Review: Left Bank (2008)

"I really never knew that Belgium had it in them to make a good horror flick, but now I do..."

Cast Members of Note- The adorable Eline Kuppens, Matthias Schoenaerts and a bunch of other Belgian actors.

Marie is a hot Belgian track star who is training for the biggest meet of her life when she meets a mysterious and wet guy named Bob, in her local locker room. He pulls the old "hey, I'm wet and naked, got a towel?" routine, and she totally falls for it because she seems to be horny and a bit easy to get in bed.

Yes you're a whore, no sense in moping about it though.

After the two of them have sex in every way possible, she decides to move in with him, where they proceed to have even more sex in every way possible, again. I guess she just doesn't like her first dates to end? This certainly isn't going to help her win any track meets.

"Oh you silly boy, I'm never leaving... ever!"

Soon enough though, things go from blissful and orgasmic, to painful and creepy, as not only does she begin to grow suspicious of her new living arrangement with her dream guy, but she starts to secrete powder from her lady parts, and she sprouts a festering knee wound that looks like she's turning into a zombie or something. STD's are no joke. Maybe this is a good lesson about the dangers of casual sex.

Trust me, it gets way worse than that.

Is Bob some creepy killer? Are Bob's neighbor's creepy killers? Who the hell names their kid Dirk? I don't want to spoil too much more for you here, but suffice it to say that Marie finds herself in some deep doo doo from which she may not be able to escape, and the ending absolutely threw me for a loop.

Now that's one creepy little hole.

It's not hard to imagine some creepy shit like this going down in Europe. I mean when you think of the term "Old World," you have to think of Europe, and if something ancient and evil exists in the world, it just makes sense that it exist there, doesn't it? This movie plays along the lines of Rosemary's Baby or The Wicker Man, with a quiet, gloomy old world "village folk" kind of feel to it, which I really dig. This was a pretty cool movie, and aside from the ending, I was into it the whole time. It's bloody, gross, creepy, interesting, the actors did a good job, and it looks great, thanks to its Belgian locales... but what's with the babies? The theme of rebirth is obviously prevalent here, but I'm not sure as to what the whole point was as far as some of the actions that theme caused. I'll need to watch it again to straighten it all out in my mind, and that won't be so bad, because I liked it.

Is this the gateway to Hell? Hmm...

 

Ok, so was this a movie about midwives? I really thought it was heading one way, and then at the end it totally flipped itself on its ass and did something that left me dumbfounded. I don't want to spoil what happens for anyone, I'm just saying that I don't completely get it.

Was she abducted? Zing!

For the love of all that is holy, what in the hell was that stuff coming out of Eline Kuppen's cooter? Gunpowder? Don't even get me started on the hairy knee wound either. And for that matter, what's in the effing bowl ?!? WTF?!?

And what's with the archery?

There were all sorts of nasty, gross and cringe inducing things in this movie, and yet the violence wasn't over the top for the most part. Blood, puke, discharge, festering wounds, and arrow violence... neat, huh?

Thank you Belgium for delivering on the T&A, and graphic sex scenes that Horror so desperately needs more of. I'm talking full frontal nudity here, and the hot Eline Kuppens even shows her Flemish Cap! (see what I did there?) She looks pretty good all greased up and naked, that's all I'm saying.

I swear they were really doing it.

Never butt into other people's domestic violence disputes. Also, dating just isn't worth the crap you have to go through.

Then again, she is a total QT...

 

Left Bank was a really good movie, both in look and tone, and it certainly had its gross-out moments and tension-filled bits, but I have to admit that the ending left me wondering what in the hell it was all about. It was a great experience, I was just surprised to find myself scratching my head at the end, as what I expected to go down never really did. Kinda. Give it a look-see, and feel free to tell me what it was that I missed at the end.

B+

Cute little Eline is not scared to be naked at all, and for that, I give her all kinds of mad props.

Review: The Stepfather (2009)

Another in a string of pointless remakes, The Stepfather is a glossy, stylized, well-cast movie that lacks just about everything that made the original so damned awesome.

As far as remakes go, it's near impossible to re-do anything that's unique or iconic, because you just can't capture that kind of lightning in a bottle twice. In this case, that missing lightning is painfully apparent with the absence of Terry O'Quinn. There is an intensity and a creepy air of underlying menace that lives inside of Terry O'Quinn, and he can emote in so many different ways, and do so beautifully and effortlessly when he needs to. Subtly, even.

But this guy?

Trying to replace him with the guy from Nip Tuck though, is just wrong. No offense to the Nip Tuck guy, because he's pretty good on that show, but but he just doesn't have what it takes to pull a role like this off, especially when he's following in the shoes of a guy like O'Quinn. There's just nothing menacing about him, and it's really hard for us to accept him as being dangerous or frightening at all.

Amber Heard is good here, as are Sela Ward, Paige Turco and Jon Tenney, but they are working with very little along the lines of good material, which pretty much renders them useless, and leaves them doing little more than spinning their on-screen wheels.

You could argue that the only reason that the 1987 original was so effective, was because of the performance of Terry O'Quinn alone. He pretty much makes LOST perfect for me every week, and it's because he seems so damned likable and sweet, and yet he can switch on a dime to dangerous and creepy. Just look at the picture below.

See what I mean? .

In short, this remake lacks the thrills and tension needed to make the story a good watch. It's got jump scares, and an unconvincing lead, which make it even worse. Maybe if there had been no original movie that was so good on its own... but there was. You should really just go rent that version instead.

