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Post by Quorthon on Sept 28, 2009 6:14:56 GMT -5
Burial Ground: Nights of Terror (or something to that effect) -- pretty lame Italian zombie horror flick with a few too many Fulci rip-offs and some of the lamest zombies ever devised.
Starship Troopers 3: Marauder -- Absolutely appalling mess of a film which may have led to my single best review, my first in ages, and easily my longest ever for such a bad movie--even longer than my AvP assault. Please feel free to take a look.
Also recently watched the Tales from the Darkside movie which, while it had it's points, also managed to be a rather humdrum feature vastly inferior to Creepshow in every conceivable way. Deborah Harry did a pretty poor job overall. Steve Buscemi and Christian Slater, however, were both extremely entertaining.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Sept 28, 2009 10:34:31 GMT -5
I think of Tinto Brass' films could make that claim, Term, and then there's Jess Franco's Female Vampire, a film so perverse and pornographic that there exists no less than 7 different variations in different territories due to the extreme nature of the material presented.
And Burial Ground is simply awesome for the fact that it presents zombies they way they should be, walking dead things. I defy you to point to those things and tell me they've been dead for centuries, instead of that piece of crap work Savini did for the original Dawn. Italians always got the undead look right, while I have a hard time thinking of the US doing them right.
Carrie-Simply added in the uncut version of the original into the collection after seeing the film censored years ago. I remember being pretty indifferent to it back then, but I've got a feeling that if I can get into my reviews, I'll have to add some more to it to make it a little more negative as it strangely didn't do all that much for me. Not that it was bad or anything, just unremarkable, like most of Steven King's work.
6/10
The Mist-Yet another King work, and this one here is incredibly frustrating due to there being a lot I liked about it, a few points I loved, and then there was times I utterly loathed it. The way the mounting hysteria over the situation with them trapped within the supermarket and how the groups resolve their problems and start new ones was pretty good and makes for a realistic feeling to the story, the first few attacks with the unknown mist killing off the victims and the different creatures and their powers were all good points. The final few battles and escapes to get out, the blood and gore and the way that the creatures are dealt with are all loved points, but the length and the mere appearance of the religious bullshit, especially that stuff, just made me feel like not watching it all that often. I think the loathing parts win out over the good stuff.
6.5/10
Ghoulies-The second to this one is actually really good cheesy fun from the 80s, the original not so much. Not even 80 minutes long, this one actually does the cardinal sin of not introducing the targets until the 40 minute mark, so over half the film is over before they even come into play. Besides a great sequence where they run rampant for about ten minutes, that's actually all their screentime anyway, so we hardly get to see them in their own film. This just doesn't work as well as it could've, as there's some good stuff in here, just balanced out by a lot of stuff that doesn't.
5/10
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Post by Quorthon on Sept 29, 2009 4:09:24 GMT -5
Hey Slayrrr--you had a note in there about Burial Ground that I wanted to elaborate on, but I didn't want to take up space in this thread, so I made a new "zombie preference thread" over in the horror section.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Sept 29, 2009 10:29:17 GMT -5
I know, I saw it.
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Post by slayrrr666 on Sept 30, 2009 10:12:54 GMT -5
How High-See thoughts in Movie Genre thread.
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Oct 1, 2009 9:53:37 GMT -5
Carrie-Not that it was bad or anything, just unremarkable, like most of Steven King's work. It's too bad you chose to watch CARRIE and THE MIST a few days ago instead of now in October. You'll see why soon. Sorry. Also, I'm not sure why you didn't put it there, but CARRIE would've easily fit into the Genre of the Month. A lot of it takes place at the high school, ie: the locker room and showers, gym class and of course the major set piece during the prom, and the majority of the characters are high school students and teachers. And finally, you shouldn't judge Stephen King's work based on the films that have been made from his books. I know you don't really read books, something you yourself have said, but as someone whose read most of them, I can say that his books tend to be much better than the films he's inspired. |
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Post by slayrrr666 on Oct 1, 2009 10:11:34 GMT -5
I didn't even think about the genre thing. Looking back and what you said, I damn well should've.
Well, it really can't be hard to beat most of his movies. His best stuff has fallen in the 'Just decent' range, and the majority is unspectacular.
