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Review by Ben Bussey

Damn it all, it’s another of those films that’s very, very easy to talk about if you don’t mind giving everything away, but considerably trickier if you’d like to leave things unspoiled. Taking what would seem to be a fairly standard trope from horror/sci-fi fantasy, yet playing it out in an unusually intimate, grounded and character-based manner, Honeymoon has gathered much praise as one of the most unconventional and attention grabbing genre films to have surfaced on the 2014 festival circuit – where I managed to miss it. Catching up now ahead of its UK DVD/Blu-ray release, I’m happy to concur that this praise has been very much deserved – although, not unlike another of last year’s most talked-about genre films Under The Skin (to which Honeymoon has been compared), this is not a film for those who like to have everything spelled out for them in black and white.

As to just what makes Honeymoon so ‘unusually intimate’ – that’ll be the fact that, aside from a couple of brief scenes, literally the only people on screen are our two central protagonists, New York newlyweds Bea (Rose Leslie – let’s just say “you know nothing, John Snow” now and get it over and done with) and Paul (Harry Treadaway – no catchphrase that I’m aware of). Straight away it seems an odd choice to cast two British actors in American roles, and for the first couple of scenes I did fear it would impede proceedings as neither of their accents is exactly spot-on; and yet, given that we spend all but a few minutes of the film in the company of these two alone, a certain verisimilitude sinks in soon enough – and in a curious kind of way, the fact that neither actor is actually American feeds into the film’s core theme of whether or not everyone is who they claim to be (much as I’ve often felt may be the case with Tim Roth’s casting in Reservoir Dogs).

Paul and Bea are living the newlywed dream. Madly in love, their every conversation is peppered with in-jokes, stock responses and reactions; these are two people utterly in tune with one another, and when they head out for their honeymoon in (first alarm bell) Bea’s family’s lakeside cabin in the woods, it’s clear they intend to savour their time together. The first seeds of doubt are sown by a somewhat tense encounter with a guy Bea used to know from childhood summers in the area, whose seemingly terrified wife warns them it’s not safe to be there. Of course, no one heeds the warning of a crazy person, so Bea and Paul head straight back to the cabin – then in the middle of the night Paul finds himself alone in bed. Unable to find Bea anywhere in the house, sleepy annoyance gradually gives way to outright panic, until he finds Bea outside in the pitch darkness, standing naked in the woods. Dismissing it as a random sleep-walking incident, Bea insists she’s fine – and yet the next day she seems strangely out of sorts, forgetting little things like how to make breakfast properly. As time goes on and Bea’s behaviour becomes more uncharacteristic, Paul is driven to find out just what happened to her in the woods that night – and whether it has something to do with the mysterious lights that have been washing over their windows in the dead of night.

I won’t say any more on the nature of what is happening to our characters, partly as I don’t want to spoil anything and partly because it is, indeed, left fairly ambiguous. Taking a step back, what Honeymoon seems to be dealing with most directly are the basic fears of anyone entering into a marriage; specifically, the fear that becoming a spouse equates to loss of one’s individuality, no longer being the person you were before. This might seem particularly true for a new wife, still typically expected to adopt her husband’s surname and as such take on what many would call an inherently subservient position. The fact that this is a female-directed film – and a major calling card for Leigh Janiak – might draw particular attention to the gender politics at play, as it’s material which, handled just a little differently, might potentially have come off a bit misogynistic, given that it’s the wife character who undergoes the change, after which proceedings play out primarily from the husband’s perspective.

Happily, Honeymoon never lapses into predictable Fatal Attraction, Basic Instinct, monstrous feminine territory. Treadaway’s Paul does not fear for himself around his somehow changed wife; he only fears that he may have lost the one he loves. This, of course, is another of the key fears for anyone entering into a marriage: how do you deal with it if you give yourself over so completely to another person, and you end up losing them? As Bea’s memory worsens, some scenes play out almost as Alzheimer’s analogies, and it’s all so beautifully acted, handled in such a believable and emotive fashion that – as absurd as the apparent explanation might be – you can’t help but take it all entirely seriously. Even so, Honeymoon never forgets that it’s a horror movie. The sense of steadily building dread never lets up from the moment Paul first wakes up alone in bed, but it isn’t the simple, tangible fear of the masked maniac or the fanged beast waiting in the woods; it’s the altogether trickier, primal fear of simply not knowing what’s going on, what is waiting out there for you, or indeed what is inside with you already. But in case that sounds a bit too oblique, fear not – there are a few great ‘ick’ moments in store as well.

It really warms the heart looking up Leigh Janiak on IMDb and seeing she has four times as many credits as ‘assistant’ than she does as writer-director. Just goes to show, taking those not-so-glamorous, starting-at-the-bottom film industry jobs can indeed pay off. The real beauty of Honeymoon is that, while it must surely have been a low budget production, it never looks cheap; and while keeping the cast size so minimal must also have been at least in part a budgetary decision, this never seems like a corner-cutting measure. Small-scale two handers with minimal locations often wind up feeling like poorly adapted stage plays, yet Honeymoon is thoroughly filmic from start to finish, taking full advantage of the beautiful locations and, naturally, making sure its stars look great – even whilst dragging them through the proverbial mud. We should damn well hope Leigh Janiak never serves as anyone else’s assistant again after this, and celebrate the arrival of another unique voice in horror filmmaking from whom we can but hope further such delights are on the horizon.

