Movie Review - Fear Island (2009)

 

Fear Island (2009)

 

As you'll find i've stated a few times within my couple of movie reviews that i seem to gravitate towards liking the more obscure and out there slasher/horror movies, i by no means like my movies tame but sometimes i come across a tame one, such as the way of this movie Fear Island, upon investigating this movie there wasnt alot about it out there, mainly just reviews on the IMBD.com website which 90% of the reviews pan this movie, now on further inspection i've found that this was actually a made for TV movie not even for cinema release or just a straight to DVD which now looking back completely explains it utter tameness.

 

So the basic story for this movie is 6 kids, 5 friends and a stow away head out to 'fear island' for one last gathering before they all go off on their seperate adventures after high school, its a very cabin in the woods isolated slash and stalk feel to this movie, its set up well in places an begins with what im asumming is FBI agents chasing a girl down in the woods and taking her back to civilization, she has amnesia and cant seem to remeber her name.

 

An FBI agent who is hell bent on finding out the truth is pushing her to tell him what happens, then in comes a psychologist forcing the FBI agent to let her shrink this girl into telling them what happened, and so we proceed to get the story in flash back form, normally flashbacks in these movies drive me mentally up the wall and make me want to throw things at my tv, it can be SO over done in the slasher genre, but somehow in this movie they to a extent made it work, you get all the right tid bits and back story, and you met all the charactors, and then the story unfolds as we go between the presences and the flashbacks of the Amnisea girl slowly remebering bits and pieces of what happened on the Island resulting in 5 dead teenagers.

 

 

I have to warn you this is a very tame "stalk and slash" infact i probably wouldn't even go so far as to call it slash, more just "stalk and Kill" the setting of the isolated island is quite pretty and the final girl Jenna played by Hayliee Duff caught me off gaurd she mirrors alot of what makes her sister more famous, she seemed to inhabited the same look and sound and feel as her sister, and she acted her part fair well to my surprise, it was also nice to see Lucy Hale before her Pretty Little Liars role though her part in the movie is a major part to the plot it seems to be played down a little which made the movie lose a little of its shine.

 

Also the big back story thats pivotal to the plot and whats happening on the island didn't even show itself till 3 quarters of the way through the movie, and as for the killings the most grafic was probably the boiled to death in the spa, it wasn't overly bloody in any aspects which i understand now that i know its a made for TV movie so therefore they had to make it pretty tame.

 

 

Honestly there is nothing spectacular or stand out or sensational about this movie, its by no means the kind of movie that will be in the relam of your Friday the 13th or Scream, but i did find enough to enjoy to be able to happily get through the movie, there is that big plot twist and role reversals between the Psychologist and the FBI agent who are both interiganting the only survior who has knowledge of what happened on the island, theres so much more i wanna say for this movie but most of it gives away a massive part of the movie and the ending, i did however pick up the ending about 20 odd minutes into the movie, and though i knew the ending and didnt get any surprise from it at the end, i still DID enjoy watching this movie.

 

this is probably the kind of tame foray into 'slash' ( i use that world lightly of course) that newbies might enjoy a watch its tame enough that there are no jump scares theres no blood guts and gore but there is a plot in there thats seemingly easy to follow, or it was for me anyway, i think its the kind of movie you have to watch with a grain of salt, dont over think this one, what you think is right is most likely just that, right.

 

There is alot that makes you 'face palm' it through out the movie, Jennas best friend bringing her yappy lil dog to the island, one of the guys seemingly feeding the dog tequila then kicking it out of the house so Jenna friend lose her shit about her dog being out in the woods, that then leads to them running around the woods trying to find this damn dog and of course finding the first dead body.

 

 

theres the silly scribblings of words like 'Evil' and 'innocent' scrawled on bodies and weird toys and on glass doors some of it you wont catch cause its scrawled so small on some little toy at the begining you barely have a chance to notice any significants till later on in the movie when the few remaining charactors discuss them, theres bear traps to the leg and death by snake bite, its all a bit of a giggle.

One moment i cheered happily was when they all realized someone was on the island trying to off them all they locked doors and bolted windows and armed themselves with weapons, and i laughed with glee happily when one of the guys comes wandering back into the room brandishing and nail gun i cheered happily for him, only to face palm it a few minutes later when he some how manages to drop the nail gun outside and run back inside without it and then killer shoots him with it, luckily not mortally wounding him, just wounding him enough to probably feel like somewhat of an idiot for losing his defence weapon, to the proceed to lose his life to a snake bite to the chest.

 

There isn't much more i can say about this movie, it goes a little bit longer then i think needed between the present day story and the flashback story telling the two plots in one seemed to push the movie into a long running time i believe, but even from all the bad reviews ive seen of it i really did not mind this made for tv movie at all, and i think thats what people need to remeber going into this one Its MADE FOR TV therefore its not going to be like sitting down to some R rated slasher flick with blood and guts flying everywhere, its more like watching a nice long episode of murder sher wrote theres abit a death and charatcors sleuthing and a sub plot to explain WHY the killings have occured and then the story being told by flash backs.

 

It can get a litte jumbled at times, but i managed through it with a satisfied smile on my face, i think it may be comforting for me to be scared but then laugh at something dumb someone does on screen and then it reminds me its not real, but dont fear, Fear Island is more of a Tame Fear Island, like spiders or snakes, they can be deadly but ya know, bug spray shovel to the head an they are dead !!!!

