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Reviews
28 Days Later... (2002)
Omega triffid zombie
An apocalyptic vision of human society destroyed by a pandemic virus. Man-made or natural we all fear the possibility of such a biological time bomb. In times of survival I'd hope people would put their discriminations aside and function cooperatively. However human nature dictates that egos will inevitably clash. The challenge of communal living or the acceptance of leadership is more frightening than the raging zombies in this movie. It seems that human beings are experts at unwittingly trapping themselves.
Maybe the story did steal from a million other films which film doesn't? I don't care, even if 'Omega man' did get their first. This is better than the bitterly disappointing reign of fire'. The film wins out because it blends genres, has a good story and a great cast and director. Some of the imagery is spellbinding. I didn't get bored or tired with the action or inaction. It may have its faults but overall it's definitely worth a watch.
American Psycho (2000)
Patrick Bateman give up your day job.
What a surprise, a gem of a movie, great.
I put this one off, basically because it had the words 'American' and 'Psycho' in the title. And what with American Beauty being released, was ready for the influx of all films having this prefix as standard.
Anyway the film despite it's title is great, I loved the humour, the acting and direction. The eighties have never been so good and yup so cold. It really struck me though after watching the film that the eighties were a very odd time indeed, what a change in lifestyles for many people seeking many greedy acquisitions. And here we have Patrick epitomising the yuppie culture of high rise New York, with a strange assortment of superficial personal and pier relationships.
The fact that he is completly deranged probably has something about selling his soul to corporate America, and only psychopaths could be wielding their power in this manner in these institutions (Many of which produce horrific consequences, socially and environmentally globally.)
Others who have commented are keen to state that this is not a horror flick. It is true deep dark satire agreed. But why are people jumping to the defence of this film. It is horror, we don't have to see the gore, implied violence and our imaginations are far more scary, check Hitchcock's Psycho.
The Batesmanesque twisted persona is a parallel of our our own facination and languish of video nasties. I don't know if I am a Patrick Bateman, I'm probably more of a Sammy Jenkis.
9 out of 10.
Candyman: Day of the Dead (1999)
A couple of good slasher scenes, plenty of cleavage and a poor ending.
Did this film really have a chance at beating the hook stabbing prequels? I was pleasantly surprised at how good the follow up to the first was, however the third...well.
After avoiding this movie for ages, not wanting to be disappointed, I finally popped by my local video shop ( I may have gone to see it at the flicks if I had been given the chance ). Sat down with a mate who hadn't seen the others and watched him squirm, not from the horror but from boredom.
A poor low budget remake of the others this certainly was. A gripping glorious gore fest this was not.
We now find that Candyman had time to do a couple of sketches of his voluptuous lover (he's no Picasso) during his slave(?) days. Thankgod the writers kept his horrible demise the same.
Well I wasn't expecting the Earth, but how about a complete self parody instead of this, at least we could have laughed aloud in the correct places, like Scream. Was it supposed to be funny?
Some good ideas: an insensitive lover who had to get it, a subway scene that didn't stand a chance against 'American werewolf' but was still enjoyable, a great cop death and plenty of honey.
Okay it was bearable. Just. Maybe they'll repair the damage with another; until then I'll conveniently forget this one. Watch the others again instead.
Timecode (2000)
Good impro'd quad-like action let down by poor ending.
I guess it's easy for directors and writers to stick to the same old conventions, perhaps they have no choice, moulded by the big boys who appear to know just what us movie goers like. At least some choose not to follow this route, to proposition and shoot a film like this, which come on, sounds pretty pretentious, is something in it's own right. Perhaps this luxury is only for the triumphant moviemaker like Figgis who has previously provided us with the great 'Leaving Las Vegas'.
Digital cameras produce low resolution images, so we have to have four mini screens to the big screen to make up for it. This worked well. It wasn't as hard on one's head as you may imagine, but through the clever use of sound my focus was passed around all four quarters. The overall effect was interesting and the eventual merging of shots and alternative camera angles gave a three-dimensional perspective whereas normally this would have been left to our imaginations.
This film like 'Vegas' has an alcoholic as the main focus, a man we don't hate or pity, despite his actions. A jealous girlfriend who obviously can't trust her partner, becomes detective. Simultaneously we watch a lovely young wannabe screw her way to stardom avec the 'red mullet' Production Company.
Well there isn't much of a plot here and the ending spoilt what I thought was a good movie, but up until then things were fine.
I'm not sure where Mr Figgis got his inspiration, perhaps it was from playing popular multiplayer computer games or from watching tacky old eighties music videos. Maybe he'll hand us a director's cut for the smallscreen, or four different releases for us to set up cunningly, hardware permitting, heck he may as well treat us to a fifth.
The film looks great despite the plot, definitely recommended.