I know it may not be very hip for me to say, but I’m not the biggest fan of Kevin Smith’s films.  CLERKS, MALLRATS, JAY AND SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK, CLERKS II … I really didn’t think any of them were all that good.  I enjoyed DOGMA but not to the extent of calling it a ‘masterpiece.’  So when I heard Smith made a horror film I wasn’t too pumped.  But then I started reading some positive buzz about it and even though I haven’t been too blown away by Smith’s previous work, at least he’s a writer-director doing some original films!!  So this past weekend I had the chance to check out RED STATE and I grabbed the opportunity.  I’m glad I did!!  RED STATE isn’t a perfect film, but it’s a damn good one that explores a post-9/11 America and how it might deal with some “older” problems.

RED STATE begins by following around three high school buddies Travis (Michael Angarano), Billy-Ray (Nicholas Braun), and Randy (Ronnie Connell).  They’re your typical high schoolers who talk about partying and constantly think with their penises.  Randy’s been on a website where local people can hook up for anonymous sex and he found a woman who wants to take on all three of them at the same time.  So the guys get some beer, load into their car, and go on a MILF booty-call.

In the same town there’s a radical, ‘fire and brimstone’ preacher, Abin Cooper (Michael Parks) who lives on a compound with his devout followers.  He preaches about the moral decay of society which he sees mainly as the fault of homosexuals and “sex perverts.”  No doubt Smith wrote this extreme religious group after the Westboro Baptist Church and modeled Abin Cooper after Fred Phelps.  This is not a subtle comparison; Smith is as blunt as a sledgehammer here, but he never reduces Cooper to an over-the-top caricature.  Smith’s Cooper is a really fantastic piece of writing.

It turns out that the woman whose trailer the three teens go to is actually a member of Cooper’s church to attract ‘sex perverts.’  Before the guys could say, “I get to fuck her first,” they are drugged and taken to Cooper’s church.  Also at the church is a tied up gay man.  We then meet Cooper and get a prolonged sermon as he explains how America has fallen and how he proposes to bring it back.  Cooper’s sermon was a little long and seemed to drag on, but it’s also a powerful scene.  I didn’t know what was more scary … Cooper’s sermon or the blank-eyed look of his devout followers, many of which were young adults and children.

Then in a third storyline, Special ATF Agent Joseph Keenan (John Goodman), who’s been investigating Cooper and his followers and is trying to follow up on accusations that Cooper and his followers are stockpiling weapons.  Well things hit a boiling point pretty quickly and all three story lines smash into each other in a most violent way.

First things first, let’s just get this out of the way:  Is this a horror movie?  Kevin Smith himself said that RED STATE is “a nasty-ass $4mil horror flick with few (if any) redeeming characters.”  And I can totally see why Smith calls this a horror film.  But in the traditional sense, no; I don’t think this is a horror film.  Horrifying themes are examined and horrible things happen in the film, but I can’t really say this is a horror film.  This being said, RED STATE is a powerful and intense film that’ll make you uneasy and ask, “What the hell happened to America after 9/11?!!?”  The acting is phenomenal from the entire cast and John Goodman and Michael Parks really stand out in their roles.  Goodman’s Keenan is a man torn between following orders and doing what he thinks is right.  He’s trapped in an agency still trying to overcome the ghosts of their past (the Branch Davidians, etc …) and which will do anything to avoid making future mistakes.  It was great seeing John Goodman on screen again and he reminded me how good an actor he really is.

This is a richly layered film that explores both sides of the same coin and doesn’t favor one point over the other like you’d expect it too.  I also really like Smith’s choice to not include a soundtrack in the film.  This lack of soundtrack gives the entire film a gritty and very realistic tone.  The only songs in the film are the ones sung by Cooper and his congregation.  And just because this isn’t really a horror film doesn’t mean it’s bloodless.  There’s a lot of violence in RED STATE and some of it is hard to watch.  Trust me; this is a powerful film.

RED STATE won’t make me look back at Smith’s older films in a new light and call them all ‘masterpieces,’ but he really did hit it out of the ballpark with this one.  This is both an exploration and condemnation of post-9/11 America and how certain policies have been exploited by the government for their owns means.  RED STATE might not be a ‘horror film’ per se, but there’s enough horrifying things going on in this film that’ll grab and keep your attention.  RED STATE is currently available on some VOD systems and will be having it’s DVD and Blu-ray premier on October 18, 2011.  Don’t miss this one!!

