The Human Centipede 3: Final Sequence (2015)

No one is taking The Human Centipede movies seriously anymore, are they?  While the first one was somewhat of a pop culture phenomenon, and certainly made its mark on the horror genre, surely everyone gets that Tom Six is making these purely for shock value now.

As we all probably heard, Human Centipede 3 takes place in a Texas prison.  Dieter Laser plays Bill Boss, the sadistic warden.  He attempts a Texan accent for about 5 seconds and then lapses back into his voice from the original movie.  They cover this up later by saying he's German-American. His accountant is Laurence Harvey from HC2, now playing Dwight Butler. Adult film star Bree Olson rounds out the trio as the much-abused secretary, Daisy.

Despite Boss's efforts to strike fear in the prisoners, and be incredibly racist in the process, the prison is incredibly inefficient and hemorrhaging money. After trying other methods such as bone-breaking, boiling waterboarding, and castration, they decide that the best solution to make the prisoners behave is to make them into a giant human centipede.

There's really no end to the disgusting things in this movie -- a rape in the kidneys, the eating of dried clitorises, raping a woman in a coma, eating of shit (outside of the centipede!), and of course, the sight of the prison centipede itself--500 people sweating and shitting in the hot Texas sun.

Human Centipede fans should be thrilled to see the return of Laser and Harvey, and there are also several other recognizable names, such as Eric Roberts, Robert LaSardo, Tommy Lister, and Tom Six himself.  I'll admit that Bill Boss's screaming got a little old about 45 minutes into the movie...and after that, you get an hour more of it.  This movie definitely could have been trimmed significantly. Several of the scenes relied too heavily on Laser, and, of course, his incessant yelling.  But Tom Six is basically just fucking with us, right?  If you go into it with that attitude, you might get a kick out of this, alongside getting totally grossed out, and getting your curiosity fulfilled.

Prisoners (2013)

Is Prisoners a horror movie?  Probably not technically, but this movie seriously freaked me out and therefore I am going to write about it.  So haters, go ahead and hate.

If you are planning on watching Prisoners brace yourself because it is a long-ass movie.  But for me, it is one of those that did not seem to drag, and I feel it used its minutes wisely.  This movie is about two families whose young daughters, Anna and Joy, go missing after a miscommunication during a holiday get together.  Basically, they end up leaving the house alone when they were supposed to walk with older siblings.  Immediately, a mysterious RV and its driver, Alex Jones (Paul Dano) is suspected of the kidnapping.  After much interrogation, Alex reveals nothing, and must be released on lack of evidence.  But upon leaving the police station, he is attacked by Anna's father, Keller (Hugh Jackman).  After implicating himself in quiet statement to Keller, he and Joy's father, Franklin (Terrence Howard) kidnap Alex, with the intention of torturing the information out of him.

Meanwhile, the lead detective on the case, Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) has moved on from Alex to other suspects, including a creeper who buys lots of children's clothes, and runs from the vigil when Loki spots him.  Keller and Franklin continue to torture Alex for information, in some pretty sadistic ways.  There is also Alex's weird aunt, Holly (Melissa Leo) and a priest with a dead body in his basement.  Throw in some bloody children's clothes, a bunch of snakes, a guy who draws mazes all over his house, and a history of missing kids in the area, and you've got a movie with a lot of moving parts.

I don't want to give too much more away, but I really liked how this movie played out.  I sometimes find "plot twists" to be kinda predictable, but I was pretty surprised by the several in Prisoners.  Captivity of any kind always gets to me, so maybe that's why this movie resonated with me so much. Also, I really found it interesting to see the lengths a person would go to in order to protect/save their children, you know, like locking a kid in the bathroom and torturing him for days.  Either way, I would recommend Prisoners if you have a quiet evening ahead to really dig into it.

Hostel (2005)

I've had an Amazon Prime membership for several years now, which I use mostly for the free shipping.  A while back, they introduced the Amazon Prime Streaming Video Library, which, if you already have streaming Netflix, is actually pretty useless.  However, while browsing for some free workout videos, I was fucking delighted to find that they are streaming Hostel, which for some reason, I have never reviewed.

