Review: The Devil's Rock (2011)

"Now this is how DTV Horror flicks should be done..."

*On DVD now, in the U.K.

It's not often that a Direct-to-DVD movie (at least it's DTV here in the U.S.) makes us happy. I'm talking truly happy, as in being glad we watched it, as well as feeling a bit bummed that it was over. The Devil's Rock is one of those good ones, and after enduring so many clunkers lately, boy was it ever needed.

The Devil's Rock is the story about two Kiwi Soldiers (Kiwi's are New Zealand people, not living fruit) sent to destroy a Nazi anti-aircraft gun encampment on one of the remote Channel Islands.

Right off the bat I'm intrigued here, as Nazi's and Horror tend to mix very well; Outpost, The Bunker, Below, Blood Creek, Dead Snow, The Keep... all great genre flicks that involved Nazi's, and some aspect or another of the Occult.

I never thought I'd want to put the words sexy and Swastika in the same sentence, but...

At the start, it's a pretty tension-filled War flick, with our Kiwi Heroes paddling a canoe through hostile waters, navigating a heavily mined beach, and storming a fortress filled with what we have to imagine are a bunch of evil Nazi's... then they hear the screams, and things go from tense to creepy. Being bad-ass commandos though, they keep right on going, which turns out to be a pretty horrible decision for them.

Is she Axis or Allies?

They split up (good plan), with one of them heading inside for a "closer look." Inside, there is only darkness, and of course the screams, which are coming from said darkness. There are also dead Nazi's everywhere, who look to have been torn a new asshole by a meat grinder of some sort, which isn't all that far from the truth. There's also a creepy Nazi dude who is still alive, who has spell books and has been drawing pentagrams everywhere. Also, there's a sexy girl chained to a wall.

You know everything is about to go to hell from here on out, right?

There's really nothing about this film that is lacking. The story is great, the atmosphere is tense and creepy, and there's a good amount of blood and gore. Something about creepy movies set in bunkers always seems to work. Nazi bunkers, even better.

Sexy Demon.

The most notable thing about TDR is the fact that it's so effective while being so sparse; there are only 4 characters in the movie (not counting a few dying Nazi extras, and the corpses of course), and most of the action takes place in only a few rooms. It's a good example of good filmmaking on a smaller budget.

Looks like a scene from a romantic comedy, doesn't it? Well, it's not!

The thing that put this one over the top for us is the Demon; we bought into her creepy taunting and also loved it when she had an orgasm from bloodletting. How can you not love that? She also has a voracious appetite for human flesh which proves rather enjoyable to watch. Sexy former Power Ranger (lol) Gina Varela does a good job at being both seductive and menacing in this one. The rest of the cast, small as it was, did a good job too, but she was definitely the standout.

The Demonic "O-face" is a new one by us.

If we could say anything bad about the movie, it's that the CGI, when used, was not the best. That's an Ironic statement considering the director was an FX guy for WETA on all kinds of good movies. It's not bad, but just looks more on the inexpensive side of things. Also, a longer running time would have been nice. Then again a longer running time may have made the movie meander too much, so that one really shouldn't count.

Death has never looked so sexy.

The Devil's Rock is a great little Horror movie. Short and to the point, it delivers both the interesting and the creepy goods. Director Paul Campion handled this one so well, we think he needs to make a sequel. If the awesome last shot of the movie doesn't beg sequel, I don't know what does.

It's available right now on DVD in the U.K., it's hitting Canada's Fantasia Fest on 8/3, and will be released Theatrically in NZ on 9/22. Whichever way you see it, just see it whenever you get the chance.

B+

Gina Varela is the sexiest Demon ever. Jennifer Grace Smith in this too, though only for a second.

 

Review: Buried (2010)

"The idea of being buried alive now scares me as much as jumping from a plane does..."

Cast Members of Note- Ryan Reynolds is the only person in the film, though Samantha Mathis and a few others do lend voice support.

