#1: CLOUD ATLAS

Director: Andy Wachowski & Tom Tykwer & Lana Wachowski
Screenplay: Lana Wachowski &Tom Tykwer & Andy Wachowski, from the novel by David Mitchell
Starring: Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent, Hugo Weaving, Jim Sturgess, Doona Bae, Keith David
Release Date: October 26th, 2012



“There’s a natural order to this world. No matter what you do, it will never amount to anything more than a single drop in a limitless ocean.”

What, exactly, is CLOUD ATLAS about, you ask? Good lord, is that a packed question. Entire textbooks could (and more than likely will) be written  about the themes and recurrent symbolism woven into the three hour running time of the Wachowski sibling’s latest staggering epic, which they co-directed with Tom Tykwer (RUN, LOLA, RUN). Directing two separate units with an international cast, the visionary trio have taken the “unfilmable” novel and made it into something truly special, weaving a beautiful, lyrical  cinematic tapestry, one of the most ambitious films I have ever seen, that touches on concepts that should speak to anybody who has ever been human.

The film is comprised of six stories that span across centuries, following characters whose actions ripple across eons, affecting each other in ways both big and small.  In 1849  American lawyer Adam Ewing (Sturgess) writes a journal detailing his journey from the South Pacific, recounting his encounter with a stowaway slave and his battle with an illness that threatens to kill him. This journal is read in England in 1936 by Robert Frobisher (Ben Whishaw) a young musician working with a famous composer (Broadbent), using it as inspiration to create his masterpiece “The Cloud Atlas Sextet”, all while corresponding with his lover, Rufus Sixsmith (James D’Arcy). In 1973 San Francisco, intrepid journalist Luisa Rey (Berry) reads Frobisher’s love letters while trying to piece together a conspiracy involving a new nuclear reactor when a much older Sixsmith is killed by an assassin (Weaving) after trying to tip her off. Luisa’s teenaged neighbor grows up to write a novel about this incident, which is read in 2012 by Timothy Cavendish (Broadbent), a British publisher on the run from gangsters he owes money to, who is tricked by his brother (Grant) into hiding out in a nursing home, where he is held against his will and mistreated by the evil Nurse Noakes (Weaving). Cavendish’s story of his return to freedom is eventually turned into a film that serves as the seed of rebellion in 2144, when it is seen by Somni-451 (Bae), a genetically engineered clone, or “fabricant”, one of millions. She is released from her life of fast-food bondage by Hae-Joo Chang (Sturgess), a member of the Union Resistance who seeks Somni’s help in revealing the horrifying truth about fabricants to the world. In the far future, 106 years after mankind’s fall,  Zachry (Hanks), a member of a primitive tribe that worships “The Gospel of Somni”, must battle a rival tribe of cannibals and battle his innermost fears, represented by the demonic visage of Old Georgie (Weaving). He must overcome his fears and self-doubt while aiding Meronym (Berry), a member of the last remnant of a technologically advanced civilization who seeks a mountainous outpost that holds the key to mankind’s salvation. By the film’s end it is clear that big or small, there is no difference, as every crime or act of kindness shares equal importance in the grand scheme of the cosmos.

“Our lives are not our own. From womb to tomb we are bound to others, past and present.”

CLOUD ATLAS is a film that demands repeat viewings in order to fully appreciate the richness of the story, the complex thematic depth, and the amazing skill and understanding of the language of cinema on display. In attempting to convey author David Mitchell’s ideas not of reincarnation, but of eternal recurrence, each member of the cast is given the immensely challenging task of portraying six different characters of varying races, ethnicities and genders, oftentimes with varying accents. The make-up used to pull off these transformations is at times mind-blowing, as when Halle Berry shows up in 2144 as an ancient Asian man, and other times distractingly unsuccessful, like Korean actress Doona Bae appearing in 1849 as the Caucasian daughter of a plantation owner. Though the seams do show in the makeup at times, I believe it is in service of the intent of the filmmakers’ for us to be able to recognize each of the actors in their appearances throughout various eras. Though Tom Hanks is always recognizably Tom Hanks, he truly disappears into each of his roles, creating six totally distinct characters, each one subtly different from his recurrence in previous eras. All of the actors do amazing work in their various roles, and it is a lot of fun trying spot their appearances in each plot line and the ways they affect each other throughout the ages.

“What you want is no different from what I want. The gulf is an illusion.”

By telling all of these stories at once the Wachowski’s and Tykwer are attempting to smash through every boundary we have defined to separate ourselves from one another, be it gender, race, class, and even time itself. The film deftly weaves in and out of each storyline, with each cut from one to the other designed to comment on the scene that preceded it. Though each segment is presented in a linear fashion, they are not presented in order of occurrence, as a slave running across the gantry of a ship in 1849 is juxtaposed with Somni-451 running across a similar platform in 2144 while fleeing the police force of her Unanimity “owners”. With the passage of time characters will switch races and motives, and certain lines in one story will pay off in another, such as Timothy Cavendish’s rebellious exultation to his captors at the nursing home that “Soylent Green is people!”, which gains resonance later on when Somni-451 discovers that the Unan government has been recycling the dead bodies of fabricants into a  crude gruel-like substance referred to as “Soap”, which is used as a cheap way to feed the fabricants and is treated with a chemical that renders them docile. This then leads back to the Cavendish story where, after raising his voice and cursing at the demented Nurse Noakes, she threatens to clean his mouth out with a bar of soap. Sometimes this includes an entire arc, where in the earliest era Hanks is portrayed as a savage brute who attempts to kill a nobleman as he sleeps to get to his gold, contrasted with the far future in which Hanks is now a noble tribesman slicing a savage’s throat while he sleeps as retribution for murdering his entire clan.  There is a beautiful symmetry at work here that resonates throughout each story, and even after two viewings I know that there are tons of little connections that I have missed. Through this insane juxtaposition of visuals and themes the narrative destroys any notions of past, present and future as separate ideas. All of it is happening now, as the present and future are the sum total of what came before.

