I’ve been waiting for this one for quite some time.  No, really; I have (that’s my life, folks).  Now I’ll be perfectly honest here … I’ve never seen an episode of THE JERSEY SHORE.  Seriously; I haven’t, but it feels as though I know everything about it.  These Guido’s infested pop culture quicker than a Canadian having sex with a dead body (too soon?  Sorry).  The main cast members were all over all the TV and radio talk shows, doing guest spots in films, and The Situation even attempted to do stand up at the last Comedy Central Roast (with disastrous results).  So it seemed inevitable that these jackholes would end up being parodied in either a SCARY MOVIE-like film or a TV flick.  It looks like the SyFy channel beat everyone with JERSEY SHORE SHARK ATTACK and combined our love of killer shark flicks and our hatred of those douchy JERSEY SHORE idiots.  Seriously; why are they so popular?  If you want to follow around a bunch of drunk schmucks partying, acting like idiots, and trying to hook up all the time, you could’ve followed me and my college buddies around.  Where’s my fucking show?!!??

JERSEY SHORE SHARK ATTACK, premiering this Saturday night, June 9th at 9pm ET/PT, stars a cast of lookalikes from the popular MTV show.  We’ve got TC, “The Complication” (Jeremy Luc), the brains of the gang; Nooki (Melissa Molinaro), a way too cute girl to be parodying Snooki; Donnie (Joey Russo), TC’s weight-lifting meathead buddy; Pauli (Daniel Booko), who may not be Italian but who “respects the Guido lifestyle”; and BJ (Audi Resendez), Nooki’s girlfriend, and aptly named I’m sure.  TC and his boys are Guido’s living down at Seaside Heights and are immature d-bags who really don’t take anything seriously.  TC’s dad, Sheriff Moretti (Paul Scalia) is the law of the beach town and wants nothing more than his son to grow up and take on some responsibility.  As the film opens we watch our gang of juiced-up cannoli eaters partying it up, getting into trouble, and just having fun.  Then when a couple of preppy, rich kids, Bradford (Grant Harvey) and Spencer (Dylan Vox) from the nearby country club cause trouble and cause Joey (Ben Giroux) to jump into the water where he gets eaten by an albino bull shark, well the gang starts to man up and find a way to convince TC’s dad and the other locals that Joey was killed by a shark.

There’s also a plot about a land developer who bought up a lot of boardwalk property with the intentions of “prettying up the area.”  Part of the plan is extending the boardwalk and building expensive condo’s, but to do this the developer, Dolan (William Atherton), needs to drill into the ocean floor.  The constant vibrations attract the normally deep sea dwellers and once they arrive they decide to have Italian.  Yes, it’s a very basic set up that we’ve seen a thousand times before, but the gimmick here is of course having JERSEY SHORE characters that look like and behave like the real life douchetards.  There’s also a few nods to other more well-known sharks flicks.  In one scene Jack Scalia tries to convince Mayor Palantine (Paul Sorvino … yes, that Paul Sorvino) to “close down the beaches.”  Now where have we seen and heard that before?  Hhmmm …  And what’s up with Sorvino’s character’s name?  It sounds like a goddamn STAR WARS character!!

You know exactly where this film is going and how it’s gonna get there, but I still had a lot of fun with it.  Maybe it’s because I grew up in South Jersey and spent a lot of time in Seaside Heights.  Yes, the actors here go overboard with their “Guido-ness,” but really not by much.  I knew and saw people like that down at the shore and I had a fun time watching them get caricaturized.  But I’ll tell ya; the Italian-American Alliance Group (I’m assuming there is one), isn’t gonna be happy with how Italians are portrayed in JERSEY SHORE SHARK ATTACK.  But on the positive side, this is a cast full of Italians, with Paul Sorvino nonetheless, and no one is in the mafia!!  That’s gotta be a first.  But I also take the good-natured ribbing not as a crack on all Italian-Americans, but on the world MTV created with JERSEY SHORE.  From what I hear about it, it’s an abysmal show.

Of course nothing here is meant to be taken seriously.  When you have Paulie shooting a machine gun at the sharks and he stops to make sure his hair still looks good, you know we’re in some goofy territory.  But there’s some really funny dialogue scattered throughout.  When the guys find a turned over little rowboat covered in blood, they figure it’s “Vinnie’s boat, but which Vinnie?”  They then proceed to list all the various Vinnie’s they know (which is a lot).  There’s Vinnie Bombatz, Vinnie Donuts, Vinnie Knuckles, Vinnie Crab, Vinnie No-Neck, … etc.  It’s a pretty damn funny exchange.

The sharks themselves pose a big threat because they literally jump outta the water and snatch people off of boats, the sides of docks, and the boardwalk.  That’s believable, right?  Deep sea sharks would probably instinctively start jumping outta the water to eat Guido’s.  I think.  The gore is as expected:  Lots of CG blood and missing body parts as well as CG sharks jumping around all over the place.  But there are a few practical f/x here with gushing blood that was a nice treat.

