BLOODSTONE (1988)

bloodstone

CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR:DWIGHT H. LITTLE / SCREENPLAY: CURT ALLEN / NICO MASTORAKIS / STARRING: BRETT STIMELY, RAJINIKANTH, ANNA NICHOLAS / RELEASE DATE: JULY 20TH

An American directs a film from a script by a Greek writer, which is financed by Indian producers, and the end result is 1988’s Bloodstone, a mostly by-the-numbers action film about a mysterious giant ruby and those who would stop at nothing to acquire it from an American couple who have been unknowingly caught up.

While nothing spectacular, given that the film manages to trade on familiar imagery from Romancing the Stone and certain parts of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, the end result is worth watching on a lazy, hazy weekend afternoon. Dwight H. Little directed Bloodstone from a script by Nico Mastorakis, and both men definitely knew their way around action films, so the scenes of car and foot chases and hand-to-hand combat are all pretty great, but the dialogue is beyond eye-rolling. Part of that may be due to the fact that every line was evidently looped in post-production, resulting in performances which are less-impressive vocally than they might seem otherwise, visually. Brett Stimely as Sandy McVey certainly seems to be doing his level best to convey no emotion whatsoever, although Anne Nicholas, as his wife, Stephanie, carries quite a bit of enthusiasm and vigor.

All that said, and despite the fact that Sandy and Stephanie are arguably Bloodstone‘s protagonists, the real star of the film is cab driver Shyam Sabu (Rajinikanth). He’s witty, he’s clever, and he gets all the best lines and fight scenes. Every time Rajinikanth appears, the viewer perks up and takes notice, because he’s just that captivating. The less said about Inspector Ramesh (Charlie Brill) – a character whose portrayal makes Fisher Stevens’ role in Short Circuit look classy and refined – the better. Every time he appears, it’s teeth-grinding in its tone-deaf offense. It ultimately detracts so much from an otherwise-decent piece of popcorn entertainment to recommend this without strong hesitation.

WHITE FIRE (1985)

white fire

PLATFORM: BLU-RAY + APPLE + AMAZON + GOOGLE PLAY | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

A diamond so dangerous it burns anyone who dares touch it. Jewel thieves, Fred ‘the Hammer’ Williamson, a chainsaw battle, and a pair of siblings who quite obviously have the hots for each other. This 1980s action movie, shot in Turkey, and directed by a French pornographer, is one of Arrow Video’s more outlandish acquisitions to date.

On the hunt for a priceless diamond, a pair of jewel thieves hatch a bizarre plan to break into (?) a mine and claim it for themselves. Bo’s sister, Ingrid, might die during the movie’s opening hour, but that doesn’t slow his roll – getting lover Olga plastic surgery so as to turn her into his late sister’s doppelgänger. Oh, and Fred Williamson is here too – recent allegations making the sudden re-release of this 40-year-old movie rather ill-timed. Read the room, guys.

As one might suspect, White Fire borders on incoherence, but is no worse off for it. The film hasn’t exactly aged well, but its action sequences still stand up, and the story is so ridiculous that it’s a hard film to dislike. In a time where most action movies star Dwayne Johnson and are made up of 90% green screen, it’s fun to return to an earlier era of budget filmmaking; copious nudity, chainsaw battles and a face-melting MacGuffin straight out of Indiana Jones.

This is not a film that really needed rescuing from the archives, but we’re glad the folks at Arrow did snatch it up, nevertheless.

ALIEN OUTBREAK

Alien-Outbreak

Police Sergeant Zoe Norris (Drake), who has emigrated from Canada to be with her husband’s family, is happy with the sleepy rural beat she has got. That is until a spate of suicides – including several right in front of her eyes – lead her to think something is amiss. There is even more panic in the fells when the village comes under attack by metallic alien craft. Alongside the only member of her team she can find, Patrick (Crane), Norris attempts to figure out what’s happening and save the remaining community.  With large obelisk-style vehicles and seemingly indestructible, dog-like iron critters appearing everywhere, is there any way to escape or survive?

Alien Outbreak, despite the common title and humble budget, is an unexpectedly well-made film. The script is tight, and full of action and tension. It may falter with some unlikely decisions made by characters and some acting wobbles here and there, but these are minor niggles and certainly not enough to spoil the enjoyment.