I remember when this movie first came out, in the early days of torture porn, when the sub-genre was all fresh and new and exciting.  Quentin Tarantino and Eli Roth were a lethal combination and Hostel was the movie that everyone was talking about.  Of course, it was notorious that two people had to leave the premiere in ambulance due to being so affected by the torture scenes.

I love to travel, and I adore horror movies about wanderlust gone wrong.  I never did the whole traveling around Europe thing, and I've never stayed in a hostel, but I just love the concept of this movie.  In case you've lived on Mars for the last decade of horror, Hostel is about a couple of Americans (Josh and Paxton) and their Icelandic friend Oli, who are hanging out in Amsterdam when they hear about an area (and corresponding hostel) in Slovakia which is apparently overrun with beautiful women.  Of course, they head there immediately without question.

Upon arrival, they find the hostel is too good to be true.  They are sharing a room with two gorgeous girls, and the place comes equipped with a giant spa filled with topless women.  They party with the girls, and declare the excursion a success.  However, they can't seem to find Oli, and become increasingly worried throughout the day.  But in the end, they decide to go to the disco with the girls anyway, since they are taking off for Barcelona the next day.

But of course, by this time they realize that the hostel is literally too good to be true, and is actually a cover for a crazy operation where rich people can pay to torture and kill people.  As you would guess, to do this to an American is actually the most expensive.  The blood and gore in this flick is cringe-inducing, and holds up well, even well after torture porn wore itself out.

There are lots of feelings you get from watching horror movies, but one of my favorite ones is the "trapped in the open" vibe.  When any of the characters are wandering around looking for their friends (prior to being in the warehouse), it's not like they're locked in a physical tight space, but trapped all the same.

There are several striking/chilling moments in this movie (SPOILERS!): when Paxton speaks German in the warehouse, when the girls are in the pub with no makeup on, when the Achilles tendon gets sliced, hiding in the cart of dead bodies, and the dangling eye OMG THE EYE.  I also distinctly remember cheering in the theater when Natalya, Svetland, and Alex got their due.  In a genre where things get old in an instant, Hostel holds up well as a horror classic.  

The Afflicted (2010)

Hi, Netflix.  Did you say Kane Hodder AND Leslie Easterbrook?!  Count me in.  It's a slow Saturday night for me here in the Big Apple, making slow-cooker baby back ribs, watching some horror movies and catching up on blogging.  The description of this made me think of Frailty, which is a movie that completely terrifies me.  Also, Baby Blues. 

This movie is told from the perspective of one of the daughters in the story.  Maggie (Leslie Easterbrook) is a bit of a crazypants.  She always plays such a good ranting lunatic, a la the ranting scene in The Devil's Rejects.  Her husband is Hank (Kane Hodder) who has had about enough of her nonsense and is on the way out the door.  She's not having that, but he's out of her life one way or the other.  After her husband's sudden departure, and with four kids left to raise on her own, fire-and-brimstone Maggie goes off the deep end.  She becomes an alcoholic, and is obsessed with watching a local televangelist who actually sometimes visits her house.

Under the guise of "the Lord," and the preacher spouting "spare the rod and spoil the child," Maggie gets right to work.  She starts by beating her children with the "board of education," but quickly forces her daughter into prostitution.  Maggie also becomes consumed with her escalating weight, and aging looks, blaming it her younger and more attractive daughters.

Apparently this movie is somewhat based on the story of Theresa Knorr who tortured and murdered her children back in the 80s.  Viewers will also draw parallels to The Girl Next Door and the two main women are quite similar.  For a fairly low-budget movie ($180K), the camera/sound/quality was great, and the acting wasn't half bad either, especially the fantastic crazy performance by Leslie Easterbrook.  The soundtrack was memorable, and that's not something I usually pay attention to when watching a horror movie!  I do agree with other reviewers that you have to suspend reality a bit...as all of the kids are teenagers, it does seems a little unbelievable that they were not able to escape or overpower her at any point.  But that aside, pretty good flick, and worth checking out!

Megan is Missing (2011)

When I saw Megan is Missing in my suggested Netflix instant  queue, I blew it off as some horrible faux-documentary ripoff of Strangeland.  But then I kept hearing about it here and there -- on Facebook, blogs, and the like.  When I finally got myself committed back to actually writing on this blog after a crazy few weeks, I thought this movie would be a good place to start.

