Gamera 2: Assault of the Legion

Yep, that’s right. The big flying turtle is BACK! And, wow, this one was a big surprise! If you need to be brough up to speed on the other big G, check out my review of Gamera (1).

Big G’s lesser known brother (Gamera) returns, once again, to save Tokyo from ‘the Legion’. As IMDb says: A strange meteor lands in Japan unleashing hundreds of insect-like “legion” creatures which find their way into Tokyo. When the military fails to control the situation, Gamera shows up to deal with the ever-evolving space adversary.

OK, first thing I noticed about Gamera 2 is that it’s definitely no kids film. Seconds after the fifteen minute mark we see an underground train driver about to be attacked by a Legion creature. I expected it to be the usual driver-escapes-in-the-nick-of-time thing, or the creature would give him a nasty bruise, but no. We cut to the cabin, hear a scream, see the drivers hand come up, into the shot, and blood spray everywhere!

This a Japanese monster movie? But there's blood, surely there's some mistake!

Totally wasn’t expecting that!

Anyway, the army aren’t doing much to hinder the Legion, and that’s when Gamera shows up on the scene. He launches a giant stream of fire at the Legion pod (which was ready to launch a ton of new Legion beasties) and whoops it’s ass. Unfortunately the millions of legion creatures attack Gamera, covering him completely and force him to retreat and launch into space. Meanwhile, some scientists search for information on Gamera on the Internet:

Netscape! Yaaayyy! Ahh, them were the days!

As the citizens are evacuated we meet up again with the girl from the first Gamera (in this ‘trilogy’) who seems to have a mental connection to Gamera via her little cashew shaped pendant.

Gamera makes a reappearance when another Legion pod appears. This time Gamera attacks them using what looks like some sort of nuke! He whoops them, but pretty much kills himself!

Uh oh, that can't be good. Bad Gamera, BAD GAMERA!

Tokyo is now defenseless against the Legion since Gamera toasted himself. Cue Huey Lewis singing The Power Of Love. As the citizens hold a candle-lit vigil at the toasted remains of Gamera their love (or something) ressurects Gamera and he (or she!) bursts forth to whoop ass once again. Hoorah for candles!

That's some bad indigestion there...

Well, needless to say, Gamera kicks the legions ass and all is good for Tokyo. Well, once they rebuild it that is…

I liked the first in this unofficial trilogy but I gotta admit that this one was even better! It had blood, monsters, fire, explosions… only thing missing was boobs, but ya can’t have everything. Otherwise it’d be 5.5 out of 5. Roll on Gamera 3!

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Trailer:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqevsDGsAs4

The original Piranha movie was hardly an Oscar contender so I really wasn’t expecting much from this or it’s 3D

*WOOT! WOOT! RANT ALERT, RANT ALERT

Dear Hollywood,

I appreciate that your films are making less and less money, even though you spend more and more on them, and need gimmicks now more than ever but would you just FUCK OFF with the 3D? It’s a pain in the ass and not new, there’s been ’3D’ films since the 50′s now dump the 3D and get some decent script writers maybe then people will watch your films.

Yours (downloading) faithfully,
Ronnie

So, I expect you want a plot synopsis then? OK, if you must:  Every year the population of sleepy Lake Victoria explodes from 5,000 to 50,000 for Spring Break, a riot of sun and drunken fun. But this year, there’s something more to worry about than hangovers and complaints from local old timers; a new type of terror is about to be cut loose on Lake Victoria. After a sudden underwater tremor sets free scores of the prehistoric man-eating fish, an unlikely group of strangers must band together to stop themselves from becoming fish food for the areas new razor-toothed residents. (IMDb.com)

First things first, you can sleep for the first 30mins of the film, nothing to see here. It’s all students-gone-wild and boring character introduction. Only after the 30min mark do you see any piranha. But, while waiting for the piranha you can always admire the boobage. Yes, there’s plenty of racks on display here! 40mins in is the first decent kill with gore. Some chick with big hooters and a parachute is being dragged behind a boat but, unfortunately for her, she ends up in the water and the next time she lifts up in to the sky… well, let’s just say that there’s a fair bit less of her to lift. The highlight of the film is at the 50min mark where the highly annoying students are told to leave the water, and the area, but no… they all continue to party and dive in to the water. And thank God they do. There’s a massacre, and it is good. One chick is hit by a high tension wire which slices through her diagonally, one selfish dude grabs a speedboat to make a get away. Not only is he mowing people down left right and center but his engine gets snagged. Snagged on some chick hair. When the propellers start up it rips her entire face off. Nice! There’s also a nice piranha-eating-its-way-out of a chick. The next scene of note is the bad-ass sheriff who slices and dices a few piranha with a speedboat motor. After the one hour mark though it’s all down hill again. I think there’s one gore scene for the next half hour then the crappy ending.

