Okay, this post is to mainly explain what is happening with "Ozploitation Month" which I started out with every intention, of getting done and wrapped up by the end of this month, which as those of you, have seen that the end of the month is fast approaching and so far I have only really looked at two films, which honestly is pretty crappy and basically is down to having not had time to review more films, due to the usual reasons I guess which prevent me from writing, such as my day job aswell as having the same days off as my fiance, who continues to endure my attempts to fill our flat with random films and Godzilla collectables.
thanks to my random shift patterns it is often a pretty rare thing for us to have a day off together and honestly, I'd rather spend those days off with her, than just writing which is what I tend to use the days off, that she is at work for.
I will still be reviewing the films, that I planned to with this month, it just means that my look at the Ozplotation genre will now go into June, making it less of a month and more of a season of films.
I know I could have continued posting and not said anything, but I feel that it's always better to tell you all the truth about these things, so please accept my apoligies for this slight hicup and I just hope that you (like myself) are all enjoying so far this random trek through the lesser known side of film history.
Friday, 22 May 2009
Ozploitation Month: Turkey Shoot
Title: Turkey Shoot
Director: Brian Trenchard-Smith
Director: Brian Trenchard-Smith
Released: 1982
Staring: Steve Railsback, Oliva Hussey, Michael Craig, Carmen Duncan, Noel Ferrier, Lynda Stoner, Roger Ward, Michael Petrovich
Rating: 4/ 5
Rating: 4/ 5
Plot: In the near future (or shud that be an alternate past seeing how it’s supposed to be 1995), people deemed as being Deviants by the totalitarian government are held at a rehabilitation camp, till theycan be reprogrammed as useful members of society. Camp director Thatcher (Craig) however, has chosen five inmates to be take part in his latest hunt, with the chance of freedom if they survive. The only catch is that they are the prey!
Review: Ever since the release of “Battle Royale” (2000) which along with the like of “Ringu” (1998) and “Audition” (1999) helped push Asian cinema, into the mainstream conscious, exposing films that would have largely been ignored by most of the cinema going public, other than cinema snobs and the foreign film fans. However since the release of “Battle Royale” it seems that when ever you have a film, come out which involves any group of people being hunted for sport, be it by people, zombies or pretty much anything else, you will always find critics quick to attach the label of a film being a “Battle Royale Clone”, which is ironic when that film is basically the same idea as “Turkey Shoot” except on a larger scale, increasing this films group of five to a school class of 42 pupils, but it’s clearly “Turkey shoot” that provides the groundwork and even though both films share the same idea, they both have enough originality to stand on their own, but if anything is a clone of anything, then it has to be of “Turkey Shoot”, but then at the same time you could say that this film is also a homage to Richard Connel’s "The Most Dangerous Game" and George Orwell's "1984", proving once again that like everything else it is just really a homage of a homage.
Review: Ever since the release of “Battle Royale” (2000) which along with the like of “Ringu” (1998) and “Audition” (1999) helped push Asian cinema, into the mainstream conscious, exposing films that would have largely been ignored by most of the cinema going public, other than cinema snobs and the foreign film fans. However since the release of “Battle Royale” it seems that when ever you have a film, come out which involves any group of people being hunted for sport, be it by people, zombies or pretty much anything else, you will always find critics quick to attach the label of a film being a “Battle Royale Clone”, which is ironic when that film is basically the same idea as “Turkey Shoot” except on a larger scale, increasing this films group of five to a school class of 42 pupils, but it’s clearly “Turkey shoot” that provides the groundwork and even though both films share the same idea, they both have enough originality to stand on their own, but if anything is a clone of anything, then it has to be of “Turkey Shoot”, but then at the same time you could say that this film is also a homage to Richard Connel’s "The Most Dangerous Game" and George Orwell's "1984", proving once again that like everything else it is just really a homage of a homage.
Opening with a montage of stock footage of riots around the world, which provides all the backdrop you need, to were society has been heading to the point, that the faceless government has set up concentration style camps, to re-educate those who wish to stand up against their Orwellian vision of society. We are quickly introduced to our so called heroes a resistance member Paul Anders (Railsback), an accused sex worker Rita (Stoner) and Chris (Hussey) who is a shopworker, who after attempting to stop the beating of a man, by government police is accused of being part of the resistance and sentenced to re-education at the camp along with Paul and Jennifer, who will soon be taking part in the hunt planned by the well spoken, pipe smoking camp director Thatcher, who is played effortlessly laid back here by Micheal Craig, who uses the sadistic camp guards to enforce his wrath on the camp detainee’s, rather than dirty his hands with such things.
With Paul having been sent to his camp, he now see’s this as the perfect time to hold a Turkey Shoot, gathering together several like minded fellow hunters, who each choose themselves a target prisoner to hunt with each prisoner then given twenty four hours to escape, with the promise of freedom if they do.
This simple plot, helps keep the pace of the film moving quickly and despite the lack of prisoners being hunted, a modest five compared to the 42 of “battle royale”, it still manages to remain satisfying enough for those of us, who heard the comparisons to “battle royale” and picked this film up hoping for a similar style bloodbath, as all four of the hunters have their own unique style of hunting with the well spoken Tito (Petrovich) preferring to chase after his target in what can best be described as a mini bulldozer and unleashing his sideshow freak / werewolf pet “Alph” to remove parts of his targets anatomy, including one scene in which he invites Alph to eat the toes of prisoner Dodge, before letting him go, so that he might enjoy hunting him again. Meanwhile Jennifer (Duncan) prefers to dress like she is going on a foxhunt, taking time with her crossbow, as she plays with her target, like a cat with a mouse, aswell as any other of the prisoners, she gets in her sights regardless of whether they are her target or not, only truly revelling the extent of her dark side towards the end, in one of the more surprising and chilling scenes, which works all the more strongly when the film is hardly subtle and pure grind house fodder for the majority of it’s run time.