 

Give it a go, but dont hurt me cause its not a spectacular kind of movie, hell it was only 8 bucks on ebay so its a nice little addition to my collection and one that in a few years time i will probably have forgetten most of it and watch it again !!!!

Movie Review - Freddy Vs Jason (2003)

Freddy Vs Jason (2003)

Freddy Krueger: [narrating] My children... from the very beginning, it was the children who gave me my power. The Springwood Slasher, that's what they called me. My reign of terror was legendary. Dozens of children would fall by my blades. Then the parents of Springwood came for me, taking justice into their own hands. When I was alive, I might have been a little naughty, but after they killed me, I became something much, much worse. The stuff nightmares are made of. The children still feared me, and their fear gave me the power to invade their dreams, and that's when the fun REALLY began. Until they figured out a way to forget about me. To erase me completely. Being dead wasn't a problem, but being forgotten, now that's a BITCH. I can't come back if nobody remembers me. I can't come back if nobody's afraid. I had to search the bowels of Hell, but I found someone, someone who'll make 'em remember. He may get the blood, but I'll get the glory, and that fear is my ticket home.

Omg the excitement this movie envokes in me when i think about it, i mean what isn't there to love when you blend to of the most iconic stalk n slash killers of all time, in Freddy Kruger and Jason Voorhees!!!, it makes me laugh cry and squeal with glee, when the blood starts to squirt squish and splatter across the screen i feel that big grin spead across my face and i sit back and enjoy the carnage that follows !!

Having read only a couple of reviews on the IMDB.com website, it gets mostly good reviews especially from the hardcore Freddy and Jason fans, and like most of them i wandered from the start whether they could ever make this work, that they could combine the two stories well enough to make it blend into some semblances of a watchable movie.

and thank god for small mercy's they made it work well together, the idea of the story starting with krugers little speech (see above) as he raises Jason from his watery grave to set him loose on elm street to make them remember him, when Jason stumbles onto Lori and her friends drinking at her house and one of her friends disappears up stairs with her boyfriend where we get the typical tit shot sex scene, that ends in the poor guy getting stabbed in the bed then bent in half by Jason when his girlfriend comes out of the bathroom and finds him screaming we cut to her running out of the house in just a towl covered in blood and her friends race after her they then flag down a passing police man.

When the police are called in it sets off a chain of events when Lori over hears the Police Chief speaking to another officer mentioning the name Freddy Kruger and she slowly starts to remember him, reminding all her friends and school mates around her, we get the typical party scene with death and carnage as Jason goes stab happy on a bunch of drunk and passed out teens much to the dismay of Freddy when Jason stabs the girl he goes after, the kids slowly start putting two and two together when Mark (Lori long lost love who vanished without even saying goodbye) breaks out of an institution he'd been admitted to with his friend Mark because they where the ones who remembered Freddy and where locked away and given drugs to stop them from dreaming, so when Will realizes whats been happening they head to the institution to steal the drugs to keep them drom dreaming and keep Freddy at bay.

Of course their plan is thwarted by freddy and Jason shows up to, to do a bit of slicing and dicing, till Lori formulates a plan to bring Jason back to his home turf of crystal lake and bring freddy out of her dreams into real life and set Freddy and Jason against each other which then leads to the inevitable show down that is done well a set up perfectly.

Freddy though seeming to be more pivotal in the movie then Jason doesn't really get much kill, Jason does all the slaughtering in his big mute hulking scary way that he does, even at times when Freddy's going in for the kill he's too weak, or Jason gets them before freddy does, but even still the friday the 13th movies where always the best for a good kill scene where as freddy was the best for the scary nightmare scenes of bloody pouring out of places and down walls and those creepy children playing jump rope singing that freddy song.

The actors do a well enough job and they seemed to be enjoying it too, Kelly rowlands was a stand out for me as the witty token black girl with an attitude to boot, shes the typical final girls best friend, whos there right up till the very end till Jason steps in and stomps her out, as he does best of course. The nerdy guy whos sweet and misunderstood and in love with the final girl, who plays loyal puppy dog till he takes a blow from Jason, Will the dependable boyfriend who was sent away becuase he knew too much about Freddy adn they couldn't let him infect any of the other teenagers in town, and his friend Mark whos with him, who believes Freddy is real when everyone else doesn't because Freddy killed his older brother but everyone believed it was just a suicide.

Theres enough blood splatter for the avid slasher fan who, like myself, love their gore, the showdown is probably the ultimate scene and the most scrutinized scene in the movie thankfully it was made over the top, and when you match to unkillable killers against each other ya wander where can they really go with that, but the face that Freddy slashes up Jason with his own knife and Jason stabs Freddy with his own severed hand it was well done in my terms of the simple minded fanatic that i am.

