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Reviews
The Girl Next Door (2007)
Totally engrossing but painful to watch
This is an excellent film and therefore in some ways it is a pleasure to watch, but anyone who has seen it will know that it's effectiveness in fact makes it almost unbearable to watch.
The story revolves around two girls who have recently been orphaned and are sent to live with their aunt who has three young sons. She is a middle aged woman obsessed with feminine purity who sees the new arrivals as a potentially corrupting influence on the masculine world she presides over.
She actively encourages her sons to perpetrate more and more severe acts of bullying and sadism against the older girl who is eventually tied up in the basement and used as a play thing by all the neighbourhood children.
Only the boy who lives next door, who has become friends with the girl, has a growing sense of unease about the "games" which are taking a very sinister turn, yet he is powerless to change the course of events.
This film is very well written, directed and performed and is therefore a relentlessly depressing affair which is horribly painful to watch. The aunt is a very cold and manipulative figure whose brutality knows no bounds and her sons quickly warm to her ideals. Realising that they have a free reign under her they too become very savage. The culmination of the acts they perpetrate are some of the most shocking I have ever seen in cinema, all the more shocking because they are perpetrated by children, against another child, encouraged by their mother.
Truly gripping. Truly horrifying. Hard to watch and hard to look away.
Black Water (2007)
Simple but effective
While many people found this film simply too slow and simplistic I really connected with it. There is no plot as such, rather the film takes the form of a human survival story about three people trapped up a tree with a man eating crocodile lurking somewhere in the water beneath them.
Personally, I thought the acting was mostly very good, despite the roles being quite demanding at times, and I felt a sense of warmth for the characters. The situation they were in was quite terrifying and I really felt nervous for them. I found the whole film quite nerve wracking because of the sheer helplessness of their situation and the constant threat to their survival.
The crocodile effects were handled surprisingly well for such a low budget film, and believe me, I have seen my fair share of dodgy croc movies. The creature moved well and had real menace and, although the audience I was with didn't seem too keen on the film as a whole, they still jumped and gasped whenever the crocodile appeared.
Script-wise, I would have made a few changes, particularly towards the end, but this was not a major problem. For fans of slow-burning survival horror set within the realms of reality this will be an engaging film but unfortunately I think for many audiences seeking a thrill ride and higher production values from their cinema experience the point will simply be missed.
Storm Warning (2007)
Menacing and entertaining
This is a very effective low budget offering from the Southern hemisphere.
The plot is pretty simple, revolving around a yuppie couple who stumble upon a backwoods family who take them prisoner. What elevates this film above similar tales is the sheer sense of menace and relentless vulnerability that is created, and also the sheer energy and inventiveness with which the captors are depicted.
Personally, I felt very uncomfortable throughout and I empathised with the couple who had somehow got themselves into so much trouble. The woman, who to make matters worse is French, is under constant threat of rape. I felt particularly sorry for her lawyer boyfriend who is helplessly out of his depth and fully aware that he is unable to defend her.
However, she is made of pretty stern stuff and when her boyfriend is incapacitated by the savage yokels they have encountered she takes matters into her own hands and begins the fight back.
This protracted turning of the tables takes up the final third of the film and is handled with great energy and and enthusiasm. Some old-school booby traps are employed against one of the villains whilst she has another trick up her, ahem, sleeve which really has to be seen to be believed.
Without giving too much away, I found the eventual structure of this film quite fascinating and original, but for the casual viewer alike this film really delivers. There is plenty of atmosphere, humour, set-piece carnage and thrills for everyone and the hyped up soundtrack keeps things moving along nicely.
All the Boys Love Mandy Lane (2006)
Exceptional Indie-slasher
This film really distinguishes itself within the slasher genre. It's that rare occurrence of a horror film that doesn't feel like a horror film, just a story.
The characters are all carefully portrayed by a mostly unknown cast who were allowed to improvise much of their dialogue. The characters are all well defined and form a totally believable and generally likable group of friends, despite their human weaknesses.
It's almost a surprise when people start being killed off because the film feels so real and doesn't bear any of the tired trademarks usually associated with the genre. The grainy film stock and hand-held camera-work also help to further differentiate this film which is essentially a cross between an Indie movie and a slasher film.
Very original treatment of some well worn themes. Great to see this type of story taken seriously for once. Just what the horror industry needs.
Rohtenburg (2006)
Almost good
***Some Spoilers*** Okay, I don't really know what the other reviewer was on about, this is a human story about two lonely guys with issues regarding their self esteem, sexuality and place in society. It is not sensationalist, nor particularly exploitative and it is based on the true events. Wishing to watch, or even make a film about a gruesome murder, does not mean you necessarily have a sick mind.
The problem I have with Grimm Love is the pathetic back story of the American student. Why does a very strong and intriguing story about two German men need to be framed by, and told through the eyes of, a fictional, attractive female American? Well, the answer is pretty simple I guess, she'll look good on the poster and in the trailer and give the film some chance of success in the US. However, this is a MAJOR flaw of the film.