“The weak are meat and the strong shall eat.”

The trio of directors is able to cut between each plot in a way that not only makes sense, but underlines how each story, no matter how different in tone or genre, is essentially the same, as each and every character is searching for some kind of truth, must overcome their worst fears, and strives to free themselves from those who would take away their freedoms. Cannibalism has a strong thematic undercurrent within the story, sometimes obviously as in the post-apocalyptic segment, and other times referring to the ways in which we as a species are willing to utterly betray one another due to greed or pride, or even a class entitlement. Hugh Grant’s is used most often to demonstrate this character type, be it as Timothy Cavendish’s traitorous brother, the misogynistic head of the nuclear power plant, or just a plain old man-eating future-cannibal covered head to toe in wicked-awesome war paint.

"The ledger of our lives is the direct consequence of our words and deeds."

The film’s main theme, at least in my eyes, is the importance of storytelling and the power of love in overcoming the many obstacles life sets in our paths. In all six stories each main character eventually leaves a journal, either in written or video form, that expresses their deepest yearnings and are all declarations of love. Life is full of loss and pain and absolute horror, but also love and pleasure and total joy. Only by overcoming their fears and openly expressing themselves, shouting what they believe to be the truth at the top of their lungs, are the characters able to break free of the chains that bind them, and in doing so set off a wave of positivity that echoes through the ages. In between the Wachowski’s manage to weave in their usual philosophical sci-fi blend, invoking grand ideas about the vastness of not only this world, but the universe as well. In the midst of that vastness it seems easy to feel small and alone. But CLOUD ATLAS argues that everything we do, no matter how minute, shares equal importance, and we are all searching for the same things. Unless you're Hugo Weaving, in which case you will always be a bad-ass evil sonovabitch.

“What is any ocean but a multitude of drops?”

If all of this sounds pretentious and depressing, know that the film is brimming with optimism. Every story covers an aspect of humanity can be easily identified with, and in between the loss and the horror there is a great deal of humor, mostly in Timothy Cavendish’s ghastly ordeal which is played as a quirky British comedy and is the most crowd-pleasing of the bunch. Plus, there’s a fantastic pussy joke right in the middle of the segment, so you can shove those accusations of pretension straight up your ass. For a little variety the 1970’s segment is a great little reminder of the awesome conspiracy thrillers that were so popular in the 70’s, and any movie that takes Keith David and Hugo Weaving, two of my favorite gravelly-voiced actors, and pits them against each other in a frantic shootout automatically gets my vote.

This has been a difficult review to write, and in fact I had to view the film a second time in order to fully wrap my head around it and figure out just what the hell I was going to say about it. It is going to affect each viewer in a totally unique way, as I feel that your reaction to the movie will be entirely dependent on the sum total of your life experience up to that point. I left the theater after the first viewing relatively unmoved, and yet the second time I had tears in my eyes, and rode on a euphoric high of optimism for the rest of the night. It is rare that a film comes along that can lodge itself into my consciousness and make me feel so positive about people in general. Though I absolutely recommend that you all rush out and see it as soon as possible, I know that many will not see the same things I did, and a good number of you might even hate it. Most films these days tend to not ask their viewers to do much thinking, and when it comes to a four-course meal like CLOUD ATLAS many viewers will find it easy to become overwhelmed.

With CLOUD ATLAS the Wachowski’s and Tykwer have once again demonstrated that they are operating on another level from other filmmakers, able to see beyond linear storytelling and exploit the pliability of  cinema to full effect, producing a true work of art, a labor of love that, like the journals of it’s characters, I am sure will endure far beyond the lives of it’s creators. I do not believe that I will see a better film released this year, or even the next. That it was even made at all is a miracle that should not be taken for granted. The film is a thing of beauty that I cannot come close to doing justice right now, and to even come close I would have to write a novel. So I will end by urging you to see CLOUD ATLAS while it is still in theaters. Whether you love it or loathe it,  you won’t ever be able to forget about it.

October 2012 Edition #31: NOSFERATU

Director: F.W. Murnau
Screenplay: Henrik Galeen, from the novel “Dracula” by Bram Stoker
Starring: Max Schreck, Gustav von Wangenheim, Greta Schroder, Alexander Granach
Release Date: March 4th, 1922 (Berlin)


For my final review this Halloween season I decided to step waaayyyy back in time, to the silent era, in order to finally view what has long been considered an indisputable horror masterpiece, a film whose unmistakable influence can be seen in the genre to this day. Though it has since been surpassed by the film’s that followed in it’s wake in terms of sheer shock and terror, F.W. Murnau’s NOSFERATU still retains an undeniable eerie power that in several instances chilled me to my core.