Megan is Missing is about two friends named Megan and Amy.  Megan seems like a bit of a turboslut, but we learn that she's had a tough past, including being molested by her stepfather when she was super young.  Her friend Amy is kind of an outsider -- pretty, but plain, shy, and not into the whole party and sex scene like her friend Megan.  Megan meets a totally cute skater guy (Josh) online and makes plans to meet him at a party, they don't connect, yet continue to chat online.  They make plans to meet up again, and Megan and Amy even chat with Josh together.

After heading out to meet up with Josh, Megan disappears.  The news stations jump all over the story, and surveillance footage shows her being led away by a mysterious man.  Meanwhile, Amy holds faith that Megan is okay, even continuing to contact Josh and chronicle her feelings about Megan's disappearance on her video diary.  Three weeks later, while filming, Amy is abducted as well.

The last 22 minutes of the film are the infamous "22 minutes" talked about in the various reviews and blogs.  They are disturbing for sure.  Not Martyrs-level in my opinion, but pretty damn close.  There's not an incredible amount of gore to see, but it's what you don't see that fucks with your brain.  The fact is, this kind of stuff happens every day, and that's the horrifying part of this movie.

At risk of being a curmudgeon, I worry for teenagers these days.  When I was younger, I partied.  I started drinking when I was in my early teens, but nothing like the kind of stuff you see in this movie, and with modern teenagers in general.  It was usually just a bunch of kids with a keg in the woods, huddled around a fire laughing, and stumbling back to our neighborhoods afterwards.  Chat rooms were first coming around when I was 15 or so, and sure, friends and I would goof around chatting with guys, but would never agree to meet up, or go any farther.  We'd wander around our neighborhoods late at night, always in groups, and looking out for each other.

With teenagers now, there's so much that puts their faces and information out on the internet.  Facebook, Instagram, Skype, Twitter,  FourSquare.  With "checking in" and all that nonsense, anyone who is someone's "friend" can see where they physically are at all times.  Like how fucking scary is that?  If some crazypants wants to find you, it would not be that hard.  This internet craziness is happening all the time, and although this movie isn't real, it's a true social commentary.

Megan is Missing is disturbing, but well made and topical and definitely worth a watch.  I kind of want to chain my social network crazy 17 year old cousin to a chair and make her watch it over and over until she never even thinks of talking to a random dude.  Also, Scream Queen needs a drink now.

Stirred by J.A. Konrath and Blake Crouch

Over the summer, I became completely obsessed with J.A. Konrath/Jack Kilborn and Blake Crouch.  I devoured many of their books, and took a break, wondering if I had a mental disorder for loving the blood, torture, and carnage a little too much.  I never got too hooked on the Jack Daniels series; although she was featured in a few of Konrath's stories, I just couldn't ever picture/identify with her.  Kind of like Sookie Stackhouse in Charlaine Harris's books.  But, you know, with decapitations and such.

Stirred called to me, being that I was entirely concerned about the Luther Kite/Andrew Z. Thomas ending in Break You.  The thought of someone being isolated, force fed, mutilated, etc. but still being kept alive, really freaked me the fuck out.  The premise of an ending to all of this was quite promising.

You can definitely read this without having knowledge of the previous Jack Daniels stories, but it's definitely more enjoyable if you've read about Lucy, Donaldson, Kite, and Thomas.  Where Daniels floats from story to story, I find the "killers" more intriguing and unbreakable. 

Stirred picks up 7 years after Thomas was imprisoned, his love Violet, and his son, Max, taken away from him.  Luther Kite is truly planning an awesome revenge against Jack Daniels and others who have wronged him.  Daniels on the other hand is retired and hugely pregnant, essentially engaged to a former fugitive.  She seems uninterested in being a mother, and more focused on her former life of solving crime.  Unfortunately, she needs to be constantly protected by friends and confidantes, for fear that a former killer seeks revenge.

At the same time that Luther concocts his elaborate plan, Lucy and Donaldson are plotting as well.  Shells of human beings, rotting away in a prison hospital, they stockpile drugs and plan their escape.  They, too, seek out Daniels, but also wish to inflict pain on Luther, who burned them terribly after their first escape from a hospital.