Honeymoon is available now for digital download, and is released to Blu-ray and DVD on 26th January 2015, from Arrow Films.

By Svetlana Fedotov

Adventure Time has become a force of nature. What started out as a fun attempt to bring some creativity to the stale and predictable world of children’s cartoons has turned into a multi-million dollar franchise that has changed the face of entertainment altogether. Spawning a fandom that would make Invader Zim blush, it’s no surprise that Finn the Human and Jake the Dog would eventually find their way into comic books. The newest mini-series, Marceline’s Gone Adrift, focuses on the side character Marceline the Vampire Queen, the resident goth kid of the Land of Ooo. While some might argue that just because the creators added a vampire to a show doesn’t make a show ‘brutal,’ I can assure you, what Adventure Time lacks in blood and gore it makes up for in epic fantasy, dark creatures, and incredibly in-depth mythology. Sure, it’s fun and goofy most of the time, but things can get pretty wild when needed be, especially when Marcy is around.

The fun thing about doing a comic about Marceline is that it opens up an unexplored world of Adventure Time. Born from fire and brimstone and saddled with a sweet bass guitar, Marcy is a bit of a wild child in the series which allows for some unrestricted access into the darker parts of Ooo. Speaking of dark, the story opens up on the drifting lyrics of the Vampire Queen’s newest song as it dances off the page like so much bad inking. Tossing aside her bass, she grumps at her inability to write anything worthwhile and pines away at how she needs new experiences. As Finn and Jake try to console her, a mysterious beam of electricity suddenly descends onto her house, dragging her away while drowning out the Candy Kingdoms own power sources. Unfortunately, the threat of a total outage forces Princess Bubblegum (the Princess of the Candy Kingdom) into dire action, one with dire consequences.

Alright, so just from that explanation, I definitely suggest getting acquainted with Adventure Time before diving into this comic. There’s not a lot to catch up on, but a definite knowledge of who’s who is probably for the best. I mean, the show has run for about five years, but you don’t have to know the miniscule details.

Definitely the first thing to grab attention is the art as it slowly breaks away from the monochromatic restraints of animation and instead plays around with the shading and coloring of the design. There’s a bit of a graffiti vibe going on with the visible blending and it’s almost chalky looking compared to the show. The characters are also more noodle-armed and wiggly, probably a result of attempting to capture the range of animated emotions from the cartoon to the comic. Obviously, we’ll have to give it some leeway in that regards as comics are obviously more static than animation and it’s fun to see comic artists add personal touches to the already stylized show.

Also, I love the new story arc; it is a perfect companion to the Adventure Time show, especially for those that have fondness for Marcy. The writing captures the voice of the show perfectly, from the mannerisms to the speech patterns, and creates a bit of a sub-vocalization effect as you hear their voices resonate in your brain. The dynamic between the characters is spot on and the new series adds on to the mythos of the land of Ooo while staying true to its source material. It’s literally an expansion of the already established universe, perfect for the child or the inner-child undeniably hooked to the animated series.

Adventure Time: Marceline’s Gone Adrift is on stands now!

Review by Matt Harries

I’ve long had a soft spot for English director Nicolas Roeg. Performance, The Man Who Fell To Earth, Walkabout, and arguably his finest film Don’t Look Now are all distinctive examples of his style; all films full of visual flair honed from his earlier career as a cameraman and cinematographer. Roeg’s disassembling and reassembling of narrative structure, his choice of leading men better known as musicians, and his frequent treatment of themes of obsession and the erotic, all mark him as one of the most quintessential of ‘art house’ directors. Even his adaptation of Roald Dahl’s classic The Witches was one of the darker and edgier children’s tales you are likely to come across.

Released under the full title of ‘Bad Timing: A Sensual Obsession’ in 1980, this always seemed like being another difficult sell for Roeg. Indeed distributors Rank Pictures themselves described it as a “sick film made by sick people for sick people”. It was given an X rating and shelved until 2005 when Criterion, who are also responsible for this latest Blu-ray transfer, released it on DVD. All credit to them for championing an often overlooked and absorbing piece of work.

Once again Roeg chose a leading man known principally as a musical performer, Art Garfunkel following messrs Jagger and Bowie, who starred in Performance (1970) and The Man Who Fell To Earth (1976) respectively. The folk singer is perfectly cast as Dr Alex Linden, an American psychology professor working in Vienna. The underrated Theresa Russell, who was later married to Roeg and actually made seven films with him during the 80s, stars alongside Garfunkel as wild child Milena Flaherty. Bad Timing owes much of its success to the uneasy chemistry between these two opposite-natured characters. Their tempestuous love affair and its near fatal aftermath forms the basis for the plot, told by Roeg via characteristic use of non-linear flashback. Despite seeming almost haphazard at first, this is in fact a very skilful method of manipulating the viewer. Witness the opening scenes, in which we see Alex and Milena, not yet obviously acquainted, admiring a Gustav Klimt exhibition, to the distinctive strains of Tom Waits (apparently Klimt’s works were a strong influence on the cinematography). The glinting golden tones of the paintings are gazed at by Alex, his expression inscrutable. Moments later a siren pierces our contemplative reverie as we are suddenly taken forward in time, on board an ambulance. A paramedic holds an oxygen mask to Milena, leering as her shirt falls open. Alex sits beside her, looking on with that cat-like cool gaze. Seeing the paramedic’s stare he leans forward and closes her shirt. Although his gaze, so similar to that with which he appraised Klimt’s artwork, is a little disconcerting, we recognise this as a protective gesture. However it is actually an echo of an earlier gesture which we are not shown until much later in the film, which places this apparently gentlemanly act in a rather more sinister light.

