way words work, the meaning and understanding of terminology... well, listeners... maybe this movie has a lot more than meets my little discerning eye. I like to think that maybe reality could have been shifted or changed... or maybe the epilogue was nothing more than a spirited and odd death dream. Who can tell? All that really matters is that the movie was tense, well done, and actually horrific while showing very little.

The acting can be hit or miss at times, but is mostly very good. There are really only four actual characters that show up on screen, but many more who call in on the radio and become personalities through that. The filmography and direction can be odd at times as well, but is mostly incredibly solid if a little slow at times. Bruce McDonald, the director, did a great job altogether. I have to say that the way the film was shot and done all around was pretty fantastic. The screenplay and the lines themselves were also very good, and I'll have to mention Tony Burgess as both the screenwriter and the novelist from the novel which this was adapted from Pontypool Changed Everything.

So, speaking a little bit specifically, I did some work for a radio station a few years ago. Technically I can still use their soundproof studio if I ever need to record anything. I found that the radio scenes themselves were fantastic because some of them reminded me of my experiences doing what I did. The joking, the hectic pace, the one person who is often exasperated and tells everyone else to stop goofing off... It all was very true to life and really drew me into the story and its characters. I do wish there had been more though. At an hour-and-a-half running time, I thought it was a little short, possibly missing a bit of character development from the very beginning of the film.

So, loyal listeners out there, I must bit you a very fond farewell. This review has been a blast. Seeing this movie was fulfilling in some ways. I would both recommend the movie and encourage watching it. I enjoyed it, and maybe all you people desperately seeking some great horror will enjoy it too.

Movie Appraisal: Autopsy (2008)

Generic horror movie, how many ways can you be seen? Set in a remote place, having bland character archetypes, inane and insufferable dialogue, and flashy moving pictures full of blood, blood, and more blood how can you be anything but a generic horror movie? Yes, you have a set-piece in a creepy hospital, but how many other, better, movies, can say the same?

This... this is the kind of movie I abhor. One with gimmicky visuals and not much else. The plot is... uh... plot? It seems to be set in a fantasy world wholly unlike our own, where things like hitting a dude with a car doesn't matter and entities like the police do not work like the police should. How does an ambulance respond within moments of an accident? And how do these people not notice they've hit a dude? That's nonsensical, weird, and not true to life.

This movie also shows me that the character archetype that I most like is the douchebag stoner type. That should not be the case. I am not a stoner and my douchebag qualities are debatable. So, there's that. What? What is this movie supposed to be telling me? What is it supposed to be saying? Why did I watch this? Why? Why? Why?

I guess I'm not quite sure why this movie was made. It's derivative at absolute best. It's not scary, not really well-paced or plotted. It seems to actively make fun of itself at points which is absolutely freaking hilarious... not. There were WAAAAAAAY too many moments of me going "What. What? WHAT? WHAT!?" I don't think I'm ever supposed to say that many "whats" in a single thought-process. Science does not work the way this movie presents science as working.

I need a break. I need to stop ranting. This movie is so... so... so... full of nothing. Why would anybody like it? Who's the audience of a movie like this? Hardcore horror fans? Gore-fest freaks? I guess. I can't imagine anybody else being fond of it. The plot is too convoluted. the characters are too one-dimensional. Nobody is real here. Now, I know, I'm not asking for Hamlet here or even The Lord of the Rings. I'm simply asking for good science and character's that seem like they could be real and not just convenient for a slasher film. I only want a horror movie to have horror in it. That's seriously all I really want. I want to be scared of a film that calls itself a horror film. If it isn't going to scare me or at the very least unnerve me, it can't be a horror film.

This is a gore-fest and it's kind of dumb. Yes, this movie is stupid. But I will admit it does have its moments of sheer ballsy entertainment. As hard as it was to suspend my disbelief, I found some of the dialogue sort of witty in a way at times and Robert Patrick was pretty freaking awesome. The guy can certainly act I'll give him that much. Some of my reactions to the actual movie amused me so much more than the actual movie. This is basically the perfect movie to watch with a bunch of friends and make fun of the whole damn thing.

I will admit that it does have two of the best "Oh crap..." moments I have ever seen though, which I think is worth something even though both seemed more deus ex machina moments that were convenient to the plot rather than intelligent and well-construed occurrences.

