Here’s the trailer for Parallel, which appears to be a film about …. can you guess it? …. parallel universes!
Tag Archives: Film
Here’s The Trailer For Survival Games
Here’s the trailer for Survival Games which looks like it’s some sort of mockbuster version of …. well, every film that’s been released over the past ten years.
I don’t know. A lot of people are probably going to get snarky about the cheap CGI and the apparent wooden nature of some of the performances but this looks enjoyably silly to me.
Here’s The Trailer For Don’t Click!
I personally don’t know if I would have the guts to call my movie Don’t Click but it’s a title that just lends itself to too many snarky reviews. You’re always taking a risk when toss the word “Don’t” into your title.
That said, here’s the trailer for Don’t Click. It has kind of a Saw vibe. Personally, I appreciate the three-piece of suit. If you’re going to become a professional torturer, you really should dress for the part. Seriously, never forget — dress for the job you want, not the one you have.
The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Edge of Fury (dir by Robert J. Gurney Jr. and Irving Lerner)
Damn, this is a dark movie.
The 1958 film, Edge of Fury, opens with a man standing on the beach. It seems like it should be a pleasant opening but instead, the entire scene feels threatening. The man, Richard Barrie (Michael Higgins), is a veteran of the Korean War and he’s working on a painting with what appears to be an almost possessed intensity. Thanks to the film’s black-and-white, noir-like cinematography, the beach does not look inviting. Instead, it looks dark and cold. A voice over informs us that Richard once asked to be confined for not only his own good but also the good of society. However, the authorities could not intervene because Richard had yet to commit a crime.
Suddenly, the police arrive. They arrest Richard and take him away, suggesting that Richard has finally proven just how much of a threat he actually is.
The rest of the film is told in flashback. We watch as Richard, who works in a bookstore, comes across a beach house that he quickly rents. It turns out that he wants to stay there with the Hacketts, Florence (Lois Holmes) and her daughters, Eleanor (Jean Allison) and Louisa (Doris Fesette). Somewhat improbably, Richard and Florence are friends, having met in a grocery store. Florence trusts Richard because he’s so polite and nice. Eleanor has a crush on Richard because he’s handsome and brooding. And Louisa just thinks that Richard is kind of a loser.
The Hacketts move into the beach house and Richard sets up an artist’s studio in the shed. He paints a lot of pictures of Louisa, despite the fact that Louisa has a boyfriend and wants nothing to do with him. Though the three women don’t realize it, Richard is growing increasingly unstable and obsessed. He wants the three women to be his new family and when he realizes that he’s not going to get his way, he turns violent….
And certainly, this is not the only film to be made about a mentally disturbed man who becomes obsessed with what he considers to be the perfect family. It’s also not the only film to end with an act of shocking violence and to leave the audience feeling as if they’ve just taken a journey into a waking nightmare. What does set Edge of Fury apart from some other films is that it was made in 1958 and, in many ways, it’s the exact opposite of what we expect a 1958 film to be. This is a dark, dark movie that suggests that the universe is ruled by chaos and that kindness will be rewarded with pain.
Seriously, it’s dark.
That said, it’s definitely a flawed film. You never buy that Florence would trust Richard as much as she does. Michael Higgins is frighteningly intense as Richard but the rest of the cast often seems to simply be going through the motions. That said, it’s definitely a film that sticks with you. This isn’t a story that you just shrug off and forget.
Probably the best thing about the film is the cinematography. This film was an early credit for Conrad L. Hall, who later went on to become one of the great cinematographers. He fills the film with ominous shadows and hints of the madness to come. As filmed by Hall. the beach looks like some alien landscape, as twisted as the inside of Richard’s mind.
Edge of Fury took me by surprise. It’s nowhere close to being perfect but it’s worth tracking down on YouTube.
Horror Scenes That I Love: 6 Must Die From The Fog
Here’s The Trailer for Midnight Sky!
I’m about three days late in sharing this but I figured that everyone could use a little hope for the future, even when in the middle of a horrorthon!
Here’s the trailer for Midnight Sky. Now, on the one hand, the trailer makes the film look like it might be good. On the other hand, the film was directed by George Clooney and that’s always a big red flag. Clooney is a good actor and usually a terrible director. It’s an odd combination but it happens sometimes. (My personal theory is that Clooney is still insecure about the years that he spent being dismissed as just being a pretty frat boy type and, as a result, he always tries too hard whenever he directs a film. It’s like he’s still saying, “I can handle things! I’m smart!”) Hopefully, for this film, Clooney will give a bad performance but that will free him up to actually do a good job directing for once. We’ll find out soon.
Midnight Sky will be released on Netflix on December 23rd.
