DVD Review: Exit Humanity / Cert: 15 / Director: John Geddes / Screenplay: John Geddes / Starring: Mark Gibson, Jordan Hayes, Dee Wallace, Bill Moseley, Stephen McHattie, Brian Cox / Release Date: June 19th (US), July 2nd (UK)

With the bizarre influx of supernatural Civil War movies hitting the big and small screens, writer, director and editor John Geddes has created one of the better ones.

In Exit Humanity, the story is told in flashback mode through our hero’s journal (narrated by Brian Cox), Edward Young (Mark Gibson); a former Confederate soldier forced to kill his wife due to an unknown infection that turns the newly dead or those that are bitten into zombies.

Young documents his experiences through his journal describing how head shots with a six shot pistol are good for close range when encountering the living dead while a rifle is better for distance along with other valuable information to be passed on should anything happen to him. As his quest continues, searching for his missing son through the back woods of Tennessee, he sadly discovers that his boy has become one of the living dead as well. Forced to do the unthinkable, he places his son’s ashes in a jar, continuing his journey to a peaceful place of rest when he can scatter them.

Fighting his way through hungry zombies to his destination, Young joins up with Isaac (Adam Seybold) forming an uneasy alliance with him to find his sister, Emma (Jordan Hayes) who may hold the cure to the disease held captive by a renegade Confederate army, General Williams (Bill Moseley) and his outlaw soldiers that include an unbalanced medic (Stephen McHattie).

PartThe Road and part 28 Days Later, the movie is told with animated segments and chapters that move the film forward. As with many other Civil War/zombie films and the lack of why the living dead are roaming the countryside, this one has a believable explanation that is delivered by Dee Wallace portraying a mysterious, secluded woman in the woods, named Eve.

Filmed on a budget of $300,000, Geddes has created an interesting twist on the zombie genre and makes use of the forest filled landscape, never playing the film for laughs. The Civil war reenactment group featured in the beginning adds to the production value of the movie as well. Mark Gibson turns in an excellent performance as the brooding Young, as do the rest of the cast turning in solid performances.

Special Features: None

Blu-ray Review: David Lynch Box Set / Cert: 18 / Director: David Lynch / Screenplay: Various / Starring: Kyle MacLachlan, Jack Nance, Nicolas Cage, Dennis Hopper, Laura Dern, Bill Pullman / Release Date: Out Now

The long awaited remastered versions of six of David Lynch’s most famous films have finally hit DVD and Blu-ray. The films themselves should need no introduction, but what about the extra features and package? Are they worth the double dip for the Lynch enthusiast?

The box set itself is a bespoke fold out affair, not just the individual releases packaged together. A set of poster cards is included, which is a nice touch, but certainly not essential.

On the discs we have:

Eraserhead – Apparently a newly remastered version overseen by the man himself, although this could just be a HD transfer of the version sold in 2001 on Lynch’s website.

The special features here are Lynch (One) an 82min documentary previously available separately, which follows him over a two year period, delving into some of his creative interests, and while making Inland Empire. This is a great look at what makes Lynch tick and, of course, highlights his idiosyncratic traits. The disc is topped off with four short films; Six Men Getting Sick (1966), The Alphabet (1968), and two separate versions of The Amputee (1974). These have previously been released (along with other shorts featured on other discs) on the long deleted 2008 DVD, The Short Films of David Lynch. Despite the great extras, the biggest disappointment is the decision not to port over the wonderful Eraserhead Stories from the Lynch approved DVD. This 85 min featurette of Lynch talking about the film is fantastic and it is such a missed opportunity not to include it. The DVD menu which features a deleted scene involving Henry (Jack Nance), a piece of wire and a dead cat is sorely missed. Shame on you Universal!

