Nazis at the Center of the Earth (2012)... the addendum.

NATCOTE Director Joe Lawson sent us this comment/criticism of our review of his movie:

"I'm asking this in all honesty and without snark: Did you watch the movie? Because while you have done a fair review of The Asylum, I would love to hear an honest critique of the film itself... we learn to be better by knowing what works, what doesn't, perhaps even why. Your review provides none of that for the film itself so I find myself genuinely curious to know more than just your reaction to the producer's M.O.. Thanks, I look forward to your thoughts, the good, the bad and the honest! :-) Joe Lawson, Director, Nazis at the Center of the Earth"

He made a pretty great point; our review really was about the Producer's M.O. more than it was about the film itself. So in the interest of fairness, and because he definitely deserves comment on his film, here is an addendum of sorts to our NATCOTE review.

The idea of NATCOTE is an interesting one, and I suppose I didn't go into the plot because with Asylum films, plot tends not to matter much and ends up being totally ridiculous. Asylum movies are about camp and shock for the most part, much like the Troma films of old.

The plot involves group of researchers that discover Hitler's Third Reich hiding under the ice in Antarctica, are captured by the evil Nazi bastards, and forced to treat their various dermatological issues. They have bad skin. The Nazi's also want spare body parts and brains, so really, it's just Mengele doing what he's always done, but this time to usher in a new 1000 year Reich... That's all I got.

Daniel Craig's Dad as Herr Gandalf.

It's definitely an Asylum film, although it's one that is reasonably constrained by its restrictions; small crew, short time and little money. If Joe Lawson had the option of making this movie with more money to improve the bad CGI and was allowed to shoot this film on a more "serious" level, it wouldn't be bad at all. The Nazi's look good, and their motivation is interesting. The story itself is workable, and the direction isn't bad at all. It almost felt like your average genre flick until the tried and true Asylum antics reared their damn head, and brought it all back down to b-level. More budget and more time could have made this the first Asylum movie to not be an Asylum movie, if that makes any sense.

While the cheesy CGI is ever present, I will say that the practical FX work was pretty good. A lot of the skinless Nazis and other bloody FX shots were well done. Some of it even recalled horror movies of old. The Nazi's flying saucer (yes, really) looked pretty good too. Cyborg Hitler I can't budge on though. I mean, come on!

"You're all my Nazi's now!"

For those fans out there who do not like cheesy B-grade flicks, like myself, the original grade of DO NOT WANT still stands.

For everyone else... There is a decent movie here, buried underneath the trappings of its own B-movie schlock; as a b-movie aimed at the part of our fandom that loves the cheesiest of b-movies, Nazis at the Center of the Earth is somewhere around a solid C+. There are lots of people who will dig this for exactly what they think it is, and be surprised when it's better than they expected it to be. In this case, that's above average as b-movie's go, and it should please fans of all that which is schlocky.

This is probably why I don't review many movies along the lines of what The Asylum or Syfy offers us, because films like that are not my taste and they earn my venom outright. Most of the time, they deserve the venom.

In some cases though, what I see as dismissible would be welcomed with open arms by other Horror fans, and so I say nay to movies that might just make those other fans happy. Then again, B-movie fans wouldn't listen to my critique anyhow, as they already know that most cheesy movies are right up their alley.

So, there it is. That was the fair shake. Not my thing, but it is definitely the thing of others, and they should find it pretty enjoyable.

And for the record, this wasn't any sort of retraction or me bending to the whim of an ego-filled director who though his film was better than I made it out to be... on the contrary, Joe Lawson was fine with us liking or hating his movie. He just wanted some honest feedback about it either way, and he was really nice in asking for it, so who in the hell are we to say no to that? 

We're waiting for your next movie, Joe. Next time, more boobs please.

Maybe remake Lolita where she's a vampire, and add in something about karate and the zombie apocalypse... and lesbian stuff.

Nazis at the Center of the Earth (2012)

I absolutely should have known better than to watch a movie from The Asylum and expect anything other than pure junk.

"Researchers in Antarctica are abducted by a team of masked storm troopers. They are dragged deep underground to a hidden continent in the center of the earth. Here Nazi survivors, their bodies a horrifying patchwork of decaying and regenerated flesh, are planning for the revival of the Third Reich."

To be fair, movies like this definitely appeal to the average Syfy movie fans out there, and some people are always up for some "so bad it was good!" type of entertainment. That's cool. As Z-grade schlock entertainment, The Asylum has no equal; they are like the modern day Troma, if you will. Troma, like The Asylum, was never in the business of making good movies. Instead they made cheesy, cheap, bad movies that a generation of genre fans fell in love with. I suppose The Asylum is now filling that role.

Not as impressive as the Hitler Cyborg that shows up later, but still pretty cool looking.