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Oct 2, 2009 9:12:48 GMT -5
Well, it really can't be hard to beat most of his movies. His best stuff has fallen in the 'Just decent' range, and the majority is unspectacular. You clearly haven't seen his "best stuff" if you consider it "just decent". Most of the best movies based on his work are the non-horror ones imho. STAND BY ME, SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION and THE GREEN MILE. All great films based on some of his non-horror books. EAGLE EYE (2008) Two strangers, an underachieving young man (Shia LaBeouf) and a single mom (Michelle Monoghan), are thrown together when they both receive phone calls from a mysterious woman they've never met, and who proves over and over again that their lives are in danger if they don't follow her instructions exactly. Starts out pretty good and is entertaining as the viewer tries to figure out what's going on along with the two main characters, but it runs out of steam at around the halfway mark and once everything is revealed it had a bit of a feeling of déjavu. Without giving too much away, let's just say 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY meets THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE. Shia plays essentially the same character he's played in several of his films so far, first he's a likable fast talking slacker-type and later he's confused and in situations over his head. (See also DISTURBIA, TRANSFORMERS, INDIANA JONES/CRYSTAL SKULL and now EAGLE EYE.) 5/10 |
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Post by Quorthon on Oct 2, 2009 9:42:39 GMT -5
I didn't even think about the genre thing. Looking back and what you said, I damn well should've. Well, it really can't be hard to beat most of his movies. His best stuff has fallen in the 'Just decent' range, and the majority is unspectacular. Wow, harsh. I think a lot of Stephen King's works have received quality film treatments. Off-hand, I can think of Christine, Creepshow, Carrie, Shawshank Redemption, Stand By Me, Green Mile (to steal a few), The Shining, and the mini-series for It are all really good. I would also list Pet Semetary, even though I'm aware some people will disagree with me, but that film gets under your skin and has an almost unbeatable atmosphere. That's one of the films that really messed with me as a kid. No 9-year-old should be seeing that. Also, I thought The Mist was really good, even though the ending was so harsh I could hardly take it. Children of the Corn is also considered a classic. Dolores Claiborne is also a pretty good film. Maximum Overdrive is one of his lamer films, although it's right up your alley, Slayrrr. I love that film just for it's totally 80's, hard-rock-infused cheesy horror style. And really, who doesn't love The Running Man? Some of the worst things based on King's works are The Langoliers, The Night Flier (ugh), and Graveyard Shift. The Nightmares and Dreamscapes mini-series has it's highs and lows, but overall I wasn't really impressed. Although, the story Battleground was a favorite of mine as a kid, so to see it in action was a real treat. Also, lets not forget that Stephen King's episode was one of the best X-Files stories, and despite it's thick horror atmosphere, it also featured some of the funniest writing ever applied to that series concerning Muldar's boredom without Scully. |
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Post by slayrrr666 on Oct 2, 2009 10:50:50 GMT -5
Truth be told, I haven't seen any of his non-horrors because they're just that, non-horror films and I have little urge to see films that are that long. Shawshank and Green Mile were automatically eliminated from viewing due to their lengths and I never found the urge to see Stand by Me at all, so those were taken out right from the beginning.
I never liked Children of the Corn at all, I much preferred the sequels. I think those are a lot better, and I did miss the remake of the original Sci-Fi aired over last weekend which most saw and liked so I might have to track that one down. Then you've also got the Something This Way Comes series, which all three were totally lame. And I'm one of the ones that doesn't like Pet Cemetery at all, I find it way too dull and the sequel is much better. The X-Files one he did was my personal favorite of the whole series, though I haven't seen any since the show went off the air so maybe I'm missing a few here and there when they got into solving mysteries and crimes away from alien abductions and government conspiracies, which I didn't like at all. I missed the Nightmares stuff because it sounded lame as well as Dolores Clairborne.
It, Christine and Creepshow are those that I do enjoy, as well as Maximum Overdrive and it's remake of Trucks was tolerable, though I have to admit that several of those you didn't like (The Langoliers and The Night Flier) were pretty good. The Mist was just like Desperation, it was good as long as religion was kept out of the picture. Whenever it was mentioned was when I had a problem with it, though I think Mist had more problems than Desperation so I throw that one over it.