The cast does a nice job and they look like they’re all having fun in their roles.  We also get a level of character development that was completely unexpected as the guys go from being punks to saving the day.  Director John Shepphird and writers Michael Ciminera, Richard Gnolfo, Jeffrey Schenck, and Peter Sullivan (yes; FOUR writers) keep everything moving along at a quick pace so you don’t have time to realize how silly everything is.  But you should already know that … it’s called JERSEY SHORE SHARK ATTACK, not SHAKESPEARE IN THE PARK!!  I had fun with this one, but the one area the writers really shit the bed was not having any of the main cast getting chewed up by the sharks.  I watched this anticipating seeing the Snooki or ‘The Situation’ characters getting torn apart by sharks.  This could have added a lot of fun to the film, but I think you’ll manage to have fun with this one anyway.  Check it out!!

JERSEY SHORE SHARK ATTACK premiers this Saturday, June 9th at 9pm, ET/PT on SyFy (did ya think it’d be airing on Masterpiece Theater??).

My Summary:

Director:  John Shepphird

Plot:  2.5 out of 5 stars (3 outta 5 if the cast got eaten)

Gore:  2.5 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

*****This is a completely spoiler free review!!*****

I’ve been waiting over a year to see PROMETHEUS, Ridley Scott’s new film that began as a prequel to his 1979 masterpiece, ALIEN, but has since evolved into more (way more).  When you’ve been eagerly anticipating something for so long you never know how you’re going to react after experiencing it.  Over the last year we’ve read the interviews and set reports where Scott and one of the writers, Damon Lindelof, discuss how this film evolved into so much more than just an ALIEN prequel.  There are a lot of recognizable ALIEN elements in PROMETHEUS, but this is most definitely a standalone film with some very high ideals.  Is this a straight up horror movie?  Absolutely not.  There are, though, a lot of horror elements running throughout this film.  Hell; there’s a lot of different genres and ideas in PROMETHEUS, but what it comes down to is whether or not all these elements blend together to make a great movie.

PROMETHEUS begins in the near future (around 2089, I believe) in Scotland.  A team of archeologists headed by Dr. Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace) and Dr. Charlie Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green) unearth evidence, in the form of cave drawings, that seem to be scattered all over the earth in many different cultures throughout history.  The picture details human beings seemingly worshipping a giant humanoid who is pointing to the stars.  Our plucky scientists believe this is an invitation to come find our “makers.”

Flash forward a few more years in the future where we join David (Michael Fassbender), a human-looking robot who’s taking care of the hibernating crew aboard the ship Prometheus.  The crew is on a mission to seek out the planet where all evidence points to life on earth actually beginning.  We get the typical scenes of seeing the crew waking up out of stasis and meeting the individual crew members and learning their specialties.  There’s Fifield (Sean Harris), a geologist; Millburn (Rafe Spall), a biologist; and Meredith Vickers (Charlize Theron), a representative of everyone’s favorite futuristic conglomerate, the Weyland Corporation; and others who are part of the ship’s crew, security, and medical staff.  As Shaw and Holloway fill them in on why they’re all there and what the nature of their mission is, they’re met with various reactions.  Some think it’s a huge waste of time, others are interested in learning more, and still others are scared at what they might find.

Once they land on the planet they enter a structure that definitely wasn’t a natural formation but had some kind of intelligent design behind it.  It’s here that they find their answers.  Wait a minute; let me correct that.  It’s here they begin to piece together the answers to their questions and get more answers than they wanted.  Yes people, PROMETHEUS is a movie full of high ideals and even flirts with philosophical questions.  This film explores the same questions that were posed in Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 epic, 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY:  The creation of life, who (or what) created us, what meaning is there in our creation, and why did our creators abandon us?  I really appreciate that Scott didn’t feel the need to have the standard religious character and turn the story into one of religious faith vs. scientific faith.  We’ve been there and seen that!!  There are people on board who believe in god (Shaw for example) but their beliefs seem to be balanced and not so black and white.  As Shaw says, “It’s what I choose to believe in.”  I really loved the script and story here.  We get, as I mentioned, the same themes as 2001, but we get them presented in a very different way.  I really like where Scott and writers Lindelof and Jon Spaihts took the story and how they didn’t feel the need to create an over-the-top action sci-fi movie that tries to rival THE AVENGERS (which is an awesome flick).  PROMETHEUS is a cerebral sci-fi flick that’s a throwback to films like Scott’s BLADE RUNNER.  There’s a lot of action here, but there’s also a lot of ideas and brain activity going on as well.

So what’s the connection with the ALIEN franchise, you may be wondering?  Well this is a spoiler free review so I don’t wanna say much.  I will tell you that Scott and the writers include a decent amount of the ideas seen in ALIEN, but they do so in very clever ways that fans of the original ALIEN will recognize immediately.  If you’ve never seen any of the ALIEN films then those scenes will be lost on you but you won’t miss out on any of the fun.  PROMETHEUS is a standalone film that fans of ALIEN will get a real kick out of.  There’s also a lot of room for a sequel or two (as writer Lindelof hinted at a few weeks ago).  We get answers here, but the answers raise even more questions that need to be explored.  There’s also the opportunity to take the next film straight up into horror territory.

