"What's going on?" "I dunno. Some apartment building in LA. Good thing we're flying away."

 Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Two months after I started this site I reviewed a movie I knew hardly anything about called Quarantine. I knew it was a remake of the Spanish film REC, it starred Dexter's Jennifer Carpenter, and used the first person camera technique that has become oh so popular in today's culture. Other than that I knew nothing. So going in with an open mind I sat down and watched it and I actually really enjoyed it. It wasn't perfect and the original was much better but it still had enough going for it that I recommended people saw it.

It wasn't before too long I heard a sequel was coming somewhere down the road and, like most of the scares in the original, it popped up on my On Demand out of nowhere and was at a bargain price. I had no idea who was in it, what the plot was besides it being at an airport, or even if it was shot in first person or not. But that didn't matter because like the original I went in with an open mind and boy was I surprised at what I saw. Not only was it shot in third person, but it was better acted, better paced and better done then the original in almost every way. I'd even go so far to say it was better than REC 2 in terms of sequels. And the most surprising thing of all? It was done by the guy who did Ghost Ship. And regular readers know my opinion of Ghost Ship.

 The plot takes place during and after the events of the original film and follows Jenny, a flight attendant who's been assigned along with her best friend Paula to cover a red eye flight out of LA. The plane is pretty empty, save for about 12 or so passengers, and seems like it's going to be as routine as it gets. The most exciting thing about the flight to Jenny is looking after a kid named George and flirting with the cute Kindergarten teacher. But once they're up in the air a passenger gets really ill and goes berserk on the plane, attacking Jenny and trying to force the plane out of the sky. Because of his actions, and because one of the crew is injured in the process by the passenger, the pilots land at a small, mostly abandoned airport with what seems like only one employee. But things only get worse as once they are in the airport as they soon realize that, like the apartment building in the original, they too are under quarantine.

The story actually works quite well for the most part. It's riddled with cliches' and stereotypes that we've come to expect from horror movies but it's written in a way that it's never overly predictable and the dialogue steers clear of the cheesy one liners for the most part. Like its predecessor it's also quite atmospheric. We don't get into the action until about 15 or so minutes into the movie and before that we are actually left guessing who could be the carrier, something that actually had me squirming with anticipation. And once off the plane, the film is paced well enough that for every time the action gets intense, there is enough down time for the viewer to catch their breath. My only complaint with the writing is one scene very late in the film that seems to go on forever. It's not so much the length of the scene but one very disgusting action done in scene at close range. What makes it worse is that the action has little to do with the plot so it's a bit jarring.

 One area the film also succeeds in for the most part is the acting. Mercedes Masohn is fantastic as Jenny, creating a very believable, likable and human character. You see her character transform completely over the course of the film and she goes through the emotional ringer a few times. What's surprising is unlike most horror movie heroes, she doesn't gain a spine all of sudden or turn into a blubbering heap at the first sign of trouble. She responds like anyone would and while I credit a lot of that to the writing, Mercedes does well expressing it on screen. Other highlights include Better With You's Josh Cooke as Henry the Kindergarten teacher and Ignacio Serricchio as Ed the bag guy. Both take on the male hero character but display two radically different styles to their heroism. Henry is an intellectual and quick thinker while Ed is a shoot first, ask questions later type of hero.

The praise for the acting, however, stops here. Luckily the three people I mentioned take up a majority of the screen time but it becomes incredibly obvious as the film goes on that everyone else is either phoning it in or just really isn't that good of an actor. Some take their stereotype to comically bad levels, some sound monotone and lifeless, and one character, the kid I mentioned in the plot outline, is so annoying that I wanted to reach in the TV and punch him out. And he's in a majority of the film! Luckily Mercedes, Ignacio and Josh do their best to get the most out of the other actors so there are occasional bright spots with the others but it's easy to see the difference in effort between the actors.

The film is relatively low budget, costing a third of what the original did to make so there are times where the film looks cheap but overall the director does his best to make the film look blockbuster quality. One neat thing is that Robert Hall and the team at Almost Human return to do the make up for the movie so the "infected" look just like they did in the original, something that as a fan of the original I could appreciate.

Quarantine 2 certainly won't win any awards and there are a few major flaws here and there but overall this is a surprisingly good sequel and horror film in general. It's a shame this is basically a Direct to DVD movie so you probably won't catch it at your local theater but if you see it on the shelves at your local video store or are in need of a good horror movie to watch on Netflix or Redbox, I suggest getting Quarantine 2.

MY VERDICT: SEE IT

"Where's Micah?" "He...he uh..wasn't up for hanging out today."

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

As many of my readers will know, I loved the first Paranormal Activity. What some people don't know is up until Paranormal Activity I really didn't like "found footage" films. I mean I had seen Cannibal Holocaust (if that counts) and Blair Witch but really I wasn't into the whole idea of home video films. As someone whose done a number of low budget (and I mean like me and a few friends) horror films, I thought that if these kind of films could get released and make millions but ours couldn't it was a bit unfair. But then, after being nagged by my friends, I went and saw Paranormal Activity and I was genuinely unnerved. It made me scared of my shadow. And it took me a while to figure out why. The Exorcist, Dawn of the Dead and The Descent were all scary in their own right but what PA did differently was that it relied on subtlety and realism, something that the aforementioned films don't have.

And since it made a huge profit it was a no brainer that they would make a sequel. But does it suffer from the usual sequelitis that other films tend to have? Surprisingly no. It's not as good as the first one, but it's still damn good.

"Don't apologize." "Why?" "You're a grown up...it's embarrassing."

 Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

I really wanted to like this movie. Despite the poor reviews and the whole "This was filmed in 2006, nobody would buy the film until 2009 when it was released in the UK and then a year later in the US" thing I had hope for this one. The trailers made it out to be either the 2010 answer to Orphan or a ghostly thriller (the two trailers were completely different, also not a good sign) and sadly it's the former. I had nothing against Orphan, just like I had nothing against the Omen, but I don't find little girls scary unless they're in a Kubrick film.