I expected worse, there is a good 30mins of blood, gore and action, but with 30mins on either side of it, it could have been planned out a bit better. The gore was pretty good and there were plenty of boobs so I’m giving it…

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Frogs (1972)

With a poster that awesome, I just HAD to watch Frogs!

Now, I wish I hadn’t.

The basic premise of Frogs is as thus: Rich playboy is out in his new speedboat and runs down a freelance photographer who’s out taking photos of the local wildlife. The guy, and his hot girlfriend, take the poor victim back to their place to dry off. There he meets the entire family and is given the job of investigating the influx of frogs on the old mans estate.

Now, technically (for a B-movie) it’s a great idea. I imagined giant mutant frogs with people’s legs dangling from their googly eyed mouths, but no.

The film is obviously made on a low budget and I feel the utmost pity for Ray Milland, a talented actor who obviously made a bad choice here, but several things popped in to my mind whilst watching this ‘movie’. First and foremost, what’s the difference between a frog, and a toad? Well, according to Answers.com:

Frogs have slimy, slippery and delicate skin, but toads have drier skin with warts

Which is what I thought, so:

That, good Sir, is in fact a toad. Identifiable by the warts upon its skin...

… the entire FROGS film is in fact filled with TOADS. Well that’s a stroke of genius. Secondly, I didn’t count one death in the film that involved a frog. All the deaths were caused by various non-frog-like creatures. There’s everything from day geckos, tokay geckos, crocodiles (more about them later), toads, snakes, in fact I think the only reptile missing from the film was a komodo dragon. Having a komodo dragon in the film (preferably attacking someone) would have instantly made it kick ass.

Several glaring errors also made me face palm and shake my head in shame at this movie. Number one is the crocodile wrestling scene. Well that seems quite dangerous you’d think, as I too thought, until I saw this one part where the crocodile is upside down and you can clearly see the tape holding is mouth shut! Behold:

Correct me if I'm wrong, but that looks suspiciously like a foreign object sealing that crocodiles mouth shut...

Second was the dead-man-lying-face-down-in-the-swamp who was clearly breathing as the photographer approached him! Third was the man who shoots a bird (which posed no danger what-so-ever), trips over a branch and proceeds to shoot himself in the leg, is then attacked by ferociously growing moss and finished off by a couple of big spiders.

Now I’m more than willing to suspend ALL belief while watching movies – hell, look at some of the movies on here that I’ve watched! – but Frogs just has too many mistakes to ignore, especially the lack of giant frogs eating people.

So, if someone out there (with too much money) wants to give me a budget, I’ll make a PROPER version of Frogs with giant mutant frogs (not toads) attacking people, it’d have hot chicks, boobs and women fainting. Not enough women faint in movies now a days, they’re too busy trying to be manly. I have to say, If this film had been called ‘Attack of Nature’ or ‘When Reptiles Attack’ it might have been cool, but putting out that poster of the frog with the hand dangling from its mouth made me expect mutant frogs. I don’t like being deceived by posters, hence why I’m being hard with this film…

Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

The trailer (which tries to make it look cool):

