Reviews

I had higher hopes for this series, but ....

First, I'll just say Bruce Greenwood and Carla Gugino owned every scene they were in. The rest of the cast were good, including an interesting role for Mark Hamill.

Visually, this is a stunning miniseries. The music also perfectly matches each scene. There are some real great scenes, but, those good parts aren't enough to make up for the show's shortcomings.

While the series is about the Usher family, each episode is essentially a take on a classic Poe tale. Some of these are done better than others. While I appreciated this approach, I wonder if they might have done better to stick to the original story a bit more. The deaths all sort of reminded me of the "Final Destination" movies, which seemed silly when you get the reveal as to why they are happening.

I've tried to put my finger on why this series doesn't work, and I think it's because there is no protagonist. None of the Ushers are good people--they're all deeply flawed with few redeeming qualities. Yes, yes, they all get their comeuppance, but Shadow Theory still applies--you need the light in order to have the shadow ... so who is the light? Auggie? He's a neutral character who mostly is a spectator; someone who listens to the story as Usher recounts the tragedies. As such, there isn't anyone you really pull for. From the get go, you know the Ushers are bad people, so their various demises aren't as horrific as they might be if you actually cared about them. Even in the most basic of slasher movies, there's a handful of decent characters you want to se live. Not so here.

And then there's the messages. Big Pharma bad is the predominant one. Okay, fine. Rich people can get away with murder. Yep, okay. And? This has all been done before.

Also, if you had any doubt whom the producers of this show vote for, you won't after you watch even one episode. And, yeah, I get it, Hollywood skews far to the left, but at least try to veil your politics a little better than this.

It actually gets laughable throughout the show as they are just overt in showcasing their political leanings, and that's a shame. Because as much as this show wants to be seen as a serious, high-brow slow-burn horror, the political jabs cheapen all that.

And during the final episode, during what should have been a very tense moment, they throw in a few lines of dialogue that are aimed at Trump. Why? Half the audience will laugh and pump their fists, the other half will roll their eyes. It accomplishes nothing except to dilute the climax of the show. It completely removes the audience from the moment whether they support Trump or hate him. And I don't consider myself a Trump supporter. But it's this lack of restraint on the writers that comes across as petty and childish, and it really flattened the ending.

There is another message in here, ones I doubt the writers were even aware of. During a rant by one of the characters in the final episode, she decries the Supreme Court ruling on abortion. Again ... way to take your audience out of the story. But, no surprise--again, Hollywood veers far left.

But, the irony here is this: the premise of this story is about two people who willingly sacrifice their offspring for money, power, and career. The writers were just too oblivious to realize what they had done.

The basic problem with this film is it lacked a clear understanding of what it was trying to be.

The initial premise is fine: a demonic possession within the walls of an ancient castle/abbey, and a veteran priest doing battle with that demon. Great. We've seen this before, but it's still fun.

However ....

The film has too many elements at play in order for the execution to work.

At first, you think it is going to be a slow build up to the possession. There are these phantom knocking sounds that serve to ratchet up the tension, but those disappear once the actual possession occurs. So the slow build is abruptly ended and the possession is so sudden. It's like they flipped a switch and the boy goes from normal to super-demoniac in a matter of seconds.

All while this is occurring, you get the second story of Russel Crowe's character as he is a veteran exorcist who must not only battle demons but the bureaucracy within the Vatican itself. His main antagonist is a young American bishop whom contends evil doesn't really exist (or something).

Anyway, Crowe is sent to Spain to help out this family who has moved into the abbey. There are the usual scenes of them attempting the first exorcism and failing and things escalate pretty rapidly.

But the climax, in my opinion, was silly. Crowe and his Spanish companion literally fight it out with women (demons) until they can toss them into a pool of water and finish reciting the rites of exorcism. It sort of reminded me of "Van Helsing" with Hugh Jackman, except that film was supposed to be sort of campy and light whereas this was not.