What ensues is a mix between Seven and Saw: The Final Chapter, where Daniels must follow clues, and then finds herself in an abandoned city, going through a series of traps set to mimic Dante's Inferno.  Everything is contained in these games, from strangers to friends to lovers to her own baby. 

Although slightly unbelievable at times (a grizzly bear, really?) Stirred was a wonderful collaboration between Konrath and Crouch.   They claim that this is the last Kite/Thomas book, but the ending certainly leaves it open for a sequel.  I've read a fair amount of horror in the last few years, and Konrath/Crouch are the only authors that continue to kill it hardcore.  Rock on, horror brothers.

Shuttle (2008)

Getting home from the airport is a pain.  When you live in Manhattan, there's no one to pick you up from the airport, and you have no car to leave in long-term parking.  You can pay a fortune for a cab, or take the subway or bus, which takes forever.  Lately, I've been thinking of trying one of those Super Shuttles that I see driving around midtown.  Perfect time to watch this movie, right?

Two girls (Mel and Jules) are returning from a vacation in Mexico.  They meet up with a couple of fratty-type guys (Matt and Seth) and they all end up taking a cheap shuttle together.  They also ride with a super-nervous accountant (Andy) who is mostly just a detriment to the situation.

Everything is going fine, with the young'uns flirting hardcore throughout the ride.  However, they soon notice that they are cruising through a crappy neighborhood nowhere near where they live.  The driver seems to have ulterior motives and doesn't seem to intend on taking anyone back to their homes.

He plays both mental and physical games, injuring the "stronger" of the group and manipulating others with threats and rules.  The ladies in this movie are actually pretty smart and not just bumbling topless idiots.  There's a twist midway through, which gets the ball rolling for a variety of other occurrences and subplots.

In the end, this movie was reminiscent of Live Animals and the end really made my skin crawl.  I'm a fairly claustrophobic person and the thought of that happening made me die a little inside.  There were some parts in this movie that were a bit slow-moving, but overall, it was a good flick.  

Victim (2010)

With so many movies on my instant queue, browsing and reading the blurbs is getting ridiculously time-consuming.  I've started just choosing movies at random, with the hopes that someday I'll be able to make even a bit of a dent in the list.  The cover art for Victim looked cool, and I'm pretty overdue for a good torture flick.  Plus, IFC has been putting out some pretty good stuff lately, so I thought this one would be worth a try. 

Victim is about a nameless police officer, who, after a happy hour, is kidnapped by a deranged surgeon and his beefy assistant.  They keep him in a sparse dungeon, while periodically physically and psychologically torturing him.  There seems to be no clear motive, as they don't torture him close to death, or attempt to kill him at all.  The doctor's motive, crazy as it is, is eventually revealed, but I wouldn't want to give away the little bits and pieces of the movie ;)

This movie was short, brutal and seriously creepy.  Through all the pain and torture, it does all come together in the end.  I wondered for a while if the "victim" was faking it, just because the whole thing was so bizarre and it was hard to tell.  This flick was really unlike any movie I've seen -- it's sort of Martyrs meets Hard Candy sort of with Dogtooth.  This movie spooked me, but was also very hard to explain.  I would say it's definitely worth a watch.

Pig (2010)

What should I say about Pig? It was an interesting movie, to say the least.  It's obvious that Adam Mason was trying to make an impression, and at that, he succeeded.

I was really bummed when I missed the online showing of this movie last year.  I was in the midst of grad school and was a little behind on my horror news, and the premiere flew right by me.  My attempts to find a copy were unfounded and after a while, I gave up.  Excited about my new banner (thanks, Scream King!) I went scrolling through some old banners and was reminded of Pig.  I started my search anew, and although I'm not going to say how I procured Pig, I will just say that I found it...somewhere on the internet.

The technical achievement of this movie is that it was filmed in a single shot with no cuts or scene changes.  Obviously this is quite the accomplishment, even though it makes you incredibly dizzy at some points.  There's very little dialogue in this movie, and much of it can be quite repetitive, or the nonstop rambling of a mentally challenged young pregnant woman.

