Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever (2010)

Where in the hell to start with this one... I'm going to skip giving this movie the whole review treatment, as it has me really perplexed.

On one hand, Ti West has a great visual flair and truly makes me believe his movies were made in the 70's, which in horror terms, adds to the general ambiance for me. He also has an interesting way about his work, which was suited pretty well to this particular sequel, as he made it feel a lot like Eli Roth's predecessor, and yet made it his own.

On the other hand, this movie was a confused mess and baffled me more than walking in on my sister giving the family dog a red rocket would be.

I know the studio (Lionsgate) re-shot and reworked a bunch of what Ti West original put down on film, prompting him to claim "Alan Smithee" and not want a thing to do with his own flick, and it's easy to see why. Let's leave the fact that the movie basically opens and closes with extended cartoon sequences (the latter bit before the end credits rolled) alone for now, as it's to easy to pick that crap apart. Instead, let's break the films aspects down per usual.

The Good:
-It was VERY bloody, and VERY, VERY gross in many places. As a fan of gore, I loved every second of it.
-I love Ti West's style. Just dig it tremendously, despite its flaws.
-I can't help but get a kick out of Winston, the creepy deputy from the first movie.
- The film's soundtrack was really cool, and even clever.

That's not toothpaste...
The Bad:
-One of the most unappealing sex scenes ever. I thought at first it was going to be a set up to a "prank the fat girl" type of payoff, but then no... the guy was into it... and it was just all very odd and uncomfortable.
-The plot was a mess, as was the way it was edited together. It's pretty straight forward for the most part (tainted water makes its way to school just in time for prom, everyone drinks it and melts), but much of it felt random and didn't make sense/was left unexplained.
-This movie couldn't decide what it wanted to be; funny or intense. In fact, it jumped back and forth several times in its own confusion.

Random gay characters... for laughs? They didn't even do any funny gay stuff!
The Downright Horrendous:
- The ending. First, the story with the two main characters just kind of ends and that's it, rather abruptly. Second, and what makes the first thing so annoying, is that after the main characters drive off, we get a 10 minute follow up scene with the stripper/hooker (same difference), as if anyone cares what happens to her. Lastly, and worse of all, the hooker sequence turns into a cartoon sequence that last for a few minutes, and closes the movie... It was all cheap and shoddy, unnecessary, and I don't blame Ti West for taking his name off of the movie.

I should have fucking watched something else.
The Downright Horrendous II: How does Lionsgate get away with the crap they pull on their own horror movies? They can mangle this movie into the ball of shit that it is, give us a new, uninspired and tired sequel to Saw every October, give big release treatment to crap like Disaster Movie, 46 new Tyler Perry "Comedies" a year, or some painful-to-watch Dane Cook movies, but they continue to bury movies like Blood Creek and Midnight Meat Train for what seems to be no good reason at all. I really wonder what in the hell they are doing over there sometimes.


The Master Says- D- (3.5/10) I think I'm being generous with this grade, and the movie is truly a mess, but the stuff in there that was obviously Ti West's was enough to not make this a total loss for me. Some people will probably love this movie, I can see it coming, but for most others I say skip this one and rent the first Cabin Fever, or even Ti West's House of the Devil instead, and spend your time and money watching a better class of movie.

10 Movies That Shaped My Life, Part 1

So the Warfreak from Olympic Artichoke leveled a challenge at me ( and others) to make a list of 10 movies that changed/shaped my life. Easy task, right? Do I pick horror only, because I could think of 10 movies from the genre that shaped me. Do I just make it a mix of 10 movies that inspired me, or made me who I am today? (Cue dramatic, poignant music.)

Let me think on this while I finish up some reviews and updating the release list, and I'll get back to you all shortly...

The Collector (2009)

"Now this is how it's done."

THE COLLECTOR 
Sub-Genre- Slasher/Torture Porn

Cast Members of Note- Josh Stewart, Andrea Roth, Madeline Zima, Michael Reilly Burke, Karley Scott Collins, and Juan Fernandez as The Collector!

What's it About?- This is a story about a loser named Arkin who is behind on his child support, and decides to steal an expensive uncut gem to catch himself up. He partners with a seedy pimp, scouts out a house, installs their windows, plans a robbery, and basically ruins his entire life in the process. You have to imagine that any guy named Arkin is prone to mess up his life somehow though, right?

Arkin, in red.

