What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[Demoncrat]

Originally Posted by keirarts

Shark Exorcist.

f****** hell.

When you see a shark film these days the basic assumption is the film is going to be a deliberately constructed 'bad film' that's designed to appeal to the 'so bad its good' crowd while showing at least a level of technical proficiency that means the film-makes stand half a chance of working again.
Sometimes you come across films like ghost shark where the money wasn't there and the film suffers more as a result. Very rarely however, does one come across a film so inept that you realise the basic fundamentals of film-making have not only escaped the makers, but were probably never there to begin with.
The plot, as best i can understand it, involves some kind of satanic nun who has summoned the devil in the form of a glowing eyed shark. Various hot women get bit and become sharks... at least I think that's what happens. Characters wander out of frame and disappear entirely from the scene only appearing later. It then occurs to me some point later in the evening that they may have transformed into a shark. Its just that the makers of this garbage fire could not afford or be bothered or have the talent to put this across to the audience. Characters move about in scenes as if they have developed the ability to teleport around the scene at will. Phantom cameramen film things then disappear and the same awful CG shark footage is recycled. One character that only appears in a dream sequence for most of the film reappears in an end credits sequence fondling toy sharks and leering at the camera. At one point I was convinced she was going to use a plastic shark as a dildo. Sadly it wasn't meant to be.
The whole affair has a car crash appeal to it. Its like someone gave Ed woods mentally handicapped cousin a camera and a bunch of models and said 'have at it.'

Sold. Worse than Aquanoids apparently

[keirarts]

To all those about to watch Shark Exorcist.. I warned you!

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by keirarts

To all those about to watch Shark Exorcist.. I warned you!

You brought it to our attention! Had you not done so i would have totally ignored it as i do the majority of these cheese fests involving sharks. The only one i like is Two Headed Shark Attack, and that's because i fall into a trance watching Brooke Hogan er' move.

[keirarts]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

You brought it to our attention! Had you not done so i would have totally ignored it as i do the majority of these cheese fests involving sharks. The only one i like is Two Headed Shark Attack, and that's because i fall into a trance watching Brooke Hogan er' move.

with this poster it would have found you eventually. It's better than the film.

shark exorcist.jpg

[Frankie Teardrop]

HAPPY HELL NIGHT – Found the old DVD of this lying around the other day and thought “might as well”, despite a foreboding memory of it being a bit boring. Pleased to report it was a pretty good watch this time around – HHN is not earth shattering, but is a moderately entertaining late slasher which gets by on some nice quirks. It's set on a campus, where kids at a frat party are stalked by a maniacal priest... sort of. Actually, I didn't really 'get' what the slasher guy was all about because of the vaguely addressed supernatural and possession type themes floating around. In fact a general floatiness could be said to apply to the film as a whole, as the narrative is not nailed down and things tend to just happen – why is that weasely bearded dude running a TV station in the frat house basement? why on earth did some of the clean cut protagonists decide it was a good idea to spring this murderous vicar guy from a high security psych ward etc etc... you can possibly gather that the list of unanswerable questions is as endless as the answers are pointless. As stated, HHN is, for me, more about its random eccentricities. There's a good bit with a living statue, and the villain's rubbish one liners, which often don't make much sense, lend a tinge of 'huh?' (shades of 'Nailgun Massacre?). The central creep looks pretty effective in a post-R Nalder kind of way, there's some bits of gore and some moody lighting. I guess my nostalgic fixation on the late eighties / early nineties tips it for me, and I did get a bit misty eyed recalling the kind of student party where a single Ramones track plays all night because everyone's always too hammered to go out and buy a new seven inch ('Happy Hell Night' has its own theme tune that plays incessantly).

THE REFLECTING SKIN – I remember this being on TV a couple of times in the mid nineties. After watching the recent blu-ray, it seemed to me as evocative now as it did back then. It's a sort of gothic noir set in the fifties in America's mid west, where a small town kid becomes obsessed with a mysterious widow called Dolphin Blue. He thinks she's a vampire. In the background, children are going missing and a black cadillac full of rockabilly types lurks menacingly on the horizon. 'The Reflecting Skin' evades easy comparison, although, being lazy about it, you could say there's a slightly Lynchian feeling in the air. That doesn't really do it justice though, as the film very much builds its own world out of endless fields of golden corn and tumbledown barns, both of which are beautifully captured but still seem oppressive. Less sentimental than the likes of 'Stand By Me' in its dissection of the darkness of childhood, the film doesn't strain to make the viewer empathise with its central characters, who are all wrapped up in their own neuroses to offer themselves and each other much hope... somehow this aspect reaches its fullest expression in the film's last sequence, a non-ending which I always found really haunting. Philip Ridley is man of many talents under-represented on film, but this is probably his most powerful cinematic work.

[bleakshaun]

Originally Posted by Demoncrat

Sold. Worse than Aquanoids apparently

So is Aquanoids the flagship of crappy sea monster flicks now?

[trebor8273]

watched The Void again, even better than the first time i watched it Best new horror in years.

[bizarre_eye@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by trebor8273

watched The Void again, even better than the first time i watched it Best new horror in years.

My copy arrived yesterday and I'm really looking forward to checking it out.

[trebor8273]

Originally Posted by bizarre_eye@Cult Labs

My copy arrived yesterday and I'm really looking forward to checking it out.

hope you enjoy it as much as i did.

[Rik]

I Drink Your Blood

First of all, Grindhouse Releasing's Blu Ray looks amazing for such an old cheapo film, I highly doubt 88 Films can better this release, we'll see in July

Right, the film itself ha ha.
First time viewing, but I have read a fair bit about it over years and seen the trailer enough times so I knew what to expect.
This is low budget drive-in/grindhouse cinema at its finest, cheap and cheerful, gory in places, plenty of laughs (both intentional and not), some sex and nudity and ridiculous dialogue ("Let it be known, sons and daughters, that Satan was an acid head" ).
Is it a good film? Hell no, but it is entertaining and I'm glad I took a punt on it, definitely not a waste of £20
At times it reminded me of the films of H.G Lewis and other grindhouse trash like Drive In Massacre, that's not a bad thing at all IMO, I even thought of Porky's at one point while watching, can't really explain why.

Definitely not a film for everyone, but I recommend it and the Blu from Grindhouse is definitely worth picking up, stellar job by them once again. Of course, 88 Films are releasing this in July, fully uncut, but there's no details about this as yet so their release may not contain both the X rated Theatrical Cut and the Director's Cut (the version I just watched) as well as the other film from the double bill: I Eat Your Skin

7/10