Low-budget sci-fi films tend to fail because of one thing: the special effects. These cost money, so it’s surprising to see how great they are here. While much of the film is shot in murky, hard-to-see dim light, the aliens are there in broad daylight and look fantastic. No ropey Sharknado-style CGI here. Boasting alien designs and execution that could rival any Hollywood blockbuster, Rowe’s film rises above the pack. The fact the writer/director did the visuals himself makes it even more of an achievement. Rowe’s wife Amanda provides the solid, stirring score that underpins the action perfectly, evoking elements of John Carpenter’s best while not straying into copycat territory.

Independent films have a hard enough time as it is, whether it’s to be seen seriously or even to be made in the first place. Ignore the generic appearance and your preconceived notions and give it a try, you might well be blown away.

stars

BLACK WATER: ABYSS

abyss

CERT: 15 | PLATFORM: DVD | RELEASE DATE: NOVEMBER 2ND

This belated, spiritual – and entirely unconnected – sequel to 2007’s Black Water, in which a ferocious saltwater crocodile terrorises a group of holidaymakers in Northern Australia, is pretty much a case of ‘rinse and repeat’. Returning director Andrew Traucki does little more than rearrange the furniture by moving the action into a slowly-flooding underwater cavern to deliver a shamelessly-derivative piece of entertaining by-the-numbers shlock that suggests that it’s still not safe to go back into the water and that movie audiences are unlikely to ever lose their primal fear of sharks, crocodiles, and other assorted big scaly things that live and feed in the water.

We’re still in Northern Australia where, this time, a bunch of faceless should-know-betters decide to go spelunking (it’s a real thing, look it up) into a cave system to escape an oncoming storm. Naturally, they can’t get out again and find themselves trapped as the waters start to rise, bringing with them a prowling, hungry crocodile that proceeds to do what prowling, hungry crocodiles are want to do when foolish humans get up close and personal. Cue much screaming, thrashing about in the water and the occasional fountain of blood as Mr Snappy gets to chow down on his latest fast-food snack.

There’s really nothing in Black Water: Abyss that we haven’t seen in dozens of these low budget creature features and it certainly doesn’t even try to put a new spin on a tired idea as Alexandre Aja managed in last year’s tense and nerve-shredding Crawl. The characters are a bland and faceless bunch despite transparent attempts to create some tame relationship tension between them but in truth, we’re not here for emotional angst, we’re here to watch a big reptile sink its teeth into screaming idiots. In this regard, Black Water: Abyss doesn’t disappoint and there’s certainly a palpable sense of uneasy dread from the claustrophobic setting – why do people insist on clambering around in cold, dark, dingy caves? – even before the hungry, hungry crocodile starts to circle around looking for a free lunch.

Black Water: Abyss is as good as it needs to be and no more. It does everything we might expect of it and no cliché is left unvisited – just when it looks as if the nightmare is over there’s one further twist of the knife – but you’re quite likely to find it an embarrassingly enjoyable experience even as you roll your eyes at its predictability.

CODE 404

code 404

CERT: 15 | FORMAT: DVD (REVIEWED), AMAZON PRIME VIDEO | RELEASE DATE: JULY 6TH

DI John Major (Daniel Mays) is brutally gunned down during an undercover operation with his partner DI Roy Carver (Stephen Graham). Carver is commemorating his partner’s death months later when, much to his understandable surprise, Major suddenly reappears, larger than life and, apparently, brought back from the dead and augmented into some sort of  Artificial Intelligence supercop. Except there’s nothing very super about this cop; he’s clearly “a few quid short of six million dollars” as he’s been resuscitated and turned into a distinctly defective detective. Dim-witted, clumsy and worryingly witless, Major also has little memory of his life just before he was gunned down – which is just as well for his punchy partner whose affair with Major’s wife Kelly (Anna Maxwell Martin) was rumbled by Major just before they set off on their ill-fated operation. Can Major and Carver carry on their successful partnership when one of them is something more (or less) than he was before, will Major be considered a failed experiment and deactivated and, most importantly, will Major find out about his partner and his wife’s little indiscretion?