After having a tea party with a little girl (at said house he plans to rob) Arkin takes off to downtown Compton for a drank, returns later that night when the house is deserted, and starts safe cracking... only the house isn't deserted! Nope, it seems as if The Collector showed up while Arkin was gone, took the owners of the house hostage, booby trapped everything, and started hurting them in really sick ways.

A really sick way to hurt someone, in Yellow.

With their oldest daughter out on a date, and their littlest girl hiding somewhere in the house, Arkin sets out to free them, find the kid, and get the hell out of the house. Of course that doesn't go so well. The Collector is a pretty smart maniac you see, and once the oldest daughter comes home for a post-date pounding, everything really goes to shit... Not literally to shit, but things do get pretty bad for everyone, which is shitty, so... yeah.

The Collector! (in black)

And so Arkin and The Collector decide to play a game of hide and go seek all throughout the house, with the added challenge of trap dodging thrown in to make things more interesting. Can Arkin find the little girl, save the family, and get the hell out of the house? Are they all screwed? What exactly is The Collector collecting? I won't spoil anything that happens for you here, but suffice it to say that it doesn't quite end the way I figured it would.

What's in the box ?!?

The Good- Not often does a movie come along and truly impress us here at THC, and especially when it comes to me. I don't nitpick ruthlessly, and I try to find some good in everything, but so many films just fall short of what they could be, that it has left me a jaded viewer (wink, wink) after seeing so many horror flicks.

The Collector managed to far exceed any expectations that I had for the movie, and left be a bit breathless when all was said and done. I think the cat-and-mouse thing that went on throughout the movie is what really got me, because it was so good and felt natural where many movies use the same device and it feels forced. Tension is the name of the game in this one, and the level of tension the film maintains throughout is fairly palpable.

It also struck me how the director used so many different colors throughout the movie. Reds blues, yellows... I tried to use pictures that showed the color schemes off a bit to illustrate it visually, because I found it all so interesting. Also, I could be way off base, but I swear that one particular scene was a nod to the color-rich cinematography genius of Dario Argento... It just had to be.

Argento tribute, in blue.

The Bad- I get why he went back for the kid, I mean how could you just leave her to such a grisly fate, but damn he was home free! There may be honor amongst thieves, but that does not include kids! UGH! I would have gone back too, but I still screamed at the screen "No, just run!" He either didn't hear me, or just flat out ignored me.

The Downright Horrendous- I have one nagging gripe about this movie, and that is how in the hell did The Collector have time to set up so many effective traps all over the house, between the time our hero leaves and returns to look for the gem? It's a small complaint, but man there were traps everywhere, and some of them weren't so simple, so it just makes me wonder. Maybe he's just had a lot of practice?

The Gory- Ha! This movie is packed to the rafters with sick, twisted, and copious amounts of blood and gore, and I have to imagine it will satisfy most gore hounds out there.

The Naked- Oh yes, we get to see the sexy Madeline Zima in all of her boob glory, and it is good. Glorious even. Of course, The Collector's meddling ass had to interrupt the sex scene, ruining what I believe would have been full nudity scrumping, and possibly some bondage, but the boobs were a win none the less.

Oh, sweet Jesus.

What did we learn?- Don't steal. Also, never go back for the kid; kids are cunning, they can survive on their own.

The Master Says- A (9.0/10) This movie was packed with so much nastiness and tension, that all I could say after watching it was "Damn!" Not since the first Saw movie have I been fairly blown away by a "fresh" concept and it's execution equally. I'm sorry I missed this one in theaters last summer, but am glad I caught it on DVD. If you haven't seen it yet, you need to snag a copy when it hits DVD on April 6th.

Final Thoughts- Andrea Roth and Madeline Zima are special, special girls... in fact, let's take a look at more Madeline in the post below...


I love her on Rescue Me, even though she's a shrew.

More Madeline Zima (The Collector)

You're welcome.

Pandorum (2009)

PANDORUM
Sub-Genre- Creature/Space Hi-jinks

Cast Members of Note- Dennis Quaid, Ben Foster, Cam Gigandet, Cung Le, Norman Reedus, and the sexy/sassy Antje Traue.

What's it About?- Two spacemen (aliens for all we know) are woken up early from their deep space sleep, to find that their ship is dark and deserted, and that they have the shakes which in space are called Pandorum. I thought this movie was supposed to be about Pandorum's Box, but I was instead surprised to find that it was about deep space and nervous conditions.