My Summary:

Director:  Kevin Smith (& writer)

Plot:  4 out of 5 stars

Gore:  3.5 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

As you can imagine, I wasn’t too impressed with the original 2008 QUARANTINE, which was a very lazy and substandard remake of the incredible Spanish film, [REC].  QUARANTINE 2: TERMINAL is not (thank god) a remake of [REC]2, anymore than Rob Zombie’s H2 was a remake of the original HALLOWEEN 2.  QUARANTINE 2 is simply the sequel to the [REC] remake, QUARANTINE.  The film takes the world created in the remake and continues the story.  Get it?  Surprisingly enough the second outing is more successful than the original, but in the end the backstory kills what could’ve been a really suspenseful, interesting, and fun film.

QUARANTINE 2 begins with following two stewardesses, Jenny (Mercedes Masöhn) and Paula (Bre Blair) as they arrive at work and prepare the airplane they’ve been assigned too for take off.  It’s a rather small plane (only 2 seats wide in one row and 1 seat wide in the other) and it isn’t even full.  We get to meet the eclectic passengers as they board the plane and even meet a potential love interest for Jenny, Henry (Josh Cooke).  Henry, he tells us, is a Ph.D. student and has brought his subject matter along with him … a cage full of “hamsters.”

Then before you can say, “Get that mutha fucking virus off my mutha fucking plane,” the rage/rabies virus breaks out on the plane infecting portly passenger George (Mattie Liptak).  George, of course, attacks some of the others and forces the pilots to make an emergency landing at the nearest airport.  But when they land they find themselves mysteriously cut off from the tower.  The pilots can’t get any clearance about which terminal to taxi too and they can’t even get an ambulance to take the severely injured passengers off the plane.  But then poor sap Ed (Ignacio Serricchio), an airport baggage handler who’s already on the tarmac and doesn’t know what’s going on, helps the group off the plane and takes them into one of the terminals.  Now they find they entire airport in lockdown and surrounded by government officials telling them they’ve been quarantined.  Could this lockdown be the result of the news reports they heard about while on the plane about an apartment building in Los Angeles being quarantined?  Well of course it is, and since the flight originated in L.A. the government isn’t taking any chances.

I liked the connection to the first film; it’s not crammed down our throats but is cleverly linked to the original.  This is an actual sequel that doesn’t forget about the first film, but builds upon it.  Yes the budget is a bit lower compared to other releases (a meager $4mil budget here), but writer-director John Pogue (who wrote 2002‘s GHOST SHIP) does a good job with what he has to work with.  I liked the enclosed setting of the terminal with the survivors having to fight off the growing ranks of the infected.  The cast was also pretty decent.  Jenny and Henry do good jobs at carrying the film.  The f/x’s were done by anythinghorror.com fav Robert Hall’s Almost Human, Inc. f/x shop.  The f/x were pretty good but I’m assuming they didn’t have a ton of money to spend on them.  We all know Almost Human, Inc.’s work.  Their work is usually way more bloody, but in QUARANTINE 2 we don’t get the explicit gore we’ve come to expect.

The one problem .. the BIGGEST problem … I had with QUARANTINE 2 was the big reveal, or back story.  To be honest I really fucking hated the explanation of the cause of the virus.  Pogue completely ignores the supernatural/religious explanations from the source material ([REC] 1&2) and goes for a more … well I’m not gonna spoil it for you.  ‘Spoil’ here is a bit of an over statement.  It’s like you were expecting to get a PS3 gaming system with all the newest games for Christmas, but instead get an ugly sweater your grandma knitted for you.  Yeah, I really hated the explanation.  I’d have rather gotten no explanation for the cause of the virus than the one we got.

Besides the explanation of the cause of the virus, the ending screws around with the “rules” the first half of the film established.  We get one character fighting off the infection so they don’t attack another survivor that was just plain ridiculous.  But other than these two elements, QUARANTINE 2 was kinda fun in a “made-for-SyFy” kinda way (this was not made by the SyFy channel).  The film moves along at a nice pace and nicely sets the stage for a part three.  If they ignore the explanation given in part 2 and keep true to the world they established in the first QUARANTINE, then I can see this becoming a solid direct-to-DVD franchise.  This is a fun one that’s kneecapped by a shitty reveal/virus origin story.  Check it out and see if you agree.

My Summary:

Director:  John Pogue

Plot:  3 stars out of 5 overall (1 star for the explanation)

Gore:  5 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  2 out of 5 brains (although these really aren’t zombies since they didn’t die before coming back)

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

be.reave.ment [bih-reev-muhnt]

noun

1. a period of mourning after a loss, especially after the death of a loved one
2. a state of intense grief, as after the loss of a loved one; desolation
3. deprivation or loss by force

Sorry for the language lesson but I thought it was important to examine what writer-director Stevan Mena didn’t; mainly the notion of “bereavement.”  Judging by the definitions above, an exploration of this concept should’ve made for a disturbing, somber horror film.  Not so much here.  BEREAVEMENT is Mena’s follow up to his 2004 film, MALEVOLENCE (see my review here).  Although this is the second film, chronologically BEREAVEMENT comes first.  I wasn’t a fan of MALEVOLENCE.  My review can be summarized thusly (first time I ever used that word!!):

MALEVOLENCE isn’t a horrible film, it’s just an extremely forgettable one.  It’s rather boring with flat characters who all blend together and have no discernible characteristics; the story progresses along in an extremely predictable way and does nothing to ‘shake things up;’ and when it’s over you’re ultimately left feeling extremely ‘meh.’

