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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 8, 2009 10:26:51 GMT -5
SLITHER (2006)
When a meteorite crashes in the woods of a nearby small town, it releases a parasite that starts infecting everyone. Campy B-Movie fun that pays homage to 50's sci-fi like THE BLOB and then later throws in some Romero type zombie action for good measure. Nice even mix of black humor and gory horror.
Nathan Fillion (TV's "FIREFLY") plays the sheriff who tries to stop the plague from overtaking his town.
7.5/10
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Post by slayrrr666 on Mar 8, 2009 10:30:25 GMT -5
Alien-1979
Years ago here, I announced I never got the big deal with the film, calling it an overlong, dull, barely-worthwhile classic, and if anything, time has not done this one any favors for me. I cannot stand this one and I might go ahead and call it one of the worst horror films I've seen, which I won't but it won't take much argument from me to say that. This is just the epitome of plodding along, as this just takes forever to get going, the kills are nowhere near any kind of suspenseful or even gory (beyond the infamous one, which we all know what it is) but even that one just doesn't have any shock now that familiarity has taken over and I expect it. Not even the cyborg revelation works here, feeling like it's inserted in an attempt to make it a sci-fi film rather than the horror film so many seem to think it is. I'll give due credit for the alien looking cool, but it's not in action enough for me to really care about it, and when something looks like that, I want to see it bright and out in the open, not cramped up in spaces so dark it's impossible to tell what it looks like. The final stalking in the pod has some good stuff to it, but too little too late.
I'd rather we remember Planet of the Vampires instead, as it came first, told the same story with 1/2000th of the budget, 50 times the imagination and it's Italian to boot.
3/10
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 9, 2009 10:49:35 GMT -5
I don't understand why if you hated it that much the first time, I do remember your insane review of it the first time, why you would even bother watching it a second time. There are no points or rewards this time, and it sounds like you went into watching it with the attitude that you were going to hate it all over again.
1. The "cyborg revelation" doesn't make the film sci-fi. The film is already sci-fi way before that event takes place:
A) It takes place in the future. B) It takes place aboard a space vehicle. C) They land on a fictional planet where they find the remains of a fictional alien. D) The title creature.
All that stuff sounds like sci-fi to me. The horror aspect is in the fact that the alien is stalking and killing the crew members one by one. Much like, I don't know, any of the Jason movies you revere so much.
You're really hung up on how much bloodshed there is on-screen and seem to have no patience for building suspense.
2. PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES was an influence on ALIEN, as was THE THING and several others, but ...VAMPIRES isn't exactly the most original movie either.
3. Italian-made does not automatically mean classic or even quality. I've seen quite a bit of Italian stuff that was overrated or even crappy.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Mar 10, 2009 10:23:12 GMT -5
First things first:
I could've sworn I mentioned I tried watching it again after several people on other forums got after me because I don't like it, I really thought I put that in there. I don't know if I will again or not, I haven't liked it or thought it was good any of the times I've seen it.
1A: That means nothing. If it's presented in such a way that there's nothing at all futuristic in the society beyond just the time it takes place in, that doesn't mean it's Sci-Fi.
1B: All right, fair enough. I'll give you that one.
1C: It's not really an integral part of the story that landing on the planet is important to the story beyond just the picking up the alien. That, I'll admit is negotiable, but still, landing there for a while and not being there all that much isn't really enough to label it Sci-Fi.
1D: Just that alone isn't enough either. It's the tone of the film itself it appears in that determines whether that alone is enough. A film like Mammoth or Alien Terminator, which do feature aliens, aren't portrayed as being Sci-Fi just because it features extraterrestrials in them, they're just part of a horror film that has a protagonist from 'not of this world,' and it doesn't make it so that a mere appearance by an alien makes it Sci-Fi.
I, truthfully, never cared for suspense. I prefer atmosphere in my films. A creepy location or setting works me over much easier, and has a more prolonged effect, than just suspense. It works in small doses, but when a film spends an hour building up suspense and nothing else, I get bored and restless. I've got stuff to do in my life, I can't waste it waiting for a movie to spend over half of it's running time building up to something. Get a move on already, which is what those Friday films do. They use suspense as well, but they start paying off around the forty minute mark all the way to the end, which is a much more manageble pace for me to handle. Remember, 2 and a half hours, straight up, is about my limit for films, I get bored and restless when I have to sit around for much longer just watching one movie.