One of the space guys, Bower, decides to crawl through a dark and cramped ventilation shaft (which is always a good idea) in an effort to unlock the door they're trapped behind from the other side, but he never quite gets the job done. Why, you might ask? Because of... Pandorum! Just kidding. It's really because he discovers that the ship is now populated with insanely strong and agile creatures that want to eat him, and anyone else that isn't one of them. Along the way he meets a Tahitian Ninja, a hot ninja-like German chick, and a black dude that doesn't trust white people. Who can blame him though? I'm white and I rarely, if ever, trust myself. True story.

She trusts no one! That's how she survives.
The other space guy, Dennis Quaid, stays behind in the locked room and tries to navigate Bower to wherever he needs to go, but he fails too because he finds some crazy guy that want's them to launch themselves into space because he's claustrophobic. I'm not kidding on that one. Launch himself into space. I may be wrong, but floating endlessly through space in an escape tube seems claustrophobic to me too...

I got your tube hanging, punk!
So, Dennis Quaid and Bower both have their hands full, and it doesn't look like either of them are going to be around long. Will Bower and his band or ragtag misfits get to the power core and save the ship in time? Will Dennis Quaid launch himself into space on the whim of a madman? Will any of them survive... Pandorum?!? Yes, no , and maybe. Also, the ending threw me for a loop, although it was a pretty cool one.

This is a Space Waterfall. They actually exist.
The Good- I don't know why, but aspects of this movie reminded me of Ghosts of Mars a little bit, which I also loved. That's fairly misleading, as the two movies aren't very similar at all, but the creatures and the way the acted just brought it to mind... though if anything the movie resembles Event Horizon or Pitch Black more closely.

Pandorum is a dark, interesting little space monster flick, that didn't make me roll my eyes once, even when the ending threw us a pretty big twist like it did. It just worked. Bloody, action packed and tense, not to mention gorgeous on Blu-ray. I also have a weakness for movies where people are aboard space ships traveling somewhere when something goes horribly wrong, and especially those of a horror variety.

I also have a weak spot for Dennis Quaid, who usually stars in some lackluster movies, but whom I like anyway. Here, he does his job admirably along with his cast mates, most noticeably Ben Foster, and I actually liked all of their characters. That's a rarity for me.

Are they suffering from... Pandorum?!?
The Bad- The ending made me a bit mad, because it looks like they have more story to tell, and I don't think it will happen since Pandorum underperformed at the box office. It was one of those "Oh cool... but... that's it? I wanna know more!" Types of endings, and it will always frustrate me unless we get a sequel someday. Good stuff though.

The Downright Horrendous- I personally find it horrendous that this movie came out last August, and I just now saw it on Blu-ray, months after the fact. I don't know why I put it off so long, and I'm sorry I did. I mean, had I seen it when it first hit theaters, I could have had this creepy little fucker haunting my dreams every night since:

Oh how cute, it wants to play!
The Gory- There was a fair amount of blood and gore, and even some slime. Yes, slime. There was even a pretty good karate fight between a ninja and a space monster, which of course ended bloody.

The Naked- Nope. We are on a "no nudity" streak as of late with the movies we've been seeing, and it's starting to suck. Pretty soon I'm going to watch some porn and pretend it was a horror movie, and just write a fake review... OR maybe you could give us some boobs, horror movies!

Best Line- "Maybe this is a bad time to tell you, but the door is open. "

What did we learn?- Dennis Quaid is a little wonky. Always has been. Also, Germany turns out some pretty hot chicks.

The Master Says- B+ (7.5/10) If you like movies like Event Horizon, Alien(s), Pitch Black, or anything starring Dennis Quaid, you'll most likely dig Pandorum. We here at THC are suckers for the whole Sci-fi horror thing, and we pretty much unanimously gave this a big thumbs up. If you haven't already seen it, you should do so when you get the chance. Don't be lame like me and wait for 7 months to check it out, because you deserve a good movie right now!

Final Thoughts- Who is this Friederike Kempter that stole my heart, though she was in very little of the movie?

The Descent 2 (2009/2010)

"A Descent indeed... into the caves of suck."

THE DESCENT 2
Sub-Genre- Creepy Caves.

Cast Members of Note- Shauna Macdonald, Natalie Jackson Mendoza, and some other people that played other parts, whom I'm not going to list.

What's it About?- Picking up minutes after the events that ended The Descent, where Sara escapes from the ground and yells into the sky, she runs off through the woods and proceeds to attempt to car jack some poor rural rube driving done the road, with the help of a decoy deer... and that is the most interesting part of the movie.

