Slither - An "A" Quality B-Film

What do Avery Jessup, Mal Reynolds and Pam Beesly have in common?

Click here to jump to the SPOILER-FREE REVIEW

Plot

The film opens with a meteor/capsule containing an alien parasite crashing to earth. Then we are given a brief introduction to small town life in of Wheelsy, South Carolina as well as an introduction to Grant and Starla. While Starla  strives the whole movie to be a good wife, Grant is less than chivalrous from the get go. While frolicking with another women he stumbles upon the meteorite and is violently infected by it. It takes control of Grant but he continues act as Grant while it buys meat, kills dogs, and mutates.

Sensing her distance from her husband, Starla contacts town sheriff Bill Pardy (her childhood crush) who attempts to reassure and comfort her while not acting on his feelings.

Grant infects a women with hundreds of his offspring. He hides her in an isolated barn where she becomes massively obese as baby alien slugs grow inside her. Pardy leads a small group of officers on a hunt for Grant, only to be lured into a trap where a massive, swollen blob of a women explodes releasing hundreds of the alien slugs. Most of Pardy's group become infected, zombie-like creatures. The infected begin to want Starla and talk to her as if they are Grant.

Before long, the rest of the town becomes infected by the parasites and are all controlled via a hive mind connection with Grant. During a failed bonding attempt with the girl name Kylie, we learn about the parasite's history and plans to infect the rest of the world. Pardy, Starla, Kylie, and Mayor MacReady make it back to town and decide to kill Grant. Unlucky for them. the townspeople attack their vehicle and capture Starla.

The survivors, Pardy and Kylie, follow Starla only to discover the infected are melding into one giant creature. Starla charms the monster by calling him "Grant" and telling him they can be together, but as they get close to each other, she stabs him in the chest. While trying to infect Pardy with his tentacles  Pardy attaches one to a small propane tank, filling Grant with gas. Starla shoots the monster, causing it to explode. Huzzah!

The Good the Bad and the Gorey
The Good
The Humor
This is a funny movie. I feel like characters react in the same way I would react in that situation, namely, "Holy Crap! What is going on?!" There aren't gallant heroes or conniving scientists, just a bunch of really freaked out people. It's funny to take a step back from the horror movie and remember how ridiculous it all is. I feel like Nathan Fillon's character, Pardy, embodies this ideas the best. He seems genuinely shocked and confused by the bizarre events. You could say he is playing the same role as Mal from Firefly, without so much sass. There are some great one-liners, the Mayor (Gregg Henry) being particularly hilarious. Even Elizabeth Banks is funny as her zombie killing ferocity replaces her southern daintiness. 

The Scares
Don't let the humor fool you, this movie is plenty scary. While most of them are the tried and true scare tactics of classic horror, that doesn't make them bad. The jump-out-at-ya and the ominous-villain-starring-through-the-window are classics because they are good. The heroes are constantly getting cornered by zombies or slugs, cause plenty of tense moments. You'll spend plenty of time saying, "Holy Crap! Get out of there!"

The Gorey
This is a must see for all fan of Splatter Films. I love the gore/special effects of this movie because of the balance between CGI and make up/models. CGI makes gore unrealistic. It's easy to spot and easy to disconnect from. However for fast moving shots like swinging tentacles or slugs pouring out of a giant women, CGI works well. It's hard to call the gore realistic since it's a story about aliens and slugs. Some if has an almost cartoonist style, such as the blob women and the mutations of Grant. But when the gore was meant to be realistic, as in stabbing zombies or eviscerating hunters, it does look real.

Recognition should be given to the make up/model guys of this film for taking on some huge design projects and pulling them off swimmingly.

A behind the scenes look at the Special Effects of Slither. 

My Thoughts on it All
Slither's director James Gunn, is best know for writing the screen play of the Dawn of the Dead remake. It was a bold move to remake a beloved classic, but he pulled it off by understanding the genre. Gunn was able to take the basic ingredients of a zombie movie, add in a dash of personal creativity, and create a new pillar of the zombie sub-genre.

