Movie Appraisal: Bunnyman (The Bunnyman Massacre) (2011)

"We're gonna need a lot of therapy."

You know when a movie comes along, and you instantly know it's going to be garbage? Yeah, I know it too. This movie is that kind of deplorable garbage. It is literally the worst horror movie- nay, the worst movie period- I've seen so far this year, if not since I started reviewing- if not of all time. While I know there are worse movies out there, I cannot think of a single one that bored me as much as this one did. I can't think of another movie that made me as literally furious as this one did. And I can't think of a single movie that made me dislike the story (ha ha "story"!), characters, and filming like this one certainly did. I hated this movie.

Hated it. Burning passion hated it.

I think I'm supposed to justify my feelings on this movie, saying how this thing or that thing didn't work. I'm supposed to inform you, the reader, about what was wrong, what didn't work, and how this thing, this garbage, could be improved. Mostly, I'm supposed to give an opinion, say what I thought.

Okay. What I thought was that every single second of this movie was excruciating. I hated every last one. There wasn't a single moment I could describe as even halfway mediocre. All I can do is think back on the WORST films I've reviewed like The Innkeepers, Marronnier, and The Reaping. And all of those compare favorably to this pile of excrement that somebody had the audacity to call a movie.

I don't even know where to begin or if I can begin. Despite being billed as a rated R graphic violence gore film, there is almost none of that. I don't like gore much myself, but if the movie is going to have the moniker of that, why not actually have it in the movie? I don't think there is a single truly graphic scene, with most scenes that should have blood or gore making the discretionary shot go out of frame or underneath something or other. Either that or the camera simply starts lilting upwards away from the action. What horror movie even does that? I guess if you are a director afraid of gore, this is how you would make a movie, but seriously, why? It's almost compelling in its complete lack of sense. I want to know how something can be this bad. I want to know how somebody could even do this.

And the lack of visceral scenes really stand out because there are bits of the movie that are kind of graphic. And the kills should be exceedingly graphic. But they're not, which confuses me to no end. Did somebody have a weak stomach on set? Did they think they were going too far and needed to stop the action and avert the eyes?

I'm focusing on this, but it's so weird in a low budget horror film like this to not have FUN with blood and gore effects. And that's what it truly seems like to me. It seems like a not very fun low-budget horror movie, which baffles the mind. Why even make a movie like this, a slasher movie like this, if you aren't either going to have a good time or shake up the genre a little.

This movie is no shake up. It's a rehash of a thousand other slasher films. College kids out in the wilderness stalked by a crazy family, all of them having one issue or another, with one of them the main killer who wears a mask. Oh boy. I could seriously be talking about Texas Chainsaw Massacre, couldn't I? Or any number of rip-offs of that movie and its premise. This isn't even a good rip-off, having no real personality as a movie with only a scattering of unique lines, no unique characters, and a plot that is literally bare bones.

The weird thing is that the survivors of this movie seems to not even care that their friends are all dead. The main girl is literally smiling at the end of the movie, completely ruining any tone or message the movie might have had. Then again, with a movie like this I checked out within the first five minutes, counting down every minute, every second, like it was pain all the way. I've been spoiled a bit this year, with very few truly bad movies that I've looked at. Hell, more often than not I've been watching and recommending the horror movies. That's incredible. And right before I watched this, I was watching Pacific Rim, which is a tough movie to follow, I'll admit.

The characters really have no character. The lines are often blurted out with no real meaning. There are long periods of silence and it doesn't work here. I almost feel as if the director, Carl Lindberg, wanted to make an artistic slasher film, especially with the bookends of the 8mm film at either of the real movie. It almost seems like it could have been intended to be artistic, a real art-house horror film that takes away the gore in favor of atmosphere. Except it fails. It fails literally every test a movie can fail. It is not coherent, not well shot, has a terrible audio mix. IT HAS TERRIBLE AUDIO QUALITY. What movie even does that anymore? I can take a video with my goddamn cell phone and have better audio quality than this movie does. That's not even right. This was a movie made just a few years ago, and it's this bad? That's insane to me. Hell, during one of the final scenes in the movie, when the main guy has the chainsaw and is going to kill the villainess of the movie, the sounds are literally deafening, so much so that the actors are barely heard over the roar despite screaming their lines awkwardly at one another. It's incredible and amateur and all kinds of wrong in every way.

The acting is bad, although not as bad as it could have been. There are moments of decency mixed in with the absolutely terrible acting. The film is never scary, but again, there are tense moments, even if they are few and far between. More often than not though, the protagonists do something stupid, idiotic, or just plain wrong, and all you can do is scream at your screen and hold your head in your hands as your fingers try to rip all of the hair out of your balding from rage head.

This is a failure of a movie, and not even an interesting failure like some of the movies I've watched. This one is just baffling and wrong, taking away any gore merit it might have had in favor of trying to be more artistic which falls as flat as it sounds. I know there are better known worse films out there. This movie isn't the worst in the world by a long stretch, but it certainly isn't good either. If I had been watching it for pleasure rather than for review, I would have turned it off five minutes in. That's how absolutely terrible it was.

I can't tell you enough to avoid this movie at all cost. Do not buy it. Do not give it to a friend as a joke. Do not touch it. It is better to just leave it alone. This movie has now gained the distinction as the worst movie I've reviewed so far. Now, I need a palate cleanser. Maybe I'll watch and review one of the movies I've been really wanting to rather than a movie that just kind of fell into my lap by chance.

Final verdict: not scary, really stupid, don't watch under any circumstances ever.

Oh, and just to get you to seriously not check this movie out, I described it to my fiancee as the movie equivalent of newborn puppies dying. Take that as you will, readers.

Movie Appraisal: The Innkeepers (2011)

Every once in a while a movie comes along that I absolutely cannot stand on any level. The Innkeepers is that movie for this October. While I'm unsure of exactly what I was expecting from this movie, it certainly wasn't whatever I just saw. Almost nothing about this movie is good. The pacing is terrible. The acting is nearly atrocious in all given cases. The characters are unlikable at best and unfathomable at worst. None of the decisions made by the characters, particularly towards the end of the film, make any sense whatsoever, and there are long periods of time when nothing at all happens.

I happen to love atmospheric horror, but this is  atmospheric horror without atmosphere. It's a ghost story without a purpose. It's a character study without character. This movie is inept. It doesn't work, wither as a movie or as a horror movie. It's boring, predictable, and somewhat pathetic. Ti West, a director I've heard a great deal of very good things about, is about the only reason this movie is even watchable. His direction is passable, even good at times, particularly when the old man shows up dead. Besides that though, none of the actors even seem to be trying. Well, that's not true, Sarah Paxton, who plays Claire, is trying way too hard. She needs to tone her acting down a notch. All I received from her character is that she was twitchy, impulsive, and really dumb. I'm sure many people are like that, but this just felt like overacting to the extreme.  Pat Healy, playing Luke, does a better job, but there are times, particularly when he is scared in the basement of the inn, where it is painfully obvious what's going on in his acting. I like subtlety in movies of this nature, but this movie looked at the word "subtle," didn't understand it, probably never even heard of it, and moved on.