Throw in some vague references to the Spanish Inquisition, which aren't really fleshed out, then you have a scene where the antagonistic bishop is in the Vatican and starts freaking out ... it was a mess.

This film tried to be multiple things and it failed.

Russel Crowe did a good job. Too bad the film fell flat around him. The rest of the cast was fine. The setting was great. But man, that story was just all over the place.

While the previous two movies were just okay, the writers (that's plural, and more on that in a minute) really missed on "Halloween Ends."

There were so many things wrong with this film that I don't know where to begin. Well, okay, the writers (again, plural). Ever hear the saying "too many chefs and not enough cooks"? Yeah, that applies here. It is very clear that not only was this film but the Blumhouse trilogy really lacked a singular voice, someone to decide on the story, because there are so many concepts that are half-baked in here. The whole tone of this film--of the trilogy--is so uneven that it is hard to really know what to feel at any given time.

First, the film jumps ahead 4 years from 2018. Well, not yet, anyway. First we get a year later and we are introduced to Corey ... a nice kid who is brought in to babysit a boy on Halloween night (I'm still amazed that parents in this films abandon their children on Halloween night, but whatever). Through an unfortunate accident, the boy dies and Corey is taken away.

Cue opening credits after a rather long introduction for a guy who really shouldn't be the main focus of this film, but he ends up being the main focus of this film ... for some misguided reason.

Four years after the Haddonfield massacre of 2018! Yada yada monologue from Laurie about living normally now after the events of 2018. What? 50 people were murdered, including her daughter and son-in-law, but Laurie's decision is to remain in Haddonfield and live in a normal house? What in this character's backstory causes her to go from a recluse alcoholic with severe mental issues to becoming this well-adjusted citizen after such a traumatic event? Whatever.

Hey, speaking of 2018 ... So Michael tore through Haddonfield like it was nothing. Even after he was seemingly beaten to death by the mob, he got right up and slashed them to pieces. He followed Karen and slashed her too for good measure. And then he ... leaves? He goes down into a sewer and stays there ... for 4 years. What? Why? Shouldn't he still be out there murdering and stuff?

So, this is getting long, but I'll say that Corey is out and about, being a social pariah in Haddonfield because he (didn't) murder that kid in 2019. He has a run-in with some marching band bullies (not making that up) with New York accents (not making that up either) and he ends up hurt. Laurie just happens to be there and she instantly takes a liking to him. She decides to set him up with her granddaughter. Because that makes sense. "Hey, Allyson, there's this loner dude whom everyone hates, you should date him!" Allyson instantly likes him. And they go out and bond. Until he is accosted by the mother of the boy he (didn't) murder and he runs away only to be cornered by the marching band bullies, who accidentally push him off a bridge near the sewer where Michael is lurking. Michael drags him into the sewer and ... does ... nothing. Corey wakes up, panics, and then Michael grabs him and ... I don't know what the hell happens, but there is some montage of tragic events and Michael just lets him go, presumably because Corey now has some of the evil? Unclear.

Corey and Allyson continue to bond, even after he tells her he killed someone (he killed the homeless guy after emerging from the sewer) and Allyson is like "yeah, cool, whatever, let's ride your motorcycle." Say what?

And that right there is the central theme of this film--a dark romantic tragedy.

Michael is portayed as an asthmatic old man who can barely lift a knife. At one point Corey assaults him and takes the mask. Yeah, a scrawny young adult defeats Michael ... the same Michael who was lifting firefighters into the air with axes and plowing through crowds of vigilantes can't fight off one kid.

And when we do finally get the showdown between Michael and Laurie ... it's bleh. It's more like a mid-movie encounter than the final fight because the two characters spend most of the fight grappling, reaching for stuff, etc. The cat-and-mouse scene from "Halloween 2018" was much better. This ... this was just bad.

There were 4 writers for this film and it shows. The movie had too many concepts that weren't fully realized here. I mean, the whole copycat thing was interesting, but not for the final act. They should have done that in the first movie or something ... if at all.

