Reviews

an interesting and surprisingly rhapsodic slasher film, 'little erin merryweather' combines fairy-tale imagery, classic horror genre elements, romantic comedy elements, and burton-esque flights of fancy to tell the story of a little girl who is 'lost in the woods' due to scarring abuse as a child. the setup and plot progression are typical (and almost dull in their by-the-book crime thriller development), but the proceedings are boosted by some suprisingly strong performances (particularly the psych teacher) and a creepy, sing-songy lilt that i've never really seen before in this type of film (i can only compare it to "dead of winter", "jack be nimble", and "the company of wolves", although i can't even really say why). deliciously eerie childlike music and fantastic illustrations and voiceover let on from the start that this is not your typical cut-em-up, but then fairly standard scare scenes bring you back to the reality that yes, it may be just that. left a somewhat stale taste in my mouth due to the demonisation of a victim of abuse (a tired and potentially insulting thriller theme that's been virtually abandoned), but earned definite points for its clean, economic direction and unique tone. i'd like to see more from these guys. screened at the nychff.

wow -- lit like a soap opera, acted like a lost episode of "saved by the bell", and populated by intergenerational television has-beens, this one is really something special. this incomprehensible film starts in connecticut (i think) with a scene stolen out of "exorsist 3" and then moves to florida (i think) where we're treated to all the fun trappings of direct-to-video horror, namely: rich kids with the run of a gigantic house, nudity-free sex, booze, racial profiling, "raves", random FBI involvement, goofy masks, murders unrelated to the plot, and horrendous music. i mean, REALLY horrendous music. i will admit that there were a few clever scares (the fold-up ironing board, a tried-and-true gag since "clue", is still effective here), but mostly it was horribly contrived. chad allen somehow reminds me of anthony michael hall in his awkward "johnny b. good" phase, only with an added prescription medication addiction. take note of the name of the lead actress - and avoid ever watching anything with her in it EVER AGAIN. and it shakes me to the bone that i am about to write this -- joey lawrence is one of the strong points of the movie. whew. i said it. words of the day: overlit, unresolved, grating, stagey, joey.

The seemingly endless parade of disappointing horror films continues, with this mess of a film stacking up somewhere between "House of 1000 (er, make it 7) Corpses" and "Freddy vs. Jason vs. Monica Keena's Cleavage". Swinging wildly between parody and gross-out movie, the film starts promisingly with a tacked-on credits sequence that sets up a foreboding mood entirely absent from the rest of the film. The movie is populated with dozens of stupid throwaway characters (which all but scream "I went to high school with the director and I'm really fun at parties!") and the last 5 minutes lapses bizarrely into a "Naked Gun" movie. There are a few icky gross-out moments, but nothing even remotely scary -- imagine a horror film of someone sneezing on a crowded bus for 90 minutes and you've pretty much got it. The words of the day are: silly, pretentious, uneven, and dull. Rent "Wrong Turn" instead.

can't say that i have the same drooly-gushy-wet-in-the-bathing-suit-area feelings as many fans about this one, but it was entertaining. note about the lovely katherine isabelle's ticket-sellers: most blatant use of a shower-scene body double since angie dickinson dropped the soap in "dressed to kill". no WAY was that her -- she didn't even have the same hair color!! actually, the whole "silicon co-stars" effect was rather disturbing -- these actresses could have been sold for parts after being dispatched. anyway, besides it being a comedy first, a WB circle-jerk second, and a horror movie way down the list somewhere after Driver Safety Film, and despite boasting some of the worst acting in the history of EITHER series (thank you, Destiny's Child), and although it was not the least bit scary and had more repetitive dialogue than a Pinter play, it was at least better than "rob zombie's house of 7 corpses". but it was NO "wrong turn"!!

the most interesting thing about this awful piece of trash is that there are three people in the credits with the last name "Squatpump". taking into consideration that "Betty Flinstone" and "Wilma Rubble" are also listed, i looked on the trusty imdb to see if these "Squatpumps" were real, and it does indeed seem that yolanda (the matriarch of the clan?) has a few more credits under her belt, including "The Usual Suspects", and may therefore actually exist. but back to the film: the wordless, pointless 10-minute intro actually made me wonder if the filmmakers couldn't afford sound equipment. the next scene, an agonizingly long dialogue scene between linnea quigley and her shrink, proved that yes, they did have sound equipment, but that they had apparently lost their sets, as the scene apparently takes place in a black hole.