There honestly isn't anything i can complain about with this movie, the only thing i didn't like about it was they killed of Mark who was the one all along warning Will that Freddy was real and his charactor to me was just to likeable that his brother had been killed by Freddy that Will had never stopped believing in him but couldn't dream about him because of the drugs they were taking in the institution. i would've liked to at least seen him in the final scenes with Lori and Will, maybe he could've been killed in the cross fire of Jason and Freddy show down or something like that, or even better he could've been a survior too an instead could've killed of Will cause i didn't really like him as the final guy that much, he didn't seem all that... right i guess.

though the whole back story of him thinking Lori father had killed Lori mother and discovering the truth at the end worked well to understand WHY he'd been institutinalised, but honestly i really am just nit picking at a movie that doesn't really have any flaws to it that i could see, it had EVERYTHING a slasher film enthusiaust could ask for, theres the nudity the sex the drugs the random back story the token black charactor the vriginal final girl, the heroic guy, the nerd, the slut and the knowledgable guy that NO ONE listens too ( i mean when are people going to start realizing when the crazy person tells you someones gonna stab you if you go in there that maybe you should LISTEN TO THEM!!)

and of course theres enough blood splashing across teh screen to make any genre fan swoon with happiness and joy as i do everytime i watch this movie, its a well blended movie of two iconic charactors that have been immortilazed on screen for so many years, and i hope that the rumours that have been floating around since 2006 of a sequeal will soon become a reality because there is definatly room to make this movie become even bigger and even better and what genre fanatic can get enough of Freddy or Jason i ask you !!! maybe they could throw in some micheal myers for good affect hehe.

So if you've watched every Firday move and Seen all the Freddy Gems, then maybe its time to throw down some Freddy Vs Jason and to feel that joy and happiness as you sit back and watch the blood fly and squish and splash all over the place and the fun ensue and the show down of all show downs occurs right before your very eyes and sob with Glee this is a DEFINATE must see for any genre fan and i'm pretty sure every fan out there has seen it so if you haven't then SEE IT NOW!!!!!!!!!!

[after seeing Jason at the rave]
Kia Waterson: Was that him? The guy you were talking about... Freddy Krueger?
Lori Campbell: No, that wasn't the guy in my dream. That was somebody else.
Charlie Linderman: Who cares about some fucking dream guy, okay? That psycho in the hockey mask was real.
Bill Freeburg: Dude, that goalie was pissed about something.

Movie Review - Cut (2000)

CUT (2000)

 

Lecturer: We are so lucky today. We're lucky because we're here to see the most exciting screening of a very rare film. You may have read about it in the newspapers, because there was this so-called "curse" on the film. And that was that every time anybody tried to complete the film, someone died. In any case, this print is the only print in existence and we are really lucky to be able to see it today. All right, nothin' more to say. Here we go, let's roll it!

So you can imagine my dissapointment a couple of months ago when i'm on my slasher/horror movie watching spree that i've rocked up to the video store excited at the prospect of seeing a lil australia slasher flick made in my hometown of Adelaide that i hadn't seen in over 10 years !!!! only to discover that the video store only had a VHS copy of the movie, now i was bought up in the days of VHS and it was ON VHS that i first saw this movie, but i haven't owned a VCR for at least 10 years if not more !!!

 

So after leaving the video store, the store OWNER even attempted a search of his suppliers to see if he could even find me a copy on DVD i could purchase only to no avail on his end, so saldy i trundled home (i did hire a bunch of dvds but i sure as hell can't remember the ones i'd borrowed that day) anyway a couple of days later i've logged onto Ebay an thought to myself, i wander, typing in the name of the DVD 'Cut' and you get a million different movies that are directors 'cut' so i've procceded to add on the likes of 'Kylie Minogue and Molly Ringwald the two 'main' notable stars of the movie, and can you imagine the thrill and excitement i felt when there was a DVD copy for sale on ebay!!

 

So finally a week ago with the money saved up (it wasn't that expensive on ebay but when ya gotta pay bills and rent and everything else something as simple and a coveted DVD needs to be saved for) i purchased my copy on ebay and 4 days later i went too my mail box and nearly cried with happiness when i opened the package to see my copy of cut all shiney and new sitting there waiting for me!!

 

 

To start with i'll explain a little of the story, the movie begins with Vanessa (played by the lovely Molly RIngwald) doing a scene for a movie by director Hilary Jacobs (played by the also lovely Kylie Minogue) the scene is ruined by the guy playing the killed in the mask when he forgets to rip open Vanessa blouse before sliting her throat which leads to Hilary screaming at the guy in front of all the cast and crews, this upsets him enough that he goes and visits Hilary in the litte out house where shes staying and proceedes to kill her by cutting off her tounge, Vanessa walks in and manages to kill him before he kills her and then we cut to 12 years later (i think i can't remember lol)

 

We then met a bunch of film school students whos teacher worked on the set of the movie called hot blooded that never got finished because of the death of its director, the film school students decide they want to finish making the movie even at the insistances of their teacher that they just leave well enough alone, there are stories of a curse on the movie, that anyone who tries to finish the movie is killed, and so brings us into the story of a bunch of films students who return to the remote location to finish the movie once and for all, even roping in the original B grade actresse Vanessa, resulting in lots of carnage on the set of the movie.