The plot largely centers around the last weekend of the Yankee Pedlar Inn (incidentally in my home state of Connecticut). I have seen the inn before in Torrington, and I guess it could be creepy. Honestly, anything set in this godforsaken state could be creepy, but for the most part this movie was decidedly not creepy at all. Anyway, this last weekend, involves a bunch of shenanigans, ranging from Claire freaking out constantly, to an actress who happens to be psychic, to ghosts and spooks jumping out from all angles. Luke and Claire have attempted to try to find ghosts in the hotel before, and Luke is even in the process of making a spooky late 1990s internet page about the ghosts in the hotel despite it being 2010/2011 when the movie takes place. Ugh. The inn is supposedly haunted, but they've caught very little in the way of evidence, and near the end of the movie you find that Luke doesn't even believe in the ghosts. He's more than likely doing all of this stuff to appeal to Claire, whom he has a thing for. Claire, on the other hand, is a ball full of twitch. The girl can't stand still. She can't stop touching things and moving and twitching and screaming, and it distracted the absolute hell out of me. I didn't connect with her character at all. I didn't like her at all. I had no emotional connection with her, and that was an absolute shame.

I don't think this movie had a promising premise in any case, with or without great characters. Some ghost stories work, but one that seems based on lack of creepy visuals, lack of atmosphere, and lack of actual subtle scares is absolutely doomed to fail. Now, I generally don't like ghost movies anyway, but I had this movie recommended to me by a source I generally trust for compelling spooks and creepy stories. Not this time, it seems. This movie is so devoid of character, scares, or investment that I found myself frequently getting bored, and wishing the movie would just end already. I never do that. Hell, even The Reaping and Marronnier were compelling enough to watch the whole way through. This movie just had nothing for me. It could have been okay. I do like a well handled ghost story... and I happen to watch Ghost Hunters too, so I should love a movie like this if it is well done. But this one was not.

I don't even have more of a plot analysis than that. I have no idea if the ghosts Claire saw were real or not. That seemed to be something the movie was trying to put a question mark on. But the end of the movie completely invalidated any question of the validity of the ghost sightings... or at least of the psychic sights. And that just took away any interest I was clinging too. I figured, "Oh, it might all be in her head. She might be cracking a little. She might be making it all up." But no. Just ghosts scaring her to death because she didn't have her inhaler (since she has asthma). Another thing I have to mention is that my girlfriend had mild asthma. I see her using her inhaler every once in a while. And although Claire uses her inhaler correctly in a few scenes, there are quite a few others when she doesn't use it effectively at all. That bothered me like mad.

There is also forced humor throughout this movie that completely undermines the horror elements. Sometimes humor can be used well with horror, see The Cabin in the Woods or Hausu, but more often than not, humor is not encouraged for movies like this, particularly if it isn't well acted in the first place. I was incredibly disappointed with this piece of garbage movie even though I wasn't expecting anything but some ghosts. The tension was never there; the horror was never there. I would rather watch almost any other horror movie than this one. Avoid it. Don't see it. Don't watch it. Don't encourage it.

Oh, and just to point this out, because I love feeling superior to movie critics who are precisely the worst kinds of people. This terrible movie? Yeah, it has almost an 80% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes. This movie that I hated because it was a poorly made, poorly acted, poorly executed horror movie? Yeah, give it an almost stunningly positive review number. But great movies like Silent Hill: Revelation, Ghost Ship, 1408, or even the near-classic Jacob's Ladder all have worst scores. Never trust critics. Seriously. If someone tells you a horror movie has a great score, just pretend it's a bad movie. Do the opposite for films that have terrible scores. Nobody seems to know how to precisely score horror movies, especially when most critics already hate them. Well, horror movies are awesome, and true horror movies need to be known. I will always call out the crap and praise the great ones. And this movie is absolute garbage.

Movie Appraisal: Marronnier (Marrionnier) (マロニエ) (Run Like Hell) (2004)

Well, this is a pretty bad movie. Actually... this may in fact be the worst movie I've ever seen. And you know what? People need to know about this one. Everyone needs to actually see how bad a movie can be before hitting the singularity of being some crazy man's home videos or something. Because this movie is a few props short of basically being that. I... I can't even believe a movie like this actually exists. (Okay, that's a blatant lie. Yes, there are bad movies out there, and this one isn't even the worst one I've ever seen- although again, it's pretty terrible.)

Junji Ito, what did you do? Why did you do this? Why, Junji Ito? WHHHHHHHYYYYYYYYY!?

WHY?

As she stares blankly at me, the whys just keep piling up.

Oh boy, this is such an awful movie, but I loved every second of it. I also hated myself ever second I loved it. I mean seriously, I hate those movies that are called so bad they're good. I hate the phrase. I hate the sentiment. This movie is plainly bad. It's never good, never does anything that I could say is even in the same ballpark as good, but I still like it because I'm insane and quite probably demented. Call it a fault of mine. I like bad movies.

I... I have a problem. I have a large problem. People shouldn't like this movie. Marronnier is such a confusing mess of a movie. It shouldn't be a movie that anybody actively enjoys watching... and yet... and yet...

How could anybody say "No" to a face like that?

I was so confused... baffled really... by what was happening if anything was happening at all. I don't think I understood who the main characters were until about 3/4 of the way through the movie. And even then I didn't get it because it was incomprehensible. Honestly, this is the movie version of Cthulhu. That's the only plausible explanation. It felt too dreamlike and too unreal. Too many things made literally no sense. Too many scenes moved too quickly to actually figure out what was happening. Lines would begin and end before I could make sense of what was actually being said. The camera work is some of the worst I've ever seen, pushing aside the lowest of the low budget films. It was like the filter and effects over the actual film had a mind of their own and started putting sparkles and flares all over the movie... over every picture... over... over everything... EVERY THING. Do you understand? Can you even comprehend it?

I can't even believe what I just watched was even an actual movie. I'm baffled and amazed. My mind is absolutely and literally blown. That was such an awful movie, but... but maybe I can make it make sense. Maybe I can see it as something beautiful and perfect... porcelain even...

What.

So, I guess the movie is about a dude, Numai, who kills women and turns them into large marrionette dolls. Numai has a fixation on a woman who really has a thing for dolls that are called marronnier (which I think refer to marrionettes, but I could be mistaken). He stalks this woman, Marino, much to her own dismay. Anyway, a man named Iwata, Numai's teacher or master or something... it's impossible to really tell, but I think Numai is an apprentice or a friend of his or something... Anyway, Iwata kills his wife who he has never so much as touched, gives her a burial in a pond or mud or something... and somehow that burial in that specific place turns her body to wax, which he then carves into a sentient (slave?) doll who is alive for reasons.

Numai then brings Iwata more girls to turn into dolls, but Iwata rebels and is subsequently killed by Numai. There's a lot more, like a man who looks like he's gong to rape Marino at one point, but it murdered is a fairly gruesome fashion by Numai, I believe, only to be found by his stalker ex-lover, who cradles the would-be rapist and takes him home with her. What? I don't even know. The world of Marronnier is a strange and often baffling place. I would certainly be terrified to live there.