The film is an unofficial adaptation of Bram Stoker’s seminal novel “Dracula”. Unable to obtain the rights, Murnau and screenwriter Henrik Galeen opted to change character’s names, and to call the ungodly creature Nosferatu instead of vampire. So Jonathan Harker becomes Thomas Hutter (Wangenheim), Count Dracula is now Count Orlock (Schreck), and the psychotic Renfield is now called Knock (Granach). These differences aside, the structure of the story pretty much follows that of every adaptation of the tale you’ve ever seen, with Hutter setting off into the mountains of Transylvania in order to oversee Orlock’s purchase of a deserted abbey across the street from his own home. Once the documentation has been signed, Orlock traps Hutter in his castle and sets off for his new home, in this case the German town of Wisburg. On the way he utterly decimates the entire crew of the schooner that is shipping his coffins, most of which are filled with plague-ridden rats, and upon arrival in Wisburg begins to feast on the blood of it’s residence, using the sudden arrival of the plague as his cover. Hutter manages to escape and rushes home to protect his dear wife, Ellen (Schroder), whom the evil Count showed a disturbing fondness for. In the film’s finale, Ellen sacrifices herself in order to lure Orlock out into the sunlight, which utterly obliterates the ghastly demon.

As far as adaptations go, NOSFERATU is actually quite sloppy. Murnau and team hit all of the important beats from Stoker’s novel, but certain elements never quite align, and one character in particular, Professor Bulwer (John Gottowt), has absolutely no bearing on the plot whatsoever, even though it is obvious that he is meant to be this film’s surrogate Van Helsing. Despite that, the film is held together by the absolutely mind-melting visage of Max Schreck as Count Orlock, a creature whose appearance is so surreally Satanic and unearthly that, thanks to the sublime expressionistic camerawork of Fritz Arno Wagoner, gave me the worst goddamn case of the willies. This despite the fact that the version of NOSFERATU that is available on Netflix features the most abysmally inappropriate modern musical accompaniment imaginable. It sounded irritatingly similar to Thomas Newman’s score from AMERICAN BEAUTY, and whoever made the decision to slap that onto this film deserves a swift punch to the scrotum. Regardless, the eerie imagery alone was able to overcome an audio obstacles I encountered. It helped that I was watching this alone, at around midnight, I’m sure, but the imagery in this flick is so powerful that it is still being ripped off and homage to this day. It should be noted that this was the first work of fiction to depict sunlight as lethal to vampires, a trait which has been absorbed by the cultural consciousness and is now accepted as a standard part of the vampire lore. The rest of the cast do a fine job, I suppose, though the acting style of the time was extremely over the top, and takes some getting used to. But any time Schreck appears on screen, the entire vibe of the film changes, as if Murnau and company were somehow able to distill pure evil into physical form and capture it on celluloid.

Vampires have never been creepier than as portrayed in this film. In terms of influencing the look and tone of an entire genre, this might be the most important horror film ever made. However, importance alone does not equate to a perfect grade. Earlier this month I reviewed another silent-era classic, THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI, and awarded it a perfect score.  In retrospect, I have been wondering whether that was entirely fair. I mean, would I have scored the film so highly if I wasn’t aware of it’s importance to the genre? I feel like I should be more careful when it comes to films like this. Just because a film is a “classic”, does not mean it is flawless. I will not be going back and retroactively change my grade. That was what I felt the flick deserved at the time, and that’s what will stick. I will say, however, that in terms of maintaining a tone of starkly surrealistic terror, CALIGARI was perfect. Though it suffered from the same overacting and plot inconsistencies of NOSFERATU, CALIGARI took place in an abstract world, viewed through the hellish prism of a madman’s mind. Any inconsistencies in that story make their own strangely illogical sense.

NOSFERATU, on the other hand, totally nails it’s tone. I just feel that a little bit of work needed to be done to the story, and we would have at a perfect film. As it is, it is merely fantastic. Dreadfully, horribly, nightmarishly fantastic. Do yourself a favor and give this film a watch some time before you die, lest you be visited in the night by the unholy specter of Nosferatu.

Happy Halloween, everybody!

My Rating: 8/10

October 2012 Edition #30: HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN

Director: Erle C. Kenton
Screenplay: Edward T. Lowe Jr.
Starring: Boris Karloff, Lon Chaney Jr., John Carradine, J. Carroll Naish
Release Date: December 1st, 1944


Today I return to the Universal Studios’ stable of classic monsters, this time with their sequel to FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN, the mad monster mash-up HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN. With the addition of Dracula and a mad doctor to the mix, with this flick Universal hoped to up the ante (and the box office) and create a monstrous brawl for the ages.

The plot follows the mad Dr. Gustav Niemann (Karloff), who escapes from prison after an incredibly plot-convenient bolt of lightning blows a hole in his jail cell, and sets off into the night with his hunchback sidekick, Daniel (Naish), seeking revenge against the men who imprisoned him for fifteen years. Hitching a ride with Professor Lampini and his traveling roadshow horrors, which includes a casket containing the skeleton of Count Dracula (Carradine). After killing the professor, Niemann assumes the man’s identity and uses the roadshow as a front to go from town to town, taking out the officials who put him behind bars, with the assistance of Dracula, whom is resurrected upon the removal of the stake from his heart. But Dracula proves pretty useless and is almost immediately killed, leaving Niemann on the run again, at which point he finds himself in the village of Visaria, the setting of FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN. Already obsessed with the works of the mad doctor, Niemann sneaks into the ruins of Castle Frankenstein and thaws out the bodies of Frankenstein’s Monster (Glenn Strange) and Larry Talbot (Chaney Jr.), aka  The Wolfman. Stringing him along with the promise of a cure, Niemann convinces Talbot to drive his chariot while he abducts his enemies and steals their brains for the purposes of an unholy brain transplant surgery that ultimately doesn’t make much sense, but hey, monster and what-not!