Part of me feels that is what he did with this movie. Gunn said he was inspired by the Splatter Films of the 80's (Evil Dead II, Return of the Living Dead, etc) and wanted to bring back some guts and gore to the horror genre. Now this definitely is a Splatter Film, I also see this as a creature movie.

James Gunn's Own words

http://www.filmthreat.com/interviews/1070/

I love creature movies. As a kid, whenever I went to the video store, they were the fist ones to catch my eye. Since then I've watched a lot of creature movies, some of them good, a lot of them bad. Most creature movies end up as a "b reel" film because of low budget, poor writing or both. But all them have the certain elements of: the creature secretly operating the around humans, the gradual discovery of the creature, the creature's grand revel  and the teamwork that kills the creature. It's a tried and true formula that works.

Slither is meant to be a culmination of b-reel creature films. It follows the same formula but adds in good acting, good dialogue and great special effects. So some people would say that Slither is uncreative or unimaginative and they do have a point. But really, isn't it just refreshing to watch a b-reel movie that is actually good? I see this movie as vindication for the formula that gave me my favorite movies like Tremors, Jeepers Creepers, and Eight Legged Freaks. And making the movie hilarious and fun to watch at the same time just makes it all that much sweeter.

SPOILER FREE REVIEW
Slither  is a Splatter Film that scratches your itch for gore and monsters. The film follows a man infected by an alien parasite and his need to infest others. While the movie does follow a clique horror movie formula  it brings some great humor to the mix. Don't think that just because it has laughs that it isn't scary  With some good jump-at-ya scares and some gory deaths, this movie is plenty capable of creeping you out. With some good acting and some excellent specie effects this movie is a special honor to b-reel horror movies every where. 

Final Grade: B+

TRAILER

Let me hear your thoughts in the comments bellow!

30 Days of Night - Alaska, the new Transylvania?

Click here to jump to the end for a SPOILER FREE REVIEW.

Plot

The Plot, as told by Bunnies.

Up in Alaska the town of Barrow is preparing for its annual month long winter-night. As the town gets ready, a stranger rows ashore from a large ship. He proceeds to sabotages the town's communications and transportation. Enter Eben Oleson (Josh Harrnet) the sheriff of Barrow. He arrests the stranger with the help of his ex-wife Stella (Melissa George).

The stranger prophecies doom and death in an apparently Cajun accent (says imdb) when someone kills the town's power and communications. Out pop a clan of feral vampires, led by Marlow (Danny Huston), who slaughters most of the town. Eben, his brother, Stella and a few others take shelter in a boarded-up house with a hidden attic.

A week passes and the group is still alive and hidden, despite sneaky vampires using survivors as bait. When a blizzard hits, Eben and the others use its cover to get to the general store. They loose track of time trying to kill a particularly creepy vampire, and to find that the whiteout ended, preventing the survivors from getting back to the attic. Eben decides that everyone should go to the police station and provides a diversion by running to his grandmother's house and blasting vamps with some ultraviolet lights. Eben escapes the house and one epic, vampire killing, tractor ride later he makes it to the station. One of the bitten survivors gets his head lobbed off and then it's back to the waiting game.

Bad-A** vampire-killin' tractor

Two weeks later, Stella and Eben see someone signaling them with a flashlight. They investigate and find Billy who has mercy killed his family. But they take him along anyway to the power station to meet up with the other survivors. On the way Stella saves a girl while Eben and Billy chase a vamp, but Stella and the girl have to hide under an abandoned truck; Eben and Billy both make it to the power station, where they find the other survivors. After killing a vampire, Eben is forced to kill a turning Billy in one of the craziest, goriest beheadings ever.

As the month comes to an end, the sun is due to rise soon and the vampires prepare to burn the town to cover their tracks. Realizing he cannot beat the vampires in his current state, Eben turns himself into a vampire via injection with Billy's infected blood. He confronts Marlow and gives him a hay-maker out the back of his head. The vamps back down and Eben saves Stella from the fire. They embrace as they watch the sun rise and burn Eben into ash.