Dune – Lynch’s much maligned adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel, and certainly plays better now than it did back in 1984. This disc has been previously released (as has Blue Velvet), and as such they don’t carry the generic menu seen on the other discs. What you do get, however are some film specific special features so obviously missing from the other films. Here we have: Destination Dune – a 6 min contemporary featurette, Impressions of Dune – a 40min retrospective with much of the talent involved, although Lynch himself is noticeable by his absence. An interview with Golda Offenheim, production co-ordinator is an uncut version of the interview used in the retrospective.

Blue Velvet – Another previously released disc, and as such has a wealth of great special features, namely: A 45min interview with Dennis Hopper, A 70 min documentary, Mysteries of Love, three outtakes, Siskel & Ebert “At the Movies” the contemporary review from the famed US film critics, four vignettes and the usual trailers and TV spots. A great collection.

Wild At Heart – One of my favourite films of all time, presented in a truly wonderful transfer. The special features are Dumbland, all eight episodes of Lynch’s absurd animated comedy, previously available on its own DVD, and two short films: The Grandmother and Lumiere and Company which runs just under a minute. Like Eraserhead, this version suffers from not having the DVD features ported over. No animated menus, and worse still, no featurettes. The special edition DVD was full of insight from all involved with the brilliant Love, Death, Elvis & Oz documentary. It would have been nice to have that here.

Twin Peaks Fire Walk With Me however, does not even merit a trailer. Zilch. Lovely transfer of the film though.

Lost Highway – Again, the special features are made up of short and experimental films previously released on Lynch’s website, and in the DVD collection, Dynamic: 01.

While it is a great collection, it is a missed opportunity to release the definitive versions of the films. I’m just hoping it’s not just a cynical way of making the fans buy the films yet again, later in some super-dooper special edition versions. Each of the films are also available separately too.

A lovely set, but could do better. Maybe wait for the price reduction.

DVD Review: Mardock Scramble – The First Compression / Cert: 18 / Director: Susumo Kudo / Screenplay: Tom Ubukata / Starring: Megumi Hayashibara, Norito Yashima, Hiroki Tochi / Release date: Out Now

In keeping with the tradition of complex backstories to most contemporary anime; Mardock Scramble: The First Compression is based on a novel which was then made into a multi volume manga which is now a trilogy of anime films and is in development as a live action Hollywood film from producer Don Murphy and director Michael Davis. This is the first instalment in the trilogy and sets the tone perfectly; it’s probably the best anime I have seen in a while despite being a little rough around the edges.

The plot is completely batty. A troubled prostitute named Rune Ballot from an abusive family is murdered by a serial killer named Shell and is resurrected through underground technology by a law firm that is part of a mega corporation. The doctor responsible for the return to life informs Rune that Shell works for a rival corporation and they are going to use her to bring him to justice in the court room. Rune is paired with an artificial intelligence that appears to her as a golden mouse and can also form weapons and other items and she sets her mind on vengeance. The killer in the meantime sets a series of grotesque assassins on to the woman to prevent her from testifying against him.

One of the most frustrating things about cyberpunk as a sub-genre is that Hollywood only gets it right once every twenty years or so whereas the Japanese have no problem and make it look easy with their animation all the time. Mardock Scramble plays out like an early William Gibson novel with strong, developed characterisation and the twisted assassins you would find in something like Ninja Scroll. Despite its subject matter the film never descends into lurid fan service the way it could have done and the sex and violence is part of the background of the story and never the focus.

The animation is solid but unremarkable, it never gets to the visual heights of something produced by Production I.G or Madhouse but looks good with some slightly dodgy computer assisted anime during the cityscape and driving scenes. The roughness gives it something of an old school feel which I really liked. It felt like the anime boom of the early 90s again, when I would watch something on video amazed that cartoons could contain such violence and language.

At a brief 65 minutes, Mardock Scramble is a complete blast of anime fun with a layered story that will be expanded on in the next two films. It ends on a major cliff hanger that may frustrate but will get you back for the next film due later this year.

Special Features: Theatrical and Directors Cuts, Trailers.

