Tuesday, December 13, 2011

A Trip to the Moon (1902, George Melies)

"A Trip to the Moon" is a 1902 french film ("Le Voyage dans la Lune") that is credited as cinema's introduction to science fiction. Film magician and innovator, George Melies, definitely put together one hell of an odd 14 minute film...

A crowd of people, all dressed like wizards, are dancing around while a guy scribbles some kind of simplistic blueprint on a blackboard. This wide shot continues for far too long before it cuts to them constructing a large capsule. Once it's complete, some dudes get inside, it's loaded into a giant, cylindrical chamber - much like that of a gun - and fired at the moon. This is, of course, where the iconic moon-face gets shot in the eye. The guys jump out of the bullet and dance around while breathing sweet, sweet moon-air. After a few seconds, they have blankets and are off to sleep while some images appear above them - such as people's heads in stars and planets n' shit. It starts snowing (moon snow, I presume) and the party retreats to an underground moon-cave full of giant mushrooms. One of the mushrooms grows and they stand back, flailing their arms at it (silent film miming). A scrawny acrobat in some kind of mask appears and crawls around before one of the guys smacks it with his umbrella and it combusts into a puff of smoke. Another jumps out. Same outcome. Then a whole herd of moon-monkeys burst on screen and capture the space travelers, leading them down to their moon-emperor. They make a swift getaway (again with exploding moon-monkeys) and retreat back to the ship...

This film was certainly full of new concepts for the mesmerized public of the early 1900s. Transitional dissolves, animation, and nicely blended painted set designs. Other than the technical aspects, "A Trip to the Moon" is fun to watch due how goddamn strange it is. Quite a proverbial acid trip. Of course, film historian types will get a boner from the significance of it's influence on the evolution of cinema.

Friday, December 2, 2011

Thursday, November 24, 2011

Rocktober Blood (1984, Beverly Sebastian)

As a fairly obscure 80s slasher, I found "Rocktober Blood" to be better than I anticipated. That's not to say it's not stupid, cookie-cutter and a bit boring at times, but the slasher sub-genre is the one offshoot of horror that I am relatively undemanding towards.

A stuck up asshole rock n' roll vocalist snaps and kills some folks, resulting in him being executed for his crimes. Cut to two years later (by the way, the details this film glosses over are immense!), his fellow female singer - who just barely escaped his rampage - is invovled in the awaited tour of his former band Rocktober Blood and finds herself being terrorized by the supposidly dead front man who is still as murderous as before...

There's a few decent kill scenes. Many of which are subject to lingering (and somewhat tedious) suspense involving people wandering around cautiously calling out "Hello" and all that kinda cliche shit. Little bit of rear view nudity of a tan-lined lady buttocks as well as some surprisingly catchy rock musical performances that are as laughable as they are awesome. Killer on the Loose and Rainbow Eyes are definatly my new "favs". The sorry thing is, they really phoned in the very end. Fucking pitiful.

Still, I urge slasher fans to peep this one. It's goofy and stupid, but enjoyable.

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Red (2008, Trygve Allister Diesen/Lucky McKee)

 
"Red" is a terrific revenge story based on the novel by the provocative horror writer Jack Ketchum.

A reclusive old man and his dog are accosted by a trio of juveniles while fishing. Their demands for the man's money prove unsatisfactory so the situation ends in a sudden burst of cruelty, leaving the old man's dog, Red, blown apart by the kid's shotgun. This senseless act of violence leads the man to the home of two of the boys where the uninterested father adamantly claims his son's lack of involvement. From there, he calls upon a lawyer and a reporter is involved, yet the concept of justice is vastly limited. The old man's frustration eventually reaches it's breaking point, resulting in some heavily provoked vigilante schoolin'...

The film is incredibly intense and heart breaking with a great cast, especially Brian Cox. His performance brings out that strong feeling of loss that makes the story as impactive as it is. His plight for retaliation is consistently hindered due to his immense powerlessness and it is all well conveyed through the character's tragic background and sorrowful demeanor. Cox emphasizes all of this near perfectly. Definitely read the book and check out the flick.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Sex: The Annabel Chong Story (1999, Gough Lewis)

"Sex: The Annabel Chong Story" is possibly one of the best documentaries on the porn industry, yet it also sums up societal indiscretion. Annabel Chong represents the forefront of a generation dependent on making a name for themselves via debauchery and long-term bodily harm to appease the reactionary public.

