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Horror Films

Swifty said:
It's not getting great reviews at the moment although the trailer looks great. I'll definitely be watching it.
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Really, I've avoided reviews and even trailers as some films I liked to see "unspoiled" as it were, it's been brought up casually on a few movie podcasts I listen to and the reactions have been from "it's amazing" to "it's pretty good but overlong", my expectations are moderate anyway.
 
This will sound crazy, and it is, but Leprechaun Returns is actually pretty enjoyable. I'd even say it was the best in the series. I know, I know, it's a SyFy original, straight to streaming effort, but it is funny and fairly suspenseful.

OK, the Leprechaun's accent makes him sound Pakistani, but Warwick Davis (who isn't involved) wasn't exactly great at sounding Irish either. Give it a look, it's a direct sequel to the original (like they did with Halloween!).
 
GNC said:
This will sound crazy, and it is, but Leprechaun Returns is actually pretty enjoyable. I'd even say it was the best in the series. I know, I know, it's a SyFy original, straight to streaming effort, but it is funny and fairly suspenseful.

OK, the Leprechaun's accent makes him sound Pakistani, but Warwick Davis (who isn't involved) wasn't exactly great at sounding Irish either. Give it a look, it's a direct sequel to the original (like they did with Halloween!).
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1. "best in the series" is a very low bar.

2. A Pakistani Leprechaun does sound amazing.
 
I saw 'Us' yesterday & honestly think it's one of the worst films I've ever paid money to see.

The doppelganger theme is an interesting one but the film includes so many of the usual generic tropes found in horror/suspense films, creatures you think are dead miraculously re-animate, family terrorised by mysterious 'others'. The suspense/shock moments are entirely predictable & the 'others' themselves & their back story, fairly preposterous.

Pacing is bad - the first part, the build up of weirdness, is OK but from about halfway it drags horribly. We both got extremely restless. We'd seen his previous 'Get Out', which is a much better film.

I wouldn't give it more than 4/10.
 
Ogdred Weary said:
1. "best in the series" is a very low bar.

2. A Pakistani Leprechaun does sound amazing.
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1: It is a low bar, and it is a tacky series, but the director of The Void is at the helm and that makes a difference. I was surprised when I started laughing with it, not at it.

2: It's just his voice that has a timbre of Pakistan, otherwise he's all in green, buckle on the hat, obsessed with gold, you know the thing.
 
Awaken the Shadowman: Not a bad movie, not a good one but it's ok. Two estranged brothers are reunited when their mother disappears. But boy is their hometown strange, Adam the prodigal son returning after years ay encounters a cult, Gateway, which helps people emotionally and in doing so teaches that this will improve their lives in a material way. He finds that his mother has a eerie set of dolls with blacked out eyes and meets her even stranger neighbour. Many of the town's inhabitants have suffered losses through fire.

Touches of Rosemary's Baby and even The Stepford Wives permeate the film as an air of paranoia develops and the weird townsfolk seem to keep secrets about many mystifying occurrences. Best of all are the junkyard guys with their freaky metal sculptures closely followed by Adam's old school friend Angela, a doomsayer who looks and acts like a crazed crack cocaine addict. Overall though the acting isn't bad, though the motivation of some of the characters doesn't convince. That may be due to the sometimes flat direction by Woodrow Wilson III who co-wrote the screenplay which has a few plot/logic holes. But it's a watchable trashy B Movie. 5.5/10. On Netflix.
 
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Pet Sematary: A tale of the Old Gods/Spirits which live in the New England Forests, Gods which predated the Amerindians and forced the local Tribes to flee the area. Infused with Pagan imagery from the beginning as a group of children in animal masks parade to the local animal cemetery - Pet Sematary - to bury a deceased dog. The forest is eerily portrayed by day as Autumnal sunshine penetrates the tree canopy but at night the dark forest exudes primeval terror, even before any of the haunted sites are approached. There is another more mundane horror though, that of trucks and cars which threaten to snuff out life at any moment.

A Surgeon, Louis Creed (Jason Clarke) and his family have moved to rural Maine and taken a job in a University Hospital. but he soon faces horror as a student struck by a car is brought in with his brains hanging out. The student dies but Louis has visions of him coming back to life and that night, in a dram is led out into the forest by the student, but when e wakes his feet are covered with mud. His wife Rachel (Amy Seimetz) has her own traumas and guilt over causing the death of her disabled sister, she now has visions of that event. Eight year old daughter Ellie (Jeté Laurence) meets local man Jud (John Lithgow) in the Pet Sematary, he warns her about dangers in the forest. When Ellies cat is killed by a truck. Jud brings Louis deep into the woods to inter it in an old burial ground from which animals have come back, the cat returns but is different, wilder. When Ellie is killed in a road accident, Louis is of course tempted to bury her in the same spot. No spoilers here, all of this is revealed in the trailers.