But why did I want to so desperately like it? Because Christian Alvart is a good director (see his German thriller Antibodies for proof) and while I initially hated Pandorum I now think it's kind of interesting space thriller that even when I hated  it, I thought it was well shot and put together nicely. So imagine my disgust when I left Case 39 and it was extremely underwhelmed and disappointed. It does have some saving graces that keep it from being on par with Ghost Ship or other craptastical horror films but it's still by no means great.

"CHEW ON THIS MOTHERF****R!!!!"

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Alexandre Aja's films have always been a mixed bag. His first film "Furia" was panned and completely ignored by the general public. His second film "High Tension" was raved as an equally great and equally horrible film by fans and critics alike. His third film "The Hills Have Eyes" was better received by critics, but still mostly disliked by the general public. Then P2 came out which I enjoyed, but most people didn't. And Mirrors was panned by everybody. So needless to say he hasn't had the best track record with critics and the general public.

There are five girls missing, and you put the one person who knows where they are to sleep?

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

As most people who are long time readers and friends of mine know, The Descent is, in my opinion, one of the best horror films ever made and of the scariest films ever made. On top of being bloody, gory and dark, this film had a big heart with its characters as well as it's great manipulation of the blackness to create tension and suspense. And the big twist ending is such a "Ah yeah...that's good" kind of ending.

So when I heard that they had made a sequel which would be released straight-to-DVD in the US, I was both angry and confused. There didn't NEED to be a sequel. There was no reason why we needed to re-do a film like this. Even Neil Marshall, the director of the original, opted out of directing the film, instead only executive producing. Instead the EDITOR from the first movie is directing it. That's never a good sign when the original director steps down.

The more I read about the film, the more it both simultaneously pissed me off and intrigued me. It didn't get the glowing praise that the first one got, but it also wasn't being panned by critics either. It was going under the "more of the same" category with an average of three stars. So eventually I headed over to the video store and picked this one up and gave it a watch. And while not as good as the original...it's not half bad.

Picking up two days after the original, Sarah (the only survivor from the original) is found and hospitalized after going through the Hell that was the first film. Shortly after arriving at the hospital, the sheriff of the town starts investigating what happened. When he finds that the blood that was stained on her shirt belonged to Juno (the kinda maybe other survivor), he gets his deputy to drag her out of bed and take her to the caves to look for the rest of the team. They find a new entrance and with the help of three specialists, the sheriff, the deputy, Sarah and the three specialists are going back into the caves.

It's not a bad plot overall. You can see the twists coming a mile away and it kinda leans heavy on the jump scares but it does it's job well. I was surprised at how much more of the cave dwellers you saw and how much they changed since the first movie (they look like goblins now), as well as how much violence and gore there was. I was disappointed that besides Sarah and the deputy you really don't learn or care that much about the characters, but for a horror film I don't expect TOO much development. For what it was, the writing was solid enough and the film didn't overstay it's welcome.

The one big gripe I always have about sequels, especially direct-to-DVD ones, is that they take the really solid cast of the first one and squander it, only giving the original characters brief cameos of a movie that was much better. Well the good news, and one of the best things about Part 2, is that they got all of the original actresses back. Despite all but two being dead, it IS nice seeing everybody again. And it's especially good since they are great actresses. Juno feels like an evil Lara Croft and Sarah, while suffering from amnesia in the beginning, gives it her all as the brave heroine yet again. The new actors are kind of meh horror fodder but do the job well enough. That and most of them are there just to be killed so hey, whether they are great or not doesn't matter if they get ripped in half ten minutes in.

One of the things I loved about the original was the cinematography and the masterful score. Well the great thing is that this still has that great feeling of claustrophobia and the fear of the unknown like the original, and the ambient noises and the silence accentuated suddenly by a blasting score is something to behold. While I'd seen it all done before, it's one of those "If it ain't broke don't fix it" kind of things.

Despite all this praise I DO have some gripes. It overstays it's welcome slightly and it's easy to spot places where it could have been trimmed down. The supporting cast, like I said, really does lack compared to the original actresses, and the revealing of the cave dwellers earlier on and more so than the original is a bit of a let down considering how creepy and mysterious they were before. Now they're pissed off orc goblins who have heightened hearing. My only other gripe is that you can TELL Marshall wasn't involved. Considering how much he made the first one his own, you can tell that he pretty much just slapped his name on it and said "There." At least with Smokin Aces 2 you could tell Carnahan had SOME part in it.

Gripes aside, The Descent Part 2, while not as good as the original, is a solid follow up and worth a look even to those who were skeptic like myself.

MY VERDICT: SEE IT

ewton, life is like a p***s. When it's hard you get screwed. When it's soft you can't beat it.

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Now this is how you make a good bad movie. What do I mean? This is a horrible movie but it's so funny that it becomes a guilty pleasure. I mean the one liners are so stupid their awesome, the unintentionally funny but still funny lines are hilarious, the acting is atrociously bad its funny and the plot...well actually unlike the first film it has a plot...and a plot I can follow...another thing I couldn't say for the original.

The premise is that Billy the Kid is now a leader of a vampire gang. They are evil and bloodthirsty and enjoy killing anybody that gets in their past. Rayne, now played a totally different actress, comes to town to visit her friends. What she's been doing since the first movie and how she got to this town are unknown but she is now in the town and she wants to see her friends. Well her friends were killed by Billy and his gang and their kids were kidnapped. Why they weren't just killed? Who cares. Anyway Rayne tries to take them on but gets the crap beat out of her. So she teams up Pat, Preacher and Franson, three unlikable people with bad one liners and decides to take on Billy again.

The writing and plot holes and dialogue are horrid but it's pretty hilarious if you look at is as a comedy. I mean look at the quote...that's funny. And the acting is just as funny. The new girl Natassia Malthe is worse than Lokken but she is pretty funny to watch. Michael Pare', an Uwe regular is laughably bad and Zack Ward as Billy the Kid is a total failure of a villain. But he's so bad it's funny. The action is actually pretty decent but the stuntwork and effects are laughably bad and cheap. The biting continuity is all over the place as well...which is even funnier.