I have learned from this movie to never mess with a 100 pound woman who has no formal training in anything. 'Cause according to this movie they will ruin everything in search of bland boyfriends and revenge. I guess what I have an issue with here is that 100 pound women are not scary. They do not bring the deepest of all dreads out of my heart. They do not make me scream in terror when they approach. And I think that's an issue when the single most terrifying character in this film is not the ex-cons, the insane doctor, or the creepy nurse, but rather a 100 pound young woman who seems to single-handedly ruin everybody.

The visuals are all right, I guess, but they seem to rely way to much on the dusky corridors and red lighting, or dim lighting at times. Makes me think they were trying a little too hard to show, "Oh, look, we're in Hell!" I wasn't fond of it.

The movie as a whole was mediocre, but not terrible. I could complain all day and all night and nitpick and everything else. The movie was mostly bad, but it did have its moments and they actually did seem to work kind of decently at points. The problem was the problem in so much horror today. All of the focus was on getting out of the hospital or getting away from the situation or trying to find a person and all it really seemed like to me was two hours of corridor wandering and getting caught a bunch of times by the same four evil characters. It became boring half-way through and a horror movie should be many things, but it should never be boring.

Video Game Assessment: Silent Hill: Ørigins (2008)

Silent Hill: Ørigins is yet another title from the Silent Hill series of video games. While nowhere near as good as some of the great titles of the series, it does deliver some interesting set-pieces to the series and the genre. It is also the first game of the franchise developed by an American company rather than Team Silent, which were a team of game designers and writers working for Konami Japan. This being a game developed in America after the successful franchise had always been developed in Japan created many criticisms... to say the least. Yes, certainly to say the least.


This game was originally released on the PSP system, but I never had a PSP, instead playing it on the PlayStation 2 port of the game. It's a short game, arguably shorter than the other games in the franchise, to the point where the game is over in a relatively quick time. This game also saw a release fairly close to the Silent Hill movie, which heightened expectations from the audience who liked that movie, and certainly lowered expectations from the die-hard fans... well, probably did. This game remains controversial in the fan community, with some seeing it as a solid attempt at a Silent Hill  game with some holes in it to utter fecal matter that should have never existed in the first place. I have heard a few mention that it is one of the best games since Silent Hill 2, but those people also happen to be clinically insane (says the man who's second favorite game in the franchise is the one everybody hates, Silent Hill 4).


The controls are good, almost too good. Combat is fairly easy and fairly streamlined, somewhat cutting down the tension. Also being able to fit weapons upon weapons in Travis Grady's (the protagonist) pants is somewhat silly, although I never even cared to notice it until I heard others point it out. I think people like complaining. I think that's really the problem here. This game was intended as a prequel to the first game, Silent Hill from the PlayStation, and with that... well, I think it succeeded. There may be holes in the story, but who really follows the story of Harry and Alessa enough to care? Okay... okay... that was mean. I guess the story never interested me all that much. I liked the horror, hated the silliness of the cult and the drugs and the what-the-hell-is-even-happening-anymore? I liked Silent Hill 2 and Silent Hill 4 because they really are insane and terrifying. I mean, things happen for no real reason, making no real sense. And I love that. And to me, this game is better than the first and arguably on par with the third.


Parts of Silent Hill: Ørigins are absolutely fantastic. The giant maps and set-pieces are great. I loved, absolutely freaking loved, the theater. It was fantastic all the way through. It was scary and introduced some of the creepiest enemies in all of the Silent Hill games. I thought it was dark and... maybe this is my bias as a theater guy, but auditoriums and theaters can be absolutely terrifying in the dark. I've done that before, seen it before, and yeah... my memories settled back on that and I was sold to the terror. Special mention goes out to one of the puzzles of the theater as well with the mirror and the freaking library and props... oh, man... I get shivers just thinking about it. So much like Borges, and I obviously love Jorge Luis Borges and his amazing stories of all kinds of weirdness.


The plot also, besides following the "canon" of Silent Hill is eerily reminiscent of House of Leaves which is easily the greatest book ever written, and this series has already been proven to take some aspects from that stupendous novel.


The movement to the "dark" world from the "other" world using mirrors somewhat diminishes the tautness at the unknown taking the protagonist and the player whenever it wants. Thus it makes the terror controllable, but the terror still exists. This game, for a freaking handheld game, is fantastic. I know there are a lot of people who hate this game, and yes, it is not as good as some of the other games in the franchise, but it does not actively steal from the movie like Silent Hill: Homecoming or feature flopping enemies and no attacks like Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, and I guess I can look upon this game with something similar to liking it a lot. 


I sounded a little stupid there, but I do like this game. It's fun, enjoyable, and scary enough to fill my requirements.

