Skyfall
Exciting, refreshing and beautiful to look at. Skyfall guarantees Bond will live on to drink martinis, seduce beautiful women and jump over komodo dragons for years to come. The film is dark, foreboding and features another sure to be Oscar nominated turn from Javier Bardem. Skyfall focuses on new beginnings, characters and introductions. It also brings back the Walther PPK which has been tweaked in the 2012 age.
It hinges on a serious tone that occasionally allows glimpses of cheeky humor associated with the Roger Moore era of 007. The film focuses on what happens when Bond gets old and the world isn’t so small. It also proves that Daniel Craig loves being shirtless.
Sam Mendes provides a confident directorial presence as he guides the film from character moments to huge explosions. The characters are believable and new additions are introduced to carry Bond into the next generation. The new Q is neat, The new M is inspired and the women are strong three dimensional characters who may or may not be killed by the charms of the super secret agent.
It is hard for me to write this review because I do not want to provide any spoilers. The film is a roller coaster ride that brings Bond back to his cheeky roots and but still manages to be a serious reflection on what Bond means nowadays. I don’t want you to know the twists and turns because they are what make it such an unexpected ride after the painful Quantum of Solace. It has a similar vibe to The Bourne Legacy which introduced characters with care and occasionally ended up on dirt bikes. The movies are completely different but you see the care taken to provide an intelligent script which doesn’t pander to the lowest common denominator of action fans. There are big chases and quiet moments that show a firm understanding of what made the other films so popular.
The supporting cast is loaded with people I want to see more of. Javier Bardem better receive an Oscar nomination. Ralph Fiennes is great but I kept wishing he would channel his character from In Bruges. I will watch Naomie Harris in anything after 28 Days Later and Tristram Shandy. Finally, Ben Whishaw is a welcome Q after Jon Cleese effectively put the role in a headlock of cheeky death.
Check out Skyfall, Forget about Quantum of Solace, Watch out for komodo dragons
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John’s Horror Corner: The Kindred (1987), tentacle monsters done right!
MY CALL: I loved this movie since childhood, back when it mildly unnerved me around age 11. Classically simple story, good deaths, a cool monster and serviceable effects leave this movie dying for a worthy DVD release. Very satisfying 80s horror! Every bit as good as I remember from 20 years ago. [B] IF YOU LIKE THIS WATCH: Slither (2006).
John’s geneticist mom (Kim Hunter; The Planet of the Apes movies) is on her death bed and demands that he go to her cabin and “burn the Anthony journals” and all of her research to “end the experiment” because “who knows what he will become.” Who is Anthony? His brother!?!
John (David Allen Brooks; Manhunter, Jack Frost 2) is also a researcher doing something with “rogue proteins called prions.” He works in the same building as his mother and Dr. Lloyd. He seeks Dr. Lloyd’s advice about “Anthony,” probably a mistake, and mentions cleaning up his mother’s experiments. Dr. Lloyd is suspiciously interested…dun dun dunnnnnn. Then Dr. Lloyd confronts mom. He’s a bad guy who wants to finish her experiments, which he has just discovered to exist.
Dr. Lloyd (Rod Steiger; The Amityville Horror, Mars Attacks!) conducts weird experiments on skinless cats and gets other subjects (i.e., human brains) by shady means. We find that his work results in the creation of ugly, slimy, blistery-oozy skinned mutants that happen to love to eat fresh, screaming human flesh. The nasty gore effort is clearly already evident in the first 15 minutes. Sadly, for whatever reason, we never see Dr. Lloyd’s mutants again.
Yet another molecular biologist/geneticist Melissa (Amanda Pays; Leviathan, The Flash) was always inspired by John’s mom’s work and joins John to the cabin after meeting him at her funeral. She claims to be his mother’s biggest fan—because geneticists are known for the loyal fanbase. She and John really hit it off, so well that you wouldn’t know John had a girlfriend. Melissa turns out to be saucy trouble and she comes with her own intriguing secrets.
