Thursday, March 29, 2012

The Pack


This 2010 French may not be a horror classic in the making, but it is worth your time to watch. It is a fresh and some times humorous take on some very old monster tales of the Golems. While these creatures have found homes in literature for centuries, they very seldom make it into films. A shame really.

Emilie Dequenne
Emilie Dequenne does a wonderful job as the tough and loveable Charlotte, who finds herself alone, caged, and the future meal of a pack of Golems. Don’t count this girl out; she’s a fighter, and fight she does. Sorry, no spoilers for this movie, you have to watch it.

The gore is kept brief, and the pace can be a bit slow at times, but over all I give “The Pack” a solid 3 ½ stars.

Sunday, March 25, 2012

Resurrection County


Low budget film? Yes. Old, overused story-line? Yes again. Bad movie? Definitely not.

It’s the age old horror film concept, two couples go into the woods, wrong some local nut cases, and the body count starts to rise. I am a huge fan of old school horror, and Resurrection County fits that image, brought into this century. The film is shot well, moody and creepy, just as it should be. Matt Zettell does a wonderful job directing, and the cast is full of talent. Dayton Knoll (Sam), Cassie Self (Katherine), Adam Hass (Tommy), Kathryn Michelle (Lucy), all do a great and believable job as the tourist with no sense. I mean come on. When the last town you drove through looked like something out of deliverance with a naked man in his front yard with only a machine-gun covering his junk, you should pay attention to the signs telling you to stay out. But of course Sam and Tommy don’t, and cruise on through with their ATVs, leaving Katherine and Lucy back at the camp site.

Lost they pull up to Stag’s (Rus Blackwell) home. All hell breaks loose, Stag’s brother is killed, and the hunt begins. Rounding out the Bible thumbing nut bags are Robert Miano (The Parson), and Jason Davis (Cody).

What I like best about this film is that it leaves a lot to the viewer’s imagination, not depending on the gore or nudity to sell the movie. There is torture, there is rape, there is mutilation, but none of it is viewed directly, leaving us to fill in the blanks, and that makes for a good movie. Would I say that Resurrection County is a must see movie? Probably not, but I would advise every classic horror fan to rent it, it is well worth the rental fee, or even the DVD price of purchase.

Over all I give Resurrection County 4 stars out of five.

Saturday, March 24, 2012

The Walking Dead Season 2 Finale

RIP Sophia
Before I get started on the season finale, first let us take a moment to remember those beloved group members that we have lost this season. The not so shocking, but heart-breaking end to Sophia. I wasn’t surprised that she had been turned, but to find out she had been on the farm the entire time… That through me for a loop. What was worse yet was watching Rick put her down in front of her tortured mother. You could feel the torrent of emotion as he took aim and finally pulled the trigger. Next we lost Dale. Good old Dale with his heart of gold and silver tongue. Who out there could not help but love him, he was everybody’s grandfather. The way he went out was horrific at least, torn open by a walker (a walker I might add that should have already been put down. Bad Carl!), left laying on the ground like the half eaten cow. I have to hand it to Daryl for stepping in and putting grandpa Dale out of his misery, not leaving it up to Rick again. Lastly we say our final goodbye to Shane. He may have been egotistical, a little damaged, and a hot head, but he was a good shot. I can’t say I am going to miss him, I guess you could say I’m on Team Rick all the way, but the show is going to be lacking that certain something without him around
.
RIP Dale
RIP Shane
Of course the finale takes up shortly after Carl puts zombie Shane down. He and Rick are starting to walk back to the house, Carl asking the tough question “What happen to Shane?”, and Rick stumbling around it. Rick of course is let off the hook (For awhile) when he notices that they are not alone in the field, not even close. Behind them is a heard of walkers, and I’m not talking a small heard like on the highway earlier in the season when Sofia ran off, I’m talking a true heard, hundreds of them, and they looked pretty hungry from their long trek.

