What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[SymbioticFunction]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Videodrome (1983)

The film explores many of director David Cronenberg's career themes and obsessions such as technology fusing (is that the right word?) with the human body and the links between sex and violence. It features one of James Woods most unscrupulous performances - he's a cable channel programmer who gets drawn in completely over his head to a dark S&M channel called Videodrome - and, who along with the equally depraved Deborah Harry and some risque imagery make Videodrome an unsettling viewing experience.

Even though Videodrome probably has logic gaps throughout it's still a deeply complex, disturbing and intense watch all these years later. Oh and Rick Baker's make up FX are still awesome.

I've read that it was still being written (or rewritten) during filming. Normally that spells complete disaster but the end result is amazing.

[MrBarlow]

The Appointment. 1982.

A girl disappears while walking through the woods and the area is sealed off, 3 years later a man is tormented by supernatural forces that causes him to experience strange dreams.

A British horror movie that doesn't rely on blood, gore, or jump scene moments but more psychological. The character build up around the family of Edward Woodward, Jane Merrow and Samantha Weysom is good and does leave you with with some unanswered questions after the interaction between father and daughter. As the day goes on for the Edward and his car journey goes get somewhat tense until the finale and how he managed to be alive. I'm not gonna lie, after the opening this film does go slow but it somehow manages to keep you intrigued.

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[MrBarlow]

Dragonwyck. 1946.

A young farm girl is contacted by a distant relative to be a governess for a young girl in a remote mansion.

Thanks to Dem for posting a picture in his Gothic thread that I went on the hunt for this, it's one of those I only partially watched and forgot about the plot. This is a lushly Gothic melodrama; abound with themes of social class; centring on the struggle between the rich and the poor in nineteenth century America. The most striking thing about Dragonwyck is the beauty of the piece. The sets are brilliantly Gothic which keeps the atmosphere thick and foreboding, which in turn ensures that the film succeeds in capturing the best of it's mood and story line.

The Gothic romance with supernatural touches shows the confrontation between an atheistic arrogant man and his naive religious wife. The performance of Vincent Price is top-notch and the gorgeous Gene Tierney performs as a naive character but with strong principles. Walter Huston is also amazing. A great Saturday morning feature.

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[Frankie Teardrop]

Finishing off my PA round-up.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 4 - The series takes a detour into the lives of some other boring suburbanites who live in a similar house. This time there's a sinister child from across the road - will he bring supernatural doom to the etcetc Maybe all the box office competition from the wave of 'Insidious' clones (arguably semi-inspired by the original 'Paranormal Activity' anyway) sharpened the makers' pencils a bit, because I found 'Paranormal Activity 4' quite effectively eerie in patches, with a nicely sustained build up and enough little visual skits to offset the expected rattling and glimpses of people running past doorways. The ending's a bit meh, but if it's the journey that counts then this one's pretty good.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY: THE MARKED ONES - Part five. Two goofballs get on the wrong side of the woman downstairs; she's pretty good at dark sorcery, so that's their hard luck really. I suppose half the point of being a kid these days is that you're a twenty-four-hour recording device anyway, meaning the 'need excuse for camera' thing is pretty much catered for there. Apart from the slight levity provided by the two doofuses at the heart of this demonic shitstorm, it only really stretches beyond the series's basic pattern when it stages a frenetic runaround in the occultist's hangout at the end, a climactic blowout that's quite atmospheric if you like big shadowy rooms full of furniture covered in sheets and rocking horse silhouettes in windows (I do). Seems quite well regarded by some - me, I thought it was OK.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY: THE GHOST DIMENSION - I pretend not to be influenced by what people say but I am really, so as the credits rolled I put my growing feeling of apprehension down to the fact that the general consensus on 'The Ghost Dimension' is that it's shite. Did I try to prove the naysayers in my head wrong? After I clocked all the shit CGI, I'm not sure I did. The problem with 'The Ghost Dimension' is that it trades what 'Paranormal Activity' does well - ham-fisted 'suggestive' spookery that looks alright when geed up by the false urgency of found footage - for a stab at something that could only ever reveal it as the poor relation of a James Wan-involved flick. Usually I can find the good in the truly bad, but this sits more in the category of films that are too bland to be worth fighting for. The backstory felt unwieldy and silly too. Actually, I fell asleep for quite a bit of it. I must stop talking about it now.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY: NEXT OF KIN - Well, it looks like I've made it. I have to admit, I had a lot more fun when I did the 'Friday The 13th' and 'Nightmare On Elm Street' binges last year, but now I'm at the top of the mountain the journey here doesn't seem so bad. And we leave things on a relative high, as 'Next Of Kin' is actually pretty good. A documentarian visits a religious community somewhere deep in the sticks to film her newfound biological family, who claim to be Amish. Just look at those big sinister barns, though - might these symbols of archetypal midwestern horror be hiding some kind of awful secret? 'Next Of Kin' builds slowly and follows firmly in the footsteps of its forebears in ticking off a plethora of low wattage bump-in-the-night cliches on the way, but, and I know this defeats the object a bit, at least it has the poise, feel and aesthetics of a 'proper film'; no scummy mid noughts trash cams here. More to the point, those sinister barns, the desolate location, the midnight gatherings in the church in the woods all boil up a fairly menacing atmosphere in places, enough to make the running around at the end feel like a pay-off. It works pretty much as a standalone film too, so I wouldn't really blame non-PA completists for skipping most of what lies between this and the first one.