International Horror Film Review: Nothing Underneath (dir by Carlo Vanzina)
The 1985 Italian film, Nothing Underneath, is a giallo that’s achieved some notoriety based on the fact that it’s not a very easy film to find.
Seriously, I’ve spent years looking for this film. I had read enough good things about it to make me believe that it was a film that I, as an unapologetic fan of Italian horror, simply had to see. Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, it’s never gotten a proper DVD or Blu-ray release in the United States. It’s not so much that the film is controversial or even particularly graphic. Apparently, the main problem is that the film takes place in the world of high fashion and that means that there are several scenes that take place at fashion shows and most of those scenes feature songs that were very popular in 1985. Nothing Underneath has never gotten a proper video release because of all the music. It’s kind of unfortunate, really. There are so many good movies that are currently in limbo because of disputes over the rights to the music on the film’s soundtrack.
Anyway, the good news is that last night, I was able to find Nothing Underneath on YouTube! So, I finally got to watch it.
The bad news is that I watched it in Italian with no subtitles.
Now, that’s not quite as big of an issue as you might think. The thing with Italian horror films is that the story is often less important than how it’s told. The best Italian horror films are all about style and suspense and less about keeping track of who did what to whom. That’s certainly appears to be the case with Nothing Underneath. Film is a visual medium, after all.
The film is about a brother and a sister. Bob (Tom Schanley) is a park ranger who works at Yellowstone and is very happy with his simple and honest life. Jessica (Nicole Peering) is a fashion model who currently lives in Milan and who spends all of her days modeling lingerie and fighting off sleazy coke addicts. Bob and Jessica have such an extremely strong bond that, occasionally, Bob has visions of Jessica’s life in Milan. Whenever Jessica is in danger, Bob knows it. When Bob has a vision of someone stalking Jessica while carrying scissors and wearing black gloves, he rushes back to his ranger station and calls Italy to warn her. Unfortunately, he’s too late. By the time he convinces the surly desk clerk as Jessica’s apartment building to give Jessica the message, Jessica has disappeared.
Bob flies to Milan, determined to find his sister. He teams up with Commissioner Danesi (Donald Pleasence) to investigate Jessica’s disappearance. As soon as I saw Donald Pleasence, I automatically assumed that he would eventually turn out to be involved in Jessica’s disappearance but no. Pleasence actually plays a good guy in the film, one who appears to harbor no dark secrets. That was kind of a nice change of pace and, even though he was dubbed into Italian, I could tell that Pleasence gave a likable and sympathetic performance in this film.
It turns out that the black-gloved killer is murdering models all over Milan. Can Bob discover the killer’s identity? Will he be able to protect Barbara (Renee Simonsen), the killer’s latest target? And will he discover all of the sordid details about Jessica’s life in Milan?
Despite the language barrier, I enjoyed Nothing Underneath. It’s an old school giallo, right down to the whodunit mystery and the point-of-view shots of the black-gloved killer. Visually, the film is impressive. The opening sequence neatly contrasted the simplicity of Yellowstone with the decadence of Milan and the scenes of the killer stalking their latest victim were nicely done and very suspenseful. It was a bit hard to judge the actors (as usual, some of the dubbing was very poorly done) but Donald Pleasence was a delight as always and Tom Schanley come across as being very sincere and likable as the park ranger.
I’m glad to have seen Nothing Underneath. I hope it gets a decent video release at some point in the future.
Cleaning Out The DVR: The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations (dir by Seth Grossman)
I’m continuing my efforts to clean out my DVR. I just finished watching the 2009 film, The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations. I recorded this film off of Cinemax way back in June. To be honest, I was surprised when I came across it because I have absolutely no memory of having recorded it. I can only hope that it wasn’t recorded by a time traveler because, after seeing enough Butterfly Effects, you know that nothing good comes from time travel!
The Butterfly Effect 3 starts in medias res. Sam Reide (Chris Carmack) already knows how to jump back and forth in time and, even more importantly, he already knows all of the dangers. He knows that he can’t change the past. He can’t try to help people. He can’t do anything but stay hidden and observe because the least little alteration to the past could totally screw up the present. And, as we all know, studying the past is the present that we give to the future. (GAG! Seriously, though, I’ve been looking for a excuse to say that for like 10 years now.) So, the good thing here is that we don’t have to sit through a lot of pointless scenes of Sam learning what we already know.