It’s probably more accurate to call the relationship between Alex and Milena a sexual obsession instead of a love affair. Although the word ‘love’ is bandied around it never truly belongs comfortably in either character’s true feelings: Alex, naturally stand offish, reserved and composed; Milena much more open, direct and impetuous. She in fact makes the first move, almost aggressively assuming the traditionally male role in trying to seduce Alex at a party. From there on he begins the process of trying to understand her. At the root of his desire to know her is his own jealousy and possessiveness. She spends time in the company of other men, she drinks too much. She is perpetual motion, laughter and energy. He dreams of being able to reign in her unfettered ways with a home, with marriage. Milena though appears incapable of change, even if she wanted it. Instead she demands that Alex love her with a passionate fervour that overlooks her wild ways. Or as one time lover Stefan (Denholm Elliot) says “we must love her…even more than our own dignity.”

There is more at stake here than mere dignity though. Throughout the gradual unfurling of Alex and Milena’s affair we are shown scenes of Milena at the hospital to which the ambulance was bringing her. It becomes apparent that she has overdosed. Unconscious upon arrival, she lies choking, instruments pushed down her windpipe as the doctors attempt to revive her. Scenes of her and Alex making love are interspersed with alarming footage of Milena undergoing a bloody tracheotomy. All the while Harvey Keitel’s intense Inspector Netusil continues to probe the rather detached Alex regarding his involvement in what seems certain to become Milena’s death. Gradually it becomes apparent that the cause of her overdose was much more complex than a night of debauchery gone awry. Netusil peels away the layers surrounding Alex and his story of the night of the incident, gradually revealing a well-hidden dark core.

Bad Timing succeeds on a number of levels, not least because of fine performances from the leading pair. Garfunkel has a natural placidity that lends itself perfectly to the character of a psychoanalyst whose observational detachment always seems at odds with Milena’s fiery and spontaneous nature. In turn Theresa Russell, only 21 at the time, is sultry and sexy and her Milena is everything that Alex is not. She is the life and soul of every scene she appears in and perfectly conveys the passion and youthful exuberance the academic Alex tries to capture.

It is the team of Roeg, cinematographer Anthony Richmond and editor Tony Lawson who really excel though. Their combined talents beautifully bring varying shades of this unconventional romance and its Freudian interplay of emotions, paranoias and passions to the screen, and Vienna provides a suitably rich visual backdrop for these dramas to take place in. The subtlety of the editing is difficult to describe, but there haven’t been many films with such flair for bringing light to the interior life of its characters. Gestures, words, thoughts, all are captured and fleeting though they may be, they add to our understanding of the events with a nuanced detail rarely seen outside of literature.

Once again, credit must go to Criterion for this release, which is the perfect way to showcase Blu-ray’s restorative powers to an already visually stunning film, that surely deserves to be seen by a much wider audience.

Bad Timing is released to UK Blu-ray on 26th January 2015, from Network.

Review by Ben Bussey

I’m sure anyone who’s ever stepped foot in a haunted house attraction, or taken a ride on a ghost train, or done one of those zombie run things I hear tell of, will have had that brief moment when a small part of them stops and asks – what if this is for real? You’re in a dark place surrounded by weird and freaky-looking stuff, with screams of terror echoing all around you, figures leaping out of the shadows with chainsaws in hand: who’s to say those might not be real screams of terror you’re hearing, real blood you see sprayed across the walls before you, a real chainsaw blade roaring in your face? Who would ever know for sure under the circumstances? This is the central hook of The Scarehouse – but by no means is it the be-all and end-all of this Canadian indie horror. It’s set on Devil’s Night in an urban Halloween attraction (using a bona fide Windsor, Ontario haunted house attraction as its main location), but director Gavin Michael Booth’s film is out to provide a bit more than your textbook slasher/torture movie scares – and largely succeeds in doing so.

It all seems innocent enough at first, as we open on a pair of young women, Corey (Sarah Booth, also co-writer, producer and wife of the director) and Elaina (Kimberley Sue-Murray), whilst they open up their downtown haunted house attraction to an eager public on the night of October 30th. However, questions arise when we see their control room has two CCTV screens for two separate entrances. One of these covers the front of house where an eager public stands in line waiting for the automated door to let in a few at a time every few minutes, whilst the other – conspicuously marked ‘slut cam’ – covers a different entrance intended only for a select, specific guest list. Not long after opening time, Corey and Elaina’s first special guest appears in camera #2, and it quickly becomes apparent they have a little more in mind than simply getting a few scares out of the young woman in question: they intend to make her suffer a slow and painful death. But our two protagonists aren’t just homicidal maniacs: they’ve been well and truly wronged, and they’re out for revenge against the bitches responsible – all of whom are members of the sorority to which Corey and Elaina were pledges just a couple of years earlier.