All there is to say about the plot of this movie is that Ryan Reynolds is a truck driver in Iraq, and he wakes up to find himself buried in a coffin-like box, in what he assumes is the desert. Alone in the box with only a lighter and cell phone, the entire movie is spent with him making calls to various people, in a desperate attempt to get himself some help.

As the movie progresses, and the plot unravels, it looks more and more like he's screwed.

To say anymore would be giving too much away, and with such a limited array of things that a tightly-plotted film like this has to work with, it's best to leave the details to your eyes for watching.

"Hey hun, it's Scarlett... I want a divorce."

"A guy trapped in a box for 90 minutes" sounds like a tough sell for a movie these days, but then again so did "A girl and her autistic brother trapped in a house during a hurricane with a hungry tiger." I'm happy to say that just like Burning Bright, the story of Buried worked extremely well in its limited confines. *No pun intended. Honest Injun.

This one man-in-a-box show had me tensed up and anxious without ever realizing that I was. At first I thought it to be decent and clever, but as the movie wore on it gripped me hard, eventually getting me so bunged up that I was ready to jump out of my seat and throw a karate kick into the air. You might not believe that such a simple premise can be so effective, but trust me, it is.

Ryan Reynolds does a great job with limited movement or other characters to interact with. It didn't take long for me to forget he was the funny actor, and believe that he was a hopelessly trapped regular guy, desperate to find someone to come help him. This is how you do suspense, folks. Nice job, Rodrigo Cortes.

Method-acting goodness.

The end. I will say no more.

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**SPOILER ALERT** (Skip this part if you don't want a pretty big plot point ruined for you.) I know this movie made some statements about a few different issues, but the biggest of them all was the way that Big Business throws the little man to the wolves. So a truck driver is ambushed, kidnapped, buried alive and held for "ransom" somewhere in Iraq, and the head of personnel for his company fires him while he's buried alive, to avoid culpability and paying out any type of damages or insurance to his family? There was no "we will get you out of this" or "we will take care of your family, don't worry," only "we're going to make up an excuse to fire you, because we can't be held libel for this shit." Wow. A strong message indeed, and sadly, a very true one.

Sadly, it ends like that for most people.

Ryan Reynolds cuts off a digit, but that's about it.

Nothing to see here, folks.

"Okay, fuck you."

Don't drive trucks in Iraq. Also, your boss most likely hates you.

Also, maybe conserve your oxygen.

If you want to tense up for about 90 minutes and feel true, hopeless despair, then Buried is the movie for you. I have to say that if you're claustrophobic, even mildly, this movie will probably give you a panic attack; I'm not so bad with tight spaces, and I found myself a ball of nerves for nearly the entire running time. Ryan Reynolds in a box for 90 minutes seems like a lame concept, but he and the filmmakers deliver the goods with his one. See Buried asap. If you're so inclined, that is.

A

Buried is available now on Blu-ray, and VOD.

The voice of Samantha Mathis is in this.

Review: Blood Creek (2010)

"Who doesn't love a good story about a Nazi necromancer and a herd of zombie horses?"

Cast Members of Note- Dominic Purcell, Henry Cavill, Michael Fassbender, and Emma Booth.
*Directed by Joel Schumacher.

During WWII, a German family living in America is bribed by the Third Reich to let a Nazi scholar come and live with them on their quaint little Town Creek farm. It turns out that the scholar is in search of a rune stone that is buried on their property, and wants to use it to turn himself into a Super Nazi bad-ass. Subsequently, the family is trapped on their farm (which is frozen in time) and put through hell for the next several decades.

"Ich liebe untoten Pferde!"