The house is nothing special. His old bedroom has been transformed into an elaborate Frankensteinian alchemy lab and he finds some old recordings (a la Evil Dead). His dog encounters a weird tentacle thing that is prehensile—poor dog. This long, thin tentacle evidently probes for food. The monster uses these tentacles to evidently impregnate a watermelon with a mass of slimy tentacles which later hatches and attacks one of John’s colleagues in her car by going all Evil Dead tree-rape-y on her; restraining her limbs and body and plunging tentacles into her orifices, down her throat and under her skin. This little, slimy squid monster reminds me of the tentacular assault from Species.
Facehugging tentacle monsters…because isn’t that what happiness is all about?
So who’s Anthony? We learn that Anthony is a “hybrid” of some sort, spliced with marine fish DNA. It turns out mom had a lot of this little critters. Anthony is awesomely ugly and we get to see quite a bit of him and his squidling little brothers. There is also a “bonus creature” with a nifty transformation scene. The death scene at the end comes with a grossly clever revelation and disgusts much as does Slither. There’s also an appropriate surprise at the end, which is action-packed as horror goes.
Very satisfying 80s horror. Every bit as good as I remember from 20 years ago.
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Bad Movie Tuesday: The Amazing Spider Man
Likable cast, solid director and decent CGI save The Amazing Spider Man (John’s review) from being just another retread. However, I found myself bored by the current hijinks of the web slinger. Amazing is not a bad film. It does not belong amongst films like The Darkest Hour, X-Men 3 or Command Performance. However, those movies were memorable in their badness whereas the new Spider Man simply exists. This is a shame because Spidey is beloved by millions and deserves more than what this film gives. Thus, Amazing is bad because it isn’t good.
I was originally going to do a second review of the bad film The Tall Man but John summed it up with this quote:
“Instead of having a beginning, a middle and an end, this movie seemed to have a beginning, a middle, then a beginning to something totally different, followed by maybe two hardly related parallel middles and four to six endings—yuck.”
In a three part structure this film had 10 unrelated parts in what amounted to a nothing more than poor Jessica Beil getting:
“attacked by a dog—twice, dragged on the road from the bumper of a car (which would shave off her kneecaps!), headlocked, survives a car accident, gets mud in all of those wounds on her face, arm and leg, passes out from near hypothermia in the road in the middle of the night, beaten over the head with a pipe, tied up—twice, punched in the face, hit in the face with a rock…”
After the ineptitude and multiple endings I was confused, annoyed and pretty happy with the badness that just happened in front of me. When Amazing ended I felt absolutely nothing. I had just watched a well manicured money machine swing it’s way through two long hours.
The movie follows the 2002 version beat for beat and offers little in the way of difference. The biggest difference is Amazing adds a mystery about the whereabouts of Peter Parker’s family and features a different spunky love interest.
I found myself twiddling my thumbs while the shiny and colorful things exploded in front of my eyes. I knew the plot and that Sony was close to losing the rights to Spider Man so they were forced to reboot a series that had only ended years ago. The good thing about rebooting is that Spider Man 3 was a massive turd with zero energy or logic so bringing in fresh minds and excited actors was a breath of fresh air. Paramount hired 500 Days of Summer director Marc Webb to helm and they cast incredibly likable actors Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone to be the good looking faces of the reboot.
The problem is no matter how many fresh faces you bring in you can’t help it from feeling stale.
You know the beats, you know the plot and most importantly the wonder is gone because you already have a frame of reference. I kept hoping that Rhys Ifans would become a wiry Lizard and punt Spider Man like he did the pigskin in The Replacements.
I suppose if you are new to the series you will have a blast watching Peter learn to swing (using a web and not big Bad Voodoo Daddy) or smooching Gwen Stacey for the first time. However, the film’s villain is too likable to root against and once he transforms he isn’t interesting due to the massive amounts of CGI. The same thing happened to the Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe), Venom (Topher Grace) and Sandman (Thomas Haden Church). Wonderful actors disappear and they become faceless CGI blobs whom look like CGI blobs. Spider Man 2 succeeded because you could see Dr. Octopus’s face and visualize him as a human and villain. His motives were murky and unrefined but so was much of the Spider Man series.