The Scarehouse manages a couple of things I hadn’t been sure were possible in recent years. Firstly, it makes something compelling out of what is essentially a standard torture porn set-up; secondly, it’s a female-centred revenge story which doesn’t turn out to be about rape – or at least, not in the way we might anticipate. On the first point, it was an interesting move to use an almost Reservoir Dogs-esque structure, flitting between the ‘present day’ narrative played out more or less in real time and flashbacks (via iPhone videos) to the fateful night on which the great wrongdoing occurred. Plenty of indie horror movies flirt with this kind of non-linear structure only to balls it up royally; happily, the Booths have a good handle on the format, working it to build intrigue and keep the viewer invested in a tale which, handled slightly differently, would have felt extremely old hat. They also have a good handle on gallows humour, some unexpected moments of levity helping the film stand above the dour depths of the torture genre at its worst. Indeed, at heart The Scarehouse feels closer to an old school slasher, particularly with some of the darkly funny methods of murder brought to the table.

As regards that whole female-centric thing: I’m sure we’ve all heard the arguments for greater female representation in horror in recent years, and I’m sure we’ve also noticed how often the films which purport to empower women tend towards misandric revenge fantasies which, whether they mean to or not, invariably cast the female protagonists as victims. It’s refreshing, then, that The Scarehouse is not about women suffering under male subjugation, but rather the subjugation that can occur within female social structures such as a sorority. There are certainly attitudes on display which might easily be classed as misogynistic, but these are espoused by the women themselves; indeed, I’m hard pushed to recall any film in which female characters call each other cunts quite so regularly and with such fervour as they do here. This is not to say the men are presented as in any way superior, for if memory serves we never see a single male in the movie who isn’t drunk, obnoxious and lecherous. But it doesn’t seem to matter a great deal as the males are entirely background figures, even the one who turns out to be at the heart of the tragedy which sets the whole thing in motion. The message is clear: women don’t need the mistreatment of men to fuck them up and turn them evil, as they’re quite capable of turning evil and fucking themselves up on their own. Now is that girl power or what?

None of this is to suggest that The Scarehouse is without its problems, of course. I’m a little surprised that the film’s reported budget is $200,000, as to be frank it doesn’t look that expensive; there’s nothing especially wrong with the camerawork and cinematography, but it does very much have that ultra-low budget DV feel. It’s also a little overwritten and overacted here and there, Corey and Elaina’s sporadic struggles with their conscience sitting ill-at-ease with how gleefully they embrace their revenge at other times, and we get a little more backstory than we really need. We’re also obliged to suspend disbelief on more than a few points; two people getting out of jail at the same time, then somehow taking over a Halloween funhouse and running it entirely on their own, and each of their intended victims showing up precisely on time with no suspicions – and all of this occurring within a year or two of the tragedy. I for one would also have liked to have seen the haunted house setting played with a little more; there are only a couple of brief moments which see the paying customers unwittingly encounter the very real horrors in the house only to assume it’s all part of the show, an angle which I can’t help feeling could have been played to greater effect. But given that the core story and the central performances are as strong as they are, these are all quibbles I can happily overlook. Also, I couldn’t detect any CGI amidst the pretty decent gore FX: instant horror cred bonus points, naturally.

All in all The Scarehouse is a very decent movie that’s well worth giving a look, and I suspect it’s not the last we’ll hear of Gavin Michael Booth and Sarah Booth. Between them and The Demon’s Rook’s James Sizemore and Ashleigh Jo Sizemore, these would seem to be good times for husband and wife teams in low-budget indie horror.

The Scarehouse is out in on VOD and iTunes in Canada (via D Films) and the US (via NBC Universal).

Review by Quin

Exorcism ends with a confession that is both well written and well performed. I’m not offering up some great spoiler. Like most found footage films, you know ahead of time what is in store for the characters. In fact, if you’ve seen any two, you can probably pick out the similarities and those plot points would be present in any other two found footage films you may choose at random – this film included. Where Exorcism fails completely is in its construction. The story is there, the acting is good enough, and it has all of the footage it needs for a complete story (even at barely 60 minutes in length) – but the editing is some of the worst I’ve seen in the last couple years. However, the film’s biggest offense is its overuse of fast moving expository intertitles and bad fonts. Throughout the film, the viewer’s hand is held, via black screens with text carefully explaining things you already know, things you can figure out for yourself, or things no one could possibly know. To make things worse – the writing is sloppy, words are misspelled and grammar is horrendous. Don’t worry, I’ll give some examples. But, I can not stress enough – a film should show you what you need to know. Writer/director Lance Patrick may want to consider a career in writing dialogue for comic books; either that or he should find a time machine and go back to the early 1920s and make movies there.

The plot of the film is simple, but please allow me to summarize and extrapolate for you. A group of young filmmakers (cast and crew) are headed to a house in the middle of nowhere. In all honesty, we can only assume this because they drive forever and then walk a little further in the dark – their destination is an old house that was the site of an exorcism 50 years prior. These people are there, illegally, to use the location to film their own re-creation of the exorcism. Throw in a curse from a disgruntled acquaintance and whatever residual haunting the house may have and crazy, bad things start happening on camera and in the audio.