Anyway, it seems that Numai mostly wants to have Marino as either his lover or a doll or both, although that's never made entirely clear. He seems to at first just be stalking her and wanting to give her presents and shower her with affection and such... and then he suddenly wants to make her a doll by any means necessary. His motivations are all over the place and make no sense whatsoever, but his character is a self-contradiction anyway. The dude won't die and randomly teleports more times than I can count just to be slightly more intimidating. Or maybe that's his magical power in this.. can I even call this place a world? Or should I just call it like I see it and say that it's some kind of broken realm of humanity that has the most disturbing people populating it.

See, the problem here though is that Numai is not intimidating in the slightest; he's simply creepy. I mean, seriously, the dude is the creepiest man I have ever seen in my entirely life. LOOK AT THAT MAN'S FACE UP THERE AND TELL ME HE ISN'T! Just looking at his smile kind of makes my skin crawl ever so slightly.  Anyway, the entire time that Marino is stalked, she is looked after by her best friend, Mitsuba... who may also be in love with her? I don't even know. Japan is a weird and terrifying place for love. There's at least one longing look from Mitsuba to Marino. That's all I know. Hell, maybe they're even lovers. I don't even know. In my headcanon they are totally lovers and Mitsuba is awesome. Then again I have no way to prove or disprove my assertion there. I just want to write raunchy fanfictions about this terrible movie that nobody even knows about. For kicks and giggles.

The main point of the movie seems to be the sentient dolls. They're supposed to be the talking point about the film and the scary part, I think. And I'll tell you, at 1AM, they are pretty creepy. I'm currently in a room that probably has... oh... let's say ten dolls or so in it, all of various sizes and looks about them. I have never been the biggest fan of dolls, sometimes I can feel their cold, dead eyes staring at me. It's creepy is the point I'm making here, and I'm kind of creeping myself out here too... whoops... I thought that many of the bits with the dolls in the movie were actually creepy and kind of effective as a horror type of thing. I certainly didn't hate them. I felt that they were some of the strongest bits of the movie. They could even be the reason I find the movie watchable.

The confusion of the movie run through the roof though. I mean, most of the time I had no idea what was going on or who was on camera or what the plot was. The beginning introduced and subsequently killed off characters so quickly that I had no idea who I was even supposed to be identifying with. And the ending was a jumble of thoughts and images put into a camera. It was more a dream sequence than a story by that point. Now, I don't mind a dream sequence, but the whole movie felt like an extended fevered dream and a doll fetish dream to boot.

The gore effects were pretty good all around despite everything else. They were obviously fake, but that made it easier to watch for me. I hate tons of realistic gore in movies. Lots of gore makes me feel uncomfortable. Instead it looks like they had a fun time with fake body parts and buckets of blood. And I enjoyed the ride of blood myself. You could call me a fan of riding the blood train.

I think I've lost my mind.

Hideyuki Kobayashi directed this film and he sure made one ugly and strangely beautiful film. It's certainly not good, like I said, but it has a feel to it that I kind of like despite the terrible quality and nonsense that could be only called a plot by those who are deranged mental patients. Junji Ito is usually good at writing, and maybe the plot itself would have been fine, if a bit simplistic, but there were so many sequences of unreality and confusing times (and what was even going on?) that Junji Ito's best quality of writing really suffered. The plot came off as hacked together. The dialogue was so simple as to be inane, and the characters, besides Numai and Mitsuba, came off as clunky one-dimensional pieces of fluff, not fit for any movie. Numai was there as the creepy dude and he did what he was paid to do, and Mitsuba, strangely, did a great job as the hero part, hacking limbs off and genuinely looking like she was having a good time throughout the movie. I enjoyed her performance the most.

Junji Ito's cameo though was the absolute best part of the entire movie, and probably the best acting performance of the entire movie as well... sadly. I wish the movie could have just been him driving Marino around. It would have been a better movie all around... and everybody would have been happy.

The movie should have been simplistic. It's House of Wax but Japanese. Simple. There. But it turns out to be an overlong and incredibly complex, almost psychological and symbolic, look at a confusing and baffling premise. I'd like to think that the film has more to it than what it showed, but I don't think I'd believe it myself. It could be an allegory on stalking, and sometimes that would make sense... but other times it just comes off as a not great movie without any deeper meanings. I like the allegory of stalking idea, it would make some scenes actually make sense rather than being some of the worst scenes I have ever seen in movies.

The expressions in this movie are priceless. I have to point that out. Boy oh boy do the characters make some absolutely perfect expression. There is also a banging soundtrack, it's another fun part of the film. This movie though, despite my saying I enjoyed it kind of is really best to be watched with others and to make fun of it. Numai is creepy and believable as a villain and the movie is so weird that it actually starts becoming quite creepy itself, but it never reached that pinnacle of actually being scary. It's easier to make fun of than it ever could be to be scared of.  Case in point: Marino catches a goddamn high heel in her mouth. WHAAAAAAT? Then there's Mitsuba and her buster battle axe which she uses to cut off limbs. Piles and piles of limbs. Somehow Marino gets a sledgehammer out of nowhere. I assume she took it out of her nonexistent pockets. Then there's Numai at the end of the film, suddenly teleporting bandages to wrap around his disfigured face out of nowhere. I mean, unless he was expecting a terrible injury and came prepared with a bunch of bandages. I would have loved to have heard his thoughts there. "Oh dude, I should bring some bandages just in case these two women somehow injure me. I mean, they won't kill me obviously, but there's always that chance that I might get some scrapes and stuff and I really would rather not get those suckers infected. That would just hella suck." Also how the hell did Numai get Marino again after being in a bear trap? Did she help him? Did he somehow get out himself after being in a bear trap? Why wasn't that scene shown? Why did he teleport out of the bear trap? Why wasn't he limping after being in a bear trap? Why wouldn't he die? Why were the dolls alive? Why was Iwata so weird? Hell, why was half the cast so weird? Why didn't Marino do anything effective?  Why didn't she just stab him to death? Why was she thinking that stuff at the end? Why would she keep a doll of her doll brother and his doll girlfriend/wife with her in the same apartment? Did she actually get away or did Numai win? What the hell was with the whole scene where she's in white and he's under some covers? What about that whole bath scene earlier in the movie? What was going on there?

A lot of those questions seriously have led me to believe that the whole film is an allegory on stalking and what it does to one's psyche. Marino is plagued by terrible thoughts and bad dreams because of Numai, her stalker. He wants her to be a puppet on strings for him, but she refuses even if she isn't the stronger girl around. She fights him with the help of her friends, who eventually leave her to play their own parts. Her brother leaves her to be with his beloved. And her loyal friend Mitsuba stays with her until the bitter end, until eventually she too becomes victim to the terrible pain of dealing with a stalker. Marino is all alone at the end. Maybe she actually kills her stalker or maybe it's simply that she finally makes him go away, finally tells him off for good. She feels that she is free finally, but even as we see her "normal" life we see that she sees others as dolls and... yes, she herself is a doll too, her strings being pulled by her own stalker. She is controlled by him every bit as much as she feels that she controls her own actions. He dictates how she reacts, what she does, and  how embittered she is. Dead or not he still is in her mind, still controlling her, still causing her to fear even despite not being there.

And right there, if that's actually what the movie is about, I'd like it quite a bit more. I think I've put more thought into it though than the filmmakers ever did, but maybe I'd be surprised.