Right.

Hollywood's biggest mistake when it comes to Horror movie remakes is that they think that they can update and water down old ideas, and the teen demographic will just flock to them in droves. I can see how some things could use an update, and how audiences may appreciate a classic tale in a new form every now and then, but you can't forget to include the elements that made the original so compelling in the first place.

That is the story with this bland, tepid remake. It's shiny and flashy, but it just doesn't have any teeth.

Sela Ward and Paige Turco are still pretty hot, and you already know about Amber Heard...

Review: She's Crushed (2009)

I hate ripping on lower budget movies, mainly because I imagine that a lot of heart and effort went into making them, even when they suck.

You can tell that they tried with this one (the writer, director and actors), but it just failed miserably. This movie does everything exactly the opposite way that Fatal Attraction did them back in the 80's, like sucking for instance. I say this, because it's obviously a Fatal Attraction clone in most ways, but it has NONE of the same qualities about it, not even the bad ones.

Some scenes in this movie were unintentionally funny, which is never good for a Horror flick. The main chick who is "crushed" overacted terribly. Maybe in the hands of a director that could have coached her better, she could have been decent, but it was tough to watch. For the record, and so as to not single any one actress out, none of the women in this movie seemed to be all that good.

"Um, like... hello?"

The main guy was decent, and the other guy was pretty funny, but the girls... it was all overacting and mumbling the lines. Really. Did the girls have odd accents, or were they just slurring? For gore lovers, this movie is a blood soaked gem, though as I said before some of the scenes were laughable, and especially the fighting/wrestling/torture scenes. Still, gore fans at least have something to enjoy. On a positive note, there was at least one really hot naked chick on display here, and in a movie this bad, that's a big plus. That's it, I will say no more. I don't want to seem overly cruel here. For most people, this movie is better skipped than watched.

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As I said above, it looks like everyone involved with this movie really tried to make it good, but in the end it just comes off as being amateurish and uncomfortably bad.

Natalie Dicksinson is bloody hot... heh.

Review: Mutants (2009)

"Pretty tasty, but not very filling in the end..."

Sub-Genre- Viral/Zombie/Post Apocalyptic Directed by David Morlet.
Cast Members of Note- Helene de Fougerolles, Francis Renaud, and a bunch of crazed, French mutants.

Believe it or not, this is a movie about relationships. Sure, the main relationship in question is between a woman and her infected, soon-to-be zombie/mutant husband, but make no mistake... it's a love story!

Now they are a cute couple!

Sonia and Marco are a married couple trying to survive in a world filled with rampaging mutant zombies. Along with a masculine French Army chick, they drive around real fast in an ambulance, argue with each other, shoot mutants, and roll over everything in their path, not even bothering to stop for humans. In a world gone mad, I'd run 'em all down too. Truth be told, I'd run most of them down now, if it were legal...

An accurate depiction of the human race?

When Sonia moronically insists on breaking their "us against the world" rule by bringing a stray mongoloid kid along with their little group, the ensuing argument leaves everyone dead save for her; the problem is though, not only is her hubby shot up pretty bad, but he's been infected (yes, by the charity-case mongoloid), and he has about three days until he becomes a mutant. Three painful, agonizing days.

"I love you."

Holed up in a hospital, Sonia takes care of her husband and attempts to give him dignity in his last days. She hugs him, rubs him, says she loves him... even after he tries to rape/kill her in a half-mutant rage. Will they survive? Will true love prevail? Was this movie one of Oprah's book's of the month? I think it was actually, and I usually hate any book that Oprah recommends.

This is what doing the "right thing" gets you.

 

Oddly enough, Mutants plays as much like a romance as it does a Horror movie in some aspects, and it at least adds an interesting angle to the tired "infected" sub-genre. I know I tease about how it's a love story, and it's really not chick-flicky, but there is definitely a vein of relationship drama throughout.

The mutants themselves were pretty neat; all creepy looking and blood-hungry. Overall it was a pretty decent flick, though for some reason I was expecting more from it in the way of horrific set pieces and tension. It looks gorgeous too, set in a remote and snowy location, which I am a true sucker for.

Is that supposed to be a turkey?

Why is it that when finding someone in an old gas station or something, there's always one asshole in the group who says "We can't leave them behind" or "They're coming with us." Wow, that's really nice of you, but those are the kinds of decisions that leave your Army expert dead, your husband shot/infected, and you basically screwed. Leave the stragglers alone to fend for themselves. It's called natural selection.

Unless those strangers have guns, then, be very nice to them.

I'm all for love, and not abandoning the ones you love even in the worst of times, but when your spouse is slowly turning into a mutant zombie, I think it's time to sneak away and go on with your life. And no, that's not insensitive of me, so don't judge!

Especially don't judge me with a gun. Please.

Ambulance violence, tooth extraction, blood vomiting, pissing blood, multiple acts of gun violence, and all sorts of infected zombie violence. This one is pretty violent and bloody.

The FX in this one were great.

Non.

When your partner is turning into an infected zombie, you have to just walk away...

...or maybe run.

This was one of those half and half movie-going experiences for me. One one hand, the movie was gorgeous to look at, bloody, and the infected mutants were cool. On the other, the plot was lame, frustrating, and I ultimately just wanted to see everyone die, because that's all the movie really had to offer me in the end. If you like movies like 28 Days Later, or if you love chick flicks, then you might enjoy this one as well.

C

Mutants is available now on DVD.

She looks much better with longer, blonder hair.