Reviews

The first time I saw KONTROLL it was playing on late night TV at about four in the morning. I might have been exhausted but this film grabbed hold of me, slapped me a few times and ensured I was still awake when the sun came up.

KONTROLL tells the tale of a group of conductors in a huge underground rail complex. Their de-facto leader Bulcsu is an enigmatic outcast who sleeps on the platforms and never goes to the surface, and his comrades are a utterly lovable batch of losers including a cranky old geezer, a short unwashed failed womaniser, a narcoleptic and a naive new recruit. They spend their days dealing out fines to faredodgers, chasing a serial troublemaker and dodging the distinctly sinister station manager. Bulcsu's thankless job is further complicated by a murderer pushing people under trains and the arrival of a beautiful girl in a bear costume.

At face value, KONTROLL is a fairly straightforward story about the daylight-deprived world of a motley gang of ticket inspectors on the Budapest subway. There are elements of mystery, romance and comedy, the industrial/dance hybrid soundtrack is fantastic and KONTROLL features in my opinion the best foot-chase scene I've ever seen, but this film really goes beyond telling a simple, entertaining story. Under the surface are massive depths. The whole movie is loaded with visual metaphor and meaning; the surreal-but-real world of the metro stations and tunnels are eerie and hypnotic, and some of the characters are much more than they appear at first (one character manifests a halo in one scene, and another has scars on his head where horns might once have been...). In the end the story told is less to do with underground rail and more about good, evil, personal demons and finally salvation. Give this dazzling movie a try and fall in love with the mysterious underground world it paints and the humans that collide within it...

The latest release from the Apatow stable, Superbad is their take on the teen rites-of-passage story. Two weeks before graduation, best buddies Seth and Evan face the dissolution of their long-standing friendship when they head off to different colleges. Seth's vulgarity and Evan's shyness keep them at arms length from the girls they are interested in, but as graduation looms and the chance to score at a party comes up, the two friends set out on a quest for alcohol and (hopefully) sex. Dragging along their nerdy friend Fogel, their well laid plan unravels into a series of misadventures and as the night continues it becomes clear the issue here is not girls, but what two best friends are going to do when life pushes them apart.

Make no mistakes here, Superbad is crass, rude and occasionally over the top, as most teen comedies are, but it keeps both the central characters planted firmly in reality. Seth and Evan are wonderfully portrayed by Jonah Hill and Michael Cera; I challenge anyone who was a teenage boy not to see at least some of themselves in them. The dialogue between them is funny and real; there are few moments where the humour is forced or unnatural. While the subplot of Fogel's adventures with two inept cops are over the top, they don't detract from the very real story at the movie's core. The movie's conclusion is perfectly in-key with this sense of reality, and is genuinely touching.

Superbad, for a crass teen comedy, has a warm heart beating inside it. While comparisons with American Pie and Porkys are bound to be made, Superbad is really in a class of its own; it's a funny, entertaining and above all fond homage to the writer's teen years, one that when it isn't tickling you with its well-observed humour it's showing you its soul - something most teen comedies don't.

I love Takeshi Kitano. There I go, outing myself again (in a cinematic sense at least). Seriously, I could watch this guy all day - even in that dross JOHNNY MNEMONIC. If he didn't exist, you'd have to invent him. He looks perfect - like some eternally world-weary tough guy... with his constantly frowning face and slight limp, you really get the idea the world tried to chew him up but he was just too hard to swallow so it spat him out. And here in VIOLENT COP it's just perfect.

Takeshi plays Azuma; an old-school, hard-boiled cop. He's undiplomatic, tactless, rude, and liable to try and solve problems with his fists. Within the first five minutes of the film we see his methods in action as he deals with a local juvenile delinquent - he just walks into the kids house, bluffs past a concerned mother and proceeds to beat the hell out of the kid. He leaves with a promise to come back if the kid doesn't turn himself in, convincing you that he might not be a nice guy, but he sure gets results.

Azuma, being one of the older cops in a precinct filling up with young hotshots who want to make their names busting mobsters, is a loner. Suddenly dumped with a green-about-the-gills rookie for a partner, Azuma pulls out all the stops to prove how his "methods" and desire to remain a solo cop are correct. He takes advantage of the youngster, bumming money off him and embarrassing him in public, and openly planting evidence as they try to break up a local drugs ring. When a whiff of massive police corruption rears its head, you already know this is going to end badly, considering Azuma's rough brand of justice could never be bought off.