so i actually continued watching this crap. and about an hour later i was treated to a downright hilarious sledgehammer-(mannequin)-head-beating and an even better shotgun-to-the-(mannequin)-head death. ultimately one of the frizzy-haired psycho girls killed everybody, apparently. i don't know. i actually was more entertained picturing david decoteau, who directed under the odd alias "Ellen Cabot", showing up to the set every day in a smart grey skirt suit and sensible shoes (as, in my mind, someone named Ellen Cabot would).

Further along the downward slide of the Zombie legacy, this well-lensed but pointless exercise teams up Jeff Stryker, best known for his work in gay porn, and Don Wilson, best known for his work in bad martial arts flicks shown on Showtime at 3 in the morning. Boring, complacent, startlingly un-zombielike zombies hover outside the heroes' hideaway for seemingly days on end without mustering the courage to enter. One hand grenade annihilates an entire resort and all its inhabitants. And the most shocking moment is when a rotund witchdoctor in a sacrificial gown exposes his man-breasts to the camera -- something that even a hardcore horror fan like myself was not, and still am not, prepared to see. Give it a 4 out of 10.

this documentary chronicles a season in the life of texas' famed "hell house", a haunted house designed by a Pentacostal church to literally "scare the devil" out of teenagers. by graphically recreating such horrors as botched abortions, AIDS death, rape, school shootings, suicide, and drunk driving accidents (and then showing the perpetrators dragged off to hell by masked demons), the church hopes to redirect "the lost" to the path of righteousness. more likely, they succeed in scarring and confusing the young, entertaining those with enough sense to see through the thinly-veiled attempt at pew-stuffing, and comforting their own smug selves that they have managed to keep evil at bay for one more year. for a group of righteous people, they spend an awful lot of time discussing and recreating violent and horrific acts -- it's no wonder that one interviewee calls the world an "evil place" (that she goes on to rhapsodize about jesus returning to earth to choose his bride will not be discussed here). mixed into the "let's-put-on-a-show-to-terrify-everyone" hijinx we enjoy scenes of parishoners speaking in tongues, an overstressed father caring for his 5 children -- one who is prone to seizures -- without the help of a spouse, and lots of confusion as to exactly what evils the good folks are battling (including exactly which "date rape drug" they are indicting and what "magic: the gathering" is). you might look at this and think that it's too good to be true, from a people-watching perspective, and it is, to a point -- as with most documentaries, the line between simply recording and exploiting is crossed early on and left behind at a sprint. sure, these people are a bit fanatical -- there's no doubting it. but the selection of the scenes, camera placement, and editing make this conclusion for you before you have a chance to reach it on your own (anyone who saw todd solondz's excellent "storytelling" might recognize that this is a dilemma inherent to documentary filmmakers, particularly those who lose respect for their subjects). in the end, those who buy a ticket to see some loony folks from the south overstepping their moral bounds and being paraded about like fools will get just that -- but in this, aren't the filmmakers preaching to the converted much as the real "hell house" does?

this is one of the strangest films ever -- a disney wilderness film (which i tend to love), it features a lynx named "lefty", who lives with brillcream-handsome ranger joel and his dog "brandy" in domesticated technicolor bliss. his misadventures include getting snagged in a boxtrap and tumbled down a very steep hill by an angry wolverine, whom joel later hurls a good 150 feet in the air into a pine tree. neither lynx nor wolverine look too thrilled during their violent tumble, and the wolverine is never seen again after he is tossed into the next county. later, joel runs out to quiet the rascally lefty (who is antagonizing the sled dogs in their kennel) wearing an undershirt, towel, and shaving cream, and is the subject of an unfortunate "towel-drop" joke that would be inappropriate even if it didn't feature a reaction shot of one of the dogs looking alarmingly at whatever joel has under his towel. animal sadism, the loneliness of a wilderness ranger, and sex farce wrapped up in amber-tinted disney packaging -- what more could you ask for?