Sara is hysterical, to the point that they had to sedate her and put her out. Seconds after they sedate her though, she's awake and answering questions from the cops, looking wide awake and coherent, although she doesn't remember anything. Naturally, with no memory of anything and being heavily drugged, the sheriff just takes her out of the hospital so that she can head back down into the caves to "Show them around." Makes perfect sense.

She looks fine to me.
So the sheriff, his deputy, a traumatized Sara and three rescue workers head down into the cave system via elevator (?!?), hell bent on finding survivors. You know that it's not long before the slimy mongoloids that dwell below find them, and start dispatching them, ripping necks and causing fountains of tomato soup to erupt everywhere.

I'll say no more, mainly because I have nothing nice to say, and leave you with this: worst ending ever! Alright, maybe not ever, but damn if the end of this movie was so bad that I wanted to bash my own face off of the nearest wall until I passed out. I didn't though. I wont give The Descent 2 the satisfaction. Nyah!

Yep, that about sums it up.
The Good- The good.. let's see... it ended? This movie was a disappointment on a massive scale for me, and I'm not sure what I can say about it that's actually good, other than it only ran for about 90 minutes, then ended. Gone is any the magic that made 2007's The Descent such a great and effective horror movie. You know, like a tight script, taut directing, fresh and creepy ideas, and near flawless execution. Here, allow me to rant for you...

Where to start? The premise of bringing a newly traumatized victim of such a tragedy, who is now safe and lucky to be alive, back underground where said trauma took place putting here right back in the face of potential danger, is ludicrous. No cop would do that, and if they did, they suck at being a cop. "She can tell us to go right or left." Really? You need a wounded, mentally frayed amnesiac to help you do your job? Whoever wrote this movie failed. Big time.

The characters were dandy too, though I'm not sure whether their actions or dialogue was more insipid and frustrating. Both were equal I think. Shauna Macdonald overacted, which may be what she was directed to do, but as the film wore on, her emerging tough chick persona was painful to watch. The chick who played Juno (yes, she's alive, and I don't care if that's a spoiler) was even worse, making me face palm myself several times with her over the top insane actions and poses. Again, the script was bad, so maybe it's all on the writing, but the actors just couldn't get it right. I wont even discuss the sheriff and his deputy, as I don't want to sound like I'm just being mean.

This face was made 236 times during the movie.
The gore and violence were laughable, though both were really graphic and plentiful. The blood looked like tomato soup, and whenever someone attacked one of the creatures, the way it was choreographed and shot was at times silly. Even more silly was the way people froze or tried to sneak by the creatures in every other scene; the part where two people magically leap 10 feet into the air, press back to back and climb the walls with their legs was seriously hard to watch. I wanted to laugh and cry, because by that point, the movie was making me sad.

The direction needs to take a shot in the nuts here to, as much of what was on screen just seemed campy rather than creepy, or even dramatic. The movements and the faces characters made, how certain scenes played out, the jump scares and obvious "It's behind you! Turn around!... oh, you turned around too slow and now it's gone..." that happened every 3 minutes were all just shoddy.

Yes, they actually mugged for the camera.
The Bad- There wasn't a thing in this movie that wasn't obvious, cliche, and that you wont see coming from about 742 miles away. Who wrote this script? I can suspend disbelief with the best of them, but this movie was so far fetched and ridiculous with most of its actions, that about 30 minutes into it I was checking my watch (figuratively of course) praying for it to be over. I don't actually wear a watch. You know what I mean though.

The Downright Horrendous- I can't remember the last time I saw an ending to a horror movie that was this bad. Where did that lame-assed twist come from, and what was the point? I literally rolled my eyes and laughed at the same time. Wow.

The Gory- They must have thought that gallons of tomato soup-looking blood and a ton of excessive violence would make up for the fact that the movie sucked so bad, because this one is all sorts of gory. Gross even. At least it might satisfy the gorehounds.

What did we learn?- Sequels often suck. Also, this sequel sucked a lot.

The Master Says- DO NOT WANT. It's as simple as that. This movie was just bad, and embarrassingly so. How they went for a great, fresh original, to a laughably bad and painful sequel, I have no idea. Mistakes were made. Many of them. This movie played like most direct to video messes tend to, but was more painful than any of those end up being, because this one was supposed to be better. It was almost guaranteed to be good, but it just failed. Go watch the first one and forget this debacle even exists.

Final Thoughts- Not even Shauna Macdonald's cuteness could save this one...