This is Code 404, Sky One’s latest ambitious six-part comedy series which clearly takes its lead from the Six Million Dollar Man, Randall and Hopkirk (which is even referenced in one episode) and, for those of a particularly decrepit disposition, the short-lived 1976 American sitcom Holmes and Yoyo. A bit like Major, however, Code 404 (computer nerds will recognise the status code which flags up an unfound online page) is every bit the mongrel its random inspirations might suggest. Several problems are immediately evident. Daniel (Not Going Out) Peak’s scripts are nothing like as funny as they need to be and certainly not as funny as they think they are. A handful of good visual gags are shored up by ‘will this do?’ swearing and too much feeble wordplay and there seems to be no reasons why Mays’ character should be called John Major beyond the promise of a wry smile when his partner’s name has no comic connotations whatsoever. It’s fairly typical of a show that seems at best half-written, hoping that the novelty of its situation will be enough to prop up the comedy. Cliches abound in each of the six episodes which largely revolve around the mystery of the mastermind behind Major’s murder and Carver’s desperation to keep his affair with Kelly secret. But the script just isn’t strong enough often enough and it falls to Mays and Graham whose on-screen chemistry speaks for itself, to give things a lift when they frequently sag. The show’s case isn’t helped by the fact that here we have two of the UK’s best heavyweight actors – Graham has recently worked with Scorsese, for God’s sake – floundering slightly in a sitcom setting they’re clearly both unused to but making the best of it anyway.

Despite its faults and its clumsiness though, Code 404 isn’t a total write-off and is actually quite fun. Mays manages to imbue his character with a certain geeky gormless charm and there’s some decent back-up in the always-excellent Anna Maxwell Martin alongside sitcom regulars like Rosie Cavalero and Tracy Ann Oberman. The show sets itself up for a second season but we’d hope for sturdier scripts that manage to do something a little more original with an already over-familiar idea and slightly subtler and more nuanced humour that gives its formidable cast a proper chance to demonstrate its versatility.

THE NEW KIDS

CERT: 15 | FORMAT: LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY (101 FILMS) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Sean S. Cunningham’s The New Kids (1985) is a curious movie; part 80s teen comedy, part horror film. It makes sense when you look at Cunningham’s short CV, having made Friday The 13th and Spring Break, which are horror and teen comedy respectively. There are great standout moments in The New Kids, especially from a young James Spader, but it ultimately doesn’t fall satisfactorily into either genre, leaving it a little flat.

We start with a fantastic montage where brother and sister Loren (Shannon Presby) and Abby (Lori Loughlin) are forced to exercise by their dad, a go-getting Colonel. In a “blink and you’ll miss it” moment, we’re told their parents were killed in a car crash, forcing them to relocate to Florida with their aunt and uncle who live on a ridiculous Santa-themed roadside fair. It’s not long before they court the attention of a hilarious group of delinquent hicks, led by an unrecognisable Spader. The group make a bet to see who can bed Abby first, but unfortunately their courting consists of them being creepy and then threatening her which, unsurprisingly, doesn’t work. What follows is an escalation of aggressive tactics between the gang and the siblings. Loren, buoyed by his father’s training, turns out to be someone you shouldn’t mess with.

James Spader is the star of the show; he’s unsettling and has some great dialogue, telling Loren at one point “you’re made of mouth.” We also get a great insight into his character by looking around his room, which contains weapons, drugs and pictures of topless women and himself! This is great visual storytelling and fine use of mise-en-scene. The Santa fair that becomes home to the protagonists is a great setting, weird and wacky in all the right ways, and is the home for a bloody climax that may remind you of Final Destination.

Despite the more unusual elements, enchanted by a suitably atmospheric score by Lalo Schifrin that sounds great here, the film doesn’t make enough of an impact. This is probably due to its mismatch of plot elements. Cunningham, who is interviewed on the disc, explains how he was tasked with making a movie to fill an open schedule with no idea of what he was going to make – this is evident from the final picture. The New Kids isn’t as fun or scary as other 80s films, which is probably why it’s less well known, especially in the UK. The disc also contains an interview with writer Stephen Gyllenhaal, as well as commentary by film experts Sean Hogan and Jasper Sharp, who all give good insights into the actors and the film business of the time.

For some, The New Kids is a cult classic – there’s something unique about teen horror from this decade, a feeling of fun and dread that Sean S. Cunningham was adept at utilising. The New Kids elicits some of those feelings; it’s just been done better elsewhere.

ZOMBIE FOR SALE

CERT: 15 | FORMAT: BLU-RAY (REVIEWED), ARROW VIDEO STREAMING | RELEASE DATE: JULY 6TH

When a pharmaceutical company releases a new medicine for diabetics called NoInsulin, it has unexpected side effects and a zombie escapes from their underground plant, looking for food. After being chased by a dog into a toilet, the zombie bites the father of the quite strange and extremely crooked Park family who own the local gas station. When they realise that the bite hasn’t killed the father but instead has de-aged him, they capture the zombie and devise a moneymaking scheme that allows the zombie to bite all their friends and make them look and feel decades younger. There’s just one problem; the zombie is actually vegetarian and very partial to cabbage.

