The Green Inferno

(2015)****

A group of activists set out to stop the deforestation of a rain forest in Peru. Their plane goes down in a remote area and a local tribe mistaking them for employees of the company destroying their home imprisons them and has a feast. If you would like a more detailed synopsis please refer to JSP's review. I cannot help but to make comparison to Cannibal Holocaust since the subject matter is similar. I can say that I hated the characters far less in The Green Inferno (with the exception of Alejandro) as the majority of them were wholeheartedly trying to do good and just ended up receiving the shit end of the stick due to circumstance and this is where it vastly differs from it's predecessor. The documentarians in Cannibal Holocaust were straight up assholes, disrespectful, destructive assholes and they got what they deserved. In this aspect there was a level of justice to the outcome although the film was far more disturbing to me than this one and I can mostly account that to the fate of that poor turtle. Still there are many cringe-worthy scenes and some real unexpected shockers in The Green Inferno's bag of tricks. I find it amusing that JSP's friend posted a negative comment in hopes of deterring potential viewers but in actuality roped in at least two of us to do just the opposite. Won't people ever learn? If you want something to go away just ignore it, the more buzz you create either positive or negative will guarantee it will be sticking around for awhile.

Crazy Bitches

(2015)*

Six girlfriends and a flamboyantly gay male friend go on vacation to a cabin where a notorious mass murder had taken place. In no time at all bitches are being slain one after the other. Yada, yada, yada.
No likeable characters, bad acting, lame plot, the comic relief is horribly annoying and get this guys, every time a sex scene gets hot they cut away before you get to see any boobs! I cannot think of one redeemable quality about this film. Worse than Dark Shade Creek and even worse than Lake Noir, at least they made an effort to make their killers scary. Heed my warning and stay away!

Timelapse

(2015) ****

Aspiring artist but creatively blocked Finn is the superintendent of an LA bungalow-style apartment complex. His sleazy roommate, Jasper plays the horses and has dreams of unlimited wealth and power. Finn’s girlfriend, Callie, is an aspiring writer who also shares the rent. When it is suspected that the elderly man living across the complex from them has died, the trio investigates. Inside his apartment they discover a room festooned with pictures of their apartment front window. A large machine is bolted to the floor and they soon ascertain that the apparatus is a giant camera that takes daily pictures of their apartment. After examining the pictures they determine that the camera takes one Polaroid picture every night at 8pm providing a 24 hour glimpse of the future.



The group soon figures out they can receive messages from their future selves. Initially this works out well as they quickly exploit the situation. Future Jasper holds up the results of the daily horse races making them rich and Finn is able to see the paintings that his future self paints which unlocks his creativity block. However when the photographs begin to portray more sinister images they attempt to recreate the images (e.g. Jasper and Callie making out) out of a fear that any deviation will mean death (“Don’t fuck with time”) given the fate of the original camera’s owner. The fatalistic question becomes whether they fall in line with the photos’ predictions because it is inevitable, or because they’re using them as an ongoing guide?



I love time travel stories and this one is captivating. Like all time-travel stories I am certain that the internal logic can be picked apart, however if you simply go with the premise of the story you will be intrigued by this well-crafted tale as the situation becomes increasingly complicated and the relationships begin to disintegrate. As is often the case, power, corruption and lies become their undoing. If I had one nitpick it is that the characters are not very likable to begin with so their inevitable fates do not resonate as strongly. Still, you won’t care; you will just want to see what is in the next photograph…

The Houses October Built

(2014)**1/2

A group of spooky house junkies decide to rent an RV and tour the country looking for the scariest haunted house attractions. They are trucking along just fine until they piss off one group by filming inside the attraction. The actors demand the film be erased immediately but of course our guys tell them to fuck off and drive away. They continue their trip but soon after realize they are being followed by these crazy people but they still refuse to hand over the goods. Things escalate and bad stuff happens.

