Reviews

I had modest expectations going into this movie. I was ready to be disappointed, and I was hopeful to be impressed. Both happened. But unlike many critics, I found the film has more identity than meets the eye.

The remake stays on the basic path forged by the original - a simple, disturbing, darkly funny gorefest. The production values are much higher however, and there's more of an attempt to develop a story amongst the bloody chaos. And here lies the good and bad/Evil of the modern 'Dead.

This is not an amateur work anymore. The lighting and cinematography are done professionally and there is meaning behind the look and feel of the film. It's far removed from the raw look of the original, so I feel the pain of purists. But this high level of production not only gives the film a unique look, but also a texture.

Many details work in concert to create such an effect - color-saturation and high contrast, the peeling garbage back over the Necronomicon, and the incorporation of water and its accompanying sloshing sounds to name a few. There's also a highly memorable siren that howls during intense moments to ratchet-up the intensity.

Unfortunately, a ridiculously trite backstory, lack of character development, and the inability to build-up momentum make it hard to appreciate the wonderful depths of the details. Any sense of dread is extinguished by premature reveal, and there are few effective moments of foreboding. This all leaves the terror predictable, hardly startling, and rather boring. It wants to be its own movie, but can't break free of the original's grasp, leaving it in a disappointing in-between.

For Evil Dead, the devil is in the structure and writing, not the details. The script isn't so much charming as it is weak, and this reduces the effectiveness of any scares. The film leaves it up to the gory details and texture to carry audience interest, painting a wonderfully tangible film on a boring canvas, leaving it devoid of much excitement.

In many ways this movie is like the young Secretariat himself. It comes from a great pedigree (backstory) and has tons of potential but it doesn't quite have the right jockey (direction) to master its power.

The direction, acting, and script can be somewhat weak and the movie doesn't seem to understand the story's natural beauty. For some reason, the movie recreates the races play-by-play. In the Belmont race, it includes a famous line, but the recreation doesn't capture the same power as Chic Anderson's original call. In fact, they omit several dramatic and powerful lines, especially in the Belmont race, in favor of a poem-gimmick that is used awkwardly.

What the movie does right is it includes a surprising amount of historical detail that really adds to the drama. From Secretariat "throwing his head around" in starting gates to extremely accurate recreations of his most notorious races. And even the dramatized competitive subplot between the Sham team and Secretariat team seems to work to build up tension.

In the end, the movie does a good job of bringing several elements of the Secretariat story together into a whole which is especially helpful for people who don't know how the story ends. The details are there, but the director and writer should have taken a character's advice and "just let (the story) run". In the end, they act like the inexperienced jockey who couldn't handle Secretariat. This doesn't make the movie bad (I mean, how could it be? It's such a great story), it just doesn't quite capture the magic to make the movie the champion it should be.

** EXTRA ** If you don't mind spoiling the results of the final race for yourself, check out this mix on YouTube of the final race. It mixes real footage and audio with the score from the film. It's brilliant and far more dramatic than the movie version. Just remember, you will see the results of the final race of the movie if you watch this... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V18ui3Rtjz4)

The Cabin in the Woods is full of CGI, cliché horror predators, comedy, and plenty of jump scares. Of course, this is the whole point. The problem is the execution is done without generating any real suspense, atmosphere or character development. This is absent in most recent horror movies anyway so youthful, casual, fans may not even notice.

The problem is, beyond the idea, there's not much else redeeming about the movie. Every scare you know is coming. (I went to this movie with a person who rarely watches horror movies and this person was able to predict when most jump scares were about to occur.) The gore is also lacking. Lots of CGI blood, yes. But actual horror-movie as-it's-happening gore? Very little. The person I went with is easily frightened but walked away from this with a 'meh' attitude (not frightened at all). A lot of ideas weren't followed through with. There was almost no detail to anything, and nothing really came as a surprise (despite what all the reviews say).

The best parts were the comedic moments (although many missed the mark) and the quirkiness of some scenes. There also were a few WTF moments which were all good and certainly the best parts of the movie - I just wish they were a more cohesive part of it.

Overall, the movie seemed like a good idea that was slapped together without much passion. It's a different take on everything, but beyond that the movie is quite simple and plain. It's too scatter-shot and doesn't take some ideas as far as they needed to go. Casual movie fans and non-Horror fans will appreciate this movie more for what it is. However, even this is not much more than a simple 'unique' shell of an idea that is lightly packed with generic, meta, filler.

The final installment of the Scream trilogy is an unfortunate departure away from the first two in a couple of major ways, and all seem to stem from who wrote the script. Writing credits are given to Ehren Kruger (The Ring, Arlington Road) instead of franchise creator Kevin Williamson. This departure leads to all the others.

The most noticeable difference is the characters. In the first two, the characters had a certain amount of depth, and were to be taken seriously even if they were a bit eccentric (ie. Randy Meeks, Dewey). Comedic elements came from these eccentricities and from situations that unfolded just as they do in the horror movies Randy discusses in the first two. In Scream 3, there is pretty much no character development whatsoever. So much so it's entirely possible to forget about characters all-together. Additionally, some of these characters are way over-the-top and would be more fit to be in Scary Movie than Scream 3. Another difference is there are several iconic links between the first two that are completely absent in the third.