This character adds absolutely nothing to the story and only serves to waste about 20 minutes of screen time which could have been cut completely from the film or used to go deeper into the actual story of the two men. Not only is this character boring and unnecessary but she acts irrationally throughout the film.
For example, she breaks into the house where the crime occurred - this was highly unconvincing and only served as a means to start some flashbacks to the actual events. Secondly, she is able to locate the actual video of the crime, which has never been found, even by the police, by posting a single message on a cannibal website! This was so laughable it was beyond belief. This lost video must represent something of a holy grail to the cannibal community so the idea that an outsider can simply stick a request for it on a forum and be sent a copy free of charge a few days later is ridiculous.
It's a real shame about these elements which surely anyone with even a basic understanding of script writing could have pointed out would scupper an otherwise serious attempt at film making.
Ils (2006)
A simple, tense and original suspense thriller
***Some Very Minor Spoilers*** I was totally engrossed by this low-key French suspense thriller. The attack on the house is very unnerving, reminiscent of Close Encounters or something like that but with a much more sinister edge.
The plot is minimal, but who cares. This is a human story about a couple trying to react to the threat posed to their home, and their welfare. I really felt for both characters and, despite being a huge horror fan, did not want to see either of them die.
I thought the locations used were excellent, the camera-work and soundtrack helped create a great atmosphere of dread and the performances were also great.
The ending was nice and original, there is no great pay-off of gore and SFX but the concept alone should be interesting enough to match the build up.
There will probably be many people who do not appreciate this film, it will be too subtle in it's intent, perhaps not provide enough entertainment or even be called clichéd. I however feel that it is a very realistic depiction of a real life horror which maintains great tension and does not use cheap horror tricks to create scares, rather clever film making. The slowness of the pace, colour scheme and minimal dialogue reminded me a lot of another recent French language masterpiece, Cache (Hidden) which has a similarly inconclusive ending.
Great stuff, I really like what French horror is doing at the moment
Isolation (2005)
Impressive Low Budget Creature Shocker
I was very impressed with this low budget, low key Irish shocker which is reminiscent of Alien and works by David Cronenberg.
Working very effectively within the budget limitations the director first establishes the bleakness, dampness, cold and murk of a run down cattle farm. The horror is inherent within the environment of mud and manure, of rusting low-fi agricultural equipment.
Out of this steaming primordial soup the mutated creatures arise and grow, terrorising the farmer, the vet and two Gypsie-travellers who are staying on the land.
The "mad scientist" responsible for the fertility engineering which has gone wrong is one of the most credible I have seen, there are no luminous green liquids or fantastical creation sequences, just a very human sense of rational pioneering gone astray.
The characters are well developed and generally likable, they act rationally most of the time and the performances are very strong.
The creature is rarely seen yet the hand held camera-work makes this feel natural, as if the creature is simply evading our gaze, rather than the approach of many directors who choose to give audiences selected static close-ups of various parts of a creature which I feel only serves to draw the audience out of the film.
What we do see of the creature is sufficiently dark and abstract to remain a terrifying presence, the use of animatronics as opposed to CGI allows the creature to merge with the environment in which it was spawned and it seems a very realistic and original creation.
The climax is restrained yet very menacing as the creature is finally caught in an agricultural machine, the flailing mechanical beast merging with the grinding cogs and chains.
A relentlessly bleak and murky film in which every element combines to create an atmosphere of dread and oppression that lingers in the mind.
The Marsh (2006)
A poor and unoriginal re-tread of common themes
***Contains Spoilers*** I can't quite believe the previous review. I have also just seen The Marsh at London's Frightfest and I and my friends were wholly unimpressed.
It feels like another film in a long line of by-the-numbers supernatural thrillers that have come out of Hollywood in the last five years such as Stir of Echoes, Hide and Seek, Secret Window, The Sixth Sense, The Exorcism of Emily Rose, Skeleton Key, The Mothman Prophecies, Bless the Child, The Forgotten, The Others etc, etc (Some of these films are quite good, but you get my point)
I have become very bored of creepy houses (this one was particularly un-imaginative) creepy cornfields, creepy little girls in night dresses, creepy dolls and scarecrows, creepy children's drawings, creepy children's songs, windows blowing open in gusts of wind etc, etc
It is also frustrating when EVERYTHING vaguely frightening is accompanied by a thunderous drum beat, even things like a shot of a child's teddy bear hitting the floor during a flashback! This device seemed to be the only means of creating any scares.
While this film was very professionally made it was very well-worn and tedious, with a series of flashbacks and revelations about something terrible which happened in the protagonist's past. The set in particular was not good and most of the flashbacks centered around a stained glass window in a door which was entirely modern and looked like it could be bought in any home improvements store.
The ultimate villain-ghost that is finally revealed to have triggered the events is actually just a rather misguided and pathetic character so when they came over all demonic at the end it rang really hollow for me.
The events themselves which triggered the haunting were, once again, rather unimportant yet predictable and wholly unoriginal.
A by-the-numbers money spinner in my opinion