The tone was wholly inconsistent as well. You're supposed to feel sorry for Corey, but he's also doing horrible things. You can tell the writers wanted you to get "Joker" vibes here. But the thing with "Joker" is that he was the main character, it was a movie about him. Halloween isn't supposed to be about Corey Cunningham, right? I mean, are we supposed to cheer for him when he goes up against Laurie Strode? Because that was the choice the writers gave you.

Speaking of inconsistent. How big is Haddonfield? We saw it was big enough for a rather large hospital, a news channel, a sizable police and firefighter force ... but everyone knows everyone on sight. Everyone recognizes Corey ... for some reason. I mean, he would have been in the news 3 years ago, but so what? The film opens with a montage of other murders and suicides, so wouldn't Corey's face have been lost in the mix? Sorry, I'm not buying it.

Look, I'll watch every other Halloween film (except for the Zombie ones), but I'm not ever going to watch this one again. It was boring. It wasn't a Halloween movie. The concepts were there to make it interesting, but they didn't know where to take them.

Very disappointing.

A group of young adults go into a haunted house to find ghosts/conduct a séance. We've seen it done a dozen times in movies. This one is slightly different. The action picks up after the expected slauther of those young adults as a police detective interviews the lone survivor.

The film is a combination police procedural, shaky-cam recovered footage, haunted house/demonic possession horror. Except it doesn't really give enough in any area to really pull it off. The shaky-cam footage is sort of worn out by this point to be scary. Plus, the over-reliance on jump-scares may provide a cheap little startle but do little to advance the plot. I was actually laughing at some of the ways they depict the police investigation. "Get more freezers for those hard drives!" And this film really didn't know whether it was a haunted house story or a demonic possession story. Before the séance--when the demon would have been summoned--all sorts of scary stuff was happening. Was the demon doing this? Was it ghosts? Who knows! It's never explained!

And while the twist at the end gives you a "hmm, interesting" feeling. It is only a matter of a few minutes of thinking that you realize that it's dumb. Spoilers: So, the demon, in order to escape his prison must inhabit a "pure soul" while also killing everyone who was involved in the ritual to set him free? All right ... so that pretty much means only an unborn child can be the host. Sucks for the demon if they all show up without a pregnant woman, right? But let's back up. The demon gets John to go around killing everyone ... but for some reason he doesn't kill Bryan, and Bryan runs away, steals a truck, kills or attacks a gas station attendant and then shouts really loudly into the radio to mess with the demon ... so that the police will shoot him? Uh ... okay.

And the demon could only be set free once the pure soul travels beyond the seal (kinda like the Holy Grail in Indiana Jones, eh?) So ... the demon then hid Michelle in a hidden crawl space so that the cops would have to spend several hours looking for her? What if they never found her? What if Michelle and her unborn child died in that crawlspace? Sucks for that demon, right?

The more you think about this movie, the more you see how easy it is to pick apart. The whole concept of demonic possession in a haunted house has been done before, and with a far simpler plot. I mean, Night of the Demons was a campy 80's horror (and a rather bad remake in the 2000s), but it at least made sense--it didn't try to be too clever.

Anyway, this is on Netflix right now (October 2020), so if you've done the bigger, better films, give this a watch ... don't expect much, though.

Spoilers ahead, yes.

The premise here is that a drug plane has crashed off Nassau and the main cast of characters stumble upon it while looking for treasure. Paul Walker plays the loser with no bright future who is looking for a quick find that will allow him and his hot girlfriend (Alba) to not have to worry about actually working real jobs. Walker has no real plan here ... and he can't even go to sea until his connected friend (Caan) arrives with some hottie he met at a club the night before. Caan plays some sort of defense lawyer and one of his clients had a mansion in the Bahamas that he used for payment ... eh, all right... Oh, and the mansion comes with a speedboat. Great timing, right?