A tale of revenants and an evil older than time itself which has preyed on the minds of the Creed family since they first moved to the woods. Lithgow is convincing as the knowledgeable, conflicted local who leads the family onto the road to damnation. Jeté Laurence is superb as both the living and dark reanimated Ellie. If the film has flaws then it may be due to having two directors, Kevin Kolsch and Dennis Widmyer, as at times it can't seem to decide whether it is a tale of dark comedy or existential terror. But this is a worthy addition to the King Canon with some truly horrific scenes, not for the squeamish. 8.5/10.
 
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ramonmercado said:
Pet Sematary: A tale of the Old Gods/Spirits which live in the New England Forests, Gods which predated the Amerindians and forced the local Tribes to flee the area. Infused with Pagan imagery from the beginning as a group of children in animal masks parade to the local animal cemetery - Pet Sematary - to bury a deceased dog. The forest is eerily portrayed by day as Autumnal sunshine penetrates the tree canopy but at night the dark forest exudes primeval terror, even before any of the haunted sites are approached. There is another more mundane horror though, that of trucks and cars which threaten to snuff out life at any moment.

A Surgeon, Louis Creed (Jason Clarke) and his family have moved to rural Maine and taken a job in a University Hospital. but he soon faces horror as a student struck by a car is brought in with his brains hanging out. The student dies but Louis has visions of him coming back to life and that night, in a dram is led out into the forest by the student, but when e wakes his feet are covered with mud. His wife Rachel (Amy Seimetz) has her own traumas and guilt over causing the death of her disabled sister, she now has visions of that event. Eight year old daughter Ellie (Jeté Laurence) meets local man Jud (John Lithgow) in the Pet Sematary, he warns her about dangers in the forest. When Ellies cat is killed by a truck. Jud brings Louis deep into the woods to inter it in an old burial ground from which animals have come back, the cat returns but is different, wilder. When Ellie is killed in a road accident, Louis is of course tempted to bury her in the same spot. No spoilers here, all of this is revealed in the trailers.

A tale of revenants and an evil older than time itself which has preyed on the minds of the Creed family since they first moved to the woods. Lithgow is convincing as the knowledgeable, conflicted local who leads the family onto the road to damnation. Jeté Laurence is superb as both the living and dark reanimated Ellie. If the film has flaws then it may be due to having two directors, Kevin Kolsch and Dennis Widmyer, as at times it can't seem to decide whether it is a tale of dark comedy or existential terror. But this is a worthy addition to the King Canon with some truly horrific scenes, not for the squeamish. 8.5/10.
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I take it you prefer it to the original? I've not seen either, though may see the new one.
 
hunck said:
I saw 'Us' yesterday & honestly think it's one of the worst films I've ever paid money to see.

The doppelganger theme is an interesting one but the film includes so many of the usual generic tropes found in horror/suspense films, creatures you think are dead miraculously re-animate, family terrorised by mysterious 'others'. The suspense/shock moments are entirely predictable & the 'others' themselves & their back story, fairly preposterous.

Pacing is bad - the first part, the build up of weirdness, is OK but from about halfway it drags horribly. We both got extremely restless. We'd seen his previous 'Get Out', which is a much better film.

I wouldn't give it more than 4/10.
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it was fairly preposterous, but somehow worked ... and made more sense with a little distance from having seen ... its not quite get out, which lets face it was flawless cinema, but its a bigger story, and pulls in a lot of genrés, and does use cliche and contemporary motifs (asian mirror girl ghost et al) but i think to good effect

theres no denying peeles genius
 
I find Get Out a tad overrated. Its theme and overall structure are highly derivative of The Stepford Wives, and hypnosis doesn't work at all like the film pretends it does.

That's not to say it isn't a decent genre flick with some interesting social commentary. Just that it's not quite the masterpiece of filmmaking people seem determined to insist it is.
 
graylien said:
I find Get Out a tad overrated. Its theme and overall structure are highly derivative of The Stepford Wives, and hypnosis doesn't work at all like the film pretends it does.

That's not to say it isn't a decent genre flick with some interesting social commentary. Just that it's not quite the masterpiece of filmmaking people seem determined to insist it is.
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I think that too, and most people I know who've seen it seem to think the same. Solid 4/5 film, will hopefully see Us in the next few days.
 
Ogdred Weary said:
I think that too, and most people I know who've seen it seem to think the same. Solid 4/5 film, will hopefully see Us in the next few days.
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Yeah, very good but not a classic. This is what I thought of it when it was released

Mar 22, 2017
#773
Get Out: Yet another deer is struck by a car, happening in so many films these days. On their way to stag parties? This film looks as if it has shades of The Stepford Wives but there is even a darker secret in play here. Daniel Kaluuya his girlfriend & his white GF Rose go to meet her parents.They are quirky liberals but they have rather odd black servants working for them. At a party the only normal person appears to be a blind art dealer.

