CHUD

A recent article in a new york newspaper reported that there were large colonies of people living under the city...
The paper was incorrect. What is living under the city is not human.
CHUD is under the city.

CHUDs are actually mutated bums living in the subway who look similar to but not as scary as the boys with glowing eyes in the music video for total eclipse of the heart.

This is slow and bumpy but has way better writing than many of today's films. All the character interaction feels real and actually like grown adults talking to each other for a change but as for the look of the film it's a bit shit and the rough creature effects are a lot shit.

NO - they blew the budget on the chud stretchy neck effect.

Lake Mungo

Set in Ararat, Australia this film uses interviews and news footage to tell the story of a drowned daughter and the families' subsequent haunting.

At first this film may seem cliched but it looks amazing for a no budget first feature, the acting is solid especially from the actor who plays the father and it starts to take unexpected turns.

There's no jump scares and the director knows that a lingering shot of a teenage girls bedroom in the dark is way more sinister than someone jumping out from behind a door with a loud bang!


YES - be patient and this slowly but surely draws you into an unsettling mystery.

The Tin Drum

I have been avoiding watching this for years and I'm not really sure why, it's a masterful film.

Set in Poland during Hitlers rise, Oskar in protest against his family, society and the world at large decides never to grow up and whenever any situation disagrees with him bangs a tin drum defiantly or emits a loud glass shattering scream.

A symbolic film if ever there was one, you can dig in if that's your thing but I let it wash over me for the most part just enjoying the amazing cinematography and the many beautiful and unsettling images such as Oskar's mother force feeding herself fish or Oskar licking lime fizzing powder off his young crushes belly button before going down on her.

There's only very oblique allusions to what was actually happening to the Jewish people in the camps but the rising dread culminates in the defense of the Polish post office, the first battle of the invasion of Poland.

The actor who plays Oskar is incredible. He was only 11 when he played this part and kicks the ass of Anna Paquin also 11 who won an oscar for her performance in The Piano. Be warned, his character is extremely difficult to like however that's part of the dark magic of this film.

YES - One human voice is a powerful weapon whether it be in defiance or leading a nation towards a heinous action.

Daybreakers

It's a vampires world and they get to smoke as much as they want to but still have to catch the train to work the nightly grind.

Humans are farmed and hunted for blood but it's getting scarce and without blood vampires are regressing to batmen forms and attacking their own kind. Ethan is looking for a synthetic blood substitute when he comes across a band of humans on the run.

I was hoping this would be more like Constantine in style and it certainly has a strong visual look but the writing and editing is terrible. I found myself wondering if I'd left my park lights on and left the theatre to check as I wasn't too concerned about missing anything.

Directed by Australian twins Michael and Peter Spierig, this features many Australian/NZ actors all of which are unfortunately terrible but so too is Willem Dafoe who cheeses out on his one liners, strangely enough Ethan Hawke comes out of this the best actor.

The film gets worse and worse as it progresses and ends with an out of no where to shoot the bad guy saving the day scene and a slow motion blood orgy with military dudes which looks extremely silly and a bit gross.

NO - Like Near Dark this also features a convenient cure for vampirism but Near Dark is fuckin awesome and this movie is not.

Shoot 'Em Up

Who actually owns the Nirvana song rights? why are they being used in such random places like this shit film and in the tv show Coldcase?

This film is for all the people who think Quentin Tarantino's films are ridiculous, just compare them to this and you can see Tarantinos skill and restraint (!)

Everything about this is overkilled. If you're going for a bombastic bullet ballet à la John Woo you need to use a ramp ratio of 2:3. Writing/Action/Soundtrack ok knock writing and action out the box ace but not all fuckin 3 otherwise the result is unwatchable.


NO - This film really wants to be your friend but is just trying way too hard.

The Road

A man and boy walk through a world that is dying after some unexplained event.

There are no animals, no power and it's fucking freezing. Many people have turned to violence and cannibalism to survive however the boy who was born after this event is being taught by his moralistic father to "hold onto the fire", their humanity, no matter how desperate their situation becomes.

This looks amazing. The world is made up of composite shots of real flood and fire footage. Every scene is haunting with the only strong colour being used in flashback.