That being said, I really don't understand the whole concept. I get the whole "labor of love" thing, but at some point once you as a company have made some money, don't you want to get into the "labor of quality" business? That's not to say you have to churn out Oscar caliber material or anything, but couldn't you maybe just make things less painfully bad?

Then again, one of our own here at THC eats these movies up like they're going out of style, so meh.

Yes Dominique, it is that bad.

Go ahead and loves these kind of flicks if you want to, but we just can't bring ourselves to stomach them. Bad acting, bad writing, awful special FX... we are not in The Asylum's core demographic.

She might not star in many good movies these days, but Dominique Swain is still a Hottie.

The Cabin in the Woods (2012)

(aka Geek-gasm!: The Motion Picture.)
Release Date:  In theaters now.
Written by: Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard.
Directed by: Drew Goddard.
Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Kristen Connolly, Anna Hutchison, Fran Kranz, Jesse Williams, Richard Jenkins and Bradley Whitford.

Here there be no spoilers. 

There's honestly not a lot we can say about this movie without ruining the experience for you, so we are going to keep plot discussion to a minimum. Cabin is such a good, fun, and unique movie, that spoiling it feels like it would be a sin; even certain single words would spoil the fun for the uninitiated, and that would really suck.

Aside from what we saw in the movie's first trailer, we went out of our way to avoid any and all info on Cabin in the Woods, and that's a near impossible feat for us; we're very curious, and we are even more weak when it comes to avoiding online spoilers.

We're really glad that we went into this one knowing as little about it as we did. The trailers give a lot of the movie away, including some of the character's deaths... so, you should just avoid them altogether.

Here's what we will say: Cabin in the Woods is the story of 5 College Students that head to a cabin (in the woods) for some partying, and things go terribly wrong. Sounds familiar, right? Well it's not... and that's all you need to know. Trust us, just go see the movie and let the story unfold naturally for you.

The Puppeteers.

It's hard to find a Horror movie these days (especially in a Theater, mind you) that inspires as much excitement and fun as Cabin in the Woods does; this movie is to the 2010's what Scream was to the 90's, though Cabin was far less tongue-in-cheek about things. It's definitely got a lot of humor, which works well, but the movie itself operates on a darker level.

There are tons of nods to other movies and myth's that Fanboys everywhere will love. Again we can't really spoil it, but it's like a crazy melting pot full of Horror, Sci-Fi and Fantasy, with a liberal dose of "breaking the 4th wall" thrown in for good measure. There's even an appearance by an all-time genre great thrown into the mix (avoid reading the cast list on to IMDB, because it was a fun surprise for us.)

Those crazy kids!

The script and its story were superb, and had our minds scrambling just to keep up with the scope of it all. Joss Whedon definitely knows how to make we movie geeks froth at the mouth, and we can't wait to see what he did with The Avengers. Drew Goddard is no slouch either; the long time Whedon collaborator delivers the goods with his first directorial effort, and he's going to go on to do more great things, we just know it. They've given us one of the best conceptualized and most sharply written movies of this decade, and there's no end to the praise they deserve for this little genre gem.

Let's take a second to talk about the cast; everyone involved did a great job here, but for us it was Bradley Whitford and Richard Jenkins that stole the show. We're long time fans of Whitford's since his West Wing days, and he really delivers some of the movies best (and funniest) lines. Jenkins is one of the best character actors ever, and he delivers the comic goods too, though a bit more dryly that Whitford. Everyone here was aces.

Boner in the Woods.

It ended. We wanted more, more, more, but we were robbed! We are seriously hoping that when it hits Blu-ray that it's loaded with tons of special features and deleted scenes, because we'll eat them up like people who are real, real hungry! Seriously, we really wish it had run for about 2 hours; the "big" scene near the end could have been 30 minutes by itself and we would have loved it. Also, we need more of Fornicus... maybe let's give him his own movie, right Joss? Drew? Whoever! Just make it happen.

The Strangers?

Stabbing, decapitation, impaling, bear traps, vomiting, bleeding, blood spraying, blood smearing, dismembered corpses, zombie gut-munching, gun violence, and one scene of awesomeness that we won't spoil, that happens during a bigger scene which we wont ruin either, that involves a... horn. That's all you get. There's blood and gore everywhere in this one. It's bloody heaven.

Ooh, a zombie movie... but not.

We actually get to see some titties! There's also some sexy dancing and general whoring by the blond chick, but nothing gets too crazy. One scene involving said whorish blond kissing a wolf's head was... oddly hot. It made us feel creepy and ashamed. And oddly hot.

She is a bad, bad girl.

"More than anything, I just want this moment to end."
"Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck You!"

The A-Team. (Look, it's Fred!)