So this flick was kind of a mess, completely ignoring previous continuity in favor of bringing these three monsters together, which is cool and all, but at this point in their run this series of monster flicks was beginning to seem kinda desperate. Karloff is great as usual playing the insane Dr. Niemann, though there isn’t really all that much complexity to his character beyond the fact that he’s, y’know, evil and all. I thought it was interesting seeing him perform in a FRANKENSTEIN film in which not only was he not portraying the Monster, but actually had to act opposite his replacement for the role. And let’s face it, folks, Glenn Strange is no Boris Karloff, as his Monster is all idiotic grunting and shambling, with none of the subtle hints of tragic pathos that Karloff was able to inject into the slightest facial expression. That’s not really a big issue, however, since the Frankenstein Monster doesn’t even do anything until the last two minutes of the film, and those two minutes seem like a mere afterthought, as if the producers forgot he was in the movie and decided to have him kill something at the last minute in order to fulfill their obligation to the audience. The flick feels like two short films pasted together, as the first twenty minutes dealing with Karloff’s encounter with Count Dracula prove to be utterly pointless, and reduce the once powerful and hypnotic Count into a complete and utter bitch, who immediately agrees to do whatever Karloff asks of him, which is simply to kill one of the officers who convicted him. Dracula is played by John Carradine, who I’m sure would have made a fine Dracula in any other movie, but here he’s supposed to be playing the same character as Bela Lugosi. Last I checked, Lugosi’s Dracula had a Hungarian accent, no facial hair, and was a total suave badass. Carradine’s Dracula has an American accent, a mustache, and wears a totally un-badass top hat. Also, while he does kill the man he was supposed to, he totally fucks up in trying to seduce and kidnap his daughter, leading to a pathetic chase in a horse-drawn cart that ends with him immediately dying beneath the sun’s rays. His screen time amounts to maybe ten minutes, and the treatment he is given is an utter disgrace to the character.

The only monster who makes any kind of impact on the plot is Larry Talbot, who does his usual emo “I just wanna die” schtick, and Chaney is great in the role, as usual, but he doesn’t really get anything to do other than mope and fall in love with the gypsy chick who Daniel not-so-secretly adores. Shit, out of all the “monsters” in this flick, Daniel the hunchback is the only one who actually kills anybody onscreen. Well, sorta. I mean, you see him as he’s about to do it, as opposed to the Wolfman, who we are told killed some totally irrelevant person off-screen.

Anyways, all of these disparate elements come together over the course of an hour, and in the final ten minutes Karloff finally conducts his grand experiment, which basically consists of zapping the ever-loving shit out of the Monster with every electrically-powered Tesla coil and gee-golly bit of doo-hickery from the Universal lot that the filmmaker’s could cram onto a single set. Of course a band of angry, torch-wielding villagers makes an appearance, confronts the scientist and his creation, Karloff reaps what he has sown, and then the flick end so goddamned abruptly and perfectly that I couldn’t help but let out a laugh. Say what you will about these old-school horror flicks, but when the movie was over, it was fucking over and done, and would you please get the fuck out of the theater right now, because we don’t have time for credits!

HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN is not without it’s merits, chiefly (for me at least) that it features both Boris Karloff AND the goddamned Wolfman. And I could never hate a movie that features the Wolfman. So for the Wolfman alone I award the movie five points, plus an extra point for Karloff.

My Rating: 6/10

October 2012 Edition #29: SLEEPAWAY CAMP II: UNHAPPY CAMPERS

Director: Michael A. Simpson
Screenplay: Fritz Gordon
Starring: Pamela Springsteen, Renee Estevez, Tony Higgins, Valerie Hartman
Release Date: November 16th, 1988 (home video premiere)


I have never gotten around to seeing the original SLEEPAWAY CAMP due to the fact that, aside from it’s infamous ending, it is by all accounts a terrible film. Now, I’m certainly the kind of guy who is willing to overlook some pretty heinous flaws in a movie in order to have a good time, but I never willingly go into a flick if I know I’m going to hate it. I’m sure I’ll get around to seeing SLEEPAWAY CAMP one of these days, and when I do you faithful two or three readers will be the first to know about it. Until that day you’ll have to make do with my views on SLEEPAWAY CAMP II, which has a far better reputation, better poster art, AND both of its stars are the sisters of famous people, so ya know it’s gotta be good!

SLEEPAWAY CAMP II picks up several years after the events of the first film, during which time that film’s transvestite psychopath Angela has done her time in a state mental institution and even managed to get a sex change on the government’s dime. Now she’s managed to finagle her way into a counselor position at the remote Camp Rolling Hills, whose campers are some of the horniest, pot smoking-est, panty raiding-est group of oversexed degenerates this side of a MEATBALLS sequel. Angela may be a psychopath, but she is still built of a strong moral fiber, and as the film progresses each of the campers gives her a sinful reason to “send them home”…in some of  the most gruesome, gore, giggle-inducing ways imaginable.