So they all go out diving ... free diving at extreme depths and for long periods of time .... Seriously, don't go free diving like these fools do. You ... will ... die. At one point, they free dive INSIDE the sunken airplane. Uh, no, you do not enter a wreck you haven't thoroughly checked out, and you most definitely do not go FREE-DIVING inside a strange wreck.

Uh, anyway.

Yeah, they discover both the remnants of a shipwreck and the drug plane. There's some moral dilemma stuff--do they tell the cops, do they try to sell the cocaine ... it's tired and predictable and there mostly just to pad the runtime.

Long story short, the 4some of idiots end up having to get the drugs for the drug dealers or else. The hottie from the club ends up dead from a shark attack, and Josh Brolin turns out to be the actual drug kingpin ... because that makes sense.

This is a poor ripoff of "the Deep." It's the same premise ... treasure hunters looking for a sunken ship stumble upon a cache of drugs and must contend with the dealers. The Deep is far superior to this mess.

Let's talk character motivation. Hottie from the Club: She apparently likes cocaine and convinces Scott Caan to try and sell some of it. Speaking of Caan, in one scene he is talking about how to cut out his hottie girlfriend from the money they will make from the treasure. In the very next scene he is doing the typical jealous boyfriend routine. His character does whatever the plot needs him to do in order to advance things. Jessica Alba is the moral center of the group, always knowing what is right and pretty much there to show off her ... eh, assets. Walker is the morally gray person. He's a hard luck sort of guy with a heart of gold ... and like most poorly-created heroes, he is able to one-up the bad guys at every turn. Josh Brolin ... treasure hunter turned drug kingpin? Eh, all right. the excuse is that investors don't like it when treasure hunters return empty-handed. Yeah, I'm also sure investors don't want to get involved in a highly-illegal trade too, but whatever.

Don't watch this movie if you want a good story and fascinating characters.

Watch this movie for the reasons intended: underwater shots, nice scenery, and eh ... the T&A. Seriously ... several of the shots have the cameras focused on parts of the female anatomy and there is no way this wasn't intentional.

This film took the best parts of the original 4 Fridays the 13th and made a single film that works for 2009, though watching it ten years later, there are some parts that are ... dated.

Remember back in the 2000s how some men had long feathered hair? Crazy, but they did, and all the main male characters in this film have that haircut. But I digress.

This iteration of Friday the 13th does a good job of upping the fear factor. Jason is menacing and brutal.

As expected, the cast of characters are all two-dimensional and have no point other than to be fodder for Jason to kill in gruesome ways.

One thing that is always funny about these sorts of movies is the hodgepodge of characters the director throws together. In what world does a wealthy college boy (sort of a jock) invite two stoners (losers) to his cabin for a weekend? He's not going to do that.

Anyway, this isn't a perfect film, but it does a fine job updating the franchise and it's a shame Friday the 13th has been dead for 10 years now.

I love the Halloween franchise. I'll even watch ... sigh ... when Bust-a-rhymes is battling Michael Myers. And I fully admit how bad each successful sequel got. And I fully agree that the Rob Zombie films were a disaster.

But I expected so much from Halloween 2018. This film is definitely of a higher caliber than anything that has come before in terms of production quality, cast and cast ... very similar to H20. But I was disappointed.

First, the good: The music ... oh the music is the best Halloween score, I dare say, since the original. John Carpenter and crew really nail the music with the synth and the spooky tones. The soundtrack alone bumps this film up a star in my book.

The cast all do a commendable job, though I thought Will Patton's role was underused.

The tension in the final act is definitely there. They nailed that. When Laurie is hunting the Shape through the house, your eyes are glued to the screen.

The Mask. A lot of the masks in the sequel were downright silly. This mask is perfect.

The Bad:

The teen characters teen too hard. A lot of the teenager scenes just felt overdone. The great part about the original Halloween is that the teens all were very authentic. The teens in this film were more like a 45 year old's take on how teens act these days.