Discovering that slathering the arms of their friends in tomato ketchup gives the zombie the necessary push, they rack up the money before the father decides to abscond with the profits and fly to Hawaii. The remaining family members continue the ruse and manage to reopen the gas station anew. Everything appears to be going fine until everyone that has been bitten starts to turn into actual zombies and run amok. Carnage ensues, including at a wedding and the local bus station, until the family are besieged at the gas station and try to battle their way out.

This South Korean flick plays everything for comedy value and, on the whole, it works. The film has a truly whimsical value to it and there are moments that will have you smiling. The third act does add a splash of tension leading to an explosive finale, and there is a charming epilogue that ties things up quite nicely.

Leaning more heavily towards comedy than horror, this is a fun way to spend nearly two hours. It may not be as funny as Shaun of the Dead, but this has enough going for it for you to give it a watch. The make-up effects are nothing spectacular, but it doesn’t feel like anything is missing in that regard as the film is more about family and how they can work together, especially in the most bizarre circumstances.

The film has English subtitles and no English dub, but there is an audio commentary which is quite entertaining, especially with what is going on in the world at the moment! The extras are also good, which you expect from an Arrow release, including a Q&A with the director as well as a video essay about South Korea’s social satires. This is also available to watch on Arrow Video Streaming.

Good fun, although you’ll probably never look at cabbages or false teeth the same way again.

DISAPPEARANCE AT CLIFTON HILL

CERT: 15 | FORMAT: DVD (REVIEWED), AMAZON PRIME VIDEO | RELEASE DATE: AUGUST 3RD

Unlike schnapps, Scandi-noir is sweeping the world… of mid-size film productions. But while the inspiration source has perfected the recipe (troubled detective, grim murders, heaps of snow), the copycats have failed consistently. Two of the worst movies of the decade – The Snowman and Night Hunter – are botched attempts at replicating the formula. Disappearance at Clifton Hill is not nearly as terrible. Some character development and overall quirkiness save it from floundering, but the central mystery is far from tight and the dialogue is alternatively trite and overcooked.

The gumshoe de rigeur is Abby (Tuppence Middleton, Sense8), a directionless millennial with intimacy problems, paranoia and a compulsion for lying. Her behavioral issues may be related to a violent event she witnessed as a child, when a bloodied kid is beaten unconscious and tossed in the trunk of a car. Returning to her hometown of Niagara Falls to sell the motel she inherited from her parents, Abby decides to solve the presumed crime that traumatised her years ago. Turns out the boy was the son of a couple of magicians who were the face of a real estate empire (you know, that normal business practice). Abby’s investigation ruffles a few feathers among the rich and powerful (literally one guy), but mostly manages to annoy the whole town.

The mystery is plagued by ridiculous contrivances and strokes of luck, like Abby’s sister working in surveillance at a casino (classic lazy scriptwriting). Never mind all the quirks her character is saddled with, Tuppence Middleton fails to combine all these traits into one remotely believable character: when one attribute surfaces, the others vanish.

There are, however, a few diamonds in the mud that make Disappearance at Clifton Hill watchable. Chief among them, a rare appearance in front of the camera by David Cronenberg. The horror legend (who hasn’t directed a movie since 2014) plays a scavenger who dives to the bottom of the falls regularly looking for treasures (and body parts) to use for his podcast. A movie about this character would be worth watching.

While not as interesting, the visual component is worth watching. The tourism industry in Niagara Falls has turned the town into a kitschy smorgasbord with wax museums, haunted mansions and restaurants shaped as flying saucers peppered throughout the city. The cinematographer and production designer make good use of the delightfully tacky setup, but without a good story to accompany it, their effort goes to waste.

OPERATION CONDOR (AKA ARMOUR OF GOD II)

CERT: 15 | PLATFORM: BLU-RAY | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

If you’re a Jackie Chan fan, you may have felt aggrieved that the classic Operation Condor has so far only been available on a barren DVD featuring an English dub of the movie. Well, the fine folks at 88 Films have remedied this by releasing a great Blu-ray package that features a 2K restoration of the original version and an extended cut. They clearly have their finger on the pulse.

