Review Category: DVD/Blu Ray

Review: Saving Santa / Cert: U / Director: Leon Joosen, Aaron Seelman / Screenplay: Ricky Roxburgh / Starring: Martin Freeman, Newell Alexander, Noel Clarke, Joan Collins / Release Date: Out Now

Children, you’re all special. You can be whatever you want to be. So said many a kiddies’ cartoon, forever giving hope to the most average and mundane (save, refreshingly, for this year’s Monsters University). Anything you want. Unless you’re Martin Freeman, in which case you’re doomed to play mildly exasperated British blue-collar variations on Tim from The Office forever.

Freeman trades in Hobbits for elves in Saving Santa, a colourful Christmas cartoon in which an outcast elf turns to time travel in order to save Christmas day. A would-be inventor cursed with bad luck and his contraptions’ habitual (and catastrophic) breakages, Bernard D. Elf (geddit) is a character very much in the mould of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs‘ Flint Lockwood or Flik from A Bug’s Life. There’s even, as in the former, a device designed to translate animals’ thoughts.

Sadly, where Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and A Bug’s Life tried to give the adults in the audience a reason for watching too, Saving Santa is tediously childish at times. Lacking in wit and ambition, it’s rarely funny and frequently dull. Worst of all is the singing, ranging from tuneless (Freeman) to uninspired (Ashley Tisdale). It all looks very nice though. The ever-reliable Tim Curry lends the film an air of class as villain Neville Baddington, while Joan Collins, Noel Clarke and Chris Barrie are fun in their respective (if brief) roles. And at least the time travel element adds variety to the otherwise predictable story, in a Groundhog Day, timey-wimey sort of way.

Younger children should have fun with the cute and cuddly Saving Santa, but everyone else will find it to be daft, forgettable, and a waste of a decent idea. It’s harmless, but lacking the individuality that its very message suggests we all have. “A Christmas without Santa doesn’t sound like fun at all,” sings Ashley Tisdale in the climactic Christmas song. Actually, it does, if this is the alternative.

Extras: None

Review: Bloody Homecoming / Cert: 15 / Director: Brian C. Weed / Screenplay: Jake Helgren / Starring: Jim Tavare, Rae Latt, Lexi Giovagnoli / Release Date: March 10th

Accidentally murderous teenagers battle a pissed off fireman’s-outfit-wearing psychopath in Bloody Homecoming, a cheap riff on the likes of I Know What You Did Last Summer, minus a great deal of the panache and sheen that made the latter so palatable.

Strains of Halloween in the film’s musical cues aim for something better, but they’re not fooling anyone. Everything – from the masked psycho to the high school setting and sinister notes left in lockers – has been done and parodied endlessly to death since the nineties. There’s even a creepy janitor who should have been played by Michael Berryman or Brad Dourif. The influence of Wes Craven and his most successful imitators (chiefly the underrated Urban Legend and the aforementioned I Know What You Did Last Summer) looms large over this uninspired slasher melodrama.

A more seasoned director and cast of better actors might have salvaged something, but Bloody Homecoming is an absolute, abject exercise in low-budget laziness. It gets better once it does away with the high school hijinks and starts with the killing, but it never rises above the level of mere distraction. Neither nasty nor original enough to be memorable, it’s not even bad enough to earn itself an ironic watch. Not that it doesn’t try with lines like “yes, I am nice, Lauren!” and a ten minute gloating speech from the villain that felt overdone the first three times they did it in Scream.

It’s always good to see a slasher villain bedecked in a blue-collar workman’s outfit (it worked well for the Maniac Cop and Harry Warden) and Bloody Homecoming has a good one, but in this case it’s utterly wasted. There’s nothing wrong with staying firmly within one’s comfort zone, but Bloody Homecoming isn’t any good at that either. This bloodless homecoming is a decidedly limp affair.

Extras: None

Review: The Conjuring / Cert: 15 / Director: James Wan / Screenplay: Chad Hayes, Carey Hayes / Starring: Vera Farmiga, Patrick Wilson, Lili Taylor, Ron Livingston / Release Date: Out Now

Similar in tone to Insidious, The Conjuring is based on the real-life case of the Perron family. During the early ’70s, the family’s Rhode Island home was the scene of a paranormal attack. Unknown to the family, a horde of murders, suicides and general nastiness had occurred for over 100 years at the site. With initially just a few strange goings-on, it soon becomes apparent that there is something in the house, something that has bad things in mind. Before long, the family makes the decision to call in the Warrens, Ed (Wilson) and Lorraine (Farmiga), who are a married couple specialising in demonic cases.