 

Okay so, i vaguley remembered this movie form when i first saw it years ago, this one goes in with Valentine (which i just recently rewatched and reviewed) of the beginnings of my love for slasher flicks, though this film is slasher-esque its not your all out stalk n slash film, but i remember so much loving this movie like 10 or 12 years ago when i first saw it, that i was excited to see it again.

to help you understand, most movies these days are so big with the shows of blood guts and gore, your pretty used to seeing it straight off the bat shoved in your face, but Cut was like a Firday the 13th or other slasher flicks of the 80s, slow buring in its build up to the kills, but once it gets there look out !!, though not so bloody and gory its actually a well done film for its kind, with the supernatural twist in it which is why i dont' see it as an all out stalk n slash movie, it has its typical problems that all movies do the pacing does become slow in the beginning and i started wandering what i loved so much about this movie, till it gets to later in the film and i realized i'd blocked at the first half of the movie and only remembered the second half when the killing starts !!

 

(Lovely australian actress Jessica Napier plays Raffy the film student director who wants to finish the movie)

 

I finially watched cut like i do a friday the 13th movie loving it for the sheer fact that it's different from the movies of today, and that they hold a special something that movies today really dont have. I've read a few reviews on this movie as well and it gets a pretty good review from people, though most do note how slow it is to get going and its certain other pit falls, but it still is better then it should have been !! and that makes me proud because its an Australian film for a start and it was filmed in my home town of Adelaide South Australia so i feel a bit protective of this movie too.

 

There are some really good austrlaian acting in this movie, a massive draw card of this movie at its time was the starring role of Kylie Minogue (very popular Australian singer who's been around for YEARS and even stared in australian tv show called neighbours) though her role amounted to about 20 minutes at the start of the movies before she gets killed off, but what i loved seeing was an older Molly RIngwald starring as the B grade actress Vanessa, and she did a brilliant job in this role, i love her from her days of 80's girly movies like Sixteen Candles and The breakfast club (my absolute FAVE girly movie).

 

 

The kills in the movie follow fairly well with a friday the 13th movie, there's a beheading that happens off camera adn then you see the head roll onto the ground and then a chick tries escaping the killer but all the doors and miraculously 'locked' and she can't get away and then he throws a huge carving knife nailing her to the door and few feet off the ground. there's a really gruesome scene of one of the girls trying to escape the killer and trys to hide in the woodshed only for the killer to find a way in and shove her head into an automatic wood cutter. and the camera pans to outside the woodshed and you see the massive blood splatter across the window below the wood cutter. by then end though when we get another beheading, you only see it sillouheted on the wall and then you get like the tiniest amount of blood spray on the wall so i'm guessing by this point they'd run out of fake blood and money to make it much bigger then that lol.

 

but all in all it is a good movie, though slow to begin with if you just push to get through the beginning and get to the middle of the movie when all the mayhem and killing starts its a great fun little movie well made for its calibre and actually is better then people do expect it to be in the end.

I do totally recommend you see this movie if you can, it is actually a hard movie to find and i live in the town it was freaking made in and it was hard for ME to find, but if you do happen to stumble across a copy its definatly one of those good put your feet up and watch cause ya don't need to think so much to get through it and its all great fun and you will possibly find yourself reminiscent of watching a friday the 13th.

 

Movie Review - Valentine (2001)

VALENTINE (2001)

Adam Carr: All I can think is when someone is that lonely or that angry they can learn to hide it. But inside, it never dies. It just stays there. Eats away at you. Until one day, you have to do something about it.

This has got to be one of the FIRST slash n' stalk movies i ever watched !! i remember it so well because i saw in at the cinema with a bunch of girlfriends when it first came out, no previous to seeing this movie one of the FIRST horror/slasher/scary movies i saw was Final Destination that had been released the previous year, Now i dont really class Final Destination as a slasher flick, but i will explain that more at a later date.

The reason i remember this movie so much is that when i saw it in the cinemas it was just me and 4 other girls we were all of about 16 and it was just us in the cinema, it was a great ol time climbing over chairs running up and down isle, i even think malteaser where throwen around at one point, but what i pointedly really remember was the way it scared us, at 16 of course we where a little freaked out and everytime there was a jump scare in the movie one of my girlfriends screamed literally at the top of her lungs, i think by this point we had one of the usher guys poking his head in every so often cause i think he thought WE were getting murdered and not the chicks on the screen.

So this little movie holds a bit of a soft spot for me, which sort of makes it hard for me to be critical of the movie, i do remember it being some what scary when i was 16, and having watched it again this afternoon, i see why to my 16 year old self that it was, the tension is well built in this movie, but i am getting ahead of myself, first let me give you a short low down of the movie.

we begin this movie in 1988 at a junior high valentine day dance, we are taken along with young Jeremy Melton as he proceedes to ask the cute popular girls to dance with him, they all refuse him in their own ways (which later sets them up for how they will die) until he finally ask Dorothy the token 'Fat" girl in junior high she accepts and then we come to a camera panning under the bleachers of the high school gym to find Dorothy and Jeremy making out, the cool guys of the school discover them and starting making fun of both Jeremy and Dorothy promting dorothy to falsey accuse Jeremy of attacking her, so the boys dump a bowl of punch (reminiscent of the pivotal scene in Carrie) on his head.

We then skip to 13 years later, and we re met Shelly (played by Katherine Heigl) on a date with a real loser, cutting the date short she heads back to the universtity where she studying to become a doctor and is in the midst of studying for her mid terms, so the scene is specifically set up just so she can die (opps sorry if thats a bit of a plot line give away) we get all of about 15 minutes into the movie before she is killed off (supposedly she had to shot her scene in 3 days cause she had prior commitments to the tv show Roswell).