The next thing you know walkers are everywhere. With no way to reach the house Rick and Carl take cover in the barn. By this time everyone has seen them coming, the walkers not Rick and Carl. Herschel decides to take a stand, stating: “This is my farm, and I will die here.” Following his lead, Daryl answers with: “You sure?”, he hops the porch rail and finishes off with: “It’s as good a day as any.” A perfect line for him. By this time Lori realizes that Carl is not in the house, and goes into a panic. The rest of the group arm-up and the battle for the farm begins. The first casualty is Jimmy. After the barn starts to burn (a fire set by Rick and Carl), Daryl instructs Jimmy to circle around the barn, that the fire might have been set by Rick or Shane. Smart man that Daryl. Of course Jimmy finds Rick and Carl on the roof, parks the RV so they can jump on top it, but is over run inside before they even get a chance to climb down, forcing Rick and Carl to run for the woods.

It does not take long to realize the farm is lost, and escape is the only choice. And why would it? I had not seen that many zombies on the show since Rick rode the horse into the city in season one. Lori leads Beth and Patricia from the house towards the cars with the help of Carol. Unfortunately they ran too late. Walkers were all around them and Patricia is taken right out of poor little Beth’s hand. Carol becomes separated from them about this time, and Andrea and T-Dog pull up in the truck. Andrea saves Carol after being pointed in the right direction by Lori, but a walkers gets a little too close, falling on top of her after it’s brains are blew out at point blank range. Think Andrea is gone, and Carol is no where to be seen, T-Dog takes off, with Lori and Beth in tow. Glenn and Maggie also decide that it is useless to continue the fight. They try to follow the others, but there are blocked by the heard. So they quickly turn around and drive off the farm the only way they could. Meanwhile Herschel is making his final stand, blasting walker after walker with his shotgun. Just when it looks like Herschel is to be zombie chow, Rick splatters it’s brains on the back of Herschel’s head. Rick pulled a reluctant Herschel to the last truck for their escape, once again Andrea is too late and goes unseen, and left behind. Daryl hears a scream for help and races his brother’s hog back toward the barn where he picks up Carol.

The group is scattered to the four winds, but eventually they all meet up on the highway where they had first broken down and lost Sophia. All that is except Andrea who was running for her life in the woods, and is saved by a hooded woman that is leading around two armless walkers on chains, like a pair of neutered pitbulls.

Rick tells Lori what happen in the field, she turns on him, he also tells the group that they are all infected, and that he was told this fact back at the CDC. He continues to let them know that from that point on there is no more democracy.

I personally can not wait until fall, to see where things go from here.

New Doctor Who Companion Announced

Who is going to be the next sidekick for the Doctor? Well it is going to be none other than the sultry Jenna-Louise Coleman. Things are definitely going to be heating up in the T.A.R.D.I.S this year. Jenna is twenty-five years old and hails from Blackpool. She made her big screen debut in the 2011 film Captain America: The First Avenger, and soon to star as Annie Desmond in ITV1's Titanic. Jenna beat out hundreds of hopefuls to become the Doctor's new companion according to Steven Moffet.

"I'm beyond excited, I can't wait to get cracking; working alongside Matt I know is going to be enormous fun and a huge adventure." Jenna said.

The Doctor will meet his new friend in a dramatic turn of events as the show builds its way toward its enormous, climatic 50th anniversary year. Series 7 is currently filming, and will consist of 14 big, blockbuster-movie type of episodes. Each one being a brand new epic adventure in itself and featuring new monsters and some familiar foes as you have never seen them before.

"It's not often the Doctor meets someone who can talk even faster than he does, but it's about to happen. Jenna is going to lead him his merriest dance yet. And that's all you're getting for now." Moffet stated today.

Footloose (2011)

I know… this is not my normal movie review. But there are exceptions to every rule. Isn’t that what this movie is all about. And since I am of the male persuasion I’m sure you are expecting a bad review. Well that is not completely true. 2011 was most definitely the year of remakes, what with films like “The Thing”, “Rise of the Planet of the Apes”, “Star Trek”, and that is just to name a few. Now, what else do these films have in common with the remake of “Footloose”? Nothing, that’s what. These three films did what a remake is suppose to do, improve on the original. Why else remake them, right? Now don’t get me wrong here. “Footloose (2011)” as a stand alone film is worth your time to watch. The story is a timeless one, and the film is entertaining.