Firstly, this film definitely matches up to Wan’s earlier films, likely being the best of the bunch. Atmospheric, tone-perfect and with scares aplenty, The Conjuring is simply one of the best horror films in recent memory. Wan captures the spirit of the ’70s expertly, delivering a similar tone and texture to many films of the era. Amazingly, there is no gore, no explicit language, no sex – this film gets by on scares alone.

Without throwing scares out there for the sake of it, The Conjuring‘s strength lies in its subtleties and timing. The cinematography is charming, and the score, setting and pacing all add to the overall bigger picture. The performances of all involved, be it the younger members of the Perron family or the more established names on show, are all great. Wilson and Farmiga are ideal as the Warrens, whilst Taylor and Livingston are pitch-perfect as the troubled Perrons.

It really is a rarity to get a genuine horror classic these days. The Conjuring is most definitely in that category. It provides suspense, drama and terror throughout. When you think there’s about to be a lull or that the story’s about to take a predictable route, things change up. Whilst all films of this nature have some element of predictability, The Conjuring manages to keep things fresh and the viewer on the edge of their seat.

The Conjuring is a fantastically constructed and crafted film that all fans of horror should make it a priority to see. As well as the fantastic main feature, the Blu-ray release includes some decent extras, including a look at the real Ed and Lorraine Warren, and a catch-up with the real-life Perron family on whose experiences the troubling paranormal events of the film are based.

Extras: Three Featurettes – Face-to-Face With Terror / A Life in Demonology / Scaring the ‘@$*%’ Out of You

Review: The Human Race / Cert: 18 / Director: Paul Hough / Screenplay: Paul Hough / Starring: Paul McCarthy-Boyington. Eddie McGee, Trista Robinson, T. Arthur Cottam / Release Date: Out Now

When 80 people are abducted by an unknown entity in a blinding light and are forced to participate in a brutal race with only one winner allowed, the battle of self-preservation begins.

The Human Race is Richard Bachman’s The Long Walk meets Battle Royale and what a fast-paced, roller coaster ride it is. The rules are simple: step on the grass or gravitate away from the course and you die. Get lapped twice, you die. As people panic, try to escape or ever break the rules by accident, they are eliminated one by one in a grisly, head-exploding fashion with plenty of bloodshed to go around.

Hough has crafted an intelligent script with complex characters who change in drastic yet thoroughly believable ways when it comes down to dog-eat-dog survival. Justin (McCarthy-Boyington) and his war veteran buddy, Eddie (McGee), are the rational ones of the surviving group. Justin begins to figure out that there might be a way to beat their captors at their own game when an unexpected event alters everything.

The Human Race is brilliant on all levels, especially when you consider what Hough has done with his limited budget. Every actor turns in a solid performance, but the one who shines the most is Eddie McGee. He’s a charismatic, thinking man’s hero excelling at surmising situations and taking action where need be. Expect McGee’s acting career to go far after this film.

Well-written with unexpected twists and turns complemented by outstanding performances, The Human Race is a refreshing movie that deserves to be on the radar of SF fans.

Extras: None

Review: All the Devil’s Aliens / Cert: TBC / Director: Daniel Falicki / Screenplay: Daniel Falicki, Ryan Lieske, Lisa Mueller / Starring: David Gries, Lisa Mueller, Joseph Scott Anthony / Release Date: TBC

All the Devil’s Aliens is the third feature from independent director Daniel Falicki and is distributed by Chemical Burn, a company specialising in low-budget genre and exploitation pictures.

Medical student Mike is offered a job as one of a team of carers for a cantankerous recluse living in isolation in a country home about whom bizarre rumours abound. However, upon arriving he is greeted by a nurse fleeing the house in hysterics, then put-upon but cheerful chief carer Robin relaying some odd rules he must follow, and numerous bouts of coughing, spluttering and muffled obscenities coming from his charge Pinborough via an audio monitor. But when he begins seeing strange figures skulking in the shadows and hears tales of unexplained disappearances, it becomes apparent there are other forces at work.

All the Devil’s Aliens (also known as All the Devils Are Here or Devils in the Darkness, depending where on the Internet you’re looking) is a curious piece of filmmaking. The harsh lighting and grainy film stock give it the feel of another example of the current horror trend for faux grindhouse, but its lack of ostentation or referential self-awareness serves to separate it from such efforts. Also, not many exploitation flicks boast an opening quotation from The Merchant of Venice to prime its audience with a clue regarding its central premise. Were it not for the foreboding atmosphere and mysterious figures flitting past the camera, you could almost mistake it for a melodrama.

