love

Author Topic: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019  (Read 27248 times)

philip918

  • Elite Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 4580
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #140 on: October 22, 2019, 08:34:13 PM »
How does one watch Possession in the US? Doesn't seem to be available anywhere.

1SO

  • FAB
  • Objectively Awesome
  • ******
  • Posts: 36128
  • Marathon Man
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #141 on: October 22, 2019, 08:38:20 PM »
I found it on Mubi.

1SO

  • FAB
  • Objectively Awesome
  • ******
  • Posts: 36128
  • Marathon Man
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #142 on: October 23, 2019, 10:10:18 AM »

You Might Be the Killer (2018)
★ ★ ½
It seems meta-slashers is all that’s left for camp killers. I understood the tone when lead Fran Kranz calls his movie geek friend and she’s played by Alyson Hannigan. Together they work through how Kranz may be responsible for all the death because of the genre’s rules. This is no Cabin in the Woods, Behind the Mask or even Tucker and Dale vs. Evil. It’s a little better than The Final Girls because this looks like an 80s slasher and not just another dead teen movie.


The Babysitter (2017)
★ ½
What a steaming pile this is. I never realized McG was such a bad director but the humor is crass, the violence manages to be extreme but not comical, so it just comes off as too much, and the attempts at being cool made me groan. I hung in there because Samara Weaving is awesome (again). She doesn’t have the polish of Margot Robbie, but there’s something punk about her on-camera attitude that has me wondering if she could be a better Harley Quinn.


The Devil’s Candy (2015)
★ ★
When I learned this is filmmaker Sean Byrne’s follow up to The Loved Ones (2009) everything suddenly made sense. Though a better film, there’s a similar problem where characters and events are a little too big, which makes the violence too mean-spirited and sadistic. The story spins its wheels, repeating the same sequence of events until the climax. The heavy metal style is commendable, but pales next to Mandy.


Deathgasm (2015)
★ ★
Writer/director Jason Lei Howden is about to get a bigger spotlight with Guns Akimbo, starring Daniel Radcliffe and Samara Weaving. This first feature starts as an offbeat New Zealand tale of some metalheads who accidentally raise hell on earth. A nice bunch of character types gets swallowed whole by the ensuing minor apocalypse and low-key humor drowns in streams of blood.

Junior

  • Bert Macklin, FBI
  • Global Moderator
  • Objectively Awesome
  • ******
  • Posts: 28709
  • What's the rumpus?
    • Benefits of a Classical Education
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #143 on: October 23, 2019, 10:25:14 AM »
I had a similar reaction to The Babysitter, which I think I wrote around here somewhere. It's trash except for Weaving, who's playing a poorly written character with all of the star power she brings to a much better role in Ready or Not.
Check out my blog of many topics

“I’m not a quitter, Kimmy! I watched Interstellar all the way to the end!”

1SO

  • FAB
  • Objectively Awesome
  • ******
  • Posts: 36128
  • Marathon Man
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #144 on: October 23, 2019, 10:26:16 PM »
Everyone who sat through The Babysitter deserves to watch Mayhem, which goes for the same tone and gets it, is a blast of fun and also stars Samara Weaving.

1SO

  • FAB
  • Objectively Awesome
  • ******
  • Posts: 36128
  • Marathon Man
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #145 on: October 24, 2019, 09:19:13 AM »
[REC]³ Genesis (2012)
★ ★ ½
Major fan of [REC], not so hot on [REC] 2, but I’ve come around on both filmmakers thanks to solid solo work, including Veronica this month from Paco Plaza, who also flies solo here. I don’t mind Plaza ditching the found footage conceit, he’s a good enough filmmaker to remove those training wheels. More of an issue is the whimsical tone and bright lighting. Not Zombieland farce, but it goes against the shocks and terror of the first two films, feeling like the pilot episode of a proposed weekly series.


Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich (2017)
★ ★ ½
How does this film exist? Nearly 20 years into a series of over 10 films – details are vague – this one is written by S. Craig Zahler (Bone Tomahawk) and stars comedians Thomas Lennon (Reno 911) and Nelson Franklin (Veep). The puppets make for lame villains because they’re as big as Chucky’s leg, but Zahler’s creative graphic violence gets a pulpy workout and the satirical tone of Jewish people fighting Nazi puppets is shockingly amusing when it could’ve easily be offensive.


The Tall Man (2012)
★ ★ ½
After a 2nd viewing of Martyrs I had to know what’s stalled filmmaker Pascal Laugier’s career. This is such an unusual story because there are big twists that change everything, but they come at the cost of completely frustrating the viewer. There’s an exciting bit of action involving Jessica Biel chasing after the Tall Man that delivers the dangerous horror I wanted from Laugier, but after that the film isn’t really about the Tall Man. It’s not even really a horror movie. Still well-made with perhaps Biel’s best performance, but what did I just watch? And why did I watch it? The message (and my horror movie) got lost along the journey. That said, this only confirms Laugier as a filmmaker to watch.