I know in a world where thousands of movies exist it is difficult to be original. I just wish this film would have tried something new. For instance, the scene where Parker is learning how to use his abilities it seemed like a mash up of Footloose and Indiana Jones 4 (Never a good comparison). The biggest improvement is the movement of Spider Man which now feels fluid yet unrefined. It also brings the hipster vibe to great heights.
I understand Sony wanted to keep it’s cash cow (700 million worldwide gross) and not let it revert back to Marvel. Fox recently lost Daredevil to Marvel because the studio was stumped as how to reboot the series. The problem is that rebooting Amazing felt like a money situation and not a creative experience. Marvel bet big with it’s phase one Avengers plan and that is why I loved it. They took a massive chance that paid off when the Avengers made a over a billion dollars worldwide.
Sony had a chance to create a new story like Christopher Nolan did with Batman. However, it played it safe and created a sure-fire hit that hit the right notes but does nothing to excite. I understand this from a financial standpoint but it frustrates me they played it so blandly. Marvel took a massive gamble and they managed to create memorable and visual delights. I’m hoping that with the back story out of the way the will widen the Spider man world and let Jaime Fox tear up the screen as Electro.
The Amazing Spider Man needs room to soar. Hopefully, the $700 million will allow Marc Webb to make a Spidey movie more to his style. A style where Hall & Oates is played liberally and Minka Kelly and Zooey Deschanel play a duo of hipster villains who were bit by radioactive fireflies.
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John’s Old School Horror Corner: House (1986), good for childhood nostalgia and goofy monster effects but certainly not scary
MY CALL: Boring, dumb, random…but it comes with a few giggles. Unless this is a childhood nostalgia movie for you, I’d suggest skipping it. IF YOU LIKE THIS WATCH: I like “house” movies, but I prefer they take themselves more seriously like in The Amityville Horror (1979, 2005), the short from V/H/S (2012), Grave Encounters (2011) or Poltergeist (1982). Even Paranormal Activity 2 (2010), although we later learn it’s less of a “house” movie and more of an evil spirit movie.
Roger (William Katt; Carrie, House IV, Mirrors 2), a divorced and son-bereft writer hitting a slow point in his career, moves into his aunt’s house after her suicide. This transition calls difficult memories as his son disappeared while he had lived in the house years earlier and his aunt had suspected that “the house took him.” He also has visions of his aunt warning him about the house. Uninteresting visions of his son and his time in Vietnam also punctuate the slow-paced fist act of the story.
Whether it’s The Nesting, The Amityville Horror, The House on Haunted Hill, Night of the Demons, The Haunting, The Shining or this… ALL “house” movies simply MUST take place in a really big house. After all, no one wants to watch a movie about a haunted 1200 square foot 2 bed/2 bath now do they? Nope, we want a BIG house. Even season one of An American Horror Story–really big house!
The first hint of remote interest comes when he opens a gate to the unknown (i.e., a bedroom closet door) after midnight and an amorphous monster attacks him. As his next door neighbor gets nosy, a mounted swordfish comes to life, his tools become telekinetically homicidal and the house fools him into killing his ex-wife (appearing as a bloated slimy demon), things still feel slow and random—bordering on boring.
About halfway through the movie the soundtrack marks a significant tone shift to something somewhat silly. We meet Roger’s beguiling neighborhood fox (Mary Stavin; Octopussy, A View to a Kill) who, I feel, is only in this movie so that the director could show us her body in a swimsuit. She dumps her son on Roger to babysit. Of course, two super-ugly house demons try to steal him.
Scariest monster in any closet ever!
Why Roger doesn’t take stock of the situation and sell this evil house and forget about it is beyond me. He simply tries to “deal with it” as if it were a domestic nuisance. I guess he wants his son back. What about hiring a medium? Nah. He’s a writer and a veteran; he’s got this.