Basically, Pig centers around a man living in a dilapidated trailer, torturing various people while alternately drinking wine and making somewhat sophisticated sauces.  He urinates on his captives, professes his love for his "retard" (his words, not mine), and generally seems to take a lot of showers for someone who remains so dirty throughout the film.  This movie really was an exercise in endurance in some ways.  You sort of want to shut it off because there's no storyline, but you're also interested to see what's going to happen next, if anything.  Like how far is Mr. Mason going to take this?!

I've seen this described as a bit Rob Zombie-ish and I could get on board with that.  It's got the same trailer trash backwoods psycho vibe of House of 1000 Corpses, but without the inherent charm of the Firefly family.  This man acts extremely erratically, and tortures, kills, and humiliates for no apparent reason whatsoever.  At first, you may think him to be mentally challenged as well, but sticking through this to the end will change that notion.  As for the ending, I found it to be brilliant.  Such a quick and effective twist, and if Adam Mason wanted to make some sort of Pig series, I supposed he opened up that can of worms.

I can't say overall how I feel about this movie, except that it had the effect intended.  I thought about Pig often over the course of the day and I imagine it won't leave my mind anytime soon.  It's an experience rather than a movie, and one of those things that kind of have to be seen to be believed.

Dread (2009)

Oh, 8 Movies to Die For....how you tempt me.  You're good, you're bad, you're in between.  Luckily for me, Dread was right on the money.  Based on a short story by Clive Barker (which is not available on Kindle, dammit), Dread is about a group of college students who decide to do their thesis project on people's deepest fears.

The dominant member of the group, Quaid, obviously has deeply seeded problems.  After watching his parents be murdered as a young child, he is obsessed with fear.  The group interviews numerous people to discover their most secret fears, but Quaid is not really impressed with any of them, aside from a young, hearing impaired man.  After an accident as a child, the man lost his hearing for a few years, and then miraculously regained it.  He now constantly fears losing his hearing again. 

Quaid also becomes obsessed with the fears of his fellow project participants.  As it turns out, they've both survived tragic instances in their lives.  Stephen's brother died in a car accident that he was almost a part of.  Cheryl's father repeatedly molested her, and Abby is terribly afraid of being embarrassed by her large birthmarks.

Instead of being a supportive individual like a NORMAL PERSON, Quaid takes it a couple steps further.  He decides to make each of these individuals confront their worst fears, which he thinks will cure them.  The "confronting" with the deaf guy and Stephen were meh at best, but Cheryl and Abby....oh my freakin' god.  I was literally squirming around in my seat. 

This flick is a little slow in the beginning, but the last half hour is awesome.  The end is so crazy and perfect....I loved it.  I might have to step away from my Kindle for a bit in order to get this story in paperback.

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Trapped: A Novel of Terror (2010)

I rarely read a book and think to myself, "they should really make a movie out of this."  Since Hollywood has run out of ideas, they pretty much make a movie out of every book anyway.  But this time is different.  Dear movie producers, pleasepleasepleaseplease make a movie out of Jack's Kilborn's Trapped.  If only I could just see how they make "the pet," my life may very well be complete.

As I mentioned before Jack Kilborn is the horror pen name for J.A. Konrath.  Several of his horror novels were previously unpublished, but the glory of Kindle has made them available for the world.  Trapped was meant to be the sequel to Afraid but even after numerous cuts and edits, the publishers nixed it.  When you download it on Kindle, you get both the original and uncut versions, and the author encourages you to review the book and choose the version you liked better.

I have to be honest, I actually like the cut version better.  Not because of any of the sex and violence that got chopped from it, but the stories just made more sense.  I preferred the army general story to the whole Chinese dude backstory, and Sara being trapped in the box by her sadistic cousin just made more sense than the kidnapping deal. 

Trapped is the story of a couple, on the verge of divorce, who run a sort of halfway house/rehab program for troubled teens.  Unfortunately the center is closing, and a camping trip one of the last times they will have to spend with the kids.  The kids in question are inner-city Detroit fuckups, who have been saved from jail by committing themselves to this program.

Sara and Martin are the couple, and they have brought along their baby, Jack.  Martin knows this island from trips he took with his brother when he was younger, and swears its a good time.  But as soon as they arrive, things start going wrong.  Martin disappears, and when Sara and one of the teens go searching for him, things go horribly wrong.  They discover that the island is inhabited by cannibals, as well as a sick doctor running demented experiments.

