Halloween 2007 - Halloween will never be the same!

Halloween 2007 - So perhaps I'm not the one that should review this having never watched the original, although some would say that's why I should because I have a fresh take on it and can just watch it for what it is a Horror Movie. I'm a fan of Zombie's last two movies and since this isn't IMDB I'm not going to list them just to prove I know them, anyways I was interested in what he would do with this film and was happy when he kept it during the same time line as the original. I think that's why the movie worked so well and why all his movies work is because he doesn't modernize them, he keeps them in the era that invented horror as we know it today. At Comic Con Zombie said his film would be different because it was about Michael Myers and not about the people he was killing, and he was not lying, this movie is 100% about Myers.

Tyler Mane was the perfect choice and frankly I would like to see him in more roles like this, I mean he's already pretty scary looking in real life but give him a knife and a mask and he's scary as hell! Even though he didn't talk, his body language spoke loud and clear and that takes a talented actor but also a talented director to be able to show it the way he did. Young Myers was actually quite impressive for a child actor, he was able to flip the switch between psycho killer and playful child very easily. I wonder if he'll grow up demented because of this movie? He did some pretty intense things during the course of the film. Since I'm on actors, I want to say that whoever casted this film did a great job. I actually believed that the girls were friends and could picture them hanging out in real life, I doubt that's the case but hey I believed it could happen while watching the movie. Most impressive was Scout Taylor-Compton as Laurie, even though I knew bad stuff was going to happen all around her I felt bad for her as they did. She really was just a likable character and it sucked to see her going through all that shit. The two baby-sat kids did a heck of a job and it was hard to tell if they were acting or if they just threw them in a room and said be yourself and turned on a camera, they were both very natural and could turn out to have quite the careers ahead of them.

Something that I don't think a lot of people will catch, or if they do they'll view it in a negative light, was all the cussing. I'm not talking about the, "Oh shit there's a killer outside my door" cussing, I'm talking about when the Dad was like, "Oh shit, my car keys." Totally un-needed right? I stood out to me, and then a couple more character did it, then a couple more, and I realized something... this isn't any different then how I talk all the time, at work or with my family. It's just not something that is brought to light in movies, that real aspect of how we talk in everyday conversations and I just thought that was brilliant. Especially at the begin when the Meyer's family is way dysfunctional they cuss a lot and instead of it feeling force or getting tired of it, you accept it because you just turned to your friend and said, "Damn they cuss a lot." If anyone watches it again or for the first time, pay attention, and then pay attention to how much you swear every day. I liked this movie, I liked Myers and what Zombie and Mane did with it. Heck I really liked Mrs. Zombie and loved it when she really switched gears and actually looked like a Mom! I'm not a fan of remakes but like I said before the movie came out, "If you're going to remake a horror movie... wouldn't you rather have Zombie, a total horror fan, do it rather than someone else?" The answer to that question is, "Yes!"

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Under the Asian Influence

Hey Check out my Review for The Host (Korea 2006) over at Under the Asian Influence!
Be sure to check out all the other great Asian Cinema Reviews while your there too!

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Hostel - Part II

Well if for some reason you were impressed by the first Hostel, they went and made another one. Eli Roth is apparently the brightest up and coming Horror director despite only having three movies under his belt, one of them a sequel and none of them any good at all.

My main problem with this movie is that it really didn't try to do anything differently from the first film. I literally sat there wondering when it was going to deviate from the first and frankly it never really did. Basically Part II was just as bad as Part I, here's my breakdown for the scoring.

Story 1.0
Sound/Music 7.0
Look/Style 5.0
Acting 3.0
OVERALL 4.0

So from here on out it's going to be Spoilers a go-go, so if you still want to watch the movie stop here! For those of you who don't care or already saw it let's continue. The main problem with the first movie was that Eli never showed you what was happening and that problem continued in this one. For instance when one of the Characters is in front of a makeup mirror to be "touched up", she bites the nose off the creepy looking Guy trying to fix her scratches. Instead of seeing this, her teeth bitting the nose, we see her lunge forward then the Guy screams and she spits something onto the floor. Then the results of what happened are shown ,the Guy missing the tip of his nose. In fact theres only two more times that anything really happens since the first hour of the movie is spent wrapping up Part I and then getting our new victims to the same town. So Nose Biter, who bite the nose off is getting tortured and the Guy (who will get to later) isn't paying attention and buzz saws her face. Would have been cool, only you couldn't really see what happened because the CG was bad and they made it super quick, once again your looking at the results. The only other scene was so incredibly ridiculous and fake looking I'll just say this the Main Character cuts the guys Penis off. Now let me clarify by saying I'm not like more gore, more gore, but if you're going to do a Horror film and claim to make it a Gore-fest then you can't turn away when the Gore comes and then show the end results. If you turn away then the audience doesn't need to which takes away from the intensity of the scene. Oh they're only going to show me mild things like fingers and Penis' okay well I can keep on trucking through. If you only show the results people will only say, "Oh how fake looking." Understandably some of the things he probably wanted to do would end up getting an NC-17 rating, but here's a thought put some clothes on these people and maybe you can hold on to an R rating.