He does have a redeeming side though, in his care for his younger sister, recently released from a hospital and living in a childlike state of obliviousness. He plays the caring big brother to the hilt - right down to roughing up some guy he finds in bed with her one afternoon (I challenge anyone not to laugh as he clouts her randy suitor into his clothes, down the stairs, up the street and right to the bus-stop). Another great sequence features Azuma's take on solving a domestic abuse case - he beats the aggrieved girl's boyfriend up in the stationhouse corridor, telling him he should respect her more between kicks. As you can imagine, his commander hates his behaviour, and several scenes revolve around his less-than-clean methods.

While the first half is quite humorous in a dark way, things become blacker and more nihilistic when Azuma's sister is kidnapped by the local drug pushers. Almost like a ship losing its anchor, he goes right over into the shadows and stops slapping people about and starts shooting them, all leading up to a desperately grim conclusion, with a cynical twist that is at once sickening and almost completely expected.

VIOLENT COP is an unflinching movie, it does not shy away from showing the audience some pretty grim scenes, and sometimes while the repeated cloutings he gives the scum of the city are amusing, they often continue into a more sadistic vein. By the end, this demon in Azuma comes full circle and once unleashed cannot be put back in its bottle. The movie is unsettling, and it creeps up on you suddenly, stopping any laughter in its tracks. It's a dark movie, broken up by moments of tranquillity and humour despite the harsh reality it takes place in.

While VIOLENT COP might not be everyone's cup of tea, it certainly is a great, hard-boiled crime movie. Just don't be too shocked when it takes its inevitable trip into bleak seriousness. This movie is called WARNING - THIS MAN IS WILD in some parts of the world, and in this case, they really are not kidding.

Back in the day, when I had a full head of hair still and a growing lust for horror cinema, a friend gave me a battered-looking videocassette to view. The label read EVIL DEAD II in a faded red typeface. Being English, I had no clue what to expect, I'd never heard of the original EVIL DEAD as it had been swept up in the BBFC's roundup of so-called "Video Nasties"(movies deemed likely by a short-sighted and infantile board of censors to "deprave & corrupt"). Either way, the weekend arrived, my house filled up with friends, the tape went in… and we were changed forever.

EVIL DEAD II a sequel to the original EVIL DEAD – the tragic tale of a group of teenagers assaulted by demonic forces while stranded in a remote cabin in the wilderness. EVIL DEAD II replayed the entirety of the first film (with several differences) in ten minutes, then brought more young folk out to the cabin to get generally mistreated by the demonic powers circling their cabin refuge like sharks at a shipwreck. Our hero is Ash, an average, slightly dumb guy who's out at the cabin with his girlfriend Linda. They find a tape recorder left by the previous tenant (a history professor working on the translation of an artefact he has discovered), and upon playing the tape release a demonic force into the woods around them. Linda gets possessed, Ash decapitates her with a shovel and then gets possessed himself (albeit temporarily). Plagued by demon-induced visions and a Linda that wont stay in buried, Ash descends into madness. Meanwhile four more victims arrive in the shape of the prof's daughter, a fellow colleague and a couple of local hicks out to make a quick buck. The circle is drawn, the demon's attacks build up in pace, and you just know it's all going to end in tears.

EVIL DEAD II is like a ride on the best ghost train imaginable. It does not let up until the very end. Even the most ADHD-gripped teen can appreciate how balls-to-the-wall this movie is. Each gag is rapidly followed by another. I use the term "gag" as this movie, despite being filled with gore and violence, is funny. I mean fall on you ass laughing funny. Even when people are dying you have a malicious smile on your face. People get drenched in blood and goo, accidentally swallow eyeballs, get possessed and generally go mental, corpses are reanimated, trees come to life and attack and disembodied hands run amok. All the while the movie's tongue moves not an inch from its cheek. If you don't at least crack a smile at this film, you're probably dead already.

Without a doubt though, this is Bruce Campbell's movie. As Ash he steals the show with bouts of world-class lunacy, crass cowardice, hammy scenery-chewing, physical comedy and occasional heroism. Ash is indeed a superhero in the making in this movie, soon after to become one of the greatest horror heroes ever. When he finally gets his act together to become the hero and dons his hero's "armour" I defy anyone not to think they're watching one of the coolest scenes in cinema history. Ash might be an idiot, but you'd want him at your six if demons were attacking your neighbourhood.