Look this is not a good film but it's 10x better than the first one. It's also better than Seed, Alone in the Dark and House of the Dead. It's so bad in every aspect of filmmaking it's funny. I mean Wild West Vampires? That should tell you something. But it IS genuinely funny not awkwardly funny and I enjoyed it.

It's Uwe Boll's The Room...so bad it's funny.

MY VERDICT: AVOID IT

I want you to find him, I want you to KILL him, and I want you to put him in the ground so he can never come back again.

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

If you are Mike from You Talking to Me or Nick from R2D2 then you are probably wondering why this post is being redone. For everyone else and these two here is the story:

I actually like Uwe Boll. If you read my site often you'll know I interviewed him. Interviewing him was a lot of fun. He's got abnormally good taste in films, he's funny, got great stories and an overall cool guy. And on top of that he's actually made five really good movies. A really good horror film, a really good school shooter film, a really good prison-esque film, a good war film and a good sociopath film. But any and all of his good movies are overshadowed by his crap or mildly entertaining ones.

Take Postal for example. I like Postal despite it's flaws and most of his other films are so bad they are good. But then there are films like Bloodrayne 1 and this one that are so bad they're abysmal. But unlike Seed I can understand WHY Bloodrayne sucked. The studio wanted a vampire horror film (Underworld was big at the time), the license was open so they took it and gave it to Boll because of his experience with video game films. That and they had to follow, or try to follow, the plot of the game so they were bogged down. Bloodrayne 2 is better because it isn't.

But this film I just don't get. It's nihilistic, uncaring, boring, unrelenting, evil, and it seems like it's made by a snuff film enthusiast without a soul. It's a brutal film, an unrelenting film and made by someone with anger issues. I don't know if Boll was trying to do a message or what but if he was he totally failed. I just don't get this film. Here is the plot:

(BY THE WAY SPOILERS...)

The first 3 minutes is Max Seed, a deadly serial killer and leatherface lookalike, watching animals being brutally being tortured and murdered in a slow and methodical fashion.

Then it sweeps over to the prison where we see a man get the chair in a very bloody fashion.

Then the next 25-30 minutes is a dual story: the current state of affairs and how they caught Max Seed.

In the current affairs, they are having troubles getting a new electric chair and the detectives and everybody involved in the case just wants to get everything over and done with. Seed sits calmly and attacks anyone who gets near him in a brutal fashion.

In the catching stage we watch an evolution of starvation torture. First a cockroach, then a small rat, then a dog, then a baby (which lasts the longest so you can see the baby truly die slowly), and then finally person after person after person, each taped and sent to the police. The main detective starts going mad and becomes bloodthirsty in his search for Seed. Eventually they find where he lives and a few Jigsaw-esque/slasher-esque deaths later, the detective arrests him.

The next 15 minutes is Seed attacking guards, Seed getting the electric chair twice, the cops deciding not to fry him again because that would mean sending him to the hospital if he was still alive thus making the cops and the prison look bad, and finally them burying Seed alive.

Well the next 10-20 minutes is Seed rising, biting a persons face off, electrocuting another, impaling another and then a montage of more killings via newspaper clips all leading up to a 8 minute scene of an elderly woman getting hammered to death slowly.

The last 9 or so minutes of film is the main detective getting a tape that shows his house, him rushing to his house, finding the police protection dead, rushing to Seed's house, getting himself locked in a room, forced to watch his wife get killed before agreeing to kill himself in order to save his daughter, and then his daughter shoved in the room with his body to starve to death like his other victims.

THE END.

Does that really seem like an enjoyable film? Would you pay to see this film? What kind of person would? The gore is so fake and CGI'd that even slasher fans like me would scoff. The violence for the most part is either starving or really quick or off screen. And when it isn't it's uninspired, boring or fake looking. The plot is terrible, the writing is worse, the lines are predictable (I even joke spoke a line...which a character than repeated after I said it) and there is no characterization. It's 85 minutes of filler. Useless filler.

I thought defending a film that has been bashed endlessly would be a good thing. Find a good in this film. But upon further looking...there is none. And that's all there is to that.

MY VERDICT: ABOMINATION TO CINEMA

I learned the truth a long time ago. Just because you can't see something, doesn't mean it can't kill you.

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Well as I mentioned in my House of the Dead review, the two films I'm reviewing today are special because they both had Director's Cut's which drastically altered my opinion on the original film. While one got exponentially better, one got worse. This is the former of the two.

Alone in the Dark is Uwe Boll's second dive into the world of video game based films. After the horrendous but laughably bad House of the Dead, you'd think he'd improve right? Well not exactly. On top of being based on a video game series whose plot changes with every game (thus making it hard to predict what exactly is going on), Uwe got his hands on the script. Originally it was going to be more of a straight up horror film with little action. Well Uwe didn't want that and he didn't think people would want that either so him and his team changed the script to be more action based and based more on The New Nightmare instead of any of the games in the series. New Nightmare was more action oriented then the other games in the series.

The film follows the story of paranormal investigator Edward Carnby. Edward was an orphan raised at an orphanage. He lost his memory when he was ten and soon afterward joined Bureau 713, getting a job as a paranormal investigator all the while trying to figure out his past. Currently Edward is working on the disappearance of the Abkani tribe, an ancient race which disappeared suddenly but left clues for people to find. He enlists the help of his archaeologist ex-girlfriend Aline to try and find out what happened to them. While all this is happening, Lionel Hudgins, the professor who was the cause behind Edward's memory loss, breaks open an old Abkani tomb which unleashes an evil demon spawn upon the world. On top of that, people who were experimented on by Hudgens as kids (aka the people in Edward's orphanage) are now possessed by the Abkani and sent to kill and destroy those who try to stop the Abkani.