Now yes a Penis being cut off probably made most Men cringe as they saw it but unless your a murderous freak that's at the mercy of a Woman who just bought her freedom then I don't think you have anything to worry about. Let's come back to this scene and talk about how the ending broke the rules set forth by the movie, we need to talk about our Killers first. The two guys that won the auction on the Main Character and her Friend (Nose Biter) are probably the worst part of the movie. Eli tries to build them as characters but ends up making them hollow and stereotypical. The first guy is Rich and Successful and is the guy who actually pays for everything, he wants to feel the power of killing someone and be a stone cold killer. He constantly has to keep his friend in line and remind him why their there. In the end he messes up with the buzz saw and freaks out, he tries to leave but the contract says 2 things: You have to get tattooed and you have to kill someone or you're not allowed to leave. So the girl is going to die from having a buzz saw in the head but they want him to finish the job or he can't leave. He doesn't so they sic the dogs on him and they rip him to pieces some how. The other guy, less successful, his wife controls him, he's having doubts, he unties the Main Character having found her in the town and talked to her. The two talk and hug and then the murder switch flips and he decides I am a monster, I am going to kill and torture this chick. See what he did there? He switched the two characters the one you thought was going to be a sicko turned out to be a weakling and the other turned out to be a monster when originally thought weak. Sorry Eli but it was really predictable. There was no depth to the characters but he who wants to kill the most in more than likely the one most afraid of doing so and that's all this was. I have more I could say about these two characters but let's move on.

So the Main Character gets our Monster in the chair and reverses roles and holds a knife to his Penis. The Main Guy who runs the whole thing comes down and She says she wants to buy her freedom. They agree on the price but there's two rules, Tattoo and Murder. So she cuts the guys penis off, feeds it to the dogs the guards have and says, "Let him bleed to death." Okay, so we just broke one of the rules we heavily enforced 15 minutes ago in another scene what's going on? I guess it doesn't matter since her buying her way out was lame and predictable as well. You find out she's rich early on, like really, really, really rich. Then later Nose Biter tells the other Victim she could buy and sell the whole town, then the Main Character says the exact same line when negotiating her freedom. Hopefully they won't make another one of these "boring, mediocre, lack luster, I watch for an hour and theres no character development or any sense of danger built then some bad attempts at Horror happen" films and Eli's next Horror movie of all trailers will some how be better. Sadly I still have more I can say about this film but I'll save that for unsuspecting ears of friends dumb enough to watch the movie too.

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Hack/Slash - From Devil's Due Press

Hack / Slash Ongoing Series - Issue 01

Written By: Tim Seeley
Art By: Emily Stone
Colors By: Courtney Via
Published By: Devil's Due Press
Released Date: 05-09-07

After several Mini-Series and One Shots, some expensive some affordable, we finally have an Ongoing Hack/Slash series. If you're not familiar with the world of Hack/Slash this issue does a fantastic job of getting you caught up without making it a boring origin story. In fact it was quite brilliantly put together, diving into the deeper psychology of the Main Character Cassandra Hack and in doing so making her flashback to the events in her life that make up her origin. Perhaps the same will be done again for our other Main character Vlad who had a One Shot I believe already dedicated to his origin.

So the premise of the Series is this: Cassandra and Vlad hunt Slashers. Slashers are Boogey-men, Serial Killers, all those Characters from Horror Movie Slashers, i.e. Freddy, Jason, Micheal Meyers, but instead of the story following the Slasher we're following the people that kill the them. Yeah that's right, there's no Arkham Asylum to send these nut-jobs to so death typically is the best answer. Typically they read a newspaper story or hear a news report and they head out to find the Slasher.

For the first issue, Cassandra uses herself as bait and gets captured by a Psychology Professor turned way evil. He's peeled off his skin to reveal a more 'Truer' self underneath and is more than likely going to do the same to Casandra. Being the interesting character that he is he wants to know what type of person seeks out a Slasher, making it oh so easy to psychoanalyze the captured Cassandra. Note he's cutting off her toes while he does this. The story does great on it's own so I'm not going to spout off all the intense, comedic or heartfelt moments of the story, I'd rather you read it and find them all for yourself.

I'd say the thing I like most about this book is that the Main Characters are human, there's the chance they'll die, or lose a limb, Casandra's toes won't grow back by the next issue they're gone for good. They don't have any money and live off of donations from family's they've helped or what the Slasher have on them. Sorta like Blade attempts to do but if you add up everything he spends and compares it to what he could potentially make you'd find he's living outside his means.

Overall I'd actually give this book a 9.0, it was the best Hack/Slash I've read thus far and has potential of being a good Ongoing Series. The art fit the story telling, the cover art is great too but don't be fooled it's not the same inside. Hopefully they won't fall victim to printing five covers a book to try and make a buck and focus on good story telling and having a consistent artist on the book. Ask for it at your local shop. Check out the write up for issue 2 on DDP's Site.



Here's a few pages of the book for you to check out!

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