I will give it to Kilborn/Konrath, he seriously does his freakin' research for these stories.  The details of the cannibals, torture, surgeries, etc. were amazing and really just sucked you into the story.  I laid awake at night a couple of times, trying to picture the "pet" and Subject 33's torture device.  If loving these stories makes me a sick individual, then get the straightjacket ready, because I can't wait to get to the next one!

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Bitter Feast (2010)

I feel like I've been watching/reading a lot of torture lately.  If I were any other person in their right mind, I'd have to take a break and watch a Jennifer Aniston movie or something.  But you know me, I'm downloading Endurance to my Kindle and trying to get the original I Spit on Your Grave from Best Buy.

Bitter Feast was a cool movie that sort of broke away from the tried and true kidnap and torture plots.  Peter Grey is a self-absorbed pretentious TV chef on the verge of a breakdown.  He is about to lose his organic-themed cooking show, which is pretty much the basis for his career.  He walks into his new restaurant, Feast, to find out he's being fired from there as well.  Why, you say?  Because of a horrible review from snarky food blogger, JT Franks.

So what does a rational celebrity chef do?  Well, of course, kidnap the food blogger and torture him in all kinds of crazy ways.  This guy is seriously a sick individual and has no problem keeping JT locked up in the basement, withholding food, poisoning him, and beating the crap out of him with a hot cast iron pan.  But meanwhile, there are people that care about JT that are looking for him.  Will they get in the way of Peter's sadistic plans?

I liked this flick.  Mario Batali makes a cameo, which is a good time, and both the story and the acting are good.  Although there is definitely torture, it's a little more calculated than the standard stuff, and the motivation for Peter really rings true.  Definitely worth checking out.

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Bloody Reunion (2006)

I lovvveeddd this movie.  Yes, it was a little confusing.  Yes, you could have easily missed the point of what actually happened, but I think any seasoned horror viewer could catch on.  I've seen this movie compared to High Tension, but it actually reminded me very much of Identity.  You know, that one with John Cusack and all the people at the hotel?

Bloody Reunion (aka To Sir, With Love) is the story of an ailing teacher, Mrs. Park, and her beloved students.  Mrs. Park is currently living with one of her former students, Mi-ja, who is caring for her in her failing health.  To cheer her up, Mi-ja arranges a reunion of their former class to stay for the weekend at Mrs. Park's home on the beach.

Mrs. Park is delighted when her former students return, but as it turns out, they are not so pleased with her.  They each harbor a secret resentment for some atrocity committed against them by Mrs. Park when they were students.  They each believe that whatever she did to them made them failures in life, quashing their dreams of becoming atheletes, models, etc.  As each secret is revealed, Mrs. Park's life is endangered.  Meanwhile, someone is picking off the students one by one, as those surviving try to determine who the murderer is.

This movie definitely wasn't perfect, as there were some plot holes and confusing storylines.  For example, there was this whole subplot about a deformed child that never really panned out to anything.  And it was hard to keep track of the characters and their whereabouts at times.  But I really believed that everything came together in the end, and I thought this movie to be a success.  I found myself thinking about it several times after I finished watching.  I definitely recommend.

 

Sutures (2009)

This was a pretty solid movie.  Even though it has a general premise similar to Hostel and the like, it has a fast-moving storyline, some decent gore, and an interesting twist at the end.

Sutures starts out pretty standard with a group of stressed med students headed up to a distant cabin for a little rest and relaxation.  They stop for gas on the way in the middle of nowhere and go along on their way.  Shortly after, a formidable man, Alexander Tatum, also stops by the gas station.  He questions the attendant about the previous visitors, but the man brushes off his questions.  This leads to torture in order for Alexander to figure out where the college students are headed. 

Alexander follows them to their cabin retreat and skulks around the house before stealing some organs and dragging them off to a secret location.  All of the kids are in for a different kind of torture -- from having their organs outright taken, to being test subjects for viruses, and to being guinea pigs for triage practice.  Meanwhile, we learn that all is not what it seems with Alexander Tatum. He has an f'ed up childhood that makes him behave in this manner and is testing the limits by breaking the "rules" of this little organ harvesting ring.