The film was quite clearly shot on a minuscule budget, but was done so in a way that skilfully disguises its limited resources. The simple plot allows almost the entire story to take place in a single setting, a creaky old building supplying all the darkened crevices necessary to hide its mysterious occupants. The human mind is always more fearful about what it can’t see rather than what it can, a reaction Falicki uses to full effect. The natural darkness of the house allows the silhouetted humanoids to remain hidden even when in shot, then the sudden jolt of revealing movement that makes you question what you’re even seeing serves to freak you out with far more precision than any histrionic close up of a snarling monstrosity ever could.

Character development is often the first casualty of horror filmmaking, but the conversations between Mike and Robin during the lulls of Pinborough’s demands and verbal assaults effectively paint them as real people with personalities and dreams, and when Pinborough himself is revealed in all his white-eyed, pale-skinned and utterly insane glory, he completely steals the spotlight.

Given how effective his filmmaking style is in establishing an atmosphere of quiet dread, it’s a shame that Falicki felt it necessary to include overstated music to bluntly signpost how the audience is supposed to feel at any given moment. You can practically hear Brick Tamland declaring “I AM BEING OMINOUS!” as the orchestral crescendos gradually overwhelm all other sound.

While by no means a classic in any sense of the word, All the Devil’s Aliens still marks itself as being made with more thought and enthusiasm than many studio-backed mainstream films with vastly bigger budgets. A fusion of horror, drama and conspiracy theory, its novel approach to what could have easily been a clichéd story makes it worth seeking out. 

Extras: None

 

Review: The World’s End / Cert: 15 / Director: Edgar Wright / Screenplay: Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright / Starring: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Martin Freeman, Rosamund Pike / Release Date: Out Now

The World’s End is the final part in Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg’s Three Flavours Cornetto trilogy, the previous movies being the horror comedy Shaun of the Dead and the action movie pastiche Hot Fuzz. This final part draws its inspiration from paranoia-driven science fiction movies such as Invasion of the Body Snatchers and They Live.

The plot revolves around Pegg’s character, Gary King, a man pushing forty who drags his childhood friends out on a pub crawl round their long-abandoned home town in a desperate attempt to relive his youth. King’s agenda seems to be an attempt to rewrite his personal history, and as the movie plays out, old friendships are rekindled and old grudges become sharpened. It slowly becomes obvious that something is terribly wrong with the town of Newton Haven, and the movie rapidly shifts from the mundane drama to creepy sci-fi. Laced with gags and clever references throughout, The World’s End gets better and faster as it continues.

The idea of people returning to their home town and discovering that everything has changed works on multiple levels. Not only do we get the obvious sci-fi twists, it also allows Wright and Pegg to deliver a polemic against the corporate homogeneity of the modern day, with plenty of snarky references to chain pubs and the media obsession with youth.

Nick Frost and Simon Pegg are perfect on screen as always, playing off against each other with the familiar chemistry that has made them famous, and they are ably assisted by Martin Freeman, Paddy Considine and Eddie Marsan, who are all playing to type. The friendships are strong and believable, lending sombre notes to what is essentially a sci-fi comedy romp.

The various features are a lovely addition to the DVD; the commentary is particularly enlightening and it doesn’t hurt that Pegg and Wright are both eloquent and charming throughout, filling the time with as much information and banter as possible. (Wright also drops a few tantalising hints about his fortcoming work for Marvel.) The trivia track is okay (though if you’ve lived through the ’90s it’s nothing terribly new) and the “making of” documentary is nice enough.

The World’s End is a worthy addition to the trilogy, fitting in neatly in terms of both maturity and hilarity. Well worth your time.

Extras: See Above

Review: Big Trouble in Little China / Cert: 15 / Director: John Carpenter / Screenplay: Gary Goldman, David Z. Weinstein, W.D. Richter / Starring: Kurt Russell, Kim Cattrall, Dennis Dun, James Hong, Victor Wong / Release Date: December 16th

Arrow Films continue their one company crusade to bring fans the best possible versions of their favourite movies with the quirky yet excellent Big Trouble in Little China.