Beavermoose

  • Godfather
  • *****
  • Posts: 5006
  • Samsonite! I was way off!
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #146 on: October 24, 2019, 08:06:02 PM »
Un couteau dans le coeur (Knife+ Heart) (2018)
This queer arthouse slasher is really on my wavelength. There is a wonderful satirical morbidity as these film producers adapt the actual murders of their cast members into the world of their pornographic films. Although it has a few pacing issues, and it loses it's way a little near the end, the camp and melodrama here really work.

V/H/S (2012)
The found footage thing was really popular for a while and I enjoyed it back then but watching this now it sort of bothered me a little. My favourite segments were probably 10/31/98 and Amateur Night, the others were fun but not as memorable. The framing story was probably the most boring part.

Child's Play (2019) Lars Klevberg
This loses much of the charm of the original by making Chucky's evil be a tech issue rather than supernatural possession. It's a bit too on the nose with the critique of technology.
I also think the Doll in this movie is too creepy. In the 80s you actually had really ugly dolls and so the Chucky design was somewhat believable. Why would anyone replace a slick Alexa box with a creepy doll, no one would ever buy this dude.
The kids teaming up also changes the tone and  loses the heightened threat created by the sense of isolation that Andy experiences in the original. It didn't work for me.

Rogue (2007) Greg McLean
For a giant killer croc in the outback film, I enjoyed it. It's really dumb and the characters make all the wrong decisions but the surprisingly good CGI croc (for a 2007 aussie movie) and the way it is slowly revealed make the film a lot better than it deserves to be. I don't really find Wolf Creek to be an incredible film and McLean's Rogue is about the same very serviceable.

All the Creatures Were Stirring (2018) David Ian McKendry & Rebekah McKendry
There have been many better Christmas + Horror movies. It's an anthology film but all segments are directed by the same people. Diversity of style is the appeal of anthology and although some of the segments were fun overall it felt quite forgettable.

1SO

  • FAB
  • Objectively Awesome
  • ******
  • Posts: 36128
  • Marathon Man
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #147 on: October 25, 2019, 10:29:22 AM »
Poltergeist (2015)
★ ★ ½
Serviceable remake that reminded me as much of Director Gil Kenan's previous film (the animated Monster House) as the 80s classic. Kenan knows how to make it scary and some of the effects are pretty great, but there's also a few that look like digital crap. What puts me on the fence is the talented cast here don't gel into the original film's family unit. They never get past coming off like a bunch of actors dialing up the charisma to compete with the ghosts.


Satanico Pandemonium (1975)
★ ★ ½
Name might be familiar to fans of From Dusk Till Dawn. Mexican horror film about Satan tempting a nun has some of the bonkers set-pieces I like with Mexican horror wrapped inside nun exploitation whose appeal I find bizarre. Thin plot won me over with the reveal that Satan has been tempting not just our lead but most of the nuns, leading to the climactic Pandemonium.


The Witch Who Came From the Sea (1976)
★ ★
Kept hearing about this as a 70s cult oddity, and boy is it. One of the more art-film grindhouse pictures I've seen, with lots of sex and violent imagery centered on a disturbed young adult who may be a serial killer, was probably abused by her father, not really a witch but drawn to the mythology of witches and mermaids. I could see this being a Top 100 film for some, but I couldn't make a specific suggestion.

1SO

  • FAB
  • Objectively Awesome
  • ******
  • Posts: 36128
  • Marathon Man
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #148 on: October 26, 2019, 12:35:18 AM »

Don't Look Back (2009)
"I recognize things, the furniture... But it's not us.
And in the photos and videos, I don't recognize anyone at all."


Filmmaker Marina de Van has my full support. She caught my attention with 2002's In My Skin, where she also stars as a woman who becomes obsessed with self-mutilation. Here she's got two major stars to work with (Sophie Marceau and Monica Bellucci), but retains her disturbing take on body horror. This time it's the mind of Jeanne (Marceau) that makes her feel like a stranger to her own home and family. This taps into something primal, a horror similar to dementia, but happening to someone much younger so it isn't exploiting the terrible disorder. (In other words, it connected with my own increasingly faulty memory.)

The film could've stayed on this path and drilled deeper into Jeanne's frustration and hopeless feeling, but de Van opens things up. Jeanne's faulty memory is due to a parallel existence where Jeanne looks like Bellucci, and sometimes she looks like both of them in strange combinations. (The make-up and effects are effective, constantly sliding between the two actress.) This turns the plot into a more fantastical mystery, and the resolution is disappointingly pat. Not worthy of the rich scenes that came before.
Rating: ★ ★ ½

- Safe for Sandy

FLYmeatwad

  • An Acronym
  • Objectively Awesome
  • ******
  • Posts: 28785
  • I am trying to impress myself. I have yet to do it
    • Processed Grass
Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2019
« Reply #149 on: October 26, 2019, 07:35:08 PM »
I like Bella Thorne, no relation, but that film isn't great.

Sorry to say I let the Shocktober marathon down by not seeing The Lodge at PFF.

 

love