Extremely straightforward and a bit run-of-the-mill found footage horror as far as the story goes; unfortunately the editing of the film pretty much dismantles all tension and makes the story more confusing and more repetitive than it needs to be. I already mentioned the text – which serves the same purpose as a guy sitting next to you in a theatre, nudging you ever few seconds and saying, “Did you see that? Huh? Did ya?” For instance, when we meet the character who sets the curse in motion, it’s preceded with a title card that says, “The envious one…” We should be able to figure that out by watching her actions, and facial expressions, not to mention her chanting something that sounds a whole lot like a curse. And then there’s the overuse of ellipses, and they aren’t even used correctly, but…

I know that every other young filmmaker since 1994 has wanted to be Quentin Tarantino, but structuring your film in a non-linear way takes skill and finesse. This film is jarring, bordering on incoherent at times and at best it just makes the viewer laugh at how silly it all is. The film hadn’t been going for 20 minutes yet and we had already jumped back to three days earlier, a few days later on the set, back at the party, two days later, 17 minutes later… oh, you get the idea. It’s totally insane, actually. Toward the end it gets oddly specific, “Exactly 11 minutes and 6 seconds later…” There are those ellipses again, maybe those are an evil spirit as well. A movie about the evil ellipses would actually be so much better than exorcism.

All they really have to do to make Exorcism decent is remove all of the exposition after the initial brief and edited explanation, and re-order the scenes so the beginning of the final scene comes first; and separate the pre-trip scenes and filming on location scenes, because the climax of the film is actually pretty strong. No matter how you slice it up, this film is never going to win any awards, but I’m sure it could make some horror fans happy. As it stands right now, I would advise everyone to look the other way and see anything else before this one. Hopefully these people will listen to some criticism and try again. I wouldn’t be surprised if one day we’re all talking about how much Lance Patrick’s films have improved. But for now, Exorcism should be credited to Alan Smithee, which is a Director’s Guild of America thing – does the UK have anything like that? (Editor’s note – yes Quin, we know who Alan Smithee is, or rather isn’t.)

Exorcism is out now on Region 2 DVD from 101 Films.

Review by Tristan Bishop

Devotees of the stranger side of cinema may well be familiar with the work of Filipino actor Weng Weng, the 2ft 9 actor who graces the Guinness Book Of Records as the shortest lead actor ever, and who starred in a James Bond spoof entitled For Y’r Height Only, which was probably the biggest home-grown hit the Filipino film industry ever produced – much to the chagrin of the industry itself, apparently. The film itself is alternately a lot of fun (especially when Weng Weng employs his gadgets, such as a jetpack!) and pretty creepy (the scenes with the childlike actor seducing women), but is unmissable for those with a taste for the bizarre. Such a film would be unlikely to be made in this more enlightened day and age, and even more unlikely to be the global hit that it was, and as such the passing years have generated real cult appeal for the film and the diminutive star. But until now Weng Weng’s life has been a mystery to those outside of the Filipino film industry.

Coming on like a cross between two huge documentary hits of recent years, Not Quite Hollywood (2008) and Searching For Sugar Man (2012), The Search For Weng Weng chronicles Australian former cult video store owner Andrew Leavold on his hunt to track down the mysterious star, and was apparently filmed over the course of seven years (although there is very little indication of passing time present in the film itself). Leavold travels to Manila and manages to track down many of the big players in the Filipino film boom of the 1960s to 1980s; thankfully most of them are still alive, still hang out together, and are more than happy to share their memories. Unfortunately it transpires quite early on in the film that Weng Weng himself is no longer with us, having passed away some time in the early nineties. You might think that this would put a bit of a dampener on the entire enterprise, but Leavold keeps on digging for more information, and manages to track down Weng’s only surviving relative, his brother, who fills in the background to Weng Weng’s fascinating and ultimately tragic story.

As a documentary, The Search For Weng Weng is a little rough around the edges (not unsurprising for what is essentially one man’s obsessive seven year quest), but keeps the interest due to a quick pace and the use of hundreds of clips of Weng Weng in action, mostly from For Y’r Height Only and its sequel The Impossible Kid (as unfortunately up to 80% of Filipino films from the period are now lost). But things really kick into gear in the second half, with an unexpected swing into truly surreal territory, as Leavold meets and interviews a certain major player in the creation of the film industry (anyone with a passing knowledge of the history of The Philippines will recognise this particular character). This sequence alone had me rubbing my eyes with amazement and qualifies as one of the most astounding coups (pun very much intended) in a documentary in recent history. The only real criticism I could give here would be that Leavold seems to be a pretty interesting and entertaining chap himself, and more of him on camera would have been nice to see, but when you have a documentary subject as rich and strange as Filipino B-movies (also covered more generally in the 2010 film Machete Maidens Unleashed), it doesn’t really matter all that much.

