What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[Frankie Teardrop]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Did you pick up the Network Blu, Frankie? It's a nice package with plentiful extras and booklet that i recommend if you haven't.

That was the one. Decent transfer, I was just happy to see it in HD after spending so long wondering why I'd always ignored it. What a splendidly trashy film!

I'll have to give 'Southbound' another go at some point. For some reason I'd kind of filed it away under 'pretty good, but...' I seem to remember I was a little disappointed by something when I first saw it... maybe time to give it a second spin minus expectations.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Patrick Still Lives (1980)

Now this is how you do exploitation.

Take a moderately successful Aussie horror, Patrick, come up with a similar title, totally unauthorised and bugger all to do with said film except have someone in a coma who kills using psychic powers. Grab a bunch of good looking actors, throw in loads of sex and nudity (And i mean loads), gallons of J&B whisky and some gory violence and away we go.

I absolutely loved this. It's way over the top especially in it's most infamous death scene as a woman is violated in graphic bloody detail by what can only be described as a flying poker which goes in between her thighs and out via her mouth. Seriously! You don't get shit like this in Blumhouse crap.

Everybody in the film bar the doctor (Sacha Pitoëff) is nude at some point, in fact i don't think one woman knew what clothes were, and it's just wonderfully sleazy politically incorrect, questionable brilliance that only an Italian genius like Mario Landi (Giallo a Venezia (1979)) could create.

Film of the month so far.

/ 5

Rome Armed to the Teeth (1976)

For me one of the three great Poliziotteschi films (Violent Naples and The Cop in Blue Jeans being my other faves) this classic crime thriller sees Maurizio Merli's Dirty Harry esq Inspector Tanzi on the trail of Tomas Milian's hunchback.

As with Dirty Harry the film has a lot to say about crime, violence, police brutality and the criminal justice system and the charismatic Tanzi whose hard nosed methods come under a lot of scrutiny from those above even though the viewer or at least this viewer is completely on his side.

As well as brutal violence, awesome car chases (You'd never want to come back as a roadside cardboard box in an Italian city in the 70's) and classic rooftop thrills the film has an awesome support cast including Arthur Kennedy, Ivan Rassimov and great support actor Giampiero Albertini. Director Umberto Lenzi paces the film superbly - breakneck all the way - and it's simply so much fun.

88 Films recent Blu-ray, titled The Tough Ones, looks superb.

/ 5

[MrBarlow]

Superman II. 1980.

3 Kryptonian Villains arrive on earth causing mayhem while Clark Kent/Superman declares his feelings for Lois Lane.

Usually over Christmas there is a Superman movie on and tends to be III, but this year there isn't so went for this viewing, More Terrence Stamp in this and shows how good a actor he is and playing the role of General Zod along side Sarah Douglas and Jack Halloran. Christopher Reeve excels as the bumbling reporter and Superman, along with Margot Kidder who tries to expose that the two men are one. Great visual effects, brilliant cinematography and background score that was adjusted and played by Ken Thorne who vamped up John Williams theme.

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[gag]

Originally Posted by MrBarlow

Superman II. 1980.

3 Kryptonian Villains arrive on earth causing mayhem while Clark Kent/Superman declares his feelings for Lois Lane.

Usually over Christmas there is a Superman movie on and tends to be III, but this year there isn't so went for this viewing, More Terrence Stamp in this and shows how good a actor he is and playing the role of General Zod along side Sarah Douglas and Jack Halloran. Christopher Reeve excels as the bumbling reporter and Superman, along with Margot Kidder who tries to expose that the two men are one. Great visual effects, brilliant cinematography and background score that was adjusted and played by Ken Thorne who vamped up John Williams theme.

Attachment 238170

First 2 Superman films are genuine classics and great entertainment.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Cecilia (1983)

After loving Shining Sex i opted for another Jess Franco film. However this quickly became boring. In comparison to Shining Sex and the Severin dvd this was tame and probably cut but i can't be sure.

The sex scenes were tedious, long and unimaginative with little story to hold them together. I fast forwarded one or two.

I ended up watching Love Actually (2003) instead. A sugary Christmas set rom com that was actually (Ahem) very enjoyable.