Luckily enough for her, one of the women is able to escape, and spends the entire movie in a hospital room relaying this story to a police officer.  The officer becomes frustrated as she fades in and out of conciousness and becomes more and more vague in her statement of the facts.  And when the officer steps out for a moment...

I thought this movie was pretty solid.  Sure, it was low-budget and the acting could have used some help, but I found it to be a bit of a fresh take on the cookie-cutter torture porn script.  The background of Tatum is definitely a new one, and the twist in the end came as a surprise.  And horror fans know that surprise endings are pretty few and far between these days.

Movie News: "The Loved Ones" looks pretty freakin' awesome

Thank God for those Aussies who come around every once in a while with a kickass horror flick.  The Loved Ones is described as being "Misery meets Carrie" and I'm not one to say no to that type of action.

Although I was warned not to peep the trailer, I did it anyway.  Bad Scream Queen.  Apparently those who saw the actual movie say that the trailer gives away the best parts.  Well, every Judd Apatow trailer does the same damn thing and I still see those movies.

The Loved Ones is the story of awkward school loner, Lola, who asks the handsome Brent to the school dance.  But Brent already has a date, Holly, and turns Lola down.  Well as it turns out, Lola is going to do just about anything to have her date with Brent.  So she kidnaps his ass and holds a torture-filled prom in her kitchen, with her demented father to lend a hand.

This looks pretty awesome and the reviews are appearing positive as well.  No word yet on when this will hit shelves but I'll be keeping an eye out.

Hunger (2009)

Dammit, Blockbuster got me on this damn exclusive Fangoria deal.  I can't even remember the last time I actually rented a movie from an actual brick and mortar store.  That shit is more than $5 now.  No wonder Netflix is making a killing.

Anyway, I digress.  Fangoria is releasing a bunch of movies exclusively to Blockbuster and Hunger is one of them.  I saw the previews for the rest and was meh about most of them, but I really wanted to see this one.

Hunger is the story of five people who wake up in a room, having no idea where they are. They stumble around in the darkness and realize that they have been locked in a dungeon-like space with a bunch of water but zero food.  One of the captives, Jordan, is a doctor and she quickly realizes what's up.  The average human body can only survive 30 days without food.  Conveniently enough, there appears to be a clock in the room that counts exactly 30 days.

At first, the group wonders why they are all in this together, but they soon realize that they all have something rather sinister in common.  At first, they remain a strong alliance against their captor, but as the days pass, they begin to turn on each other.  Their creepy warden watches with glee as they form little mini alliances and plot against each other in order to survive.  Additionally, we find out that there is an ultra disturbing reason that the "scientist" is keeping them locked up in this mess.

I thought this was a good movie.  It kept me interested, and it only veered out of the path of realism a few times, I felt.  The ending was sort of meh, but I don't really see where else they could have gone with it, so I'll take it.  I think this one's definitely worth checking out.  I'm not sure when Netflix will be carrying it, but Blockbuster has a whole section devoted to the Fangoria exclusives. 

Oldboy (2003)

This movie was so awesome.  Although I wouldn't catergorize it as straight "horror," I think it's worth reviewing here.  Those who enjoy horror will love the violence and people who like great movies will love the storyline and the twists.

Oldboy begins with Oh Dae-Su and his friend Joo-Hwan in a police station.  Dae-Su is drunk and disorderly and Joo-Hwan is bailing him out.  Dae-Su leaves the police station to find a public phone and call his young daughter, as it is her birthday.  He passes the phone to Joo-Hwan and seconds later, Dae-Su is gone.

Where has Dae-Su gone?  Oh, only off to be imprisoned for 15. freakin. years.  Throughout this time, he is confined to a small hotel room, being controlled by an unseen person.  15 years later, and poof, he's out.  Standing on the roof of a building, dressed as a businessman, he re-enters society, but his journey has just begun.

He finds himself at a sushi restaurant, being served by a beautiful chef, Mi-Do.  When he passes out, she takes him to her home to recover.  He tells her of his intentions to find who imprisoned him.  But soon he will find out that the stakes are even higher.  He meets his captor, and learns that he has 5 days to find out why he was locked up for all this time.  If he does not discover the reason, Mi-Do will be killed.  If he does, the captor will kill himself.