Yes I’m being vague … very vague because PROMETHEUS is a film you need to experience for yourself.  Don’t go into it expecting an action film like ALIENS, or it being a direct prequel to ALIEN because you’ll be disappointed.  PROMETHEUS is a thinking man’s scifi-action-horror-thriller film that I found really satisfying.  I can’t help it; I’ll always be a philosophy student at heart, and us philosophy students always wanna know the answers to the big “Why’s.”  PROMETHEUS answers those big questions and then some.

I’ve been consumed with PROMETHEUS for over a year (just do a search on anythinghorror.com), and was afraid that my expectations wouldn’t live up to the delivery.  Luckily I was wrong in this case.  The ending feels a little rushed especially since there was so much going on, but the ending is wholly satisfying.  With a great cast, great writing, amazing sets, high ideas, and excellent execution, PROMETHEUS is one great film.  Ridley Scott creates a beautiful film that reaches far and succeeds.  Don’t go in expecting a direct prequel to ALIEN; that’s not what this film is about.  This is it’s own film that contains some elements of ALIEN (mainly the origin of the creatures).  If you go into PROMETHEUS expecting to see a great Ridley Scott film, you won’t be diappointed.  Don’t miss this one in the theaters.

My Summary:

Director:  Ridley Scott

Plot:  4 out of 5 stars

Gore:  3 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

Did you know PIRANHA 3DD, the follow up to 2010’s PIRANHA 3D, opened yesterday on June 1st?  Now don’t go feeling like a bad horror fan for not knowing because it seems Dimension Films didn’t want you to know.  How many TV spots of the trailer did you see?  Radio spots?  Even the online world was pretty quiet about the opening.  Dimension Films treated PIRANHA 3DD the same way the piranha treated Big Dave (Adrian Martinez) in the film (if you’ve seen the film then you know exactly what I’m talking about).  Sorry; I don’t want this to end up being a rant against Dimension Films.  Let’s talk about PIRANHA 3DD … and how much friggin’ fun it is!!

PIRANHA 3DD is directed by John Gulager and written by Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan (along with Joel Soisson).  Those names sound familiar, you say?  They should!!  Gulager, Melton, and Dunstan are the trio that gave us the FEAST trilogy (one of my all time favorite ‘guilty pleasure’ franchises).  If you saw the FEAST films then you’ve seen how bat-shit crazy these three are.  There’s no limits to the depravity and depths they’ll sink in order to shock their fans and give them something they haven’t seen before in a horror film.  Well good news; they haven’t changed!!  These three lunatics fill PIRANHA 3DD with more titties, gore, bathroom humor, and genital gore (along with a little full frontal nudity for good measure) to make even the most hardened horror fan (like yours truly) get excited and even giggle at some points.  When the holy trinity of Gulager-Melton-Dunstan are attached to a film you know they won’t be accepting an Academy Award, but you can pretty well damn bet that you’re gonna have a fun time watching their film!!  They do not disappoint with PIRANHA 3DD.

The film picks up some undisclosed time after the events of the original film.  We’re told via a news report that Lake Victoria, the once bustling “go to” spot for Spring Break, is now closed down and all but abandoned after what the media has dubbed, “The Lake Victoria Massacre.”  The news reporter ends her report questioning whether something like this could happen again.  I think we all know it can, and the new location is The Big Wet Water Park in Arizona.  The owner of the park, Chet (the always great David Koechner), has re-invented the water park for the upcoming new season.  Instead of having the regular old stuffy lifeguards, Chet replaced them with stripper-lifeguards (“water certified stripper-lifeguards”) and even made a section of the water park “adults only.”  So pretty much from the first frame we get wall-to-wall titties and naked girls running around being crazy.  Chet’s stepdaughter Maddy (Danielle Panabaker), isn’t happy at all with these changes.  Maddy’s home for the summer from grad school where she’s studying marine biology (hello convenient SyFy-like plot devise).

Gulager takes some time to introduce the other characters:  Barry (Matt Bush), who’s secretly been in love with Maddy since the seventh grade; Kyle (Chris Zylka), a crooked deputy who’s Maddy’s ex; Shelby (Katrina Bowden), the gorgeous actress from TUCKER AND DALE VS EVIL; Ashley (Meagan Tandy), Shelby’s best friend; and a bunch of other really good looking cast members with either hugh titties or ripped abs.  But it doesn’t take long at all for things to get bloody, messy, and gored up!!  The piranha have apparently been traveling through underground lakes and streams to end up in Arizona where they’re looking for a new party.  But how, you might ask, do the piranha end up in the chlorinated pools of the water park?  Good question, and the filmmakers bring back Christopher Lloyd’s “Carl Goodman” character to explain that.  Does it make sense?  Who fucking cares!!  This is a B-movie through and through with great special f/x, great performances, lots of skin, and some unique gore.  What happens when a girl goes skinny dipping and a tadpole-ish piranha is in the area?  You’ll see!!  What about the after effects of having sex with said girl a few days later?  You’ll see (and guys; you’re gonna flinch).