I know this review makes it sound like we're fellating this movie, and maybe we are, but it was way too good and far too much fun for us to be coy about it. As genre fans, you owe it to yourself, and the filmmakers, to go to the Theater and experience this movie; it's the kind that doesn't come around too often, and it deserves our love. Cabin in the Woods is destined to land at the top of many a "best of" list come the end of the year. It's already at the top of ours. For now.

A+

Joss Whedon sure knows how to fill his movies with hot chicks, and that's the truth! Now if only he got Scarlett to go topless in The Avengers...

Monsters in the Woods (2012)

Let me just say this before anything else; I love Glenn Plummer. His performance in South Central (1992) alone was a thing of beauty, and he's been in a bunch of cool movies since then, and he always holds it down. That being said, why in the hell was he involved with this poop-knuckle of a movie?

Monsters in the Woods is the story of a film production crew (out in the woods) who are doing a few re-shoots for an already completed movie. The director thinks the movie is perfect as is, but the Studio wants more sex and blood or his movie will never be released!

So yeah, it's kind of a meditation on the evil Hollywood Exec killing the creative spirit of the Artist, I suppose?

This being the creative spirit?

Here's where things go all wonky.

When the film crew accidentally kills the director, they decide to finish the re-shoots instead of, I don't know, calling the Police and being glad that they don't have to act in this shitty movie anymore. Yeah. As they try to complete the movie, they are attacked by a pack of "Devil Dogs from Hell" which are spawned by a Vagina Cave. Bravo (Yes, there's a guy named Bravo in the movie), has apparently made a pact with The Devil to kill the film crew and let him take their souls in return for allowing this movie to be made. This crappy, Z-grade movie. Sure.

Then some Angels from Heaven show up and everyone tries to close the Vagina Cave, because it's the entrance to hell.

...and you thought we were kidding.

This movie is just bad. The acting is terrible, even from the aforementioned Glenn Plummer, which is sad. The script... it's nonsensical in plot and dialogue. One Actress asks her fellow Actor "who are you?" and the guy responds "I'm an actor." Come on. It gets worse than that, but you get the point. If you've got no money to work with, you have to make the script tight or don't bother to make the movie. The direction, the production, it's all a shoddy mess.

At least she finally shut up.

It's not truly devoid of anything entertaining, it has it's moments, but they are few and far between and what is bad is bad enough to make you shake your head.  Aside from some hot chicks and a bit of gratuitous nudity, there's really not much to this movie.

At least we get some hot chicks to look at throughout the movie. That's something, I guess.

Nicolas Winding Refn is makin a Maniac Cop Prequel!

*We know this is the poster for Maniac Cop Part 4 or whatever, but it's more dynamic than the original,. so shush.

 
Danish director Nicolas Winding Refn, the man who gave us last year's superb Drive, is making a prequel to Maniac Cop. Now, if you haven't seen Drive, you need to go grab a copy and make it happen now. If it wasn't for I Saw the Devil and The Help, Drive would have far and away been our most beloved movie of 2011. It's just an amazing piece of film making.

After you watch Drive -which you're going to do right now, remember?- imagine the man who created that ethereal, brutally beautiful film, behind the camera on a horror flick such as Maniac Cop... if that prospect doesn't excite you then you're already dead, so R.I.P. lame ass.

Refn is only producing the movie at this point, but rumors are swirling that he may direct. As true horror geeks, we certainly hope he does.

And for the record, we think Ryan Gosling should be the Maniac Cop. Why? Well let me tell you; he's bad ass, that's why. Not only does he randomly break up street fights with his muscles, but he saves innocent bystanders from being hit by cars, by fighting the cars. Not even joking. Peep this video, Ryan is the dude in the blue hat.




You're telling me he couldn't be a cop of the maniac variety? Ha!

Plus, he and Refn are already working on a new movie together, so he almost has to do it, because they are like creative soul-mates now. You watch, he's gonna be all like "That's a crazy idea, you Danish genius! I already patrol the streets of New York... let's do this!"

You watch.

DVD Releases for April 17th

Talk about a crazy amount of DVD releases to choose from, this week is busier than Lindsay Lohan's HJ schedule. That's pretty busy.

This weeks best bets are The Divide and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, both of which were good in their own way; Cassadaga which looks really good, although it's only being released in the U.K. for now; and Maniac Cop and Halloween: Resurrection, which are 2 classic re-releases which are both worth at least seeing if not owning.

This weeks ?'s are 7 Below, Hell's Labyrinth, The Asphyx, The Survivor, and Break... none of which we've seen, but at least look interesting.

This week's worst bets are Episode 50 and Robotropolis. We've seen and reviewed Episode 50 and weren't big fans. Robotropolis... well lets just say the trailer didn't do much to pique our interest.