a lot of focus has been placed on the graphic murder scenes, which is not surprising. but these two scenes only make up a small part of this odd, quiet, ominous film. i did find it unsettling that the murders -- particularly of the boy -- did not seem entirely without tenderness. the killing is done entirely with the mouth, in the guise of what are otherwise intimate, tender gestures -- not with blows or weapons. did they eat out of love? does uncontrolled love turn into the desire to consume completely? the relationship between isolated desire and consumption is what i found interesting here -- each of the characters spends most of his/her time alone, each with his/her own private quest involving one of the other characters. the victims -- both quite young -- are each seen eating a piece of fruit (a bit heavy-handed) before breaking into their murderer's home (or hotel room) and subsequently being violated and eaten themselves. is this a contemporary fairy tale cautioning youths about the perils of succumbing to their carnal appetites?

this is, simply, a fantastic film. succeeding as horror film, dark comedy, and social commentary, this brave and brutal story is shocking, entertaining, and cautionary without being didactic or the least bit predictable. the parallel made between puberty and the transformation of a human into a wolf is fantastic, and the lingering fascination of the camera with blood and flesh as they contemplate their own bodies and the changes that they undergo, both naturally and unnaturally, is horrific and thrilling. the extensive gore may deter some squeamish viewers, which is too bad -- it's completely appropriate and necessary in confronting the topic of pubescence head-on, and by placing the story within the context of a horror film, the filmmakers are able to explore the nastier realities of our bodies freely. it's kind of like cronenberg doing a highschool sex-ed film. highly recommended.

say what you like about the success of "the idiots" as a satire: i'd say it's hard to miss the biting wit and gasp-inducing daring behind this strange, sad little film. bad boy von trier seems determined to offend here in a naive schoolboy poop-joke sort of way, but although his exploration of the vulgarities of this group of players is exhaustive, it is ultimately not the point -- it is a device to keep us entertained and busy so that he can hit us upside the head with yet another "breaking the waves"-style melodramatic surprise ending. and, as with "breaking the waves", it is completely effective -- the audience (myself included) was stunned, sobered, and silenced -- almost as if they had been caught laughing at the jokes and were then punished for it. the line between those who need to get in touch with something vulnerable inside and those who just want to act like children is clearly drawn, to highly dramatic and moving effect -- one can almost see the line of von trier's thought between "breaking the waves"'s slow bess and these noxious pranksters, who spend their time trying to achieve her simplicity. i don't think i'll ever see anything else quite like it.

i can't believe i'm writing a comment on this, but i have to -- it's like picking a scab.

how hilarious is this film? we haven't seen a big-budget b.m. of these proportions since gene kelly and olivia newton-john skated through 'xanadu' all those years ago. granted, the house is big. it's quite big, actually -- and that fact almost impressed me until i realized that it was only offering the cast and director more rooms to overact and be lame in.

liam "i did this movie years ago and it was called 'high spirits' and it sucked then, too" neeson, catherine "i'm not welsh if i'm not yelling" zeta-jones, and lili "joe lies, i just sold out" taylor try their hardest to upstage a bunch of computer-generated golden children that apparently want something from the human guests -- the result is rather like a gothic honeycomb commercial shot in dolby surround. todd field, making a name for himself as 'that infinitely discardable guy' in epic disasters (see also: 'eyes wide shut'), and the assistant girl are the lucky ones, getting kicked out of the house before the acting starts (although i think that her piano-wire-to-the-eye is a stunning metaphor for this moviegoing experience as a whole). avoid watching when not zonked on nyquil.

love, salvation, sacrifice, and loss drive the complex and troubled characters of this exceptional film. max's becoming a savior dashes his emotional and spiritual architecture to the ground, and he must allow himself to be saved as well in order to reclaim his life and relationships.

