All Hallows' Eve (2013)

I think the problem that I have with most of today's B-grade Horror cheapo's is that they look really cheap. I know that sounds redundant sounding, but it's not.

In the 80's, Horror fans were subjected to a crazy amount of cheap, shitty, generic B-grade Slasher flicks. That's a whole discussion for another day, but my point here is that as cheap and shitty as they were back then, B-movies were shot on film, so they always had that filmic "feel" to them.

Today's B-movie, especially those of the Horror variety, tend to be shot digitally, which makes them "feel" like my next door neighbor made them with his cellphone camera.

I get why digital is the way to go; it's way cheaper, it's easier and allows more freedom, saves a ton of time and effort... Using digital cameras to film, digital editing, and digital distribution means that filmmakers don't have to go to film school anymore to make a film.

In many ways that can be good. In many, many other ways, that can be bad, because pretty much anyone can make a "movie" these days on the cheap and easy.

I guess that what I'm saying it that while watching All Hallows' Eve, I couldn't help but feel that it would have sucked me in more had it been completely shot on film. I could be way off base with that statement, but I'm allowed to feel my feelings!

All Hallows' Eve is an anthology flick that involves a babysitter and her young charges being terrorized by an old VHS tape. And a clown. Both are connected.

The Wrap- You see, someone slipped an old videotape into one of the kid's bags while they were out trick or treating, and of course the kid wants to watch it, despite the babysitter's concerns that it will most likely contain something creepy and totally inappropriate for younger viewers. Being the worst babysitter ever, she lets the kids watch the tape after one of them gives her the old "bitch, I do what I want!" attitude.

I personally would have knocked the kid across the room with that VHS tape, but that's just me, and it's probably why I don't babysit. I can't be too mad at her though, because she kinda looks like Pam from The Office... which allows her a lot of leeway with me.

Marrying Jim doesn't seem like such a hot idea now, does it Pam!

The first "Story" on the tape is The 9th Circle (which is a short film that was originally available on YouTube.) A cute young girl is waiting in a train station, when a creepy clown shows up. He stares at her, smiles at her, honks a horn, and gives her a flower... which has a bug in it! Then he drugs her, chains her up in the basement (of the train station, because they have those), and she gets raped by a bunch of creepy monsters.

I like that mask.

The next story that Pam Beesly watches (alone this time, as she has sent the kids to bed), is about a cute chick who is all alone in her new house, being terrorized by Aliens. It has no clown, and has nothing to do with the rest of the movie, mainly because ti was filmed to flesh the whole thing out.

Okay.

The last story is Terrifier (another short originally available on YouTube.) A cute girl is stops for gas, and is terrorized by our clown. This clown apparently doesn't like cute girls at all, because all he does is terrorized/dismember/kill them!

I know, right!

Finally, back at the wraparound, we have Pam Beesly being sucked into the clown's world. She's cute and alone (following the established pattern), the kids are in bed, and having watched the entire VHS tape by herself, has apparently drawn the attention of  the clown... oh, whatever.

Maybe next time, don't be a moron. Cutie.

The first thing I thought as I began to watch this movie was "hey, that chick looks like Pam from The Office, mmm!" She was the absolute highlight of this movie.

As anthology flicks go, this one isn't too bad in some aspects; it feels old school (including the score), has a ton of blood and gore in it, and despite its technical woes, All Hallows' Eve manages to deliver some pretty creepy moments, even if they seem to be fleeting.

The aforementioned Katie Maguire, who plays the babysitter, did a pretty good job here, and was also not hard to look at. I'm not mad at Kayla Lian, Marie Maser or Catherine A. Callahan either; all are cute, and all did pretty decent jobs with what they were given to work with here.

You suck as a babysitter, but you're hot, so... call me?

This movie is basically two YouTube shorts put together with a new, unrelated story, which feels completely out of place, and a wrap that "ties it all together." It truly felt like a bunch of things that had been tied together too. Loosely.

As mentioned above, All Hallows' Eve feels rather hollow in its cheapness. It's not all AHE's fault though; the fact that every "smaller budget" Horror flick that comes down the pipe lately feels hollow and cheap in the same way, doesn't help things at all. Watching movies like this over and over again tends to wear on us, and thus, All Hallows' Eve didn't excite us all that much.