Fast forward about 70 years, and we meet Evan; an EMT with a heart of gold (?), who lives near Town Creek. He's been a mess ever since his brother Victor disappeared while they were camping together 2 years earlier... my question is, how do you stay lost in the woods for 2 years? That shit is beyond me, but when Victor suddenly shows up in the middle of the night looking like Dan Haggerty on crack, the two of them head back to Town Creek to get revenge on "Those Kraut Bastards" who have been keeping him a prisoner all along.

For the love of God I hope he's planning to shoot Channing Tatum.

The problem is, "Those Kraut Bastards" have a Super Nazi bad-ass Necromancer with a thirst for warm blood locked in their cellar, and when he gets out, they're all pretty much destined to die painfully. Can the brothers defeat the evil Nazi Sorcerer? Will Zombie Horses nip a guy in the shoulder and pull him through a window? Do the words "bone armor" make anyone else laugh as much as they do me? Maybe, yes, and they just have to.

Bone armor... lol.

I am absolutely astounded at how good this movie was. First and foremost, I loved the premise; the Nazi's sent "Scholars" to America to find ancient rune stones, hoping to harness their Occult powers to win WWII, and thus rule the world. If that isn't creepy, I don't know what is, especially since the Nazi's actually were into the Occult.

The Occult aspect of this movie is its strong point. Magic rune stones, reanimated dead people (and animals), blood rituals, wards painted on the house to keep the evil at bay, people frozen in time, the Lovecraftian "third eye," and those creepy Necromantic spells that the Nazi whispers... It was just all really, really cool.

I actually felt tense during much of this film, and especially once the Super Nazi shows up and starts kicking all sorts of ass. The guy can reanimate anything dead to do his bidding, which makes things all the more interesting. Zombie Horses, y'all. Yep. Bad ass.

It's nice to see Joel Schumacher making a strong return to the Horror genre; after all he is the guy that gave us The Lost Boys and Flatliners. And two horrible Batman sequels... anyway, welcome back, Joel.

*Addendum- This movie features a pre-Superman Henry Cavill and pre-Magneto Michael Fassbender, which is kinda cool.

Yeah, this actually happened.

Zombie Horses. Not only are they huge, mean, and very creepy to look at, but they are near impossible to kill. If they don't die after 10 shotgun blasts, I'd quit shooting and run. Or, I'd turn the gun on myself.

Zombified and under the control of an evil Nazi Necromancer, Butternut tried to rape everyone in the cabin, earning him a hide full of buckshot and a heart full of shame.

After a few title changes and basically no promotion whatsoever, Lionsgate dumped this movie into a handful of Dollar Theaters and then banished it to Straight-to-DVD hell. Why? Did anyone see The Stepfather, Whiteout, or Sorority Row? They all got Theatrical Runs, decent promotion, and they all sucked. Badly. Blood Creek is a great little movie, and I refuse to believe it couldn't have made enough $ at the B.O. to justify even a Limited Release... and no, Dollar Theaters do not count. I just don't get it.

Then again, it's not like this movie is Superman or something...

This one is a Gorefest; blood-drinking, bloodletting, torture, bone-knives through chins, all sorts of shotgun violence, Zombie Horse violence overkill, dog stabbings, zombie violence... there's all sorts of messy goodness to be found here.

Ouchie.

No.

Was it rape?

"That's mine" or "No. You're going to feed me."

Zombie Horses are really hard to kill. Also, Evil Nazi's never die, which means that Hitler is probably a zombie somewhere in Guam or something. Great.

Fassbender.

This movie was as enjoyable as any I've seen lately, and the best Horror flick of the year so far. Creepy, tense, interesting and bloody as all get out, Blood Creek is far better than its treatment by Lionsgate would have you believe. If you love Nazi's, zombies, or just have a love for the Dark Arts of Necromancy, then you'll love this movie. You definitely need to rent this one, if not buy it, as soon as you get the chance.

A

Blood Creek is available now on DVD and VOD.

Emma Booth is in this. *Apologies to Emma Booth for our originally mistaking her for Winter Ave Zoli. Hey, they do look kinda similar...