2: True, there's a couple elements of earlier stuff involved, but frankly, Vampires was the first one I can think of that told that specific plot (The Thing might be the first overall one about aliens, I'm not sure, but Vampires was the first one to go into space and deal with them there, as far as I can remember) and I think it's better anyway so I'd rather put up that one.
3: Quality of filmmaking doesn't mean anything as long as it's not enjoyable. Italian, and European in general, manage to make them enjoyable despite looking like they're made with the budget of The Matrix's catering bill, but simply using "They're poorly made" as the reason to write them off doesn't mean anything to me.
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 11, 2009 9:50:54 GMT -5
1A: That means nothing. If it's presented in such a way that there's nothing at all futuristic in the society beyond just the time it takes place in, that doesn't mean it's Sci-Fi. In this film, it means everything. If it wasn't set in the future there'd be no movie because in '79 when the movie was released, or even now at the present time, we don't have people awakening from hypersleep who make their living traveling around in space in mining freighters. That's called science-fiction. 1C: It's not really an integral part of the story that landing on the planet is important to the story beyond just the picking up the alien. That, I'll admit is negotiable, but still, landing there for a while and not being there all that much isn't really enough to label it Sci-Fi. You said it yourself. They pick up the alien because they land on that planet. If they didn't stop there, there would be no movie. They would've continued on their merry way back to earth. 1D: Just that alone isn't enough either. It's the tone of the film itself it appears in that determines whether that alone is enough. A film like Mammoth or Alien Terminator, which do feature aliens, aren't portrayed as being Sci-Fi just because it features extraterrestrials in them, they're just part of a horror film that has a protagonist from 'not of this world,' and it doesn't make it so that a mere appearance by an alien makes it Sci-Fi. That's crazy. If there's a non-existent alien from a non-existent planet interacting with earthlings, or in this case, stalking and killing them, how is it not science-fiction? The killing them part makes it horror too. Like THE THING or SPECIES. I, truthfully, never cared for suspense. I prefer atmosphere in my films. A creepy location or setting works me over much easier, and has a more prolonged effect, than just suspense. The movie has tons of atmosphere too. From the opening scenes where we see nothing but the seemingly deserted corridors of the Nostromo, to the planet they land on, the inside of the derelict ship they explore, the area where they discover the eggs, etc. Get a move on already, which is what those Friday films do. They use suspense as well, but they start paying off around the forty minute mark all the way to the end, which is a much more manageble pace for me to handle. Remember, 2 and a half hours, straight up, is about my limit for films, I get bored and restless when I have to sit around for much longer just watching one movie. But if the extent of the suspense in the Friday movies is, "Gee, will Jason kill those teenagers making out in the cabin?" Does that really count as suspense? Once you've seen a couple of those movies, you pretty much know what the answer is going to be everytime. At least in ALIEN, it's truly suspenseful and surprising because you had no idea who would survive and who would be killed or even that one of the crew members was a robot working against them. Quality of filmmaking doesn't mean anything as long as it's not enjoyable. Italian, and European in general, manage to make them enjoyable despite looking like they're made with the budget of The Matrix's catering bill, but simply using "They're poorly made" as the reason to write them off doesn't mean anything to me. I never said I was writing them off because of low budgets or anything like that. I enjoy well-made low budget films more than poorly-made big budget flicks. I said that you praise them like being Italian-made automatically means they are all great films or automatically entertaining. I've seen enough of them and can be unbiased enough to know that's not the truth. For every truly great Italian genre film, there are probably five - ten terrible ones. Just like American films or Japanese films or whatever. Anyway, that's all I'm saying on this topic. You don't like ALIEN and that's fine, to each his own, I just don't agree with your reasons. |
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 11, 2009 11:15:34 GMT -5
A couple of underrated flicks coincidentally released in the same year:
THE ARRIVAL (1996)
Long before he was a sitcom star, Charlie Sheen played it straight in this tale of an astronomer who receives a signal from space that seems to be extra-terrestrial in origin. When he turns his findings over to his superiors he is fired. Deciding to investigate on his own, he soon discovers that the aliens are already on earth and plotting a total takeover and that not everyone is who they seem.