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes

Plot (I didn’t even know there was one! – Ronnie): After a wave of reports of mysterious attacks involving people and pets being eaten by the traditionally docile fruit, a special government task force is set up to investigate the violent veggies and put a stop to their murderous spree. Included in this crack team are a lieutenant who never goes anywhere without his parachute, an underwater expert who’s never out of his scuba gear, and a master of disguise who conceals his appearance by dressing as a black Adolf Hitler.
Alex: present day? do we all get presents?
Ronnie: you reckon that was a reverse shot?
Alex: no, not the semi-attractive redhead housewife
Alex: it was a clever reverse shot actually
Alex: it looked good
Ronnie: I’m liking the intro song…
Alex: we have to post the youtube link to the theme song, for all 3 people who read this and haven’t heard it
Ronnie: ‘Miss Potato Famine of 1922′??
Alex: I bet shes hot
Alex: these credits are hilarious “THIS SPACE AVAILABLE CALL”
Ronnie: ‘got little Timmy…’
Alex: i like how it leaves old people alone
Alex: wow they had the money to crash a real helicopter?
Ronnie: WIG!
Alex: and a GREAT wig

Now THAT's a quality rug!

Alex: super spys name is MASON DIXON
Ronnie: are they meeting in a phone box?
Alex: at least they aren’t pretending like there is a plot
Alex: this is Monty Python levels of silly
Ronnie: Monty Python indeed…
Ronnie: but tomato style…

I hope they don't get a fire alarm...

Alex: I’m waiting for Cleese to show up with a dead bird…
Ronnie: hopefully not…
Ronnie: haha… dubbing
Alex: great the jap has come up with a half man half robot, and the dubbing is great
Alex: Tomatoes are fags
Alex: i learn something new everyday
Alex: thats guys face makes me laugh for some reason, def. getting a picture of that
Ronnie: yeah
Alex: JAWS?
Ronnie: swimsuits!
Alex: yup, jaws
Ronnie: tomat-jaws
Alex: jawmatoes even?
Alex: how did we get to motorbikes?
Ronnie: Dunno, but there’s hot chicks…
Alex: wait, there might be boobage, I’m enticed
Alex: how about that Fairchild
Ronnie: mumbling tomatoes?
Alex: they are throwing tomatoes being thrown at the car
Ronnie: what’s with the pens! :/
Alex: The president used the Statue of Liberty as collateral
Ronnie: meh, it’s only a statue anyway…
Ronnie: (French I believe)
Alex: true, I memory serves we got that from the French
Alex: why did they just make a Superman joke
Ronnie: I’ve no idea…
Ronnie: was W Bush President when this was made??
Alex: not yet, nor his father
Ronnie: ‘those funny black ships keep sinking anyway…’
Alex: is the black master of disguise guy dessed like Hitler?
Ronnie: In a word: yes
Ronnie: Why? I do not know…
Alex: this is police academy bad