Anywho, I cannot in any way recommend this movie. It's not easy to find. It's not easy to watch. It's not really a fun experience. If you are a die-hard fan of Junji Ito's writing or really crappy movies about puppets, I guess I can't tell you to stay away from this movie, but do realize that it's not good even if I personally did kind of get a kick out of it. Watch other movies. So many other movies are better. It's a travesty that you aren't watching them. It's a travesty that I'm not watching them. Instead I'm a puppet on a string, subjecting myself to terrible movies so often that... that I must be losing my very mind. Heh heh...

(Also, as some housekeeping, this movie is incredibly hard to find information for. Some of the other reviews I looked at had multiple different names for the director of the movie, either with the name being Akira Kobayashi or Hideyuki Kobayashi, which I've gone with. Also, this is a very low budget film, so I don't want to be really mean about the whole thing. I did kind of enjoy it, but you can really tell the extreme low budget of the movie. Hell, I made a student film a few years ago on a lower budget than this and it looked better. The visuals here are legitimately painful to watch. The pacing is terrible, with the movie moving too quickly through many scenes and an eighty minute or so running time feeling like so much longer. The editing is painful... hell, most of the movie is simply painful. I may like some parts of it, I may like the idea of it... I may even think that the movie isn't the worst movie I've ever seen... but that's me being generous. It's a terrible, painful movie that nobody should be subjected to at all. Many of the reviewers I've read have an intense dislike of the movie. It's certainly a bad movie, but I can't say that I hate it. I just simply can't muster up the emotion to hate it. Another note is that I can't find exactly when the movie came out. I've seen most dates be 2004, but Wikipedia (a reliable source if there ever was one OBVIOUSLY) lists the movie as coming out in 2002. And at least one reviewer lists the release date as 2005. So, I'm playing it safe and going with the majority. I've found so little on the movie that I think it's best to play it safe.

Anyway, that's my housekeeping notes. Avoid this movie at all costs. If you have watched it, I'm so sorry that you probably had no fun at all watching it. At least I kind of thought it was amusing and okay... but I can find a lot to like in a movie that's hated. Most people can't. And I don't blame them at all for that.)

Movie Appraisal: A Return to Salem's Lot (1987)

This may in fact be one of the worst movies I have ever seen. It certainly is an insult to 'Salem's Lot and every adaptation of that wonderful Stephen King book. I could say a ton about how much this movie gets wrong. I could say just how much this insults me as a fan of the original story and the original miniseries, both of which I really enjoyed. I could say a lot of things, and I will, don't you worry, but I'll also say that as bad as this movie is, it does have some decent parts... but none of them have anything to do with the original story or characters. Hell, this movie doesn't even deserve to have "Salem's Lot" in it's title. Besides this movie taking place in the town, it has very little (read: nothing) to do with "Salem's Lot" to the point where I have no idea how this movie even comes to pass as a sequel to the events from the 1979 miniseries.

For a year or more now I've been waiting to watch and review this movie. I knew it would probably be bad, but what I didn't expect was just how bad it would be. It's not that I personally dislike it because it's not the perfect sequel to Salem's Lot that I wanted. It's terrible because almost every aspect of this film is a total and complete failure. The editing is terrible and choppy. The film somehow looks worse than its black-and-white predecessor from eight years prior. The acting is at times astoundingly bad. The direction is awful, just awful. The scenery is cheap and looks terrible. And the plot makes no sense and doesn't work in any sense of that word. And that's not even scratching the surface as to how wholly abominable this movie actually is.

For one, that tagline up on that poster: "Based on characters created by Stephen King." makes absolutely no sense. There are no characters based on Stephen King's stories. There is a town that is wholly different than what King wrote. There are vampires that are totally different than what King wrote. There is a non-burned down 'Salem's Lot, which makes no sense since 'Salem's Lot always burns down when Ben and Mark light the town on fire at the end of any version of 'Salem's Lot. So, why is this town intact? Why no burn marks? Why is it burnt down all over again at this end of this film?

See, the problem here is that this movie is no sequel to 'Salem's Lot or Salem's Lot. It is instead a completely different canon. It simultaneously a remake of the miniseries with different characters and its own story entirely. And that's where I found myself confused. Why didn't they just call this movie something completely different? It has nothing to do with Salem's Lot as a town or a book or a movie. The vampires are wholly different, no longer the shambling zombies they are in the book- they instead are humans with fangs and a hatred of light. The only vampire in 'Salem's Lot who was intelligent and coherent was Barlow, but here that whole aspect is thrown away in favor of talking vampires for some reason. This cuts away all of the horror while also taking away the point of 'Salem's Lot, the message of a charismatic and powerful person taking away the will to think of an entire populace.

I can keep going on about how the plot is ridiculous and the acting is pretty awful. I can keep saying how this movie seems pointless and kind of insulting. I can keep ripping apart every aspect of the film, from the pointless and antipathetic characters to TWO ridiculous "romance" plots... and all the way to some terrible fight sequences... terrible cinematography... terrible editing... terrible direction of almost every sequence. I just found this entire movie disheartening and incredibly insulting. I didn't like it and would never recommend it... but... but there were some okay things in the movie, and although I find the flick wholly reprehensible, I'd like to focus on the more positive aspects of the movie (the few that there are) because I find that there is no point in tearing the terrible and forgotten movie apart. It's already out of the public's memory. I think that speaks volumes about how terrible this movie actually is.

The opening of the movie is actually kind of fun, with a kicking opening tune and a psychedelic LSD vision. I enjoy a good strange opening and this one worked for me, getting me pumped up for a much better film than this one turned out to be. The music in general for this movie is pretty good actually, being one of the few redeeming features to an otherwise completely unremarkable film. The scene with the natives and Michael Moriarty's character, Joe, filming a ritual of one of the native's getting his heart pulled out is pretty good. I had no idea what was going on, but the effects were pretty decent. It had me believing this movie might actually look kind of interesting. In my mind, Cannibal Holocaust kept running through my head... and I guess I must have thought maybe I would get a movie more in line with that kind of film. It would have been a whole hell of a lot better than what there is.

The special effects sure are "special," especially when none of them seem to look good until the very end of the movie. Even then- they don't look good... it's probably more that I actually saw something that didn't make my eyes bleed which was better than this movie had been doing to me. And even though there are scary monster faces sometimes, the movie is mostly boring. There is no horror here, no tension. The vampires show up quickly and do nothing else. Yes, people are bitten with some terrible blood effects, but mostly the vampires stand and talk... and then stand and talk some more. Every once in a while they- wait for it- SIT and talk. WOW. Wow. Oscar calibre performances, people. There is overacting galore, although the kid, Ricky Addison Reed, and Michael Moriarity to a pretty good job at keeping cool. If "keeping cool" is swearing constantly and at the weirdest and most inappropriate times. I can't blame the actors for the odd lines though. The script seemed to be the real culprit here.