But I also noted that Mena executes some interesting shots and “deserves another shot;” that’s why I watched BEREAVEMENT.  Let’s see what went wrong.

BEREAVEMENT begins the same way as MALEVOLENCE; with the disappearance of young Martin Bristol in 1989 (played by Chase Pechacek in the beginning and then by Spencer List for the rest of the film).  The difference here is that we get more details about the abduction.  We also learn that Martin suffers from a very rare condition in which he can’t feel any pain.  This becomes a very convenient gimmick later on in the film (see below).  After being kidnapped by Graham Sutter (Brett Rickaby), we flash five years into the future (1994) and join up with Jonathan (Michael Biehn) as he picks up his niece Allison (Alexandra Daddario) who is coming to live with him and his family in the small Pennsylvania town of Minersville after her parents died in a car accident.

But right down the road lives Graham Sutter in his family’s old condemned slaughter house.  He’s been raising young Martin to take over the family business which is apparently now abducting and killing young women and taking orders from the skull of a longhorn hanging up on the wall.  We get a pretty damn slow beginning of the film where Mena introduces us to the main characters and sets the stage for, what I hope would be, a solid psychological and gory film.  No such luck.  The characters are indeed “set up,” but ya gotta wonder why.  The characters here don’t go through any big changes or development; in fact there’s not so much a character arc here as a “character straight line.”  And this is a shame.  The main reason I was curious to see BEREAVEMENT was because I was told by fellow reviewers that this was an amazing examination of how Sutter breaks down and ‘trains’ Martin to become a killer.  That I was interested in.  Unfortunately we got no such examination (sometimes I feel as though I watch a different version of films than other reviewers!!).

Let’s take care of the acting first, which was overall pretty damn good.  Biehn, as always, kicks ass even though his characters isn’t too deep.  Allison does a pretty decent job but isn’t all that convincing as a sullen 17 year old high school student (as a 20 year old college student, absolutely).  Then in the second half of the film Mena does something that really baffled me:  Allison goes from being a strong character to one who does extremely stupid things that puts her in danger’s way and makes her situation worse.  It might be a pet peeve of mine, but I hate it when characters just walk into other people’s houses to “look around.”  This just doesn’t happen.  Also worth pointing out is that Rickaby does a really great job as the killer.  He’s a strong actor that did his best to make the most out of his under-written character.  We see Sutter talking to the longhorn skull on the wall and he even sees shadows of people in his home, but we never examine these in detail.

But perhaps the biggest problems I have with BEREAVEMENT is that there’s no motivation for the killer, we get no explanation why Martin suddenly becomes a killer at the end, and there’s just too many damn gaping plot holes to ignore.  The story takes place in Minersville, PA, a very small community.  So wouldn’t it make sense that once a bunch of young women from around the community started disappearing that someone would notice?  Nope; not so much as a “lost” flier was seen hanging up.  Then we have to ignore the fact that young Martin has been missing for 5 years, yet Allison spots him on the Sutter property the day after she moved there?  Really?  Did the authorities ever think of checking out the old Sutter property, which is home to very strange loner?  It’s ridiculous elements like this that pull you completely out of the story and give you a headache from rolling your eyes so much.

BEREAVEMENT is a slight improvement over MALEVOLENCE (which really isn’t saying much), but it’s far from being a film I can recommend.  The most interesting aspect of the film, that of Martin ‘becoming’ a killer, is completely ignored to focus on secondary, less interesting characters (John Savage has a completely superfluous role that added nothing to the story).  Add to this a very slow pace, huge plot holes, and not one original idea, and you’ve got yourself a 103 minute time waster.  I’ve been reading positive reviews about this one and I’m baffled.  Some reviewers will like all indie films simply because they wanna support the indie horror scene.  You all know by now that I’m a huge fan of indie horror, but I put them up to the same scrutiny as I do Hollywood releases.  Bottom line is that BEREAVEMENT isn’t a fun film at all.  It’s dull with a slow pace and characters doing really stupid things.  Definitely skip this one.