Movie Appraisal: Dark Floors (2008)

Well, I just saw this movie, Dark Floors, and I... well, I can honestly say that it was certainly a movie... a short movie, sure, but a movie  nonetheless. As for everything else... hmmm... I hate saying that I went into watching this movie having a bad feeling about it, but... I kind of did.

Now, this certainly wasn't the worst movie of this type I have ever seen. Sublime, The I Inside, or Autopsy would be among the worst of this genre... this psychological horror-esque weird kind of genre that really isn't anything at all but generic kind of horror. Honestly, I'm probably more forgiving with The I Inside than the other two simply because it was kind of a different formula even if it wasn't very good.

And Dark Floors is kind of different, I guess... especially if you've never seen another horror movie in your life before. I tire of predicting the scares, the shots, the scream chords, the deaths, and in what order those deaths occur. I mean, yes, they certainly tried to make it suspenseful, and maybe they would have succeeded if not for me being the jaded and cynical viewer of horror that I am today. No, I have to disagree with myself. The suspense was... not great. It was kind of all over the place and I was lost.

No, I wasn't lost because it was SOOOOOOO DEEP, or because too much was happening. I was lost because the director obviously seemed to have no real idea what was going on. What was going on? I certainly don't have a clue. It seemed like there were monsters pursuing a bunch of people who got trapped in an elevator and were transported to a cross between Silent Hill  and "The Langoliers" (That's not a reference I make very often, so everybody should pat me on the back for that one.). Now, I like Silent Hill, and "The Langoliers" is pretty good. Hell, I even enjoyed the TV movie of it and not many can say that without being slapped upside the head. But I like my Stephen King and the novella was really good especially for him during that time period of his writing.

Anywho, that's kind of what I thought about the movie. It was a cross between Silent Hill with the corruption, the monsters, the zombies, the punishments... all of that stuff... and "The Langoliers" because of all of the time stuff. I had guessed it long before it was revealed and I was all like, Stephen King does know that you ripped off his idea, right?

This movie is such a generic horror movie. Oh, it certainly tries to be psychological, but... seriously? Come on. No, really, come on. This is not psychological. This is not scary. Suspenseful maybe if you like the characters, but... characters? Look, this is the most generic horror movie setting I have ever seen: a hospital. Wow, I've never seen that before. I'm shaking in my boots at being in a hospital. It's as if I've never seen one before. Stupid. Look, try something new. Look at The Other Side of the Tracks. Seriously. Look at that movie. No, it wasn't quite horrific, but it was extremely effective. It did something I have rarely seen, and it did it really well... well enough that I want to watch it all again. It surprised me and it wowed me. the directing was fantastic, but Dark Floors was just... generic. I cut copy-and-paste it with any other cheaper horror movie made today. Not that they're all bad, but this one was so obviously generic that it's basically my tagline for this movie.

Dark Floors: "So you want to see the most generic horror movie of all time? Well, here it is, you brats. I hope you enjoy it."

Oh, and the freaking little girl. Seriously? Haven't I ranted and raved about this enough? Little girls are not scary, not in any context. Maybe... MAYBE... in The Ring, but that was effective in many more ways than just a creepy little girl. It was a fully packed psychological horror movie without being in some fantasy realm or inside of somebody's mind. It was incredibly effective and beautiful. But the rule of thumb is still that little girls are not scary. If I can punt the scary symbol of the movie like a basketball, then that thing is not scary. Yes, I know, the girl wasn't the antagonist of this particular movie, but the director tried incredibly hard to make her into the creepy little girl trope and nobody could ever convince me otherwise. And it didn't work! She was not scary or creepy, she was just bad at acting (Sorry, little girl, but you're still young, you'll get there eventually... and I don't think it was your fault anyway. I really blame the director.). Okay, now that I have talked to the young actress of this movie who will never ever in a million years read this review, let's move on.

The acting in general is... not wonderful, which hurts this movie even further. Some of the characters get by on a singular one-dimensional characteristic, like the nurse being cute and innocent, or the mean and angry man (see also "The Langoliers") being both mean and angry, and acting as a general jerk to everybody around him. Then there's the big guy who also appears to be black... and of course, of course, he's the first one that "dies." Oh, and there's the crazy old and wise guy. He's crazy, old, and wise! And the main everyman man... who represents every man! These characters are so generic that they should have names like "Meany-pants", "Old Wise Guy", "Everyman", "Cute Nurse", "Creepy Little Girl", "Black Tough Guy Who Sacrifices Himself Early In The Movie". Ugh... the writing is bad, the characters are cheap, and... well... that's all I have to say about that.