So, this is Tara Reid'd first role... if that interests you at all. Doesn't really mean much to me, I have to say. Knowing what movies that girl would be in- well, I'm not surprised this is where she started. Kind of fitting in a way. And kind of sad too. She is easily the worst actor here... and that's saying a ton. I seriously wanted her to stop talking every time she opened here mouth. Her "death?" scene was also painful to watch. I can't believe that that was the take they decided to go with. Did they even know what a good performance was? The sad thing is, they really must have because one actor really shines and rises this movie above absolute garbage. Oh, he's not really even introduced until two-thirds of the way through the movie or so... after you go catatonic because it's that bad... but once Samuel Fuller enters the flick as Van Meer, the Nazi Killer, the movie takes a turn to getting a lot more interesting. Samuel Fuller is wonderful here and seems to be having a great time. The man takes the performance and sells it for all its worth. He easily outshines everybody else. He is the only likable character as well as the only one worth cheering for. He chews the scenery up at times, but he is such a joy to watch that he alone makes the movie a little bearable. For the twenty or thirty minutes he decides to grace the screen with his kooky hair and bad dude stance, he is the greatest thing around. Hell, I would love more stories based on his character alone. Again, he's the only good character here in this movie.

So, the biggest thing that bothers me is the departure from the established lore of the freaking franchise that this movie is a sequel to. How do these vampires know their own history with both Straker and Barlow dead? Didn't Straker and Barlow come from Austria and England (basically Europe) too? Why are these vampires American and like 300 years old? Why are they here when all the vampires here were supposedly made by Barlow? Did they take over the town after Mark Petrie and Ben Mears from 'Salem's Lot burned the whole town down? Did they rebuild it? Or were they always there, these vampires, as Barlow made the whole town under his thrall? Because that would have been stupid. This is one of the big reasons this movie has to be its ow separate canon. It would make no sense otherwise. Why does Axel say that he's 300 years old? What is the point of that? Is it supposed to make him scarier? Or is it some kind of convenient way of saying, "Dude, this vampire's hardcore!" Well, it doesn't work. The line is awful; it doesn't make him more intimidating, it makes him seem like a petty bastard. Barlow was the first vampire there, but he's totally forgotten... well, except for the art of him on the box and poster. Yeah, that's definitely Barlow from the Salem's Lot miniseries. So, these seem to be in canon with one another... which would only really be possible if nothing made any sense any more. They would have to be implying that this town already had vampires in it. Or that they came later? I mean, is this movie saying that it takes place in the far-flung future of 2287? What? What? WHAT? What? I keep saying "what" so often it doesn't even sound like a word anymore...

The vampires were mindless like zombies in the movie, the book, and the canon, not like this... except for Barlow. It was scarier that way and so much more effective. This is just stupid. And then somehow the town name keeps changing between Jerusalem's Lot and 'Salem's Lot... when it's been established that the town name was officially changed to 'Salem's Lot. It's in the book. What am I even saying? They didn't read the book. Why would I give them the credit of reading the book? I must be insane. EVEN THINKING that these numbskulls would have considered reading the book... or (HA HA) watching the movie that this movie was a sequel too. Because they didn't watch that movie either. They didn't care about stupid things like consistency... or canon... or anything established. Hell, how is this even based off of anything Stephen King did? I mean, sure some of the plot is ripped off wholesome from the book... but calling this a sequel is like calling me a sane and smiling person. It's just not true and nobody should ever say things that they can't take back like that.

Oh, at least we get to see breasts... said Saquarry dryly. His face was likened to a rock. Breasts were not going to help this movie. They were just going to tell how bad a movie this was. Trying to distract with breasts was never going to work. There is so little of substance here and... this movie is entirely classless. And clueless. Why even include a scene like this? Are you establishing a romance? No, not really. Are you establishing how it might be difficult for Joe to hurt his beloved? No, not really. Oh, it's mentioned once, but never amounts to anything. The romance and the sex scenes are pointless. These are pointless breasts that make the entire movie worse because they have no point. I'm not saying that naked women are wonderful in movies, but they are usually meant to establish something (or for pure fanservice), and this movie doesn't seem to be doing either. These are breasts for the sake of breasts and there's just no point beyond that... and the shots aren't even good. They don't try to make the act of sex look vicious or terrible or sweet or sexy... the directing does NOTHING AT ALL. This is a terrible movie. This is such a terrible film. 

Wow, it turned daylight very very quickly towards the end of the movie. BAM. Night to day. There we go. That's how the sun comes up. No gradual rise. No tension. Nope. One second as dark as the dead of night and the next it is noontime. Wonderful. I get the feeling nobody associated with this movie has ever seen a sunrise...

Look, let me reason with you, the reader, here. Do not watch this movie. Do not seek it out. Do not think that you should watch this movie in any way. Despite a good performance by Samuel Fuller and a pretty good film score, this movie is a waste of time to watch. It has nothing to do with 'Salem's Lot as the town, the book, or the movie except in name. It has nothing to do with Stephen King either except for stealing some of his plot-points much worse than he ever wrote them. Some of the effects towards the end of the film also look okay, but no better than any other movie out there. Avoid this movie at all costs. This is The Reaping level of bad, and I'm not taking that back. So, I guess this October starts off wonderful... hopefully the next thirty nights go better than this one did or else I'm going to be a very unhappy fella.

Movie Appraisal: Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966)

"There is no way out of here. It will be dark soon. There is no way out of here."

You said it, Torgo. I don't think I'll ever be able to get this film out of my head. It's like a disease that won't let up... It's like I've watched the movie in The Ring except it's not some creepy little fifty pound girl who's going to come out of my television and get me, it's a brain aneurysm caused by anger and confusion over this film and just how bad it was.

I watched this film not knowing what to expect. I knew it was bad... Hell, I knew it was REALLY BAD, but I thought that maybe somebody got it all wrong... maybe they didn't know what they were talking about and this is really and fantastic and underrated gem of a movie. No... no... It's not. Don't watch this film. Don't even think about watching it. It's not fun, not enjoyable... it's like getting repeatedly stabbed in the chest with all the pain that entails, without dying, and also being completely bored and wishing you could just end it all right there and then.

Am I even making sense anymore? Okay, this film, nowhere near as bad as the abomination that is Space Thunder Kids, but it's bad. The film is amateurish, and is shot like a really bad high school student film. The acting, although bad, is actually usually palatable when the main female lead isn't on screen. The main female lead, I believe her name is Margaret or Maggie... possibly both... I don't know or care and I'm not going to use my brain to think about it... well, she happens to be my least favorite character is any film I have ever seen. I wanted her to suffer in a way I've never wanted any character to suffer. Useless doesn't describe her... I want a word that is more intense to describe her... rocklike... a big sack of nothing... DAMMIT, WOMAN! Why couldn't she do anything? Why did she get tired constantly? Did she have brittle bone disease? Some kind of horrible disease that make her weaker than a newborn kitten that also happens to have no legs, and may in fact be pond scum. THAT DOESN'T EVEN MAKE SENSE!!! I hate that woman so much! She gives human beings a bad name. No, Maggie, when it seems like some creepy guy might try to take advantage of you, you do not just stand there staring at him awkwardly, not backing away or trying to get away at all... you don't do absolutely nothing... The only thing that saved you was that Torgo was a decent dude, who although a bit of a moron himself, was smarter than your stupid idiotic self. WHY THE HELL DID YOU KEEP CHANGING YOUR STUPID MIND ABOUT WHERE TO GO AND WHAT TO DO!!?!? Why did you fall on the ground every five seconds? Were you that tired? How can any human be that tired and not be on a freaking respirator in some hospital somewhere looking for a lung transplant or dying of awful cancer or something. I'm not even saying this in jest. What the hell was that woman doing?