I can't give up too much more of the story without seriously spoiling it.  But let it be said that this is one of the craziest twists I have ever seen in a movie.  I was literally watching it yelling, "no way.  Seriously, no way."  This is a really exciting and thought-provoking movie.   And although it's not traditional horror per se, it's chock-full of violence and torture, not to mention an awesome storyline.  Check it out.

Ichi the Killer (2001)

I love Takashi Miike.  Loved Audition and Imprint, the episode he did for Masters of Horror.  The guy in all the pictures for this movie actually is not Ichi.  That was really confusing to me when I started watching this movie and I was having a hard time keeping all of the Japanese names straight in my head.

The man in all the pictures is actually Kakihara.  His boss, Anjo, has gone missing and he is in charge of finding him.  In a way, he relishes this, because it allows him to inflict pain and suffering on many individuals in attempts to find Anjo's whereabouts.  But in turn, Kakihara himself enjoys pain to an extreme extent.  In fact, he so enjoyed the pain inflicted on him by Anjo that it motivates him further to find him.

Meanwhile, people are getting killed all over the place by a mystery man named Ichi.  The murder scenes he leaves behind are ridiculously bloody and violent, yet the identity of Ichi remains hidden.  We learn that Ichi is actually a timid and reclusive individual who has been trained to kill using the power of suggestion.

As Kakihara goes through the rival gangs searching for the perpetrator, he finds himself seeking out Ichi.  Obviously, a showdown is bound to ensue, but what will be the outcome?

I wouldn't exactly call Ichi the Killer a horror movie, per se, but it is extreme and ultra violent.  I enjoyed the storyline, although it was a bit slow moving at times.  The torture and death scenes were truly awesome, and there were some methods of murder I have never seen in a horror movie before.  I didn't find this as good as Oldboy but definitely worth checking out.

Movie News: The "Saw" series enters the Guinness Book of World Records

Love it or hate it, the Saw series does not fool around.  It has earned the Guinness Book of World Records title for "Most Successful Horror Movie Sequels."  After 7 movies, and $730 million in worldwide box office revenues, Saw has managed to surpass predecessors such as Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, and Jason Voorhees to claim the top spot.

It was announced earlier this week that this Halloween's installment, Saw 3D, will be the end of the series.  The ultra-gory finale had to be re-edited and submitted to the MPAA six times in order to get an R rating.  There are a record 11 booby traps, and the filmmakers claim that viewers' lingering questions will be answered. 

I stopped watching around the time of they left poor Donnie Walhberg on that ice block because I just couldn't follow the damn plot anymore, but this record is a pretty big achievement.  I'm tempted to watch the whole series again to see if 3D will really answer all my questions.  Might be a project for a rainy weekend.

photo source: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjouN8ki3EQQ7-8jFuO7hV5i_G1kgUgiKXPwV5lgwX844KiDz8uFzVCxMDwZkcz4zMnt4r-QnKZ9ZKWAkKEJmKvqZBvtfTY-gJSZxEPaaUjNyBEbI5W7q28Md8p7hGzL2KNbr5QbLWSekpY/s400/saw.jpg

Live Animals (2008)

I bought this thing from Best Buy called "Horror Collector's Set" for $4.99.  It has four movies on it and this is one of them.  Live Animals is seriously low-budget but I liked this flick.  It was an original concept and exciting enough to keep me watching it for 1.5 hours.

Live Animals is about a group of college kids hanging out at a cabin for the weekend (or longer?  It's not clear)  They throw a party, drink, have fun and sex, and are generally having an awesome time.

However, there's trouble lurking nearby.  A beefy masked kidnapper is all worked up to swipe some co-eds and that he does.  Hours later, they regain their senses to see that they are all locked in horse stalls in a barn.  One of the friends is being tortured in order to set an example for the others to behave.  Torture continues, but we're not sure yet why these people are being kept.

However, we soon learn that this is all part of some white slavery ring being propagated by the creepy Santa Claus looking dude that runs this shit.  Suffering continues, and some attempt escape.  Will they be successful?  That is the question.

The sound and picture kind of sucked in this movie, but I thought it was a pretty solid flick.  Especially for $1.25.  I'll keep posting reviews to the rest of the movies on the disc, and for those of you that are interested, looks like it's still available at Best Buy.