The executive decision to excise ALL material from the sequels and make this a direct sequel to the original. Here me out. Yes, the sequels really made a mess with the contrived storylines involving family and Laurie dying but not dying, then dying again, she had a daughter, no she had a son ... oh and there was some cult that made Michael evil. Making a cohesive story while keeping all that would have been near impossible. But ... to completely ignore it brought out a major problem. Michael Myers loses his gravity as a mass-murdering monster. Yes, I can buy that Laurie would be traumatized by her encounter with the Shape. She most likely would have PTSD and become an alcoholic and have deep psychological issues. All that was great character development. But why would teens in Haddonfield, 40 years later, know or care about Michael Myers? He killed his sister when he was a kid and then killed 4 people as an adult (according to this new timeline). So what? There's even one teen character who suggests as much, who brings up this plot point, but it is just dismissed as "dude, her grandmother was almost killed." No, no, you still need to explain why everyone is so obsessed with Michael Myers? Why are British podcasters interested in him? They're award-winners, after all, why go to a small Illinois town to get a story on an old murderer from 40 years ago? You get what I'm saying? By removing the yearly rampages of death that Michael inflicted throughout the sequels, you reduce Michael to just a common criminal.

Then there's the fact that by removing the supernatural element to Michael, you need to explain how Michael could recover from getting shot 6 times (or even fewer). HE was also stabbed in the neck, had an eye gouged out, and was stabbed in the chest BEFORE Loomis put six slugs in his chest. That's what made the ending of the original so great ... oh my God, this guy is unstoppable! So he's not supernatural (or maybe he is, who knows) He then is able to exist in maximum security prison and after 40 years of no exercise, he's strong enough to overpower anyone? You see what I'm getting at here?

The point is, by removing ALL the material from the sequels, you reduce Michael Myers to nothing, and yet this movie's whole premise is dependent on the legacy of those sequels.

Okay, enough of that.

I still enjoyed the film. It has its moments, it has its charm. I would rank it as 3rd or 4th in terms of Halloween films.

I thought the psychological aspect of this film was well-done. The characters never knew what was real and the audience had to keep guessing as well. The mirror really was a character itself and boy is it evil. The cast did a good job, including Karen Gillan in her first American role.

Spoilers:

So the premise is that these two siblings who are now adults experienced a horrific series of events when they were growing up. Through flashbacks and dialogue, we learn that the boy shot and killed his father after his father shot and killed their mother. The boy spent his childhood institutionalized while the girl grew up in foster care. When the boy is released from care, the sister picks him up and promptly asks him to help her expose the truth--that their father and mother had become possessed by the evil in the mirror. The girl has set up the whole house to detect the paranormal, complete with a failsafe device that will (hopefully) destroy the mirror unless they are still alive to keep resetting it.

The mirror almost immediately begins to mess with their minds, twisting them so far out of reality that the experiment ultimately ends in utter tragedy for both of them.

I do wish the ending had been different, but I understand they were trying to establish that the mirror is too evil and too powerful, or that perhaps the siblings should have simply destroyed the mirror first without trying to prove anything. At any rate, the way the film ended felt a bit abrupt. Perhaps they planned on a sequel?

I've seen this film on several lists of "must watch horror for 2018!!!" Really???

Maybe 2018 was just really short of horror films? I dunno.

Why is this not a good film? It just doesn't have anything good about it. You already know who the bad guy is coming into the film "The Ranger." It's no big surprise when he starts the punks. There was a clunky attempt to have a "she becomes just like the killer" at the end, but it just was weird and didn't hit the mark.

I also really never felt any empathy toward any of the characters other than the police officer who is killed in the beginning. The punks could have all died for all I cared because they had no redeeming qualities. Even the girl was complicit in murder and I didn't really care what happened to her.

The biggest selling point of this movie was that it was unique because it took an 80's slasher motif and applied the punk label to it. Whenever people try to pay homage to old 80s horror films, they usually fall flat. So does this one.

You can skip this one and not feel like you lost anything. In fact, if you do watch it, you'll lose about an hour and a half of your life.