DVD Review: Stormhouse / Cert: 15 / Director: Dan Turner / Screenplay: Jason Arnopp / Starring: Katherine Flynn, Grant Masters, Patrick Flynn, Grahame Fox / Release date: July 9th

The British film industry may be on its arse, but at least plenty of genre films are being made and picked up for distribution. Stormhouse was screened at last year’s Fright Fest and finally hits the DVD shelves in July.

It’s 2002, four months before the invasion of Iraq and the British military have managed to capture and imprison a supernatural entity. In order to get a better insight into what is happening at the secret Stormhouse base (which is only a ball throw away from playing school kids), the government have sent a ‘ghost whisperer’, Hayley Sands (Katherine Flynn), much to the annoyance of Major Lester (Grant Masters). She receives a hostile reception from the other army guys, too. Not least Lieutenant Groves (Grahame Fox), although she makes an ally (as well as someone to flirt with) in Australian boffin Justin Rourke (Patrick Flynn). It seems the soldier boys have bigger plans for this spirit, especially in the crackdown on terrorism. Sands is obviously appalled with what’s going on, but the increasingly restless ghost may become a bigger problem, especially since it wants to ‘play’.

Allegedly ‘inspired by real events’, Stormhouse tries hard to be a good little chiller. CCTV footage is used sparingly enough so as not to become as annoying as your standard found footage fiasco. Some real anxiety and atmosphere that is built up tends to be wasted as it does employ the ‘loud noise jump scare’ a little too often. It builds up the tension with within its claustrophobic setting, and when the entity begins to enter the bodies of the men, it resists the temptation of becoming a clone of The Thing. The sets are minimalist but effective, but you would have thought the military could afford lighting, especially in our claim culture society.

Writer Jason Arnopp – who used to write for Kerrang Magazine when it wasn’t just Smash Hits for the shoe gazing generation before moving onto Dr Who fiction and a Friday the 13^th tie-in novel – has a decent premise, but some of the plot holes are bigger than the one in the cage the entity is kept in.

The film really suffers from its lack of budget, noticeably with some weak acting; sadly this seems to come from some of the more experienced members of the cast. Andrew Hall, playing the government minister meant to be looking out for Miss Sands, is particularly woeful. This doesn’t, for the most part, detract too much from the proceedings though.

I’m intrigued as to why Ms Flynn is not listed as being in the film on IMDB. I know it can be wholly inaccurate at times, but you’d have thought the film makers would have corrected it? Could it be that she wanted her name removed so it didn’t tarnish her bio?

For all its flaws, it does make for a good Saturday beer and mates movie, although you may never want to hear ‘Frere Jacques’ again.

Special Features: Behind the scenes, interview, featurette.

DVD Review: The Reeds / Cert: 18 / Director: Nick Cohen / Screenplay: Chris Baker / Starring: Anna Brewster, Geoff Bell, Daniel, Caltagirone, Emma Catherwood / Release Date: June 25th

Winner of the Toronto After Dark horror film festival 2009, low-budget British horror The Reeds is only now making its DVD debut in the UK. This is, to say the least, a bit of a puzzler because this is a competent, dark and largely-effective little chiller which echoes recent fare like Eden Lake and The Children in execution if not necessarily in subject matter.

Once again we have a group of lively youngsters – this time a bunch of twenty-something Londoners – whose weekend boating trip on the bleak and desolate Norfolk Broads turns into something unpleasant and distinctly grisly. After a day of fun and frolics they decide to take a shortcut through some thicker reeds so they can reach their overnight mooring place by nightfall. Before long the novice sailors are lost in the dark and soon one of them is injured in a bloody (and wince-inducing) accident, strange shapes loom out of the darkness and something nasty from the past is lurking beneath the surface.

For the first forty-five or so minutes The Reeds is engrossing, unnerving stuff. Trapped and lost with one of their number in danger of bleeding to death, the little group slowly starts to fall apart – and terrifying (and initially confusing) hallucinations and visions only make the situation worse. Eventually the boat is lost, the casualty list gets longer and those who survive find themselves tormented by eerie ghostly figures and a mysterious man with a gun.