However, Scream 3 isn't a complete failure. The rules of the third are what they should be and the movie does a good job of sticking to that idea. The story in this sense is fitting as the final chapter in a trilogy, but ultimately, Kruger doesn't seem to quite get it. It's as if Scream 3 is an impostor - something like out of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. It may look like Scream, and it tries to act like Scream, but it's not Scream - even if some casual passer-byers can't tell the difference. Thus Scream 3 lacks an identity and never figures out what kind of movie it is. Scream 3 seems in search for it's soul which is something it seems it cannot have without Kevin Williamson, even if Wes Craven is directing it.

Had the original (1974) Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Deliverance never have been created, this movie might be passable as a decent idea. However, as most people are aware, these movies did in fact come out. The borrowing of ideas and concepts from these older films far surpasses homage and trends deep into the swamps of rip-off. One scene is nearly copied and pasted from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and then there's little ideas taken from the movie as well. Themes are one thing since many movies use similar concepts, but lifting scenes is over the top, especially given there's not much else going on for the movie. The cinematography is amateurish, the editing so messy at times it looked as if there was missing footage, and then there's this whole problem with the seasons which is mentioned in the message boards.

The concept of the movie itself, as stated above, is decent enough, and I get it. And there is some redeeming value in the amount of time spent on the villain. But never was I creeped out or scared like I am while watching something like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974 version of course). In fact, some scenes had me laughing. I can only hope this is unintentional humor. Overcooked bad ideas and ideas that go nowhere combined with poor production value really drown any hope this movie had of being anywhere near good.

Not the worst movie I've seen, but I'm struggling to find good things to comment about. Calvaire is a mess of unrealized and borrowed scenes and ideas. The production quality makes the 1974 Chainsaw Massacre look as polished as a Michael Bay movie. Yet another throw-away B-grade horror movie.

More of a remake of Friday the 13th 2, this remake is another bland and bogus attempt to modernize a horror classic (even when the original wasn't that great).

Friday the 13th (2009) has much in common with the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake in that it's stripped of all the best and unique parts, atmosphere, and cinematography, and replaced with cookie-cutter scenes that couldn't be distinguished from one horror remake to the other. Of course slasher films are gonna have similar deaths and that's fine. The problem is the lack of style in which it is done. There's no creepy cabin-in-the-woods feel, there's no mystery, there's no spooky shots or suspense, it's all action/horror. It's as if these remakes were all shot with the same writers, directors, cinematographers, art directors, etc. and maybe they were, I really don't care to investigate (though I did see Michael Bays stamp on this one so it doesn't surprise me).

If you can withstand these complaints, there's also the lame characters who you'll grow to hate along with their lame jokes and one-liners. I did give this movie 3 stars for a reason though. Not because anything good is going on, but because it was a pleasure to see some of the annoying characters fall victim to Jason's comically large machete, and because I've seen worse. Namely Zombie's Halloween.

There have been few well-styled horror films released in theaters lately and this one is no exception. However, if you're a young, casual horror and action movie fan who simply wants to jump a few times in their seat, disregard what I've said as I'm sure you will anyway and have a watch - it's not the worst thing ever - just a disgrace to true horror fans. Deserving of a bad review, this Hollywood action horror is only in it for the cash.

I can't speak for his music, but his movies have never been anything too original. He copied the Texas Chainsaw Massacre with 1000 Corpse's, Devil's Rejects wasn't groundbreaking, and then he remade one of the best horror movies of all time. Now, he's remade the sequel. And man is this thing loaded to the brim with junk.

Hollywood has a knack for over-explaining everything until it all looks the same and Zombie does nothing to prevent this. This is ironic since everyone featured in the film is trying ever-so-hard to not conform. From the bathroom to the attitudes (though you cannot deny Zombie has his own style). In fact, everyone in the film appears to be a fan of Zombie's music, including a guy driving down the highway. Either way, Meyer's is over-explained even more in the sequel, but if that weren't enough, we're now drowned in this bizarre flashback world that introduces another method of explaining something that has already been explained when there was no need to explain it in the first place. Am I explaining this alright? When you take out the key elements, this movie does exactly what it and its characters don't want to do - conform to the usual standard. This movie is just another girl in a nurse's costume on Halloween, and this girl isn't a looker.

I always bite on B-horror films like this (and Black Sheep) and so far, the same results - disappointment. Dance of the Dead has absolutely no suspense whatsoever, and the pacing of the movie, along with comedic timing, is a bit off at all times. Then there's the acting which ranges from acceptable to down-right BAD (I guess that's what you get when you cast real High School-aged actors). All in all, it's no better than a b-film. I wouldn't even rank it a B+. But that's not to say it lacks any redeeming value. The character development is weak, but not non-existent. There's some serious lack of creativity (Power Plant for example) and there are moments of complete cliché (I understand what kind of movie it is but let's face it), but there's also some good gory laughs thrown in during later scenes if you can bare with it a while. The gore is here and there, and the special effects are good enough. My main problem was the amateurish aspects of it. The pacing, the timing, etc. The movie just seemed to skip too quickly without building up scenes or parts of the plot. It does get better as it goes though.

I'm no disgruntled employee, but I do think the movie is way over-hyped. It's by no means anything comparable to the likes of Shaun of the Dead or Evil Dead for that matter, but it does have a few things going for it. Only recommended for zombie fanatics that have an affinity for b-quality films. If you like polished production values, you might want to avoid it. A good test is watching the intro sequence.