The story could have been a decent action thriller if not for the piss poor pacing, the awkward sex scene, the terrible acting across the board, the lack of gore, the lack of any seeable action (it's all in the dark mostly), the lack of demon showing, the exposition padding, and the giant plot holes. All of that makes this a film SO bad that it deserves to be punted off a cliff. I was never a fan of the video game series but man this film had so much wrong with it.

MY VERDICT: ABOMINATION TO CINEMA

Then something came around that caught my attention...a Director's cut of the film...

This wasn't any ordinary Director's Cut though. No this was a revamped, unrated Director's Cut. So what's different? Well Tara Reid (Aline) is cut out almost completely and all the excess scenes with her (including the sex scene) are gone. Also most of the pacing issues have been taking care of. And they added some awesome and gory fight scenes with the demons. The acting is still bad but now more tolerable than before, mostly due to a better pacing and Tara's almost absence. I mean Slater and Dorff aren't Academy Award winning actors but you can tell, especially in this version, that they're actually trying...something neither of them have done since. It's almost as if Uwe Boll realized he had made a bad film and fixed what he could with it.

It's still not a great film but this version has better action, better effects, gets rid of a lot of my plot and acting gripes and is definitely a mindless guilty pleasure.

MY VERDICT: RENT IT

Simon says lets get the hell out of here and let the cops ask questions later while we're kicking it back in Seattle selling our story to the Enquire.

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

The next two in my Uwe Boll series are an interesting pair. They are considered to be Uwe Boll's worst movies ever and on top of that some of the worst movies ever. The interesting thing though is that about a year after both films came out, Uwe Boll released a Director's Cut of them that dramatically altered the film. For one it made the film a lot better, for the other it made it worse. This is the latter. Granted the original is not much good but the new version which I'll get to is much MUCH worse.

I will say before we go on in Boll's defense...he didn't write this film and he had nothing to do with how the film went. He was just the guy behind the camera. Just saying.

The story of House of the Dead is loosely based on the classic arcade shooter. And when I say based I mean there is a house, there is zombies and they are dead. Besides that and a few shots of the video game interwoven into the film itself it has nothing to do with the series. Basically what happens is a group of kids decide to go to a rave on an island. There is a mysterious boat captain, a cop, a smuggler, and a bunch of whiny teens. They arrive on the island and find it abandoned. Apparently zombies attacked. And their boat is useless. So what do they do? Grab a bunch of guns and go slo-mo shooting for about ten or so minutes until there are a conveniently small number of them left. They hole up in a house and wait. When that becomes boring they decide that they must escape somehow through the tunnels underneath the house and that there is some scientific explanation for the zombies. More people die until there are two left and they face an immortal zombie swordfighter whom they fight and promptly kill.

There's the plot. The plot is nonsensical, the dialogue is CHEESY as all Hell, the deaths are awkward to watch and not really that imaginative or interesting (ooh a bite...big whoop), some deaths are totally bafflingly stupid, the scientific explanation is BS and the acting is horrible across the board (except maybe Jurgen Prochnow).

But for all it's faults, House of the Dead is ALMOST a guilty pleasure. The action is SO over the top it's funny, the dialogue is so bad it's funny and every plot convenience and stupid moment and awkward death is so bad it's funny. So in a way it's so bad it's funny which makes it slightly tolerable. SLIGHTLY...

MY VERDICT: AVOID IT

But the reviews not over yet...apparently Uwe Boll heard that people liked this film as a guilty pleasure because it was so bad it was funny. Well being the businessman he is, he decided to release a NEW version of the film this time with more nudity, more hijinks, pop up commentary and lots of WOAH WACKY moments...that's right...

Yeah I wish this was an April Fools joke. No this is a real DVD and a real film. The pop up stuff is annoying and blocks a good portion of the screen, the naked scenes are awkward and borderline pornographic in a bad way and the wacky hijinks are really lame. LIKE IN ONE SCENE....GUNS...GUNS ARE REPLACED...BY WATER PISTOLS ROTFLOL!!!! HAHAHAHA

...yeah no. It's pathetic humor and it really makes this film so bad it's garbage. So what was once a guilty pleasure is now just a guilty film.

MY VERDICT: ABOMINATION TO CINEMA

None of that s**t matter, where you been, where your from. Right now...your in Vietnam

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

War is hell. War is a drug. War is life. War is horror. We've heard all sorts of depictions of war from all the different eras. We have seen Revolutionary War films, Indian War, Civil War, World War 1 and 2 films, Vietnam, Korea, Gulf and Iraqi war films. We have even seen films about wars yet to come. The problem, however, is that because there are so many war films from so many great eras, that low budget films by a notorious director seem to go unappreciated. Well that's why I'm here I guess.

1968: Tunnel Rats is one of the new "realism" films from Uwe Boll (that includes Darfur, Rampage and a bunch of his future films), the notorious modern day Ed Wood. While I feel no ill will towards Boll, I know a lot of people do and the mentioning of his name is like a painful shot to the stomach. Well I say ignore the name and watch this film for what it is because trust me, you'll be in for a surprise.

Tunnel Rats follows a group of soldiers in Vietnam who are sent to clear out the tunnels surrounding their camp. Their assignment is to destroy the tunnels, disarm the traps and kill anybody or anything near the camp. That's really it. There isn't a deep political message or anything, it's just a mission and what happens. That might piss some people off but while on paper it seems thin, it's not. These soldiers aren't faces. They are people you learn to love and care about and feel emotionally attached to. Some are young, some are old, some are black, some are white, some are innocent and some have seen a lot in their lives. Some are gun ho and brash and some are more quiet and reserved. Uwe Boll made the smart decision of letting the characters improv and say whatever comes to their mind. This makes the characters real and the story much deeper. It takes time for it to get going but about 45 minutes in the action really picks up.