Moving on, I need to talk about some of the positives of this film to get the awful taste out of my mouth. I liked the music mostly, believe it or not. It was pretty decent and it set the mood pretty well. Torgo, the caretaker of... wherever they were... was pretty awesome. I would have watched a film of him just talking or doing stuff. Hell, a film of Torgo doing his taxes would have been more enjoyable than this. The Master's mustache was pretty awesome. I think that's it for positives.

Since most of this film is made out of negatives, it's really hard for me to precisely focus on what the worst things are, although I am damn well going to try.

The dubbing was awful. The cinematography (That is way too technical a word to call the crap that is this film.) is atrocious. I'm pretty certain every cut is awful... right before the editing cut the character might be running away and then it cuts and the character has stopped, turned around INSTANTANEOUSLY and looks very comfortable talking to another character.

I've never seen a movie make a cat fight (and by "cat fight" I mean women fighting each other for some reason only they seem to know) unappealing and frankly weird. It was awkward and uninteresting. I'm not the kind of dude who even cares about stuff like that because it's sexist or whatever... but I was bored to tears of the movie by this point, and I see that these chicks are going to start fighting and I start thinking, "Man, this might get at least a little fun to watch." No. It wasn't fun. It wasn't fun at all. It was like watching grass grow. Worse. It was worse than watching grass grow.

The movie was boring, made no sense, had little to no quality to it... had stupid women... stupid men... stupid everything... and I just... I want it to end! Stop playing those images in my head! Torgo, save me!

I can praise Torgo. He was really the sole saving grace of this film. (Okay, he didn't save it, but I enjoyed when the dude was on screen.) He really was the only decent thing to see here and I thought he was entertaining.

Okay, on to more negatives: "Well, sound does travel a long way at night." 

.....what.....? 

...what...? 

WHAT!? 

I don't think night has anything to do with the way sound travels, genius. I don't think darkness or light HAS ANYRHIGB TO DO WITHT HE WAY SOUND TRAVELS.  I know there are typos there in the previous sentence. I don't even care. I can't type without almost throwing my computer across the room I'm so angry at that STUPID line. So, that's the best I can do without breaking anything. I'm not ever reading that sentence again because I'll probably start spitting blood out of every orifice in my body hoping I can create a rage explosion rather than just plain flipping out and watching my brain rip itself out of my head and hunt down the actor who said that line, living or dead, and telling him about simple physics and sound waves... AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! I'M GOING TO THROW MY TOASTER THROUGH DEATH ITSELF BECAUSE OF THIS MOVIE!!!

Okay... hey, Torgo... no, I'm fine. I'm fine. Thanks, buddy... No, I'm calm. Look, I'm very calm. Okay... yeah... Do I need to keep going, Torgo? Please, I want to stop. I don't want to remember anything else...

Okay... okay... you're right... I'm almost done. I'm almost done...

So, the noises in this "film" are atrocious. There's an EXPLOSION at the end that's supposed to be thunder and instead sounded like nuclear fusion. I seriously thought that the shack had been H-bombed out of existence... not even kidding. Oh, and earlier in the film some... uh... I'm going to say that they were supposed to be animal noises... were going on, and it sounded like a whole bunch of people were howling and vomiting off-screen. They must have been watching the finished version of this film because those were the exact EXACT sounds that I was making after I saw this film.

This movie is more of a comedy than... uh... whatever it was supposed to be. There were a few times I laughed, but I don't think I was supposed to laugh. I don't think I was meant to laugh. I don't think they wanted me to laugh... I don't want to laugh anymore... TORGO! TOrgo, I don't want to laugh anymore! Make them stop... I don't... no... no... The movie's not funny, Torgo... It's a bad film... full of bad people... bad everything... I want it all to stop. WHERE'S MY TOASTER!? I'M GOING TO TAKE YOU DOWN, MASTER!!!!

Give me a second.

Okay... okay... Torgo gave me a strange look and now I feel a little better. DO YOUR TAXES, TORGO! I'LL BE FINE HERE REVIEWING THIS MOVIE!!

So, a lot (and when I say "a lot" I simply mean, "more than there ever should have been") of the film has a couple making out in a car and drinking... at various different times... and the police come and tell them off... Why not, I guess? I guess it makes sense. (No, it doesn't. it has nothing to do with any of the main story of the film and is, in the end, completely useless and astoundingly stupid.)

Torgo, I think that's the end of my review. Are you proud of me for keeping my sanity?

Movie Appraisal: The Reaping (2007)

What is it with horror movies and little girls? Little girls are not scary. they have never been scary. I could punt a sixty pound girl and anything that can be punted is not scary. I'm sorry, but it's true. Sure, there can be a certain amount of unsettling imagery just as there can be with anything, but little girls are not frightening. The worst they could do is kick me in the shin and give me a bruise. That is not frightening. That is annoying. So, I guess what I'm saying is that these stupid movie-makers should realize that something so puntable is about as scary as a cute little hamster running around on a wheel-thing.

The plague aspect of the story is much better, unsettling and eerie. I usually don't like religious imagery because I had enough of it going through nine years of Catholic school, but most of the imagery here is pretty decent. I particularly like the red river towards the beginning of the film. It's a nice touch.

The story itself is a little ridiculous. It has to do with crazy Christian cults and appeasing the Devil and, I think, the Antichrist. All these movies seem like they have something to do with the Antichrist. I'm sorry for complaining about this, but the Antichrist isn't frightening either. It's just a silly thing that I don't care about. Most Antichrist stories are pretty ridiculous and I can't stand them.

This movie isn't bad, per se, but it's certainly not good. The imagery is mostly here. The acting is WAAAAAAAAAY over the top to the point of sometimes being a little ridiculous and incredibly unbelievable. The plot is convoluted and confusing, with way too many different plot points and no really enough time to explore any of them adequately. I don't know if this story has a point or if it's just silly for the sake of being silly. It seems to take the worst of the horror genre and mix it all together in a movie that is altogether forgettable and confusing.

Another thing I need to complain about is women ALWAYS having a starring role in these modern horror movies. I feel that a dude should get a starring role every once in a while, but no, it always seems that some half-naked chick is going to run around in all these horror movies bouncing up and down for a full forty minutes, and sure, maybe I'm not adequately man enough or something, but it's kind of disturbing. I don't want to have to watch that in a HORROR film. The problem is that horror films and gratuitous naked chicks seem to be side-by-side in this day and age and it's awful, just awful. Nakedness for the sake of nakedness is stupid. Why can't horror movies focus on horror and not some awful sexual perversion? It's so stupid. This movie isn't as blatant about it as some horror movies are, but it still has it and it's absolutely ridiculous.

The Reaping is... unsettling at points. I'll give it that much. But by the end of the movie it just becomes ridiculous. I watch that final plague come down and I just don't care. Let 'em all die, is the only though in my head. Let this stupid, awful movie end. Oh, and the special effects... damn the special effects... damn them to the furthest corners of whatever hell created them.

This movie is starting to make me angry. It wasn't at first. It didn't seem so bad at first, but with so many better movies out there and with this one stealing away my time forever, I become angry that I wasted my time with this insipid movie. The twists are awful. The acting is terrible. The scenery except for a few small exceptions is awful. The art style and directing are awful... truly awful cinematography. How did I manage to sit through this whole movie without throwing my chair through my television screen? I think I have greater willpower than I have ever known. I can't believe I made it through that whole movie.