Viggo does some of his best work as the solo father - desperate, devoted and selfless. The boy seems ethereal not of this world and he isn't really, born after the disaster knowing nothing of what was, he is looked upon in awe by others and the man refers to him as a god meaning that the boy is the only reason he hasn't perhaps killed people or done something much worse.

Every encounter with other people in this film is filled with fear or suspicion it seems so bleak but aren't we living like this now? we don't fear being eaten but what about being stabbed while doing your job driving a taxi, being raped while walking home across the park or simply being lied to and ripped off? 

Ultimately this is about humanity and loved ones. These people being the reason to keep your humanity not because you fear being punished by a supernatural being but because of love.

YES - hell is other people, sometimes.

Body Bags

Directed and scored by John Carpenter this is a relatively late entry into the pantheons of the portmanteau horror film.

John plays the mandatory ghoulish shit one liner host and the 3 stories that he introduces are all pretty cheesy.

The first tale is of a petrol station attendant who is pursued by a madman, the second a more creative story of vanity and brain sucking hair snakes and last is Tobe Hoopers story of possession by eye transfusion. This last story features a crazed Mark Hamill humping and strangling his wife at the same time.

It's all very 90s and what Debbie Harry and Twiggy are doing in this is completely beyond me.

YES - but only to see Mark Hamill looking like a possessed Ned Flanders.

Whole a Documentary

Whole is a documentary about a group of men from different countries who all want to/have become amputees by choice.

They all grew up imagining being amputees and pretending to be one by using a peg leg, crutches or as one man still does bind his leg and wear baggy trousers when he goes out.

This is now officially recognised as Body Integrity Identity Disorder, a neurological disorder that leaves the sufferer feeling that part of their body is not their own and that unless it's removed they will not feel complete.

This is shot in such a straight forward uninteresting way that the subject matter becomes less outlandish. There are no explanations offered, why mostly men and just legs for instance, just each person's story which are all very similar. The most interesting being the two men who actually destroy their own legs.

The disturbing part is not being allowed to have their legs removed and being driven to drill, shoot or freeze them off themselves. It seems strange that cosmetic surgery or a sex change is acceptable in the medical world but removing a healthy limb at the request of the sufferer who obviously has issues and has done so since they were very young is not.


YES - if you can imagine it then it's happening in the world right now.  

Stingray Sam

Stingray Sam is an excon working as a lounge singer when he's visited by an old jail buddy. If they find a missing child, their records will be cleared and they can live as free men.

This is director and star, Corey McAbees' (he plays stingray and also a sweet ukulele) second film after the black and white musical space western that was The American Astronaut. This is also a black and white musical space western which was made as a serial in 6 parts to purchase and view on phones or music players. It's being shown at some festivals/theatres in one piece but very limited.

A bit hitchhikers guide and a bit flight of the conchords it's a unique piece of film made with love.

Someone give this man some more money please so he can make another black and white musical space western (or a black and white musical werewolf horror which is actually on the cards)




In the future rich men can become pregnant to father sons, but which father does the boy get named after...

YES - inspired.

Synecdoche, New York

It means when something is referred to indirectly by naming a small part or alternatively a whole part. Confused? you will be.

Hypochondriac playwright Caden receives a grant to create his masterpiece. This play drags on for years and becomes more elaborate and pointless and he recreates New York inside a giant warehouse, casts doppelgangers to play versions of himself and watches as they live more fulfilling relationships than he does.

Ultimately the play seems like it will never be completed and Caden remains alone and unable to accept any part of his life, the good or bad parts. All too late his life is over without ever having lived it or realising that the shitty, sad and difficult parts aren't failures but actually make up part of the living.

Starts off really interesting. Catherine Keaner is fantastic as always and Phillip Seymour Hoffman perfect as the morose Caden (but how did he end up with a woman like Adele?) however some way into this very long seeming 2 hours, maybe when Caden becomes his ex wife's cleaning lady or when he casts Ellen Barkin to play himself, the film just becomes a collection of short peculiar scenes, somehow detached from the whole of what should be a moving piece of film.

NO - starts off tight but soon unwinds into a mess.