SLEEPAWAY CAMP II: UNHAPPY CAMPERS is a double dollop of dumb-assery, a pitch-perfect spoof of the slasher genre made when it was at it’s zenith, that knows how to make fun of itself and wink at the audience without ever looking down it’s nose at them. From top to bottom this flick just looks like the cheapest piece of shit, but director Michael A. Simpson and screenwriter Fritz Gordon inject just the right amount of pathos into their stable of cardboard stock characters to make them stand slightly above the rest in the slasher canon. The casting is rather jarring, as maybe two of or three of the kids attending this camp are actually kids, while the rest are obviously played by 25 year old, which is fine by me because the older cast members manage to turn in far better performance, considering the material, than the filmmakers would have been able to get out of actual children on such a low budget production. Also, these 25 year old girls have giant racks. Giant racks that they show off in, oh, EVERY SINGLE SCENE. So the movie’s got that going for it, which is nice.

You're welcome.

While the performances are nothing to write home about, none of them are terrible, and it seems every member of the cast seemed to get the tone the filmmakers were aiming for. Pamela Springsteen (yes, she is The Boss’ sister) is adorably evil as Angela, and while she never quite achieves the level of likeability her cuteness adds a much-appreciated dose of levity to the kill scenes, which are already pretty damned silly to begin with. Angela cuts out the tongue of a girl who talks too much, roasts two stoner chicks over a pit, casually dispatches one girl with a drill. The flick’s cleverest scene involves two young boys who dress up as Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees in an attempt to scare Angela, only for her to emerge dressed as a facsimile of Leatherface and dispatch the two of them with a chainsaw. The gore effects, while not very elaborate, are still decent enough to get the job done. By the film’s end Angela has amassed quite an impressive cache of corpses stashed away in an abandoned cabin in the woods.

I was honestly surprised by how much I liked these characters, given how thin they all are. There isn’t even really a main protagonist, though I suppose Molly (Estevez) comes the closest seeing as how she winds up as “The Final Girl”. At a certain point it seemed like Ally (Hartman), the film’s requisite slut and direct competition for Molly over one of the boys, would wind up as the heroine. They even spend a fair amount of time subtly hinting at how her bad-girl behavior might be the result of some type of trauma or need relate, but then Angela stabs the hell out of her and jams her into a leech-filled shitter, so that all goes out the window.

SLEEPAWAY CAMP II is cheesy and awful, and it knows it, yet somehow the filmmakers were able to craft a good-natured satire of the slasher genre that fully exploits every facet that it’s fans have come to love, without ever making the joke at their expense. That sort of balance is extremely difficult to find in the horror comedy genre, especially in this instance, where the comedy is so broad. But rather than stoop to embarrassing levels of childishness ala RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD PART II, which shits all over the legacy of it’s predecessor, SLEEPAWAY CAMP II acknowledges it’s progenitor’s shortcomings and celebrates them, to delightfully campy effect. I had a blast with this dumb-ass movie.

My Rating: 7/10

October 2012 Edition #28: THE DUNWICH HORROR

Director: Daniel Haller
Screenplay: Curtis Hanson & Henry Rosenbaum, from the story by H.P. Lovecraft
Starring: Dean Stockwell, Sandra Dee, Ed Begley, Lloyd Bochner
Release Date: January 14th, 1970



THE DUNWICH HORROR is a very loose adaptation of the H.P. Lovecraft story of the same name, detailing how creepily mustachioed Wilbur Whateley (Stockwell) travels to Miskatonic University in Arkham, Massachusetts looking for the Necronomicon. Unable to convince Dr. Armitage (Begley) to allow him to borrow it for research, Whateley then convinces Armitage’s student Nancy (Dee) to drive him back to the house in the town of Dunwich that he shares with his aging grandfather. The Whateley family are pariahs to the local townsfolk, who relate rumors of strange cult rituals and unnatural childbirths dating back generations. And as Nancy gives in to Wilbur’s hypnotic gaze, thanks to a healthy dose of druggings, it becomes clear to Armitage that she is in danger of becoming the subject of another Whateley ritual, an attempt to resurrect the elder god Yog Sothoth, who will wreak havoc upon our earthly realm. Bad 70’s hair, infra-red acid-inspired dream sequences, and implied tentacle rape ensue.

Wow, this flick was terrible. The opening credits start off promisingly, with an animated sequence showing black figures against a blue background climbing Cyclopean peaks in order to perform some hideous pagan rite. But right off the bat, the filmmakers display a total misconception of tone, as the theme music, which plays pretty much consistently throughout the body of the picture, is a snazzy little jazz riff that is completely out of place, providing the meandering mess that ensues with as much atmosphere and scares as an episode of THE ODD COUPLE.

I began to sense I was in trouble when, thirty seconds into the film proper, Dr. Armitage is standing with a group of chuckling students and casually tells Nancy “Would you be a dear and take the Necronomicon back to the library?” Yeah, just take this eons old text written by a raving mad lunatic that is rumored to summon infinitesimal horrors down the hallway, sweetheart, no big deal! And then Dean Stockwell shows up brandishing an impressive Jew-fro and a wisp of a mustache, and everything turns to shit in the blink of an eye. Stockwell has been in his fair share of stinkers over the years, but the man is usually reliably decent in his roles. Here he spends the entirety of his screen time mumbling all of his lines while staring blankly into space as if he just doesn’t give a fuck, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if that was the case. He is sooooooo boring, and unfortunately that makes him the best actor in the movie, as Sandra Dee’s Nancy is a useless caricature of a human being, and that’s giving caricatures a bad name. She exists to look pretty and say things, occasionally getting sorta naked. She is the epitome of bland, reacting blandly against the bland blandness of Senor Blandington.