This simple plot, helps keep the pace of the film moving quickly and despite the lack of prisoners being hunted, a modest five compared to the 42 of “battle royale”, it still manages to remain satisfying enough for those of us, who heard the comparisons to “battle royale” and picked this film up hoping for a similar style bloodbath, as all four of the hunters have their own unique style of hunting with the well spoken Tito (Petrovich) preferring to chase after his target in what can best be described as a mini bulldozer and unleashing his sideshow freak / werewolf pet “Alph” to remove parts of his targets anatomy, including one scene in which he invites Alph to eat the toes of prisoner Dodge, before letting him go, so that he might enjoy hunting him again. Meanwhile Jennifer (Duncan) prefers to dress like she is going on a foxhunt, taking time with her crossbow, as she plays with her target, like a cat with a mouse, aswell as any other of the prisoners, she gets in her sights regardless of whether they are her target or not, only truly revelling the extent of her dark side towards the end, in one of the more surprising and chilling scenes, which works all the more strongly when the film is hardly subtle and pure grind house fodder for the majority of it’s run time.
Gore wise there is plenty of interesting moments, to rival that of “Battle Royale” which I know I keep drawing comparisons to, but that will be the film which most viewers will compare this film to and “Turkey Shoot” does have more than enough of it’s original moments, as limbs are removed and a memorable exploding head being only a few of the delights on offer.
On the soundtrack, Brian May adds his usual orchestral styling to the film soundtrack, once again like he did finding the perfect score to soundtrack, the events unfolding on screen, heightening the experience in the same way that he did with the “Mad Max” movies and here also it works perfectly to complement the film.
On the soundtrack, Brian May adds his usual orchestral styling to the film soundtrack, once again like he did finding the perfect score to soundtrack, the events unfolding on screen, heightening the experience in the same way that he did with the “Mad Max” movies and here also it works perfectly to complement the film.
“Turkey Shoot” is defiantly a lost classic, that will now hopefully find it’s audience once more, especially since being featured in the “Ozplotiation” documentary “Not Quite Hollywood” which will no doubt have the “Battle Royale” fans hunting it down already, something that I urge you to do, even if this film has so many random moments, such as the werewolf create and most of the bad guys, appear to have come from the Star Trek school of villainy, it still possesses that grubby charm that makes it still a highly watchable movie, I’m now after seeing both this film and the documentary “Not Quite Hollywood” torn between which has the better story, the film or the making of the film, which if I’m to believe the documentary, had half the budget being funded, through betting funds at the dog track and live ammunition being fired at the actors, let alone the story of Oliva Hussey almost cutting Roger Wards real hands off with a machete, which all in all only helps further this films reputation as a Ozploitation classic!
Friday, 15 May 2009
MEG & My Killer Shark Obsessions
Isn't it funny, how more and more books are being advertised like films. I mean I can't count the amount of times, I've been watching TV when a trailer for, what I assume to be a film to suddenly pop up, totally grabbing my attention, to the point that I'm probably willing to sacrifice my first born in order to see it, only for it suddenly turn out to be an advert for a book, which isn't a bad thing, it's just you can't help but feel slightly cheated by this. James Patterson in particular has become notorious for this especially, but recently I found a trailer for the latest book in Steve Alten's cult giant shark series "MEG", which for this release of the forth book in the series "MEG: Hell's Aquarium", has also been given the fake movie trailer treatment.
The film adaptation of the first book "MEG" is currently still buried deep in pre production, with the last reports still having Jan de Bont (Speed 2) attached to direct and Nick Nunziata (he of CHUD.com) attached as a producer. However a recent article in the "LA Times" also named veteran Hollywood producers Lawrence Gordon ("Die Hard") and Lloyd Levin ("Boogie Nights"), as being attached to the project, which can be seen as highly positive for the long delayed adaptation, seeing how they are responsible for "Hellboy 2: The Golden Army" and "The Watchmen" finally making it to the screen, after both suffering numourus delays and setbacks, so fingers crossed they can do the same for "MEG" which so far has only produced so fantastic Promo art and little else outside, of some extremely random draft scripts, one of which having the giant shark having wings!! Not sure how that would have worked out, especially seeing how the idea of flying killer fish, barely worked with "Piranha 2: The Spawning" (1981), so how it would have worked to have a flying 70-foot Megalodon shark, I'm not overly sure.
Still in the meantime Asylum films are set to release "Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus" next week, which for those of you already associated with Asylum films and their DTV style of film making, you should know what to expect already........ but here's the trailer anyway.
And finally to wrap up this killer shark obsessed piece of blogging, I found this trailer for one of the numerous "Jaws" (1975) cash in's which appeared after the release of the first movie, which in it's wake spawned a whole heap of killer shark knock off's, which continue to this day, but this trailer actually has made me want to hunt this one down.
Still I guess this goes to prove once again, that even though I know the majority of shark movies outside of "Jaws" will suck, I will for some strange reason still find myself obsessing over them while hoping that one day we might see a "MEG" movie. Still in the meantime Steve Alten is running a competition, where the winner can get thier name, in the fifth book "MEG: Night Stalkers", which could lead to a random claim to fame, of having your character killed off by a giant shark...who knows?
