Snowbeast Jaws on the slopes...a badly acted, poorly made, thin storied TV monster flick from the late seventies. I liked it!
It has made me want to get hold of a copy of
Shriek Of The Mutilated!
Blood Creek
You know, Joel Schumacher is an odd director with a very varied career. He is mostly pretty dreadful having put his name on films inane (
The Lost Boys,
Flatliners), toe-curling (his two
Batman films,
Dying Young), tedious (
The Client,
Veronica Guerin) and just plain bad (
8MM - one of the worst films ever made IMO). Yet, he is also responsible for bringing us the excellent
Falling Dawn and
Phone Booth. He is hard to predict.
I was hoping for another fluke Schumacher winner as I put on
Blood Creek. I didn't know much about it, and Schumacher's name did concern me, but I was intrigued. But I watched it and I watched it all. It's...OK. No, it's actually a bit better than OK. It's no
Falling Down, but also, it is certainly far from an
8MM! It is competent in all respects and interesting without ever fully catching fire. Watchable, likeable even, but it just falls short.
It's well worth a viewing if in the mood for a Hollywood horror flick, being better than most of that ilk, but there is something unfulfilling about it. A shame, and possibly a lost opportunity, but, for Schumacher, not bad.
The Innocents
I hadn't seen this for years and then had only seen panned and scanned BBC screenings. Film 4 recently showed a fully 'scoped print of pristine quality, which I recorded. Finally caught up with it last night. Exquisite. One of British cinema's horror highpoints, it is damned near impossible to find anything even resembling a flaw in the production. The photography in particular is sublime - more so when one can actually see the full frame - and the use of sound is easily the equal of the visuals. Even though I have seen it before and know the story well, it is
still creepy and wonderfully atmospheric. A masterpiece of the genre and essential viewing.