My Summary:

Director:  Stevan Mena (& writer)

Plot:  1.5 out of 5 stars

Gore:  3 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

I saw APOLLO 18 the same afternoon I saw SHARK NIGHT 3D (see my review here).  You all know my thoughts on SHARK NIGHT by now (big ‘blech’), but I’ve needed some time to get my thoughts in order about APOLLO 18.  It isn’t a horrible film, but it is a movie that will leave you feeling that it could’ve been so much more.  With a little more focus on the creatures and some original thought, APOLLO 18 could’ve been a good film.

The beginning of the film tells us about the various manned Apollo missions and how the Apollo 17 mission in 1972 was the last official manned mission.  But then a year later in 1973 there was another, highly classified mission … Apollo 18.  No one other than those with a super high clearance knew about it, and not too long ago hundreds of hours of film was found about this mission.  And then we get the typical ‘the movie you’re about to watch is edited from this found footage’ spiel.  That’s right folks, we’re up to our nipples in the old ‘found footage’ sub-genre, and so far it’s following the book step by step.

The movie then opens with what looks like family footage of our three astronauts at a picnic with their respective families, girlfriends, and friends (just like we get with every astronaut flick).  They’re having a pre-party before their mission.  The astronauts have to lie about the mission because it’s been taken over by the Department of Defense and compartmentalized as “Above Top Secret.”  Even our three astronauts don’t exactly know what the hell they’re supposed to be doing.  As one of them puts it, “I guess NASA needs more rocks.”  Our three astronauts are Ben Anderson (Warren Christie), Nathan Walker (Lloyd Owen), and John Grey (Ryan Robbins); three ordinary guys who just wanna go to the moon.  Grey is their “eye in the sky,” or I guess ‘eye in moon’s orbit’ as Walker and Anderson head on down to the surface of the moon to … collect more moon rocks?  As the guys set up all this high tech equipment (well I guess it was ‘high tech’ back in 1973), we start witnessing odd things happening just off camera and in the darker parts of the moon.

The story moves along in a pretty predictable fashion as events begin to slowly build up in intensity until “The Moment.”  You all know “The Moment” in these found footage flicks; in PARANORMAL ACTIVITY, for example, it’s when Katie appears and throws her hubby at the camera.  It’s that last little jump the director tries to get outta the audience.  It’s also the moment that, if done right, creates the buzz about the film.  APOLLO 18, unfortunately, follows the ‘found footage template’ to a “T” and this is one of the main problems with it.  There’s no originality or anything new going on here to grab the audience.  The tagline here is “There’s a reason we’ve never gone back to the moon.”  I like that!!  It creates suspense and makes me anticipate a pretty intense film.  But what we get are typical scares and pretty standard aliens/creatures.  After it’s all said and done it kinda feels like ya just watched an episode of THE X-FILES.

I’m not gonna spoil anything, but the aliens/creatures were very disappointing.  There were one or two interesting moments about the creatures, but the overall lack of explanation and focus on the aliens really makes ya feel cheated.  I think the filmmakers were more interested in trying to establish a creative set-up for a sequel (I don’t think that’s gonna happen) instead of just ending this one properly.  If I’ve said it once I’ve said it a thousand times:  Don’t promise us a creature flick and then not deliver on the creatures!!

Another problem with APOLLO 18 is also one of it’s strengths; the way it’s filmed.  APOLLO 18 really embraces, I mean really embraces, the found footage gimmick and really makes it it’s own.  All the shots and angles we get are really believable, and every shot looks like it was taken back in 1973.  All the shots are really authentic looking and I completely embraced my ‘suspension of disbelief” and bought into the story in this way.  Unfortunately, because director Gonzalo López-Gallego wanted to keep that authentic feel, he limited himself with what he could show us.  I think the guys who made 1998’s THE LAST BROADCAST (Stefan Avalos and Lance Weiler) had the right idea of using the found footage sub-genre and supplementing it with “staged footage.”

Is APOLLO 18 a horrible film?  Definitely not.  I enjoyed it more than I enjoyed the DON’T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK remake (that’s not saying much).  APOLLO 18 falls into the ‘solid idea poorly executed’ category.  There’s just nothing new or all that fun going on here.  Yes, there’a a few scares, but you’ll know exactly where and when they’re gonna occur.  Add to this an unsatisfying alien/creature and you’ve got one disappointing film on your hands.  I think the summer of 2011 will go down as being the “Summer of Superhero Films,” and the horror films will all but be forgotten (except INSIDIOUS).  If you’re still interested in seeing APOLLO 18 definitely wait for it to hit cable or MOD/VOD/DVD.  When is Hollywood gonna realize that standard, “safe” horror flicks are not what horror fans want?