Sam actually has a pretty good scam going. He goes back into the past, observes a murder taking place, and then tells the police who committed the crime. He’s convinced that cops that he’s a psychic, which I guess cops would be more likely to believe than that he’s a time traveler. I don’t know. Whatever. We’ll go with it. Helping Sam out is his sister, Jenna (Rachel Miner). Jenna, we’re told, would be dead if not for the fact that Sam jumped into the past and saved her from a house fire. Of course, by doing that, he also accidentally killed off his parents! That’s how Sam learned not to mess with the past! As a result, despite his ability to time travel, Sam leads a pretty squalid existence. He drinks at the local bar. He hangs out in the worst sections of Detroit. He visits Jenna in her run-down apartment. And yet, he doesn’t use time travel to invest in Facebook or anything like that because he knows that it’ll change the present. That’s dedication!
Sam is also still mourning the murder of his girlfriend. (Has anything ever gone right in Sam’s life?) The man convicted of her murder is due to be executed but Sam has reason to believe that the man might be innocent. When Sam visits the man and lets him know that he’s going to go to the past to prove the man’s innocence, the man is not impressed. According to the man, Sam is the murderer!
Anyway, Sam starts jumping into the past to see what really happened but, of course, he can’t help himself and he ends up changing stuff. As a result, the presents gets messed up though not as dramatically as it did in some of the previous Butterfly Effect films. For instance, the slutty bartender is suddenly engaged. At one point, Sam wakes up to find out that he no longer has an apartment. It’s kind of weak. (To be honest, this film might have worked better if it had just been a time traveling mystery as opposed to a Butterfly Effect film.) The mystery, however, is intriguing and the film ends with a somewhat satisfying twist. As far as third entries in bad franchises are concerned, The Butterfly Effect 3 is actually better than you would probably expect it to be.
4 Shots For 4 John Carpenter Films: Halloween, The Fog, Christine, They Live
4 Shots From 4 Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking.
This October, we’ve been using 4 Shots from 4 Films to pay tribute to some of our favorite horror filmmakers! Today, we honor the one and only John Carpenter!
4 Shots From 4 John Carpenter Films
Halloween (1977, dir by John Carpenter)
The Fog (1980, dir by John Carpenter)
Christine (1983, dir by John Carpenter)
They Live (1988, dir by John Carpenter)
Lifetime Film Review: Her Secret Family Killer (dir by Lisa France)
DNA Tests are all the rage right now.
Right now, everyone is taking them. Most of them seem to be hoping that they’ll find something really unexpected and cool in their background, like that they’re descended from Tecumseh or somebody. Personally, I’d love to discover that I am related to Rutherford B. Hayes, seeing as how he was the greatest president who ever lived. Of course, then you have other people who are just hoping that a DNA test will somehow make them seem less generic. “I’m 1.2% North African,” they’ll tell you, in-between posting Taylor Swift memes on twitter.
That said, everyone should approach DNA tests with caution. First off, if you’ve ever taken a DNA test, that means that the government now has access to your DNA and can probably use it to clone a race of super soldiers or something. That’s definitely one thing to consider. There’s also the possibility that being goaded into taking a DNA test could end whatever hope you have of ever being elected President. That’s another thing you have to consider. And finally, there’s the possibility that your DNA will turn up on the dead body of your best friend! Agck!
That’s exactly what happens to Sarah (Brooke Nevin) in Her Secret Family Killer. Her best friend Victoria (Carmen Moreno) gives her a DNA test for her birthday. Despite the protestations of Lyle (Devin Crittenden), who says that DNA tests are the first step towards dictatorship, Sarah gets the test done. Later, Victoria disappears. Sarah, while out on her morning run, just happens to stumble across Victoria’s dead body. The police test the DNA that was on Victoria’s body and just guess whose DNA shows up.
That’s right! Sarah’s!
But, surely, Sarah couldn’t be the murderer. It must just be someone who shares Sarah’s DNA, like a family member. So, which of Sarah’s relatives is the murderer? Or, could it be that there’s something else going on? I mean, seriously, when you’ve got DNA traveling all over the place, who knows who might be able to get their hands on it….
The best Lifetime films always strike at a secret fear that many people have but aren’t always willing to express. Her Secret Family Killer is all about the fear that one of your relatives might be murderers and you might not know it. I mean, it’s definitely possible. Ted Bundy, Charles Manson, the Grim Sleeper, the Baseline Killer, the D.C. snipers, they all had families and they all had relatives who were probably shocked when cousin Ted ended up in jail, accused with murdering people across the country. I mean, who knows what type of monsters you might have hiding in your family tree? People take DNA tests assuming that they’ll discover they’re related to someone great. What if you take your DNA test and discover that your great-uncle is the BTK Killer? It could happen.
Anyway, Her Secret Family Killer is another entertaining Lifetime thriller. Brooke Nevin has appeared in a few of these and she does a good job of embracing the melodrama, which is pretty much the key to making a good Lifetime film. If nothing else, watching the film will make you think twice before sending your DNA off to strangers and that’s probably a good thing.
Through the Shattered Lens 