Have you seen Gone Girl yet? If not you really should. It’s trashy, satirical, fun and seems like something Brian DePalma would’ve made after Dressed To Kill. Yes. Fun. You read that right. The movie has a dark heart at its centre, and David Fincher, along with author Gillian Flynn, have brought it beating to life.
But this specifically is to talk about Amy, and her actions in the movie. Suffice to say, I’ll be spoiling the hell out of it.
There’s bad, and then there’s bad. Once upon a time there was a film called The Room. Auteur/melted candle lookalike Tommy Wiseau wrote/directed/produced/acted in a melodrama that was meant to end in a crescendo of tragedy, but instead had audiences howling with laughter.
The fifth time’s the charm for Martin Scorcesse (A Shark’s Tale) and Leonardo DiCaprio (Critters 4) as they reteam for the dramatisation of Jordan Belfort’s cock-manual/memoir The Wolf of Wall Street.
There was a rumour this week that actor Michael B Jordan, best known for Friday Night Lights, Chronicle and The Wire will be starring as Johnny Storm, AKA The Human Torch in a new Fantastic Four reboot. It’s a great idea, until fanboys get involved. You see the problem is that Michael B Jordan is black, whereas Johnny Storm is as white as that thing people do where they roll cheese down a hill and chase after it.
Making movies is a sort of alchemy. Elements are brought together, mixed together and it’s hoped that it turns out alright. Sometimes it works and other times you get The Canyons.
Happy Halloween everyone! Hope you’re in a suitably festive mood. If not then I have just the film for you.
Is it sacrilege to watch Halloween not on Halloween? I’ve been doing it for so many years now that I almost guilty when I don’t. But here we are, all grown up and breaking all the rules.
There was a period in American Horror, from the 70’s onward, that spawned a certain type of film. Ostensibly it was seen as a reaction to the Vietnam War, not a politically motivated action, but a subconscious one. The violence that was shown on television at the time permeated into the violence you would see on screen. With the leaps being made in special effects (What better frame of reference than some news footage on TV) it meant that filmmakers could push the boundaries of what was seen before. Indeed, filmmaking itself was getting cheap and mobile enough that it was easier for a Director with no budget to go out and shoot something.
It’s this perfect storm of influences that led to Wes Craven’s The Last House On The Left.
While the 80’s was the brief reign of the slasher film, the decade also gave rise to the body horror concept. Though it wasn’t a new phenomena (You could argue that something like The Wolf Man is body horror), the special effect advances allowed filmmakers to be more adventurous with what they did.
Hellraiser is one of them.
Ah plans. There’s some saying about plans are the best way to make God laugh. And that’s what happened when I said I was going to view Jason Lives tonight. DVD problems prohibited that and for some reason all the films were taken off Netflix on the 1st October – great timing there.
So instead we’ll take a look at another long running franchise that reduces the slasher formula to it’s most base elements.
Is This Thing On? 