Later he enlists his nosy neighbor’s help to ambush the closet monster. This goes very poorly and Roger is dragged into the closet and then apparently into the tropical forests of Vietnam where he bumps into an old ‘Nam buddy of his before being vomited back into his spare bedroom. Did that sentence make sense? Well, neither does this movie!
Continuing the search for his son, Roger creates a portal out of his bathroom medicine cabinet and is swiftly attacked by a tentacle monster. Unphased by the attack, Roger crawls into this alternate dimension and finds his son in a bamboo cage in a tropical swamp. He rescues his son and somehow finds himself in his swimming pool. Did that make sense? Still no?
Okay, now let’s make sense of this. You see, his undead ‘Nam buddy kidnapped his son to exact his revenge for not killing him when he was suffering during their war tour. Roger defeats this 6’6” war-seasoned soldier zombie with his cloth belt and a positive attitude. Pathetic.
So Roger is a hero for “finding” his long lost son and he wins back his ex-wife—who, evidently, he didn’t actually kill earlier in the movie.
Senseless. But it made me smile here and there.
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John’s Horror Corner: Humongous (1982)
MY CALL: Ouch! This monstrous slasher film just hurt. Never scary, never suspenseful, only off-camera kills, dumb story and an aggravating theme…not even fun to laugh at. [D-] ALTERNATIVE TITLE: Dog Island—pretty dumb name. Not that Humongous was a winner either.
In 1946 a woman is raped at a cocktail party. Perhaps a little on the late side, she is rescued by a dog—that was random.
36 years later a group of five twenty-somethings go on a boat outing. They pick up a stranded seafarer and then, during a dumb fight between two of them, crash onto the shores of an island inhabited by a lone reclusive woman and a pack of wild dogs.
While on this island folks start to die one by one, they discover the reclusive woman’s house and try to solve the mystery of her seclusion. Eventually, they learn that she had given birth to a mutant son and isolated herself on the island to keep him away from humanity. This is delivered to the audience with no real flavor, creating the sense that any details of plot presented in this movie are basically futile.
Like Frankenstein, our shaggy-haired Wrong Turn mutant hates fire. Like a good psycho-killer, he just won’t die. But like all such monstrosities, he ultimately dies at the lucky hands of a scared girl—the chick who didn’t show her tits, get drunk or do drugs, that it.
What’s bad? Night scenes are gritty and it’s hard to see what’s going on. But with acting this bad, it hardly matters if you can see what the actors are doing. Then there’s the slow-moving grunty monstrous killer, through whose eyes we often see, but who we never see until the end. This movie is never scary, never suspenseful, we never see the killing actually happen (except for a bear-hug and a face-crushing), and I found the strong dog motif to be nothing more than distracting, even annoying.
What’s good? For me, nothing. But I read several reviews that considered the mood and its complimentary scoring very effective. I felt no such thing and found the simplistic 80s score to be little more than adequate. But, at one point, a girl accidentally sits in the lap of a dried up corpse. It wedges on to her and basically dry humps her. This was my only laugh during the movie.
This movie is deliberately exploitative. The opening rape scene is unnecessarily drawn out and, as quickly as we shift to present day (1982), we are greeted by gratuitous nudity—all in the first ten minutes. There’s even a scene where a chick bares her breasts to warm up an injured friend who was cold—presumably hypothermic.
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The Man with the Iron Fists (2012)
MY CALL: This movie shouldn’t have been written AND directed AND scored AND starring Rza. However, the movie was still loads of fun and Rza has definitely proven that he has great cinematic vision. Expect many filmmaking imperfections, but enjoy the fun ride. [B-] IF YOU LIKE THIS WATCH: Shinobi: Heart Under Blade(2005), Croughing Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), Elektra (2005), The Warrior’s Way (2010) and Bunraku (2010)…all very stylistic with cool combat.
Thaddeus (director Rza) is a gifted blacksmith whose talents are contracted by local warring clans. He is pure of heart and wants nothing more than to purchase the freedom of his courtesan wife Lady Silk (Jamie Chung; The Hangover 2, Sorority Row) from the brothel madame Blossom (Lucy Liu basically reprising her Kill Bill role; The Tournament, Kung Fu Panda 2).