Some good things I should mention are that the sounds are pretty good even if the acting isn't fantastic. They did do a really good job with ambient noise and music. I was impressed at points, even if the acting couldn't hold it up. Also, the make-up and scene effects were pretty decent too, even if I had trouble telling exactly what some people in make-up were supposed to be besides generic monster-things.

There were so many cheap little scares and it was so predictable. It was actually starting to bore me a lot. I actually had to stop the movie at one point because I was predicting everything that was going on and was starting to fall asleep from literal boredom.

Also, I suppose I should also mention that the band Lordi, who I'd never heard of before this film, were the ones not only playing the monsters, but were also the ones that really wanted to make their own horror film. The subtitle for this film is usually The Lordi Motion Picture. I guess if you like horror movies, you should make your very own. I guess that's a thing now. Oh, and this film is a Finnish film as well, but nowhere near as good as the last Finnish film that I saw: Sauna: Wash Your Sins.

I mean, I guess the movie was all right. I can't recommend it. In my obviously professional opinion, this is not a movie that is good enough to recommend. The tension in the movie can be pretty good at times though. I wasn't exactly impressed, but it was better than I would have expected.

Novella Investigation: N. (2008) by Stephen King

So, this may, in fact, be a bit of a Stephen King October Nights. This is the third Stephen King work that I've looked at this month and I've planned for a few more. I know Stephen King and his works really well, so these are ones I feel obligated to review. I've read almost all of his novels, short stories, and novellas, and I know most of the movies based on his works. So, these reviews are ones that I feel very comfortable with writing.

"N." is a fantastic story of a psychiatrist who is becoming more and more engrosses with a patient who exhibits a very excessive case of OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder). That is the main premise of the story. It does also make some interesting and halfhearted attempts to make some scholarly ideas up about the disorder as well, but they fall very flat if you know anything about it at all.

Well, the story starts out with a woman, Sheila, writing a letter to a man, a reporter, Charlie, about her brother, Johnny the Psychiatrist, who recently was thought to have committed suicide. She found something strange amongst his possessions, a box that said "BURN ME" upon it. The story progresses as Sheila writes this letter to Charlie about all of the things that Johnny experienced up to the time of his death.

Johnny was seeing a patient, the eponymous "N", who has severe OCD. Johnny tries to solve the man's problems, but the man start spouting off some very strange stories to Johnny about a field that has seven stones in it even when there are supposed to be eight. The eighth cannot be seen unless it is seen through something else. In N's case he saw the eighth stone through his camera. The problem is that there are eight stones, but since only seven are visible, a darkness starts coming from the middle of the circle of stones. Holding his camera and looking through it at the stones keeps the eighth stone anchored in the world, preventing a dark and terrible entity, Cthun, from entering the world.

This sounds like Lovecraft, doesn't it? Well, get that out of your head. Stephen King has said that he was inspired by "The Great God Pan" by Arthur Machen, which is a stunning tale of horror and suspense that I'll probably get to reviewing at some point. It has a fantastic pace and some great feelings to it for being one of the first of its own genre.

But getting back to "N.", Johnny starts thinking that N might have schizophrenia because he keeps saying that he sees things, and he keeps having to set things in a circle or in a diagonal to keep the world together. Then one day, after N leaves Johnny and gives up getting help, he commits suicide, which hits Johnny quite hard because of several different reasons. He was also planning on writing a book about N and his experiences and neuroses.

Johnny goes to N's funeral, a rather odd practice for a psychiatrist, and then makes his way to the field that N spoke o, Ackerman's Field. There he sees the stones, eight of them, and finds a key, the same key that had been sent to N after he had come to the field a few times. Johnny is taken aback, but takes the key that is in a plastic baggy along with a small note that apologizes to him for getting him involved.

Johnny is about to leave, calling the whole thing creepy and stupid when he sees only seven stones and a darkness starting to emerge out of the middle of the stones. He holds the plastic bag up to see the eighth stone and gets the balance back. Soon he is doing all of the OCD things that N had been doing before. And eventually both he and his sister commit suicide, and it's hinted that Charlie might be next.

Now, you can see, when reading the book, the similarities to both "The Mist" and From a Buick 8. The themes are very similar and even some scenes are close. I like this novella. I think it blends an interesting way of telling the story to an actually unnerving story. You don't know what's real and what's not after reading it and it's very disconcerting which is exactly what everything horror should be.