This feature-packed double DVD edition contains not only the expected audio commentary by Leavold, extended scenes and trailers, but also the music video for ‘I Love Weng Weng’ performed by Roy Arabejo. However the icing on the cake is the full feature film D’Wild Wild Weng, an utterly bizarre attempt at a Filipino western, which alternately appears to be set in the 19th century and the present day (modern jeeps appear at one point), and also features samurai, ninjas and an army of fellow dwarf actors (apparently waiters at an all-dwarf restaurant which still exists in Manila) painted in ‘red face’ to appear to be native Americans! To be honest, it’s a bit repetitive and dull, despite all this, and looks like it was scraped off the bottom of a dumpster, but it’s a miracle given the nature of film preservation in The Philipines that it has survived at all.

But this is just frosting on an already delicious cake, of course, and any fans of bizarre world cinema would be well-advised to tag along with Leavold on his quest. Long live Weng Weng!

The Search for Weng Weng is released to region 2 DVD on 26th January 2015, from Monster Pictures.

By Svetlana Fedotov

Doing a true all-ages work is hard to pull off. Balancing the child-like wonderment of children stories while creating a tale that appeals to older readers without diving off into kiddie fart jokes takes a serious steady hand that few possess. While animated endeavors such as Adventure Time, Regular Show, and Gravity Falls have managed to create a visual wonder for the kids in all of us, the comic industry is just now catching up to the possibility of entertaining both parents and their brood. Thankfully, it looks like Archaia/BOOM! Studios had gotten the notice early, and on top of their already stellar line up of cross-generational work have recently released the dark fantasy Feathers. A bit gothy, a bit mysterious, but all adventure, Feathers follows the lives of two kids who desperately wish to break away from their parents stronghold only to find each other. It’s very sweet.

Set in a city named Maze Town (as the streets are as dangerous as they are easy to get lost in), the comic opens up on a man finding a baby abandoned in the streets. As he lifts the mewling bonnie boy, he quickly notices it’s no ordinary child, but one covered head to toe in black feathers. Unbeknownst to the man, they are both being watched by unseen voices, voices with big plans for the both of them. Soon, eleven years pass and the boy, now named Poe (yup, Poe), has become an urban legend among Maze Town, spending his days helping homeless kids from the shadows and his nights on missions with his adopted father. As he dreams of freely walking among the populace, a girl across town dreams of the same thing as she lives in the gilded cage of the rich. Luckily for them, destiny has heard their call and has begun spinning the wheels in ways that would change their lives forever.

I am absolutely digging this new series. Granted, I’m a sucker for all-ages dark fantasy work, but even if I wasn’t, Feathers absolutely stands out as a comic to watch. While the first issue doesn’t give much in what to expect in the overall story arc, it has set itself up fantastically to the possibilities. It’s one of those comics that read like a book and the first issue is simply the first chapter, which I’m sure wouldn’t work outside of something billed as all-ages. Also, the characters are brilliantly fun and relatable, each with their own personality that would attract the wanderlust spirit of even the grumpiest of old men. Sure, they’re young and shoe-horned to be wild, freedom-yearning creatures to move the story along, but so what? Who doesn’t love a good hero’s journey? Throw caution at the wind, you crazy kids!

Definitely a solid standout in terms of appearance is the pen work by the writer Jorge Corona and Jen Hickman. It appears as if they channeled their inner Mike Mignola, mixed it with Ted Naifeh’s spirit, and a boiled the mess with some Pixar magic creating a visual panorama of spreading cityscapes and tons of spooky shadows. There are plenty of fun, cartoony angles that harken to moving animation while still keeping with the four panel spirit. The characters are also wonderfully expressive and have very unique appearances, letting the story flow naturally page after page. I’m also really digging Poe’s little yellow goggles, giving him a cute creative signature as the lead.

If you’ve been looking for a good comic start your tween on, look no further than Feathers. It’s a mile a minute romp that’ll have the kids clambering for more.

Review by Ben Bussey

I had a rather strange experience watching Ninjas Vs Monsters. I knew going in that it was the third film in a series, following on from 2011’s Ninjas Vs Vampires and 2008’s Ninjas Vs Zombies, but I had no recollection of ever having seen either – then a few minutes in some footage from the original film was used in a flashback montage, and my brain suddenly screamed, “oi, dickhead, you’ve seen this before.” Yes, even though when I posted the trailer for Ninjas Vs Monsters on here only a few days ago I claimed to have been hitherto unaware of Ninjas Vs Zombies, in truth I had not only seen the damn film but I even bloody well reviewed it back in 2012. In my defence, the film had at that point been released by the sadly-missed Revolver Entertainment under the (astonishingly crap) alternate title Zombie Contagion, so that may have had something to do with my confusion. A more likely explanation for these odd gaps in my memory, however, is all that crack I’ve been smoking the fact that I’ve been at this horror reviewing lark for more than six years now, and in that time I’ve seen more no-budget shot-on-DV movies than I’d care to remember – quite literally, it would seem. Still, I do feel a little ashamed for having banished Ninjas Vs Zombies so haphazardly into the landfill site on the peripheries of my memory, for while it isn’t by any means a great film or even a particularly good one, it is a well-meaning effort from a cast and crew with a readily apparent enthusiasm for action, comedy and horror, and indeed some relative skill at pulling them off on film with limited resources.

