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Post by Michael Connolly on Feb 17, 2021 20:25:32 GMT
Hellboy (2019) - I read a lot of negative reviews about the R-rated reboot of the comic character before finally watching it yesterday on tv for free. Why the world needed a reboot after merely 15 years is anyones guess, but it seems the movie was one of biggest movie flops of 2019. The director of the two original Hellboys del Torro didn't want to do it, so Ron Perlman who played the character under the heavy make-up twice also declined. Now the character was played by actor David Harbour, who was new to me. I liked Harbour as Chief Hopper in Stranger Things and can imagine him as Hellboy, but Perlman is a tough act to follow. As a fan of the comic book who has collected nearly every issue of Hellboy, BRPD and the rest and actually read most of it I guess I was both the target audience and not. Coincidentally, I just read the first storyline in the comic series (the one about Rasputin) yesterday. Good stuff, and thanks for recommending it. What used to be fun on the page turned into a deadly dull paint-by-numbers affair. Instead of developing a story flow, the viewer was bombarded by monster-action, and the in the comic over decades developed Hellboy universe was clumsily force-fed in a series of enough flashbacks to start a drinking game. The only new stuff was the extremely heavy-handed character reversal, which in some parts was an abject and grating failure. As this was a reboot of course characters had to be the opposite of what was already done, but the "re-imagining" of Hellboy's kindly foster-father Professor Bruttenholm didn't work at all for me. Hearing this makes me happy I passed on the reboot. The relationship between Hellboy and Bruttenholm was one of my favorite parts of the original move, and it sounds like the reboot's handling of it would've ticked me off. The movie already had a solid shitstorm before starting production because they wanted to cast Daimio, the undead soldier coupled with a jaguar spirit and who is supposed to be Japanese-American - which I frankly never did realize as a reader -, with a white actor before giving Daniel Dae Kim the role. He should've been their first choice all along, given his background in genre television ( Angel and Lost, for example). Plus, my wife is quite the fan of his cheekbones. Apparently del Toro wanted his HELLBOY III to feature the Frankenstein monster, Dracula and the Wolfman from the old Universal horror films. Such a loss.
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Post by helrunar on Feb 17, 2021 21:28:53 GMT
I watched The Earth Dies Screaming a couple of years ago on y.t. If you accept that it is a low-budget character-focused alien invasion story, it's really not bad at all.
My favorite in that genre has to be Devil-girl from Mars with incredible Patricia Laffan in the title role. I think it is set in the holy realm of Dr Shrink Proof, somewhere remote in bonny Scotland. Derived from a stage play that definitely shows its vintage, but whenever Laffan is onscreen there's something mesmerizing about the proceedings. She's either the nightmare or the wet dream of the "anti-women's-libbers" male faction of a certain era... by any criterion she is a fiercely ruling intergalactic dominatrix.
H.
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Post by ripper on Feb 18, 2021 14:10:51 GMT
I watched The Earth Dies Screaming a couple of years ago on y.t. If you accept that it is a low-budget character-focused alien invasion story, it's really not bad at all. My favorite in that genre has to be Devil-girl from Mars with incredible Patricia Laffan in the title role. I think it is set in the holy realm of Dr Shrink Proof, somewhere remote in bonny Scotland. Derived from a stage play that definitely shows its vintage, but whenever Laffan is onscreen there's something mesmerizing about the proceedings. She's either the nightmare or the wet dream of the "anti-women's-libbers" male faction of a certain era... by any criterion she is a fiercely ruling intergalactic dominatrix. H. Devil Girl from Mars is a hoot. It's cheap as chips and rather talky, but Miss Laffan makes up for all the film's deficiencies. I saw a rarely screened and probably mostly forgotten British 60s horror film last night. It! from 1967, with Roddy McDowall and Jill Haworth. It's about a golem that is delivered to a museum and inevitably goes on a rampage. McDowall is great as a crazy assistant curator, who keeps his mother's rotting corpse in his house and talks to her as if she were still alive. I can only remember it turning up on UK television once, when ATV showed horror films on Fridays after News at Ten in the 1970s. It passed 90 minutes quite reasonably, but is certainly no classic.
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Post by helrunar on Feb 18, 2021 15:00:58 GMT
That's cool, Ripper. I have thought about revisiting It. I tried watching the movie on VHS years ago and just couldn't get very far with it. Now I'd probably make more progress with the film. One issue that hasn't changed is my dislike of the Golem design which just doesn't seem like what one would expect of a proper Golem. For some reason it always makes me think of the ambulatory tree in It Came from Hell (Back send it).
cheers, H.