This film IS low budget and you can tell, but not in a bad way. Boll wanted to make a simple film, told simply and with no need for flashy special effects. This film never claims to be Platoon or Apocalypse Now or The Deer Hunter. This is almost a character study, mixed with horror elements involving the horror of war. The characters and all the people involved make note of that and it's really something. Probably another great thing is that not everything is happy. This is not meant to be a happy film with happy American characters. This is a gritty look into the world of war. Granted there are some anachronisms and some errors, but give Boll a break...would YOU pay him if you were a Hollywood executive? He worked with what he had. The actors are quite good although it is apparent some have had more training than others but you really do care about all of them.

Tunnel Rats is not a masterpiece and not a revolutionary war film. There is no underlying message and no deeper meaning. The actors have no script and some have very little experience. It's low budget, grainy and has problems with pacing. But it is a film with a lot of heart, a lot of time invested into the characters, a lot of action and suspense and even some unintentional jumps, and it provides a simple look at how the Vietnam War and war itself is violent and that not everything is sunshine and roses. While not as good as Rampage, Tunnel Rats is definitely another step in the right direction for Uwe Boll.

MY VERDICT: SEE IT

Why are you screaming? I haven't even cut you yet...

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

With every passing week I get more and more assured that Hollywood has run out of ideas. But unlike some people I really don't mind remakes, endless sequels (I love Saw don't I?), and when films steal ideas because of that very reason. Hollywood can't make anything original. One person that has really perpetuated this and that is Michael Bay and his production group Platinum Dunes. Since 2003 they have remade most to all of the original slasher films (besides Halloween which Rob Zombie got) like Friday the 13th, Texas Chainsaw Massacre (both of them), The Hitcher and The Amityville Horror. Now Michael Bay and crew are back and this time they are revamping the classic series A Nightmare on Elm Street.

A Nightmare on Elm Street has always been one of my favorite horror series of all time. Besides the abysmal second one the series has maintained a sense of creepiness, actual scariness without jump scares and it's campy as all Hell. As the series went on Freddy got more and more vocal and by Freddy's Dead he was a snarky bastard who was as creepy as he was funny. Then in 1994 A New Nightmare was released during Wes Craven's "Tongue in cheek F-U horror films" phase. A New Nightmare saw a more evil Freddy, a more demonic Freddy and it brought him to the real world. Freddy then disappeared for nine years, resurfacing for the campy but fun "Freddy vs Jason." It's been seven years now and Freddy has finally returned, this time with a new face. And that face's name is Jackie Earle Haley.

This version of Freddy is a much more creepy than scary Freddy. Part of that is due to an actually touching but horrifying back story that they show about halfway into the film. In it, Fred Krueger is a gardener whose life revolves around the children at a local pre-school. (WARNING SPOILERS BUT REALLY IF YOU'RE SEEING THIS YOU KNOW THE STORY) Fred is a kind man and loves to play games like hide and seek and tag. He also lives in the basement of the pre-school. Down there is his "secret cave." In his "secret cave" he would bring the children down to paint and draw pictures. He would also get them to take pictures...and if you've seen Diff'rent Strokes you know how the rest goes. Anyway the kids told on Fred and Fred decided to flee only to be caught by the kids parents and burned alive. Unlike the original series it's never revealed how Freddy came back to life and how he got into people's dreams but it's a 90 minute horror film so what do you expect?

Either way it's many years later and the film starts with Dean and Kris. Dean keeps falling asleep and seeing this man. Kris tries to assure him he's not real...right before the dream man forces a knife into his throat. At the funeral Nancy, a local diner waitress, reveals that she sees the man as well but she keeps trying to forget and ignore him. A few days later Jesse, Kris' ex boyfriend, comes over to Kris' house after Kris has a horrible daydream in class that causes her to freak out. Jesse decides to stay the night only for Kris to get murdered in her sleep. Jesse gets arrested and dies shortly afterwards and now it's up to Nancy and her buddy who has a crush on her Quentin to figure out how to stop this man who reveals himself to be Freddy.

(END SPOILERS)

The film doesn't reinvent the wheel. In fact I don't think it tries to. It knows it's a modern day remake of a classic 80s slasher flick and in fact this new Nightmare tries to be a little more campy in some ways. It's not ha ha funny like the fifth and sixth film but most to all of Freddy's lines as Freddy are pretty tongue in cheek or more along the lines of an action hero who talks in one-liners. But where some films would become eye-rollingly bad from this walking one liner dispenser it's helped by the phenomenal acting of Jackie Earle Haley. Haley is the reason to stay and watch this film. He embodies creepiness and, despite him sounding like Rorschach the entire film, he actually pulls Freddy off quite well. And especially in the back story scenes he conveys this dark innocence and malevolence that only someone who starred in Little Children could do. He's the best thing this movie's got to offer. That's not to say the other actors are bad however. In fact most of them are pretty good. Their main problem however is that you don't really care about them. They are all kind of emo so it's really hard to root for them...except Nancy but she's the protagonist so you have to root for her.

But even with all the positives I've listed there are a few nagging errors in this film that DO bother me. The first is that they only use jump scares to induce fear. The back story scenes are a welcome change but everything else is "Quiet....AHHHHHHH....quiet.....AHHH!!" the entire film. There is barely any music (which is sad since the composer does a great job) and so it's a bit off putting to keep getting VERY LOUD musical sting after musical sting. Like the Wolfman and many horror films nowadays musical stings have become the only source of scariness in films. With the original it was more in your face. Johnny Depp got pulled in the bed and there was no jump scare with it. It was just "Oh he's getting pulled down...WTF is happening? OMG BLOOD GUSHER!" That was awesome. And instead of a musical STING it was like the Jaws theme in there. And THAT was scary.

See what I mean. That's scary. The music sting/jump scare thing is really the only major gripe I have. Otherwise my only other problem is it's a bit abrupt, poorly paced at times with lot's of talky pieces in between the death scenes and as a slasher junkie there weren't enough kills. There were a lot of off-screen ones that you only briefly hear or read about but only a few people die in this film. Remember Freddy's Dead? He killed thousands in that film!

Overall A Nightmare on Elm Street is a decent horror remake of a great film and features overall good acting that suffers from bad pacing, one note scaring tactics, characters you don't care about and not enough slashing. I recommend it but only after you've seen all the other films...besides two...this is MUCH better than two.