While I can say with 99.999999999% certainty that I never saw the second installment Ninjas Vs Vampires (our former contributor Aaron Williams covered that on its 2012 release, and was unimpressed), it’s not too hard to pick up what’s going on in Ninjas Vs Monsters, though I get the impression that not having seen either preceding film might somewhat diminish the intended emotional impact of much of what occurs. Yes, I just used the words ’emotional impact’ in relation to a no-budget direct-to-DVD schlockbuster about all-American nerds magically imbued with ninja skills who go head to head with Dracula, Frankenstein, the Wolf Man, the Mummy and a trio of witches (plus a few more colourful opponents for good measure). Not content with simply delivering the low-rent shits and giggles we might anticipate, writer-director Justin Timpane sets out to give us a bona fide trilogy closer here, meaning that the characters we’ve seen develop over the years will finally reach the end of their journey. Ah – but if we haven’t actually seen these characters develop over the years (or, like me, had completely forgotten having done so), it would seem to render much of Ninjas Vs Monsters a trifle redundant. Or it may simply be that the intended audience for this film is very, very small.

Okay, so in a nutshell here’s what’s going on: the band of monster-fighting ninjas open this film in a somewhat fractured state, with the master magician brothers Randall (Dan Guy) and Eric (PJ Megaw) holed up in a remote mansion, whilst their old ninja friends Kyle (Daniel Ross, pictured up top), Cole (Cory Okuchi),  Aaron (Jay Saunders) and super-psychic Alex (Devon Brookshire) are still on the job battling demons in whatever form they happen to take – which apparently includes clowns and pirates. However, when both parties find themselves under attack, it comes to light that Dracula (the staggeringly hammy Sam Lukowski) has enlisted all the biggest and baddest from the annals (heheh) of horror history in order to wipe out their super-ninja opponents and, y’know, take over the world and shit. The rag-tag bunch, plus a number of new arrivals including Step (Jasmine Guillermo, who doesn’t look anywhere near as stripper-ish in the movie as they’ve made her look on the cover art), must put aside their differences and overcome both literal and personal demons in order to save basically everything from being plunged into eternal darkness – but it may be that none of them make it out of this particular battle unscathed.

I guess the Ninjas Vs – series must have a fanbase of some size and description to have made it this far, and I should expect that for them Ninjas Vs Monsters may be quite the crescendo, but for everyone else a great deal of the character-based scenes are bound to fall flat. Still, Timpane and co haven’t forgotten about covering the basics, so we have plenty of martial arts action (it ain’t quite The Raid, but it’s competent enough), a smidgen of titilation (mainly in the one witch who only has half a top on), and an overabundance of film geek humour: I spotted lines lifted from Die Hard, Ghostbusters, Mallrats, Aliens, The Monster Squad, Army of Darkness, Predator and more besides before losing count. Such desperation to be fan-pleasing can easily backfire, and I expect for many viewers it’ll just get annoying – but I dunno, I found there’s just enough charm to the whole affair to forgive its fanboy over-indulgences.

If you have no patience for shoestring DIY horror movies with a nerdy disposition, then move along right away; but I found it hard not to feel some affection for Ninjas Vs Monsters. Above all else, it’s rather heartwarming to see that the same cast and crew (from what I can see, the majority of the key players have returned in all three films) have been happy to plugging away this silly little franchise for what looks to have been the better part of a decade – and given the level they’re working at, you know they’re not just in it for the money. Indeed, that the film opens on a bittersweet note with a dedication to series producer and FX artist Brian Anderson who passed away last year would seem to underline what a family affair the Ninjas Vs- series is. As to whether watching the movie makes you feel part of the family, or feels akin to being shown a stranger’s holiday snaps – well, that rather depends on the viewer. Me, I enjoyed it well enough – but I’m not counting my chickens as to whether or not I’ll remember it two-and-a-bit years from now…

Ninjas Vs Monsters comes to UK DVD and Blu-ray on 26th January 2015, from Left Films.

NINJAS VS MONSTERS Trailer from Left on Vimeo.

Review by Quin

In my review of Abandoned Mine at the end of 2013, I declared mine horror officially dead. I’ve seen two more mine related horror films since then, the first (and better of the two) being an older film finally seeing daylight after having been buried deep underground for a while. That one is called Mine Games (which was briefly re-titled The Evil Within, and then re-titled back to Mine Games again, and it’s now on Netflix). It’s basically a dumbed-down ripoff of Timecrimes but a nice idea. It is also one of those movies that gets better and more engaging as it goes along. The setup is so familiar that you could almost recite dialogue with the actors even if you’ve never seen it before. Early in the film after a van breaks down, one character actually says, “Why don’t we split up and look for help?” The optimists will say, it must be irony. But it’s really not. It needed a smarter script and more nuanced actors capable of making more noticeable decisions with their characters.

The second mine film was a 2014 film called Beneath (not to be confused with the man-eating fish movie that came out a year prior, or a half a dozen other films with the same title) and it should have been better than Mine Games. There are no silly young adults who still behave like teens, the great Jeff Fahey is one of its stars, and mines are inherently scary places that hold a wide array of unknown terror. Unfortunately, Beneath screws all of this up and gives us something boring and ridiculous.

It starts with the usual bit proclaiming that it’s based on true events. It seems like this has just become an industry standard. It doesn’t have to be true, because it’s not a documentary or a news report, but I think these words are supposed to add to the suspense we feel. It rarely does – and the older I get, I just get mad because I had to put my glasses on for that crap. Another review I read on Beneath pointed out that the “based on true events” blurb is the same as saying, “Mine disasters have happened before.” That’s pretty funny, but astute and it can be applied to many a found footage film. Thankfully, Beneath is not found footage. What we see is polished, professional and cinematic. But as I said before, it is just so dreadfully boring.