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Post by ripper on Feb 18, 2021 17:45:11 GMT
That's cool, Ripper. I have thought about revisiting It. I tried watching the movie on VHS years ago and just couldn't get very far with it. Now I'd probably make more progress with the film. One issue that hasn't changed is my dislike of the Golem design which just doesn't seem like what one would expect of a proper Golem. For some reason it always makes me think of the ambulatory tree in It Came from Hell ( Back send it). cheers, H. Spot on, that design does look decidedly odd, and I see the connection to From Hell it Came. I must have been around 12 when I last saw it, and at the time I thought it was great, especially when it survived a nuke blast, but not so much last night. Not a particularly strong cast, though McDowall was, I thought, pretty good as the Norman Bates wannabe. For me, McDowall has that ability to put menace into whatever he says; it's like behind the rational normal person, there's crazy underneath, just waiting to burst through. I am, of course, referring to McDowall's performances, not to the actor himself, whom we lost far too soon. I did notice Ernest Clark and Ian McCulloch in the cast. Clark was a popular character actor, perhaps best remembered for playing Professor Loftas in the many 'Doctor' TV sitcoms, while McCulloch went on to star in Italian nasties Zombie Flesheaters and Contamination.
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Post by helrunar on Feb 18, 2021 22:36:47 GMT
This is a good radio adaptation of Bram Stoker's Lair of the White Worm: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b07lp80pScript by Brian Wright, it aired originally in 2004. This version includes more elements from the original book, which I did read but barely remember--it was a mess! The above link is good for about another three and a half weeks as of this date, 18 February 2021. Edit to add: Just read an online synopsis of the book--to quote a character in the radio version, "Hell's teeth!" The radio play is a pretty thorough re-write which only retains a few elements of the novel. Lovecraft commented that the book had the germ of a good idea which Stoker ruined with an "almost infantile" attempt at development. There are also some extremely racist plot elements that were eliminated altogether along with several other setpieces that could not have been included in the format of an hour play--or depicted readily via radio. Sometimes one must be grateful for these things... cheers, H.
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Post by bluetomb on Feb 19, 2021 0:08:53 GMT
Now I'm wishing that Robert Holmes did more writing for film and not just his often brilliant Doctor Who work. I have the vaguest recollections of Invasion, in which the aliens were Japanese people, but given his talent with the four part Doctor Who story format, or roughly a feature length, I'm sure he could have done well with more. I've yet to see The Terrornauts, The Body Stealers or Zeta 1 but will keep an eye out for them, I'm rarely less than entertained even by the lower end of old sci fi B's. Actually just put some Leslie Nielsen affair called The Resurrection of Zachary Wheeler on to tape, which has a solid 2/5 from the Radio Times Guide to Science Fiction. Looking forward to it. The Body Stealers is actually on Youtube. I watched it last night. The only thing I could remember about it was the disappearing parachutists. It's certainly low budget, but there are some prominent names in the cast list. Seeing Mr 'Protect and Survive' as a kind of low rent James Bond was interesting. There's some rather dodgy acting in a few scenes and for some reason our dog got a bit restless during the parts showing the parachutists--don't think he appreciated the weird sound effects. Thanks for the tip, I'll check it out.
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Post by bluetomb on Feb 19, 2021 0:17:53 GMT
Of the three I don't think you'd be wasting your money on a DVD of The Terrornauts. It's endearingly cheap and bonkers (and features a guest appearance from faithful British sci-fi location Betchworth Chalkpits). The Body Stealers should be a much better film (and I suspect might have been with someone more charismatic in the lead or if Patrick Allen had played his role differently). They Came from Beyond Space is a bit dull, despite this viewer at least willing it to achieve greatness. Of course if you want a cheap British sci-fi film that is actually really rather good you could do worse than have a look at The Earth Dies Screaming. Thumbs up to The Earth Dies Screaming eh? I think on the rare occasions that this has been on the box I've skipped it on account of the 1/5 from the Radio Times, despite the 5/5 title. It's an august publication, and an edition of the Encyclopaedia I have put me on to Singapore Sling despite it having been rejected for certification in the UK, but not without its faults, like 1/5 for the mighty Tourist Trap. Looking the film up I also see that I ought to watch Island of Terror and Night of the Big Heat. I think I saw one or other of them a very long time ago, but not the other, and then for some reason became convinced that they were two different names for the same film.