Sheen does a good job of playing this paranoid character, the aliens and other effects are done well and the material is taken a littlle more seriously and realistically than usual. It was nice to see a movie like this that was a little more thought provoking and, at least until the third act, was not loaded down with gunfights, car chases and explosions.
6.5/10
On the other end of the spectrum we get...
MARS ATTACKS! (1996)
Tim Burton's parody of 50's alien invasion B-movies based on a set of TOPPS' trading cards. Starring an A-list cast of actors (Jack Nicholson, Glenn Close, Annette Benning, Michael J. Fox, Pierce Brosnan, Sarah Jessica Parker, Danny Devito, Jack Black, Natalie Portman, etc.) who purposefully ham it up and are mostly blown to smithereens. The aliens are great fun with their huge heads, bulging eyes and mischievous personalities. And most of the stock characters from these types of films are represented, from the pipe-smoking scientist to the warmongering Army General.
Pretty funny and should've been a huge hit, but unfortunately it was released right on the heels of mega-blockbuster and vastly overrated INDEPENDENCE DAY so maybe audiences felt that was enough alien attacks for a while. Or they didn't get the joke. "Ack! Ack!"
7/10
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 12, 2009 8:39:35 GMT -5
ALIENS VS PREDATOR - REQUIEM (2007)
A small Colorado town is the latest battleground between the title creatures. When a Predator ship crashes in the woods, the Alien facehugggers he was carrying escape and immediately start attacking the locals. A second Predator comes to earth to clean up the mess and eliminate the Aliens.
Sounds good enough, but the execution is so poor on every level that this might be the final nail in each franchises' coffin.
The low budget gives this movie away at every turn. From the non-epic location, to the f/x guys turned directors, to the no-name cast. When an alien is stalking a group of teens the flick takes a turn into "slasher movie" territory. The only things missing were a hockey mask and a machete.
The "story" even throws in a female soldier, recently back from Iraq, and her young daughter. An obvious ploy to try to get us to recall Ripley and Newt from ALIENS. These two are no Ripley and Newt.
As amateur-hour as the whole thing feels, my biggest complaint has to be the lighting. As in, where the hell was it? Most scenes take place in darkness, which is fine, all of the previous movies in the two Alien and Predator franchises did as well, but the difference is, here, everything is so poorly lit that I couldn't tell what was going on. Poor or non-existent lighting, lots of closeups during battles or attacks, and frenetic cutting, made it almost impossible to make out what the hell was going on most of the time. And when I can't even see the on-screen action it makes it almost impossible to give a damn about the movie. There's no excuse for that. Most of the action in THE DESCENT takes place inside a cave and I could always tell what was going on in that movie.
As bad as the first AVP was, it was a classic compared to this mess. The whole thing is a waste of time and money and further tarnishes the legacies of both creatures.
1/10
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Post by slayrrr666 on Mar 13, 2009 10:21:06 GMT -5
Doom-2005
First off-Heiney, can I get an official ruling on this one? It takes place on Mars and the creatures are mutated from the inhabitants, but they don't come out and directly say that they were the creatures that lived on the planet.
Either way, this one here, I remember being pretty critical of it back when it first came out, actually fared a lot better this time around when I didn't have my friend constantly talking in my ear telling me exactly where everything came from which individual video game or what was supposed to be going on but ultimately changed, which goes a long way here as I was able to turn my brain off and enjoy. Lots of great fighting scenes, some wonderful atmosphere (the underground caverns are glorious) and the impressively designed creatures are a treat with no CGI (at least noticeably, I couldn't remember it too well in theaters) and along with some gore and a couple nice jumps, it passed the time nicely.
8/10
John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars-1998
Now, this is a little more like the kind of stuff I usually enjoy. Full-on action, tons of great kills, acceptable gore, fantastic-looking creatures and tons of stuff blowing up or being shot to pieces, expertly placed to avoid boredom with nothing to get sidetracked on, lose attention to or just plain idiotic moments. It's cheesy, sure, but it's fun and is certainly Carpenter's best film, though that's not really saying much with his output. Just a ton of fun all around.