I was very impressed while reading it. I believe that both of the other two stories that are similar by Stephen King are better than "N.", but I also think that this is easily the best written and the most elegant. There is also a web-show/web-comic type of thing based on "N.", so check that out if you like the story, as well as a graphic novel. It's pretty good and there are no real complaints that I feel that I have to give. Expect an old-styled, slow-paced, atmospheric horror novella, full of feelings of both dread and creeping horror.

I left a lot out, like the ending, but  think people should really check it out even if the ending is incredibly similar to the end of From a Buick 8. (So, if you've read my review of that, you'll probably get the gist of this one.) Anyway, I suggest it. I think it's pretty wild and pretty creepy, and it needs to be read by those who enjoy horror.

Movie Appraisal: The Other Side of the Tracks (The Haunting of Amelia) (2008)

OH MY GOD. Oh wow. Oh wow. Oh wow. Okay, I started watching this movie on a freaking whim. I saw that it had been filmed partially in my own hometown and I just wanted to watch it and see if I recognized anything. I mean, I wasn't expecting to even freaking enjoy it. I mean, I figured that this was just a simple independent film that seemed like it didn't have a terrible story to it. So, I watched it. And now, after I've finished it, I'm sitting here with my jaw hanging wide open and not understanding the world anymore.

So, first of all, I bow my head and clap my hands to A. D. Calvo, the director, and the cast of characters of this movie, especially Brendan Fehr, Chad Lindberg, and Tania Raymonde, the main cast of characters. They were brilliant, absolutely brilliant and I didn't even really see it until the end of the movie. ARGH, this movie was so freaking good! I can't even stop and breathe for a second. Hell, I should be studying instead of writing about this, but I can't. This movie was just too good.

So, I'll get to a point-by-point review. It'snot every day that I get to watch a new film that is absolutely stunning. I think the last film of that caliber that I saw was Sauna: Wash Your Sins, but that film was also very different than this one.

At the heart of it, it's clearly an independent film. It feels like a film that could never even get into theaters despite being higher quality than anything mainstream right now. I mean, damn, this movie is going to stay with me for a long time. it gave me so much to think about, so much to wonder about. I just loved the entire feeling of the movie. I also didn't understand until the very end of the movie why many websites listed this as "fantasy," but now I do. It's fantasy in the classic sense, not the Lord of the Rings elves and dwarves sense. The movie is psychological and does have some scary elements to it, but it is never horrific. Warning, I am going to spoil the Hell out of this movie, so avoid reading past this point if you don't want them.

The story is essentially a cross between a romance/friendship movie and a psychological horror movie with fantasy elements revealed in the end. The acting is simply fantastic, but only after viewing the whole movie. Don't look at the first half of the movie and think that that is all there is. This movie drew me in and I loved it. I haven't felt this positive about a movie in a very long time.

The movie is comedic at times, partially due to Stephnie Weir from MadTV fame and Sam Robards being in this movie. They are absolutely fantastic and amusing. The dialogue can be incredibly awkward at times, and heavy-handed at other times, but in the end it is so full of misdirections and twists and turns out to be so much more genius after viewing the entire movie. Ink is a good comparison to this movie. Both are independent films that are utterly beautiful with amazing acting and stellar direction. Seriously, I am in awe here that I had never heard of this movie before. I will be looking out for more movies from A. D. Calvo. Mark my words, the man is fantastic.

There are energetic performances all over the place. The actors really seemed like they had a good time. There is a train motif that runs throughout the movie in the same way that lot of psychological horror movies usually have a hospital setting. This is so new and different and beautiful. Why can't all movies feel like this? It has a similar feeling to what Carnival of Souls should have felt like if it were ever to be done well.

Rusty Miller (Chad Lindberg) has a ragingly awesome car just to let you all know. His character and the character of Josh (Brendan Fehr) really are amazing together. This is the story between two old friends having a reunion and reconnection just as much as it is a love story. But  at first there is such a disconnect in the two main character's emotional and energetic performances. Josh shows the feelings of depression and obsession whereas Rusty is just so energetic, so willing to move and shake and roll with the punches. man, he's so cool.

A few questions should be raised here, even if they are ultimately not the main themes of the story in the end. There is the question of lasting love and does love last beyond life and death? Can a person forget about life after their lover dies? Can they refuse to ever move on by what happened? Will they just live in the past forever? I don't know. I guess I do know a little. I know statistics of how many people keep living after their forever love has died. So many just die from something like heartache... or heartbreak... maybe there's something in that. We need that love most of the time. We need that companionship. How can we be human without love? I don't even want to think about losing the person I love to a horrible accident. I couldn't even imagine it even if it does happen all the time. I have no idea how I would keep together and maybe that's part of the terror, the soul-quenching horror, maybe it's an ordinary fear, but it is one that hits me quite hard.