It’s probably to The Reeds’ credit that it isn’t just another runaround with a bunch of isolated holidaymakers terrorised by grotesque locals but its supernatural stylings, which become more and more evident as the film progresses, unfortunately just muddy the (brackish) waters and the sense of threat seems to diminish a bit when we realise the true nature of the apparently-feral kids who roam the marshes. Explanations, when they come, are muddled and, at one point, absurdly coincidental and ultimately the combination of ghost story and the more routine creepy they-all-get-picked-off-one-by-one story doesn’t really work as both elements work against one another so that neither of them is as effective as they could be. The denouement is particularly perplexing as we’re left asking ourselves if anything we’ve seen in the last seventy minutes or so is supposed to have happened at all.

It’s a shame that The Reeds fumbles the ball because it’s an interesting piece with a lot of potential which is squandered because it’s never quite sure what it’s supposed to be and what it wants to be. The cast of predominantly new faces (including Will Mellor… yep, him off perennial BBC3 sitcom favourite Two Pints) are all good value and the script, when it’s not wandering back and forth between genres, is naturalistic and dynamic. But in the end The Reeds lets itself down and throws away too much of its early good work in a jumbled, messy final reel and a climax which leaves the audience unsatisfied and asking too many unanswered questions.

Special Features: None

DVD Review: Doctor Who – The Krotons / Cert: PG / Director: David Maloney / Screenplay: Robert Holmes / Starring: Patrick Troughton, James Copeland, Terence Brown, Frazer Hines / Release Date: July 2nd

Originally, this story was broadcast between 28th December 1968 – 18th January 1969 but was actually a late replacement for a completely different tale – Prison in Space, a risqué effort that had leather clad women running a top security establishment and contained a scene with the Doctor spanking Zoe to break her of mind control/feminism.

Robert Holmes was drafted in to fill the gap and provided us with our first view into Doctor Who as seen through his eyes.

The basic plot treads a familiar path, the TARDIS arrives on a planet that looks like a quarry, the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe discover a world ruled/enslaved by unseen forces and set about changing the status quo. Making the locals rise up and carpe the living diem out of the invaders. All, standard, run of the mill stuff.

In this world, the brightest locals (Gonds) are always chosen to serve as ‘companions’ of the Krotons – and are never seen again. A sort of parallel with the national curriculum, but, rather than a one way trip to university; the brightest children are absorbed into the alien ship – if you want to see a subtextual comment about the nature of working for a living, then feel free. We are here simply to discuss Doctor Who.

Zoe and The Doctor shine in this story and are given some wonderfully quotable lines and watching the imp-like second Doctor in full flow it is easy to see echoes of his portrayal in evidence in the Smith Doctor of today.

As Monsters go, the Krotons themselves are rubbish and would have been better suited to an audio realm, if it wasn’t for their ridiculous South African accents. Their lumbering form and spinning heads do little to convince us of their apparently crystalline structure and yet Homes still manages to give them both menace and motivation.

Yes, this story has parallels with the student uprisings of 1968 and even with certain episodes of the prisoner but it is still a fun story and not even remotely as dull as The Dominators.

Special Features:

As is the norm this story comes with a  commentary track with actors Philip Madoc (Eelek), Richard Ireson (Axus) and Gilbert Wynne (Thara), assistant floor manager David Tilley, make-up designer Sylvia James, costume designer Bobi Bartlett and special sounds designer Brian Hodgson. A revolving door commentary moderated expertly by Toby Hadoke. It is the late Philip Madoc who both illuminates and dominates the commentary and it was a tear in the eye that you hear him offering to attend American conventions the moment that he is asked.

Also on the disc is a lovely documentary called Second Time Around. When faced with William Hartnell’s deteriorating health the Doctor Who production team hit on the idea of ‘rejuvenating’ the show’s hero and giving fresh life to an already popular show. This mini documentary takes a candid look over Patrick Troughton’s time as the Second Doctor. And is so much better than a ‘making of the Krotons’ would have been.