MY VERDICT: RENT IT

What is this? What are you doing to us?

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

I never have nightmares anymore. The last time I had a nightmare was after watching Antichrist. It's not because the film was scary but mostly because foxes eating themselves saying "Chaos Reigns" and a woman chopping her private parts off with rusty scissors is enough to make me never want to sleep again. And I thought after laughing my way through Seed, Saw and Hostel films that I was totally desensitized to creepy torture porn or weird horror films but I guess I was wrong. Well who do I thank for this. Well I thank the controversial Dutch director known as Tom Six who wrote and directed a little film called "The Human Centipede." Needless to say that film gave ME nightmares.

The plot is as follows: Dr Heiter is an evil mad scientist. He kidnaps a truck driver and we never see him again until later. Meanwhile Lindsay and Jenny are two American tourists whose car breaks down. They end up at Dr. Heiter's house to see if they can find a way to fix their car and when they finally get INSIDE the house...the shit hits the fan. The girls are drugged and forced into a makeshift hospital ward where they wake up and see the truck driver. He is killed for not "being a match" and the girls then wake up again to find a NEW replacement named Katsuro, a Japanese tourist. The Doctor explains that he is a world renowned surgeon known for separating conjoined twins. He has this idea to join three people together through their digestive track, a "human centipede" of sorts, and wants the three captives to be the guniea pigs.

Long story short, they end up joined together, are forced to do tasks, Katsuro gets angry and gets the crap beaten out of him, Lindsay is forced to swallow crap, Jenny's dying of blood poisoning, a couple of police officers show up, they go, Katsuro stabs Heiter, commits suicide, the officers return and Heiter and the officers get shot. Jenny finally dies of her blood poisoning and Ashley is left alone with two dead people attached to her.

This is one MESSED UP MOVIE. It's helped by the fact that it's well acted and written for the most part but it's still messed up. Heiter is a great mad scientist and one of the best villains I've seen in a while. The cops are good and, besides Katsuro, the captives are all pretty good actors. And the plot doesn't really screw around much which is appreciated. Don't worry there won't be any "Wait for 45 minutes before anything happens" going on in this film. Once it gets going...it gets GOING.

The special effects are good and I HAVE to applaud the make up department. The lighting and the cinematography are quite good as well. The film has a very nice atmospheric feel which really adds a good tone to the film. My only huge issue with the movie is I couldn't get this out of my head...

Overall the Human Centipede is a messed up but decent horror film that takes risks and is quite original. It's not for the weak of heart or stomach but there are certainly worse films out there...

so if you're even slightly interested...give this one a look.

MY VERDICT: RENT IT

Fried food can kill me, a mugger can kill me. You're not so special down here, Jones!

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Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Well the Prophecy series has reached its end...well there WERE two movies after but they don't count because Walken wasn't in them. So does Prophecy 3: The Ascent live up to the other two movies standards? Well that answer is really hard. It's both yes and no. In a lot of ways Prophecy does well from a trilogy standpoint by bringing almost all of the plot points to a close and giving closure to the viewer. Add onto that Christopher Walken's amazing performance (as usual) and his even crazier outfits and wigs and some good action and special effects and you'd think that it would be the best. Well IMDB, for the most part at least, does in fact believe this. But even as a fan of the series I do have to admit that besides these couple of points I mentioned, the film really does lack in other areas.

The main issue however is the acting. Vincent Spano and Dave Buzzota, who are good actors (Spano recently did great playing Virgil in the Dante's Inferno video game and animated movie while Buzzota I mostly remember being good in She's All That) they just really lack in their roles here. Spano, who plays Zapheal comes off as a little too stiff and robotic and doesn't ever feel truly menacing. He's supposed to be the villain but gets out shined by Walken every time. Even when he is truly being foreboding he never really is. As Buzzota he is playing our main character Danyael. He is supposed to be half angel, half man in yet he can't seem to hold his own too well. At times he even feels a bit dopey, never really fitting in with his "hero" role. Maybe a bigger focus on Walken would have been much better in my opinion as he was already an established character and has much more presence as a "hero" type.

Well that's all my complaints now onto the story:

The story takes place 18 years after the second one ended. The war in heaven is still going on, people are pissed, angels are pissed and Danyael, a half human, half angel hybrid and was prophesied as the one who would end the war. Well Zapheal will have none of this and makes it his mission to take out Danyael. But Gabriel, now human and having switched sides, makes it his duty to protect him. Fighting, special effects and speeches ensue.

Overall it's an okay film with decent acting that works because of Walken and good writing. Watch the first two for sure but think before watching this one.

MY VERDICT: RENT IT

There's a small step from prophet to martyr. Can you take it?

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Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

This third edition of Christopher Walken month brings to you the sequel to the Prophecy (known as God's Army) known simply as The Prophecy II. Bringing back Walken as Gabriel in a larger role, featuring a young Britney Murphy and appearances from Russell Wong, Jennifer Beals and Eric Roberts the Prophecy II proves to be a worthy sequel to a good horror film.

The story this time around is Gabriel is back and he isn't happy. He has returned from Hell (he was killed in the first movie) and is determined to find a Nephilim "monkey" (the offspring of an angel and a human) who is destined to precede reconciliation between the two angel factions that are going at it. Thomas, from the first movie, now a monk delivers this news and Gabriel makes damn sure to try to stop it. Danyael is the angel who seduced and impregnated the woman (whose name would turn out to be Valerie) who would give birth to the Nephilim. Soon after Gabriel kills Thomas for not helping him and after things don't go well for his army he instead does this:

Gabriel takes this girl, Izzy, who just committed suicide and recruits her to help him to find the girl since Gabriel can't work any technology. Here's a prime example:


Eventually the movie climaxes in a battle at Eden (yes THAT Eden) and Gabriel kills Danyael. Valerie, in a desperation move, grabs Gabriel and throws herself off a building which only ends up impaling Gabriel on a spike. The angel Michael turns him human and the movie ends with the war culminating for an exciting battle.