Thaddeus becomes mixed up in a plot to steal a large shipment of gold. The main villain is Silver Lion (Byron Mann), who betrays the Lion clan leader with the help of Bronze Lion (Cung Le; Dragon Eyes, Pandorum). Zen Yi (Rick Yune; Ninja Assassin), the son of the murdered clan leader, sets out to stop Silver Lion with his armor of retractable blades. Also in the mix is Jack Knife (Russel Crowe; Robin Hood, The Next Three Days), the most interesting and charismatice character (outside of combat) with an interesting taste for bachelor party shenanigans (i.e., Asian call girls, liquor and opium).
Russel Crowe as Jack Knife, rounding up his entertainment for the evening.
The fighting in the movie was a mixed bag that will largely disappoint martial arts movie fans. As the oddly bewigged lion clansman, Cung Le was sadly under-utilized. He never gets to looks good or show off. Not even in his finale fight against Lucy Liu. The choreography presents a mix of very cool and very silly kung fu combat maneuvers. Sadly, by and large the action is filmed way too close-up. For me, the combat highlights should all be credited to Bautista’s Brass Body. He seemed to have the coolest scenes, obviously the coolest F/X because of his ability, and some of the most fun choreography that was filmed so that we could actually see it.
Despite my complaints about much of the action, the kung fu theater feel was maintained undeniably well. Rza captured that tone perfectly. There was also a festive display of spewy-fun gore.
The dialogue is dreadfully dry (except for Crowe’s delivery). Rza, God bless him for trying, can’t act or effectively narrate. His character was not only understated, but lacked the lines to justify his purpose. It seems that Rza was going for a mood-driven film with stylized combat like Bunraku or The Warrior’s Way. I could see his goal, but his meant-to-be-poetic blacksmith character was clearly the weak link in synthesizing this quasi-arthouse-ful conceptual grace. Rza tries to use a Shaolin Temple training flashback to corroborate Thaddeus’ focus and combat ability. Still, I found him to have zero combat credibility when facing Iron Body—a character who actually earned my respect on screen.
The score (also by Rza) was cool during the first scene (a fight scene). But I noticed less effective use of music later in the movie. I’m not hating, it was a neat score. But this was disappointing as I expected to have some awesomely rap-scored fight scenes, but some of them had combat volume drowning out the music, rendering it ineffective even at times that louder music would be appropriate.
Director Rza—of the Wu Tang Clan—was always a devout fan of Hong Kong cinema’s kung fu theater. While his direction is clearly fledgling and his scoring ability nothing to his own rapping talent, his passion for classic kung fu movies manifested the greatest strength of this film: the kung fu theater “feel” of it all. His excellent theatrical homage includes some classic kung fu movie components such as the iron body (brass body in the movie) focus style, techniques that are named after characters (e.g., the Gemini stance), the betrayal of one’s master and the revenge that follows, the house of mirrors fight (which was unfortunately brief), traps and poison darts, fighters exploding from the ground in ambush and semi-flying combat maneuvers. Perhaps the most fun was when all of the brothel whores turn out to be ninja-savvy combat-chic assassins. Rza also covered the bases of kung fu weaponry, including bladed fans, bladed sleeve extensions, chain-fighting, various blades and good-old kung fu.
This movie shouldn’t have been written AND directed AND scored AND starring Rza. However, the movie was still loads of fun and Rza has definitely proven that he has great cinematic vision. I’d like to see him collaborate with more experienced film makers before attempting another solo venture like this. But I am so glad that I got to see it anyway, imperfections and all. This was a good debut considering his complete lack of experience since yet more experienced hands have failed to produce such entertainment time and time again.
I also hope to see more of David Bautista. He worked really well in this!
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The Tall Man (2012)
MY CALL: Featuring a story that is less reliable than the “pullout method”, this movie is an unsatisfying waste of time drowns itself in too many plot loose plot elements. Skip this head case of a movie. It’s not clever, it’s simply indecisive. [D+] SIDEBAR: This is one of very few movies bad enough to get hosed by both myself and The Hof, who will be featuring this movie for his next Bad Movie Tuesday.