I’m gonna have to say skip APOLLO 18 due to an uninspired script (one of the writers is Cory Goodman, who also wrote 2011’s PRIEST … ‘nuff said), standard action, and a pretty lame alien/creature explanation.  Are we gonna get any good horror this Fall?

My Summary:

Director:  Gonzalo López-Gallego

Plot:  2 out of 5 stars

Gore:  0 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

[This review CONTAINS SPOILERS, but who cares since no one’s gonna see it!!]

I think I owe a sincere apology to the people over at the SyFy Channel.  I’ve been pretty hard on them when it comes to their SyFy Originals.  Sure they all essentially share the same plot.  Sure they all have the same stock characters.  Sure the acting and dialogue is sometimes laughable.  Sure the special f/x (which are always CGI) are often poorly executed.  Damn; where was I going with this?  Oh yeah … SyFy Originals are guilty of all these things.  But ya know what?  Despite all their flaws, about 80-85% of SyFy Originals still manage to be fun.  They are silly, eye-rolling, ‘get together with your buddies and beer’ films.  The same cannot be said about SHARK NIGHT 3D.  Not even close.  Let me give you the short version of this review:  SHARK NIGHT 3D is one of the worse pieces of trash I’ve seen in a really long time.  The story is lazy and insulting, the dialogue it absolutely mind-numbing, the acting is terrible, and the f/x are laughable.  SHARK NIGHT 3D is a movie that the SyFy Channel would reject, and I hated every goddamn minute of it.

You wanna hear more?  Okay, but remember that you asked for it.  Like any good ‘creature attacks’ film, this one starts off with some bimbo getting killed.  She’s out swimming with her boyfriend in a salt water lake.  The boyfriend goes into the camper and a shark attacks and kills her.

Roll opening credits.

Next; start introducing the future shark poop.  There’s Nick (Dustin Milligan), the nerdy yet hunky college student trying to get into medical school; Sara (Sara Paxton), the main girl and Nick’s love interest who has a traumatic past; Beth (Katharine McPhee, who was on AMERICAN IDOL), the slutty, hardcore girl who falls to pieces at the first sign of trouble; Gordon (Joel David Moore), the comedy relief, goofy guy (Moore is playing the exact same character he played in HATCHET); Blake (Chris Zylka), who poses nude for all the art classes on campus; Malik (Sinqua Walls), the black guy; and Maya (Alyssa Diaz), Malik’s Hispanic girlfriend (I guess it’s best to keep all the minorities together).  As the gang all gathers together for their big weekend we learn a little about them … very little.  There is zero character development here, but we get tons of really dumb, inane dialogue to make up for it.

As soon as they get to the bayou they run into one racist redneck after another, reinforcing the Hollywood view that the South is made up only of uneducated, racist hicks, the two main ones being Carl (Jimmy Lee Jr.) and Dennis (Chris Carmack).  As it turns out, Sara once had a relationship with Dennis (ho-hum).  Then I guess writers Will Hayes and Jesse Studenberg suddenly realize that they have two minorities walking around who haven’t been killed off yet.  Yes people, the black and hispanic characters are the first to eat it (or ‘be eaten’ I guess).  This starts off a chain reaction of one stupid scenario more dumb then the next.

There’s just absolutely nothing fun or entertaining going on here.  The characters are such broad strokes with no development that we feel no attachment to them at all.  When they’re killed, it doesn’t affect you at all.  In fact there’s nothing in this entire film that you’ll connect with.  The whole time I was watching this cinematic abortion I was contemplating walking out of the theater (I saw it in the theater with one other person and he walked out after 15 minutes).  But I really wanted to review it, so I stayed.  I took a huge bullet for you all; please make my pain and suffering worth it.

Not convinced yet?  Well suck on all these reasons why blindness is preferable to watching SHARK NIGHT 3D:   A character who gets their arm ripped off by a shark out swims the shark back to shore (they have ONE ARM); the underwater scenes of the sharks attacking show the sharks swimming around, then stopping on a dime, and then attacking.  Let me repeat that, the sharks stop swimming in the water before attacking; the entire lake is like 20-30 feet deep but is full of killer sharks.  No one’s noticed this?; Discovery Channel’s Shark Week is a major plot point; a great white shark is held in a vey tiny cage that’s barely big enough to contain it.  Don’t sharks need to constantly swim around or they die?  Not this one!!; and so not to be out done by the SyFy Channel, we are privy to watching sharks jumping out of the water to kill people.