The script is at times a bit limited and clunky, and some of the other performances are minimal. Also the effects sometimes look seriously bargain-basement. It doesn't matter in the slightest though. This is a film made with real passion, a sense of humour, and no desire to do anything that scare and delight the viewer. It's horror from a simpler age; one not afraid to be silly or gross in equal parts. It's classics like this that have cemented Sam Rami's career as a director to watch long before SPIDERMAN. EVIL DEAD II is without a doubt one of the greatest horror movies ever made. And if you've never seen it, there's only one thing you can do. Go out now, rent the tape for yourself… and join the rest of us in the world of the "Ultimate Experience in Gruelling Terror"…

Come on… join us… join us… join us

CHUD has been a guilty pleasure of mine for many years now, having seen it originally during a drunken afternoon of loafing at college as a makeshift double-feature with EVIL DEAD II. This film is an exemplar of low-to-no-budget film-making, yet somehow (at least to me, and I confess to adoring trashy horror movies) seems to rise up from gutter level and show a little more than expected - much like its titular monsters.

The premise is a simple one of everyone's favourite just-add-insects\rodents\humans\delete as required monster making ingredient, toxic waste, being stored in underground catacombs beneath New York city. The rafts of homeless in the metropolis don't all reside in cardboard boxes though, and those that dwell in the abandoned subway stations, ancient sewer mains and derelict basements become exposed and transform into rubbery cannibal monsters with glowing ping-pong-ball eyes. An ex fashion photographer who has given it all up in favour of photojournalism, a cop who has been told to shelve a growing number of missing persons cases and an ex con artist and thief who now runs a soup kitchen for the homeless, stumble by accident over a conspiracy to keep the existence of the monsters secret (in case anyone finds out how the illegal dumping created them in the first place) and go out to expose the truth. They run into red tape, lies and a general first-class conspiracy under the control of a shifty spokesman from the NRC, and eventually the aforementioned scabby flesheaters.

Toss into this some colourful support from a bible-spouting hobo-loony, the photographer's model girlfriend and a reporter looking for a big story and our characters are thrown into the deep end, with government spooks trailing them and the CHUDs themselves getting more and more brazen in their surface raids for fresh human groceries. Folk get chomped, a plot to kill the monsters is hatched and it all comes down to a final-reel race for survival and the truth behind what CHUD really means...

The principal cast put in great b-horror performances, especially Stern's AJ (aka The Reverend), who steals every scene he's in. Some scenes, like the oft-mentioned shower sequence, seem to be edited in for no reason. Also the low budget shows, with all the gore relegated to post-mortem stuff and the CHUDs themselves look, well, somewhere between laughably rubbery and totally cheesy Halloween costumes. This doesn't remove the movie's simple charm. It doesn't take itself too seriously, the cast deport themselves well despite it all, and it has a few standout moments that highlight the reality of the underworlds that exist beneath many major cities. Even John Goodman turns up as skirt-chasing beat cop, before he ends up a CHUD hot lunch.

The DVD issue of this movie features a priceless commentary from Hurd, Curry and Stern, which is worth the price of purchase alone, and reveals the troubled production for what it was. It highlights though that the guys involved are good friends and despite it all, look over this movie with some reverence, one which even after all these years, I'm forced to share with them. This movie could have become a great series of trashy monster flicks (it has a sequel that has practically nothing to do with CHUD save the title, and lacks an eight of the charm the first movie has), but alas no. The CHUDs are forced to live on in Homer Simpson's imagination, and that of anyone who has thought they've heard a sound under a sewer grating or down a subway tunnel at night.

Who knows... it might be CHUDs after all down there...