Also included is Doctor Who Stories – Frazer Hines (part one) where actor Frazer Hines reminisces about his time on the series in an interview originally recorded in 2003 for the BBC’s Story of Doctor Who. It is important to note that this is the last full Troughton story to be released so Part Two will logically appear on a future ‘Regenerations’ release.

Rounding off the disc is another episode of The Doctor’s Strange Love, where writers Joseph Lidster and Simon Guerrier take an overly affectionate look at The Krotons. The usual suspects of Radio Times Listings and programme subtitles finish off this lovingly restored old master.

DVD Review: Intruders / Cert: 15 / Director: Juan Carlos Fresnadillo / Screenplay: Nicolas Casariego, Jaime Marques / Starring: Clive Owen, Carice Van Houten, Izan Corchero, Daniel Bruhl, Ella Purnell, Pilar Lopez de Alaya / Release Date: Out Now

The third film from Intacto and 28 Weeks Later director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo suffers very much from difficult third film syndrome but despite what you may have heard isn’t a total write off. It is one of those films where you can see the good film inside trying to escape but too many choices are made which count against the film and thus it does not live up to its potential.

We start off in Spain as a child and his mother are terrorised by a malevolent entity known as Hollowface which tries to take the child. The action then switches back and forth between the mother and child in Spain trying to come to terms with their traumatic experience and a family in the suburbs of London whose father and daughter start to experience similar visions of Hollowface after the daughter finds a story on paper stuffed in a tree at her grandparents’ house. Are these two stories connected? Of course they are…

The fatal flaw with Intruders is that Fresnadillo lays his cards on the table far too early by revealing the entity and using some truly awful CGI. All the tension evaporates and the wind is sucked out of the film from this point onwards so the admittedly very creepy scenes that follow as Hollowface emerges from cupboards and alleyways in London lose any power they may have had. The two storylines that are seemingly connected by the evil presence do keep your attention and keep you guessing from the very beginning and the ending may well surprise you. However in connecting these two threads they make some poor editing choices which again lead to an absence of tension.

The performances in the film are all very good. Clive Owen, Carice Van Houten, Daniel Bruhl and Pilar Lopez De Ayala are all very solid but the child performances are what stand out. Ella Purnell and Izan Conchero are a couple of remarkable child actors who we should see more of and really sell the blind panic that occurs when you are young and have an irrational fear of something in the darkness. The tragedy is that the film and story around these performers cannot live up to all of their efforts.

This is one of those films set in the London suburbs that, like the recent Heartless, is really well shot and makes the whole area seem like a dark threatening sprawl with unspeakable evil lurking around the corner. Working with an international crew, Fresnadillo really brings something unique to the locations which add to the overall feel of dread.

Intruders isn’t a bad film in the way that many are just plain bad but it reeks of a missed opportunity.

Special Features: Deleted Scenes, Featurettes, Who is Hollowface?, The Making of Intruders.

Blu-ray Review: The Woman in Black / Cert: 15 / Director: James Watkins / Screenplay: Jane Goldman / Starring: Daniel Radcliffe, Janet McTeer, Ciaran Hinds, Sophie Stuckley / Release Date: June 18th

When it was released in February, Hammer’s The Woman in Black made an obscene amount of money in the UK. Audiences seemed genuinely captured by this supernatural tale based on a book, which was then a play and is now a film. What was it that drew them in though? Was it the presence of Daniel Radcliffe? Was it the history of the property and its successful stage production? Or were people just in the mood for a good old fashioned spook fest? Due to its success you couldn’t be blamed for thinking that the film was some kind of classic and a true return to form for Hammer. However, temper your expectations if you missed it first time around.