Top all this off with some very stupid plot twists that make absolutely no sense and a “big reveal” that makes even less sense and you’ve got yourself a reason to put a gun in your mouth.  I could go on and on, and to some of you this might all sound like a lot of fun in the “so bad it’s good” kinda way.  Nope.  Director David R. Ellis, who directed FINAL DESTINATION 2 and THE FINAL DESTINATION, manages to suck all the fun out of this film by taking it all way too seriously.  SyFy knows they’re making crappy, campy films so they make them fun.  There’s nothing entertaining about SHARK NIGHT 3D.  I really hated every second of it.  What’s that?  You think the nudity and gore will save this one.  Well this ain’t no PIRANHA 3D people!!  There’s ZERO GORE and the only bit of nudity we get is Blake’s naked ass as he’s posing for an art class.  Seriously?!!??  ‘Fraid so.

Still not convinced?  Still considering seeing SHARK NIGHT 3D?  Well this should have you running screaming.  I’m gonna give you the “big reveal” here people.  If you don’t wanna know the ‘reason’ how the sharks got into the lake and why they’re attacking, then stop reading and skip down to my summary.  [SPOILER AHEAD]:  The sharks were brought into the lake by Dennis and Carl (yup; the racist rednecks).  How did they get their hands on so many different species of sharks?  The writers didn’t say.  Why did they release all these killer sharks in the lake?  Ah-ha; now this I can answer [SPOILER WARNING]:  Dennis and Carl are making shark snuff films to sell on the internet.  Yeah you read that right.  They’re filming the sharks tearing apart people and making sharky snuff.  I’m not kidding.  I wish I were.  [END SPOILERS]

Just do yourself a favor and avoid this one.  It’s not fun on any level.  I can’t believe I spent over $10 to see SHARK NIGHT 3D.  I spent over $10 to see a flick that the goddamn SyFy Channel would reject.  Everything from the plot to the acting, the dialogue, and the f/x are lazy and insulting to the viewer.  SHARK NIGHT 3D makes the majority of SyFy Originals look like CITIZEN KANE!!  If I could poke out the memory of seeing SHARK NIGHT 3D by jamming a rusty coat hanger up my nose and into my brain, I’d do it in a heart beat.  Skip this one and forget all about it.  I absolutely hated SHARK NIGHT 3D!!

My Summary:

Director:  David R. Ellis (shame on you!!)

Plot:  0 out of 5 stars

Gore:  0 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

Interesting title, eh?  Originally titled REYKJAVIK WHALE WATCHING MASSACRE in it’s native Iceland, HARPOON: WHALE WATCHING MASSACRE gets my vote for the best titled film of 2009!!  And best yet, it delivers on the title.  We get tourists out for a nice day of whale watching around Iceland getting massacred.  I like when a film lives up to the title.

The story begins as do most slasher flicks:  With the diverse cast gathering together on a boat to go out and enjoy a nice day of whale watching.  There’s a group of three older ladies, a group of Japanese tourists, and some other scattered nationalities.  Once out on the ocean, there’s an accident with the ship’s captain (Gunnar Hansen) which leaves the group stranded in the water.  They send out an S.O.S. signal and a decommissioned whaling ship pulls up to help them out.  This is when the fun begins.  The ex-whalers are pretty pissed off that they were forced into giving up their lucrative job of whaling and reduced to selling shitty little nicknacks to tourists.  What’s even better is that the ex-whalers are a mom and her two sons (it’s always a mom and her sons!!).  They use the stranded tourists to take their frustration out on the “whale huggers” and environmentalists who essentially shut them down.  Pretty much as soon as the tourist/whale watchers are helped on board the whaling ship, their hosts start killing them off, forcing the initial survivors to scatter all over the boat.  We then get your pretty standard stalk n’ slash flick.

The basics of this film are fun.  The gore is well executed and the acting is pretty solid from the entire cast.  I had some issues with the plot, though, and I attribute this to being a foreign film.  I know that sounds like I’m sticking up for the film on shaky grounds, but if you’ve seen HARPOON, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.  Huge example:  HARPOON kind of comes across as a black comedy, but did director Julius Kemp intend it to actually be one?  HARPOON has a weird kind of energy to it and goes off on a lot of odd tangents (one of the main characters almost gets raped).  Some characters’ motivations aren’t explained at all making it seem like they just do things for no particular reason.  A timid Japanese woman suddenly becomes extremely cut throat and convinces her friend to sacrifice herself because “your grandfather was a Kamikaze pilot” (consequently she does sacrifice herself and dies a horrendous death), and one of the girls is really bitchy for no reason and won’t lift a finger to help any of the other characters).  There’s many loose threads in this one and most of them are left dangling and never “snipped.”  Some may find this annoying, but I find it to be the norm, especially with Scandinavian genre films.