Julia (Jessica Biel; Total Recall, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre) is a small clinic nurse in Cold Rock, a small poor town plagued by a rash of soul-crushing child disappearances. So troubling were these tandem disappearances that the mysterious “cause” was given a name: The Tall Man, which has wedged itself into the minds of the locals as a piece of folklore-turned truth complete with local sightings.
Julia is kind-hearted and strong, and is no stranger to loss either, having lost her husband. She doesn’t believe in The Tall Man, she dedicates all of her spare time to her young boy, and she never wears make-up.
Any sense of mystery is swiftly defeated as, when Julia’s child is taken, we see The Tall Man, the beat up UPS truck that he drives and his pissed off dog. He reminds me a good deal of Hollowface from Intruders (2011)—another generally ineffective boogeyman figure. Julia sneaks into his truck and gives him one Hell of a fight—you gotta’ watch out for those chicks who don’t wear make-up. But, alas, in order to make a movie of this The Tall Man needs to get away with her boy. So he does.
This movie quickly takes a unique turn as we discover that The Tall Man may not be just one man acting alone and that other citizens may be involved…or someone is just nuts and they’re imagining things…or something else.
Biel gets put through the ringer in this one. No make-up, attacked by a dog—twice, dragged on the road from the bumper of a car (which would shave off her kneecaps!), puts The Tall Man in a headlock, survives a car accident, gets mud in all of those wounds on her face, arm and leg, passes out from near hypothermia in the road in the middle of the night, beaten over the head with a pipe, tied up—twice, punched in the face, hit in the face with a rock…
Despite the Die Hard John MacClayne ringer she goes through, this movie had a stupid, generally insanely senseless plot. I seriously thought that this movie was “just about to end” four times, so watching this movie is like reading a poorly written book and never knowing how many pages are left. This isn’t necessarily because they drew it out to far, but rather because the plot and the message that the viewer was meant to take home from this simply took a long time to hash out the schizophrenic plot salad. Instead of having a beginning, a middle and an end, this movie seemed to have a beginning, a middle, then a beginning to something totally different, followed by maybe two hardly related parallel middles and four to six endings—yuck.
This movie would have been better delivered as a crime thriller where they draw the curtains on the “secret” much earlier and the shocking “motive” appropriately at the end—so that there would only be one ending. In the end I found this to be a generally ineffective un-thriller. The only tension is our own frustration as we go from thinking this is a supernatural thriller, to a real crime thriller, to a cult-driven story, to a conspiracy, to a crazy swap-mama story, to maybe a psychological thriller, and ending up as a crime-mystery drama. This process is never satisfying!
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The Hof offered a less favorable review of The Bay. But Hofsey is no horror fan (—not to say that he dislikes horror). So, for readers who don’t drool over the next DTV horror releases from Fangoria magazine every week, perhaps you should turn to his review. But the real horrorhounds may prefer my take; that of a true Horror Czar…
MY CALL: Parasitic isopods? Nope. No one else has done that yet. But this turns out to be more interesting and well-composed than exciting, there were hardly any scares. I enjoyed it very much but hesitate to strongly advise this movie to others. For me, it gets a solid “B”. IF YOU LIKE THIS WATCH: No movie that I can summon compares well to this. Lake Placid (1999) is too tame, The Thaw (2009) was just awful although conceptually similar, and Cabin Fever (2002), Splinter (2008), Piranha 3D (2010) and The Ruins (2008) are pure gore-hound flicks.
This film was directed by Barry Levinson (Academy Award-Winning Director of Rain Man, plus Disclosure and Sleepers). He’s never done “horror” before—but, of course, Sleepers was more terrifying than A Nightmare on Elm Street in its own way—and I’m so glad he finally did. Levinson brings a serious attention to detail that is often ignored in the recent found-footage subgenre fad. And how perfect, in my opinion, that he teamed up with the Paranormal Activity production team.