The fourth collaboration between director Carpenter and star Russell pitches us into a modern day San Francisco Chinatown where a magical underworld awaits that promises adventure and fun. Misunderstood on its release – Fox obviously had no idea how to market this movie hybrid – it has gained a cult status all of its own as the years have gone by and it’s easy to see why.

Jack Burton (Russell) has to rescue his best friend’s girlfriend from the nefarious clutches of David Lo Pan (Hong), a 2,000 year old magician who is hell-bent on becoming human again. That’s the story in a nutshell, but the brilliance of this film is not its layered plot or excellent acting, but the pure adrenaline thrill ride that it is. Mixing comedy, action, adventure, Kung fu, monsters and ghosts, it creates a subgenre all by itself – although don’t ask us what it’s called. This is Boy’s Own fun and with Burton, we have one of the best action heroes who never were.

Arrow have outdone themselves again with this release of an ’80s classic. Both the Blu-ray and a limited edition Steelbook are brimming with extras. Fair enough, most of them were on the 2-disc DVD release a few years back, but one of the great new editions, along with a cracking transfer, is a bunch of new interviews with Carpenter, Russell and a lot of others involved in the production. It’s very insightful and interesting to hear what they have to say about the film. There’s also a booklet with new writing on the film.

In all honesty, if you’ve never seen the film, then buy it now. If you have and you already own it on DVD, there’s plenty to convince you to pick up this HD version. As good old Jack Burton always says, “The cheque’s in the mail.”

Extras: Audio commentary / Interviews / Featurette / Deleted scenes / TV spots / Gallery

Review: Man of Steel / Cert: 12 / Director: Zack Snyder / Screenplay: David Goyer / Starring: Henry Cavill, Michael Shannon, Amy Adams, Russell Crowe, Kevin Costner / Release Date: December 2nd

Now available for your home viewing pleasure, Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel tale looks to re-energise Warner Brothers’ seemingly dead Superman franchise. With no ties to any of the Superman films of yesteryear, Snyder’s movie acts as fresh introduction to the last son of Krypton.

Yes, you may have heard the basic story of Superman at various times in various formats over the years, but this latest effort looks to attack things from a different angle. Before we even get to the space adventure of the baby Kal-El heading for the fields of Smallville, we’re given a fantastically magical and mystical look at Krypton. With Jor-El (Crowe) engaged in battle with General Zod (Shannon), the patriarch of the family El is trying to give his son a future away from the imploding Krypton. It’s action-packed and stunningly-beautiful, and that’s before we even get to the meat of story.

Picking things up years later with the now-adult Clark Kent (Cavill) channelling his inner hobo, CK moves from place to place, job to job, trying to keep his extraordinary powers from the world. Of course, if that was the case, we’d never get to see the big, blue Boy Scout, Superman. In this retelling of the Superman mythos, the coming of age of Clark Kent to Superman is as a result of General Zod coming to Earth to find the son of Jor-El. Having been banished to the Phantom Zone for crimes against Krypton, the vengeful Zod is back. Adding a suit and cape to his powers, Clark Kent is finally ready to embrace his destiny as he has to face his biggest challenge yet.

As Superman, Henry Cavill is simply brilliant, particularly in his earlier ‘finding himself’ moments. Taking on a role made infinitely harder by the Christopher Reeve blueprint – just ask Brandon Routh – Cavill delivers a Superman fitting to his time. Opposing him, Shannon’s Zod is clinical, thorough and unforgiving, with Shannon impressing. That said, it’s Antje Traue’s Faora that threatens to steal the show with her electric one-liners and imposing actions. Not to be outdone, Lois Lane (Adams) also gets to showcase her typically acerbic wit, even if certain parts of her relationship with Superman don’t sit well with many. Similarly, there are certain elements – here’s looking at you, destruction of Metropolis – to Snyder’s film that lay uneasy.

As real as you can make the ‘alien baby lands on Earth, flies around in cape, with X-ray vision, ice breath, and heat rays from his eyes’ story, Snyder has delivered a film that sets the tone for a new world for Warner Brothers, a world that our young Superman is slowly discovering and coming to terms with.