Nothing in this film is to be taken seriously (have you seen the FEAST films??).  The writing is quick and rides the line between laugh-out-loud humor and cringe-inducing gore.  If you can’t have fun in PIRANHA 3DD then you just aren’t a horror fan!!  This was originally supposed to be released around Thanksgiving 2011, but releasing it now was a much better idea.  This is a 100% summer movie through and through that will make every horror fan stand up and cheer.  We also get the return of two other characters from PIRANHA 3D:  Ving Rhames, who played Deputy Fallon in the original film and who lost his legs to the little monsters, and Paul Sheer, who played Andrew and was Jerry O’Connell’s camera man.  But the actor who pretty much stole the movie was David Hasselhoff!!  Yeah; I know.  The Hof looks like he’s having a blast ripping on both his character from BAYWATCH and his real life persona.  It’s pretty hilarious at how nonchalant he is at the horrors going on around him, and he also gets the best line in the film:  “Little ginger moron.”  When you see this line in context, you’ll be laughing out loud.

PIRANHA 3DD is never gonna win any awards.  It’s over-the-top in both nudity and gore; has a bat-shit crazy kind of energy to it; and doesn’t try to be more than what it is.  PIRANHA 3DD is, simply put, a really fun film that would’ve been great to see up on the big screen.  Dimension Films needs to seriously reassess the way it treats it’s films!!  The lack of support they showed for PIRANHA 3DD says a lot about a company.  You should be able to catch PIRANHA 3DD digitally.  It’s playing on vudu.com and I caught it on my cable system’s VOD.  Look for it; it’s worth it.  You’re gonna have a great time.  Oh yeah; they also left room for another sequel.  Sweet.

My Summary:

Director:  John Gulager

Plot:  3 out of 5 stars

Gore:  8.5 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

CELL COUNT is the kind of indie horror film that “gets it.”  There’s a great story that doesn’t get too ambitious; there’s good characters that go through some growth; and the f/x are well executed.  Writer-director Todd Freeman understands what “restrain” means and doesn’t go to far beyond what his budget and story can handle.  What we’re left with is a tight, well-paced horror film that delves into Cronenbergian ‘body horror’ territory and is hugely successful.

The story is pretty simple:  The film opens with Russell (Robert McKeehen) sitting bedside with his terminally ill wife Sadie (Haley Talbot).  The exact disease is never fully explained but an elder doctor, Dr. Brandt (Christopher Toyne) comes in to talk to Russell and is pretty blunt with him.  He tells him his wife will be dead in a matter of days but he can give him a choice.  Watch her die in a slow and painful way, or admit her into his (Brandt’s) private, government-funded clinic where he guarantee’s he will cure her.  Brandt also tells Russell that he’ll pick up all the outstanding medical bills accrued up to now.  Russell agrees and goes a step further; Brandt is also looking for healthy individuals for the research they’re conducting at the clinic.

Fast forward a few weeks; Russell wakes up with a small incision on his chest and his wife is all but cured.  The clinic looks like something out of a Kafka novel.  It’s sterile and very industrial looking; not at all comforting for the sick people it houses.  Once Russell and Sadie are reunited, they meet up with the other volunteers and go through a very stoic and corporate introduction to the facility.  The place is full of locked doors with handprint recognizers that will allow them into other rooms.  They are told the place is not a prison but is organized this way for their protection.  The volunteers, as well as the viewer, can’t help but feel they’re in a prison-like setting despite all the reassurances.  They are then told the facility also houses two convicts:  Tiny Tim Jacobs (Judd Eustice) and Abraham (Ted Rooney).  Soon after their introduction, Dr. Brandt visits them and tells them they all have a lot of healing to do but they are all coming along well enough.

We then follow around the volunteers as they get to know each other and as they attempt to uncover exactly what’s going on in this research facility.  A few things become clear right away:  Dr. Brandt definitely isn’t telling them everything; there’s something wrong (very wrong) with the cure; and there’s more to this clinic than meets the eye.  We also get very subtle hints that the disease Sadie suffered from is an epidemic across the globe.  Again, the disease is never elaborated on but it seems to be like a new plague sweeping across the world.  We also get hints here and there that the “outside world” may not be exactly like the world we, the viewers, live in.  Hints of the world being some kind of dystopia are dropped in a few places.  Freeman includes all the puzzle pieces, he just doesn’t tell us what the picture should look like.

First; what I really liked about CELL COUNT.  The first thing I noticed is the acting; it’s excellent.  Considering the main cast is made up around eight to nine people, everyone does a really nice job in their roles.  There are no cases of overacting or anyone looking uncomfortable in front of the camera.  Excellent job in casting this film!!  I also really like the idea of casting an elderly man with a German accent to play Dr. Brandt.  Once you hear him talk and then mention experiments he’s running, your blood kinda turns icy.  Sorry to all my German friends out there, but German doctors in horror films never end up being good!!  Sorry to be the condom with the hole in it, but it’s true.