This review started off calm and I didn't want to rip this movie apart, but this movie deserves it for the torment it has put me through. Hilary Swank is not going to save this movie by being the sexy action chick. I'm sorry, she just can't. The way she talks in this movie grates on my nerves, as if I'm hearing metal rubbing against a chalkboard continuously for three years of my life every time she opens her mouth and says something.

I feel as if I've aged thirty years in this ninety minute or so movie. Don't watch it, I beg you. Don't watch it or it will steal all the happiness from you and leave only the cold misery of knowing that this movie was ever made. Save yourself from that eternal torment. Be smarter than I. Don't allow yourself to ever watch The Reaping or you yourself will find yourself reaped. (And not in a good way.)

Movie Appraisal: Cast a Deadly Spell (1991)

For the second day in a row I was primed and ready to review Jacob's Ladder, which just so happens to be my favorite horror film of all time. I was about to go and watch it again and write a review when suddenly I have this crazy desire to watch this movie, Cast a Deadly Spell. If you've never heard of it before, I don't blame you. I hadn't heard of it before a few months ago for the first time.

The premise is interesting. It's pretty much a 1940's detective story with magic. Yeah, it's a weird combination, I'll say that much.  It's more detective story than anything else though. I find it hard to call it a horror story too. Until the end the horror end of the movie is played down pretty hard.

So, the story opens up in Los Angeles in 1948. "Everybody used magic." the opening title tells me. Is something wrong with the grammar there or what? I know what it's trying to say, but I don't think it's saying it right. Wouldn't it be "Everybody uses magic." or "Magic is a tool for everyday use." or something like that? The past tense really confused me there.

Then the movie gets going. We meet a detective named Howard Philips Lovecraft, but usually goes by Phil. Really, movie? That's what you're going with here? You're going to use the name of an author who was a known racist and misanthrope? Okay then. All right. Let's see where this goes then. Oh, and just to put this out here too, Phil's former chief detective (or something like that) has the name of Bradbury. I wonder if his first name is Ray.

Anyway the story starts off with a dame like every one of these detective stories starts out (or so the opening monologue tells us). I don't really see the dame in this case... but all right... No, seriously, where's the dame? The only dame I see in the beginning is Phil's landlady... and she isn't causing any trouble... and it can't be the girl who Phil meets later because she doesn't start any trouble... nor does the "love interest" introduced later on. So, Phil's voice-over monologue is a freaking liar.

Phil goes about his private detecting ways and early on we are forced to see that he doesn't use magic like everybody else. Okay... so this comes into play in the story eventually, right? We learn why he doesn't use magic and that lack of using magic like everybody else saves him in the end, right? Right? No, I'm sorry to say that none of that ever comes into play in this movie at all, and that's disappointing. It feels like there were a lot of good ideas but none of them were used well at all. The only thing that Phil not using magic is meant to show is his integrity, but it's a silly notion. Magic must be a relatively new thing in this universe, but using it would help him solve crimes and put those bad guys away for good... plus, he wouldn't get into half of the terrible situations he does get in to. Use your head, Phil.

Anyway, Phil soon meets up with a man named Amos Hackshaw, who's played by David Warner. I've never heard of the name David Warner before, but the actor is so familiar I want to yell at the screen who he is even though I can't really remember. Anyway, this guy is very obviously not a good guy. I can tell this right off. He seems a little odd and well... anybody who wants the Necronomicon can't be a good guy... plus,  the actor always played bad guys from what I can remember, and since I can't remember anything, I'm going to go with my gut on this one.

There are some weird other scenes earlier on... most of which are just strange. There's a little guy named Tugwell, who is my favorite character by far, who goes and does murder. He seems to be a genuinely terrifying guy who only stands about four feet tall. I like this guy. I like his spirit. I want him to be the hero. (He isn't the hero. He's just a lackey for one of the villains.)

Anyway, the story goes on and I keep having flashbacks of The Big Sleep and The Maltese Falcon. This detective story seems to have a ton of elements of those two movies... and you know what? This movie is worse than any of them... it's probably worse than most 1940's era detective movies. I kind of wish this movie were in black-and-white. It feels like it should be. There's not reason why it isn't and it makes me confused. For a movie that so obviously wants to be a throwback to better detective movies, this movie isn't trying very hard.

And I talk about the detective elements instead of the horror ones, because the horror ones are stupid. Throughout this film, little things seem out of place because of the "magic" world gimmick, which is all good and fine, but the horror elements are lacking. Every time a horror gimmick or creature is introduced this movie turns from a serious detective film to a slapstick horror comedy, like Evil Dead 2, and that just doesn't fit. It doesn't do the comedy as well as Evil Dead 2, and thus it's comedy is stupid and makes me want to punch the screen until something breaks. Thankfully the horror elements are used sparingly, but this is the main gimmick of the film. How can the main gimmick be used sparingly in a film that really needs the gimmick to stand out?

Well, I guess you're starting to get my impression of the film. It's not good. It's actually pretty terrible. The acting isn't bad (mostly), but that's about the only good thing I can say about this movie for the most part. The scenery is weirdly washed out and doesn't look real. Again it would all look better in black-and-white. The monsters are  really fake looking and used with so much stupid humor that the scenes they appear in just make you want to hold your head in your hands until it goes away.

The plot eventually makes itself a bit interesting when a virgin sacrifice is required to summon the Old Gods, including Cthulhu and Yog-Sothoth. The ending of this scene, which is the best scene in the film, can be scene from a mile away... with the sixteen year old girl not being a virgin any longer.

So, let me say what this movie has in it: statutory rape played for laughs, a gargoyle getting kicked in the gonads, an angry landlord taking a shotgun to some gremlins, a serious conversation between to old friends, a very small man being drowned in a bathtub full of bubbly water, a zombie breaking a broad's arm, zombies building houses, the last of the unicorn hunters, a serious detective story, Cthulhu rising from beneath the ground, eating a dude, and then going back down, the Necronomicon, a demon rising from a pot of soup, and a great scene with a layer named Thadeus Pilgrim.

Ugh... I don't know what else to say... oh, yeah... when was it established the sixteen year old girl virgin was the last of the unicorn hunters? When Phil drove past her for the first time he seemed to think it was all very normal. I guess it wasn't Phil, was it? Why didn't you say something at the time? What about all the other virgins out there? Why did she have to be the virgin of choice? Couldn't it have been a male virgin too? Or is that just not allowed? I never understood that in movies. Why is it always a female virgin? Is it because males seem to fantasize about female virgins and male virgins are usually icky people who shouldn't be spoken of? Is that it? It must be and it's silly and stupid and these stupid movie characters should really get these virgin sacrifices to make sense... and if this girls father really wanted her to be a virgin for life, maybe he should have made certain she didn't hit on everything with a penis that moved in her general direction. And statutory rape played for laughs? Really, movie? What is wrong with you? And by a police officer no less... I don't understand... This movie is just the opposite of classy... it's base and seriously...? Kidding around about a police officer having sex with a sixteen year old girl?