[Frankie Teardrop]

KILLER PARTY – Eighties set sorority / frat-house horror always makes me feel a bit gooey inside, but I have to say that ‘Killer Party’ left me cold. I don’t know what it was, exactly… just the sense of an interminable and ponderous build with too many false scares and too much dithering over who gets their ass whacked with the gamma beta phi-carved paddle (or something, you get the picture). In the last few minutes it goes from disposable froth to a big kill with an overly intense possession-victim at the centre, a tonal glitch that I wouldn’t mind had the rest of the film not tried so hard to persuade me of how boring it was. A shame, for ‘Killer Party’ ticks many worthy boxes pour moi, as evinced by the presence of a stupid number of false starts, all the garish eightiesness, actually likeable characters and a theme tune that sounds like it was done by Bananarama on Mogadon. Ah well, can’t have it all.

PHANTOM OF THE MALL – I remember seeing an ad for it on the back of an issue of ‘The Dark Side’ (or was it ‘Fear’? Maybe it was ‘Fear’) and thinking “I bet that’s shit.” Fast forward to the distant future, where time travelling Frankie is shocked to find his forty something self not only still watching this kind of gunk (he was thinking it might have all gone Fellini and ‘Starlight Express’ way before now), but actually pleased and slightly grateful to have had the chance to see, for the first time in HD, ‘The Phantom Of The Mall’. Young Frankie to Old Frankie, was it worth the thirty year wait? Well, I like the gimmick, which transplants the lineaments of the G Leroux ‘classic’ into a slasher scenario set in a rubbish eighties mall – I think I like the slightly crass bravado at play there, though they missed a trick in not actually turning it into a musical. Apart from that, it’s the season for nostalgia. I enjoyed it more than the little guy would, put it that way. But as is sometimes the case with these boutique labels (and I’m not knocking them or their efforts), I kind of wish I could be satisfied with the scratched-up DVD I might once have found going for a quid on the sticky shelves of CEX.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop

KILLER PARTY – Eighties set sorority / frat-house horror always makes me feel a bit gooey inside, but I have to say that ‘Killer Party’ left me cold. I don’t know what it was, exactly… just the sense of an interminable and ponderous build with too many false scares and too much dithering over who gets their ass whacked with the gamma beta phi-carved paddle (or something, you get the picture). In the last few minutes it goes from disposable froth to a big kill with an overly intense possession-victim at the centre, a tonal glitch that I wouldn’t mind had the rest of the film not tried so hard to persuade me of how boring it was. A shame, for ‘Killer Party’ ticks many worthy boxes pour moi, as evinced by the presence of a stupid number of false starts, all the garish eightiesness, actually likeable characters and a theme tune that sounds like it was done by Bananarama on Mogadon. Ah well, can’t have it all.

I rewatched the dvd of this recently. The best thing i can say is that it has a cool poster art.

[Frankie Teardrop]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

I rewatched the dvd of this recently. The best thing i can say is that it has a cool poster art.

I know, I was so disappointed. I was really looking forward to watching it for some reason. Always seems to happen that way, and vice versa.

[MrBarlow]

Candyman. 2021

Finally got round to seeing this and wasn't what I expected it to be, yeah it is a sequel to the original with two characters returning and a mentioning of Helen Lyle. With Candyman supposedly based on the urban legend of Cabrini Green, seems like someone else's back story maybe a urban legend.

What this lacks is the suspense as the film goes on and tension that the first one had and very little jump scares. We do see Candyman but just seems to be from a distant and in shadow form but one up close scene, blink and miss it. There is a decent build up to the main characters but seems to go on and off the rails a bit, no harm in another re-watch.

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[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Frankie Teardrop

I know, I was so disappointed. I was really looking forward to watching it for some reason. Always seems to happen that way, and vice versa.

I can relate to what you said regarding boutique labels releasing for want of a better word rubbish in great packages. I've already seen two or three slashers released by Arrow this Christmas that aren't fit for purpose but look absolutely lovely in HD. Trapped Alive, Doom Asylum and The Prey spring to mind.