charliemanson999's Reviews

[Rec]² (2009)

3/10

3 March 2010

Warning: Spoilers

First of all I really enjoyed the first REC film. It had an original, realistic and creepy feel to it. The characters were well built and developed, funny at times, and interesting story lines were built around the main frame of the film. The sequence of events was intriguing from the very start, as to see the gradual escalation of events in a zombie film was untouched ground, as "zombie"-esque movies tend to start straight in with survivors trying to stay alive in a fully-fledged infection. Everything was well done, the ending particularly ambiguous and creepy, and I found the unfinished story lines, the unnerving "is this actually religious or just crazy experimentation gone wrong?" ending, the way everything built on a gradual crescendo to the nail-biting finale kept me thinking about the film for days.

REC2 takes away all of the impact of the first film. They feel the need to explain. everything. There is no nail-biting crescendo which puts you firmly in the shoes of the actual victims, there is no development of characters or interesting sub-story lines. There is just one bad bad movie spin-off from the game Doom.

The dull predictable attack-scenes, which seemed to follow exactly the same formula (some shadowy figures appears, charges the camera) each time, the slightly ridiculous decision to go down the purely "exorcist"-esque route, the lack of a more-detailed plot just kills everything that could and should have been good about this film.

The ending "shock" is horrifically predictable (yeah it's really believable that the former lead just got away from the infected girl who so easily dragged her into darkness at the end of REC), and with the ending meaning the "demon" successfully got out of the building it's difficult to see what direction the film can go in without it being completely different from the first two. Presumably something to do with the two kids who appeared to survive having been locked in the room by SWAT.

A sorry excuse for what could have been an excellent franchise. DO NOT WATCH.

50 out of 100 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Dangerous Minds (1995)

1/10

Utterly Dreadful, Do not even think about seeing

24 October 2009

Cheesy Cringe-worthy Punch-in-the-face-worthy soppy acting from Michelle Pfeiffer Stereotypes blown totally out of proportion Poor camera work Diabolical musical overlay Badly scripted Rushed feel No real closure

I cannot criticise this movie enough. While I was expecting a typically dark gangster/student-type movie, addressing the inner-city problems of troubled kids in poverty-stricken areas, and the interesting, inspiring attempts of an admirable teacher to get to the bottom of their various dysfunctions, what I instead got was something so cheesy it would have been better suited to Broadway, if they threw in some hastily written musical numbers.

For something (slightly) more realistic, see Coach Carter, but please, please, don't waste the 1 hr 30 mins I did on Dangerous Minds, the mis-titled waste of film roll that it is.

14 out of 27 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Passengers (2008)

3/10

Watchable but Dull

15 May 2009

As a big horror fan, I read the cinema description with interest. "Passengers dying in plane crash, disappear one by one, twist at the end..." sounds good. Ultimately though, this film disappoints. It is not a horror, but a drama, and a very gentle one at that. The film seems to plod along at a half pace the whole way through, much like the first 10 minutes after the initial shock of a proper horror movie would go, and I found myself wondering throughout when the big finale was going to happen. Indeed, praying it wouldn't be the obvious "we're all dead" thing.

Sadly, the ending disappointed me particularly, as I saw it as the one potential saving grace for the film; to bring in an original, exciting finale. Nothing comes, though the flashback to the scene with the plane crash itself was at least a little moving; the only nicely done part of the film.

In conclusion, it is watchable, but only for the overly sentimental, over-70s age group, immune to soppy poorly-acted romances. Poor overall.

7 out of 12 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Mirrors (I) (2008)

7/10

Not bad

3 May 2009

"In New York, the former NYPD detective Ben Carson is hired to work as night watch of the remains of the Mayflower Department Store that was partially destroyed by fire many years ago. Ben became alcoholic and was retired from the police force after killing a man in a shooting. His marriage was also destroyed and now he is living in the apartment of his younger sister Angie. However he has not been drinking for three months and sees the employment as a chance to rebuild his life. When he goes to the rounds in his first night, he finds that the mirrors are impeccably clean and his colleague explains that the former night watch was obsessed by the mirrors. After a couple of nights, Ben sees weird images in the mirrors, but due to the lack of credibility of his past, his ex-wife Amy believes he has hallucinations as a side effect of his medication. When Angie is found brutally murdered in her bathtub, Ben discovers that there is an evil force in the mirror that is chasing him and jeopardizing his family."

Interesting. Better than most horror movies around nowadays. Suspenseful and with the majority of the film a good plot; though the descent into the finale of "Kieth Sutherland running through flames and a collapsing building fighting a scary monster" was a bit disappointing with regards to originality. The ending also disappoints, as despite being very predictable, also opens up a whole load of loopholes in the story itself.

Still, whilst not scary, definitely a little creepy and definitely worth a watch.

0 out of 0 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Halloween (2007)

1/10

Useless

28 April 2009

So I've never even seen the original Halloween film. When I rate this movie, I speak as a new-age horror film fan; I liked House of Wax, I liked the Halloween HD, I even liked the Redsident Evil trio.

I am not comparing this Rob Zombie movie to John Carpenter, and I don't think I've even seen any 70/80s or John Carpenter films in my life.

So the fact people may argue in defence to most critics of this film that people will always turn their nose up to remakes of classics, that the directors are always fighting a losing battle to die-hard fans and no matter how good the film they produce is, people will criticise, will not work for me.

And I say that Rob Zombie's remake of Halloween, STINKS.

The god-awful acting of the victims, the god-awful scripting, the way the whole thing just is.not.scary all contribute to an utter abomination of modern-day film-making. There is no suspense, no real plot, the film itself just isn't clever or original even to the most imaginative person in any way possible. Indeed, I found myself idling off to do other things, leaving the film to run itself through, just to distract myself from the sheer boredom.

In conclusion, 0/10, avoid at all costs.

1 out of 3 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

charliemanson999

Reviews

Tell Your Friends

Recently Viewed