I was incredibly disappointed to see that this was directed by the same Daniel Haller who made DIE, MONSTER, DIE!, which I enjoyed the hell out of. While he does bring his eye for interesting production design to this flick, particularly in the brightly-colored interior of the Whateley house and the ancient ruins at which the film’s climax occurs, for the most part this flick carries with it all of the style of an ABC After School Special. The only scenes that are semi-cool involve the demonic tentacle-monster that dwells in a locked upstairs bedroom of the Whateley manor. This creatures presence causes everything to take on an infrared tint, and for some reason it likes to tear women’s clothes off before it eats them, which is always a plus. But the infrared shit gets overused to the point of annoyance, as do the abundance of psychedelic dream sequences that go on forever and ever, and were obviously only included to appeal to the audience of LSD-fueled hippies who might have gone to see this on it’s original release.

My expectations going into this flick were quite low, but somehow THE DUNWICH HORROR managed to sink below those expectations. This flick is pedestrian to the extreme, made with a total lack of imagination or passion from anybody involved.

My Rating: 4/10  

October 2012 Edition #27: PREMATURE BURIAL

Director: Roger Corman
Screenplay: Charles Beaumont & Ray Russell, from the story by Edgar Allan Poe
Starring: Ray Milland, Hazel Court, Richard Ney, Heather Angel, Alan Napier
Release Date: March 7th, 1962


PREMATURE BURIAL is another in the Roger Corman stable of Edgar Allan Poe adaptations, this one starring Ray Milland instead of Corman’s usual collaborator, Vincent Price. Change in leads aside, this film shares the same gothic atmosphere, ornate production design, vivid Technicolor cinematography and dryly dark sense of humor that has made this particular cycle of movies some of my top picks for annual Halloween viewing.

The flick gets off to a great start with Guy Carrell (Milland) observing as two grave robbers exhume a recently-buried corpse for the purposes of medical examination. This scene takes place in the kind of moodily lit and fog-enshrouded graveyard that only exists in old movies,  so I knew immediately that I was going to dig this flick, especially once the grave robbers (one of whom is played by Corman and Joe Dante regular Dick Miller) pulled back the lid of the coffin to reveal the twisted visage of the man inside, his face a rictus of agonized terror and his fingers bloodied from attempting to claw his way out of the coffin. After a colorful credits sequence, the story picks up several months later as Emily (Court), Guy’s fiancée,  arrives at the Carrell mansion hpping to rekindle their waning romance. This proves difficult, as ever since the incident in the graveyard Guy has been overcome with a crippling, irrational fear of being buried alive. He claims his father suffered from catalepsy, a condition which renders the victim unresponsive to any external stimuli, and as a boy he heard his father screaming from within his tomb on the night of his funeral. Fearing that the condition could be hereditary, Guy is convinced that the same fate will befall him. Guy is able to overcome his fear temporarily on his and Emily’s wedding night, but soon becomes obsessed with building a crypt with dozens of built-in escape aids, including a collapsible coffin, several sticks of dynamite, a hidden escape hatch, several days supply of food and lastly, should all other plans fail, a vial of poison. Emily convinces Miles Archer (Ney), a psychiatrist and old friend, to stay at the mansion to help her cure Guy of his increasingly unhealthy behavior. But someone may be plotting to turn Guy’s unfounded fear into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

PREMATURE BURIAL is a fun, atmospheric little gem that fits perfectly alongside Roger Corman’s Vincent Price-starring Poe films in style and tone. Setting the storyline and performances aside, this film is a treat just to look at, with perfect shot composition that takes full advantage of the widescreen frame and lushly vivacious colors that pop off of the screen, in particular the red candles of a candelabra that resides in Guy’s manor. From the moonlit mists of the moors and the trees that seem to reach out like gnarled hands, every single location is obviously stage-bound, but this blatant artificiality lends the film a sense of heightened unreality that serves to enhance the gothic melodrama of it all.

As far as the performances, there isn’t a weak one in the bunch, though I will admit that I sorely missed the presence of Vincent Price. That’s not to say that Ray Milland is in any way lacking in screen presence. In fact, his portrayal of Guy is appropriately tense and bi-polar, as he swings back and forth between overcoming his fears and embracing them. But Price always brought a certain intensity and subtly knowing sense of humor to these films, a quality which could have greatly served this story.

As it is, though, PREMATURE BURIAL is perfectly serviceable, following just about every beat I’ve come to expect from these flicks, right down to, you guessed it, the “Technicolor Psychedelic Nightmare Freakout” scene, in this instance a lengthy sequence in which Guy imagines that he has awakened inside his fool-proof tomb, only to discover that each and every one of his plans for escape has failed him. None of this is particularly scary, but it wasn’t really meant to be. Like the work of Poe, these films are all about shining a light on man’s fears, both logical and irrational, and obsessions through the creation of a particular mood. I especially appreciated the eerie use of the song “Molly Malone”, whistled by one of the grave robbers during the opening scene and which recurs throughout the picture, sometimes in Guy’s fevered imagination,  and sometimes when a mysterious other is trying to drive him mad. The revelation of just who is messing with Guy’s fragile psyche, by the way, actually threw me for a loop. In retrospect it seems pretty obvious, but Corman and his screenwriters set several reasonable antagonists, only to finally settle on one whom I not only never suspected, but who made perfect sense.