9.5/10
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 15, 2009 10:12:28 GMT -5
Doom-2005 First off-Heiney, can I get an official ruling on this one? It takes place on Mars and the creatures are mutated from the inhabitants, but they don't come out and directly say that they were the creatures that lived on the planet. Can't say for sure as I've never seen it. From what I've read though, the "creatures" are just mutated humans, not actual aliens, is that right? So if there are no actual Martians or other aliens in the film, then I guess it wouldn't count. |
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Post by slayrrr666 on Mar 16, 2009 10:10:42 GMT -5
All right, thanks. man. Little confused, as they do offer up the possibility that they are the mutated race, but it's never officially proved. The notion is laughed at and dismissed, even though it's brought upon by logical evidence and reasoning when it does come up.
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 18, 2009 9:51:02 GMT -5
SIGNS (2002)
Six months after the accidental death of his wife, former reverend, Graham Hess (Mel Gibson) discovers a giant crop circle on his farm. As more crop circles are found all around the world, and later lights are seen in the skies, Hess and his family, along with the rest of the earth, prepare for a possible alien invasion.
Doesn't rely on flashy effects as director M. Night Shyamalan builds real suspense, using mostly sound effects and, until the very end, just glimpses of something otherworldly. Good performances by the main cast and an old-school creepy score by James Newton Howard. The "water thing" is a little shaky, but overall it's a pretty entertaining movie.
7/10
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Post by slayrrr666 on Mar 18, 2009 10:09:58 GMT -5
Wing Commander-1999
No confusion here, this one is a pretty solid entry in the defend-against-invading-alien-forces (DAIAF?) genre, despite not doing anything that will stick with me at the end of the week. This is mainly due to the fact that it's focused a little too long on the cliched and out-right obvious love triangle between the three top heroes that just simply sticks out because it's featured in every single attempt at doing these movies. The space battles, when we get them, aren't that bad and do generate some kind of excitement due to there being something else on screen, but as merely time-wasters go, I've seen much more excruciating ones.
6.5/10
Xtro-1983
This is considered a cult classic, and for some reason, I've never gotten into it. Mind you, it's decent, but it's not great or anything and there's certainly much worse ones out there. Maybe it's because the film seems to want to be a horror film yet there's nothing horrific about it beyond the fact that the title being is an alien. Maybe it's because it's more of a suspense film and I do atmosphere better and easier. It certainly didn't feel that gory for the time period, but whatever the cause, this one was definitely lacking for me.
5/10
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Post by slayrrr666 on Mar 21, 2009 10:55:12 GMT -5
Predator-1987
The shootout in the jungle that hits nothing but trees. 'Nuff said.
10/10
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 21, 2009 13:21:02 GMT -5
THE WAR OF THE WORLDS (1953)
Adaptation of the classic H.G. Wells' novel, produced by George Pal and directed by Byron Haskinsis. Tells the story of an invasion from Mars hidden within what first appears to be a meteor shower.
Though it's starting to look pretty dated, check out the wires holding up the Martian's ships, you have to respect it for taking the material pretty seriously and not turning this production into another silly 50's monster movie. For the most part, the special effects and design of the Martians and their ships are done pretty well.
Some pretty good scenes of mayhem and destruction. You gotta love that twist ending just as all hope seems lost.
6.5/10
CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (1977)
Speaking of taking the material seriously.
Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) and Gillian Guiler (Melinda Dillon) are just two of many people who have recently had close encounters and are having visions of a mountainlike image. Along with government agents and scientists, they are drawn to a specific location to try to make contact with the aliens.
Great direction by Spielberg and a really memorable score by John Williams.
A film that focuses more on the "sense of wonder" of being visited by extra-terrestrials.
8/10
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Post by slayrrr666 on Mar 24, 2009 10:14:53 GMT -5
Evolution-2001
I've always thought this was a funny-looking movie, based on the previews, and when I finally saw it, it didn't disappoint. Maybe it was because I was still a huge X-Files fan at the time who loved seeing David Duchovny in a straight-up comedy, maybe it was my juevenile sense of humor that finds movies this stupid a good time, but whatever the reason, this one still holds up well, which I credit mainly to not having seen it since then. That can have a good effect on a film, and it's still a fast-paced, incredibly goofy fun time that I found really enjoyable.
8.5/10
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