[MrBarlow]

Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop

Finishing off my PA round-up.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 4 - The series takes a detour into the lives of some other boring suburbanites who live in a similar house. This time there's a sinister child from across the road - will he bring supernatural doom to the etcetc Maybe all the box office competition from the wave of 'Insidious' clones (arguably semi-inspired by the original 'Paranormal Activity' anyway) sharpened the makers' pencils a bit, because I found 'Paranormal Activity 4' quite effectively eerie in patches, with a nicely sustained build up and enough little visual skits to offset the expected rattling and glimpses of people running past doorways. The ending's a bit meh, but if it's the journey that counts then this one's pretty good.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY: THE MARKED ONES - Part five. Two goofballs get on the wrong side of the woman downstairs; she's pretty good at dark sorcery, so that's their hard luck really. I suppose half the point of being a kid these days is that you're a twenty-four-hour recording device anyway, meaning the 'need excuse for camera' thing is pretty much catered for there. Apart from the slight levity provided by the two doofuses at the heart of this demonic shitstorm, it only really stretches beyond the series's basic pattern when it stages a frenetic runaround in the occultist's hangout at the end, a climactic blowout that's quite atmospheric if you like big shadowy rooms full of furniture covered in sheets and rocking horse silhouettes in windows (I do). Seems quite well regarded by some - me, I thought it was OK.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY: THE GHOST DIMENSION - I pretend not to be influenced by what people say but I am really, so as the credits rolled I put my growing feeling of apprehension down to the fact that the general consensus on 'The Ghost Dimension' is that it's shite. Did I try to prove the naysayers in my head wrong? After I clocked all the shit CGI, I'm not sure I did. The problem with 'The Ghost Dimension' is that it trades what 'Paranormal Activity' does well - ham-fisted 'suggestive' spookery that looks alright when geed up by the false urgency of found footage - for a stab at something that could only ever reveal it as the poor relation of a James Wan-involved flick. Usually I can find the good in the truly bad, but this sits more in the category of films that are too bland to be worth fighting for. The backstory felt unwieldy and silly too. Actually, I fell asleep for quite a bit of it. I must stop talking about it now.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY: NEXT OF KIN - Well, it looks like I've made it. I have to admit, I had a lot more fun when I did the 'Friday The 13th' and 'Nightmare On Elm Street' binges last year, but now I'm at the top of the mountain the journey here doesn't seem so bad. And we leave things on a relative high, as 'Next Of Kin' is actually pretty good. A documentarian visits a religious community somewhere deep in the sticks to film her newfound biological family, who claim to be Amish. Just look at those big sinister barns, though - might these symbols of archetypal midwestern horror be hiding some kind of awful secret? 'Next Of Kin' builds slowly and follows firmly in the footsteps of its forebears in ticking off a plethora of low wattage bump-in-the-night cliches on the way, but, and I know this defeats the object a bit, at least it has the poise, feel and aesthetics of a 'proper film'; no scummy mid noughts trash cams here. More to the point, those sinister barns, the desolate location, the midnight gatherings in the church in the woods all boil up a fairly menacing atmosphere in places, enough to make the running around at the end feel like a pay-off. It works pretty much as a standalone film too, so I wouldn't really blame non-PA completists for skipping most of what lies between this and the first one.