'fearless' addresses those abilities that approach the divine (the ability to save, to help, to heal, to create), those needs that keep us human (the need for love, for contact, for security), and demonstrates that, as we each have all of these qualities, none of us is perfect (as his wife says, 'max is not an angel, he is a man; he cannot survive up there'), and yet none is without hope (as demonstrated by carla's recovery). parallelling max's self-induced 'fall from grace' with the full memory of the plane crash is pure genius -- the combined emotional impact of the two events produces ten of the most staggering minutes of film i've ever seen, and max' subsequent breath of life/return to mortality is simply beautiful. when the credits rolled, my heart was somewhere under my chair. a film with geniune respect for its characters and a desire to see them heal (see also: 'magnolia', 'bringing out the dead', 'always', 'the fisher king'). we need more of these.

this movie takes the prize for boldly spitting in the face of such old standbys as plot, structure, character development, narrative arc, tone, reason, common sense, temporal cohesiveness, and logic more effectively and with more glee than any other film ever made. the story elements (namely, a funeral home, a tall man, a silver ball with a drill on it, a killer housefly, a musclecar, an ice cream man, killer jawas, and a tuning fork) are not really combined so much as stuffed into 88 minutes, and the scariest thing about the movie is that this stream-of-consciousness approach to horror filmmaking actually works. a creepy location, some genuinely startling imagery (the funeral home interior shots are downright kubrickian), and a lack of any exposition/explanation keep you wondering what in god's name is going on until the last frame. hats off to writer/director don coscarelli for pulling it off -- it's a great time.

this is easily the worst-written film ever made. my friends and i only made it through 15 minutes of this debacle before we had to switch to "the warriors" to wash the cheesy full moon taste out of our mouths. besides the fact that the main girl looks and sounds a bit like charlotte from "sex and the city", this video has no redeeming qualities. pithy, punchline-challenged horror movie in-jokes and limp references to "the beyond" and other decent zombie flicks only succeed in emphasizing what a mistake this film is. plus, the lead male needs a haircut.

granted, funhouse thrills are not exactly this film's selling point, but come on -- who wants to see a doped-up, incoherant, self-mutilating, flagrantly misguided "feminist" trash herself and the adult film industry in the name of 'sexual expression'?? never before has such an undeserving person had such a forum to display her idiocy. what's the point here? if this is a cautionary tale, it's a poor one -- five minutes is enough to realize that this girl brings everything upon herself, and her situation is so specific that it is invalid as metaphor or allegory. she's not even tragic -- she is merely being presented as something to disgust us. does anyone else question the motives of the filmmaker here? does anyone find it a bit of a coincidence that annabel's parents receive 'anonymous letters and phonecalls' at the time that she happens to be visiting with a camera crew? this kind of manipulative filmmaking is not documentation, it's emotional snuff. shame, shame.

This film is easily one of the most impressive and sure-handed directing debuts I have ever seen, and one of the finest films of the year. Pierce captures the Midwest in its garish glory (unlike its white trash cousin, "Gummo", which blanched out its landscape like a wasteland) and loads it with beer, highways, sky, cigarettes, guitar rock, and rage. The script deftly manages to round out potentially cardboard characters with little or no confessional or sentimentality -- the players don't reveal anything that is not necessary, leaving an air of mystery to everyone, not just the strange hero. The young cast (except the actress playing Lana's mom, whose excellent performance should not be overlooked) manages the emotionally charged and incredibly intense material almost effortlessly, without crossing the line into exploitation or camp (even the brutal violence in the film, which I might consider exploitative in other films, is unfortunately quite appropriate here). Swank should be applauded for her portrayal of the confused and hungry Brandon, as should Sevigny, for turning a white trash Juliet character into someone multi-faceted and real. Becky from 'Roseanne' puts her acting experience to good use and does a fine job as well, as do Saarsgard and Sexton, who is almost unrecognizeable here.

Although the film is difficult to watch at times, it is an incredibly told story, and should not be missed.

Most disappointing -- Greenaway's slide continues on from the flagrantly banal "Pillow Book", which looked like a pornographic Sprint commercial and had about as much intellectual impact. The thin visual style of "Women" harkened back to "Drowning by Numbers", one of my personal favorites, but the interchangeable, glibly apathetic characters lacked the depth necessary to hold it up. As usual, some interesting discussion of the body and its trappings, but sadly, prematurely self-referential and dull on the whole. Note that Vivian Wu manages to turn in yet another openly wretched performance, this time while fully clothed; Toni Collette provides minor temporary relief with her hilarious accent.