Of course this is all the set up to reintroduce us to Kate, Paige, Dorothy and Lily who are of course all grown up now, and we proceede into them all recieving Valentines that aren't so sweet and then being stalked and slashed all esculating at a Valentines bash in the home of Dorothy's rich father.

(Denise Richards As Paige and Marley Shelton as Kate)

The reason this movie works for me is its just really kind of simple, after a few re watches there aren't all those massive twist plots that go on and on through out most slasher movies these days, its pretty much the simple stalk n' slash stuff you'd have watched back in the 80s, the story line is simple and easy to follow (for me it was) though there are a few random kills in the movie, why the killer went after Dorothy's toy boy i'm not quite sure, i guess to get him out of the way who knows, theres no real gore to this movie, we do see one of the bodies lying in a pool of blood after the killer has impailed them on broken glass after having thrown them through a wall of glass.

but if you sort of just shrug off the random kills, it is a good movie, Marley Shelton as the final girl in kate is believable, she is the typical all round sweet nice girl you expect to be a final girl, Denise Richards does a remarkbly good job as sexpot Paige who dies in the typical phallic way that is death by drill (sorry for another give away lol) and David Boreanaz as nice girl Kates On/Off boyfriend Adam is right in all the right ways.

(Kate Davies: He's no angel, but he's not a killer.)

there really isn't anything bad that i can say about this movie, it is by no means the best slasher flick you'll find going round, and honestly i had forgotten about this movie for ages in was still packed away in boxes of dvds i hadn't unpacked since i'd moved over a year ago !!! so after taking hours to hunt it down in my spare room i was happily surprised how much i still admire this movie after 11 years, i'm sure i've seen it a few times since 2001 but then again the amount of movies i've watched.

So it may not be one of the most memoriable movies in the slasher genre going round, but this movie gets props for being the first slasher flick to get me into said genre !!! the ending i think left alot of people scratching their heads and going "Huh" but rewatching it again now i've done the whole "Ohhhhh dur of course i get it now" i wont say much else other wise i will give away the ending, thats the only twist through out the movie is the twist at the end, so thank god for that movie these days try to be TOO smart with all their plot twisty and turns and it just gives me a headache trying to figure it out lol.

The killers disguse of all black with the creepy cherub mask works well, it seems so innocent and yet creepy at the same time, the way they've worked it into the movie right from the beginning is really good too, theres not much more i can think to say about the movie, i really just loved it to bits because it holds that special place in my heart lol though it doesn't rate on my top 10 because it really is the kinda movie that you forget about after awhile (is that a bad thing i dunno??) but i think in essences i will forever APPRECHIATE this movie for introducing me to the world that is stalk n' slash !!!

so i do recommend giving thismovie a go, a relaxing arvo off work if you may, come home pop it in the DVD player put your feet up, grab a couple choccies from the cupboard and a nice ice cold can of Fanta from the fridge (doesn't have to be fanta i just say fanta because its what i was drinking at the time i watched the movie lol) and sit back and be happily apprechiate a movie that is by no means the best ever but does well in making you smile !!!

(Phallic drill kill anyone!!)

Paige Prescott: Does somebody wanna be my Valentine?

Movie Review - Black Christmas (2006)