Freeman also does an excellent job controlling the material.  We know something ain’t kosher about the doctor, the facility, and the cure, and Freeman really takes his time developing a good amount of suspense before blowing his wad.  Tension between the volunteers grows little by little, especially after the convicts are released into the common area with everyone else, and Freeman really manipulates the story to get the most bang out of it.  As the viewer finally realizes what the ‘cure’ is, Freeman backs it up with some great special f/x.  CELL COUNT isn’t a particularly gory film, but there are a few gag-inducing, body-horror moments that would make David Cronenberg himself dry heave.  Trust me when I tell ya you’ll never pet a dog the same way again!!

The story keeps building in tension until it hits its boiling point and everything explodes.  One of the convicts proves to be more than he at first appeared and as we enter into the last act of the story, the scope opens up to reveal that something bigger than we anticipated is at stake here.  I still have mixed feelings over the final act and am not sure if it works as well as Freeman wants it to.  After thinking about this film, I understand now what he’s getting at, but up to this point we were in a very isolated and contained atmosphere.  There was a great claustrophobic vibe going on, and this is lost in the last act of the film.  I understand from reading interviews given by Freeman that we shouldn’t look at the final act as an “ending,” but more as a beginning.  Freeman will be going into production next year with part two of the story, CELL COUNT II:  HUNDRED MILES OF BAD ROAD.  I’m definitely looking forward to seeing the story continued, but I wish this film was more of a self-contained film that ended this story a little more than what we got.  But at least it’s good to know that we’re gonna get a lot of answers in the sequel.  I, for one, can’t wait to see what happens to the “human Billy bomb” (just watch the movie)!!  Freeman, though, should be commended for creating characters that we really care about and are interested in seeing what happens to them in part two.

Yes; I’m being very vague about exactly what the cure is.  Most of the fun here is finding out or figuring out what’s going on.  I will tell you that the old saying, “Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease” has never been more true!!  Great acting, story, and supporting f/x make CELL COUNT a really enjoyable and kick ass film.  I read that Freeman is currently in negotiations for a distribution deal, so I’ll keep my eyes open and let you know when it’s available.  When Freeman sent me the link to check out the screener he wrote to me, “I hope you like CELL COUNT; we’re very proud of it.”  Well the cast and crew should be really proud of what they made.  It’s not every day you get to experience such a well-made and executed indie horror film.  Definitely check out CELL COUNT!!

My Summary:

Director:  Todd E. Freeman (& writer, producer, cinematographer, & editor)

Plot:  4 out of 5 stars

Gore:  6.5 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer

What is it with Canada’s love affair with the good old exploitation/grindhouse flicks of yesteryear?  Don’t get me wrong; I’m not condemning our friends to the North.  I think you all know me well enough by now that I absolutely adore the grindhouse genre that sprung up in New York City’s 42^nd Street district.  Sleazy theaters showing excessively gory, violent films with little plot, lots of nudity, and subject matter that would make Quentin Tarantino himself blush.  Last year we saw Jason Eisener’s homage to this sub-genre in the form of HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN.  This started off as a trailer he submitted in to a contest being held around the time Rodriguez and Tarantino’s GRINDHOUSE was released.  Eisener won, obviously, and this ultimately led to him making a full length feature based on that winning trailer.  The boys behind FATHER’S DAY had a similar start.  This film started as a faux-trailer which they submitted to Troma Films, and much to their surprise they got word back that Troma was offering them $10,000 to turn the faux-trailer into a feature film.  So here we are.

How to describe FATHER’S DAY … wow.  The city, and specifically fathers, are being terrorized by serial killer-anal rapist-cannibal, Chris Fuchman (Mackenzie Murdock).  Ahab (Adam Brooks), whose father was a victim of this ass-fucking maniac, track Fuchman down and kills him … or so he thinks.  But years later it seems Fuchman is back, and more rapey and cannibally than ever.  Fuchman rapes and kills a young street hustler, Twink’s (Conor Sweeney), dad.  So Twink teams up with Ahab (after tracking him down and enticing him to end his self-imposed banishment and retirement) to track down and find out if indeed Fuchman is back or if a copycat killer has taken his place.  To make things even more odd, Twink and Ahab are joined by a priest, Father John Sullivan (Matthew Kennedy).  Just so you know, I’m making this sound way more coherent than what’s up on screen.  Just like the good old grindhouse films of the 1970’s and 80’s, the plot is just a vehicle and excuse for some excessive violence, mayhem, lots of nudity, and lots of anal rape scenes.  Lots.