As you can tell I'm confused and angry. This movie is a million times worse than Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2, and that's a thing I've never thought I'd say (even though that movie was actually pretty good). I wish I'd have my ninety-six minutes back. I wish I had just reviewed Jacob's Ladder.

Video Game Assessment: BioShock (2007)

Okay, I'm seriously very sorry for doing this, but this is a game I've been wanting to review for a very long time and I only just remembered it existed while I was going through a pile of games I finished. I say that I'm sorry because I'm sure there are people out there who really like this game. There are probably even people (perhaps) reading this review who REALLY like BioShock. Well, I'm going to say something that's probably going to make me very unpopular to those people.

I hated this game.

I hated it with a severe passion I usually only reserve for Dark City, Finnegans Wake, and The Martian Chronicles.

I'm not even kidding. This is my least favorite video game OF ALL TIME. You may think I'm going way overboard with that statement or something... but I'm not. I cannot think of a single video game worse than this piece of absolute crap. I'd rather play anything instead. I'd rather play a freaking Barbie game, or one of those freaking Pet Vet games or whatever they're called where the vet goes and pets the animal a lot until it gets better, or whatever the hell those games have in them. How should I know what's in them? I don't play them for a reason and if I did play them I'd kind of know what to expect.

This game is a pile of turds. Why? Well, because of what it claimed to be and what it turned out to be, of course. I mean, if you tell me this'll be the game that innovates first-person shooters with many elements of horror for years to come, I'd understand what you're saying... then I'd play the game and slap you in the face for this affront to humanity.

Did I say "affront"? I meant blight.

Seriously, this game is terrible. And I'm sure all these people who are into "mainstream" games like the Halo crowd are probably slobbering all over this game calling it a masterpiece of horror, sci-fi, and video games themselves... but those people are idiots. They have no idea what's going on at the best of times, and even though I consider myself quite mad most of the time, I'm not mad enough to call a turd a piece of gold. I'm sorry, it's just not something I feel comfortable with. It goes against the basic rules of everything.

BioShock feels like a game that wants to be something better. It wants to be the older kinds of games with a great plot and some puzzle elements and a WHOLE LOT of horror... but what it comes off as is pretentious bullcrap.

I love great stories. Love great twists and turns. Look at my Silent Hill 2 review or my Deadly Premonition one if you don't believe me. Seriously. Those show that I love great stories, even when the game is ultra-hyped. Silent Hill 2 is often called the scariest game of all time, and you know something? Despite my insistence on hating most things well-loved by the populace, I love Silent Hill 2. I think it is the scariest video game of all time without a doubt in my mind. And saying that makes me hurt a little knowing that I agree with so many other reviewers out there... but it's true and I cannot deny the truth despite my obvious mental defects.

But this game... oh, this game... I can't even like it. Sure, I tried to like it. I played levels and had a little fun from time to time. I killed weird people stuck in the underwater city of Rapture, and I didn't feel anything. The scares WEREN'T SCARY! How can a horror game not be scary? How is that even possible? How can people like this game?

I'm so angry I could spit staples out of my teeth as hard and fast as my staple-gun. I don't think any game has ever made me this angry before... no, I know that no game has ever made me this angry. I can't believe how many people liked this game. I can't believe enough people liked it so that there was an even more terrible sequel made which I will never play even under threats of death and bodily destruction. I'd rather die painfully than play a game that hurts my pure visions of video games.

I played this game for about an hour on my first playthrough. It seemed a little tense from time to time and I didn't hate it. I thought it was all right. I thought that maybe I'd like the game even... but after a little time playing through the game, I found that instead of liking it more I was just bored. I knew what was coming before it came. I could kill everything without a blink of my eyes. I don't even like first-person horror games all that much because they make me nervous, but this game just made me sigh for the game to throw some kind of challenge at me... anything to keep me from falling asleep in front of my television.

I mean, there are some good ideas... like the plasmids and everything, but they're implemented so poorly. It's like a rip-off of the Fallout series or something with all the little cutesy 1950's era doodles. It just makes me angry. Nothing here feels original. Nothing here even feels good. It's like vomit in video game form and that... well, that just isn't right in any circle.

The big twist is stupid and happens way before the end of the game. I couldn't care less. I might not have seen it coming exactly, but I didn't care about these characters I never saw except when I listened to them talking over a radio at me and saw a little picture in the corner looking at me. How stupid is that? Show me a cutscene if you're going to try to be Half-Life... I mean, Half-Life did that whole playable cutscene thing perfectly, showing me the characters involved without feeling distant from everything. It made use of the special weapons (e.g. The Gravity Gun) and used them effectively. This game instead goes for the whole, "Yeah, go use this fire plasmid to melt some ice. Yay!"

Whoopdee-doo... A one-year-old child could figure that out. A dog could figure out that warmth is bad for ice. What the hell kind of game is this that treats me as if I have the intelligence of a one-year-old child dog thing? IT MAKES ME ANGRY!

And the worst part is the ending... well, that and the item collection to become a BIG DADDY, which has to be one of the most hyped up easy enemies ever. I mean, when I first saw the trailer I was all like, man those things are going to rock!And then they didn't. It was quite the let down. It was like somebody telling me they were going to give me a puppy, and then instead they ritually sacrificed the puppy there in front of me and gave me the poor thing's fur as a final gift. I don't want dead puppy fur, I want a living puppy that will make me giggle and be happy! BioShock, why did you have to give me a dead puppy's fur? (Yes, I'm going to go with this analogy as long as I can. Hopefully you're getting a fraction of the amount that I abhor this game.)

Why does this game exist? Why is it so popular? Has the mainstream become so hopeless that this is seen as GAME OF THE YEAR material? I can think of many better games of 2007 right off the top of my head: Assassin's Creed (which I didn't even like all that much), Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, The Orange Box, Lost Odyssey, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, Peggle, even Silent Hill: Origins, which was absolutely terrible mostly! I can't even think straight... This game is making me so angry...

I will admit one positive aspect of this game just to calm my absolute rage. It has outstanding visuals. The graphics are outstanding mostly, and the water effects are beautiful. Okay, that's about it... and you know what? I guarantee that almost everybody who loves this game love it for its "innovative weapons" and "cool graphics" and that's sad. Games should be measured by more than just what they look like and how you kill the enemies. But no... stories don't matter... characters don't matter. The only things that matter are graphics and gameplay and if that's all that matter than yes, this game is a fricking gem among an ocean of gems. ALL GAMES ARE PLAYABLE OR THEY WOULDN'T BE GAMES! GOOD GAMEPLAY IS LIKE SAYING A MOVIE SHOULD BE WATCHABLE! OKAY!? AND GRAPHICS SHOULD BE TOPNOTCH ON NEW CONSOLES, BUT THAT'S NOT ALWAYS THE CASE, ALL RIGHT!? AND IF IT ISN'T THEN THAT GAME THAT DOESN'T SHOULD HAVE SOMETHING EXTRA SPECIAL LIKE A REALLY GOOD STORY! Okay... take a deep breath...

My point is that games should have all these things... just because this game has some decent graphics and gameplay doesn't make it GAME OF THE YEAR. What made it GAME OF THE YEAR are douchebags who consider it art rather than seeing it as pretentious bullcrap that should be flushed down the nearest toilet.