The film adaptation of the first book "MEG" is currently still buried deep in pre production, with the last reports still having Jan de Bont (Speed 2) attached to direct and Nick Nunziata (he of CHUD.com) attached as a producer. However a recent article in the "LA Times" also named veteran Hollywood producers Lawrence Gordon ("Die Hard") and Lloyd Levin ("Boogie Nights"), as being attached to the project, which can be seen as highly positive for the long delayed adaptation, seeing how they are responsible for "Hellboy 2: The Golden Army" and "The Watchmen" finally making it to the screen, after both suffering numourus delays and setbacks, so fingers crossed they can do the same for "MEG" which so far has only produced so fantastic Promo art and little else outside, of some extremely random draft scripts, one of which having the giant shark having wings!! Not sure how that would have worked out, especially seeing how the idea of flying killer fish, barely worked with "Piranha 2: The Spawning" (1981), so how it would have worked to have a flying 70-foot Megalodon shark, I'm not overly sure.
Still in the meantime Asylum films are set to release "Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus" next week, which for those of you already associated with Asylum films and their DTV style of film making, you should know what to expect already........ but here's the trailer anyway.
And finally to wrap up this killer shark obsessed piece of blogging, I found this trailer for one of the numerous "Jaws" (1975) cash in's which appeared after the release of the first movie, which in it's wake spawned a whole heap of killer shark knock off's, which continue to this day, but this trailer actually has made me want to hunt this one down.
Still I guess this goes to prove once again, that even though I know the majority of shark movies outside of "Jaws" will suck, I will for some strange reason still find myself obsessing over them while hoping that one day we might see a "MEG" movie. Still in the meantime Steve Alten is running a competition, where the winner can get thier name, in the fifth book "MEG: Night Stalkers", which could lead to a random claim to fame, of having your character killed off by a giant shark...who knows?
Monday, 11 May 2009
Final Girl Film Club - Amityville 2: The Possession
Ok so it's Final Girl Film Club time again, were the blogging world comes together, to bitch about one chosen movie, which this week is the turn of "Amityville 2: The Possession", the prequel to the 1979 original, which I only have vague recollections of watching, but I was curious to see if this film would prove to be more memorable than the first. So join me now as I now present you with my two cents on this months film choice.
Title: Amityville II: The Possession
Opening with the Montelli family, moving into the now infamous house, they seem like a perfectly normal kind of family.....well actually they are pretty messed up to begin with as Anthony Montelli (Young) clearly prefers to rule the family with a domineering attitude, as he spends most of his time shouting at his children, even on several occasions appearing willing to use, physical force to control his children, but then when his kids seem as dysfunctional as they are, it makes you wonder how he hasn’t been driven (more) insane, especially seeing how his wife Delores (Alda) sees to be off in her own perfect little world, which gives the viewer that she is kind of oblivious to what is going on around her, even though she later confesses to her eldest daughter about how her marriage is secretly falling apart. Meanwhile the two youngest children are creepy as hell, with one such memorable scene involving Jan and Mark (played here by real life brother and Sister Erica and Brent Katz) play fighting in the kitchen, only for Jan to pull a plastic bag, over her brothers head while laughing “Ha Ha, Your dead” which to them seems incredibly funny, but to the audience comes across more than slightly creepy, much like the incestuous antics of the older
brother and sister Sonny (Magner) and Patricia (Franklin), who even before the haunting’s have started and long before Sonny become possessed, are seen flirting with each other and even after Sonny has become possessed by a demon, (which is pure assumption on my part, seeing how it’s never properly explained) she doesn’t seem to find it weird that her brother is asking to see her naked, let alone the incest scene, which closely follows, with her only real remorse coming during an extremely brief confession to the priest, which here seems to only have been added, for the point of driving home the point that incest is bad (aswell as creepy), as no doubt Damiani didn’t want to obviously be seen, as promoting incest as a good thing.
The trouble with this film however is that, it never seems to know what sort of film it want to be, starting off as a family drama, as we see the dysfunctional family, trying to portray this image of family wholesomeness, only to then turn into a ghost story once the spooky thrills start, before then turning into a crime drama of sorts as we see Anthony threatening his wife with a rifle and even more so when Sonny kills his family, which in the lead up to those murders, the film is trying to busily turn itself into it’s forth incarnation as a possession movie, it almost had be shouting at the screen “Pick a genre already!”. Still somehow out of this jumbled wreckage of genre swapping, it still manages to be an entertaining film, even if this is your first introduction to the series, it stands well on it’s own or as part of the larger franchise.
Title: Amityville II: The Possession
Director: Damiano Damiani
Released: 1982
Staring: James Olson, Burt Young, Rutanya Alda, Jack Magner, Andrew Prine, Patrica Montelli Rating: 3/ 5
Plot: Years before George and Kathy Lutz moved in and were terrorized by the spirits in the Amityville House, a family, The Montellis, lived there before and were terrorized by demoniac spirits and their own son who is ready to kill them
Review: Sequels as I looked at with my last review can often be tricky things to pull off, let alone do well, with the main problems for sequels coming from trying to follow, directly on from were the first film ended. Still despite being one of the less well known of the horror franchises, especially amongst the fair-weather horror fans, who’d probably name “Nightmare on Elm St” & “Friday the 13th” when asked to name a long running horror series, the Amityville films have since the release of the 1979 original “The Amityville horror” spawned an impressive eight sequels, which includes this prequel and the 2005 remake of the same name with this film currently rumoured to be receiving the remake treatment in 2010.