BLACK CHRISTMAS (AKA BLACK XMAS) (2006)   Hospital Santa: [Noticing a padlock on Billy's cell door] A Padlock? Security Guard J.Bailey: His mom used one when she kept him in the attic... it helps him feel at home, especially at Christmas, every year around this time he tries to escape   And here it is people, my number one FAVE slasher flick !!! it stole my number one spot for the original friday the 13th because to me this movie is THAT GOOD !!! it is nothing but your basic slash stalk kill !!!! its got the blood its got the guts and its got the gore and its an ALL female cast apart from 2 cast members !!!   So what is it i love about this movie over all the others you ask, well nothing really i just love it, alot, it doesn't really follow the whole sin rules of your normal everyday slasher flicks, theres a bit more of a story line, but yet not really, most of it is for show so they can get to some good killings, even one victum aciddently kills themself !!! its got those creeppppy ass phone calls although not as pivotal in the remake as it was in the original, the remake relys solely on the bloody kills instead of the pee your pants phone call scares.     Basically the story revolves around a big ass house thats been made into a sorority house, but back in the 70's a kid called billy lenz lived there with his mother and father, and like any good back story poor billy lenz wasn't loved by his mother, so after witnessing his father being murdered he gets locked in the attic in the house, until yearslater he escapes and kills everyone and is then arrested and placed in a sanitarium.     So on christmas eve a bunch of sorority girls are opening presents with their house mother, when one of the girls seems to disappear but no one notices till another girl disappears and then the first girls sister rocks up at the sorority house demanding where her sister is because she was supposed to have been with her already. then one by one the girls get stalked and slashed byt a crazed killer we all assume is billy lenz escaped from the sanitarium. I honestly love this movie because the kills are pretty simple every day objects the killer picks up in the house to off the girls with, and then proceedes to pull out the girls eyeballs to hang them on a christmas tree in the attic, and also at one point even EATS one of the girls eyeballs, so its got the blood guts and gore of a slasher flick that i love, by the end when you get to the attic scene with final girl Kelli and the first girl to be offed's sister Leigh discover all the bodies and they all have there eyes missing and one of the girls head is on top of the christmas tree instead of a star or angel !!! its gross and awesome at the same time.     there is actually a decent plot line behind what is happening in the sorority house ! they actually go into it in the guise of the house mother and Kelli boyfriend Kyle who has lived in the town his whole life telling the story of Billy Lenz, everyone of course thinks Billy is dead, but they are wrong, but the girls are all lead to believe he's not dead and has returned to kill them all off one by one, without giving too much away if you pay enough attention to the story of billy and to the beginning of the movie you'll see there is more too it then that !!     Not only is there a pretty decent storyline in the movie but there are quite a few recognizable faces, Michelle Tratchenburg (from Buffy), Lacey Chabert (from Party of Five), Mary Elizabeth Winstead (From Final Destionation 3) and Katie Cassidy (from the Nightmare Remake and most noteable for me Supernatural Original Ruby !!!) so that for me was the draw card in the beginning for seeing this movie, it was a few months ago i first actually saw this movie or even heard of its existances, i was searching for some good horror movies to watch and stumbled across this one online, so i headed to the video store and hired it and they rest they say of course is history !!     I honestly cannot find much bad to say about this movie, i liked it from start to finish, maybe i am just a simple minded gal !!! i do honestly love most the bad slasher movies out there, the ones that most people dont like as i've said before in previous movie reviews, the thing is with this movie i watched the remake before i watched the original, i actually didn't know that this was a remake till a month or so after i'd discovered this little gem and watched it i found the original at the video shop and decided to watch it too, and i didn't really like the remake, it was kind of slow and didn't really build up to anything or go anywhere, i was slightly confused by the plot of the original, where as in the remake they outlined the plot clearly enough so you understood what was going on. I've said it before and i'll say it again, i loved this movie for the blood and gore involved too, always a big draw card for me is a movie thats not afraid to be a bit disgusting in its storyline, i mean eating eyeballs YUCK!! an when billy kills his mother on christmas, he makes christmas cookies out of her flesh and eats them with milk when he gets arrested by the cops!!! disgusting and sooooo awesome at the same time !!!     So this is DEFINATLY a movie i'd recommend watching especially if you love your slasher flicks and you love some good kills and a bit of disgustingness thrown in !!! then you will probably love this movie as much as i did !!! i even recommended watching the original and then watching the remake and try imagining the creeeeeeepy calls fromt he original placed into the kills of the remake !!! that would've been soooooo freaking creepy !!     they do use the creepy calls in the remake, but not so much to the extent of the first one, its more concentrated on the kills and the stalking then anything.     So i hope ya watch this movie and enjoy it as much as i do !! and i hope it gets added to your top 10 slasher flicks !! even if it doesn't get to your number one spot !!!!! Melissa Kitt: I'm sorry, but that-that fuckin' voice, that was not Megan or Kyle. That was the fucking devil, and he was not talking to us, he was talking to Billy

Movie Review - Darkness Falls (2003)

DARKNESS FALLS (2003)

Caitlin: Black cat. Why not?

Okay now, to start off with i have to explain something before i review, i absolutly love those really bad and really obscure slasher/horror movies, i'm not very main stream and having read over reviews of this movie and other movies i find the ones most people hate are the movies i really like !!!

This little oddity of a movie is quite and interesting one to watch, now let me explain to you also that i don't scare easily (the only movie ive watched that really scares the pants off me is Jaws, cause i have a a shark phobia so that movie is scarrrrrry) i don't really jump in those moments when your supposed to, but with darkness falls it creeped me out and it made me jump which i think means the movie needs some kudos !!!

Basically the movie revolves around 150 year old legend of Matilda Dixon who kids would bring her their teeth when they fell out and she would give them a shiny gold coin, anyway as all good 150 year old stories go she was hurt in a fire which badly scared her face and her skin was too sensitive to go out in the sun so she only came out and night and to protect her face she wore a porcline mask and of course this scared the little kiddies away, when two kids go missing she is blamed for it and hung where she curse the town of Darkness Falls, "Since then there are some who believe that Matilda visits the children of Darkness Falls on the night they lose their last tooth, seeking her vengeance on any who lay their eyes upon her face, fulfilling her curse: What I took before in kindness, I will take forever in revenge"

all of the above is actually explained to us in narrative as the credits are rolling, which was the first thing i liked about the movie, it actually gave us a solid story and background for what happens next.

Anyway after that we proceede to met Kyle and Catilin, when they're young teenagers, Kyle inevitably encounters Matilida Dixon, who in the town of Darkness Falls is where the legend of the tooth fairy comes from, so through out the movie she is referred to as the tooth fairy, and in the beginning of the movie catilin says when the tooth fairy comes, don't peak, but unfortunatly for Kyle thats what he does, and cause he saw her she now wants him dead, it envitably leads to his mother getting killed and Kyle is taken away from his family home, and then we skip to 12 years later, where we see a grown up catilin in a hospital with her younger brother who is suffering the same night terrors as Kyle has his whole life.

