ABCs of Death 2 (2014)

I enjoyed the first "ABCs of Death" anthology quite a bit. Definitely ranks among the best of it's kind I've seen and seemed to cater amply toward more "extreme" horror buffs with certain segments, I thought. Since seeing that, I was pretty stoked for the sequel and I must say - and some will argue - it tops it's predecessor.

Same set-up as the first film - 26 film-makers from around the world are asked to pick a letter of the alphabet and a word beginning with said letter and make a short film based on that word. Each installment is roughly 4-6 minutes in length and contains a prominent DEATH theme...

Some of the more notable shorts were "C is for Capital Punishment" - a guy is wrongfully executed - via sloppy axe beheading - for a crime he didn't commit. "D is for Deloused" - a stop-motion animated bit by Robert Morgan (known for "The Cat with Hands") about a dead guy who is resurrected by bugs to exact revenge on his killers. There's also another cool animated segment from Bill Plympton, which is a more chaotic and morbid take-off on his 1988 short, "How to Kiss". "J is for Jesus" was a decent one about some kind of 'angel' that is sent to protect a homosexual from a mob of God-fearing killer fag-haters and "S is for Split" was a pretty well-shot home invasion bit. One of the best, I thought, was "V is for Vacation" - a POV joint about a killer prostitute. "X" was cool, as it featured Béatrice Dalle, of "Inside" fame and THE best, hands down, was "Z" which was a brilliant fucking idea.

There's a few other good ones and some flat-out shitty ones - like, "F is for Falling" and Larry Fessenden's "N" segment - both were self-indulgent with very weak payoffs. Overall, I like these "ABCs" flicks and I hope they do more. They're basically just entertaining "samplings" of a wide range of film-makers and 'styles' with a hefty amount of gore, usually, so I can't see being too picky about it as a whole. Each segment is short so the discouraging looking 2-hour runtime actually goes by pretty fast, so I give "ABCs 2" a hearty rec. I know it's not everyone's "thing", but for the good bits it contains it's well worth a watch.