What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[keirarts]

A little break from Italian cinema.

Paradise lost: the child murders at robin hood hills

Weird to think it's approaching the 25th anniversary of the trial. Essentially documentary film maker Joe Berlinger began to shoot a documentary on the trial of three teenagers accused of murdering three eight year old boys. Pretty soon it's clear that the prosecution has very little evidence of motive or anything linking the the three teens to the victims. I stead they build a case based around the occult, arguing the killings were a ritual sacrifice. The main thrust of the prosecutions arguments being based on a dubious confession from Jessie Misskelley Jr, a teen with an IQ of 73 who was interrogated for twelve hours with only 45 minutes actually being recorded. The rest is based on Damien Echols experimentation with the Wiccan belief system.
The film doesn't take stance on whats happening, rather it looks at everyone involved including the victims families, the suspects and their families and the court processes and invites the audience to make up their own conclusions based on what they see. Essentially its not good, the teens appear to have been arrested for not fitting in. Wearing metallica T-shirts in the heart of a deeply christian community. The rise of 'satanic panic' doesn't help either. Numerous snake oil salesman were approaching local law enforcement at the time offering guides on satanism and the prosecution even brings one of them in as an expert witness in spite of his PHD essentially being bought through mail order.

Paradise lost 2: Revelations

The original documentary stirred up so much controversy that six years later, Joe Berlinger returns to the community to look at the appeals process for the west Memphis three. This raises questions about inadequate defence, with defendants rarely having money to present an adequate defence. It also looks at some of the glaring holes in the Prosecutions evidence, especially the initial forensic examinations. The defence has raised more money thanks to the public outrage at the initial trial and other expert witnesses are brought in who poke holes in almost all of it. We also see that in spite of this the state is highly reluctant to admit it may have got it wrong. Especially the judge who was preparing to stand for public office.

Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory

18 years after the initial conviction, new DNA Evidence comes to light that casts further doubt on the convictions. Essentially there is no DNA connecting the three teens to the murders whatsoever. Itself highly unusual. The one piece of DNA identified seemingly linking one of the victims stepfather to the crime scene. A man it turns out has a past history of violence. We also learn that the alleged sexual mutilation of one of the boys along with the knife marks are in fact the result of animals biting and scratching at the bodies. Eventually under growing public pressure, including John Mark Byers, stepfather to one of the boys who was featured prominently in the previous documentary and was even considered a possible suspect. Having been ruled out it was clear at the time that Byers was gripped by a powerful rage against the three who he could not forgive so his change of heart is especially potent.

West of Memphis

A documentary from Peter Jackson's Wingnut films. Jackson and Fran Walsh had contributed considerable time and money to the west memphis three's defence and appeals after Jackson had seen Paradise lost. This documentary is a condensed timeline of the trial, appeals and acquittal looking much closer than Paradise lost did at the forensics and how expert witnesses brought in essentially ripped the prosecutions case to shreds. Even more controversially there is strong evidence that the discovery of a key piece of evidence was staged for the press and the prosecution were aware that it could not have possibly been the murder weapon. This one is on Netflix and worth checking out. Essentially it gives you everything you need to know about the case. However if you ever have a day to kill its worth having Marathon of the whole lot.

[keirarts]

Suspicious death of a minor

Sergio Martino's hybrid of Giallo & Poliziotteschi has Claudio Cassinelli as Germi, a tough undercover cop who uncovers a child prostitution ring after one of the girls is brutally murdered. He's in a race against time to uncover the powerful people involved as the killer carves his way through witnesses.
The film has something of a wry sense of humour to proceedings, though not to the extent it detracts from the genuinely tough nature of what its dealing with. As one would expect from Martino, one of the better directors working in the genre, the action scenes are great and the film looks incredible, especially with Arrows recent restoration of the picture. Cassinelli is a great leading man and worked a lot with Martino, and we also Mel Ferrer as the chief. Luciano Michelini score is excellent as well and compliments the film well.

What have they done to your daughters

Dealing once again with the thorny issue of child exploitation, Claudio Cassinelli plays another tough cop determined to uncover the truth. This ones directed by Massimo Dallamano and is much more grim and gritty than Martino's picture with very little humour and some genuinely nasty violence perpretrated by a blak clad biker with a hatchet. The claret flows freely here and for the most part is convincingly done. Stelvio Cipriani delivers an Amazing score. Like Michelini's one for suspicious death of a minor it's highly memorable. On balance I think I prefer this to Martino's picture. Its much more grim & nasty than that, but more imprtantly I think this one had more genuine suspense and some scenes that are still genuinely unsettling.

[Susan Foreman]

Originally Posted by keirarts

The Climber

Joe Dellasandro plays Aldo, a young American in Italy and involved in petty crime

From what I am led to believe, he never once gave it away!

[zeroid]

Originally Posted by Nosferatu@Cult Labs

I haven't read any of the books so can treat the films as films rather than adaptations of a literary source. Prisoner of Azkaban is easily my favourite of the Harry Potter films. In fact, it's the only one I've seen more than once!

Your short reviews of may be interested in (when the price is right) buying the 4K Ultra HD box set and watching all of the films in a relatively short period of time.

I've never read the books but I did listen to the audio versions read by Stephen Fry, when I used to get a bus to work. His voice acting is great and really brings the stories to life. They are unabridged so they are still long and take a bit of getting through but you can do other stuff at least.