From iphone recordings and news clips to security camera footage—quite an impressive media admixture—The Bay presents a small coastal Maryland town on Chesapeake Bay on the 4th of July.
In the beginning we are introduced to the film’s narrator Donna, an intern reporter who was on site covering the holiday festivities during “the event” and is now disclosing a collection of previously withheld-from-the-public clips. She introduces us to the ill-fated town on the 4th of July: boardwalk families coming together, games, Miss Crustacean…I’m actually reminded of the finale of Humanoids from the Deep (1980). So many of these movies revolve around small towns dependent on summer tourism revenue (e.g., Piranha 3D).
It all begins as an “outbreak” of CDC concern, but escalates into the “animal horror” that was advertized. Regular updates from a team of marine biologists and a concerned doctor’s regular exchanges with the CDC gradually reveal more about this outbreak’s causative organism. There are also brief but effective clips spread throughout the film that add a very real humanity to the film; text messages, 911 calls, radio transmissions and voicemails. The intentional diversity of media results in scenes of varying film quality, some quite poor. However, this didn’t bother me. It just added flavor. I can see how others would disagree, though.
An explanation is offered as to the origin of the outbreak. Investigative news clips reveal that 45 million pounds of chicken shit are dumped into the bay each year and others point to a water desalination plant that hydrates the chickens and the chickens’ steroid-rich diet. Levinson really gets into it in a rather politically-geared context. Not that you need to have any political cares to enjoy this film, but there is a strong political statement being made about handling our water management and waste disposal. It’s all well assembled into a cohesive background story.
The story is carried by clips of our narrating reporter, a mother (Kristen Connolly; The Cabin in the Woods) in a young family of three, a few cops, the doctor and the mayor, along with numerous clips of suffering extras. It’s not such a fresh take, but it’s fresh enough for me. It also comes off as shockingly realistic. Do a Google search for the “tongue-eating louse” Cymothoa exigua. This isopod really is big and really eats tongues (which happens in the movie).
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Dragon Eyes (2012)
MY CALL: At the end of the day this is just another direct-to-DVD action movie. But Cung Le has some hard-hitting cool fights and, fan or not, Van Damme has a pretty cool role. However, admittedly, not nearly as much Van Damme as I expected based on the trailer…which was a bummer. [C+] IF YOU LIKE THIS WATCH: Assassination Games (2011) gives you more of the Van Damme that you want and, while I really like Cung Le, Scott Adkins is an even better supporting ass-kicker. Also, Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning (2012) features a smaller Van Damme role, but a WAY AWESOME one and loads of great Scott Adkins and Dolph Lundgren action.
Hong (Cung Le; The Man with the Iron Fists, Pandorum) is a soft-spoken bad ass who can handle himself pretty damned well. He takes on four Latin hoodlums by himself just for the Hell of it. He’s not superhuman and the choreography is nothing flashy. It is, however, brutally “practical” and, because of that, impressive in its own way. Although, it’s not without a little cinematic flash, fights rarely seem unrealistically one-sided; a rare and good thing.
There’s a move you don’t see every day. The compound butt crusher.
We alternate between two different times: a past when Hong is in jail being mentored by Tiano, and the present when Hong is living his life as a free man. In prison, Tiano (Jean-Claude Van Damme; The Expendables 2, Assassination Games) transforms Hong from a fighter who studies martial arts to a martial artist who studies opponents. Disappointingly, all the scenes with Van Damme from the trailer seem to represent the entirety of his screen time in the movie. Big Bummer.
Mr. V (Peter Weller; Of Unknown Origin, Screamers) runs the crime in the town of St. Jude. He’s a farcically over-dressed crime lord who takes a piece of all the action of the local black and latin gangs. He’s smooth, calm and collected most of the time. But mess with his money and, well…there’s a cool scene where he teaches a hooker how to beat up on a sadist. At the end of the scene, she shows us she appreciated the lesson and that she learned.
Isn’t he smooth?