The Good the Bad and the Gorey
The Good
Setting
30 Days of Night brings some strong ingredients to the pot. The setting and theme are the most apparent. The Alaskan landscape is frigid and desolate. The town of Barrow doesn't even have paved roads. Everything there is isolated and entrapped by the freezing weather. Now take that helpless environment and remove daylight, and the scene is perfectly fragile for the looming vampire disaster. And in general I always think it's cool when one of the limitations of a "classic monster" is removed. It makes them that much more powerful and more terrifying.

Cinematography
Now, I'm far from student of photography, but this movie has some really beautiful shots. With the Alaskan snow as a back drop, all of the figures and action pops out with great contrast. At one point the viewer is shown a bird's eye view of the town and the carnage being dealt out upon it. Really cool.

I am a big fan of, what I'll call, the Spielberg-effect. When Steven Spielberg was directing Jaws, his dream was to have a giant mechanical shark to use in every shot. However he didn't have any money for said giant shark robot. Instead he was forced to create the horror of the monster without ever actually showing the monster. It became a relatively common technique in horror and when it is done right, it is truly terrifying. In 30 Days of Night the Spielberg-effect only last till around the halfway mark when everything becomes very in-your-face. But that build up makes for some great shots of people disappearing into darkness. The tease makes finally seeing the awfulness of the vampires that much more awesome. 

The Villains
What I really love about this movie is the Vampires themselves. I've seen vampires of all types, shapes and sizes in the horror world, but these ones hit just the right cord with me. That cord being the freak out cord. Movies often have the very human vampires (The Lost Boys. Let the Right One In) or they might have the demonic monster vampires (from Dusk till Dawn) but 30 Days of Night gives us a spooky medium. 

They are clearly human and seem to have a Gothic/euro fashion sense. Nice dresses and slick suits aren't covered up by winter clothing. The undead don't mind a little cold. I don't know how to say this without sounding like a jerk, but all the vampire actors are funny looking. I should just say that they aren't the traditional beautiful faces of Hollywood, and it's a good thing. It made the vampires feel that much more strange. It made you want to look at them longer, trying to pick out what's wrong.

The facade of humanity they create breaks down fast. Their eyes are black. Black and unreadable, like a shark. There is something terrifying about the inability to track your enemy's gaze. You don't know what they are looking at or where they will strike. When the vampires speak or scream they do it by sucking air into their lungs. It's a great effect. The undead, speaking backwards because their existence is backwards.

Instead of the neat and tidy two fangs of Dracula, these guys got nasty snark like teeth. They look all mangled  like someone took a hammer to a bulldog's mouth. It makes them savage and bloody. But all the while they try and keep it cool. I loved the image of Marlow slicking back his neat hair with the blood of one of his victims. Chilling.

The Bad
Timing
It's hard to make an action movie that takes place over the course of a month. The subtitles actually have to pop up to show you how much time has passed. For a lot of the screen time the survivors are just sitting holed-up in an attic, dinner, police station. In a movie culture of, "Let's go out there and get 'em! EXPLOSIONS " in can be hard to watch a film where the heroes decided just to wait it out. Now that might be more of a problem with plot, but I did just find myself wishing they'd go out and kill so vamps.

Story
Knit picking here. But I wish they would have done more with the human stranger that was essentially a scout for the vampires. Ben Foster is a great actor, but we only get a glimpse of him before he's killed off. I felt it could have added more to the story while offing some more origin explanation for this random group of vampires.

The Gorey
As to be expected of any vampire movie, 30 Days of Night is bloody. The vampires are almost always covered in blood, a result of mauling people with their mangled teeth. There is some good killings of vampires and some sadistic vampire murders. If you are a gore lover though, I doubt you'll be impressed overall (but still check out the beheading at the end).

My Take on it All
Ok, so I know a lot of people hated this movie. A lot of the criticism seemed to point to different points in the plot as "illogical" or "unrealistic" behavior of the characters. Some feel that the plot is pushed or forced unnaturally. Well I understanding thinking a character made a stupid choice, but thinking that a movie is bad because of unrealistic plot choice is stupid. Sometimes the old man wanders off at the most convenient time because we got to move the story along.