Extras: Strong Characters, Legendary Roles / Planet Krypton / All-Out Action

Review: The Phantom of the Opera / Cert: PG / Director: Rupert Julian / Screenplay: Elliott Clawson / Starring: Lon Chaney, Mary Philbin, Norman Kerry, Arthur Edmund Carewe, Gibson Gowland / Release Date: December 2nd

Never trust critics. Quite why we like horror movies is always going to be personal. After all, that’s why some love a bit of torture-porn while the rest of us worry about what is the matter with these people. But for this writer, the love affair started with those Aurora model kits of the old Universal Monsters. These were iconic images; not least of which was the 1963 kit of Lon Chaney as the Phantom. This was an image that apparently caused 1925 cinema-goers to faint (although we’d take that story with a pinch of salt if we were you). The Phantom of the Opera (1925) was a massive hit when it was finally released after a troubled production and a couple of false starts; its success is largely the reason for that canon of Universal horror that followed. But contemporary critics were rather ho-hum about it. Had they identified that it was really just a load of populous theatre-fodder?

You all know the plot (although that does vary from version to version) and this is considered by many to be the definitive adaptation. We really are taken into the past here: this is a restoration of the film’s 1929 re-issue and it’s presented here with the original screen tints (so often forgotten on silent movies) and even what survives of the full colour scenes. With a cast of thousands and a giant set that’s still used today, this is melodrama of the most melodramatic sort. But behind the opera house grandeur we’ve got tunnels, chambers and more trapdoors than you’re ever likely to see outside a trapdoor factory. It’s dark, Gothic and silent. If that weren’t chilling enough, it’s got Lon Chaney. The moment that mask gets removed is still shocking. Historians like to put themselves in the mindset of the time. They crave to know what the audience of King Kong (1933) really felt when the big fella first appeared; they even puzzle over what they felt when Charlton Heston rounded the corner to see the half-buried Statue of Liberty and realised that we really blew it up (God damn us all to hell). These moments are lost to the present; only those that were there can really know. But Phantom still holds its power; or perhaps it’s regained it: Thirty years can be unkind to a film; after nearly ninety, the very act of peering into the past provides an unsettling otherworldliness. When the mask is removed, Chaney stares at us. And he keeps staring. Like a nightmare that won’t end. Maybe they really did faint.

Today this film is the stuff of legend, so what did those critics have against it? It was a long time ago; we’ll probably never know. Never trust critics.

Extras: Original 1925 version / Trailers / Reel 5 to 1929 sound version (all that survives) / The mysterious “man with a lantern” scene / Lon Chaney – A Thousand Faces / Booklet and PDF

Review: Big Ass Spider! / Cert: 15 / Director: Mike Mendez / Screenplay: Gregory Gieras / Starring: Greg Grunberg, Ray Wise, Claire Kramer, Lombardo Boyer / Release Date: December 23rd

You’ll probably gather that Big Ass Spider! isn’t the subtlest movie ever made. In its most basic terms, it concerns a spider which is distinctly ‘bad ass’ and which escapes the usual collection of worried-looking military grunts and anxious boffins and sets about wrecking Los Angeles and killing some (often busty) locals. But it’s a slightly schizophrenic movie too; chunky former Heroes star Greg Grunberg plays the same sort of luckless schmuck he portrayed in last year’s agreeable TV movie The End of the World – this time he’s a portly pest exterminator – but the violence is graphic and gruesome and almost entirely at odds with Grunberg’s slapstick bumblings and the film’s inept attempts at goofball comedy.

The plot is actually pretty much the same as last month’s Spiders 3D, with the military and scientific communities in a tailspin when an arachnid whose DNA they’ve spliced with a recovered alien organism cuts loose and starts to grow exponentially, quadrupling its size every few hours. Grunberg’s Alex is on hand at a local hospital when the spider escapes from a corpse it’s devoured from the inside out, and before long he’s teamed up with the American military’s finest to track down the pesky spider before it can escape into the city. Whoops too late, there it goes…

When the creature, now swollen to enormous proportions, sets out on its rampage across the city, it all gets a bit graphic as victims are speared, ripped apart and devoured. But it’s all at odds with Grunberg’s tiresome comedy partnership with hapless hospital porter Jose (Boyas) and the script just seems to think it’s enough to have the pair pull faces and behave like brainless dorks instead of giving them anything actually funny to say or do. Fortunately there’s plenty of distraction courtesy of some decent special effects – the spider’s King Kong routine atop a skyscraper is particularly effective – and the weak script’s deficiencies are made up for by some sturdy production values and Mendez’ occasionally inventive direction.

Big Ass Spider! is schlocky nonsense, marginally better than Spiders 3D by virtue of its more accomplished and ambitious effects sequences, and at a tight seventy-five minutes it doesn’t outstay its welcome. This is one giant spider you really won’t mind inviting into your home.

Extras: None