The movie unravels as Catilin rings Kyle up asking for his help with her brother, and Kyle returns home to Darkness Falls after 12 years of hiding away from the tooth fairy, and the rest unravels as a race against time to stop the tooth fairy before she gets Kyle, Catinlin and her brother.

So to start with what i liked about this movie was the beginning with a young Kyle and Catilin, there is a really good jump scare when you see a shadow flash across one of Kyles bedroom windows and then Catilin jumps in through the window, your expecting it but it still startles you and makes you jump, and the moment when Kyles hiding under the sheet on his bed and he slowly pulls in down and peaks out and the tooth fairy is right there in his face that is creepy and well timed.

Not much of anything really does happen after that, there aren't a whole lot of scares after that one funny one when catilin has returned back to the hospital and is sitting in her car trying to calm herself down and a black cat jumps on the bonnet of her car startling her and the audiance too, again becuase of its well timed exacution.

the movie really does just plod along after that, the kills aren't violent of bloody by any means, just scratched up faces and bodies with not alot of blood so thats a one down side from my end being i love blood guts and gore. you don't really get to learn much about Kyle or Catilin from the last 12 years, but if you look past that its not really that hard to follow, you kind of wander why Catilin has such a younger brother, and where are their parents, i think it could've worked better if he'd been her son not brother.

Whilst the movie has a creepy undertone to it, if your a seasoned horror/slasher movie fan it'll be fairly tame and more like watching a disney movie for you !! but i think it's still worth a watch to see if you get a little jump out of it like i did, the beginning really was the best part of this movie, the young actors who played the young Kyle and Catilin did a really good job, unfortunatly the older versions aren't acted so well, i honestly think the actors who played them where just to old when you considor how young the were in the start and add 12 years onto that, they're only supposed to be about 24 or 25 but they looked closer to 30 !!!

The ending of course is pretty standard for any creepy legend killer movie, theres always at least ONE way to kill them and the hero or heroine will always stumble upon that one weakness, as they do in the end of Darkness Falls, and then thats kind of just it.

So in recommending good movies for you to watch, in conclusion i say if you like your movies a little bit more obscure, or your only just starting out in scary movies this is a good one to watch for first timers, there isn't much to follow, there's a good couple of scares and not much blood or gore to freak you out with, and if you like the little bit more obscure movie or just wanna test your jump factor this is a good one to give it a go.

but i should also come with a warning on this one, its isn't the best movie i've seen, i could manage to sit through the whole thing easily without getting too bored, generally all i wanted was some more blood and guts spilled but i did like it, but it is a slow moving hard to get off the ground kind of movie so proceede with caution if you are to watch this movie and don't hate me if you do and don't like it !!!! they cant ALL be good !!!

You have been warned, go forth and watch my young jedi horror/slasher fans !!! be bold and brave hehe and if all else fails just drink ALOT of alcohol first and laugh at the movie !!!!

Officer Matt Henry: This thing's gonna kill us isn't it?
Kyle: Probably.
Officer Matt Henry: All this over a fuckin' tooth.

Scream cause i know what you did last friday the 13th

"It's halloween, everyone's entitled to one good scare" - Halloween (1978)

Most people will tell you that slasher films, horror movies, or scary movies are all just excuses for blood guts gore and nudity, that they can't teach you anything of use, well to these people i tell you, your sooooooo wrong.

Let me tell you what these movies have taught me, 1. NEVER EVER under ANY circumstances investigate a noise if your alone in the house, my advice on this is to go to the pub for 3 days THEN return home. 2. Do not and i mean DO NOT own a house with a chequred past, especially if it is an old house, new houses are generally safe, unless they've been built on some acient burial ground. 3. Within these house DO NOT have a basement or and attic, if you do i highly recommended boarding them up or just burn the house to the ground and save your self some trouble!! 4.If your going to camp, well DON'T like honestly just DON'T hasn't Jason taught us ANYTHING i mean really !!! also STAY away from ABANDONED camps cause you KNOW they where abandoned for a reason and that reason is 9 times out of 10 NOT A GOOD ONE !!! 5.If you are going to break all these rules and go away to camp or buy and old creepy house or live on a house built on an accient burial ground then for the LOVE OF GOD would you please supply yourself with endless weapons, and STOP running up stairs, in fact just go with number 1 and head to the pub for 3 days !!!!!

Anyway enough of my lecturing !! i just wanted to dedicate and entry on here to all things SLASHER !! yes you heard right, this is my ultimate genre !!! the blood the guts the gore !!! yes i am a girl, and yes i do ocasionally watch girl movies but seriously 5 seconds into Milo and Otis i ball my eyes out like a bitch, can you IMAGINE what im like with girly movies 90% of them are just depressing cause your life is never going to be like that.

So this is what i love about a good slasher flick (and even some of the bad ones) your to damn shit scared half the time to cry !! and the other half your yelling at your tv for the damn girl to stop running upstairs and make a beeline for the EXIT !! not to mention there is some SERIOUS eye candy in a slasher flick, not just of the female varity either (though i can say i do apprechiate that too) i guess it can stem from the whole princess damnsel in distress save me kind thing we grow up with, but in all honestly i know if i were in a horror/slasher flick i'm sure to kick some SERIOUS butt and go to the pub for 3 days !!! AND get the hot boy too

But okay in all seriousness, i dont really KNOW why i love scary movies so much, maybe because it IS fun to be scared and not be whimpering like a little baby, i think is someway we are all obsessed with our own immortality. The thrill of watching Halloween or Friday the 13th in that the old movie are not that scary to this generation but you can imagine back in the late 70's early 80's these movies would have been scarying the pants off of teenagers around the world.