If you need it spelled out for ya, nothing, and I mean nothing, in FATHER’S DAY is meant to be taken seriously.  This plays out like both an homage and a spoof/satire of the grindhouse sub-genre.  FATHER’S DAY is written and directed by Astron-6, a collective of five guys who are bat-shit crazy and love making films.  Astron-6 is Adam Brooks (who plays Ahab), Jeremy Gillespie, Matthew Kennedy (who plays Father Sullivan), Steven Kostanski, and Conor Sweeney (who plays Twink).  The best way to describe the tone of FATHER’S DAY is to appeal to those of you who saw HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN:  Eisener wrote HOBO to be an authentic grindhouse flick.  The humor found in HOBO was black humor that was an organic part of the story.  The way it was done, the viewer felt almost uncomfortable laughing at some of the ‘humor.’  Example; when the guys went on the school bus full of kids with the flamethrower, I was laughing hysterically while my wife and the other few females around me were looking at me as if I were Stalin with a swastika carved in my forehead.  FATHER’S DAY, on the other hand, was written more like a traditional Troma film.  The entire film is absurd and filled with gross out humor that is kind of poking fun at the entire grindhouse sub-genre.  This isn’t a criticism, per se, but if you’re looking for another HOBO-style film you may be disappointed.  HOBO had more clever and, yes, sophisticated writing behind it while FATHER’S DAY was approached as more of a comedy set in the grindhouse universe.

FATHER’S DAY goes straight for the juggler but wants to have a frat party beer-kegger as that juggler drains out.  Watching this with a room full of horror fans at the Texas Frightmare Weekend 2012 heightened this experience.  There are scenes that are straight up ‘laugh out loud’ as well enough graphic dismemberment, anal rape, and cock ripping scenes to leave you wide mouthed and wondering, “Did that just happen?”  The acting is good all-around with Adam Brooks’ Ahab and Conor Sweeney’s Twink stealing the show.  These two, as well as the entire cast, look like they’re having a blast and that on-screen attitude becomes infectious.  FATHER’S DAY is just a really fun, offensive, bat-shit crazy film that you’re either gonna love or hate.  The one element that Astron-6 did fail on was the length of the film.  Even with only a 99 minute run time, FATHER’S DAY felt like it dragged on about 20-25 minutes too long.  Tightening up some of the scenes and re-working the ending that takes place in Hell (yes; in HELL) would’ve made the film flow a little smoother.  As it is, FATHER’S DAY over-extends its welcome a bit.

FATHER’S DAY is one of those polarizing films that you’ll either love or hate.  If you love films like THE TOXIC AVENGER, CLASS OF NUKE ‘EM HIGH, and TERROR FIRMER, then you’re gonna love FATHER’S DAY.  If you’re down with bizarre plots that are full of gratuitous nudity (titties, ass, and cock), excessive violence, loads of gore, and some genuine laugh out loud moments, then this is the film for you.  But love it or hate it, FATHER’S DAY will leave an impression on you.  Most of all, though, you’ll never be able to look at your father the same way again on Father’s Day!!

My Summary:

Directors:  Astron-6 (& writers)

Plot:  3 out of 5 stars

Gore:  8 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Father-Raping Cannibals:  5 out of 5 prostate jabs

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer at the Texas Frightmare Weekend 2012

Here’s one that really surprised me.  I hadn’t heard anything about this one until the final screening schedule came out for the 2012 Texas Frightmare Weekend line up.  Besides the basic plot, HUFF was described as a modern day retelling of the Three Little Pigs.  Hhmmm.  Okay.  Sounds gimmicky; very gimmicky.  Boy was I wrong.  HUFF doesn’t rely on the Three Little Pigs as a gimmick, but incorporates the structure of that classic story into its plot.  What we end up with is something extremely intense and brutal.  The Three Little Pigs actually gave HUFF a richer subtext and a deeper layer in both its meaning and impact.

HUFF is the story of a very dysfunctional family.  Lorelei (Elina Madison) is a single mother of three daughters who hooks up with who she thinks is gonna be her Knight in Shining Armor, Huff (Charlie O’Connell).  It turns out that Huff is a violent, sociopathic pedophile whose main source of income is drug running and trading.  Always sitting around the house waiting for his ‘next big score,’ Lorelei is always working (as a stripper, mind you), and is never around the house.  This allows the wolf, Huff, to prey on Lorelei’s daughters, Brixi (Marie Bollinger), Styx (Jenna Stone), and Shay (Elly Stefanko).  Using the bible as his cover, Huff puts on the pretense of being pious and god-fearing when in reality god is most likely scared to death of Huff!!  Lorelei finally opens her friggin’ eyes when one night she comes home from work to find Brixi huddled up in the foetal position naked and crying.  Huff was preying on her younger sister, Shay, and Brixi interrupted and essentially took her place.  It’s a chilling and disturbing scene that plays out.  This, though, is the event that finally wakes mom up out of her oblivion as she realizes this sexual abuse has been occurring for a long time.

That night as her daughters are sleeping, Lorelei packs them each a backpack and fills it with drug money she stole from Huff and sends them on their way so they at least have the chance at a better life.  If you’re rolling your eyes to some of the plot elements, don’t.  Remember that HUFF is structured on and plays out like a modern day fairy tale.  The next day when Huff finds out his money is gone, this sends him over the edge.  Think about this:  A man I described above as “a violent, sociopathic pedophile” goes even further over the edge and becomes even more violent and destructive.  Things get really bad for our “three little piggies”!!