I actually almost PREFERRED this film because while it has it's semi scary moments, it really showcases Walken's dry wit and humor about everything and he has SO many great lines in the film. The rest of the acting is sharp and the writing is really good, considering this IS the middle part.

Overall good action, great Walken, good acting, good story, good writing...so basically a GOOD movie.

MY VERDICT: SEE IT

Do you know how you got that dent, in your top lip? Way back, before you were born, I told you a secret, then I put my finger there and I said Shhhhh!

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Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Welcome to the second edition of "Christopher Walken Appreciation Month." In this edition and the next two editions we will be covering a series of films that are loved and hated by many people: The Prophecy series. The first three films are great, mostly because they feature a more kick ass version of Walken, but also because Heaven vs Hell movies tend to be pretty good, or at least they WERE. The Prophecy series is a prime example of how H vs H movies really DO work so without further ado let's take a look into the first one.

The film starts with an image you don't usually see: an angel standing over a skeleton. A voiceover reveals to the audience that another war has broken out in heaven and that the angels are divided now and fighting each other. Thomas, a soon to be ordained priest, sees visions of this and abandons the church to become an LAPD officer having lost his faith after seeing the visions. Thomas arrives home one day to find the angel from the opening, named Simon, sitting in his room. After talking for a bit Simon departs leaving Thomas confused.

The next day Simon gets into a fight with another angel, getting seriously injured, but kills the angel before his heart gets ripped out. Thomas arrives at the crime scene (the angel took human form) and, at the apartment which Simon was staying at, finds a book he was studying at seminary. Simon goes after an evil soul of a man that just died while Thomas goes to the coroners. When there he finds the non-existent 23rd chapter of Revelations and translates it. Soon after Gabriel (Walken) shows up looking for Simon. Basically from there Simon meets a schoolteacher, puts the evil soul in a kid, Thomas and Gabriel chase down Simon, Simon gets killed, Gabriel is evil, Satan shows up, confrontation, Gabriel gets killed and sent to hell, and Thomas regains his faith.

It's a very intricate and intriguing story whether you are someone of faith or not. The acting is great all around, the effects are cool, Walken is badass and it has some truly good scare moments. The writing is pretty good, albeit a bit heavy handed at times but overall pretty good. A decent horror movie if you can get your hands on it.

MY VERDICT: SEE IT

Okay, just to be clear here, our options are: die here, die in the tunnels, or die in the streets. That pretty much it?

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

If you have been a consistent reader of TME then you would know I hold great respect for films that take the cinema verite approach to making films. It's really easy to make big budget films, just ask Michael Bay, but it's really hard to make a big budget film that LOOKS like it was made cheaply and make it seem believable. Films like REC (and its sequel) and Quarantine got that idea down and Paranormal Activity, whether you liked it or not, did too. But one film that ignored for the longest time was probably one of the first cinema verite movies in MY lifetime to become popular, Cloverfield. Whether it was the supposed Dramamine inducing headaches, the warnings on the theater doors or my general distaste for monster movies, I stayed FAAARRR away from this movie. But one day I found this film in the bargain bin of my local store and, after doing some intensive studying on the film, I figured what they hey and picked it up. If nothing else I'd get an 75 minute (its 80 with credits) monster movie I could make fun of. But after watching all the behind the scenes stuff and how much work they put into it, as well as actually sitting down and watching this movie I realized "Wow...this is actually a really good movie!"

The plot is simple and works because of that. Rob is going to Japan and is thrown a surprise party. Rob's brother Jason and his fiancee Lily are assigned to record testimonies for the party from friends of Rob. Well Jason has the attention span of a newt and pushes the camera onto Hud, Rob's sarcastic and pessimistic best friend, who takes the job after he learns his crush Marlena is going to be there. Things seem to be going well until Rob's ex girlfriend Beth shows up. They fight, she leaves and the lights go out. From then until the end it's basically Hell on Earth as Rob, Hud, Lily, and Marlena run around the city trying to avoid whatever is attacking the city and save Beth.

A lot of people will complain that you don't see enough of the creature or that the first 18 and a half minutes are totally boring. I would have to disagree. I think the mysteriousness of the creature and the fear of the unknown really add to the tension of the film. That and when you DO see it, it's pretty badass. As for the first 18 minutes...yeah they are really slow but they work. Most to all of the character development as well as most of the plotline are IN that 18 minutes and unless you wanted a bunch of first person people running around for an hour, those 18 minutes are necessary.

As for the acting, I thought it was quite good. I found it funny how much of the cast from She's Out of My League was in it, but for the most part the acting is great. They are realistic, believable, not stupid (for the most part) and don't make idiotic decisions. It's like if someone was experiencing this for real instead of on film. And I think that really works in the film's favor. The effects are brilliant and the monster design is great.

My only concern and issue is that with most POV films and that is the shakiness. It never really bothered me but it bothered everyone else watching it with me. It's a bit dizzying at time and there are a few moments where I thought the film had froze and that was only the special effects used for the camera. But these irks aren't that bad to me but could piss a lot of people off.

A film that I had previously given no chance turned out to be a great, cheap, thriller that was entertaining from start to finish. An ingenious movie. Give it a look.

MY VERDICT: OWN IT

You're not dead are you?

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Now I'm no Bargain Bin B movie kind of guy, granted I've seen my fair share of B movies (including all the Turkish rip offs) but for the most part I try to AVOID these kinds of movies just for the sheer reason that I know that they are bad. But sometimes you find a movie that is SO bad, it's hilarious and almost becomes a campy cult classic. Granted those are few and far between but for the most part I tend to get lucky. Well when I heard that George A Romero's classic Night of The Living Dead was public domain (which means anyone could redo it) I kinda set out to find the different versions. One stuck in my head though: the 2006 3D edition of Night of the Living Dead. Why? Maybe because of the cheesy pre Avatar 3D effects or maybe it was because Sid Haig was in it. Either way I sat down and watched this one and let me tell you...it was bad...and not in a good way.