Still with Sequels being such tricky things, it is perhaps because of this reason it was better that director Damiani, choose to make a prequel to the 1979 original, rather than a direct sequel, a choice that was also probably heavily influenced by the real life case of Ronald DeFeo, Jr who in 1974 shot his family, claiming that voices in his head told him to carry out the murders. Still seemingly this wasn’t interesting enough for Hollywood meaning that this film shares many connections to that case, changing the name of the family from DeFeo to Montelli, while at the same time, adding numerous details of its own to the case, using Hans Holzer’s book “Murder in Amityville” for the majority of the films extra plotting, with the most obvious addition of course being the idea of possession.
Review: Sequels as I looked at with my last review can often be tricky things to pull off, let alone do well, with the main problems for sequels coming from trying to follow, directly on from were the first film ended. Still despite being one of the less well known of the horror franchises, especially amongst the fair-weather horror fans, who’d probably name “Nightmare on Elm St” & “Friday the 13th” when asked to name a long running horror series, the Amityville films have since the release of the 1979 original “The Amityville horror” spawned an impressive eight sequels, which includes this prequel and the 2005 remake of the same name with this film currently rumoured to be receiving the remake treatment in 2010.
Still with Sequels being such tricky things, it is perhaps because of this reason it was better that director Damiani, choose to make a prequel to the 1979 original, rather than a direct sequel, a choice that was also probably heavily influenced by the real life case of Ronald DeFeo, Jr who in 1974 shot his family, claiming that voices in his head told him to carry out the murders. Still seemingly this wasn’t interesting enough for Hollywood meaning that this film shares many connections to that case, changing the name of the family from DeFeo to Montelli, while at the same time, adding numerous details of its own to the case, using Hans Holzer’s book “Murder in Amityville” for the majority of the films extra plotting, with the most obvious addition of course being the idea of possession.
Opening with the Montelli family, moving into the now infamous house, they seem like a perfectly normal kind of family.....well actually they are pretty messed up to begin with as Anthony Montelli (Young) clearly prefers to rule the family with a domineering attitude, as he spends most of his time shouting at his children, even on several occasions appearing willing to use, physical force to control his children, but then when his kids seem as dysfunctional as they are, it makes you wonder how he hasn’t been driven (more) insane, especially seeing how his wife Delores (Alda) sees to be off in her own perfect little world, which gives the viewer that she is kind of oblivious to what is going on around her, even though she later confesses to her eldest daughter about how her marriage is secretly falling apart. Meanwhile the two youngest children are creepy as hell, with one such memorable scene involving Jan and Mark (played here by real life brother and Sister Erica and Brent Katz) play fighting in the kitchen, only for Jan to pull a plastic bag, over her brothers head while laughing “Ha Ha, Your dead” which to them seems incredibly funny, but to the audience comes across more than slightly creepy, much like the incestuous antics of the older
brother and sister Sonny (Magner) and Patricia (Franklin), who even before the haunting’s have started and long before Sonny become possessed, are seen flirting with each other and even after Sonny has become possessed by a demon, (which is pure assumption on my part, seeing how it’s never properly explained) she doesn’t seem to find it weird that her brother is asking to see her naked, let alone the incest scene, which closely follows, with her only real remorse coming during an extremely brief confession to the priest, which here seems to only have been added, for the point of driving home the point that incest is bad (aswell as creepy), as no doubt Damiani didn’t want to obviously be seen, as promoting incest as a good thing.Possession might be the main theme for this prequel, but we still manage to get a decent amount of ghostly activity despite this, including an extremely haunting sequences, as a paintbrush glides through the air, before drawing a picture, as a warning to the family, which Anthony refuses to believe is anything to do with ghost, much like when the kitchen is pretty much trashed by the spirits, which like the bedroom scene he’d rather blame on his children. Still these early haunting scenes, which begin almost from the start, as we are less than ten minutes into the film, when blood starts pouring from the tap’s, which would be enough of a warning for most people, that something strange is afoot, but seeing how it happens in front of Delores, she quickly writes it off in her own mind, rather than mention it to anyone.
It’s around the same moment that the ghostly haunting start to run out of steam that the film moves onto the main focus of the story, as Sonny becomes possessed, turning the film in more than one way into kind of a cash in on “The Exorcist” (1973) as we witness the battle between good and evil unfolding, as Father Adamsky (Olson) suffers visions of his own, such as holy water being turned into blood, as he attempts to bless the house and as he later attempts to save Sonny’s soul from the demon, which has taken control of him and which lead him to kill his family, during one particularly chilling scene, as a blank faced Sonny moves around the house, rifle in hand killing the members of his family one by one, while not even showing the slightest hint of emotion, in this recreation of the real life murders which the story is built around.
For fans of “The Exorcist” you might be able to detract from this film, for it’s exorcism like scenes, but personally I felt that it manages to bring it’s own spin to the idea, with a notably distinct lack of pea soup and more especially by bringing in the idea of a processed person, being driven to murder their family and how such a case would be seen in court, aswell as some still impressive transformation sequences, during the final confrontation between Sonny and Father Adamsky
It’s around the same moment that the ghostly haunting start to run out of steam that the film moves onto the main focus of the story, as Sonny becomes possessed, turning the film in more than one way into kind of a cash in on “The Exorcist” (1973) as we witness the battle between good and evil unfolding, as Father Adamsky (Olson) suffers visions of his own, such as holy water being turned into blood, as he attempts to bless the house and as he later attempts to save Sonny’s soul from the demon, which has taken control of him and which lead him to kill his family, during one particularly chilling scene, as a blank faced Sonny moves around the house, rifle in hand killing the members of his family one by one, while not even showing the slightest hint of emotion, in this recreation of the real life murders which the story is built around.