After dealing with dear old mom, Huff sets off to find his step-daughters and the money.  You can tell by the girls’ names which “little piggy” they are.  There’s Brixi, Styx, and Shay (‘hay’ with an ‘s’).  This is where the story could’ve become very gimmicky, but writer Cort Howell and director Paul Morrell know exactly where they want the story to go and they nicely control the material.  The girls’ names reflect both their age and personality.  Brixi is the oldest daughter and has endured the majority of the abuse from Huff.  Her innocence is gone and she’s erected a hard shell around herself for protection.  She already lives in a house of bricks.  Styx is the middle daughter who has managed to escape from Huff’s twisted grasp (most likely because she’s dating the son of Huff’s mistress).  Styx believes she’s tough and can stand up for herself, but deep down she’s constructed a house made of dried out sticks that can easily be destroyed.  The sticks give her a false sense of security thinking they are strong enough to protect her.  After Huff “blows down” those sticks, Styx is left facing the cold, hard reality of looking into the face of a wolf.  And Shay, the youngest, never thought she needed anything more than hay to protect her.  She’s young and innocent and can’t believe there are wolves out there who would want to harm her.  Shay never had a chance!!

The power and success of this film rests squarely on the shoulders of Charlie O’Connell.  Yeah you read that sentence correctly.  Charlie O’Connell goes completely against his typical roles and puts in one of the most brutal, savage, and powerful performances I’ve seen in a long time.  No shit!!  This is the same happy-go-lucky, eternally nice guy who starred in 2-HEADED SHARK ATTACK (my review) and DUDE, WHERE’S MY CAR? !!  But after watching him in HUFF you’ll never look at him the same way.  O’Connell never lets his character slide into the bat-shit crazy, eyes-rolling-in-the-back-of-your-head kind of bad guy.  Huff is never a caricature of other villains.  O’Connell keeps Huff threatening, violent, scary, and brutal the entire film.  If anything, he makes Huff more sociopathic by the film’s end than he was in the beginning.  He goes from being a wolf to being a monster and O’Connell does a truly amazing job in this role.  He pulls it off with 100% success.

The acting from the remaining cast wasn’t as strong as O’Connell’s, but everyone held their own.  The cast and director were present at the screening I saw and they stayed for a Q&A afterwards.  During the Q&A, Elly Stefanko (Shay) mentioned that this was her first acting role (although she’s been in the music industry for years).  This was very apparent.  She looked the least comfortable in front of the camera.  This isn’t to say she did a bad job, but she clearly wasn’t as experienced as the others.  Overall the acting was good, with a few problems here and there.  Luckily the story was strong enough to absorb some of the lesser acting moments.  This isn’t to say the story was perfect.  There were times when Brixi and other characters did some really stupid things that made their situations worse, but these moments were few and far between.

The gore, here, isn’t off the charts either but there’s a lot of very disturbing themes and a lot of violence and intense moments that had me squirming in my seat.  O’Connell played Huff with no boundaries; Huff took what he wanted and did whatever he wanted.  Whether it’s cutting a bloody path trying to find his money or raping his young step-daughters (very disturbing scenes here), there was nothing redeemable about Huff.  I also liked the decision of making Huff asthmatic and when he gets too worked up he needs to suck on his inhaler.  Usually in even the most despicable characters you feel a little empathy for their weaknesses.  Not with Huff.  Every time he pulled out that inhaler I was hoping it was empty.  I wanted to see that bastard slowly suffocate to death!!

There was also an odd religious element that ran throughout the film that didn’t make much sense to me.  In the opening, pre-credit scene, Huff is relating a rather bloody and violent bible story to his three very young step-daughters.  The story included gang rape, dismemberment, and all those other bible-friendly themes.  At first it was a rather funny scene due to the age of the girls (they were pre-pubescent at the time) and the horrific nature of the story.  But when you looked into O’Connell’s eyes as he told the story, you saw that there was nothing there other than malice, violence, and destruction.  If this wasn’t foreshadowing for things to come I don’t know what is!!  After this very effective opening scene they filmmakers could’ve abandoned the religious theme and the film wouldn’t have suffered in the least.

Unfortunately I have no news right now about when this film will be getting released.  I’m hoping it’ll hit various cable MOD/VOD system’s soon and I’ll definitely let you know when it does (I have from a very reliable source that a distribution deal is coming).  HUFF is a ‘don’t miss’ film that achieves a level of intensity rarely attained in genre films.  This is career-changer role for Charlie O’Connell and it’ll blow you away.  Do not miss HUFF!!

My Summary:

Director:  Paul Morrell

Plot:  4 out of 5 stars

Gore:  5 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer at the Texas Frightmare Weekend 2012

The first film I watched at this year’s Texas Frightmare Weekend 2012 was one I heard absolutely nothing about:  IT’S IN THE BLOOD.  The film has a very small main cast, is filmed in isolated and remote areas, and often times has a very hallucinatory feel to it.  IT’S IN THE BLOOD is an indie horror film that transcends the genre and ends up being a lot more than what it starts out as.