Like the all of the flicks, PREMATURE BURIAL will not be everyone’s cup of tea, particularly those more accustomed to horror films with quicker pacing and gorier grue. These folks will probably find most of the film corny, and they would be absolutely correct in thinking so. I just happen to dig this particular brand of corn a great deal, and strongly suggest that if you’re looking to watch something that is more light in tone, but will still evoke that particular Halloween mood, you can’t go wrong with PREMATURE BURIAL, or any of the Poe films for that matter.

My Rating: 7.5/10

October 2012 Edition #26: INSIDIOUS

Director: James Wan
Screenplay: Leigh Whannell
Starring: Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Ty Simpkins, Lin Shaye, Barbara Hershey
Release Date: April 1st, 2011


Within the first minute of James Wan’s INSIDIOUS I found myself pressed back into the corner of the couch, the hair on my neck standing on end as a dark brown stain formed in my pants and trailed down my leg to mingle with a puddle of my tears. This is my subtle, incredibly tasteful way of saying that the flick definitely had an effect on me. I don’t believe in ghosts and I do not scare easily, yet the imagery, sound design and intense score in this film combined to deliver one of the most consistently pants-shittingly creepy horror films in recent memory.

The premise is very simple, following Josh (Wilson) and Renai (Byrne) Lambert, who move into a new house with their two young boys and a baby. On their first day in the house their oldest son, Dalton, has a nasty spill from a ladder while exploring the attic, and though he doesn’t appear hurt at all, when they go to wake him they find they are unable to. Dalton has slipped into a coma that leaves every doctor baffled. As the months pass and Josh and Renai try to cope with the financial and emotional burden of the situation, Renai begins to notice strange activity around the house. Strange voices can be heard over the baby monitor, objects seem to move without explanation, and eventually sinister, often confrontational apparitions begin appearing in the late hours of the night. Convinced that the house is haunted, Renai persuades Josh to hastily move the family to another, smaller location. But the poltergeist activity continues to torment her at the new house as well, and all of it seems to be centered around her comatose young son. At the behest of Josh’s mother (Hershey), they eventually call in paranormal expert Elise Reiner (Shaye) and her team of ghost hunters to investigate the phenomena, at which point Elise comes to the conclusion that it is no the house that is haunted, but the boy. Dalton, it seems, is an astral projector, one who’s spirit is able to leave his physical body as he sleeps. Not knowing the danger of his hidden talent, Dalton his accidentally gone beyond the spheres of mortal conscience into a place Elise refers to as “The Further”, a dark domain full of spirits and demons who yearn for a physical body to claim as their own. It is these spirits that have been tormenting the family, and one in particular, a black shape with a fiery face full of burning hate, has staked a claim on Dalton, intending to use his body to cause great pain to the ones he loves. I do not want to spoil the rest of the movie, except to say that someone will have to venture into “The Further” to rescue the spirit of the poor child, but it will not be easy, and will come at great personal sacrifice. Perhaps, even, the loss of one’s soul.

With INSIDIOUS director James Wan and writer Leigh Whannell, who previously collaborated on the original SAW, apply a much more restrained approach in weaving this tale of a family being torn apart by some very literal demons. From the very first frame Wan establishes a mood of constant pervasive evil that never waivers, using tried and true low budget techniques to keep audiences on edge. PARANORMAL ACTIVITY director Oren Peli is credited as a producer on this flick, and his influence can be felt not only in the “haunted person” storyline, but in the relatively low-key camerawork. The beginning of the movie features many wide shots of the first house’s interior that recall the angles of the hidden cameras of PARANORMAL ACTIVITY. These shots not only effectively establish the layout of the home, but also lend the movie a certain banality that helps ground it in reality, which only intensifies the scares. When the shits begins to hit fan and certain characters have to investigate strange noises, the camerawork switches to an unsteady handheld style that provides the uneasy sensation that we’re seeing things from the perspective of a demon about to lunge upon them. It’s these little stylistic flourishes that really amped up the tension for me, and to me signal great growth from the director compared to the fast cutting and sensationalism of SAW.

None of this would be at all effective without some damn fine performances from the leads. I’ve always liked Patrick Wilson for his ability to come off as an everyman, despite his pretty-boy appearance and his relationship with Rose Byrne as his wife serves as the emotional anchor of the film. The family seems like a real family, with very relatable problems. I also enjoyed the kooky performance of Lin Shaye as the medium who comes to help the family through their crisis, and her two ghost hunting assistants (one of whom is played by Whannell) who provide some much needed comedic relief to ease the tension.

But much of what made this flick work for me is the amazing sound design and intensely eerie imagery. While a lot is left to our imaginations, we do eventually get to see quite a bit of the ghoulish ghosts terrorizing the family, and for once someone was actually able to deliver the goods when it comes to revealing an initially shadowy antagonist. The main demon in particular is fucking horrifying, a ghastly obsidian figure with a fleetingly-seen red -tinged that is the stuff of nightmares. He looks like Darth Maul, if Darth Maul was the fucking antichrist. Wan even manages to get some good scares in broad daylight, when Renai sees the ghost of a small child dancing in front of a record player playing Tiny Tim’s “Tiptoe Through The Tulips”, a scene which manages to forever ruin that song, and children in general.