For fans of “The Exorcist” you might be able to detract from this film, for it’s exorcism like scenes, but personally I felt that it manages to bring it’s own spin to the idea, with a notably distinct lack of pea soup and more especially by bringing in the idea of a processed person, being driven to murder their family and how such a case would be seen in court, aswell as some still impressive transformation sequences, during the final confrontation between Sonny and Father Adamsky
The trouble with this film however is that, it never seems to know what sort of film it want to be, starting off as a family drama, as we see the dysfunctional family, trying to portray this image of family wholesomeness, only to then turn into a ghost story once the spooky thrills start, before then turning into a crime drama of sorts as we see Anthony threatening his wife with a rifle and even more so when Sonny kills his family, which in the lead up to those murders, the film is trying to busily turn itself into it’s forth incarnation as a possession movie, it almost had be shouting at the screen “Pick a genre already!”. Still somehow out of this jumbled wreckage of genre swapping, it still manages to be an entertaining film, even if this is your first introduction to the series, it stands well on it’s own or as part of the larger franchise.
Wednesday, 6 May 2009
Ozploitation Month: Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior
Title: Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior
Director: George Miller
Released: 1982
Staring: Mel Gibson, Bruce Spence, Michael Preston, Max Phipps, Vernon Wells, Kjell Nilsson, Emil Minty
Rating: 5/ 5
Plot: Continuing after the event of the first film, Max (Gibson) now travels through the post apocalypse Australia where Gasoline has become most valuable commodity. It’s here that he becomes involved in a struggle between a group of psychotic bandits lead by the Humangus (Nilsson) and a town that has built its defences around a small refinery.
Review: When it comes to naming the greatest sequels of all time, it’s usually a pretty short list, especially when you limit it to movies which manage to surpass the original film from which they have been spawned, which will no doubt leave you with a list that looks a lot like this.
* Godfather part 2
* Gremlins: The New Batch
* Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
* Terminator 2: Judgement Day
* Aliens
* Baby cart at the River Styx
But for myself when it comes to one movie that not only surpasses its original film, but blows it out of the water, I always think of this film, which was released three years after the original movie and costing ten times the budget of the original movie, it’s hardly surprising that this was at the time one of the most expensive Australian movies made at the time of it’s release, but for myself this truly is a film that surpasses it's original, which honestly I never really cared for, seeing how it had a strong memorable opening and a great finale, but somewhere in-between it became just a run of the mill chase thriller, as Max and his family found themselves constantly on the run from “The Toecutter” and his marauding group of bikers and true it’s storyline might be important, due to it showing how Max became the shell of the man he is, when we catch up with him in this film, where it seems since the last time we saw Max, the world has gone to hell in a hand basket, thanks to the war over oil, ravaging the planet which only proves all the more ironic when we look at the conflict currently happening in Iraq. Still thanks to the dramatic opening narrative, we are quickly brought up to speed, before being thrown into the first of the films many chase sequences, which after all were the selling point of the first film and realising this Miller, has with this sequel created some of the most memorable chase sequences put onto film, maximising on the apocalyptic setting, to not only create strange hybrid vehicles, but also using the setting to bring a new primal and more brutal edge to these sequences, with the standout of course being the final tanker chase, which not only clocks in at an impressive 15 minutes, but in many ways modernises the familiar set piece of westerns by giving us his version of a stage coach ambush setting, as we see the Humangus’s dogs of war leaping from vehicles, to try and climb onboard the tanker.
It’s true that “Mad Max 2” might also be almost a complete reimagining of the world created in “Mad Max” (1979), which despite having a future time frame still looked very current for the time of it’s release, but it’s a reimaging or even a reboot which saved the series, which at the end of the first film had really no where to go, but by making the subtle tweaks to the setting, such as the world now being post apocalyptic, it helps make the film more open to creativity, which is none more present than with Humangus and his dogs of war, who are really a rag tag band of bikers and savages still trying to cling onto familiar symbols of the old world, such as several members of the gang, being seen wearing police uniforms, similar to the ones we saw Max and his fellow officers wearing in the first film, while the bikers tend to favour the more traditional leather and Mohawk combo, with the Humangus’s muscle “Wez” (played here by Vernon Wells in what would prove to be his most memorable role) even sporting a pair of ass-less chaps, which along with the affection he has for the blonde guy who rides with Wez on his bike, only further fuels, the idea that several of these bandits are openly gay and idea not usually associated with tough and sadistic villains like these, who are happy to torture and rape their victims, whenever provided the opportunity and judging by the comments made by the Humangus while trying to calm down a psychotic Wez, saying the following words softly, as he restrains him
“I understand your pain. We've all lost someone we love.”