The 10 Horror Eyes returns!

We haven't done one of these since early January mainly because our old computer that died, may it rot in hell, had all of our pictures archived on it, and so we were screwed. All of the upcoming Hottie pictures, top 10 list pictures... all gone. It still grinds my gears...

Anywho we are building our stores back up again, and have enough for a few good "Eyes" posts, so here it goes.

Don't ask me why, but I love doing these for some reason.


"One, Two, Freddy's Coming For You..." Eyes (ANOES 2010)
Alone in Infrared Eyes (REC2)
Crazy, Crazy Birch Eyes (She's Crushed)
An Innocent Child's Eyes (Pandorum)
Infected Eyes (28 Weeks Later)
Taking it From Behind Eyes (Growth)
Wikus-Prawn Eyes (District 9)
The "coolest looking creepy eye pictures we've seen in a long time" Eyes (Amer)

[REC] 2 (2009/2010)

This review may contain spoilers for [REC] as well as [REC] 2, so if you haven't seen the first one, proceed with caution...


[REC] 2
Sub-Genre- Infected Demons/Survival

Cast Members of Note- Manuela Velasco, Ferran Terazza, Pavlo Rosso, and Javier Botet.
Directed by Jaume Balaguero and Paco Plaza.

What's it About?- [REC] 2 picks up right where [REC] left off, with a small group of special unit police entering the sealed off apartment building to see what the deal is with the viral outbreak. And what is the deal? Everyone from the first movie is either dead or turned into infected demons, Nina Mederios is still running around hiding in the dark, and I'm still crapping my pants watching all of the exploits.

Creepy, creepy, creepy.
This time, the Vatican has sent one of its holy soldiers to investigate the goings on, and to collect a vial of Mederios blood in hopes of creating a cure for the demonic virus. That's right, they have to search through the entire, dark, demon filled building and find the creepiest demon of them all, corner her, and take a blood sample. You see where this one is going, don't you?

Go ahead, tell him no.
As you might expect, things don't go easy at all for our heavily armed police squad, and just when all hope seems lost... Angela shows up, alive! Yes, she survived the first one (which they explain, and it makes sense), and now she's back to get some revenge with a shotgun and a will of steel! I love tough chicks.

Bad girl with a gun!
Will Angela help the Padre to get his demonic blood sample? Will a gang of creepy demon kids wreak havoc and kill everyone in the building? Will Nina Mederios find a way to escape the apartment building and plague the earth with her demonic virus? I don't know actually, I was hiding under the bed when it ended... Don't judge me.

It just doesn't look good for them...
The Good- [REC] 2 was better than the first one, and I loved me some [Rec]. the sequel takes us deeper into the story, explains a ton, and proves my theory about the first one right... it was demonic possession! take that, chat room people that called me crazy! Ha!

The creepy kids and the scenes where the priest talked to them, the crawlspace, and the whole infrared thing were just great. The whole thing had me creeped out and on the edge of my seat, and that is quite a feat for any horror flick to pull off these days.

The Bad- God were those teenagers annoying or what? I get that kids do "crazy" and dumb things because they don't know any better, but once a S.W.A.T team and guns are involved, it's time to stop acting like a moron and go home. You don't sneak into a quarantined apartment building under armed guard, just because it sounds like fun, and if you do, you deserve everything that happens to you.

Dummies.
The Downright Horrendous- I am not getting up in that crawlspace. I don't care what's up there, what orders I'm under, or if you put a gun to my head and tell me to "get up there or die"... not happening. Do you know what's up there? Neither do I, and that's exactly why I AM NOT GOING UP THERE!

The Gory- This one is bloody and violent enough to satisfy your cravings, I promise. Especially if you like shotgun violence and things like random puking of blood. Good stuff.

The Naked- Ugh... no! Manuela Velasco needs to be naked! Damn these high brow horror movies that think they can focus on plot and atmosphere, and not show any boobs! How dare they!

What did we learn?- Never trust a priest. Also, leave the damned lights on at all times!

The Master Says- A+ (10/10) We don't often hand out the A+ grade here at THC, because to most people that grade implies perfection, but I can't see giving it anything less. This is exactly how a sequel should be; better than the first one. Plain and simple, if you liked [REC], I can't see how you won't like this one even more. It's creepy, bloody, and executed almost flawlessly. We get answers, new questions, and a pretty good twist... See it. See it now.

Final Thoughts- Donde esta Fuego gracias hot! I don't even know what I just said, but you get the point.