DEATH LINE (or RAW MEAT as its known in the US) is one of those movies that you accidentally stumble over on late night TV while attempting to sober up and find a snack. The immediate feelings of kinship this brings with the movie's 'monster' as you stumble about in the darkened kitchen, mumbling about pizza and noisily slurping the dregs out of beer cans is uncanny. I've seen it a dozen or more times now at uncivilised hours and it never lost its charm. Our gruesome tale surrounds the last surviving members of a turn-of-the-19th century construction crew from the beginnings of the London Underground. Sealed in the underground bunk rooms and crawlspaces and surviving through cannibalism and interbreeding, now only two remain, soon to become one as the heavily-pregnant female of the couple expires, leaving her heartbroken mate (a cross between Fagin from OLIVER and Bub from DAY OF THE DEAD) to shamble out into 1970's London to find new friends and eating opportunities. He batters a few folk senseless to drag back to his pantry, those that put up too much of a struggle the tends to just off on the spot, impaling people on broken brooms, splitting skulls with shovels and displaying some superhuman strength. DEATH LINE doesn't slouch on the gore, though you're usually too liquored up to mind. Throats are slashed, rats are nibbled, and we see several corpses in their rather realistic gory glory. Alas, a couple of meddling students and an unreconstructed 1970's London copper (played to a wonderful sarcastic turn by the great Donald Pleasence) rumble his nightly feedings. Our lonely cannibal isn't going to quit without a fight, and turns things personal when he kidnaps the female student (who isn't that keen on his concept of a candlelit dinner for two in his verminous lair), leading the boyfriend and the cops to hunt the monster down before it's too late. DEATH LINE's strengths are in its subtleties. "The Man", our monster, is very sympathetic. He is riddled with disease, bereft and alone, and utterly uncivilised (much like the average drunken late-night movie viewer). He makes you pity him with his wails and moans, with his attempts to feed his dead mate, even when he mercilessly butchers folk and nearly forces himself on the heroine - he's nothing more than an animal in human clothing doing what any animal does to survive. The real bad guys here are the cops (who are obsessed with tea-drinking instead of solving missing persons cases) and the "hero", who is a singularly self-absorbed, pseudo-intellectual cold fish of a boyfriend, who's final act of savagery is even condemned by his rescued girlfriend. Indeed it seems he needed his girlfriend kidnapping by a cannibal to give that much of a damn about her. The jerk should have ended up on the menu if you ask me. It's a simple film overall, with several flaws that stop it being recognised as truly great horror, but if you want things uncomplicated enough to wash over with you like the lager and cold Chinese take-away, you can do a lot worse that watching DEATH LINE. Who knows, you might see it sober and find the hidden gem that it is too...

When this film was first released in 2002, it was considered by many to be the first wave of a new generation of smart, original horror movies that broke the conventions of an admittedly tired genre. Considering the mountains of praise heaped upon this film it must have worked for some. At it's release it was touted as the future of "zombie" movies (though the film doesn't feature a single zombie) and another triumph for director Danny Boyle (who's only talent seems to be for tapping into the zeitgeist-de-jour of the time and churning out dull movies that end up being adored by the readers of the NME and GQ magazine - just look at TRAINSPOTTING).

28 DAYS LATER tells a pretty damn formulaic tale of a lone man who wakes up in hospital to discover the London he left behind is a deserted ruin of overturned vehicles and blowing litter. Hiding though in the shadows are a bloodthirsty throng of mindless victims of a accidental viral outbreak. Our lone protagonist finds other survivors and together they attempt to find a safe haven from the contagious horde forever at their backs.

So far, so OMEGA MAN. After the predictable deaths along the way, the survivors travel to an apparently safe military compound, only to discover the soldiers there are as desperate as they are and have unpleasant motives of their own, leaving our hero to save his new friends from the dangers within and without.

A horror story is only as good as its monsters. The Infected Masses are single-minded beings, existing only to kill and run about howling. They appear not to eat, ignore injury, and enter a kind of torpor during daylight hours. Since these aren't cannibals or animated corpses like most monsters that fit this cinematic "zombie" prototype, the "ugh" factor comes from the fact they constantly vomit large quantities of infected blood, obviously inspired by real-life diseases like Ebola.

On the other hand you have the soldiers, who harbour a plan to collect women, reconstructing "humanity" and rebuilding their cabin-fever-shattered mindsets via rape, (all of which is approved of by their commander), leaving us with a tired question of who really is the monster - us civilised humans or the primal screaming horde outside (who are at the end of the day are just us anyway - the kill-or-be-killed instinct hiding under the veneer of "humanity" in every one of us) but by this point I didn't care.

The story is cliché from moment one, leaving the audience with nothing to cling to but the characters. No bad thing, but the script is dire. Most of the cast do as well as they can with what they have, which includes some serious talent like Eccleston and Murphy, but it's an uphill struggle. The camera-work and editing is frenetic and perfect for MTV viewers, people with ADHD and those who think this is a hallmark of modern cinema and not just irritating. The movie is hip for certain, but clothes do not make the man. Don't even get started on the holes in the plot... most of the time you can forgive such things in horror movies but here they're glaring and obvious.

28 DAYS LATER seems to be so much more to its fans, but to me it is no more than yet another sorry collection of horror clichés presented in a way that seems to be original until you realise you've seen every scene before in some other movie, most likely handled better.