 However… it is lacking in comparison to the original film. What do I mean by lacking? Well where do I start? Oh, I know… Lets start with talent; specifically the main character, Ren McCormack, originally portrayed by Kevin Beacon. The new version has Kenny Wormald as Ren. Now Kenny does have some good moves, and is a decent actor. But… when it came to the two critical scenes of the film, the aggression dance in the warehouse and the stand off with the town council, where he had to be on top of his game, Kenny, cut the cheese instead of the mustard. His performance was weak at best, and unbelievable. There was no emotion in his eyes or body language, and the words came out of his mouth as dry as the Sahara. The next down-fall in the cast was, Ziah Colon as Rusty, originally played by Sarah Jessica Parker. Her performance as Ariel’s best friend was dry and lifeless. Now on a positive side, Julianne Hough did no harm in her role as Ariel Moore, the rebellious preacher’s daughter, nor did she bring anything extra special to the role either. Hough’s performance was good and solid, just not spectacular.

Julianne Hough ( Ariel Moore)
Now lets take a look at a couple actors that did bring something to the film. First I’ll go with Dennis Quaid taking on John Lithgow’s role of Rev. Shaw Moore. Although the part was changed very little, Quaid made the role his own and refining the character just enough to upgrade the Rev. to Rev 2.0, but then again… it is Dennis Quaid after all. Now on to everyone’s favorite farm-boy Willard, now played by Miles Teller. As for Teller’s acting ability, I would have to say he did his mentor, Christopher Penn, justice. But, he did out perform Penn by a mile in the dance category.

There was two main changes that altered the tone of the film. One of them being that Ren’s mother had died from Leukemia, the reason that he moves to town, although it is now from Boston instead of Chicago (why I have no idea). This gave Ren even more reason to be angry and strong willed, since he was the only one that to care of her until her death. The second is the character change of Ren’s uncle, Wes Warnicker, played by Ray McKinnon. No longer is he the bible-thumping, overly trained puppy following Rev. Moore’s every step as if he were God himself. Uncle Wes is now Ren’s greatest ally, ready to stand and defend his nephew against anyone in town. This to me was a great switch to the film. Another change I liked was the replacement of the game of tractor chicken with a bus race on a figure eight dirt track, it was twice the thrills and ends with a bang.

So over all, as a remake I give “Footloose (2011)” 2 stars… However as a stand alone film I can bump it up to 3 ½ stars. This is a good film for the new generation and those that have not seen the original, but don’t let them revel in this film alone. After they have watched it, pull out the original and have them watch it next. Lets see what they think shall we.

The Beautiful Ladies of Television's Darker Side

 These are the gorgeous women that bring light into the darkness every week. I am keeping this to shows that are at least into their second season. So have a look and vote for your favorite in the comments section. Let the best girl win.

Shows included are: The Vampire Diaries(TVD), The Walking Dead(TWD), Haven(H), Being Human (US, UK), and Lost Girl(LG).

Sarah Wayne Callies (Lori)(TWD)

Nina Dobrev (Elena/Katherine)(TVD)












Zoie Plamer (Lauren)(LG)
Meaghan Rath (Sally)(US)
Laurie Holden (Andrea)(TWD)
Lenora Crichlow (Annie)(UK)
Lauren Cohan (Maggie)(TWD)
Ksenia Solo (Kenzi)(LG)
Kristen Hager (Nora)(US)
Katerina Graham (Bonnie)(TVD)
Emily Kinney (Beth)(TWD)
Emily Rose (Audrey)(H)
Dichen Lachman (Suren)(US)
Claire Holt (Rebekah)(TVD)
Anna Silk (Bo)(LG)
Candice Accola (Caroline)(TVD)