The haunted and grieving lawyer Arthur Kipps (Daniel Radcliffe) is whisked away to the countryside to sort out the affairs of a recently deceased owner of Eel Marsh House. Whilst in the nearby village, Kipps begins to uncover a tragic and haunted past and that the village’s children seemingly do not live very long. Staying alone at the mansion, Kipps uncovers a secret and is menaced by the ghost of an angry woman who is back for vengeance.

Ok so the play and book may date back to before the current supernatural craze began but the elements of The Woman in Black have all been seen before in about five different films from recent years. The house is right out of The Others and the malevolence is from Insidious. Sadly the miscasting is right out of Bram Stokers Dracula as Daniel Radcliffe seems the biggest mistake since Keanu Reeves played Jonathan Harker. I’ve always felt that Radcliffe felt uncomfortable in the Harry Potter films and here he is perhaps the most uncomfortable he has ever been, even without that many lines. He simply is not convincing as a grieving man with a child, he doesn’t seem old enough and looks like a kid on work experience at a museum. Radcliffe does well in the scenes where he has to creep about with a candle and act scared but everything else just falls flat on its face.

Due to this one fatal flaw The Woman in Black is held back in the classic horror stakes because, although derivative, everything else around the performance works wonders. The screenplay by Jane Goldman is very well paced, taking time to build its setting and the environment and the direction by James Watkins is great with a number of well-timed scares. The production design is also fantastic, littering the locations with odd little details that add to the overall eerie atmosphere including the creepiest toys ever seen on film.

The Woman in Black is a solid, haunting but flawed supernatural melodrama best enjoyed with the lights off.

Special Features: Commentary, Making of, Interviews, Red Carpet Special, Ghost story read by Daniel Radcliffe, Photo Galleries, Trailers.

DVD Review: Zombie Apocalypse / Cert: 15 / Director: Mick Lyon / Screenplay: Brooks Peck, Craig Engler / Starring: Ving Rhames, Taryn Manning, Eddie Steeples, Lesley-Ann Brandt / Release Date: Out Now

Ving Rhames, last seen strapping on his artificial machine-gun leg and giving Hell to fiendish flesh-eating fish in Piranha 3DD is back! This time, fully-legged, he’s a survivor of a zombie apocalypse (hence the title) and he’s leading a nervy bunch of survivors across a desolate, undead-ridden America in the hope of finding safety on Catalina island off the coast of California.

If the words ‘Sy Fy’ Presents’ don’t fill you with enough dread, here comes the killer credit – The Asylum. Yep, Zombie Apocalypse is a product of the house of the humdrum, the studios that ruthlessly, shamelessly churn out cheeky rip-offs off multiplex blockbusters in the hope of coining it from gullible punters who won’t notice the difference between Transmorphers and Transformers or, any day now, Abraham Lincoln vs. Zombies as opposed to the big screen Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

It’ll come as no surprise then, to find that this is a cheap and cheerful generic zombie movie, one of the B-est of B movies. What will surprise though, is the fact that it’s actually not a bad little flick in its own right; I wouldn’t go as far as to say that The Asylum have pulled out all the stops here but it certainly looks as if they’ve loosened them a bit and actually come up with a film which has a halfway decent script and a few more dollars than usual thrown at it.

An effective opening sequence details the coming of a lethal virus which quickly wipes out most of the world’s population, turning them into raging zombies. A few useful digital effects show a plane plunging into the tower of Big Ben, bridges blowing up in attempts to contain the virus, panic on the streets of Japan. Two groups of survivors – led by big, bluff Henry (Rhames) – join forces to battle their way to a safe haven as yet untouched by the virus. En route they’re attacked – frequently – by hordes of the undead (look closely and you’ll see the same zombie cropping up on more than one occasion… think of it as a sort of zombie drinking game) – whom they routinely shoot, blow up, decapitate and disembowel. A bit later on they meet yet another group who use bows and arrows to dispatch the unliving. Not unnaturally, not all of the survivors make it to the end of the film but, for once, there’s enough character meat on their bones to make some of them more than just zombie fodder and the script’s done enough in its occasional downtime to make some of the deaths matter because the characters are a bit more three-dimensional than the clumsy klutzes who usually wander through cheap zombie films.

