Three Films Make A Post: Half-man half-beastbird... swooping on his human prey... drinking blood... mutilating flesh!

Blackaria (2010): This is the other low budget homage to Italian horror cinema and the giallo by French directors Francois Gaillard and Christophe Robin, but where Last Caress was mining the totality of the giallo and Lucio Fulci-style horror, this one is a love letter to Dario Argento from Deep Red to Phenomena. Unlike Last Caress, this one also has an actual plot, but given the roughness of the script, the - how shall I say? - problematic intelligence of said plot, not to speak of what I can only read as its rampant misogyny, that's not necessarily a good thing. Again, you'll also need a high tolerance for amateurish acting and a non-professional feel, but just might be compensated for your patience by the film's cheap yet loving art direction, the excellent editing and a lot of style. This is clearly again a film made by fans of Italian horror for other fans of it exclusively, so you'll probably already know if Blackaria is for you or not.

Gun Crazy: Episode 2 - Beyond the Law (2002): Atsushi Muroga is one of the better directors of Japanese 90s/00s direct to video action fodder, and while this concoction about a cute, idealistic female lawyer (Rei Kikukawa) finding herself trying out the at first rather more simple seeming law of the gun isn't exactly a hidden gem, it's among the more watchable films from this part of the Japanese movie industry. The problem with these films is often that they're produced so cheaply they can't actually afford all that much action - which is a bit of a problem in supposed action films - and have to replace it with weirdness (if you're lucky), melodrama, and empty warehouses. Muroga generally knows how to handle these things with a certain degree of style, and here avoids the genre's all too typical boredom by judicious application of slow motion, entertaining pseudo-philosophy, and choice moments of leather and guns porn. It's not great filmmaking, but it's entertaining enough.

Cosmopolis (2012): Not to sound like one of those people who hate any movie with intellectual ambition, but nearly two hours of expressionless puppets declaiming stiff (I'd bet taken one to one from DeLillo's novel) dialogue that confuses depth and obtuseness are nothing to endear a movie to me, particularly when nothing the film has to say is all that complicated or deep. In fact, I can't help but suspect this is a case of a film hiding its lack of intellectual rigour behind gestures to suggest DEEP ART. My disillusionment with Cronenberg continues apace. At least the soundtrack is pretty great.

Technorati-Markierungen: french movies,japanese movies,canadian movies,horror,action,girls with guns,sf,atsushi muroga,francois gaillard. christophe robin,rei kikukawa,david cronenberg,in short. italian movies

Three Films Make A Post: For the sake of your sanity, pray it isn't true!

Final Exam (1981): The slasher elements of this campus slasher are as generic as possible, with little gore to distract one from the film's many technical flaws, one of the most teleport-y killers in any movie of the genre and a handful of truly ill advised attempts at copying Halloween directly, which isn't something you should try unless you're a really great director.

However, despite not being much of a horror movie, Jimmy Huston's local (North Carolina, to be precise) film won me over with its other charms. The weird rituals of fraternity culture, some Southern stereotyping done with great pleasure, and many a smile-inducing off-beat idea add up to the sort of homemade appeal regional slashers sometimes have. One could call it "heart". This is how a particular group of people dramatized the life and times and people they knew through the filter of a cheap horror movie, sharing it with a willing audience. That sort of personality is worth ninety minutes of one's time, even though the resulting film sucks as a horror movie.

The Island at the Top of the World (1974): Leave it to mid-70s Disney to make a movie about airship travel through the arctic, lost Vikings and other great elements of the extraordinary voyage school of adventure cinema, and have the results become nearly impossible to enjoy. It's all a matter of having all your characters being infuriating racist stereotypes or jerks the film doesn't want to realize are jerks, ruining every chance for audience immersion through tedious and unfunny humour, and incredibly bland acting throughout the non-humorous moments. Congratulations, you just ruined a sure thing.

Last Caress (2010): This is one of two loving homages by French filmmakers Francois Gaillard and Christophe Robin to the giallo and Italian supernatural horror. The film suffers a bit from cases of amateurishness in the acting department and its narrative structure, but makes up for that by so vigorously and lovingly copying the surface charm of Italian genre cinema (the colours! boots! nudity! the improbable gore! the iconic non-characters! the strange poignancy! the score!) on a budget it's impossible for me not to adore it a little. It's also truly impressive how well this is edited and how good it looks even though it's absolutely clear this was made by enthusiasts and not professionals on an enthusiast budget.

Technorati-Markierungen: american movies,french movies,in short,horror,adventure,fantasy,giallo,jimmy huston,francois gaillard,christophe robin