A Horrible Return To The Film Review Lagoon
Oh, yes. He has been away and his eye muscles have been busy, ladies an' gents. A lot of horror movies in this one, but hey, why should today be any different. It goes without saying that there are spoilers here, but only for the movies that were terrible. In fact, an inverse relationship between the badness of the movie and the amount I talk about it should be a well-established trend by now. Let's get the ball rolling, film monkeys.


Death Race

Amazingly, a Jason Statham movie besides "Snatch" that was actually entertaining. Who figured it would be a remake of 70's cult classic "Death Race 2000" ? Certainly not I. The film did acknowledge its roots by having David Carradine, who starred as the driver Frankenstein in the original, to do the voice of the driver Statham was to replace. Although not a masterpiece of the cinematic field, it was most definitely a good popcorn movie, and is one of the few successes Paul W.S. Anderson has had since "Event Horizon". It's also the closest thing we're going to get to a Twisted Metal Black movie, for reasons I won't go into. Not expecting much to start, my only knock against it was it took place in a massive private prison, as opposed to being cross-country and having the iconic "pedestrians, 10 points each" factor. Still, if you got four bucks and liked Death Proof, you can risk giving it a rent.


Eagle Eye

Now, I'm about as Shia LaBeouf-ed as everybody else at this point (I'll make an exception for Transformers 2, but that's strictly an inner child thing), considering his style of acting can be summed up as saying "go go go" urgently. He does manage to play that down in Eagle Eye to his credit, though it will still occasionally smack you in the face. The movie has a slight sci-fi edge that I won't go into detail about, but fans of suspense should enjoy it regardless. Billy Bob Thorton gave a fine performance, although I get the sense that half of Rosario Dawson's scenes ended up on the cutting room floor. Ultimately, the film is entertaining, but watching this with Death Race back-to-back might melt your brain. 


Midnight Meat Train

Despite sounding like a gay porno, the film had some of the best shots I've seen in an American horror movie in some time. It's rare that someone can actually make a 360 CGI shot look near-flawless, but they did deliver. The story, which Clive Barker admits he wrote while tripping major balls, starts easy enough and then just sort of wanders at the tail end. This isn't to say it's a bad movie. In fact, in points, it's a very good movie, and Barker's sense of dread still comes across well. The ending was such that it was like having a wonderful meal, and then having a passing waiter accidently fart in your face while your mouth was open. It's forgivable, but still leaves a bad taste in your mouth. Vinnie Jones did great though, proving that once again, if you give him a role with only one line in an entire movie, he will play that shit to the hilt.


Sex Drive

Funnier than "Road Trip", not as funny as "Superbad". But if you ever wanted to see Seth Green play a sarcastic Amish, and see a talking donut with one of those suction-cup dildos stuck to it, by all means, knock yourself out.


House

I was disappointed by this one considering how interesting "The Visitation" was. The plot was like a plane being controlled by Michael J. Fox and co-piloted by a hyperactive mongoose on meth, bobbing and weaving everywhere. (Yes, yes,  I know I'm going to hell.) While the acting wasn't atrocious, the movie never actually managed to ESTABLISH anything, like a kid who can't sit still. Plus, I've got news. Stories about being in a scary place and it turns out it was purgatory and if you won or lost the test determined if you lived or died? Never was a viable theme, never will be.


Let The Right One In

People who know me know that I hate vampires most of the time. I feel Bram Stroker ruined the entire mythology by making them beings of sexuality, rather than beings of slaughter and decay. That said, this movie, direct from Sweden of all places, managed to endear itself to me anyway. It was perhaps the fact that the vampire in question was a 12 year-old girl with no sexuality whatsoever except to the 12 year-old boy who lives next door to her. There is never any major sexual tones to the film, her state of being thought of more as a medical condition that she and her human "father" take care of by harvesting victims, while the relationship between she and the young male lead is more that state of love conceived of before one had sexual urges. All in all, I enjoyed it, and think others cynics of the "modern" vampire themes would to. Eat it, "Twilight."


Jumper

Proof, if nothing else, that Hayden Christiansen can act, and just got handed a really shitty script in "Star Wars" Parts 2 &3.  I'm sure the book was better, although the movie wasn't god-awful. It was an interesting premise, backed by decent acting, and on occasion, somewhat predictable turns. Catch it on HBO or TV, but I wouldn't  pay cash for it.


[REC]*

Although remade as the American release "Quarantine", the Spanish original version is the one you want to see. Where "Quarantine" was bumbling and disjointed as a cheap "28 Days Later" knock off, this film never really explained whether there was a disease at all, giving a number of possible explanations that the viewer can draw their own conclusions from. Also, the constant first-person horror conundrum of "why the fuck are they still filming everything" is given reprieve, as the main characters are the only reporters on the scene and aren't about to stop filming. My only complaint doesn't actually come from this movie, but from its remake, who completely ruined the last scene of the movie by including it in its own trailer AND PUTTING IT ON THE POSTER. Still, half the fun is getting there, so by all means, torrent it as actual non-Blu-Ray copies are in short supply last time I checked.


Mutant Chronicles

Boy, am I glad I didn't pay to see this in the theaters. Although having an impressive cast with Thomas Jane, Ron Perlman, and John Malkovitch Malkovitch Malkovitch, the story didn't know how to finish strong, and lost steam about half-way through. It slowly turned into another Thomas-Jane-as-the-lone-badass-survivor epic, killing off about half the cast in a lackluster battle two-thirds of the way in. The one thing I do respect this film for, was taking chances. Alternate Earth circa World War I where everything is ruled by four corporations? Paid off. Steampunk space ships fueled by coal? Weird, but still very, very cool. Hero getting turned into villain to be fought at the final battle? Sorry pal, snake-eyes.