And if you don't think it's realistic for the group to spend a week in the attic without food or water, I would have to say, "You're watching a vampire movie dammit!" You're gonna have to suspended some reality in general. And as a general rule for all movies, you have to work with the director. Sometimes they don't want connect all the dots for you. So instead of trying to tear plot holes in movies, try instead to cover them up. Create the justification to make a story work. It makes movies more enjoyable in the end.

But stepping off my soapbox, I really do like this movie. In part it touches on my love of zombie movies. The community undersigned  having to hide and barricade. I just think that's cool. But this movie has decent acting and solid (but perhaps simplistic) plot. Add on top of that a unique setting and the scariest vampires ever and I think you got a really good flick.

SPOILER FREE REVIEW
30 Days of Night takes us to the small Alaskan town of Barrow. The town goes through a yearly darkness for one month, but this year some blood thirsty visitors are coming to town. This movie offers a unique vampire experience. With it's unique setting, it's a story of survival. While it lacks the romance of Dracula, and the heart pounding action of Resident Evil this flick does scare. With some of my favorite vampires ever, I can promise you some creeps and a few jumps. Pick it up for sure.

And in regards to the sequel...just don't.

Final Grade: B

Trailer!

Pontypool - Radio Play Terror

I didn't stand a chance with this movie. Seeing as I share the rather unique first name of the main character, this movie got a lot more real for me, really fast. But I tried to smooth out my shattered nerves and review the psychological horror, Pontypool.

Click here to jump to the end for a SPOILER FREE REVIEW.

Plot
The saga opens with Stephen McHattie’s character, Grant, driving to work through the morning snow and cold. On the way he has the unsettling experience of a women pounding on his car window, speaking a few confusing words, and then simply walking off into the dark Canadian morning. Grant Mazzy is the new radio host of the small Canadian town of Pontypool. Grant doesn't have the greatest opinion of his more amateur gig in isolated Pontypool after his the more exciting shock-jock position he held previously. Nonetheless, Grant begins his morning show with the help of the very lovely Laurel-Ann (Georgina Reilly) and the stern traditionalist producer Sidney(Lisa Houle). After some character-establishing back and forth between the three, strange reports start coming in. Through some dramatic call-ins, police reports, and official alerts, we learn that a murderous riot in spreading in Pontypool, of which individuals are acting and speaking bizarrely. Confused and suspicious of the incoming reports, Grant wants to take a walk, maybe see some of the crisis with his own eyes. They soon discover a growing mob around their building, chanting the words of the radio piped out over loudspeakers. The three lock themselves inside, and go back to the microphone. Sadly, the unrealistically attractive Laurel-Ann starts babbling, and speaking in a trance. At the same time, a plot device is literally dropped into the story, when Dr. Mendez crawls through a window and shuts himself, Grant and Sidney up in the radio booth. Dr. Mendez is connected to the outbreak of a virus in Pontypool. He explains over the radio, that the virus is carried by words in the English language. Infected words infect people and make them drawn to the speech of others. They are so drawn to others, that they try and eat their way into an other's mouth. This zombie-insanity is clearly seen as the infected Laurel-Ann bites at and charges the booth, and then dies. *Tear. After some cerebral back and forth, they decide that a word must be “understood” to infect. The massing horde breaks into the station and surrounds the booth looking for some tasty words. They use the loudspeakers to draw the horde out, but it looks like Dr. Mendez is losing it. But really the doctor is discovering that other languages are virus immune. After killing a zombie, Grant and Sidney hide while the doctor selflessly leads the zombies away. After a good build of dramatic tension, a climax is reached when the two discover a cure is created when an infected word loses its mental understanding. The culmination is a dramatic radio broadcast of the discovery as the military prepares to bomb the station. Grant and Sidney smooch in a rather Thelma and Louise type fashion.