Here we have yet another haunted house scrip that features a skeptic who is proven wrong ... and saves the day motif. There's nothing wrong with that if done well. Haunted house stories can be quite good (see The Haunting of Hill House). With Winchester, you have some good ingredients: the Winchester House is real and already creepy as it is, you have the film set in 1905 during a time when spiritualism was big, and you have a good cast.

The problem? Meh, it just failed to all come together. Jason Clark plays the man with an unfortunate past who doesn't believe in ghosts ... yet he sees weird stuff but chalks it up to his laudanum addiction. He goes to do a mental evaluation on Sarah Winchester, who by now has constructed the bizarre house. See, the Winchester Company is concerned about her mental state and would like to wrest control over the company from her. In the house is also Sarah's niece and the niece's son. These latter two characters seem more like an after-thought ... and ultimately, they detract from the main plot... And that's the problem. The plot forgets itself halfway through the movie. Clark's character goes from one who is assessing Winchester's mental state to one of trying to protect her from an evil spirit.

It probably would have worked better if the plot were for him to figure out if she was crazy or not rather than switch tracks halfway through.

I think they didn't use the house as much as they could have. The place is a literal maze, but after you are introduced to it in the first act, the house is just a backdrop ... a place for these things to happen.

Additionally, the creepy factor never really set in for me. Seeing "ghosts" so early in the film removed the tension. Finally, why did the evil ghost wait so long to attempt to kill Sarah Winchester? He had been dead for over twenty years. Seems like he could have made that his top priority once he assumed ghost-like status ... but maybe I missed something.

Anyway, this isn't a bad movie. It's worth a viewing but don't expect too much from it.

Perhaps fans of the comic book found something in this, but ... I just don't get it.

You'd think the premise of this film--Ranarok, the destruction of Aasgard--would be front and center in this film. Instead, that's more like a side plot. Most of the film takes place on this absurd trash planet ruled over by Jeff Goldblum.

Along the way, we see the death of Odin, the introduction of Hela (who should have been a fantastic villain) and the deaths of the warriors 3 (though they get about 5 seconds of screen time before their quick demise).

So basically, Thor and Loki get stranded on Jeff Goldblum's planet during a brief fight with Hela. This, after Hela easily destroy's Thor's hammer. Thor is then captured and forced to fight as a gladiator ... against the Hulk, who just so happens to be on this planet after the events of Age of Ultron (something something wormhole on earth that didn't drag anyone else in something something plot needs to tie in other Avengers for Infinity War). Oh and somehow the Hulk has been the Hulk for 2 years ... Thor finds out his enslaver is a Valkyrie and he must convince her to help him save Aasgard while also navigating Loki's usual machinations.

Anyway, during all this Aasgard is suffering under Hela, who has slaughtered the army, raised an undead army of her own, freed her giant wolf, and is "getting more powerful" with each passing day. Meanwhile Heimdall has been helping Aasgardians escape.

Therein lies the problem. This was two movies crammed into one and we could have done without the silliness that was Jeff Goldblum's planet. Hela was completely underused. We're told how powerful she is going to become, but we see her easily defeat Thor and Loki in her first few minutes, then she easily annihilates all the soldiers and establishes herself as ruler. It would have been cool to see her powers grow, to actually see her become this formidable foe for Thor.

Speaking of Thor, he loses his hammer ... and his hair, then with a fight against Hela later, he loses an eye. Oh and he becomes the true god of Thunder (and lightning), which is supposed to be cool, but it doesn't do much in his fight against Hela.

The other problem is how much comedy is injected into this film. For instance, when the Warriors 3 are killed, Karl Urban's character sees this and says "I'm just a janitor." Ill-timed comedy completely minimizes the death of these friends of Thor (nevermind they are never mentioned again). Then, when Aasgard is destroyed, there's some comedic lines ... it should have been a somber moment--seeing the destuction of Aasgard (yeah yeah, I know, Aasgard is a people not a place).

I don't know, this film really missed the mark for me.