Pineapple Express

The best comedy to feature James Franco crying on a swing set while eating a burger. 


Repo! The Genetic Opera

Despite being very, very goth and containing Paris Hilton, I actually liked this movie a bit. The creator has promised a follow-up, and I suggest that he take his time to both hire a better songwriter and not put in explanatory cut-away cinematics that ruin the flow of the movie. The art direction was fantastic though, and one or two songs were catchy. Plus, Paul Sorvino can really belt 'em out. And it followed Opera themes enough that what I couldn't enjoy, I could respect.

Rocknrolla

Guy Ritchie has yet to make a British gangster movie I could say no to, and this one is no different. The snappy back and forth, the strange facsimiles of men, the copious amount of drugs and good looking women the male leads really have to work at; it's all just gravy. Also, the soundtrack compliments absolutely every scene. Don't feel disappointed by the ending as being slightly anti-climactic, as this is the first of Guy Ritchie's "Rocknrolla trilogy". Also, if there isn't in fact a band out in the real world right now called Johnny Quid and the Quid-Lickers, there should be. Don't rent this, buy this. And get the Director's Cut, you cheap punk.

Max Payne

Play the game. Stop encouraging Mark Whalberg to do anything besides "The Departed" quality work. I mean, what the hell Mark? First you get a role that should have belonged to co-star John Leguizamo in "The Happening" and now this? Mila Kunis was good and all, but shit, this was not the game. Look, get yourself a nice indie script, take a week off, and then maybe star in something nice with Chris Nolan at the helm, huh?


Time Crimes

Proof again that Europe is kicking our ass in the horror department, Time Crimes could easily be called "Why People With No Knowledge of Temporal Mechanics Shouldn't Time Travel."  The lead, a married man more boring than dirt, happens to spy a girl getting naked at the tree line near his rural home. Playing binocular tag for a bit as his wife mills around, he eventually sets off to get a closer look, only to find her dead, and then be stabbed in the arm by a psychopath in with a pink bandaged face. He runs, hiding in a science lab with a researcher who puts him in an enormous contraption... and then crawls out of it an hour and a half before he went in. Things only get worse from there.
Although predictable, it's designed to be, and half the fun is seeing how its going to get from point A to point B, and whether he'll be able to change anything at all. 
The cinematographer needs to be wild-fucked by a Parisian mistress of 5000 bucks a night caliber for managing what he did with moving shots, and the actors did well enough to make some occasionally not-so-great written reactions seem believable. Though less of a horror movie than "High Tension", it still ranks as one of the better European horror films I've seen in awhile.

The Strangers

Oh god, I still can't get the scent of this movie out of my clothes. It's like someone excised a tumor, and the tumor decided it wanted to make it big in Hollywood. The tumor naturally had competition, so it drove its competitor script-maker for the studio off the road, even going so far as to attend the funeral to assuage himself of guilt. The tumor got the script approved, but had its vision shat upon by a big Hollywood executive. Hiring his mistress to plant a cardiac-arrest inducing drug in his wine, he was free only until the mistress demanded more cash from him. Pushing her off a boat after a faux romantic dinner, he was only found out by an intrepid gossip reporter. This is the story of that tumor.


Tropic Thunder

See the director's cut. No, no, not the regular cut. Director's. This movie was actually so funny, I shit myself on three separate occasions. Comedies should rate themselves on such a system, of one to three pants. Tom Cruise is hidden somewhere in the film, and I didn't even care that his Scientology spouting ass was it in. Matthew McConaughey was actually GOOD, for fuck's sake. Ben Stiller has proven he has directing chops, and I encouraging him to stop doing kids movies to do some kind of similar film. Jack Black manages to channel some hidden depth of rage at being typecast as a kid's movie star, no doubt taking tips from Robert Downy Jr. on how to act like you really need some coke. Good stuff. Buy it. Now, motherfucker, now!


Zack and Miri Make A Porno

Aside from the fact that this movie contains the deplorable human being that is Traci Lords, this had all the classic funny points that make for a good Kevin Smith flick. It was like a fusion of Chasing Amy and Mallrats, centering more on the nature of independent film than relationships. (Making a boom mic out of a hockey stick and duct tape, borrowing that one friend who shoots amateur video, etc.) Despite intense Seth Rogen saturation of the film scene, he still fits perfectly into the role, although you can clearly tell that Elizabeth Banks, while good, is trying to do things as the original female lead meant for the scene, one Rosario Dawson, would have delivered them. Keep in mind that Katie Morgan does actually sound like that in real life, but she's still in MENSA and you're not. Expect good things from the almost completely improvised conversation between "new Superman" Brandon Routh and Justin Long.

Knowing

So let me get this straight.... Aliens tell a girl fifty years before the fact the date and GPS coordinates of every major disaster for the next 50 years by whispering numbers into her head. Fifty years goes by, and then they miraculously start again, with new kids, after the numbers were rediscovered. And it's all to warn people that the sun is going to flare and destroy the ozone, and need to get to designated spaceship pickup areas. Except the only ones who can go are the ones who can hear the aliens.

...

What kind of douchebag space race does something like that? Fifty fucking years of cryptic writings and then you only take the psychic ones?!? God forbid you take anything but kids onto some new homeworld, leaving everybody else to burn horribly you cosmic ass-pirates! 

This aside, the story suffers from a number of other problems. Nick Cage didn't ruin the movie, but nothing could really help it. When you have a scientist who's lost their wife and their father is a minister, the cliches kind of write themselves. Alien assholes and their convoluted space plans aside, the movie's one saving grace was the ability to depict the chaos of a fresh disaster, and the vision of burning animals running out of the forest was second only to the plane crash scene. Still, not enough to save it. Fuckin' aliens, man.


That's it. Go read a book.