Jeff Fahey’s character is an older coal miner who is about to retire. He coughs a lot and shows signs that his mind may not be what it used to be, whatever that was. His daughter has never been to work with dad and wants to see the mines from deep inside. So, his last day of work becomes an impromptu take your adult daughter to work day – and wouldn’t you know, that’s the day disaster strikes. The group is trapped in the mine. Oxygen gets low. People see other people turn into demons before their eyes. And the movie really wants us to question whether or not something supernatural is in the mine (think Alien) or if they are all just delirious from lack of oxygen. But, you know what? Who cares?

I’ve always really liked Jeff Fahey. There was a brief time when I was younger when I thought The Lawnmower Man was a good movie. My tastes have changed, to say the least. When he was added to the cast of Lost in season 4 as Frank Lapidus, I was reminded of why I liked him so much. He’s completely wasted in Beneath. Which is a darn shame. The rest of the cast is forgettable as well.

I guess I’ll say it again, mine horror is dead. If you really want to see some good mine films, check out John Sayles’ Matewan or the 1976 Barbara Kopple documentary Harlan County, USA. Each of these showcase the horrors of the coal mining industry. They may not give you nightmares, but they might make you angry. For a slightly more sinister film, that may give you nightmares and make you too angry to sleep, check out the 2005 documentary The Devil’s Miner. It’s about kids as young as 12 in Bolivia that are forced to work in the silver mines of Cerro Rico. These kids have to stop by a statue of the devil (Tio) each day before work to bring offerings so their lives will be spared that day. It doesn’t get much scarier than that, folks. Beneath is for amateurs. For a mine film filled with adult characters creeping through the dark toward Hell, the film is kids stuff.

Beneath is available on VOD from IFC Midnight and it’s streaming on Netflix in the US.

Review by Ben Bussey

I’m quite certain I’m not the only person in recent years to have sat down to watch The Other and within the first ten minutes found myself thinking “gee, wonder if M Night Shyamalan ever saw this one.” As groundbreaking as The Sixth Sense’s grounded, dramatic take on supernatural horror might have seemed back in 1999, such an approach was quite clearly not without precedent, as this 1972 production from Robert Mulligan demonstrates. Were you to go in blind, perhaps knowing only that this was a film from the director of To Kill A Mockingbird, then the opening scenes might leave you thinking you’re watching nothing more than a fairly standard American coming of age tale, but – as the Shyamalan influence might suggest – there’s a twist in the tale.

With their matching blonde bowl-cuts, beige T-shirts and short trousers, Niles and Holland Perry (Chris and Martin Udvaronky) seem like your textbook prepubescent Hollywood twins. They’re living the textbook Hollywood rural childhood too, spending all summer playing around the family farm climbing trees, swimming in the lake, taunting the grumpy old hag next door and so forth. Of course, as is so often the case with twins in the movies, it soon transpires they’ve got a bit of that good twin/bad twin vibe going on, with Niles being the comparatively good boy who gets home on time, washes up for dinner and is kind to his unwell mother (seemingly a broken woman since being widowed), whilst Holland seems to make a point of avoiding everyone else, more or less living outside permanently. This idyllic veneer is set to be severely tarnished when a series of mysterious ‘accidents’ bring tragedy into their homestead, but – as I suspect you’ll have gathered by now – things are not as they seem.

I found The Other quite a curious viewing experience. So much about the set-up seems to directly foreshadow The Sixth Sense that I figured out the twist almost straight away, and as such found myself getting a little impatient with the whole affair until the big reveal. But the smart move here is that this central revelation doesn’t actually resolve matters at all; indeed, I’m not sure it was necessarily even intended to be a particular shock, as it’s largely self-evident from early on. Rather than closing the book, the twist simply turns things around as the final act takes us in a direction that may be a tad bit darker than we had originally expected. The publicity from the film’s release plays heavily on its ‘shocking’ content, carried over from the Thomas Tyron novel on which it’s based, and it’s easy to see how it could have had that effect in 1971, particularly given that it was a PG on release – and it has by no means lost the ability to shock today.

Above all, The Other stands as a solid example of the curious respectability horror seemed to have by the early 70s, a vibe The Sixth Sense (last time I’ll mention it, I promise) very much brought back around the millennium. While it’s considerably milder than Rosemary’s Baby, The Omen or The Exorcist, it’s that same brand of slick, well-made, upmarket genre film with high production values and proper actors, notably a scene-stealing turn from Uta Hagen as the enigmatic woman who takes Niles under her wing. Speaking as someone who tends to prefer his horror movies a bit less respectable, all this good taste and restraint leaves me a bit cold, though I can’t argue that everyone’s doing their job very well.

While it may ultimately be one of those that impressed me aesthetically and intellectually more than it actually entertained me as a horror fan, The Other is nonetheless a noteworthy film which warrants mention among all the great sinister kid shockers, and is well worth giving a look.

The Other is released to UK Blu-ray on 23rd February, from Euerka Entertainment.