Josh, the depressive, perks up when Amelia (Tania Raymonde) shows up. He certainly turns on the charm with her moreso than he has with Rusty and the other characters, but I'll get back to that later. The chemistry between them is incredibly well done.She just gets the job at the pizza place that Josh works at without any kind of interview at all. That was kind of easy... actually... wow, that was the easiest interview ever. She comes onto Josh so heavy. Jeeheez, woman, I can see that you're interested in our boy Josh here. But she never overdoes it, not when the ending is known. I can understate that they have a ton of charisma with one another. I have to give them that.

Rusty, on the other hand, does not have any skills with women. Rusty is not Mr. Charming, but also that is a plot point I will get to later and a brilliant one at that. Man. And Josh acts towards the girl he likes and telling people about her about like I do, which I find funny. The dude's excited. Be happy, Joshy boy. I see hints all over the place that Amelia doesn't exist, possibly, but it's all freaking misdirection. Watch the magician's other hand, not the one that he flourishes so nicely. A. D. Calvo, you are a magician of a director.

So, from the beginning of the movie we've seen that Rusty and Amelia know each other and have something between them. She tells Josh to beware of Rusty, but the dude is the best character ever! Why would I beware that weird and awesome dude?

One thing I do have to admit, maybe it's just that I knew it would come, but there's a kissing frame before Josh and Amelia kiss. It's so freaking obvious they're going to kiss. LIPS ARE COLD HINT. We have to remember that. Ghost?

"Sometimes we need to let go, otherwise we remain haunted." The themes of this movie are all hitting me over the head here. Even if they are, they are kind of good morals: moving on, letting go... it works.

So, another thing is that there are parallel stories too and the smaller one makes no sense until the end unless you have the biggest notice of Chekhov's gun that there ever was. There are hints all over the place, but I didn't catch it. So, the subplot is about the owner of the pizza place, her daughter, and her daughter's lesbian lover who takes care of her mother's brother who is in a coma. Whew! Get all that? Anyway, they have some ideas about life and death and even love and they come out of nowhere at first and I was all like, surprise lesbians for no reason? And then the ending presented the reason and I was all like, that was brilliant.

I'm raving and ranting here by the way. This was a good movie.

Amelia's make-up and the music within the film are both absolutely fantastic, just pointing it out. I mean, they did a fantastic job and it was kind of cool to see. There is the only scare chord after "sex" scene. But there is also a blending between reality and dreams by this point even if Amelia's bracelet proves that it's all true. Pay attention to that freaking bracelet too. It appears all over the place.

OH DAYAMN a hickey! Josh has a hickey, that must mean that Amelia is real, right? The friendship scenes between Josh and Rusty are all kinds of sweet, really opening Josh up to the world and making him feel something and anything. It's certainly letting his character evolve and change throughout the story.

There are themes of leaving home, of the loss of stagnation, and of the evolution of a person. These are not as apparently head-hittingly obvious as they appear. They're actually quite subtle, less Blue Velvet and more Ink.

The sounds are fantastic as he runs from the very dead girl that was one Josh's Emily. He has a dream of his dream girl swathed in light. Amelia is another name for Emily. I'm going quickly because the movie moves like this. These are the things presented. Put the puzzle together, my readers.

Wake up and move on is what everybody keeps telling him, but Josh finally loses it. He can't leave, he doesn't have the power or the energy to leave and it's all because of the girl he once loved, and still loves despite the ten years between them. Choices and decisions for Josh and he makes the right one. He decides to go with Rusty and then... there's Amelia again, in his house, asking for him to go with her one last time. Oh, man it's really poignant, and then he's gone. not quite suicide, but close.

Rusty and Amelia were spirits sent to help Josh find his way, either to life or to death for he was the brother and the uncle in the coma. His girlfriend and his best friend were killed in the train accident and he survived in a coma. They came to help him in the ways they thought best. He could have woken up or simply kept going on as he was if he had gone with Rusty, but Amelia showed him to let go, that he still had her even in death.

And the last scene, between Emily and Rusty is fantastic, showing that Emily is ready to move on and be with Josh while Rusty still has work to do, still has to be that spirit guide with his awesome car. The Connecticut licence plate with "HEAVEN" on it made me feel ridiculously happy and I'm not even religious. I just loved those details and little touches. It was powerful and it worked really well.