The movie also never truly delivers on the scare front. It shows some promise in that department, but most of that kinda fizzles out pretty quickly, and the movie ended up feeling more campy to us than it did terrifying. 

The evil clown and his constant smiling was distracting at times, to the point of detriment for us. The whole "evil people acting wacky" thing has never been very enjoyable for us, and this movie is full of that kind of thing. Had the clown just been creepy and menacing, and left the cutesy shit out of it, we probably would have found him creepy.

All Hallows' Eve also feels rushed in places, mainly because it was.
 

For Christ's sake, stop smiling!

All Hallows' Eve isn't horrible, but it's not very good either. It certainly wasn't as good as it could have been had Damian Leone gone more for atmosphere than he did wit and flat-out gore. Younger Horror fans will most likely find this one creepy as hell, but more discerning Horror connoisseurs (if that's even what we are) will most likely find All Hallows' Eve more goofy than it is terrifying.

D+ 

Katie Maguire and Marie Maser are in this.

10 Reasons that we loved Machete Kills (2013)

If you're sitting down to watch Machete Kills, you know that you're in for a cheesy, ridiculous, insanely over-the-top, and self-aware ride. You're not expecting it to be "good," and you know that you're going to be rolling your eyes in disbelief, more than a few times.

That's what it is though, so it's alright.

Sometimes we need the ridiculous movies of the world just to make us laugh and say "what the hell just happened?"

Machete Kills is nothing more than a bunch of friends getting together to make a silly movie, because it's fun for them to do, and fun for saps like us to watch.

As we did with the first Machete (back in 2010),we've thrown together 10 pictures that best summarize the reasons that we loved this movie.

And just so you know, Lady Gaga was NOT a reason that we loved this movie. She's an awful actress, and a mediocre Pop Star to boot, so, just no.

Danny Trejo is still the man- Dude is 69-years-old, rescues dogs in the snow, and would kick your ass if the mood struck him. He's our hero.

A foul-mouthed, leather-clad Sophia Vergara- TV's hottest housewife lets her freaky side show in this one, and good lord what a great thing that is to witness. Also, the titty guns were pretty neat.

The 4 minutes that Walton Goggins spent on screen- One of the best actors on TV, Walt Goggins is just brilliant to watch in anything he does. Especially in The Shield and Justified.

El Mariachi- If El Hefe (Robert Rodriguez) had a personal El Hefe, it would be Antonio Banderas... which I guess makes him the El Hefe of El Hefe's?

Amber Heard- If I have to explain this one to you, I don't want to know you anymore.

Charlie Sheen as President Rathcock- So much winning. Rathcock, LOL.

Michelle Rodriguez- Even with one eye, she sees into our soul. She's a fine specimen, folks, and a bro too.

Damian Bichir- Hot off of his great work on FX's The Bridge, Damian Bichir goes off of the edge of insanity cliff in this one. Fun times.

The armored El Camino- Because why not take one of the biggest Mexican stereotypes and make it truly bad-ass. P.S. I want one.

Danny Trejo and Mel Gibson in a Landspeeder- Because it doesn't get much more surreal that that.

For the record, we didn't think that Machete Kills was a s good as the first one. It was still goofy, escapist fun, but it felt a bit forced at times, and more polished overall.

That being said, we had a good time with this one, and yes, we'd absolutely put our money down to see Machete Kills: In Space. Because that is quite possibly going to be a thing.

B

The hot chicks still love Machete.

 

41 Reviews for you to start your weekend with!

Sure, they may just be older reviews that we've gone back and reformatted or reworked, but you haven't read them all yet, have you!

There are some good flicks down there, and you know your Netflix queue could use some updating...

Since 2013 marks our 5th year in service to the general Horror-loving public, we felt it would be a good idea to go back and clean up our older reviews; not only have a lot of them lost their proper formatting over the years, but we've changed a lot since the summer of 2008, and a lot of our older work needs some TLC to make us feel a bit more streamlined.

We also really wanted to organize them by decade, so that they're easier for our readers to find and access.

Some of these bad boys are older reviews, and we've changed formats over the years, So you're going to notice smaller pics, colored text, different graphics, etc... We're not going back and changing everything though, just tidying up a bit.

So as always, CLICK THE PICS FOR INFO ON THE FLICKS.