Visually the film does a good job in depicting its ravaged post-virus environment with some eerie shots of dark, dead cities and devastated streets but the overuse of digital effects for explosions and during zombie fights gets a little wearing. Lovers of physical gore will be disappointed by the pumping, spraying digital blood gouting from dismembered zombies and some of the zombie make-up probably wouldn’t stand up to close scrutiny.

But Zombie Apocalypse is lively and inventive and there are some good ideas here, such as the concept of the mutating virus slowly making the zombies more intelligent and any film which has the guts to climax with an attack by zombie tigers when it hasn’t got the budget to do it particularly effectively has to be given full marks for at least trying. The story itself is something and nothing and it’s certainly nothing we haven’t seen before but the film’s combination of unusually-strong performances, a knowing script (one character refers to a fallen comrade known as Kirkman, a clear nod in the direction of The Walking Dead’s creator) and some interesting visuals makes Zombie Apocalypse worth eighty-four minutes of any zombie fan’s time.

Special Features: None

DVD Review: Metal Tornado / Cert: 15 / Director: Gordon Yang / Screenplay: Andrew C. Erin, Gordon Yang / Starring: Lou Diamond Phillips, Nicole de Boer, Stephen MacDonald, Greg Evigan / Release Date: June 11th

Metal Tornado has been knocking about on the Syfy Channel for some time now and is finally unleashed on DVD aimed, I can only assume, at an audience with absolutely nothing better to spend its money on. If Syfy excels at anything at all (and the jury’s still out on that one), then it’s on schlocky so-bad-it’s-good monster movies generally involving giant sharks and/or octopi. Certainly Syfy is rarely interested in making any actual… er… sci-fi, any speculative fiction with some merit or purpose. Metal Tornado, sadly, has even less to recommend it than your average Mega Shark or Crocosaurus… at best it’s an absolute crock of something else entirely.

“This is getting scary!!” gasps Nick (MacDonald), rebellious son of top scientist Michael Edwards (Phillips) whose experiments in harnessing solar flare power and storing it to provide a useful energy resource have gone a bit haywire. Frankly scary is absolutely the last thing it ever gets. It seems that 2% of the collected power has gone rogue, setting off on a frolic of its own in the form of a weakly-animated tornado which wobbles around the countryside attracted by a vein of underground iron ore, sucking up anything metal in its path. Shiver in fear as cabinets rattle! Shriek in terror as bits of metal fly about the place! Laugh like a drain as cars and caravans are whipped into the maelstrom courtesy of the miracle of bad CGI! Fight the urge to yawn as you realise that, actually, real tornados might be a bit scary if you’re in the path of one but this one, spinning around with random bits of metal caught in its eye, is about as terrifying (and interesting) as Lou Diamond Phillips’ eyebrows.

Metal Tornado is hellishly dull stuff. There’s nothing dramatic going on at all. Edwards’ naughty son does nothing worse than skip his father’s detention an hour early, there’s an invisibly-thin subplot about Edwards romancing his colleague Rebecca (de Boer) and the usual gubbins about Edwards’ boss trying to cover up the results of the experiment. Ultimately the metal tornado threatens to destroy some Hicksville town but Edwards stops it by firing missiles at it. Over in Europe a similar tornado is on the rampage but, as we’re sombrely told after Edwards does his stuff and Saves The Day in America, “Paris wasn’t so lucky.” Never mind, there’s always time for lots of smiles and a special celebratory dinner at the end of it all with not a thought for all those mangled Parisians.

Hapless and hopeless, Metal Tornado is about as dire as TV movies get. You’ll make no alloys if you choose to waste your time on this one, at the very least it’ll test your mettle and… (‘Alright, alright, we get the picture’ – Ed). Avoid. Ore else.

Special Features: Don’t be silly.