Now, are there complaints? Yeah. The lesbians were not amazing actresses and it showed as they compared to the rest of the characters. I think it would have been more effective without the flashback scene too, but I see why it exists. I still didn't like it though and I thought it was a little hamfisted to a subtle movie like this. So, if I had one scene I would have taken out, it would be that simply because all of that was already established, or close to established, and I didn't see the need to reveal something we already kind of knew. The music also was a little too loud from time to time, but besides those, I thought this film was incredible.

Watch it. If you read my blog to hear about all the great psychological or horror movies out there, this is one of the most beautiful of them. I won't forget this one and I think everybody should be forced to see it. I compare this to Black Swan and all I see is the quality here and the lack of it there. This film makes me giddy whereas Black Swan makes me angry at the mainstream movies and their lack of focus, quality, or form. I can't believe a film like that could do well... oh, wait, yes I do... because people are stupid and can't see quality even after it stands up and kicks them in the face.

Anyway, seriously,this is a fantastic film. See it if you get that chance. I loved it and hopefully you will too.

Movie Appraisal: The Objective (2008)

The Objective is a difficult movie to categorize. It could be psychological horror, but it really isn't. It could be about aliens, but... that also doesn't really fit right with me. Is it a thriller? A soldier movie? No, it's not really either of those things... So, my difficulty in categorizing this film really left me asking a lot of questions of what exactly this film was about or why it was about it.

Not that it is a pointless film by any means. It's a decent film with some decent acting, and some very nice filmography for the most part. I guess my problem is it never really blew me away with anything. I could predict exactly what was going to happen from the very beginning of the film.

Soldiers. Fight for survival. Dying one by one. Sand replaces water. All overused ideas. All things easily predicted when the film opens. I complain about these things because it could have been done so much better. There were some VERY good ideas. One of the scenes in particular that stands out in my mind is a scene with binoculars where one character is looking through said binoculars (infrared ones, I believe, or night vision, or both. I really don't know the correct terminology here, so correct me if you see this film and I said something wrong.) and sees enemies charging at him, but he sees nothing with his naked eyes. It was very well done. Very dramatic. It was one of the few times this movie saw fit to really show some tension.

Most of the rest of the movie is... well, kind of boring. There are interesting parts, and some of the characters are quite interesting as well. The movie really wants you to care about the characters, but about half of them seem very empty. And the ones that do exhibit actual emotions and come into their own are soon killed off in radically terrible ways. The deaths in this film are terribly done. One second they're alive and the next second they're dead. It was kind of disappointing. Maybe the director was trying to show that in war things happen quick, but it really came off as sloppy filmmaking in my mind... or maybe a bad script... or not enough of a budget for good visual effects.

Speaking of the visual effects... they're pretty bad. Actually, they're very bad. It took me out of the movie when I saw some particularly jarring examples of bad CGI effects. The soldiers' bits were fairly well done though... as were the shadow effects, but the actual meat of the film, the whole "objective" is a bit of a let down. Well, it was to me. the film turned from a kind of neat, if not well-acted psychological horror film to an "UFO" film in seconds. It was pretty badly done. It would have been better to focus on the psychological horror than the UFOs, but I guess that's because I really dislike UFO films, because they mostly suck.

This film pales in comparison to other better films, but it isn't bad. I thought it was engaging and interesting. I can draw comparison to two movies in particular. The first is actually the movie that led me to watching this one: Sauna, and the other film is Dreamland (2007), which has a nonlinear and hard to follow plot, but for whatever reason reminds me of this movie. I think it's because of the way the films were both shot and the use of military stuff in both... but that's about it. The Objective reminds me of Sauna in very vague ways... mostly about the soldiers on a mission. The differences are that this movie has much worse acting, much worse visuals, and is in English, which instantaneously  makes it less classy. (Although there is an Australian, who happens to be the best character in this film in my opinion. So, that classes it up a bit.) But seriously, Sauna is a much better movie in every way and should be watched long before this movie is.

The main character in this film is a particularly good case in point of the bad acting. It's almost painful to watch his performance. But maybe that's just me.

I guess this is the point where I prattle on about the plot. Haven't I taught you already that the plot rarely matters in a movie like this? Fine, I'll do a hasty explanation. The CIA sends in an agent to get some information in a very remote region of Afghanistan. The CIA agent then recruits a few military men and they go off in the desert with only a young Afghani man helping them. They find out eventually their equipment doesn't work. And strange things seem to be following them to their OBJECTIVE. See? Did that explanation of the plot really help explain this movie at all? No. No, it did not, but I included it anyway. You're welcome.