We are also shown that these bandits, have also been driven insane by the violence, which has erupted around them and that Max could easily have become one of these men, as he to seems to care for nothing in this world which has taken everything he cares about, having become a shell of his former self, with his emotions as barren as the desert landscape which surrounds him, with the only real sign of any emotion in the whole film, being at the start, when he finds a small music box, which when wound up plays the tune of “Happy Birthday” raising a slight smile on his face. Still it would seem that Max, still holds onto a lot of his old values, as he keeps his deals with both the Gyro captain (Spence) and PappaGallo (Preston) again proving, that even though he is emotional dead, thanks to the experiences he has been through, he is still not ready to turn into a savage like the Humangus and his gang have long since become. The Villagers on the other hand seem strangely innocent compared to Max and the bandits, dressing almost uniform like in their Nomadic white cloth wraps, yet are prepared to defend their makeshift village, no doubt having learned from previous experience that passive behaviour, holds little weight in this world, an idea only re-enforced by the opening montage, as the narrator explains states that
"Only those mobile enough to scavenge, brutal enough to pillage would survive."
Though like the bandits they too, have chosen to follow the leadership of a charismatic leader, with their leader coming in the form of PappaGallo, whose command they follow without question, despite having launched numerous failed attempts to escape from the bandits. It is also curious that with a society that these villagers have created for themselves that they have a feral child, the imaginatively named Feral Kid (Minty) amongst their number, who speaks only in grunts and howls and despite his young age has already become desensitised to the escalating violence around him, while showing no remorse when his steel boomerang kill’s Wez’s partner, giving the viewer the impression that this child is the new evolution of humanity, created in this societies soup of violence and rage.
Now were most movies would be lucky to manage one interesting villan, this film is unusual in the fact that it has two, with both the Humangus and Wez fighting for the title of supreme evil of the wasteland, even though it made clear that the Humangus is the one with the power, easily commanding his followers with a few simple words and inspiring them with his torture party demonstrations of power, aswell as Neo Nazi like rants at the towns folk, with his style of leadership having possibly been inspired by his own father, as we see in the Humangus’s gun case a photo of a man, who could be his father wearing a Nazi uniform. However he is slightly let down by his costume choice, which thanks to S & M style leather and a hockey mask covering his disfigured face, means he does end up looking like Jason’s gay Australian cousin. Wez on the other hand is less focused with his intentions and merely a man of action, admittedly these actions are mainly of a psychotic and violent nature, who draws pleasure from pain, demonstrated near the beginning when we see him pulling an arrow from his own flesh, with an almost transfixed look of concentration on his face. Still for myself the most memorable character of the film, will always be the Gyro Captain, with Bruce Spence playing the role, like it had been written for him, which makes his appearance in “Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome” (1985) all the less suprising. The Gyro Captain makes for an interesting choice of sidekick for Max, even though Max rejects his offers of partnership, whenever it is brought up he continues to follow Max around, knowing that they both need each other, if they are to survive in this new world, even if Max isn’t forthcoming in admitting to it, only expressing his respect for the Gyro Captain at the very end of the film.
Brain May once again provides a great orchestra score to the film, adding real tension and drama, to what is unfolding on the screen, in much the same way that he would later do for many Ozploitation classics including “Turkey Shoot” (1982) and “Patrick” (1978), the score coming into real effect during the chase sequences, all of which were shot without the use of CGI, making every smash and crash all the more exciting, as Miller attempts to top each chase sequence with the final chase especially easily worth noting as one of the most spectacular and exciting ever captured on film.
Since it’s original release Mad Max 2 has been endless paid homage to, with many films sharing it’s apocalyptic setting drawing heavy influence from the ideas which it along with the other films in the trilogy laid the foundations for. The film is also packed with textbook examples for how chase sequences should be done and certainly something which Australian films have in time become renown for, but Mad Max 2 just ups the ante with these sequences almost as if Miller was playing a game of one upman ship with himself, to see just how insane a chase sequence it would be possible to create and these sequences stand as a testament, giving almost textbook example as to how chase sequences should be shot.
Mad Max 2 is also a film that since I first saw it, back in my early teens, it has frequently been a film, which I have returned to and even after countless viewings still manages to create the same emotions in me, that it did the first time I saw it in much the same way as “Zulu” (1964) and like that film, it is one of the films which I hope gets passed onto the next generation of film junkies, who will no doubt never get to experience a film like this, especially in these times were CGI has pretty much replaced the role of old school effect, atleast this film much like John Carpenter’s “The Thing” (1982) will remain testament as to the power of the old school style of film making.
Tuesday, 5 May 2009
Still loving Hack / Slash
So after a huge wait and much hunting around, I finally managed to get my hands on "Hack / Slack: Reanimation Games", which is the fifth collection of the long running series and for those of you not to familar with comics and wondering what I'm going on about, Hack / Slash is basically the fantastic horror comic series created by Tim Steely, who is clearly a man in love with the horror genre, something that is quite obviously clear from the writing of each issue, as he crams manages to cram in numerous horror references, without losing the flow of the writing, something that is certainly not easy, to pull off as we have seen in the past and only proven further, with the numerous amount of films, that have attempted to emulate this style first popularised by Quentin Tarantino. You only really have to notice the similarities between Cassie Hack and Tiffany Shepis ( B movie star of "Scarecrow" and "Die, Delta, Die!") to realise that Steely is not trying to cash in on a popular market, but instead pay homage to the genre he loves, as the series walks the tightrope between Horror and Humour, in much the same vein as the Evil Dead movies.