IT’S IN THE BLOOD is about a father, Russell (horror icon Lance Henriksen), and his son, October (Sean Elliot, who also co-wrote and co-produced) who’re trying to reconnect after not seeing each other for years.  A terrible trauma both binds them together and pushes them apart and it’s this horrific event in their pasts that they’re trying to move beyond.  They go out into the wilderness to hunt and try to bond and Russell ends up injuring himself bad (real bad) in what might be one of the worst compound fractures ever put on film.  With limited mobility and absolutely no supplies, the two are completely at the mercy of the elements, and just when they thought things couldn’t get any worse they realize some kind of creature is stalking them down with the intention of killing them.  From the few distant and blurry images we get in the beginning it’s obvious this is not your typical woodland predator after them.  This thing is big, intelligent, and fierce as hell.

The film unfolds with the father and son having to come together to survive, all the while trying to figure out what the creature is and what it wants.  At the same time, Russell’s compound fracture is getting worse (make that, disgusting), and October’s recurring nightmares about his past trauma, which includes the girl he loved, Iris (Rose Sirna), start bleeding into his waking state.  This is most definitely a “slow burn” flick and director/co-writer Scooter Downey does a really nice job controlling the material here.  We get scenes that go from the ‘real time’ in the film to flashbacks of the horrific event that changed all their lives, to hallucinatory scenes of the creature.  In lesser skilled hands, IT’S IN THE BLOOD could’ve been a muddled mess, but Downey masterfully controls all the various elements like a well-seasoned pro.  The film is also shot beautifully, really embracing the dark and the isolation of the situation, and the editing is phenomenal.  The dark and isolation become imposing characters themselves as they threaten and consume Russell and October.  Downey’s style here reminds me a lot of Lucky McKee’s style in THE WOMAN (my review here).  There’s a noticeable lack of a soundtrack in the first half of the film and he builds the story in a slow yet deliberate manner where you feel the tension building as if you were inside a pressure cooker.  Downey does a fantastic job here.

As great as the direction of the film is, it’s the acting from Henriksen and Elliot that really make this film.  You all know that I’m a huge fan of Henriksen’s.  He’s an iconic genre actor that’s been in some of horror’s best films.  His performance in NEAR DARK still sends shivers up and down my spine.  But lately I’ve been seeing him popping up in more and more B-movies.  Hey look, everyone needs to pay the bills and I’m just glad to see Henriksen still working.  But his performance in IT’S IN THE BLOOD will remind you why you fell in love with this man in the first place.  He’s absolutely amazing here in the range he plays and the depth of his performance.  He is the sheriff in this small, very rural town who lost his wife and had to raise his son alone (and who also adopted a young girl and raised her as his own daughter).  He’s a tough old man who fiercely guards his emotions and feelings and rarely lets anyone “in.”  He’s also a heavy drinker who hates where his life has taken him and who still can’t get beyond the tragedy that destroyed he and his family’s lives.  But beneath it all, Henriksen’s Russell loves nothing more in life than his son and is trying to find the way to reconnect with him and get them to both overcome their pasts.  And if you’ve ever wondered what Henriksen would sound like imitating a woman having an orgasm, IT’S IN THE BLOOD will settle that for ya!!

Sean Elliot is perfect in this role as Henriksen’s troubled son.  Elliot’s October is a highly intelligent guy with a photographic memory who essentially stopped living after that traumatic event in the woods that fateful day.  With both Elliot and Henriksen we get believable characters who do realistic things and react in realistic ways to the events they find themselves in.  The writing is excellent and the execution is pitch-perfect.  I know this isn’t usually the kind of film I rave about, but when there’s so few elements in a film, it only takes one small screw up to ruin everything.  The cast and crew in IT’S IN THE BLOOD came together and executed on a very high level and made something truly fantastic.  My only complaint is that the ending of the film got a little redundant.  The film ends but we get more.  It almost felt like Downey wanted to make sure we “got it.”

I’m not gonna talk about the creature or the traumatic event in any detail.  This is a film I want you to experience in the same way I experienced it … without knowing a damn thing about it.  But be warned; besides one of the most hideous leg injuries ever put on film (my leg aches just thinking about it), there’s really not too much gore in this film.  There are, thought, some really disturbing images that’ll satisfy the horror crowd.  Some may argue that IT’S IN THE BLOOD isn’t even a horror film.  I label it a horror-psychological drama.  It takes it’s time developing all the characters and themes here, but the entire time you can feel it building up in intensity.  This is a really great film.  It won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but those of you that connect with it will have a really great experience.  Check this one out!!

My Summary:

Director:  Scooter Downey (& co-writer with Sean Elliot)

Plot:  4.5 out of 5 stars

Gore:  4 out of 10 skulls

Zombie Mayhem:  0 out of 5 brains

Reviewed by Scott Shoyer at the Texas Frightmare Weekend 2012