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Oct 2, 2009 11:40:51 GMT -5
Truth be told, I haven't seen any of his non-horrors because they're just that, non-horror films and I have little urge to see films that are that long. Shawshank and Green Mile were automatically eliminated from viewing due to their lengths and I never found the urge to see Stand by Me at all, so those were taken out right from the beginning. Yeah, but isn't that the whole point of Genre of the Month? To give some new things a try and to watch some movies outside your comfort zone? If you end up watching just CREEPSHOW, CHRISTINE and others that you already know you enjoy, then really, what's the point? You're missing out on some great movies, SHAWSHANK and GREEN MILE, based on some pretty lame biases. ie: the length. And they do have this thing called the Pause button so you can get up and stretch, take a piss, eat a sandwich, etc. and then come back to the movie. And I think you'd find a lot of humor in STAND BY ME. It's not a horror flick, but it's certainly not entirely serious either. Lots of funny moments in that film. I hated MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE. Just lame on every level except for the great AC/DC soundtrack. King can take all the blame for that one since he directed the movie too. One of those where when it was over I would've liked my money back. yes, I saw it in a theater. I've never seen CHILDREN OF THE CORN or DESPERATION so their both in my Netflix queue for this month. Gotta agree with Q on PET SEMATARY. It's not the best movie, but it is creepy, creepy, creepy. And I remember the entire theater going "Eeeewwwwww..." during that ending. The sequel was crap. As for mini-series stuff, besides "IT", I thought "THE STAND" was really well done too. Sure they had to change some stuff and the ending doesn't have the impact the book did, just like IT, but overall, it was pretty well done. And even though THE SHINING is pretty revered by almost everyone, except for King himself, who hates it, the tv remake with Steven Weber is actually more faithful to the book. I enjoy both for different reasons. Watching the X-Files and saying you don't like the ones about alien abductions and government conspiracies is like watching Seinfeld and saying you don't like the episodes where they hung out at Monk's Diner.  But if you like the non-alien ones, then I highly recommend an episode called "Home". Probably the single best stand-alone episode they ever did and just one of the creepiest, most vile episodes of a mainstream tv series ever aired. |
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Post by slayrrr666 on Oct 5, 2009 10:10:32 GMT -5
I'm not saying I won't watch them, just saying why I hadn't watched them before. With their length issues and them not being horror films, I tended to ignore them, and seeing as how I've seen films that were longer, I might be up for them. I'll just have to clear three hours from my schedule to see them, for I'm not blessed with a TiVo or a DVR, so I have to catch them on TV.
And The Stand was never seen for exactly that same reason: I ain't spending eight hours watching one single movie. Sure, there's commercial breaks, but that's still overkill to me.
And is Home the episode where the two pose undercover as a newlywed couple investigating a series of murders in a planned community, only to find a monster made of sewage and sludge is killing off those who breaks their rules? I don't know episode titles.
Wrong Turn 2: Dead End-I'm a huge fan of the original, and this one is just a million times better. Awesome, awesome gore effects, great chase scenes, tons of suspense, fantastic locations that derive plenty of atmosphere, an utterly spectacular finale with tons of action and plenty of blood, brutality, a few surprises and much more. Sure, it rips off one of the single worst scenes in the original TCM almost shot-for-shot and the creation of the killers is a bit of a stretch, but you don't notice them all that much. Fantastic entry.
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Oct 5, 2009 18:46:25 GMT -5
I'm not saying I won't watch them, just saying why I hadn't watched them before. With their length issues and them not being horror films, I tended to ignore them, and seeing as how I've seen films that were longer, I might be up for them. I'll just have to clear three hours from my schedule to see them, for I'm not blessed with a TiVo or a DVR, so I have to catch them on TV. There's always DVD or even the good old-fashioned VCR. And The Stand was never seen for exactly that same reason: I ain't spending eight hours watching one single movie. Sure, there's commercial breaks, but that's still overkill to me. Well, it's a mini-series, not a regular movie, hence the extra-long running time. Personally, I'd rather spend 3 - 8 hours watching one really good movie or mini-series than 4 mediocre to bad standard-length movies. There's no way THE STAND could've been told coherently in a standard 2-3 hour movie, the book is a monster in length. It's like the LORD OF THE RINGS of Stephen King books. And is Home the episode where the two pose undercover as a newlywed couple investigating a series of murders in a planned community, only to find a monster made of sewage and sludge is killing off those who breaks their rules? I don't know episode titles. No, but I know the one you're referring to. "Home" is the one about the family of inbreds who kept the mother under the bed. Just some creepy, creepy shit. Believe me, I don't know the titles of most of the "X-Files" episodes either, but I remember that one just because it was such a standout. |
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Post by slayrrr666 on Oct 6, 2009 10:02:38 GMT -5
Well, if I'm going to watch them off my VCR, guess I'll have to make some room for them then.
I think I remember that episode since you put that up. Who was the guest star in there, I might know it from that.
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Post by Heineken Skywalker on Oct 6, 2009 17:59:47 GMT -5
I think I remember that episode since you put that up. Who was the guest star in there, I might know it from that. No guest stars that are name actors. |
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