There are several reasons to not give this film a decent rating, first and foremost is the fact that the cameraman is a dick for not respecting the requests of his subjects. Seriously, haunted house attractions are all about the mystery of not knowing what is around the next corner. If they gave him the thumbs up to film that's one thing but going in with the intention of showing others what to expect is just being an asshole so from that point on I was rooting for the creepy clown and his posse. Secondly, once they realized these people were crazy enough to actually close down their house just to chase them down for a film they should have realized things were going to get ugly and just handed the damn thing over. Of course they don't which made me have zero sympathy for any of them, you reap what you sow. The extra 1/2 star is for the creepy porcelain doll faced girl, if that thing was following me I would have given them the whole camera. In conclusion, though this review may make it sound like the film was fast paced it was in fact slow and redundant. Going to spooky houses is fun, watching other people go through them on film not so much.

Crimson Peak

(2015) ***1/2


Directed by Guillermo del Toro, the visuals in this movie were beautiful! I almost gave it four stars, but the ending left me with a few questions hanging in the air-which are still unanswered.
Placed in 1887, this love/ghost story definitely holds your attention.
Young Edith has been seeing the ghost of her recently passed mother, who warns her"beware the crimson peak".
 She grows up to become a writer of ghost fiction which is frowned upon by men. They try to convince her to write love stories instead but they are failures. She decides to try to send her last ghost story to New York to be published, but before she does, young handsome fella Sir Thomas Sharpe picks it up and takes a liking to it. He charms her by sending it himself, romancing her to win her heart and has many outings with Edith and his sister Lucille. Her father notices rather quickly and puts an end to it. The next day, his body is found in the bath house. Edith is then whisked away to Allerdale Hall to become his wife but she soon discovers she has made a mistake! Many noises are heard...many ghosts are being seen!

I do recommend seeing this movie specially for the twists, just keep in mind you might be confused about a couple of thing..minor things.

We Are Still Here

(2015)****

Older couple moves to an old house in a new town to try to forget the recent death of their adult son.  Then, strange things start to happen. 

I won’t take the time to rehash the plot since it has been reviewed a number of times here already, but suffice it to say, I agree whole-heartedly.  Quality VOD horror is a rare find, but it seems there have been a number of really entertaining ones this year!  Tales of Halloween, Xmas Horror Story, and this one.  I was actually really tempted to go higher on my rating, but the awkward acting job of the two main leads was a little too noticeable at some points.  But on the plus side, this was definitely the scariest movie I saw this year.  I woke up a number of times in the nights afterwards, thinking about the burned children and their “hot hands”.  

Very glad I learned about this one.  Thanks Horrorthon!

Ash vs Evil Dead

STARZ network

(2015) *****

It has been 23 years since Ash last tangled with the deadites. Time has not been kind to him. He is 30 pounds heavier and when he is not working as the senior stock boy at Save Stop he spends his nights at the local watering hole picking up women during last call. One evening after a particularly poor decision he unwittingly brings back an ancient evil he thought he would never confront again.

For those concerned that an Evil Dead television series would tarnish the memories of the cult movies I am pleased to report that Ash Vs Evil Dead delivers the goods on all fronts. The horror comedy never misses a chance to shock with extreme gore or make you laugh at Ash’s buffoonery. The pilot episode written by Sam Rami and Bruce Cambell could easily be a cinematic sequel to Army of Darkness. With his chainsaw literally in hand and his ‘boomstick’ on his back, Ash easily slips into his warrior mode to take care of business through a brisk hour of non-stop carnage. There are 10 episodes to the series and it has just been renewed for a second season. Find a copy immediately!

Let Us Prey

 (2014) ***1/2

After watching Last Shift which involved a female rookie cop left alone in a station, I couldn't resist following up with this Scottish film which had a similar premise. Both films turned out to be quite good.

Rookie cop Rachel starts her first shift with a man who is brought in after a hit and run an incident, weird thing is that the victim, an old vagrant, disappeared. The old man shows up at the station and weird things begin happening. The four men being held in the cells all feel they have been incarcerated in error and just want to be released. Their obvious guilt has a way of surfacing as one by one their inner demons are revealed. No one is safe, including the veteran cops on duty who are harboring their own secrets. As the night goes on madness ensues erupting in rage and violence.

This film stands out by taking a familiar situation and turning it into something unique and engaging. Backed by some very good actors Liam Cunningham (Game of Thrones, Dog Soldiers) and Pollyanna McIntosh (The Woman) the film seems to have a life of it's own as the violence escalates and secrets are revealed. A fun film to watch, what baffles me is why the Scottish don't make more horror films with credits like Dog Soldiers and The Wicker Man on their list I don't get it because it sure seems like they know how to get it right.

The Talented Mr. Ripley

(1999) ****

Tom Ripley is a peaceful piano tuner/player in New York City in the 1950s.  After a performance one afternoon, the wealthy shipping magnate, Mr. Greenleaf notices Tom's Princeton blazer, and assumes Tom must be friends with his son, Dickie, who is living the life of luxury in Italy and refuses to come home.  Mr. Greenleaf wants his son to return home.  He could just cut off his son's allowance, but instead, he asks this nice piano player to go to Italy and convince him that working in NYC is way better than luxury on the Italian coast.  Rather than do so, Ripley ends up enjoying Italy so much that he decides to stay there and spin a web of lies intricate enough to be bank rolled and stay forever.

The Talented Mr. Ripley is a fantastic psychological thriller that shows off the young talents of Matt Damon, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Cate Blanchett, and Phillip Seymour Hoffman.  Just look how cute they were 16 years ago...

Actually, Paltrow looks exactly the same.  Funny.

Damon's performance as a killer is disturbing.  It never seems as though he intends to kill.  He backs himself into corners where his lies become so tangled that murder becomes his only option.  Of all the serial killer movies out there, this is one where the murderer is genuinely disturbed by his actions. The scene where he lays and spoons with his first victim as he bleeds out is chilling.  Wonderful acting, beautifully shot on location throughout Italy, but loses a star for what frankly, is a ridiculous opening premise as noted above.

The Hands Of Orlac

 (1924)****

Orlac is a famous pianist who loses his hands in an unfortunate train accident. After much begging from his loving wife, a brilliant surgeon replaces his hands with those of an executed killer. When Orlac realizes what has been done he struggles with the evil that his hands have committed. Even though he is reassured, "The hands don't rule the person...the head and heart lead the body...and command the hands..." Orlac isn't buying it and when his father is murdered he becomes sure that he has committed the crime even though he has no memory of it. It is a long and complex struggle between good and evil all within his own mind, or is it? Could there be some other source of foul play at work here?

I love to dig up at least one or two of these old relics each year. There is so much emotion conveyed in these silent films through exaggerated gesture, truly a lost art. I could feel his struggle and sympathized with Orlac and his poor wife. What tormented souls they became all through an act of healing. If I have a complaint it is that the film seemed much longer than it actually was, time passes slowly when the world is silent.

Dark Shade Creek

(2012)*

To review this I first need to explain why this piece of crap is on my list in the first place. Typically much of my Horrorthon viewing is done alone in the evenings since my husband works evenings. Having honed my system of selection over the years, I enjoy the freedom of choosing films I feel I would like and so far have been pretty consistent at finding ones that are at the very least watchable/enjoyable. This year I was excited to know my dear husband would be taking a weeks vacation so that we could enjoy the final stretch of Horrorthon together. Yikes! What the hell was I thinking? This is a man who puts on a Troma worthy zombie flick EVERY SINGLE NIGHT when we go to bed! My dreams are often invaded by these weak representations who call themselves zombies. So I thought telling him that I was trying to avoid zombie films this year would help my situation, he picked this instead. A film so bad Troma would have sent them packing. Want to know the plot? A group of too old to be teens that would never in a million years hang out together go to some back wooded area to party. In spite of the numerous warnings from the locals, including the sheriff about a resident who went mad after overdosing on acid and the knowledge of numerous murders taking place there they decide it's still a good idea to go. Soooo...murder and mayhem, crappy fx like blood being thrown on trees, a killer with a big ugly head and a blond with terrible 80's hair. Unbelievably this big headed psychopath is somehow immortal Jason Voorhees style and by God they made a sequel that I can tell you will never grace my tv screen, at least while I'm awake anyway. I think next year I will urge the hubby to take Christmas week off.