[Demoncrat]

Tokyo Ghoul (2017)

A somewhat different beast to the last film . What to do when the demure girl of your dreams ... turns out to be a flesh eating monster?? CGI ridden Asian potboiler.

[nosferatu42]

Random thoughts strung together round a fire about the past weeks viewing skewered together in a misshapen kebab style confection....

Flash Gordon's trip to mars

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Been watching this on and off for a while and tis well worth the effort if you are a fan of 20 minute bursts of retro nostalgic fun.

Probably doesn't do anything for the kids of today. but it's their loss as we get to go through the trials and tribulations of Flash getting caught by Ming, escaping for 5 minutes and getting caught again in a strange eternal loop.

Brilliantly bonkers in the way it has a total death cliffhanger that is some how escapable by re shooting a vital scene at the last moment each week.
Still fantastically cosy and comforting to watch.

Recommended 8/10

Meshes of the afternoon.



A short film that i came across reading something that was related to David Lynch, i think.
A Surrealistic short that has something to do with a woman re-living moments in her afternoon through different versions of herself ,while she sleeps.
I guess.
With a spectre like cowled figure with a mirror face.
I enjoyed this for it's arty experimentalism and odd angles that reflected the disorientation of the female protagonist.
Something that could be watched beside 'Un Chien Andalou', Svankmajer and The Brothers Quay on a mushroom fuelled afternoon.

8/10

to be continued....

[nosferatu42]

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Back in the room...

Castle of the living dead

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An ok hybrid, a someweird cross between an early Bava film and 'Mill of the stone women' with a room full of petrified corpses, and although featuring work by Michael Reeves of 'Witchfinder general' fame and Christopher Lee doesn't really come to life.
Some nice camerawork but i found it a bit dull.
Still has Donald Sutherland as a witch so was worth the effort.
Reminded me of something out of 'Blackadder'.

6/10.

Comedy of Terrors

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Rewatched this due to the Karloff/ Lugosi top tens.

I saw this years ago and always remembered enjoying it at the time.

Nice rewatch, Price and Lorre hamming it up as funeral merchants who bump off their customers, meanwhile Karloff plays a doddering old geezer who gives shoddy funeral sermons and sits lost in his senility.

All the while his daughter sings excruciatingly and breaks glass, being ignored by 'Price' and lusted after by 'Lorre'.
All is disrupted by the cantankerous (almost dead) corpse of 'Basil Rathbone" with his repetitious cries of "What place is this!!".

Almost classic, that has trouble sustaining itself like old Basil, but is entertaining enough just to watch the old 'fiends' having a ball and bouncing off one another.

Recommended 7 1/2/10

[nosferatu42]

Death Walks on high heels

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A new one of these giallo things on me, something about a load of stolen diamonds and the daughter of the thief.

As usual vague, vapid pop art people spend time confusing the viewer in the search for some kind of half assed resolution.
Whilst a killer rattles in and out of the plot haphazardly offing the protagonists at opportune moments to pad out the films running time, all the while prompting some deliriously sensuous soundtrack compositions.
Oh and there's tit's too.

A lot of these giallo films are so similar that they slot together in the memory like a warped Freudian jigsaw puzzle stuck together with jism, blood and smeared in liquid LSD, but they are so addictive too.

A couple of days later and it's just another sordid memory seeped in that giallo goo, but i remember it kinda made sense and i thoroughly enjoyed the experience at the time. Above average for the genre.

Recommended 8/10

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Mutant (1984)

Two brothers discover that the residents of a small Southern town are being infected by a form of toxic waste, turning them into zombies.

Starring Wings Hauser and Bo Hopkins, this is quite good for the first forty or so minutes as it's basically two brothers versus a redneck town, however it goes downhill once the zombies are introduced. Not just zombies but zombies straight out of Romero's Night of the Living Dead... except less effective. In fact less effective sums up the whole thing really.

Average at worst, average at best, such a pity the rather nifty movie poster has bugger all to do with the film.

[nosferatu42]

Last house on the beach

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(Considering that they are always the 'last" house, there seems to be a lot of 'em about.

Anyways, this ones a beach house filled with virginal girls who are being looked after by the nunsploitationtastic form of Florinda Bolkan, a woman with a habit. (of being in dodgy exploitation films...ahem!! )

In this one a gang of 3 fugitives turn up and turn the place upside down, slaughtering the maid and keeping the group busy, by way of intimidation and rape/ murder.

Coming after the original 'Last house" this is in many ways a better made film, it is less roughly shot but loses the gritty impact of the original film, it is also not as deliriously sleazy as Deodato's 1980 psychotic classic "House on the edge of the park"

Ray Lovelock from "Living dead at Manchester morgue" turns up here as one of the bad guys that may be sympathetic to the girls plight and offers some hope of salvation.

The rape scenes are discreet and there is no titillating shots during these sequences, instead we get distorted views of the perpetrators which put you solely in the eyes of the victim. These scenes have a grim impact from their direction alone.

As usual we side with the victims, waiting for the final scenes when they get their revenge, and by the end of this i was quite satisfied by the resolution.

A more coherent film than many in this subgenre but one that slightly blunts that nasty edge, still a film i really enjoyed.

Recommended 8/10