The Marked Ones I liked a lot, Ghost Dimension is a hit or a miss, but need to re-watch Next Of Kin. Will you be jumping at the chance to see Paranormal Activity 8??

[MrBarlow]

The Innocents. 1961.

One of the best adaptations of Turn Of The Screw, this one sees Deborah Kerr playing the governess to Pamela Franklin and Martin Stephens as the orphaned children while the spirits of Peter Wyngarde and Clytie Jessop are tormenting the governess.

Is The Innocents a ghost story or something psychological like a game to drive the new member of staff to brink of loosing her sanity...either way it does play on your mind as a audience member as everyone involved do play their part well especially with Miles who seems to have a troubled background and who knows how his mischievous mind works while being assisted by his sister or is it just him altogether and being influenced by the late vale Quint. Darlk gothic and atmospheric sets in well and created brilliantly by Jack Clayton and Freddie Francis.

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[MrBarlow]

The Elephant Man. 1980.

Something different from David Lynch who likes to confuse his audience yet with Mel Brooks producing this film we can understand the plot as even to actually feel sorry for the title character on how he became a side show freak, to being somewhat rescued, treated as a human only to be exposed by a hospital worker. Then another circus/freakshow owner then returned back to the doctor.

Anthony Hopkins plays the doctor who is interested in John Merrick and seems to have empathy side towards John and helps him to adjust to new surroundings while John Gielgud has a sharper side and then slowly understands what the doctor is doing. John Hurt plays John Merrick and really went into this role with everything he could even down the make up process and how to actually master the speaking parts.

This is basically a unseen movie for me as I have only seen bits of it but watching it all the way through I have truly enjoyed this film.

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[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop

Finishing off my PA round-up.

I haven't seen a single Paranormal Activity film after the first one so was intrigued by what your consensus would be of the whole series, Frankie.

Well after reading your write ups i won't be shelling out for a Blu-ray box set anytime soon. So i'm pleased that idea has been laid to rest.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Plane (2023)

Gerard Butler plays a commercial airline pilot forced to make an emergency landing on Jolo island in the Philippines. Together with a prisoner being escorted on the plane (Mike Colter) they must protect themselves and the passengers from rebels intent on capturing or killing them.

A hugely enjoyable action thriller in which i was immediately invested. Part disaster movie, part Rambo like shoot 'em up, Plane is one of the most gripping films from recent memory. The airliner coming down was terrifically tense and the final acts a white knuckle thrill ride.

Both Butler and Colter are very good and aided by some suspenseful action sequences helmed by French director Jean Francois Richet. Plane plays like a piece of classic 90's popcorn cinema so if you love the likes of Con Air and The Rock as i do then this should be right up your street.

[J Harker]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Plane (2023)



Gerard Butler plays a commercial airline pilot forced to make an emergency landing on Jolo island in the Philippines. Together with a prisoner being escorted on the plane (Mike Colter) they must protect themselves and the passengers from rebels intent on capturing or killing them.



A hugely enjoyable action thriller in which i was immediately invested. Part disaster movie, part Rambo like shoot 'em up, Plane is one of the most gripping films from recent memory. The airliner coming down was terrifically tense and the final acts a white knuckle thrill ride.



Both Butler and Colter are very good and aided by some suspenseful action sequences helmed by French director Jean Francois Richet. Plane plays like a piece of classic 90's popcorn cinema so if you love the likes of Con Air and The Rock as i do then this should be right up your street.

I really liked Plane. Think it was actually one of the last things I reviewed before I hit a wall again.