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Post by samdawson on Feb 19, 2021 12:56:37 GMT
If you approach it with low expectations I don't think you'll be too disappointed. It was made as a one hour long quota quickie on a clearly very small budget (the only remotely expensive bits are borrowed from Village of the Damned), but it uses its setting, the Village of Shere (also seen in A Matter of Life and Death and The Ruling Class) well and is a nice example of the British genre of it's the end of the world as we know it so, quick, let's gather in the nearest pub.
Night of the Big Heat and Island of Terror were made, IIRC, back to back, using the same locations, and have a very similar feel, even down to the monsters. Like The Earth Dies Screaming they're not going to win any awards, but they have a certain charm and even tension (let down in the former by the cheapness of the monsters). If you could only watch one I'd go for the latter.
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Post by helrunar on Feb 19, 2021 13:36:29 GMT
Sam, that's fascinating that Earth Dies Screaming and Ruling Class were filmed in the same village. I well remember when I first saw Ruling Class, the film broke about one thirds of the way through. The screening did eventually resume but the remainder of the film did not seem terribly coherent (I think they had to skip whatever had remained on the broken reel). A year or two later I saw it again at a college screening and it STILL seemed utterly loopy--but fun! I should see it again sometime.
I saw Night of the Big Heat around 15 years ago. I seem to recall there was a flurry of excitement when it was discovered and released on DVD because it had been so little known, and the film features the beloved pairing of Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. Patrick Allen also contributes a sturdy performance as a rather nasty character. My memory is pretty vague of both this and Island of Terror which I finally saw on you tube a year or so ago. I thought Big Heat had a slightly more interesting script and scenario. Island of Terror starts out promisingly and has some good scares for a film of the era but the monsters are really ridiculous. These films are fun if one enjoys the script styles and acting techniques of the era. It was all done very vividly and colorfully whereas today, I so often find how these things done to be shades of arctic blue and sterile grey. As they say on the interwebs, your mileage may vary...
H.
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Post by samdawson on Feb 19, 2021 15:11:33 GMT
The Ruling Class was filmed at a variety of locations, but the hunt scene was Shere and, I think (it's a while since I last saw it) includes the pub in which the action takes place in Screaming (and which is still there). The village seen in the camera obscura in A Matter (Stairway to Heaven in the US) was Shere, proving that it is almost perfectly unchanged since the 40s. I'd like to say that this is due to socialist planning but it's actually due to a landowning family who preserved key houses for low paid workers and kept it as a village with a working population rather than making a fortune flogging it off to incomers. I think they may also have put money into a residents' lido and a leftwing theatre that existed there. Sadly the money has now run out and bits of it are getting sold off. It's a gorgeous place, although the locals are currently complaining about overwhelming numbers of visitors flooding it during lockdown, along with lots of (sadly often rather aggressive) cyclists.
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Post by ripper on Feb 19, 2021 16:59:55 GMT
Of the three I don't think you'd be wasting your money on a DVD of The Terrornauts. It's endearingly cheap and bonkers (and features a guest appearance from faithful British sci-fi location Betchworth Chalkpits). The Body Stealers should be a much better film (and I suspect might have been with someone more charismatic in the lead or if Patrick Allen had played his role differently). They Came from Beyond Space is a bit dull, despite this viewer at least willing it to achieve greatness. Of course if you want a cheap British sci-fi film that is actually really rather good you could do worse than have a look at The Earth Dies Screaming. Thumbs up to The Earth Dies Screaming eh? I think on the rare occasions that this has been on the box I've skipped it on account of the 1/5 from the Radio Times, despite the 5/5 title. It's an august publication, and an edition of the Encyclopaedia I have put me on to Singapore Sling despite it having been rejected for certification in the UK, but not without its faults, like 1/5 for the mighty Tourist Trap. Looking the film up I also see that I ought to watch Island of Terror and Night of the Big Heat. I think I saw one or other of them a very long time ago, but not the other, and then for some reason became convinced that they were two different names for the same film. I agree that Island of Terror is the better film. It has Edward Judd playing the romantic lead, and I think he is more effective than Patrick Allen, who does the same in Night of the Big Heat. Both are worth watching, but if it is one or the other, go for Island of Terror. Oh, and if you can, try to see Day the Earth caught Fire, again with Judd as a tenacious reporter discovering the horrifying secret behind why the world's weather has suddenly gone haywire. It's a really good film in that quiet, low-key British way.