Still it would seem that not happy with creating his own gallery of gruesome slashers for Cassie and Vlad to deal with, which so far has included psychotic teddy bears, killer conjoined twins and a demon worshiping Elvis, Tim Steely has also in the past has even brought famous slashers into his world with the most memorable, certainly being Chucky from "Childs Play" (1988) whose storyline bridged the gap between the end of "Seed of Chucky" (2004) and his own stand alone comic strip, which "Devils Due Publishing" the same company which publishes Hack / Slash would later publish continuing the story from the end of his Hack / Slash appearance and it's continued within in the pages of this fifth collection of the series, which gathers together issues 11, 14 - 17 aswell as the sellout annual, which revolves around a slasher killing off members of the "Suicide Girls", in a story which would also bizarrely enough lead to Cassie being featured in her own set of Suicide girl photos, which Steely would go on record to admit, that one of the main reasons for doing this, was because of the high volume of letters he received from people wanting to see Cassie naked.
The main plot line for the series revolves around Cassie Hack, a wise cracking slasher hunter and survivor of the attack by a vicious slasher, known as "The Lunch Lady" who ironically also turned out to be her own mother and who now with her partner Vlad, travel through America hunting down Slashers.
Still it would seem that not happy with creating his own gallery of gruesome slashers for Cassie and Vlad to deal with, which so far has included psychotic teddy bears, killer conjoined twins and a demon worshiping Elvis, Tim Steely has also in the past has even brought famous slashers into his world with the most memorable, certainly being Chucky from "Childs Play" (1988) whose storyline bridged the gap between the end of "Seed of Chucky" (2004) and his own stand alone comic strip, which "Devils Due Publishing" the same company which publishes Hack / Slash would later publish continuing the story from the end of his Hack / Slash appearance and it's continued within in the pages of this fifth collection of the series, which gathers together issues 11, 14 - 17 aswell as the sellout annual, which revolves around a slasher killing off members of the "Suicide Girls", in a story which would also bizarrely enough lead to Cassie being featured in her own set of Suicide girl photos, which Steely would go on record to admit, that one of the main reasons for doing this, was because of the high volume of letters he received from people wanting to see Cassie naked.The main selling point of this fifth volume though is, a storyline involving Cassie's dead mother being resurrected, by Dr. Herbert West from Stuart Gordon's"Re-animator" (1985) in a classic storyline, which bridges the gap from the last re animator movie "Beyond Re-animator" (2003) and the forth coming "House of Re-animator" which at the time of writing, is currently set for a 2010 release, which see's Dr. West being called to the White House, to bring back to life the corpse of the President. These Dr West issues are proof once more, of Steely's love for the genre, as he seamlessly fits the world of Re-animator into the world of Hack / Slash, especially when it comes to writing the character of Dr. West, while at the same time still managing to reference the films, with loving nods to the films, he is using as his reference point, which no doubt the fan boys, will have much fun in trying to spot.
Currently for myself Hack / Slash is still one of my favourite series and thankfully currently seems to show no sign, that it is running out of ideas to keep the series fresh, while I have to wait patiently for the release of volume 6, which hopfully won't take as long as the first volume of "Kick Ass" which seems to have been put on hold for the moment, while the film version takes priority. This I can only assume is after the backlash that greeted the adaptation of "Wanted" which also came from creator "Mark Miller", which the fans of the comic will rightfully point out bares no resemblence to the source comic, which was a shame really especially seeing how funny and violent "Wanted" was as a comic and I personally urge you all to hunt it down, just so you to can see how much the film pales in comparision. Still with the long mooted film adaptation of Hack / Slash still in pre production with "Rogue Pictures", I can only hope that it too doesn't fall prey to a studio taking such a liberties being taken with the source material.
Friday, 1 May 2009
Childhood Fears Redefined By Joshua Hoffine
Joshua Hoffine is clearly a gentleman, who prefers the darker side of life, which is clear from his latest collection of photos, which focus on the theme of Childhood fears.I shud start really by thanking Jay over at "The Horror Section", for originally finding these pictures, the full set of which you can find on Joshua Hoffine's website, which has already recived it's fair share of intrest from the members of the horror blog community and with good reason, as not only his work fantastic to look at, it's also creepy as hell.
Still while it seems that with most of the pictures he has choosen to look at familar childhood fears, such as creatures under the bed and in the closest, aswell as my own personal fear of clowns (darn those freaky bastards), he has also expanded the theme, looking at several of what I can only assume are his own personal fears, while also it would seem paying tribute to the horror genre, with the clown fear especially reminding me alot of Stephen King's "IT".
Still if you enjoy slightly less tradtional photography, I can highly recommend his current work, while looking forward to seeing what he has planned for his next project.
Repo! The Genetic Opera
Title: Repo! The Genetic Opera
Director: Darren Lynn Bousman
Released: 2008
Staring: Alexa Vega, Paul Sorvino, Anthony Stewart Head, Sarah Brightman, Paris Hilton, Bill Moseley, Nivek Ogre, Terrance Zdunich
Rating: 3.5 / 5
Rating: 3.5 / 5
Plot: In the year 2056 an epidemic of organ failures devastates the planet. Out of the tragedy, a savoir emerges: GeneCo, a biotech company that offers organ transplants, for a price. Those who miss their payments are scheduled for repossession and hunted by villainous Repo Men. In this world where surgery addicts are hooked on painkilling drugs and murder is sanctioned by law, Shilo (Vega) a sheltered young girl searches for the cure to her own rare disease as well as information about her family's mysterious history.