But I just sat back and took it all in and found myself enjoying HARPOON despite the huge holes in the plot and the sometimes random events unfolding in front of me.  We get some pretty damn fun gore and Kemp isn’t afraid to throw around the red stuff!!  There’s also an interesting anti-environmentalist message here that makes a solid point (how American policy has carelessly ruined many people’s livelihoods in Iceland).  The pacing drags in some places, but once the survivors get on the whaling ship, it picks up and becomes rather enjoyable.

This one probably didn’t make any “Best Horror Films of 2009” lists, but it’s an overall enjoyable film that puts the slasher film in a different setting and has some pretty fun kills and good gore.  You’ll also love the NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD-inspired ending (although this one is a little more racist).  You can catch HARPOON streaming on Netflix, and if you find yourself in need of a decent film, check it out.  You could do worse … way worse.

My Summary:

Director:  Julius Kemp

Plot:  3 out of 5 stars

Gore:  7 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

This one took me completely by surprise.  I thought I had this one pegged after the first five minutes but I was very wrong.  What I thought was going to be a simple “jealous guy stalks his ex-wife” went in a totally different direction.  But the best thing is that it works and I ended up really enjoying THE CALLER.

Mary Kee (Rachelle Lefevre) is going through a rough patch.  As the film begins we see her going through a nasty divorce from Steven (Ed Quinn) and has to put a restraining order on him (he’s not the “we grew apart” ex; he’s the “hitty, abusive” ex).  So Mary Kee moves into a new apartment and almost immediately starts getting strange calls from an elderly lady, Rose (Lorna Raver) who keeps asking to speak to “Bobby.”  What starts off as an apparently mis-dialed number turns into something more supra-natural and insidious (and no; it’s not a lame-ass ghost calling her).  That’s right; I wrote “supra”-natural, not supernatural.  I’m keeping this one vague because I want you to all experience the film as I did and have no knowledge of anything going into this one.  Let’s just say that THE CALLER messes around with the concept of time and how easy it is to ruin one’s life from the past.  Yeah I know … it’s vague, but trust me that you’ll like this one.

Director Matthew Parkhill does a great job controlling the story and never lets it get too complicated or self-contradictory.  Parkhill also does a great job creating a very creepy and paranoid atmosphere.  Soon after Mary Kee gets her first phone call from Rose she feels as though someone is following her.  Is this just in her mind or is something/one stalking her?  Is it her unstable ex or is it connected to the strange calls she’s been getting from Rose?

THE CALLER is a really effective horror-thriller that, granted, has zero gore in it, but has such a great plot that’s handled so well that you buy into it whole-heartedly.  We also end up really caring for Mary Kee’s character.  She’s not some bimbo who constantly does and says stupid things thereby making her situation worse.  Mary Kee is an intelligent 20-something woman who gets caught up in something supra-natural and tries to figure out how best to get out of it.  Little by little the people around her are “taken away” from her and she realizes she can rely only on herself to get out of the bizarre situation she’s in.  Writer Sergio Casci does a really great job with the plot, and the ending is completely satisfying and doesn’t suddenly “change the rules” that the first half of the film established.

The only problem I had with THE CALLER was that a hip 20-something woman would have an old school rotary phone that the calls are being made on.  Really?  Can you still buy those fuckers?  Where the hell would you even find them?  But I was able to set this small detail aside and buy into the premise.  If you do you’re in for a fun ride.  THE CALLER is opening in limited release on Friday, August 26, 2011.  I’ll keep you all posted when it hits DVD and MOD/VOD.  Check this one out!!

My Summary:

Director:  Matthew Parkhill

Plot:  4 out of 5 stars

Gore:  0 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

I need to apologize to everyone.  Why?  Because I did something this past weekend that I never do … I second guessed myself about a film.  The film is of course the new release, CREATURE.  I saw CREATURE last Friday, opening day, but I’m only now writing and posting the review.  Why, you ask?  Because my initial reaction was that I enjoyed this film.  It’s not a genre-defining film by any means, but I found myself having fun with it nonetheless.  When I started Tweeting about how much I enjoyed it, I started getting a lot of replies from other reviewers telling me “you’re crazy,” “you gotta be kidding,” and “are you serious?”  So instead of writing and posting the review on Friday night after work, I waited.  I waited because I wanted to see the film again and make sure I wasn’t losing my fucking mind.  So last night (Sunday), after the kids went to sleep, I went to see CREATURE again (this time with a more skeptical eye).  The verdict after watching it a second time?  I still enjoyed myself.