Several vialiant victims of the great tomato attack of '78

Ronnie: New York? Looks more like the Street of San Francisco…
Alex: I don’t remember trolly cars in New York…um…ever
Ronnie: so we’ve gone from scrolling ‘buy our sofas’ ads to a sing-song? Oh dear…
Alex: look to be that way
Ronnie: from an old dude with while flares on…
Alex: those pants made me a little gay just by seeing them
Ronnie: don’t forget the shirt…
Alex: she movies needs an injection of floozy women and more tomatoes attacks…
Ronnie: very true…
Ronnie: ok, now they’re pretending there’s a story to this…
Ronnie: ‘a lady of the evening’
Alex: yeah…thats usually where it all goes downhill
Ronnie: ok, it’s getting boring now…
Alex: wait, the dog is talking
Alex: oh well i guess non-descript white kid got eaten up
Ronnie: hopefully…
Alex: is that Ernest Borgnine?
Alex: YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
Alex: ok, that scene won me back for a minute
Ronnie: for his sake, I hope not…
Alex: They are having way to much fun with the captions
Ronnie: was probably a new invention when this was made… it was 1978 after all…
Alex: along with wool suits apparently
Ronnie: that’s the 70′s for ya…
Alex: they are actually onto something with the whole Jesus Christ in commercials
Ronnie: yeah, it’d work…
Ronnie: They had planes in 1978? Holy crap…
Alex: back into the little meeting room
Alex: this scene is actually kind of clever
Ronnie: nice cutting…
Alex: splicing together 2 phone conversations to make one
Alex: that guy with the handgun is about as accurate as my dad when he plays DOOM
Ronnie: I expected the ship to sink…
Alex: THAT would have been funny
Ronnie: it needs the Benny Hill sound track…
Alex: its been needing it for a while
Alex: worst chase ever
Ronnie: yeah but it was meant to be…
Alex: I am still not getting the whole “pens” thing
Ronnie: nah, I don’t get it either…
Alex: oh fuck, musical time again
Ronnie: but getting worse!
Ronnie: ok this is just embarrassing now…
Ronnie: ooh, explosions!
Alex: well, we only got 23 minutes left
Alex: the minature city was kinda funny
Ronnie: Thank God!
Alex: you know what this makes me want to watch?
Ronnie: uh, Airplane?
Alex: no, but that movie eclipses this 10 fold
Alex: some kind of crazy Godzilla movie with really bad minature towns and robots
Ronnie: ok, the interview made me laugh…
Alex: yeah, he called the lady “no spring chicken”
Alex: +.5 stars for using the phrase “spring chicken”
Ronnie: nice cartoon sound effects…
Alex: wiley coyote should pop up any minute now….
Ronnie: I can but hope…
Alex: what the hell is even happeneing in this scene?
Ronnie: I have NO idea…
Alex: douchebag turn around twist OMG
Alex: is that blue and yellow furniture?
Alex: did people actually have that shit back in the day?
Ronnie: oh yes… it’s all being used now in Russia…
Alex: no interest in Russia
Alex: although don’t they have some pretty womenz?
Alex: I would rather hop on over to Amsterdam
Ronnie: Sometimes, yes.
Alex: UPS gets blown away
Alex: what does Puberty love have to do with anything
Ronnie: Please… no. Please don’t play Donny Osmond!
Alex: besides being a Michael Jackson Hit
Ronnie: what’s with the white guy dressed as an Arab?? :/
Alex: I noticed him too! I guess Hezbollah is gonna help fight those dastardly tomatoes
Ronnie: and someone dressed as Groucho Marx
Alex: Well, the Marx thing kind of makes sense
Ronnie: It does?
Alex: I can certainly see some Groucho influence on whomever created this…mastperiece
Ronnie: you have a point there…

They're attacking, and they're tomatoes! AGGHHHHH!!!!

Alex: This is worse than The Baron against the Demons
Alex: in case you were wondering
Ronnie: impossible!
Alex: a tomatoes with HEADPHONES?!?!?!
Alex: very possible
Alex: that is a strong woman to pick him up like that
Alex: oh fuck me running, no more singing
Ronnie: not half! Maybe they used wires…
Ronnie: I’m dropping it .5 for the singing crap…
Alex: so it gets a 0 then?
Ronnie: no no…
Alex: mercifully
Ronnie: *phew!*
Ronnie: well… it was funny (in places) and didn’t even try to be serious (pro’s), but the singing and lack of boobs is a definite con…
Alex: it needed some gore as well
Alex: even terrible gore
Ronnie: true
Ronnie: but, still, I’m giving it a 2
Alex: I’ll go 1
Ronnie: ouch…

Ronnie’s Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

Alex’s Rating: 1 out of 5 stars

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes intro theme:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wfm3_BMinhg

The Delaware County sheriff’s office says in a statement Sunday that 32-year-old Jesse Fierstine of Manchester struck his 63-year-old father, Charles Fierstine, on the head with a flashlight and a piece of firewood Saturday, then cut the pacemaker from his chest using a pocketknife.

The statement says the younger Fierstine was charged with attempted murder.

Charles Fierstine was taken to University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City. Officials didn’t give details on his condition Sunday.

The sheriff’s office refused to release further details, referring questions to the county attorney’s office, which was closed for the weekend. Online court records in the case were not yet available and no attorney could be located for Jesse Fierstine.

That's a lot of tapes. Guy must of had a reward zone card for Best Buy.

The Poughkeepsie Tapes (or simply Tapes, as I will refer to it from here on out) is not a movie.

I’ll let that sink in.

“When hundreds of videotapes showing torture, murder and dismemberment are found in an abandoned house, they reveal a serial killer’s decade-long reign of terror and become the most disturbing collection of evidence homicide detectives have ever seen.” -Tribeca Film Festival Synopsis.

It’s a mockumentary, minus the comedy and satire.  It’s a mockumentary that houses a two-pronged attack of brutally accurate portrayals of torture, murder and dismemberment seamlessly interwoven with expert analysis and the thoughts and memories of those who were affected by the killers rampage, and those who were hunting him down.