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Post by samdawson on Feb 19, 2021 17:06:41 GMT
Seconded on the Day the Earth Caught Fire and Edward Judd too, a rather underrated actor. That film inhabits a class (and maybe a budget too) far removed from the likes of The Terrornauts
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Feb 20, 2021 17:48:00 GMT
The Netflix production of BEHIND HER EYES is well crafted, but slow and often a bit boring. A very faithful adaptation, it adds one very clever, or perhaps inevitable, element that is necessarily not in the novel: {Spoiler}Take careful note of the colors of the "astral bodies."
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Post by bluetomb on Feb 20, 2021 23:06:58 GMT
Shall keep an eye out for The Day the Earth Caught Fire. In the meantimes though
The Body Snatcher (1945) Penniless medical student becomes assistant to brilliant but compromised (he got off lightly in dealing with Burke ands Hare) surgeon and becomes involved with resurrection man, the wheedling Gray (Boris Karloff). Shenanigans ensue, also involving a small role for Bela Lugosi. Karloff is quite brilliant as a very human kind of evildoer, he may take some fiendish glee but really he's just a jealous, manipulative, ultimately pathetic man. Strong turns all round though in what surely must be one of the horror highlights of its decade, short on blatant spooks but long on tension and atmosphere, even packing a certain morally ambivalent charge unusual for its time.
To Freddy (2020) Low key Norwegian weird suspense thriller in which five friends go on a camping trip after graduation, but one has received a message saying that one of them will kill him. I'm not a huge fan of films about fate, a lot of them seem to go for either callow nastiness or a sort of lame crypto-Christian optimism and they also often feel like over-extended Twilight Zone/Outer Limits episodes. This is on the (mildly) nasty side, and doesn't really do anything too innovative or striking, but it's tight (less than 75 minutes long) and well wrought and captures the headspace of young male friendship at a loose end post university quite well.
15 Things You Didn't Know About Bigfoot (2020) Millennial internet news satire in which a clickbait presenter and his producer are packed off to Georgia to meet a man who knows about Bigfoot. Things of course go abit awry. Very much satire rather than horror, and satire whose heart is with its characters and so is content to jab rather than cut. So some will be pretty unimpressed, but I quite enjoyed it. Quite on target even if it isn't too sharp, some solid chuckles and I found the characters reasonably appealing. Fun final act change up too.
I Remember You (2017) Psychiatrist whose son has been missing a year is called to the scene of a suicide and drawn into a missing child mystery from the past. This Icelandic film is a lot like the Asian style of supernatural mystery horror that was all the rage around the earlier portion of this millennium, except snowier. Attractively shot and well played, with some unnerving moments and a dark theme, but I wasn't really feeling it until its slightly loose structure and light approach to explanation comes together in a moving climax with a fairly interesting take on its phenomena.
The Swerve (2018) Tense and ultimately bleak drama of a teacher in bad decline. Skilfully restrained direction and an excellent central turn from one Azura Skye bring out the horribly banal side of mental illness that many film-makers skip or just don't understand at all, this is focused and intimate and not fun, but impressively wrenching. Particular thumbs up for, by my thinking at least, avoiding either exploitation or needless cleverness. Well recommended, but not when you need a pick me up.
And Soon The Darkness (1970) Pamela Frankin trying to find her missing chum in rural France in a mean suspense thriller with a great sense of place, from Avengers men Brian Clemens and Terry Nation (Nation also creator of the Daleks of course), directed by Dr. Phibes man Robert Fuest, with an assistant art director credit for later Oscar winner but more importantly director of great 1982 sci-fi horror oddity The Sender Roger Christian. Mostly ace, an infuriatingly contrived climax sours the overall effect unfortunately but it's still worth a look as an exercise in how do this kind of thing in the right style.
Thunderbird (2020) A fisherman with past trauma and haunted by strange visions searches for his sister, suddenly missing after getting discharged from a mental institution. Some of this is cornily contrived but a lot is a pretty interesting offbeat slow burner that tries to take a mature approach to Native American culture and mythology and has fine cinematography and some great locations to boot. Unfortunately the storytelling collapses in a rushed final block that feels like pieces are simply missing, and just about precision designed to frustrate. It just about makes sense but you have to squint pretty hard and its a real shame for something that had quite a bit of potential.
Goodbye Honey (2020) Tense, minimalist thriller in which a middle aged and not exactly loving things trucker (it was really her husband's business, she's just supporting her daughter now) encounters a girl on the run from a psycho. Taking place almost entirely in or around a truck in a park, this is long on the lousy things men do, but tight direction (including an ace opening long take), great performances from the likeable central pair and a relatively serious and non exploitative approach make it satisfying rather than simply a screed. Some odd shafts of real insight too I think. Well worth a look.
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