The Good and the Bad
Acting
I am extremely impressed with the overall acting in this movie. Stephen McHattie was perfect for the lead role. With an acting record as long as his, you can’t expect anything other than a phenomenal performance. And Pontypool demanded good acting. The movie is shot in one location, without much movement, focusing on dialogue. McHattie’s leathery, hardened face is transfixing with his sly smiles, genuine confusion, and consuming terror. Strangely, it’s not boring watching a guy simply talk into a microphone for ¾ of the whole movie.
Lisa Houle does a great job as well. She easily brings across her early role, the simplistic and conservative station manager, but really shows off her chops as the crisis grows. Her fear seems real and her despair is consuming.
I don’t know whether the character of Laurel-Ann is simply one dimensional or if Georgina Reily is simply a young actor in this movie, but either way her performance was pretty forgettable. But I’ll forgive her, because she is so pretty and because she made a good zombie.

Cinematography
Again, I’m amazed at what the director is able to pull off with this story. It is very much a bottled-in plot. You could easily turn this movie into a stage performance with a single set. Even with that limitation though, the director hardly uses the same camera shot twice. The framing is dynamic and conveys the confusing and changing developments of the movie. The close-up is used liberally as the tension builds.

Style
The director, Tony Burgess, was clearly influenced by famous Orwellian radio plays like The War of the Worlds. It is a type of drama/horror that is hard to expresses in film, but this movie pulls it off. Simply hearing dialogue and newscasts is more scary than you’d think. The most terrifying moments are when a reporter calls in and describes the insane mob pulling people from a car and ripping them to pieces. Hearing the football player screaming, literally, like a baby gave me shivers. Not being able to see the ensuing chaos adds a new level of terror and fear. I’m a firm believer that horror is more what you don’t see, than what you do see. The things we imagine are much scarier because it adds us into the creative process. In essence, we end up making the monsters ourselves. The radio is a perfect medium for this brand of terror.    

Plot Progression
The style of Pontypool is great for a director because it allowed him to completely control the plot progression. All the information comes from call-ins and broadcasts, so the director has complete control of timing. The timing and pacing of the movie is great. The crisis grows from confusing, disconnected reports. I was so confused when the French alert warned that affectionate words and baby talk were related to the glowing plague.
Our understanding of the plague finally becomes clear at about 1:10 mins. And then there is a bit of a zombie-holdout scenario, a quick cure discovery, and then the movie is over. I thought this was the biggest problem with Pontypool. All build up, with very little bang. I spent an hour plus piecing together this catastrophe, investing emotionally into the characters, and then the movie just ends? Where is the dramatic fighting for our lives moment? Where was the, “let’s use our new found knowledge of the zombies to defeat them”? I wanted more of the classic zombie survival scenario. And it’s probably just because I do love zombie movies so much, but I was left wanting more. This movie gets you all hot and bothered with horror anxiety and then turns out to be a zombie-action tease.

But don't take my word for it. Listen the the director Tony Burgess discussing Pontypool.

SPOILER FREE REVIEW
Pontypool is a George Orwell radio horror for today. If you are a big fan of fast action and bloody monsters, this isn't the one for you. Grant, the shock-jock at a radio station in small-town Pontypool, listens to and broadcasts strange reports of lunacy spreading throughout the community. This movie brings terror through your ears and into your imagination. What you don't see, can scare you. The steady build of anxiety will leave you on pins and needles long after the credits roll. The premise of the movie is entirely unique and will keep you thinking and wondering. Without a lot of violence or gore, this movie could have easily been bumped down to PG-13 if they had knocked off a couple of f-words. But don’t let a low gore movie turn you off. The terror Pontypool creates in your mind is real enough. With quality acting and quality cinematography, this movie delivers the language of fear. 

Final Grade: B

Trailer

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from Dusk till Dawn - Mexican Vampire Strippers?

I doesn’t matter what you are expecting when you pick up this flick, it isn’t going to match up with the the smorgasbord of awesomeness that this movie lays out for you. This film isn’t one for the kiddies, but if you’re looking at horror movie reviews for your children, then what’s wrong with you? Get them something with ponies. Cuz this movie hit’s the Rated-R peddle hard, racing down south for Mexican Vampires.