In fact, it’s not too far removed from what the Discovery channel and TLC show on a daily basis.  All those shows about FBI profilers and how they catch these seriously deranged serial killers all seemed to be influential to the Dowdle Brothers, who both penned and directed Tapes.

And  writing may actually be Tapes strongest assets, although I’m sure it will get lost amidst all the chatter about the lengthy, suspenseful, and downright shocking film the killer shoots himself that is shown at certain intervals throughout.  The writing leaps off the screen, as the Dowdle brothers concoct a credible, highly intelligent, innovative killer and sets him loose in the “Anywhere, USA” suburbs of Poughkeepsie, New York.  The killer taunts his pursuers and gives cryptic clues for investigators to find, knowing far in advance where exactly the authorities will look to find them.  It’s this depth to a nameless, faceless character that brings us closer to him than is comfortable for most audiences.  Instead of being bogged down with trite, rationalizing back story about how the killer was beaten as a child or not hugged enough as a baby, we instead get an uncompromising and genius killer, who has found a way to elude the authorities all while documenting his spree.

A brief glimpse of the killer's thorough work.

Direction is also key, not so much in the static look of the interview pieces, (with the exception of the interview with Cheryl which actually made me lose sleep, it’s that fucking clever and disturbing) but in the low-fi, slow burn masterwork of the killers tapes.  The camera is almost always in the right position, whether it’s showing you everything that’s going on, or whether it’s showing you nothing, such as the inside of a car door, or an empty room.  There are times where the camera will be haphazardly placed, seemingly by accident, and we are left with just the screams and pleads of the victim and the orders of the killer to clue us in of what going on.  It’s a time-tested approach that works flawlessly here.  Show some gore in full view to screw with audience equilibrium, and then deprive them seeing something later on.  It works in two ways.  Once you don’t show the audience a scene straight on, it gets their minds working.  They create in their head horrible visions of what must be going on.  It also works to create a sickening feeling in the viewers, because they have to realize that they WANT to see whats happening, so much so they are willing to create the images in their own heads to replace the ones that aren’t on the screen.  It’s a lost art, but it’s a tactic employed by the Dowdle Bros. in exemplary fashion.

Eyes Without A Face reference in the movie. Who would've thought?

With the audio and visual facets of the film firmly in and place grounded in reality, the one area where horror, or should I say terror in this case, goes awry is usually the acting.  You can have all your ducks in a row as far as directing and writing are concerned, but if your actors don’t come through in creating these characters in the physical form, than everything is lost.  Thankfully, the Dowdle Bros. must have been keen on this, and not only hired no names, but no names who looked liked everyday people.  I’m not sure how involved with the casting they were, but from what I’ve read and inferred through the piece itself, it seems fairly obvious they were pivotal in every decision made.  The most all inclusive and flattering thing I can say is, and this goes for the whole endeavor, not JUST the acting, if this were played one TV on night, and no one was told it wasn’t real, there would be a legitimate fear and uproar in many communities around the U.S.  It’s that believable.  So believable that even though I knew coming in it wasn’t real, I still lost sleep over it, and was looking over my shoulder while watching it.  It’s orchestrated with the sole intention of, if nothing else, to stay with you long after the credits have rolled.

Tapes has a long, uphill battle ahead it.  Still having no official release date for theatrical or dvd release, it is caught in release purgatory.  And once it is released, it will undoubtedly be met with serious backlash from angry mothers and politicians who won’t even bother to see the flick, but instead just berate both those who created it, and its fans.  It will be labeled as the next sick evolutionary step in the Torture Porn sub genre, when it really has a lot less to do with the fantasy world that movies like SAW occupy, and a lot more to do with the gritty, unfair, demented world we live in everyday.  There’s no sense of morals, right and wrong, or justification that other horror flicks try to implore.  It is just cruel, relentless, remorseless and always 10 steps ahead of you.  Just like the killer.

The Poughkeepsie Tapes has, buried underneath it’s tough outer shell, an insane amount of creativity and artistic ingenuity.  If an opportunity to see this bound-to-be-lost gem arises, don’t hesitate.  Just don’t plan on going to bed immediately afterward.