The story is basically the same if you ever paid attention to the story of Night of the Living Dead. A guy and girl head to a funeral, guy gets attacked, she runs to an abandoned farmhouse (or pot farm in this case) and holes up with a family and a bunch of misfits. The dead have risen and now its up to them to survive the attack and find safety. That's the extent of the story and honestly it's nothing too different from the original. The only difference is that they added Sid Haig as an evil mortician and they made the dialogue a whole helluva lot stupider. Honestly that quote at the top is one of the smartest lines.

The acting is abysmal, save for Haig who does an actually decent job, and the plot holes are huge. Nothing in this movie makes sense, they mock the audience by playing the original in the background, the dead are stupid, the people are stupider and its basically a waste of time. The effects are cheesy and the 3D is dull. Overall a pretty shitty movie.

So please don't watch this...go watch the original. Please?!

MY VERDICT: ABOMINATION TO CINEMA

Villainy wears many masks, none of which so dangerous as virtue...

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Hey hey hey kiddies it's time for a Tim Burton movie (cheer). There really is no need to go into any more detail about Tim more than I already have: he's a creative, twisted and dark mind who loves Gothic over and undertones and he enjoys his good ol' fashioned blood spurts. So what is he tackling this time? Why a timeless tale told a hundred times before! So what is this Gothic Johhny Depp/Christopher Walken masterpiece? Sleepy Hollow.

Those who grew up in the Disney animation era will know that Sleepy Hollow is one of the most terrifying cartoons ever made. For the most part it's a well animated, funny, quirky story that's great for kids....but the last ten-fifteen minutes are poop your pantsingly scary. Seeing that Headless Horsemen chase after Ichabod and throw his flaming pumpkin head at him and kill him?! God I had nightmares for years. I was afraid to go outside. It didn't help that shortly after I watched that I watched this. One of my first R rated movies, this made me even more afraid of the Horsemen and so for years I was terrified of him. Thanks Tim Burton...douche...

With that being said let's get into the film: Ichabod Crane (Depp who else) is a constable from the city sent in to solve the case of multiple brutal slayings that have been happening around town. He's a shy, introverted and awkward type who can faint at the drop of a hat but he is also quite brilliant. The town believes the culprit is a man known as the Headless Horsemen but Crane would believe differently...that is until he sees him face to empty void. Now it's up to Crane to stop the Horseman and figure out why he keeps attacking people.

Needless to say Depp is amazing in this movie. It's no surprise to anyone that Depp is great at playing quirky characters and Crane is one of the quirkiest. His tone and dry wit are hilarious and every time I watch this movie I always get a chuckle out of his performance. Ricci is great as well, considering how young she is and of course Chris Walken is brilliant as the Horsemen...even though you don't really see his head. Overall pretty solid acting all around. The action is good as well although there are certainly a few moments of "What the F**k?" stupidity in this movie, which brings down the intelligence of this film slightly. The blood and gore is handled well in this film although there are a few over the top moments, although that is to be expected from Burton. The music is great and the cinematography is brilliant as well.

Overall not Burton's best film but still an entertaining horror film and a good retelling of the classic tale of Ichabod Crane.

MY VERDICT: SEE IT

"It's gonna be alright, we're gonna be okay" "You don't really believe that do you?"

Hello I am the movie encyclopedia and if no one else will see it, I will.

Horror remakes seem to be as common as a Saw film nowadays. Michael Bay is hellbent on remaking every horror movie series from the 80s with his remakes of Texas Chainsaw, Friday the 13th and the New Nightmare on Elm Street and other recent films like Last House on the Left, Dawn of the Dead (and subsequently the remakes of Day and Night) and My Bloody Valentine have been crowding our screens nowadays. Honestly though, like most common horror movies, they all suck...that is with the one in a million exception. Every now and again a director and writer strike gold with a remake making it better (or almost better) than the original. Sadly though Dawn of the Dead and Last House on the Left are the only recent ones that come to mind but now I have another to add to the list: The Crazies.

The Crazies is the third film from Sahara director Breck Eisner and is written by Ray Wright (2006's Pulse) and Scott Kosar (TCM remakes and The Amityville Horror remake) with help from original director George A Romero. With the exception of Romero the credits didn't make me excited for the movie. Even the title made me laugh the first time I saw it. The film looked interesting but needless to say I went in with low expectations. When I walked out I was flabbergasted...the film was amazing!

The plot of the Crazies is pretty simple: In small town Ogden Marsh located in rural Iowa things seem pretty normal. That is they seem normal until a toxin contaminates the water supply. When that happens, slowly but surely each of the inhabitants of the town go completely crazy and suddenly die. The government gets word of this and quarantines the town shooting anybody on sight. Now a small band of people must get together and try to escape the town, or die trying.

The first thing I noticed about this film is how intelligent it is. Usually in horror movies, no matter how good they are, there are a lot of eye rollingly bad moments where you just want to yell "C'mon!" But surprisingly to me and everyone else in the audience there weren't that many in this film. Like The Descent the characters think before they act and actually use the thing between there ears. The second thing I noticed was the acting...it's top notch in this film. I personally think Timothy Olyphant is highly underrated and it shows in this film. His role is brilliant (no award winner by any means) and he was a joy to watch. Otherwise the supporting cast was quite good and very entertaining to watch, especially when everything started going crazy.

Another nice thing about this movie is it's unwillingness to rely on jump scares. Most horror films use that as a crutch but not this one. Yes they are in there but when they are used they are used smartly. The film also doesn't rely on gore to get a rise out of people. There are some extremely disturbingly violent moments and gory moments in the movie (I may actually have nightmares) but overall it is uses tension to create the scares and not the jumps or the gore.

Overall The Crazies is no award winner. But it DOES stand head and shoulders above most horror movies out there and it stands millions of miles above most to all horror remakes. Despite it's name and it's writer/directorial credits I suggest giving this one a look. A great film if you want a good scare.

MY VERDICT: TOP FILM