Hong is a mix of vigilante and criminal but we don’t know why. He obstructs the business of the black and latin gangs which, in turn, affect Mr. V. He even cleans out a drug den and he never keeps any of the spoils for himself. Then, by Mr. V’s demand, he starts to work with the local gangs and changes the way they run things…no guns, no selling drugs to kids, upping the prices. This brings in less revenue, but makes the locals of St. Jude feel safe (and that Mr. V is the one who cleaned it up).
Hong is eventually double-crossed. But, like in any Van Damme movie (or Dragonball), the hero must be defeated before retraining and returning victorious. Hong’s training montage is no Van Damme homage, but he still throws a mean kick and even suplexes a guy in the end. Typically, these martial arts action movies have endings more like videogames than reality, with men favoring fists over firearms and one-on-one at a time over gang tactic combat. This movie is no different, the finale’s outcome doesn’t make much sense given the intended goal of the story, and I didn’t feel satisfied by it.
The victory in this movie is finding Van Damme in a different kind of role (that of the teacher, not the student) and finding Cung Le in a leading role (instead of his often effective supporting roles). I was entertained and look forward to seeing more of both of them.
Director John Hyam (Universal Soldier: Regeneration, Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning) has developed a fine knack for making the most out of humbly budgeted action flicks. I’m guessing it’s just to please JCVD, but among his common actors is Kristopher Van Varenberg (Van Damme’s son; Universal Soldier: Regeneration, Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning, Assassination Games) in a tiny role. I’ll let it pass. If that’s what it takes to get this level of Van Damme-ity, it’s worth it.
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The Bay
Found footage eco-terror directed by Oscar winner Barry Levinson. The movie features footage recovered from a wikileaks type source that features the parasitic carnage that destroyed the small city of Claridge, Maryland in 2009.
The Bay strays away from the mutants in Chernobyl and angry ghosts named Toby stalking children. It shoves the ecological message down your throat and proves that isopods are jerks. What bothered me is the eco-torture porn vibe Levinson created. Levinson has a message to push and he wants you to see so much blood you feel compelled to seek out and punch whoever might foster the growth of angry sea creatures. The exorcise feels created to illicit a manicured response. Gone is the unpredictable nature that found footage films need to create to be successful. There is no ambiguous ending or unexplained creature terrorizing the citizens. It is a man made creation that that is initially ignored by the CDC, EPA and NWO (Hulk Hogan wants nothing to do with isopodes).
Politics has long been a staple of horror films. George Romero, Wes Craven and John Carpenter successfully incorporated greed, bureaucratic governments and war into classic films that didn’t feel overly preachy. They were bloody, dangerous and highly intelligent. You liked the characters and the message was buried in the carnage. The Bay feels like Levinson wanted to discuss isopods and pollution so he made a message film with occasional gore and government incompetence.
It is never scary and occasionally gross. The parasites infect the body and produces lesions, bubbles and lots of puked up blood. The isopods are insect like aquatic creatures mutated by drainage from a chicken-processing plant and other shady environmental dealings. They get inside the town folk bodies, eat them alive and create lots of gore. 
The movie falters when it tries to create suspense. Levinson seems more interested in bashing the EPA than scaring the audience. Also, I’ve said it time and time again that found footage movies live and die with the actors. The successful FF films like Blair Witch, Paranormal Activity and The Last Exorcism (Cotton Marcus) work because the actors pull of the “natural acting” without making it seemed forced. The best thing those films had going for them is that there wasn’t a blueprint of natural acting to mimic. Now, it seems like actors are acting natural. The lead character in this film Kether Donohue tries her best but it always feels like she is acting.
The best thing The Bay has going for it is the occasional feeling of dread created knowing that people have creatures eating them from the inside out. The concept is neat, the wikileaks footage is grounded in reality and the gore is suitably gory. The biggest problem is the lack of suspense and knowledge of what will happen. At least fantastically bad FF films like Apollo 18 are so insane you never know what will happen or why the moon rocks are so angry. Also, with Chernobyl Diaries you know the characters will do something dumb but you never know how dumb.
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