Review: So with us starting a new month, which also marks the start of “Ozploitation Month” here on the blog, I thought that I would allow myself one film outside of the months genre, before I dive headfirst into a month of Aussie themed insanity, for which I’ve already lined up a whole bunch of cult, weird and pretty random movies for the month, but first I wanted to look at this film, which I was going into pretty much expecting to hate every minute while looking forward to taking it behind the critical bike sheds and giving a good kicking, the kind best reserved for any film with “Noel Clarke” in it's cast and whose character Mickey, was one of the main failing of the new Doctor Who in, while he is currently set to bother movie fans when he appears in “Doghouse” which is set for release later this year and bears more than a slight similarity to the “Masters of Horror” episode “The Screw fly solution”. Strangely enough though I actually enjoyed this film a lot, even though it was a film that had a lot stacked against it, seeing how it has Paris Hilton in it, let alone the fact that what could have very easily been filmed in a very traditional style, is instead shot by Bousman as a rock opera, which somehow he manages to pull off.
Set in a world non to dissimilar to that of Terry Gilliam’s “Brazil” (1985) the setting for the film like the characters back stories is explained with the extensive use of Comic Panel art, drawn by Terrance Zdunich (who is also involved in numerous other aspects of the films, having apparently not satisfied with just playing the drug dealer “Graverobber” is also on producing duties, aswekk as co writing the film and soundtrack with Darren Smith…phew!) as we are shown how the world became it’s current dystopian state, as human flesh is bought and sold like a commodity, while organs are reprocessed from their owners, who have failed to keep up with their payments. It is certinally an effective style that works well here, helping to keep the action flowing and stopping the story from becoming overly confusing which it could easily have done with the extensive catalogue of colourful characters which inhabit this world that Zdunich and Smith have created as a warped stage for each of their creations, to be showcased, from the sheltered Shilo and her over protective father Nathan (Head), who is living a double life as one of the Repo men to the bickering Largo siblings, eager to claim GeneCo. for themselves, Repo certainly is a film best remembered for it’s characters, who provide the substance of the film, which could have easily gone the other way, giving us a film which is all style and no substance, which is how many detractors felt about “Southland Tales” (2006), Richard Kelly’s follow up to his breakthrough hit “Donnie Darko” (2001) and it’s “Southland Tales” which I feel that this film bares the closest resemblance to, especially with the artistic freedom that Bouseman has chosen to use when it came to shooting the film. Bouseman himself is a really surprising choice as director, seeing how he is best known for directing Saw 2, 3 & 4, all of which lacked the qualities which made the original film so special, but Repo is a vast departure from that less subtle world, even though this new world is one which contains a slight dash of Saw’s gore and violence, as we watch repo men tearing various organs from the bodies, as they perform gooey backstreet surgery, which like helps make this opera, like the DVD case states nothing like “Your parents opera”, which again like the promise of a rock opera, could have turned out horribly, yet somehow these sporadic scenes of gore throughout only add to the storyline, including one memorable and quite humorous scene, involving Shilo’s father reclaiming a spine from a man who hasn’t kept up with his payments, while on the phone to her, as he tries to cover up what he is currently doing, while at the same time she is desperately trying to cover for the fact she has snuck out of the house again.
Seeing how this is an opera I should also comment on the vocal performances, which vary greatly, much like the song range as despite being an opera, it is not an opera in the traditional sense and not only because of the setting or the gore, but rather the song range, which goes from traditional opera style pieces such as Blind Mag’s (Brightman) “Chromaggia” at the climax, a song which makes full use of Brightman’s ability, as she carries over the same vocal range which she brought as Christine in “Phantom of the Opera” (a role which was specifically written for her.) to the “Nightmare Before Christmas” (1993) esq “Zydrate Anatomy” in which Graverobber proceeds to explain about the addictive painkiller Zydrate, which head of GeneCo. Rotti’s surgery addicted daughter Amber (Hilton) is also hooked on. Sadly as is the case with all musicals there are several songs which don’t work such as the Punk rock “Seventeen” which not only features a cameo by Joan Jett, but also has Shilo sounding more like a spoilt brat stomping her feet, than I’m sure it was originally intended. It’s also worth noting that as fantastic as he as Rotti’s psychotic son Luigi, Bill Moseley is no singer and it’s quite painfully clear here whenever he attempts this, still as I already stated he plays the character so well, even if it is a slightly more upper class psycho, than the usual red neck kind he tends to favor playing. Still the rest of the cast manage to hold the singing parts together well enough for the format to still work, especially Zdunich whose performance as graverobber easily were some of my favourite parts.
Thankfully Repo, knows how a musical should work, which is with the songs being used to further the story, rather than bring it to a halt which is the problem that I found with Tim Burton’s “Sweeney Todd” (2007) which would frequently for me come crashing to a halt, as the cast churned out another dreary musical number, which thankfully I didn’t find with Repo, even with the less than fantastic songs, of which it does as I stated earlier feature a few.
Rumoured to be the first of a trilogy, with a Prequel “Repo!: The Beginning” planned to be the next part to follow, but Repo stands well on it’s own and my only fear at hearing such news, is that any additional sequels / prequels would only take away from the mythos, in a similar way that numerous sequels have done to the “Saw” franchise, to the point were it has now fallen into the same rhythm of numerous other long running horror series, so it is now more about the death scenes, than the actual plotline. Still in the meantime if you’re looking for an opera with a difference, or if you liked the pop cultured tainted flamboyant extravagance of “Moulin Rouge” (2001) then this is certainly the film for you and it makes me wonder how the original stage version looked and whether having the larger canvas which film provides, added or took away from what at the soul from what is defiantly an highly original piece of work, which is worth a rental at least.
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