So, in short. This is a completely average film in almost every way with exactly one memorable scene in it. It has no real category of movie to put it in, and it seems to be confused about what it wants to be. Check it out if you're really into weird films that are kind of creepy... sort of... or if you're into anything that has psychological horror at all... but otherwise stay away from this forgettable film.

I will admit one thing though: The Objective is the perfect name for this film. I've never gone out of my way to compliment a movie title before, but this one is very appropriate.

Movie Appraisal: Sauna: Wash Your Sins (2008)

Sauna is one of the best films I've seen in a VERY LONG time. Sure, I've said good things about 1408, Jacob's Ladder, and Zombieland, but those movies respectively I've either seen before years and years ago and therefore do not count as recent films I've encountered, or count as a really fun ride kind of movie with flaws here and there, but not necessarily worthy of acting awards. There's a "subtle" difference between acting in Zombieland and acting in Sauna that can really be summed up in one phrase: Comedy vs. Horror.

Yes, while Zombieland was an absolutely fantastic film and fun throughout it had this silly curtain hanging over it called comedy. I have nothing against comedy. I'm funny all the time. Some of my best friends do comedic things. Hell, I know a ton of improv comics. My point is, I love comedy. I think comedy is often times just as hard to pull off as straight drama, maybe even harder in some ways. Having a ridiculous film is always fun. having a film that can make you smile and laugh and forget about all your troubles is fantastic and deserves much praise. My problem is that comedy films, even with horror elements, are still comedies. They don't portray things realistically (albeit very few actual films today do portray life realistically). They tend to show funny things in serious scenes therefore ruining the effects of the serious issues. A comedy is a film where the main characters usually come out all right and on top of things. The main characters usually get what they want and it's all very "entertaining". I think Zombieland is one of the best comedy-horror films I've ever seen, but it isn't as good as more serious films in my mind. The acting just isn't as strong... or maybe I'd rather see good dramatic acting than comic acting. It is harder to make someone cry or scream than laugh. That's kind of a fact.

Wow, I was really getting into that. Ahem. So, Sauna, in my mind, is such a wonderful film because it is a very dramatic horror film. Psychological horror film actually. Yeah... I know, I tend to focus on psychological horror... but they're just SO good! (Okay, most of them aren't, but the ones that are good... they are THE BEST.) This film is a bit of a cross between The Lord of the Rings trilogy (specifically the part with the Dead Marshes) and 1408. They are both fantastic films in their own ways and combining them makes this film easily one of the best movies I have ever seen.

Sauna is a foreign film. It's Finnish to be precise. I didn't even know Finland had a film industry. I've never seen a Finnish film before either, but I am going to praise Finland up and down for this underrated masterpiece. The acting throughout this film is phenomenal (although I neither understand Finnish, nor Russian, so I guess it could have been really bad. It sounded good to me though.). The visuals are AMAZING. The story, set in the late sixteenth century after a war between Sweden and Russia has concluded. The tale involves two brothers traveling with three Russians to make a new map of the borders between their two countries.

Historically, I have no idea about any of it or how good it is. I'm not well-versed in my Swedish/Russian history in the sixteenth century... but it seems good to me.

As for the imagery, it doesn't have a ton of imagery in the film, but the images it does have stick in my mind. The shots of the "sauna" itself was fantastic. It really helped to lead to the creepy tone felt throughout this fantastic film. There is very little gore throughout this thoroughly horrific film, and I feel that's a good thing since I thoroughly despise excessive uses of gore by anybody who isn't Sam Raimi. That being said, I think the film is much better without a ton of gore or some villain to take the limelight. There's a real focus on atmosphere. This movie does atmosphere better than most other psychological horror movies, and most psychological horror movies are strictly atmospheric pieces!

If you've ever heard of the phrase "Nothing Is Scarier" than you'll understand what I mean when I say that this movie takes that and runs with it. It uses atmosphere to create dread, but there is very little reason or substance to the dread. It's being built up, but the payoff doesn't come until the film's ending.

And what an ending. I think the last five minutes really sold this film to me. I don't think I'll be able to shut my eyes without seeing... I pretty much doubt I'll be able to sleep without having nightmares is what I mean to say.

I would suggest this film to anybody. It's a wonderful bit of psychological horror with a heavy atmosphere and great characters. Everything seems very cohesive and very well done. In my opinion this is one of the very best films I have ever seen, and I have seen a LOT of films in my time.