Skip to the end for a SPOILER FREE REVIEW


Plot
The movie opens in the typical, nonchalant Tarantino fashion. A cop at a gas station, having a normal conversation with the clerk. But things quickly escalate when brothers/bank robbers/fugitives shoot up and then burn down the place. Seth Gecko (Clooney) and his creepy brother Richard (Tarantino) are headed to Mexico after robbing a bank and taking a hostage. After Richard rapes and kill the said hostage, it becomes apparent that the brothers differ in views of criminal professionalism, Seth being the professional and Richard being the psycho. The two end up hijacking an RV belonging to an ex-pastor, Jacob, and his two children, Kate, and Scott. After getting across the border they drive to the desert cantina, the Titty Twister. The seedy trucker/biker stop is where the brothers need to wait for a criminal contact. So the Gecko’s and the RV family grab a table among the thugs and strippers to enjoy the show. All at once, strippers and bartenders transform into demonic, hellish, vampires and start chowing down on all the patrons. The only ones left standing are Seth, the happy family, and two more vampire fodder. Richard thankfully gets what’s coming to him, death. Seth and and the Family fashion some DIY vampire killing toys and face off against the vampire horde. As always daylight comes in the nick of time, but only Seth and the daughter Kati walk out alive. A couple thousand dollars are passed around and everyone drives off into the horizon.  

Here’s what was good
The Casting
No review can be made about from Dusk till Dawn without mentioning George Clooney. The part was originally written for John Travolta, but we all lucked out because Clooney was exactly what was needed. He was the epitome of badd-ass. 50% of his screen time has to be him staring down people over his gun sights. The character is pretty one dimensional to begin with, but Clooney adds depths and believability.

I don’t know if Tarantino wrote a part that he could act, or is simply just a great actor, but either way he was awesome. He was able to pull off creepy, neurotic, and sadistic in a way that should put him on a list of potential mass murderers.

I swear that there must be some universal contract out there that guarantees Danny Trejo a role in any Mexican movie.I liked that they threw a role to Cheech Marin and Salma Hayek, the vampire queen, is hot. Nuff said.

But at the same time there is some terrible choices on the part of the Fuller family. Harvey Keitel is acceptable, but not memorable as the ex-pastor Father. But he was a heck of alot better than his kids played by Juliette Lewis and Ernest Liu. Maybe it’s just because they are next to such great actors and if only we.......no. No they are just terrible.

Here’s why I liked it.
The Directing/Writing
This movie was written by Quentin Tarantino and directed by Robert Rodriguez. Tarantino could have directed it but he wanted to focus instead on writing and acting. So he gave the job to an up-and-coming horror director (and the friendship formed would one day give us Planet Terror) The first half of the movie is written so well, like all of Tarantino's movies. The conversation feels real and natural while still creating memorable, witty lines. For a movie that is clearly meant to be over the top, it never comes across as cheesy or too comedic.

From the Horses Mouth

The Action/Gore
When I watched this the first time I was starting to get annoyed. I was halfway through the movie and hadn’t seen a single vampire. But the action and carnage of the second half more than covers the dramatic first half. Once things start, they do not slowdown for the rest of the movie. The action is clearly meant to be over the top and the guts and gore border on the absurd level. That level of ridiculous gore actually makes it less graphic to me for some reason. Maybe just because it removes it farther from reality. But this show has great costumes, makeup, models and exploding body parts. Anyway you could imagine to kill a vampire is in here, plus a couple new ways you never dreamt up.

I loved the vampires in this one. I get tired of the Nosferatu or Underworld vampires. They are so fancy, drinking blood out of martini glasses. from Dawn till Dusk has some nasty, demonic, spawn of Satan kinda vampires. They are creepy, disturbing, and all around interesting to look at.

SPOILER FREE REVIEW
from Dusk till Dawn is not your typical fairy tale vampire movie. An excellent example of Tarantino cinema, it follows bank robbing brothers as they make to Mexico looking for safety but find just the opposite. If you are a drama lover, you'll love the writing and acting. If you are horror lover, you'll love the Evil Dead style gore-dom. And if you are movie lover then you can't skip this one. It's so hard to find good writing, plot, acting, or action in horror these days, but this movie somehow managed to wrap all those up in a nice little package.

Final Grade: B+

Trailer!

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