Good Horror/Thriller with a fine line of dark humour running through it. 8/10.
 
Us - it's sprawling and unfocused and does have pacing issues. It's also trying to say a lot but not altogether coherently. But it was not the kind of film you see often - very unique and memorable.


Edit: brilliant score and photography too
 
James_H said:
Us - it's sprawling and unfocused and does have pacing issues. It's also trying to say a lot but not altogether coherently. But it was not the kind of film you see often - very unique and memorable.


Edit: brilliant score and photography too
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The Silence: In a cave system deep under the Appalachians explorers break into a sealed cavern and let loose horrors. No, not inbred cannibal hillbillies, this time it's a type of Pterosaur which become known as Vespas. The creatures swiftly descend on New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Mayhem ensues as the Vespas attack and eat people. It soon becomes clear that that they hunt by sound and are blind. One family is better equipped than most to deal with the catastrophe as 16 year old Ally (Kiernan Shipka) is deaf and her family all use sign language . The father (Stanley Tucci) wants to stay put but his friend Glenn convinces the family to flee to the countryside.

There are the usual apocalyptic massive traffic jams, civilisation starts to break down and robbers try to ambush the family. In a moment of dark humour a farmer runs out shouting : Get Off My Land and discharging a shotgun, he is eaten alive by the Vespas. A mad cult arises as society further disintegrates. The Vespas are well imagined, the size of a Pterosaur you'd use for falconry. This has all the ingredients for a very good Post-Apocalypse film but the script is wanting at times and doesn't complement the effective action scenes. Good performances by Tucci and Shipka with Billy MacLellan eerily and evilly silent in a character part as the Cult leader.

Director John R. Leonetti delivers an effective Horror Thriller but it's no Classic. 6.5/10. On Netflix.
 
Couldn't they have come up with a better name for the creatures than "Vespas" or are they "Vespers"?

Either way, deduct one mark and fine Netflix.
 
Day Of Reckoning: Strange creatures burst forth from the bowels of the Earth. Some fly, others walk, trot or whatever, generally of a lizard/dinosaur type but a couple of varieties are humanoid. an epic battle is fought with them for 24 hours, eventually they are beaten. Fifteen years later and all of the signs which preceded the previous attack are lining up: seismic activity: check; dead esalife being washed ashore in shoals check; an Eclipse of the Sun: due shortly. Yes the creatures arrive again.

The ground creatures are well imagined but the flyers look a bit ropey. Still there's one darkly funny scene where people are arguing about who'll drive a car when the loudmouth knowitall is carried off by a flying creature. Some see the coming of the creatures as God's Judgement, literally accepting them as Demons. A Cult even welcomes this End of the World. The film follows one family as they attempt to escape from thae attack. Chaotic traffic jams as people flee, shelters full.

So-so acting but a couple of likeable characters, some dodgy effects, pedestrian direction but enjoyable nevertheless. About what you wold expect from most SyFy Channel films. 5.5/10.
 
ramonmercado said:
The Silence: In a cave system deep under the Appalachians explorers break into a sealed cavern and let loose horrors. No, not inbred cannibal hillbillies, this time it's a type of Pterosaur which become known as Vespas. The creatures swiftly descend on New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Mayhem ensues as the Vespas attack and eat people. It soon becomes clear that that they hunt by sound and are blind. One family is better equipped than most to deal with the catastrophe as 16 year old Ally (Kiernan Shipka) is deaf and her family all use sign language . The father (Stanley Tucci) wants to stay put but his friend Glenn convinces the family to flee to the countryside.

There are the usual apocalyptic massive traffic jams, civilisation starts to break down and robbers try to ambush the family. In a moment of dark humour a farmer runs out shouting : Get Off My Land and discharging a shotgun, he is eaten alive by the Vespas. A mad cult arises as society further disintegrates. The Vespas are well imagined, the size of a Pterosaur you'd use for falconry. This has all the ingredients for a very good Post-Apocalypse film but the script is wanting at times and doesn't complement the effective action scenes. Good performances by Tucci and Shipka with Billy MacLellan eerily and evilly silent in a character part as the Cult leader.

Director John R. Leonetti delivers an effective Horror Thriller but it's no Classic. 6.5/10. On Netflix.
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Sounds like a mix of "A Quiet Place" and "Q - the Winged Serpent".
"Q" is fun entertainment and good monster movie.
 
ramonmercado said:
Still there's one darkly funny scene where people are arguing about who'll drive a car when the loudmouth knowitall is carried off by a flying creature.
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Always my favourite part of a movie. I love Night of the Living Dead remake in part for the divine reckoning one of the characters receives that he so deserves, even in the original.
 
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