Chong is a now retired, unattractive former Singaporian porn actress who became famous throughout America and most of Europe for performing in the world's largest gang-bang scene at the time. She fucked 70 men - most of which were off the streets - 251 times in 10 hours; a record that has since been broken. This rather tedious documentary covers the before-and-after of this new feat of exhibitionism in the most exploitive way possible.

It doesn't take the viewer long to realize that Annabel Chong, as a fully clothed individual running her yap, is an awful subject for a documentary. Though, listening to her attempts at making sense of her mission of over-the-top sexual degradation I found interesting, yet, at the same time, repugnant over time. Weak females yearning for some kind of notoriety in a typically last-ditch resort of someone with no real passions or personality is something all-too prevalent in today's society. It's become all too common for both males and females in today's culturally deprived, deteriorating, and directionless society to avoid contributing an actual skill by simply nailing your testicles to a table like Steve-O or fucking some brain dead mook on night-vision camera like Paris Hilton. I saw no redeemable qualities behind Annabel Chong's forced and empty sex babble and inane lack of reasoning behind what she was trying to accomplish by having 300 dicks (her initial goal) in her. Frankly, she's retarded.

Of course, throughout the entire the movie, the possibility of Chong enduring some type of sexual abuse as a child seemed fathomable and, as it turns out, low and behold, she was gang-raped in the storage room in a subway station. Contributing factor? Seems like, in this age of Jackass pranks, professional party girls, and ridiculous viral videos, it no longer takes an unbalanced mind to conceive the notion to attempt and/or pull off "outrageous" behavior for the sake of fleeting public "respect". The 22-year old Chong claimed, almost hesitantly, that the possibility of contracting HIV during the gang-bang was not a concern.

Throughout the film, Chong shows many instances of being a naive dolt with a habit of dressing like an intellect when featured in certain interviews, as if wearing glasses and a dress suit will add any kind of credibility to her embarrassing ambitions. Her look shifts from mousy women's rights activist, to slovenly bull dyke, to simply wearing T-shirts that read "SLUT". Again, her points on the subjects of socio-political ethics are vague and clearly recited rhetoric. At one point she claims she's trying to bring "a more unified view to human sexuality". Good stock comment. I'm sure no other person in the porn industry has ever used that line. Chong was also obsessed with tired notion that female sexuality is a socially bastardized concept. She also considers her porn to be a form of "art". Obviously, she's delusional.

Like I mentioned, "Sex: The Annabel Chong Story" is, overall, a nice look at the inner workings of the porn industry. After Chong's 251 cock gang-bang, she was refused payment of the negotiated ten thousand dollars of which she claimed wasn't the point of her record setting sex session. Clearly, honesty or loyalty within the porn business is not a primary concern, yet teenage runaways with no attributes other than ample pussies flock to Hollywood to make these fat miscreants more wealthy.

Saturday, November 12, 2011

Bone Sickness (2004, Brian Paulin)

"Bone Sickness" was my introduction to indie-horror 'do it yourselfer' film maker Brian Paulin. I first saw it a few years ago when Unearthed Films first released it and, upon re-watching it, I still find "Bone Sickness" to be quite a triumph in the way of micro-budget horror film making.

A guy who is dying from some rare bone disease is revived by ingesting bone marrow from corpses his friend is stealing from they cemetery. Next thing you know, the angry dead are rising and going after those that desecrated their remains...

Pretty silly premise and the acting is downright atrocious, which is the primary reasoning behind most people's adamant dislike toward the film. Thing is, "Bone Sickness" does not derive it's strength from the performances of it's cast of non-actors, but from it's extensively intricate and prolific array of ultra-splattery gore effects. Literally wall-to-wall zombie gore and make-up effects is what "Bone Sickness" should be viewed and enjoyed for since that was clearly the main objective of Brian Paulin who single-handedly assembled the on-screen carnage.

Due to many people's harsh take on the film, I must express that I am in no way affiliated with Brian Paulin nor have I met him or received bribery for any kind of positive "fluff" review. My personal inference on independent film making is based on numerous components, rather than just one or two less-than-satisfactory aspects, such as piss poor acting from non-actors. I've seen many rancid, digitally shot back yard films with such a lack of aesthetic prowess that something like "Bone Sickness" - involving laborious make-up and prosthetic effects - is somewhat reminiscent of the days of Sam Raimi and Peter Jackson's earliest horror films.

If you like zombie flicks with tons of sick gore, "Bone Sickness" is not one to pass up