The flick did eventually begin to lose my attention during the finale, during which Wilson is forced to venture into “The Further” in order to save his son’s spiritual body. This entire section of the flick is very reminiscent of POLTERGEIST II: THE OTHER SIDE, which featured a similar demonic figure in the guise of Kane taking Carol Anne into his supernatural realm. INSIDIOUS isn’t at all as embarrassingly goofy as that flick, though, and while the final act didn’t quite work for me as well as the first two third of the film, Wan was still able to provide ample disturbing imagery that kept me on edge all the way to the harrowing end.

I’m really upset with myself for waiting this long to see this flick, as I would have loved to see this in a packed house back when it opened. Regardless, INSIDIOUS is an immensely effective film that, much like it’s chief inspiration, POLTERGEIST, knows what scares you.

My Rating: 9/10

October 2012 Edition #25: NOT OF THIS EARTH

Director: Jim Wynorski
Screenplay: R.J. Robertson & Jim Wynorski
Starring: Traci Lords, Arthur Roberts, Lenny Juliano, Roger Lodge
Release Date: May 20th, 1988


NOT OF THIS EARTH is a prime example of producer Roger Corman’s immense ability to pinch a penny for all it is worth until, by some mad act of alchemy, he seems to produce a movie from nothing. With this remake of his 1957 film of the same name he has recreated the no-budget look and spirit of his earlier work, albeit with a 1980’s makeover. The film was the result of a wager between Corman and director Jim Wynorski (CHOPPING MALL) wherein Wynorski bet that he could remake the ’57 film on the same budget and the same shooting schedule of twelve days. He ended up winning the bet, finishing the film up in 11 ½ days, resulting in a patchwork of a film with whole scenes from other Corman-produced films edited in as filler to (barely) string the story along.

That story involves an alien (Roberts) from a dying world landing on Earth with the purpose of harvesting his species’ primary source of food: blood. Assuming the guise of a regular-looking middle-aged dude wearing black shades, he quickly sets up shop in a Los Angeles mansion and, going under the alias of Mr. Johnson,  pays Nadine (Lords) to stay as his live-in nurse, giving him daily blood transfusions to stave off his hunger. Despite these daily feedings, he still finds the time to stalk the streets and neighborhoods of L.A. at night, draining nubile nymphs and hookers of their plasma, when he’s not busy receiving transmissions from his home world detailing their ultimate goal: total world domination.

There’s a bit more to the plot than that, but to spend any more time explaining this flick would be giving it more thought than the people who made it. As previously mentioned, the flick was shot in under twelve days, looks like it was shot for the cost of a pack of ‘cigarettes, but nothing fancy like Basics.  More likely Pyramids The movie’s chief selling point is the casting of Traci Lords, who up until this point had starred solely in hardcore pornography. It seems that the goal here was to show off her comedic acting chops, but mostly what she does is blandly read her lines while wearing clothing that consists solely of a nurse’s uniform, a ridiculously tiny bikini, or just nothing at all. So basically, business as usual for Ms. Lords. Not that I’m complaining or anything, but aside from her undeniable assets she doesn’t bring much to the table as far as charm or likeability, other than my wishing to see her boobs come to no harm.

When she isn’t busy sunbathing or toweling herself off in the nude, most of her screen time is spent engaging in inane, supposedly “witty” banter with  Mr. Johnson’s butler Jeremy (Juliano), a beefy ex-con doofus who spends most of his time slobbering over Nadine, much to her police officer boyfriend’s chagrin. So we get lots of scenes of these folks hanging around the mansion, and then occasionally Mr. Johnson will sneak off into the night to drink more blood, at which point the director decided to shave a few bucks off of the budget by splicing in scenes from HUMANOIDS FROM THE DEEP. Rather than hire another actress or find another shooting location, Wynorski instead opted to shoot footage of Roberts lurking outside of a window, occasionally cutting to these shots while a scene of a girl talking on the phone from the older movie plays. If I wasn’t already familiar with HUMANOIDS…(which, by the way, is an awesome fucking amphibious rape-monster flick) I might have been fooled. But I wasn’t, and instead was just annoyed by the cheap cynicism behind it all.

I will admit there is a certain charm to the general shittiness on display here, and I did enjoy the fact that half of the cast of Wynorski’s CHOPPING MALL showed up at various points. But it really says something when the best part of a movie is it’s opening credits, which consists entirely of scenes taken from other, trashier, far more entertaining Corman movies, including GALAXY OF TERROR, previous SIHS entry FORBIDDEN WORLD, HUMANOIDS FROM THE DEEP, and PIRANHA. It takes a special kind of demented freak to derive any enjoyment from a ball of rotten cheese such as this, and though I am certainly just such a demented fuck-wad, I cannot in good conscience recommend this flick to anyone but the most hardcore fans of Z-grade cinema. The movie does feature eleventy pairs of boobs, though, so make of that information what you will. The best I can say about this movie is that, through clever editing of scenes from older movies into their storyline, the filmmakers were very creative in displaying their utter lack of imagination.

My Rating: 4/10