My Ultimate fave would have to be The friday the 13th movies, from the orginal from 1980 to the remake in 2009 and all the good bad and the ugly inbetween, there is something about Jason that isnt so much scary as it is to the point the dude is just freaking creepy, and come on how many of us have been away at camp or gone camping at some point in our lives and not thought "shit what would happen if some axe weilding maniac started chopping everyone to bits while i'm out here in the middle of the woods" of course this hasn't really ever happened for real that i know of, but thats what makes it so much fun to watch Friday it makes you sit there and think., What if??

The slasher genre is a fairly over looked genre and while it had a pretty good run when Halloween started in 1978 right through to Friday the 13th and nightmare on elm street, in the late 80's and early 90's it didn't fair so well, though people still made slasher movies in this time, most of them never really made it to theatre realse and alot of actually good late 80's early 90's slasher flicks that were straight to DVD are some of the best slasher flicks floating around (if you exclude Halloween and Friday of course)

The bases of a slasher flick, is the whole stalk and slash, a killer generally hidden behind a mask or some form of 'costume' stalks a bunch of teenagers and kills them all off one by one till you get to the last girl/boy or both and they fight to the death generally stopping the killer in his tracks at this point, because the formula for a slasher flick is so simple its an easy movie to make, but it isn't always the best either, some people are just so basic with the formula its like watching paint dry at times, but others have pushed the boundries and made some really good movies.

Even thou the genre was so very lacklustre for awhile, in 1996 the realse of scream saw the genre get a new reboot of life for a whole new generation, and it's like in the 2011 scream 4 when one of the character states "there just something scary about a guy with a knife who just snaps" which is so true because with Scream it wasn't about being an immortal killer like Jason or Micheal, it was about a real life human being behind a mask who has literally flipped their wig and gone crazy !!!

Now days, the genre consists mainly of remakes and reboots and rebirths of old movies, in the last couple of years we've seen Friday the 13th, Halloween and nightmare on elm street go through this, and its not all that bad i like seeing this done because i feel like a whole new generation gets to see these movies, and that maybe once they see the remake they will go back and watch the orginals and maybe love it just as much as i do !! i do actually like the Friday the 13th remake (i orginally only watched it because Jared Padalecki from Supernatural was in it) and suprisingly enough it was still good, even thou in the orginal FIRST friday Pamela was the orginal killer not Jason, and i sort of liked the remake of Nightmare on elm street (again only watched it for my girl crush Katie Cassidy was in it) it was a little lack lustre for me, kind slow had the basic story right but i dunno, i guess if you know and watch the orginals like i do, your always going to be critical of the remake.

There is one remake of a classic that i actually love more the the orginal, and that is black Xmas, the orginal was made in 1974, and now whilst to someone like me it was not by any means blood guts and gore scary it was actually a well done movie that im sure would've scared the crap out of people back then, for me i loved the remake that was done in 2006 and i only just recently discovered it probably about 6 months ago i stumbled across it in the video store, and hired it and absolutly LOVED it, its up there with the orginal Friday and Halloween for me !!!!

I guess it helped that my girl crush was also in black xmas, but it actually boast a popular cast of names and faces which for me is sometimes the ONLY draw card for a movie, i guess maybe because of my girly crush (plus she was the final girl) makes me a little biased rose covered glasses in my opinion, but hell take the My bloody Valetines remake, again the draw card for me was my ULTIMATE crush Jenson Ackles, but this remake of a movie was AWFUL i just did not like it, most of the acting was shit and even Jenson himself seemed a little off with this one, so its not ALWAYS a biased opnion becuase of the actors in the movie, and My Bloody Valentine wasnt all THAT BAD!!!

But there really was just something about Black Xmas that i truly loved !!! those creepy ass phone calls the killer makes where the pivotal point in the orginal movie and freaking actually scary as hell, and bring that over into the remake with alot of blood guts and gore and eyeballs being ripped out just doubles the affect of how creepy and scary a movie it can be!!

I could probably go on for DAYs about slasher flicks and all my favourites and what i like and dont like about them, there is soooooo much about them i love and very little i hate. but i'm sure you will hear about it all over and over again in my many reviews that i will be doing, so i will leave you with a list of my top 10 slasher flicks and for you too all look out for my reviews that i will give each and every one of them...

THE ULTIMATE SLASHER TOP 10

10. Scream 4 (2011)

9. Prom Night (1980)

8. Friday The 13th (2009)

7. Childs Play (1988)

6.Halloween (1978)

5.Nightmare on Elm street (1984)

4. Cherry Falls (2000)

3. Scream (1996)

2. Friday the 13th (1980)

1. Black Xmas (2006)

Heather Lee: I'm really not okay with any of this. I mean, buying a Christmas present for a serial killer?
Melissa Kitt: No. You see, serial killers murder repeatedly for sexual thrill. Billy Lenz was a spree killer - dude just fucking lost it.

(P.S i had to put this picture in because i mean COME ON who wouldn't want this coming