Operation Condor (AKA Armour of God II) was the most expensive Hong Kong film ever made at the time of its release in 1991. Chan, who also directs, plays Condor (being Hong Kong, this is a semi-sequel to Armour of God – the characters are different but the themes are the same), a treasure hunter who is hired by the brilliantly-named Duke Scapio to find some lost Nazi gold in the African desert. He is given the key to the vault, which every dirty rotten scoundrel is after, including a group of deadly mercenaries led by a World War II veteran. Condor is joined by three beautiful women – a German girl named Elsa (Eva Cobo) whose grandfather buried the gold in the first place, desert expert Ada (Carol Cheng) and mysterious nomad Momoko (Shoko Ikeda).

The film is an entertainment showcase, featuring gadgets galore like Condor using a Zorb ball to escape some natives in a great opening sequence. We get a fantastic car chase, as Jackie on a motorbike is pursued through the tight streets of Spain, as well as parkour, bawdy comedy and, of course, martial arts. What Jackie and his stunt team do so well here is perform short pieces of exquisitely choreographed action, where disarming a gunman looks beautiful. The audience has to wait until the end for an extended fight sequence, with Jackie facing off against multiple mercenaries in an underground bunker. At this point in time, no-one could create an action sequence like Chan.

Not everything in the movie holds up for a modern audience, however. It’s great that Condor is accompanied by three women – its not a coincidence that they are from the three areas of the world that the film was trying to appeal to – but the film treats them in a very chauvinistic way. Ada and Elsa both have their towels pulled off them to distract gunmen, the action coincidentally taking place when they are scantily dressed. The film is also set in a strange alternate universe where everyone in Spain and North Africa speak Cantonese.

The extended cut doesn’t offer any new scenes. Rather than giving us a bit more context to existing ones, it ultimately improves the film with enhanced picture and sound; Operation Condor has never looked or sounded so good. The disc includes a trailer and an interview with Canadian stuntman Bruce Fontaine, which gives a good insight into the processes on set. The highlight of the package is a booklet with great art work by “Kung Fu” Bob O’Brien that gives some good background and facts about the Armour of God franchise. It also features an interview with lead villain Vincent Lyn (this was originally meant for the disc, but Bob turned it into a telephone interview due to the coronavirus). Don’t be put off reading it though, as it’s an incredibly detailed and insightful account of working in the Hong Kong film industry with all its magic and madness. A disc made by fans, for fans. Lovely stuff.

CREEPSHOW 2

Creepshow 2

CERT: 15 | PLATFORM: BLU-RAY | RELEASE DATE: JULY 13TH

How do you follow up the greatest anthology movie in the history of horror? Well, you don’t do what 1987’s Creepshow 2 did, that’s for sure.

Consisting of three separate horror offerings penned by George A. Romero and Lucille Fletcher, and based on Stephen King stories, here we have Native American trinkets at the centre of Old Chief Wood’nhead, the gooey threat of The Raft, and the unrelenting car crash carnage of The Hitch-hiker. Of course, all are tied together by short sequences headed up by the Creep (genre fave Tom Savini).

All of these stories look to scare the pants off the audience, yet none of them manage to successfully hit in the right way. They do all manage to start in a promising manner, but it’s not long before that promise and potential descends into bland and formulaic territory.

Sadly, Creepshow 2 never quite hits in the same way as its predecessor. Obviously, that was always going to be a tall task, given the sheer quality of that 1982 film, but one of the main issues of this sequel offering is that its stories just seem too long and stretched out.

Rather than keeping each individual story to the brisk 20-ish minutes of Creepshow, the biggest downfall of Creepshow 2 is that it instead opts to centre on just three stories that clock in at 30-minutes apiece. And frankly, none of the three tales are engaging or interesting enough to be allotted a half-hour spot. Would the stories have worked better with a reduced time? Absolutely. Would they have all of a sudden become great terror tales? That’s debatable.

On the plus side, Creepshow 2 does feature some impressive practical SFX work on display, and things get particularly gnarly in The Raft. Likewise, Lois Chiles puts in the feature’s standout performance in The Hitch-hiker. Unfortunately, good gore and the odd solid turn can only get you so far, and the end result for Creepshow 2 is a movie that’s shockingly dull.

The new 2K restoration of the movie makes it look better than it ever has, and there’s a huge amount of great special features included on this typically crammed Arrow Video release – including a booklet of new writing on the sequel and some fresh interview content for die-hard horror hounds – but this really is only a release for the completists out there.