As already mentioned, CREATURE isn’t going to re-define either creature flicks or the horror genre in general.  It tells a very familiar story with very familiar characters in a very familiar setting.  Six friends take to the road for a little vacation to the Louisiana Bayou.  (Am I missing out on something here?  Why do so many people make the Bayou their destination vacation place??).  There’s brother and sister Oscar and Karen (Dillon Casey and Lauren Schneider) and two couples, Niles and Emily (Mehcad Brooks and Serinda Swan) and Randy and Beth (Aaron Hill and Amanda Fuller).  In addition, Emily and Randy are also siblings, and we learn that Randy is a marine and Niles is, I believe, an ex-S.E.A.L (I could swear they mention this in passing very quickly near the beginning).  Oscar and Karen grew up in the Bayou and thought it’d be a great idea to hang out in the swamp with the gators, bugs, and … something else.

Things immediately get weird when they stop to pee at a local gas station where three locals send out more “turn around and leave” vibes than a blaring car alarm.  There’s Bud (Wayne Pére), Jimmy (David Jensen), and genre favorite Chopper (Sid Haig).  They convince the gang to go check out a local landmark:  The house where Grimley lived.  Grimley (Daniel Bernhardt) is a local legend that covers all the basics; incest, a giant albino gator, and a man turning into a creature.  The gang of twenty-something’s are excited and make a bee-line straight out to the seemingly abandoned shack.

Let me stress again that the set-up here is nothing you haven’t seen before.  In fact, you probably saw the exact same set-up the last time you turned on the SyFy channel.  The entire setting is very reminiscent of the HATCHET films and the six main players here are pretty much your cookie-cutter, stock characters.  There’s the hero (Niles), the slutty girl (Karen), the innocent girl (Beth), etc …  Each play their roles accordingly and you’ll be able to figure out the fate of each character within the first few minutes of the film.  There’s a little twist that happens in the the third act, but besides that the film unravels in a pretty predictable manner.

Then there’s the titular creature.  On the plus side the creature is a 100% practical effort.  Unfortunately we never really get a solid look at it until the end.  The design isn’t bad (think SWAMP THING meets gator-boy) but the back story is a little weak.  We essentially get a man who is so torn up by grief and rage that he turns into the creature.  Okay, whatever.  But what’s odd is that the townies then worship/praise the creature as their god.  This is never really explained and could’ve been a pretty interesting backstory.

I know the way I’m describing everything here makes it sound like I didn’t enjoy this one, but that’s not the case.  I’m just trying to convey to you all that there’s nothing fresh or new in CREATURE.  But that doesn’t mean you can’t have a good time with it.  Let’s face it, there hasn’t been anything new in the zombie genre since Romero’s DAWN OF THE DEAD back in 1978, but this doesn’t mean there haven’t been any kick-ass, fun zombie flicks since.  CREATURE follows the ‘creature feature’ template to a “T”, but the cast and overall energy of the film makes it pretty fun.  What also doesn’t hurt is that CREATURE takes on an R-rating and actually delivers some R-rated fun.  Not even five minutes into the film we get full frontal nudity from the sexy Jennifer Lynn Warren, and then get lots of tittie shots peppered throughout the rest of the film from Lauren Schneider and Amanda Fuller, who also dabble in a little girl-girl fun.  The gore isn’t off the charts, unfortunately, but there’s enough here that makes it all satisfying.

Two of the saving graces of the film are lead actor Mehcad Brooks and genre fav Sid Haig.  Brooks, who played the recurring character Eggs from 2008-2009 on TRUE BLOOD, is an extremely likable, charismatic guy who carries the film nicely.  He looks like he’s having a lot of fun in his role and never takes what he’s doing too seriously.  He  helps to set the tone here.  And Sid Haig … well Haig is Haig!!  How can you not love this guy?  But seriously people, if you’re ever in the backwoods or the Bayou and Sid Haig hands you a hand-written map of a place you “really need to check out,” DON’T GO.  For the love of all that’s good, just turn the other way and run like hell!!

I’m gonna say it again; CREATURE isn’t gonna change the way horror films are made.  Yes, it’s derivative, but there’s also some fun to be had here.  After a summer of tame PG-13 and tame R-rated films (I’m looking at you DON’T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK), it’s nice to get an R-rated feature that delivers R-rated fun.  It’s got the holy trinity here:  Titties, gore, & girl-girl fun.  Granted the gore could’ve been heavier, but there’s still enough to make everything fun.

Don’t listen to all the bashers out there trying to tell you that CREATURE is a piece of shit.  It’s not.  It’s fun, fast-paced, and although the final act suffers a little bit, it’s overall a satisfying film.  Sure this is yet another film that doesn’t do much to help the image of Southerners (hey Hollywood, why don’t ya lay off Southerners for a while).  This is also one you don’t need to see in the theaters, but definitely check it out when it hits DVD and MOD/VOD.  I’m dying to hear what you think of it.

My Summary:

Director:  Fred Andrews (& co-writer with Tracy Morse)

Plot:  3 out of 5 stars

Gore:  4.5 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer