Category Archives: Film Review

Review: Orphan (dir. by Jaume Collet-Serra)

Posted on by Arleigh

There has been a complaint which has been getting louder and louder for the past several years from both horror and mainstream film fans. The complaint is that horror films of late have either been remakes or another sequel. While this complaint is not exclusive to the horror genre (non-horror genres have had the same problem) it is more prevalent and happens more often. Once in awhile a film will come out that tries to be different and put out an original story. Spanish director Jaume Collet-Serra has done just that with his second foray into feature filmmaking with Orphan. While the film won’t win many awards and become the critical darling the way Let the Right One In did Collet-Serra’s Orphan does bring a fresh new take on the evil child subgenre. Despite some of the flaws and script problems the film does entertain throughout most of its running time until it loses steam in the final 15 minutes.

Jaume Collet-Serra first got his start directing the 2005 remake of House of Wax. A film more famous (infamous in some people’s eye) for being the first major film of socialite Paris Hilton. A film that deservedly got panned by critics, but still did well enough in the box-office to put horror fans on notice that Collet-Serra might be a filmmaker to keep an eye on. Orphan marks his second full-lenght feature and using the screenplay by David Leslie Johnson, Collet-Serra tries a hand in the evil child subgenre which has more than it’s share of classic titles like The Omen, The Bad Seed and The Good Son. While this subgenre of horror usually means some sort of demonic-possession or some sort of mental or genetic abnormality causing for their psychotic or sociopathic behavior, in Orphan an interesting reason was given to the nature of it’s titual character.

The film begins with a harrowing and quite disturbing scene of the Vera Farmiga’s character pregnant and in labor, but also starting to miscarriage her child. The graphic nature of the scene quickly lays down the hammer that Orphan will not hold things back just because childen will be involved throughout most of it’s running time. We then see Farmiga’s Kate and her husband John (played by Peter Sarsgaard) at the local orphanage as they attempt to fix their family and ease Kate’s emotional turmoil over the miscarriage by adopting a child. They meet Esther a 9-year-old Russian orphan girl who seem to be the perfect child at first glance. Esther’s well-spoken and well-mannered at such a young age. Esther soon becomes part of John and Kate’s young family which consists of a younger deaf daughter named Max and a son named Daniel. While Max accepts Esther as a new older sister Daniel senses something just off-putting about Esther and reacts much more coldly towards his new dopted sister.

The majority of Orphan‘s second and first half of the third and final reel shows Esther’s true nature peek through the facade of Old World genteel and proper behavior. 12-year-old Isabelle Fuhrmann does an excellent job portraying the sociopathic and manipulative Esther. It is difficult to believe that a child actor of her age able to tackle such a dark role and actually pull it off without making the character too over-the-top or campy. In fact, no matter how one thinks of the performances of the rest of the film’s cast (Farmiga does a good job in the Cassandra-role with Sarsgaard an average performance as the hapless and clueless husband) this film is totally Fuhrmann’s and she sticks the landing.

While the film tries to make something original (and most of it is to a point) out of a tried-and-true model of the evil child storyline the script doesn’t hold up through the length of the film. The story itself is quite interesting when one really steps back to look at it, but there’s several leaps in logic the Kate character makes which will illicit more than a few confused reactions (running away from incoming help and into the dark, unknown being a major one). The dialogue itself is serviceable with none of it wince-inducing. There’s just a sense that the film’s reveal in the end of the film as to Esther’s true nature was just handled in a very clumsy manner. The twist is very original but the execution of that reveal after the tense and very brutal 40-50 minutes before it comes off quite flat. Orphan definitely looked like a script which was in need of several more rewrites to reconcile the first 3/4’s of the film with the final part. Yet, despite the ridiculous manner in which the final 10-15 minutes unfolds Collet-Serra manages to keep the film from dragging along through two hours. It actually plays much faster for a film with such a long running time.

In the end, Orphan marks a decidedly better effort from Jaume Collet-Serra, but one which still shows that he has some polishing to do to join the ranks of better horror directors of his generation. The film is enjoyable enough if given a chance. Most horror fans will enjoy the film and some may even embrace it because of the silly ending. Mainstream audiences looking for a change of pace from the strum und drang of the summer blockbuster season could do no worse than Orphan. It is not a perfect film and not even an above-average one, but it is a good horror film that tried to add something new to the genre, but hampered by a storyline that cannot sustain the tension it built-up and the brutality it showcased. In the hands of a much more seasoned filmmaker with a better hashed out screenplay Orphan could’ve become an instant classic.

Review: Sole Survivor (Dir. by Thom Eberhardt)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In my “which movie should I review poll” 1983’s Sole Survivor came in dead last, receiving a total of 3 votes out of the 234 cast.  I really wasn’t surprised to see that because Sole Survivor, along with having a dreadfully generic title, isn’t really that well-known.  I found the DVD at Half-Price Books where it was being sold for a dollar in the clearance section.  If not for the fact that I can’t resist a bargain, I would never have heard of this movie either.  Which is a shame because, taken on its own low-budget terms, Sole Survivor is actually a pretty effective horror film.

Written and directed by Thom Eberhardt, Sole Survivor has a plot that should be familiar with anyone who has ever seen any of the Final Destination films.  Denise (played by an actress named Anita Skinner) is a neurotic commercial producer who, as the film opens, is the sole survivor of a horrendous airplane crash.  (When we first see Denise, she’s still sitting in her seat, surrounded by the remains of her fellow passengers.)  Against the advice of just about everyone, Denise insists on dealing with the trauma of the accident by trying to return to her normal life.  This is complicated, however, by the fact that she’s still having dreams about the plane crash.  Everywhere she looks, she sees mysterious and menacing strangers watching her.  And, on top of everything else, she is now being stalked by a mentally unstable former actress who claims to be having nightmarish visions of Denise’s future.  Is Denise suffering from survivor’s guilt (as her doctor boyfriend insists) or is she instead being pursued by Death?  If you’ve ever seen a horror film, you can probably guess the answer.

As I mentioned previously, its easy to compare Sole Survivor with the Final Destination films.  However, a more appropriate comparison would be to the 1962 black-and-white classic Carnival of Souls.  Whereas the Final Destination films are largely about coming up with ludicrously convoluted ways for Death to get what he or she wants, Sole Survivor (like Carnival of Souls)  is less concerned with how Death gets the job done and more concerned with building and maintaining a growing sense of dread and hopelessness.  For the most part, director Eberhardt disdains easy shock effects in order to concentrate on building up a palpable atmosphere of doom.  As a result, the film can occasionally seem to be a little slow but it stays with you even after the final credit. 

Also, much like Carnival of Souls, Sole Survivor features an excellent lead performance from an actress who, more or less, disappeared from movie screens after the film’s release.  Carnival had Candace Hilligoss.  Sole Survivor has Anita Skinner.  Skinner gives an excellent lead performance, always remaining a sympathetic.  According to an interview with the film’s producers, Skinner was uncomfortable with the more excessive side of Hollywood and retired from acting shortly after making Sole Survivor.

Sole Survivor was released on DVD by Code Red, so now people like me can appreciate this neglected movie.  The transfer looks great.  Unfortunately, the DVD is pretty thin when it comes to extras.  Neither Eberhadt nor Skinner are interviewed nor do they contribute to the film’s commentary track.  Instead, we have to make due with the film’s producers.  In general, producers usually provide the worst DVD commentary tracks with typical insights running along the lines of “We had the same lawyer” and “So, after that, we brought in another screenwriter.”  The producers of Sole Survivor aren’t quite that bad but their commentary is still definitely lacking in insight. 

But that’s a minor complaint.  In the end, what matters is the movie and not the commentary track.  And as a movie, Sole Survivor is a an overlooked classic of the horror genre.

Review: Anatomy of a Murder (Dir. by Otto Preminger)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last Friday, I randomly selected 10 movies from my DVD library and I asked you, this site’s wonderful readers, to vote on which one of those movies I should watch and then review.  234 votes were cast and the winner (by two votes!) is the 1959 courtroom classic Anatomy of a Murder.

First off, a confession of my own.  When I’m not reviewing movies or chattering away on twitter, I work in a law office.  Before anyone panics, I’m not a lawyer, I just hang out with a couple of them.  For the most part, I answer the phone, I schedule appointments, and I keep all the files in alphabetical order.  On a few very rare occasions, I’ve accompanied my boss to court and the thing that has always struck me about real-life courtroom drama is how boring it all really is.  There are no surprise witnesses, no impassioned closing statements, and those all trail rarely, if ever, jump to their feet and start yelling that they’re innocent.  For the most part, real life lawyers are usually just as poorly groomed and bored with their work as the rest of us.  Don’t even get me started on the judges, the majority of whom seem to have judgeships because they weren’t really making the grade as an attorney. 

As a result, it’s rare that I get much out of seeing lawyer-centric movies or tv shows any more.  After seeing the reality of it, I find fictionalized courtroom theatrics to be ludicrous and, for the most part, evidence of a lazy writer.  However, I’m happy to say that last night, I discovered that — no matter how jaded I may now be about the legal process — Anatomy of a Murder is still one of my favorite movies.

Based on a best-selling novel and directed by the notorious Otto Preminger, Anatomy of a Murder tells the story of Paul Beigler (James Stewart), a former district attorney who is now in private practice after having been voted out of office.  Having apparently fallen into a state of ennui, Beigler spends his time drinking with another alcoholic attorney (Arthur O’Connell) and trying to avoid his secretary’s (Eve Arden) attempts to get paid.

However, things change for Beigler when he is hired to defend an army officer named Frederick Manion (Ben Gazzara).  Manion has been arrested for murdering a bar own named Barney Quill.  Manion says that he was justified in committing the murder because Quill raped his wife, Laura (Lee Remick).  Others claim that Manion is himself just a notoriously violent bully and that the openly flirtatious Laura was having an affair with Quill.  Despite strongly disliking Manion and disturbed by Laura’s own obvious instability, Beigler takes on the case.

Beigler decides to argue that Manion was temporarily insane when he shot Quill and that he was acting on “irresistible impulse.”  As shaky as that line of defense might seem, it’s not helped by the fact that Manion himself is a bit of a brute.  Meanwhile, Beigler finds himself facing not the innefectual D.A. in court but instead a young, ambitious prosecutor from the State Attorney General’s Office, Claude Dancer (played by a young and obviously ambitious George C. Scott).  As the trial begins, small hints start to appear that seem to indicate that there’s a lot more to the murder of Barney Quill than anyone realizes…

Director Otto Preminger is an odd figure in film history.  Up until the early 60s, he was a consistently interesting director who made intelligent, well-acted films that often challenged then-contemporary moral attitudes.  However, once the 60s hit, he became something of a parody of the egotistical, old school, autocratic filmmaker and his films seemed to suffer as a result.  Like many of the film industry’s top directors, he found himself adrift once the 60s and 70s hit.  His decline was so dramatic that, as a result, there’s a tendency to forget that he made some truly great and important films, like Laura, Carmen Jones, The Man With The Golden Arm, and, of course, Anatomy of a Murder.

Anatomy of a Murder represents Preminger at his best.  His own natural tendency towards embracing melodrama and shock are  perfectly balanced with an intelligent script and memorable performances.  Whereas later Preminger films would often come across as little more than big screen soap operas, here he makes the sordid believable and compelling.  Preminger has never gotten much attention as a visual filmmaker but here, he uses black-and-white to perfectly capture the grayness of the both the film’s location and the moral issues that the film raises.  He keeps the camera moving without ever calling attention to it.  As a result, the movie has an almost documentary feel to it.

As previously stated, Preminger gets a lot of help from a truly amazing cast.  At first, it’s somewhat strange to imagine a Golden Age icon like Jimmy Stewart appearing in the same film as a dedicated method actor like Ben Gazzara.  These are two men who represent not only different philosophies of acting but seemingly from two different worlds as well.  However, Preminger uses their differing acting styles to electrifying effect.  One of the joys of the movie is watching and contrasting the old style, “move star” turns of James Stewart, Arthur O’Connell, and Eve Arden with the more “naturalistic” approaches taken by their younger co-stars, Gazzara, Lee Remick, and especially George C. Scott.  The contrast in style becomes a perfect reflection of the film’s contrast between what is legal and what is correct.  All the actors, as both individuals and as an ensemble, give memorable performances.  When you look at the cast, you realize that any one of their characters could have been the center of the story without the film becoming any less compelling. 

Lee Remick (a notoriously fragile actress who, for years, I knew solely as the poor woman who kept getting attacked by her adopted son in the original Omen) brings out the best in everyone she shares a scene with.  Whether she’s making Stewart blush or breaking down on the witness stand, she dominates every scene as an insecure young woman who forces herself to be happy because otherwise, she’d have to confront the fact that she’s miserable.  (I should admit that I related more than a bit to Remick’s character.  To me, the movie was about her and therefore, about me.) 

She is perhaps at her best towards the end of the film when she is on the witness stand and is cross-examined by George C. Scott.  Starting out as flirtatious and seemingly confident, Remick slowly and believably falls apart as Scott methodically strips away every layer of defense that, until now, she’s spent the entire movie hiding behind.  By the end of the scene, Remick has shown as every layer of pain that has built up in Laura Manion over the years.  For his part, Scott is simply amazing in this scene.  Determined and focused, Scott doesn’t so much cross-examine Remick but seduces her and the audience along with her.  As a result, when he suddenly turns off the charm and lunges in for his final attack, it’s devastating for everyone watching.  (And, as was correctly pointed out to me by a friend while I was watching the film last night, George C. Scott was quite the sexy beast when he was young.)

Lastly, the film’s judge is played by an actual lawyer by the name of Joseph Welch.  Welch wasn’t a great actor but he did make for a great judge.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Preminger film is a few contemporary morals weren’t challenged and, at the time it was released, Anatomy of a Murder was considered to be very daring because of its frank discussion of topics like rape and spousal abuse.  It doesn’t seem quite so daring now but it does seem to be remarkably mature in a way that even most modern movies can’t match.  That being said, the film does occasionally embrace the “she must have been asking for it” male viewpoint but still, it’s a remarkably advanced movie for the 1950s.

One of the wonderful things about watching a 51 year-old film is that it provides a chance to see what was considered to be shocking in the years before you or I was born.  From watching this movie, I’ve discovered that, in the year 1959, “panties” was apparently a taboo phrase.  A good deal of the film’s plot revolves around the panties Lee Remick’s character was wearing the night she was raped and their subsequent disappearance.  At one point, there’s even a scene where Welch, Stewart, and Scott struggle to come up with a less offensive term to use when referring to them in the court.  (Scott suggests employing a term he heard in France.)  Seen 51 years later (in a time when we can not only say “thong” in polite conversation but specifically go out of our way to show off the fact that we’re wearing one), this scene, and the actors’ obvious discomfort whenever they have to say the word “panties”, never fails to amuse me.

Preminger’s other grand challenge to the 50s mainstream was in getting Duke Ellington to compose the film’s jazz soundtrack.  At the risk of being called a heretic by some of my closest friends, I’ve never been a big fan of jazz but it works perfectly here.  Ellington, himself, makes a cameo appearance and wow, is he ever stoned.

In conclusion, allow me to thank the readers of the site for “ordering” me to watch, once again, a truly classic film.  Now, seeing as how close the vote was and that I know, for a fact, that some people voted more than once, I think it would be only fair for me to also rewatch and review the other 9 movies (Lost in Translation, Primer, Hatchet For the Honeymoon, Emanuelle in America, Starcrash, Darling, Sole Survivor, The Sweet House of Horrors, and The Sidewalks of Bangkok) in my poll over the next couple of weeks.  I’m looking forward to each and every one of them (well, almost all of them) and, again, thank you for allowing me to start things off with a great film like Anatomy of a Murder.

Film Review: Bloody Sunday (dir. by Paul Greengrass)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

On January 30th, 1972, in the Bogside area of Derry, Northern Ireland, the British army opened fire on what-was-meant to be a peaceful demonstration.  13 men were killed on the spot, another died later of his injuries.  In the months leading up to the demonstration, the British army had been frequently attacked by pro-independence, largely Catholic “nationalist” groups and the Army was quick to claim that the were acting in self-defense and that they had been fired upon.  Others, however, pointed out that almost all of the men killed (most were just teenagers) had been shot while fleeing the soldiers and none had any weapons on them.  This was the event known that later became known as Bloody Sunday and served as one of the leading catalysts for the decades of “Troubles” that would follow.

Earlier today, 38 years after the fact, British Prime Minister David Cameron finally publicly acknowledged the fact that the 14 men killed on Bloody Sunday were murdered.  Much like the classic Monty Python skit where Eric Idle is convicted of murdering 300 people in one day, Cameron said that he was “very, very sorry.”  (Actually, Idle said that but the idea is the same.)

The Bogside Massacre also served as the basis of one of the best (and most important) films of the first decade of the 21st Century, 2002’s  Bloody Sunday.

Directed by Paul Greengrass (who would later, of course, direct the final two Bourne films), Bloody Sunday is a disturbing recreation of January 30th, 1972.  We watch as the civil rights activist Ivan Cooper (a very likable James Nesbitt) makes his way through the Bogside area of Derry, encouraging people to attend the march while still finding time to beg the local IRA leadership not to start any violence.  While most critical attention is, understandably, given to the scenes that recreate the massacre itself, these early scenes are just as important.  They establish the idea of the people of Bogside as being a community full of actual individuals as opposed to just a collection of pawns in the war between the nationalists and the unionists.

While Cooper tries to ensure peace, we are given contrasting scenes of the British army preparing for the exact violence that Cooper is trying to prevent.  Ironically, in these opening scenes, both Cooper and his military counterparts are motivated by the same basic fear of the IRA.  Its only once the demonstration has started and the first shots are fired that Cooper realizes that the establishment is far more dangerous than the insurgents.

Throughout the film, Greengrass directs in his signature, documentary-style, employing hand-held cameras and rejecting any artistic flourishes that might take the viewer out of the “reality” of the situation.  Each scene ends with a fade-to-black and, as a result, the viewer gets the feeling that he is literally dropping in on the action.  This is not to say that Greengrass is not an artful director.  The power of his artistry, however, comes from his ability to hide the technique.  As a director, he does not demand attention with a lot of showy tricks.  Instead, he earns the attention by perfecting his craft.

Greengrass’s psuedo-documentary style is at its strongest and most devastating during the recreation of the massacre itself.  Perhaps because the film was made for British television at a time when there was still official doubt about what set off the Bogside Massacre, Greengrass leaves hazy the exact reason as to why the army starts firing.  However, what he does make clear is that the 14 men killed were, essentially, murdered.   One of the unfortunate things about being as big a movie fan as I am is that I’ve grown jaded to the sight of people dying on-screen.  However, unlike many other similar films, the deaths in Bloody Sunday are not presented as just being plot devices or as an excuse to get an emotional response from the audience.  Instead, the deaths in Bloody Sunday hurt because you immediately know that, regardless of which you side you support as far as the Troubles are concerned, none of the deaths were necessary.  They were, instead, the product of a nation’s wounded pride.  14 men died so that the British could feel British again.

As you can probably guess, the British don’t come across particularly well in Bloody Sunday and, quite frankly, they shouldn’t.  Watching this movie, you’re left with the impression that the Bogside Massacre was the British Army’s attempt to exorcise the demons of the collapse of the British Empire by killing the Irish.  (Though, in all fairness, the Irish killed a lot of British in the time leading up to Bloody Sunday.)  However, and this is to Greengrass’s credit, individual British soldiers are shown to question the massacre.  Its only when those soldiers are forced give up their individuality and function as a collective that they commit (and, at the film’s end, conspire to cover up) murder.  For just that, this movie should be required viewing for anyone who insists on claiming that “individualism” is a threat to society.

The film ends on a quiet note as a somber Cooper announces that he no longer sees a “peaceful” solution.  This scene gets its power largely from Nesbitt’s own charismatic performance.  Playing the closest thing the film has to a central character, Nesbitt makes his early enthusiasm for the march so infectious that its simply devastating to see him after the massacre, angry and disillusioned.  It also reminds the viewer that, in the years after Bogside, there was no peace and many more innocent people — on both sides of the conflict — would die.  The British army may have thought it was going to scare Northern Ireland into submission but instead, they helped to perpetuate a continuing cycle of death, destruction, and hatred that, regardless of any treaty, continues to this very day.

I should admit that I’m a fourth Irish.  My great-grandparents were born and raised in Ardglass, Northern Ireland.  Though I’ve never been, I hope to visit Ardglass some day.  Though I no longer consider myself to be a member of any religion, I was raised in the Catholic church.  As such, I’ve always had an interest in Irish history and the Troubles in particular.  I’ve also always been biased towards the nationalist side. 

So, it would be fair for someone to ask if I’d have the same reaction to this film if I was a Protestant with family living around London and the honest answer is that I don’t know.

However, the power of Bloody Sunday doesn’t come from political ideology.  Instead, the movie serves as a disturbing but powerful reminder of what can happen when people surrender their free will to groupthink.  Though the oppressors in Bloody Sunday may be British, recent history has proven that, when actively opposed, those with all the power will always react with the same brutal fury.  The forces of oppression remain the same whether they’re in Northern Ireland, Iran, Honduras, or the U.S.A.

Poll: Which Movie Should Lisa Marie Review?

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last night, with the help of my friend Jeff, I conducted an experiment. 

First, I took out my contacts which basically left me blind.  Then, just to make sure I was totally without sight, I had Jeff blindfold me.  He then took me by the hand and led me over to my DVD collection.  Clumsily, I grabbed 10 DVDs at random and handed them back to Jeff.  I then proceeded to walk into a wall, at which point I tried to take off the blindfold and ended up losing my balance and falling down flat on my ass. 

Why was I risking life and limb to randomly select 10 DVDs?

I did it so you could have the chance to tell me what to do.  At the bottom of this article, you will find a poll listing the 10 DVDs I randomly selected.  Come next Saturday (June 19th to be exact), I will watch and review whichever movie receives the most votes in the poll.  In short, I’m giving you all the power.

Now, to be honest, I’m feeling just a little trepidation about doing this.  Whenever you set up a poll, you’re running the risk of absolutely no one voting.  Fortunately, I have a plan B in that I recently got the 1st season of Gossip Girl on DVD.  If nobody votes in the poll, I’ll just spend next Saturday watching Gossip Girl and writing several long — very long —  essays on how different Chuck is in the books as compared to the TV show.

The choice, as they say, is yours.

The 10 movies I blindly selected are listed below in alphabetical order.

1) Anatomy of a Murder (1959) — Jimmy Stewart asks Lee Remick a lot of questions about her panties.

2) Darling (1965) — Julie Christie claws her way to the top of the modeling industry and discovers ennui.

3) Emanuelle in America (1978) — Emanuelle investigates decadence in America.  Some people think that this movie contains footage taken from an actual snuff film.  We call those people “idiots.”

4) Hatchet For The Honeymoon (1969) — Mario Bava directs this film about a man driven to murder by the sight of an unflattering bridal gown.

5) Lost in Translation (2003) — I will admit that I squealed with joy when I discovered that I had randomly selected one of my favorite movies of all time.

6) Primer (2004) — Engineers play with time and space.  Oddly enough, this movie was filmed a few miles away from where I live.

7) The Sidewalks of Bangkok (1986) — Like most of Jean Rollin’s film, this is something of a misunderstood masterpiece.

8 ) Sole Survivor (1982) — An atmospheric little horror film with a sadly generic title.

9) Starcrash (1978) — Strange sci-fi movie in which Christopher Plummer recruits space pirate Caroline Munro to battle a pre-Maniac Joe Spinell.  This film also marks the screen debut of David Hasselhoff.

10) The Sweet House of Horrors (1989) — One of Lucio Fulci’s last films.

So, those are our ten options.  On Saturday, July 19th, I will sit down, watch, and review whichever movie receives the most votes.  On that day, for four to six hours, I will give up my independence and submit to the wishes of the majority.

Film Review: Zombie 5: Killing Birds (dir. by Claudio Lattanzi and Joe D’Amato)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Thanks to the wonderful people at Anchor Bay, I recently watched Zombie 5: Killing Birds, one of the last of the old school Italian horror films.

Admittedly, when I first hit play on the DVD player, I was expecting the worst.  Of all the various official and unofficial sequels to Lucio Fulci’s masterpiece Zombi 2 (which, of course, was itself an unofficial prequel to Dawn of the Dead), Zombie 5: Killing Birds has the worst reputation.  While most Italian horror fans seem to agree that Zombie 4 is enjoyable on its own stupid terms and even Zombi 3 has a few brave defenders, its hard to find anyone willing to defend Killing Birds.  The general consensus has always seemed to be that Killing Birds is a generic and rather forgettable splatter film that, title aside, had absolutely nothing in common with the Fulci classic.

Having now seen Killing Birds, I can say that the general consensus, in this case, is largely correct.  Killing Birds is generic, predictable, and ultimately forgettable.  However, taken on its own terms, it’s a perfectly enjoyable way for a lover of zombie cinema to waste 90 minutes.  As long as you don’t compare it to Zombi 2, i’ts a perfectly tolerable piece of trash that actually has one or two memorable moments tossed randomly through its running time.  At the very least, its a hundred times better than Umberto Lenzi’s similar Black Demons.

The film deals with a bunch of grad students who, while searching for a nearly extinct species of Woodpecker, end up spending the night at a deserted house in Louisiana.  Many years ago, a brutal murder was committed at this house and, well, you can guess the rest.  The grad students end up falling prey to a bunch of zombies, largely because the students are all remarkably stupid.  Meanwhile, B-movie veteran Robert Vaughn shows up as Dr. Fred Brown, a blind man who spends his days studying birds.  There’s a lot of birds in this movie and its never quite clear how they link up to the living dead but they certainly do look menacing flying past the camera.

With the exception of Vaughn (who overacts just enough to keep things interesting without going so far over the top as to become ludicrous), the film’s cast is likeable but not memorable.  Everyone’s playing a stereotype (i.e., the leader, the computer geek, the slut, the girl with looks and brains) and no one makes much of an effort to be anything more than a stereotype.  While this certainly keeps Killing Birds from displaying anything resembling nuance, it’s also strangely comforting.  Its lets a neurotic viewer like me know, from the start, that there’s no need to think too much about anything she might see for the next hour and a half.  Since this movie was made in the late 80s, most of the men sport a mullet and all of the women wear those terribly unflattering khaki pants that I guess were all the rage back then.

As I stated before, the film does have its occasional strengths.  Some of the deaths are memorably nasty (even if the gore effects are decidedly cut-rate, pun not intended).  As well, the film does an excellent job at capturing the hot, humid atmosphere of the Louisiana bayous.  I’ve spent enough time in that part of the country that I can attest that the movie perfectly captures the stagnant heat and the way dehydration can cause your mind to play tricks on you.  While the zombies themselves are hardly as impressive as Fulci’s, the filmmakers wisely keep them in the shadows for most of the film and, if nothing else, this allows the viewer to imagine something scarier than what they’re actually seeing.  Finally, this movie does have one of the most effective nightmare sequences that I’ve ever seen.  Lasting barely a minute and not really having much to do with the overall plot, this nightmare still features some rather disturbing imagery.  One image, in particular, has so stuck with me that I found myself paying homage to it in a my own writing.

Though the movie’s director is credited as being Claudio Lattanzi, it is pretty much an open secret that the movie was actually directed by the infamous Joe D’Amato (who, regardless of what else he may have done during his storied life, also directed one of my favorite movies ever, Beyond The Darkness).  I’ve read a few interviews where D’Amato said that he allowed Lattanzi to be credited as director because he wanted to help Lattanzi’s launch his own career.  To judge by the movie itself, however, it seems more probable that Lattanzi wasn’t delivering the movie that D’Amato wanted and D’Amato stepped in as a result.  Regardless, Killing Birds is hardly the best example of D’Amato’s work but, at the same time, it’s hardly the worst either. 

In the end, Killing Birds is a movie that will probably be best appreciated by those who already have a good working knowledge of Italian exploitation films.  It’s hardly a masterpiece (and, despite enjoying it, I would hesitate to even call it a “good” movie) but it’s not really deserving of all the criticism that it’s received over the years either.  As a bonus, the Anchor Bay DVD come with a lengthy interview with Robert Vaughn in which he discussed his career in B-movies and, while Vaughn says nothing about Killing Birds during the interview, he’s still interesting and enjoyable to listen to.  Unlike a lot of “reputable” actors who have made B-movies, Vaughn never condescends to the films that both started and ended his movie career.

Quickie Review: Irréversible (dir. by Gaspar Noe)

Posted on by Arleigh

Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible is filmed in the same style as Christopher Nolan’s excellent Memento. With the story unfolding in reverse sequence, the audience’s first impression of the story doesn’t end up being the same once it finishes.

Everyone has made it a point to mention the disturbing and hard-to-watch sodomizing that Monica Bellucci’s character goes through at the hands of a random, strung-out stranger. This 10-minute sequence is as disturbing as any film sequence I have ever had the chance to watch. There is absolutely no feeling of lust or sexiness this scene brings up. A sense of shock, disgust and pain is more appropriate reaction to seeing the lovely Ms. Bellucci’s character go through a very inhumane experience. This scene goes a long way to explaining the film’s beginning where a brutal and equally inhumane murder takes place inside a murky, red-lit, underground gay S&M club.

As the film continues to move backwards in time and shows the viewer the earlier and happier time of Bellucci’s and Vincent Cassel’s characters, the earlier scenes of violence take on a more poignant and sad note. In a space of a day many lives are broken and destroyed, and in the end all because of a random night occurrence in an dingy, lit underpass.

Gaspar Noe’s film is not for everyone and even those daring enough to take a chance to view it will have a hard time sitting through the first half of the film. The film itself takes on a dream-like quality as it begins to unfold. From its nightmarish tone and look to a dreamy last reel. I have heard people call Noe’s film as exploitive and misogynistic in its treatment of its main female character. In the end, Noe’s choice to shoot the rape scene in a realistic fashion and have it linger and linger shows the viewer that evil and ugly things do happen in real life. One either takes it and learn from it or turn away and pretend it never happened.

Irreversible is a film that people will either love or hate. This film doesn’t straddle the center when it comes to viewers reaction to it. Gaspar Noe’s film is not perfect, but overall it provokes the viewer to think on what they’ve seen and felt as the story unfolded.

A Quickie With Lisa Marie: Putney Swope (dir. by Robert Downey, Sr.)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

One of my favorite recent DVD discoveries is an underground film from 1969 called Putney Swope.   Directed by Robert Downey, Sr. (who, as we all know, was the father of not only Iron Man and Sherlock Holmes but Sgt. Osiris as well!), Putney Swope is a hilarious satire of advertising, race relations, and everything in between.  It’s a must-see for anyone interested in American independent film, American satire, or just plain vulgarity in the service of art and humor.

Since the film takes place at the Truth and Soul Advertising Agency, it features several fake commercials that are so spot-on perfect that they could easily pass for the real thing if not for all the profanity and occasional nudity.  Below is my favorite Truth and Soul Commercial:

Review: The Descent (dir. by Neil Marshall)

Posted on by Arleigh

Neil Marshall’s follow-up to his cult-favorite werewolf film Dog Soldiers does not disappoint. Marshall’s filmmaking has improved dramatically since his debut—the film not only cements his skill as a director but also signals the horror genre’s return to a darker, meaner, and more exploitative spirit, reminiscent of a time when filmmakers weren’t afraid to push limits.

The Descent begins with tragedy: Sarah (Shauna MacDonald) suffers devastating losses that form the emotional and psychological foundation of the film. Her grief gives the story a weight that elevates it beyond a typical survival-horror narrative, grounding it in raw emotion and human fragility. Surrounding Sarah are her close friends—Beth (Alex Reid), who travels with her to the U.S. at the invitation of their American friend Juno (Natalie Mendoza)—and newcomers to the group: Holly (Nora Jane-Noone), Sam (MyAnna Buring), and Becca (Saskia Mulder). What begins as a healing adventure for six women soon transforms into a descent not only into the depths of a cave system but into the recesses of fear, betrayal, and survival.

Led by Juno, the group embarks on a spelunking expedition in the Appalachian Mountains—Marshall’s deliberate nod to Deliverance. Though the forest scenes were filmed in Scotland, their authenticity never falters. Yet Marshall doesn’t linger long in the open air; safety and sunlight give way to shadow and claustrophobia as the women push deeper underground. The descent itself is drawn out just enough to build tension until the film snaps into full horror mode. When the inevitable cave-in comes, the sequence is nerve-shredding—an expertly shot, suffocating nightmare that will have claustrophobic viewers flinching and gasping for space.

After the collapse, the women find themselves trapped, nerves fraying and panic growing. Juno, initially portrayed as the group’s confident alpha, begins to reveal a brash, reckless streak masking her deeper insecurities. What started as a confident façade becomes a fragile disguise for fear and guilt, and Marshall uses this shift to explore how leadership and trust erode under extreme pressure.

From this point forward, The Descent becomes a masterclass in oppressive atmosphere. Gone is any trace of daylight—the cave becomes an abyss of darkness, amplifying a universal fear of entrapment and the unknown. Marshall layers internal conflict onto external terror, exposing lies, betrayals, and fragilities within the group. The result is as psychological as it is visceral; survival becomes both a physical and moral test. This is no Steel Magnolias—it’s a blood-soaked exploration of human endurance under primal duress.

Marshall, alongside cinematographer Sam McCurdy, crafts a sensory experience that manipulates both light and sound to devastating effect. The pitch-black sequences—where nothing is visible, yet everything is heard—are among the film’s most frightening moments. Every drop of water, every panting breath, every unseen shuffle echoes with menace. The sound design alone makes viewers feel trapped within the cave alongside the characters, scanning the darkness for unseen horrors.

The titular descent takes on a new layer once the film’s monsters, the Crawlers, make their appearance halfway through. Marshall wisely delays their reveal, letting claustrophobia and suggestion torment the audience first. When these pale, feral creatures finally emerge, their raw physicality and relentless hunger confirm every imagined dread. Their attacks are fast, brutal, and chaotic—filmed with a balance of restraint and brutality that gives the violence a strangely poetic rhythm. Fans of gore will be thrilled, but even skeptics of splatter cinema will find the violence purposeful, anchored by the audience’s genuine investment in the characters’ fates.

The Descent succeeds as a terrifying, pulse-pounding revival of hard-R horror. It straddles the line between primal terror and visceral gore without losing its emotional core. Marshall doesn’t reinvent the genre—the DNA of Alien and Predator is evident—but he honors it with craft and vision. The interplay of light and shadow even recalls Argento’s dreamlike intensity, while the cave setting feels nightmarishly tactile.

In an era where horror films trend toward PG-13 softness, The Descent proudly reclaims the genre’s raw, adult intensity. This is horror meant to unsettle, to overwhelm, and to make you feel the walls closing in. Neil Marshall, once known only for Dog Soldiers, proves here that he’s no fluke. The Descent solidifies him as one of the most promising horror filmmakers of his generation—a director unafraid to go deep into the dark.

Review: Test Tube Babies (dir. by W. Merle Connell)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

If I haven’t already made it clear in my previous reviews on this site, I love exploitation films.  Regardless of whether they’re blaxploitation or gialli or whether they’re about zombies or cannibals or just people looking for revenge, I love everything about them.  I love them because they’re shameless, they’re frequently incoherent, and occasionally, they’re works of pure (if fractured) genius. 

However, I have a special place in my heart for the old school exploitation films of the 1930s and 40s.  These are the exploitation movies that came out while the American film industry still operated under the puritanical production code.  While the mainstream film industry was still struggling with the idea of Clark Gable saying “damn” onscreen, the underground B-movie makers were making the movies that everyone saw but few people ever talked about.  These were low-budget movies, filmed on the cheapest stock available and often times edited with all the skill of a chainsaw-wielding maniac.  And while these movies were not necessarily impressive technically, they continue to serve as proof that even our elders occasionally enjoyed a dirty joke.

For the most part, these exploitation films were disguised as being public service announcements.  Hence, a film like Ruined Souls wasn’t just a movie about young people skinny dipping and having sex.  No, it was a warning about the dangers of venereal disease.  Typically, once the film had finished showing off all the bad behavior it could, an authority figure (usually a doctor) would show up and explain why those in the audience shouldn’t do any of the things they had just watched.  There’s a shamelessness to these old school exploitation films that reminds me why I admire panhandlers who go through the trouble to come up with an entertaining way to ask me for my money.

1948’s Test Tube Babies (directed by W. Merle Connell and produced by George Weiss, who would produce most of Ed Wood’s early films) is a typical example of an old school exploitation film.  Now the title might lead you to think that this is going to be another horror film about demonic children.  However, the exact opposite is true.  The message of Test Tube Babies (the film’s PSA) is that any marriage — regardless of how drab and dull — can be saved by forcing the wife to go through hours of excruciatingly painful labor.

The first half of Test Tube Babies plays out roughly like the 1st half of Revolution Road.  A boring young man named George meets a frumpy young woman named Cathy.  They’re attracted to each other and, since this is the 1940s after all, they get married so that they can have sex.  George and Cathy go on a whirlwind honeymoon.  They get a house in the suburbs.  George gets a job and Cathy settles into the life of being a slave (or “housewife,” as it was apparently known in the 1940s.)

However, is it possible that there is trouble in paradise?  Shortly after the honeymoon is concluded, we start to get hints that maybe Cathy isn’t entirely satisfied being an indentured servant.  At the breakfast table, Cathy and George talk about how boring their social life is.  When George’s womanizing friend Frank comes to visit, Cathy greets him in her nightie and proceeds to dance with him while a simmering George watches.  What’s wrong with Cathy?  Could it be that she’s suddenly realized that she’s surrendered her own identity just to be someone’s wife?  Perhaps it has dawned on her that marriage is really just a societal invention that’s designed to keep anyone from truly challenging the status quo.  Or maybe she just needs a child to give her an excuse to remain in a loveless charade of a marriage.

Regardless of the reason why, Cathy is clearly dissatisfied with her new life.  Soon, once George is off at work, Cathy invites all of her decadent friends over to the house for a party.  This party appears to be the 1940s version of a key party.  As Cathy plays hostess, Frank proceeds to make out with another man’s wife and then, from out of nowhere, an elderly lady with bleached blond hair shows up and starts talking about her former life as a burlesque dancer.  As Cathy watches in horror (no doubt wondering why she couldn’t have just listened to her husband like a good, dutiful slave), the dancer starts to dance and things quickly escalate until Cathy is finally forced to call George at work and beg him to come home.

One of the reasons I love these old school exploitation films is that they provide a chance to see what our grandparents considered to be risqué.   It’s a chance to peer into the repressed sexuality of our elders.  So, what can we learn from watching the party scene in Test Tube Babies?

1)  To judge from the leering reaction given to the frumpy clothing worn by the female guests, Sears was apparently the Victoria’s Secret of the 1940s.

2) The entire party sequence ends with a bizarre catfight between two women, over the course of which both women somehow end up naked.  This serves to prove that, much as I always suspected, men have always been the same.

In a plot development that was later shamelessly ripped off by Revolution Road, all of this suburban decadence leads to Cathy and George realizing how empty their “perfect” sham of a marriage really is.  Whereas Kate Winslet decided that this emptiness was linked to her sacrificing her own identity to be a wife, Cathy decides that the marriage is empty because she’s not yet a mother.  After all, what could be better than bringing another human being into the world for the sole purpose of justifying a failed marriage?  Never mind that neither George nor Cathy comes across like the type of people who could actually raise a happy child.  What’s important here is to go through the societal motions.

Cathy, of course, wants to get pregnant immediately because you know us women.  We’re just slaves to the old biological clock.  However, despite George’s best efforts, Cathy simply cannot get knocked up.  She wonders if maybe something’s wrong with her.  George is quick to agree that something could be wrong with her so, like any good American couple, they go to a doctor to specifically find out what’s wrong with the wife.

(Interestingly enough, just to judge from the movie’s dialogue and the fact that Cathy is shocked when told to undress before being examined, it would appear that this is not only the first time that she’s ever been to a gynecologist but perhaps the first time she’s even heard the term “gynecologist.”  To judge from this movie, apparently women in the 40s were simply locked up in the attic until some idiot came by and paid their dowry.)

It’s here that the movie takes a truly shocking turn as it is revealed that — gasp! — nothing is wrong with the wife.  Instead, George is sterile.  And this, of course, leads us to the whole concept of test tube babies and how they can even save the most pointless of marriages.

Now, the filmmakers obviously knew that this would a bitter pill for a 1948 audience to swallow so, in order to make sure we understand that this sort of thing actually does happen, we are introduced to Dr. Wright.  If for no other reason, see this movie for Dr. Wright.  With his oily hair, his ever-present smirk, and an equally ever-present cigarette, Dr. Wright is probably the creepiest gynecologist this side of Jeremy Irons in Dead Ringers.  As played by exploitation vet Timothy Farrell, Dr. Wright is the only character in the film to seem to realize that he’s surrounded by idiots.

In the great tradition of old school exploitation, Dr. Wright is used to explain and justify the concept of a test tube baby.  By doing so, Dr. Wright justifies and excuses all of the “decadence” that has previously been put up on-screen.  Dr. Wright also makes a good argument for the health benefits of cigarettes.  Seriously, I have never seen a doctor smoke as much as Dr. Wright.  Literally, his every scene is enveloped in a cloud of smoke.  He smokes while conducting a consultation, he smokes in between operations, and apparently he even smokes while conducting his examinations.  (Which reminds me of a story concerning an ex-boyfriend but the less said about that the better…)  Perhaps his best scene comes when, spying a nervous George in a hospital waiting room, Dr. Wright suggests that George “smoke a cigarette and relax.”  (“I’ve already gone through two packs!” George replies and everyone shares a cancerous laugh.)

In the end, what can you really say about this odd little time capsule?  As far as old school exploitation is concerned, it’s not a classic in the way that a movie like Reefer Madness is.  Still, the movie holds a strange fascination for me.  Some of it, of course, is the whole “so-good-that-its-bad” factor.  This movie has that in spades.  However, I think an argument can be made that movies like Test Tube Babies provide a view into the American subconscious that more mainstream films simply can not.  Freed up from the confines of the Hollywood production code, the old school exploitation movies could give the people what they wanted to see as opposed to what they felt they should want to see.

Perhaps that’s the real appeal of a movie like Test Tube Babies.  Its proof that people were fucked up before any of us were born and that they’ll continue to be fucked up long after we’re gone.

Then again, perhaps I’m just reading too much into an amusingly bad B-movie.

Perhaps it would be best to give the movie the final word…