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Review by Ben Bussey

Another found footage movie.

Will those four words alone not suffice? Do they not immediately tell you everything you need to know? Do I need to mention cameras running at all times when any reasonable person would have turned them off, the bulk of the screen time taken up by unconvincing relationship scenes involving boring two-dimensional characters you couldn’t have cared less about in the first place, and wobbly, erratic camerawork getting even wobblier and more erratic at those rare moments when things threaten to get interesting, thereby denying us even a glimpse of whatever it is that’s supposed to be the big threat, ultimately leaving us utterly cheated in every respect – only to then have the dreaded “cop watching footage days later” ending and proceed to continue in proper film mode for a further ten bloody minutes?

What makes it hurt most of all is that Frost really needn’t have been this way. Scientists on a glacier uncovering something that shouldn’t have been disturbed – yes, obviously it evokes The Thing (as does the other upcoming release, the similarly formulaic but far more entertaining Blood Glacier), but it’s still hardly one of the most frequently utilised horror movie set-ups, and the potential is there to do something genuinely haunting and cinematic. Even more teasingly, there are brief moments when Frost comes close to doing this, when not in found footage mode: we open and close on some nice, atmospheric opening close-ups of the ice, and have some really quite beautiful Shining-esque aerial shots along the way. But nope, for the bulk of it, it’s an uninteresting thirtysomething couple, on the glacier for no readily discernible reason, spending the bulk of their time having boring relationship issues which – again, for no readily discernible reason – they keep the camera on throughout. That said, they do stop short of filming themselves in bed, even though they come close – which, frankly, feels like yet another way this boring bloody film robs us of any real entertainment value, given that we get almost no look at whatever it is that is threatening them.

I know there’s always that ‘power of imagination’ argument to be made, but there’s also the argument that this is just lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy filmmaking at its most boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring.

Sorry, but if they can’t be arsed to make a proper movie, I can’t be arsed to write a proper review.

Frost is out Region 2 DVD on 10th February 2014 from Entertainment One.

Review by Stephanie Scaife

I am not the intended audience for Insidious 2 so this makes it slightly difficult to write a fair review. I’m a film snob and I’ve seen so many horror movies that when a film such as this relies so heavily on the tried and tested conventions of the genre I’m simply overwhelmed with the sense of déjà vu. Not a jump scare goes by without me sighing and rolling my eyes. I’d seen James Wan’s Saw, The Conjuring and in preparation for this I also recently watched Insidious – I didn’t enjoy any of these films. These are horror movies for people who aren’t horror fans, where the cheap scares, convoluted plot and stock characters make for fun and scary viewing.

Insidious 2 has pretty much entirely the same set up as Insidious, with the family having relocated to except this time instead of Josh (Patrick Wilson) and Renai’s (Rose Byrne) son being trapped in the Further (the spirit world), it’s Josh who draws the short straw leaving his human body free to be possessed by a malign spirit. So Renai enlists the help of Carl (Steve Coulter), Specs (screenwriter Leigh Whannell) and Tucker (Angus Sampson) to figure out why Josh has now gone all Jack Torrance on them and to uncover his secret past.

Now, when I watched Insidious I’d found it to be fairly dull and predictable, and Insidious 2 is just more of the same; it’s repetitive and clearly a lazy cash in based on the success of the first film. Let’s hope that, like Saw, Insidious doesn’t turn into one of these franchises that drags on and on, churning one out each year around Halloween with an ever increasingly confusing mythology to match my decreasing interest/comprehension (delete as applicable). This isn’t to say that Insidious 2 is a bad film per se, but it’s entirely perfunctory which I think is oftentimes worse that something that is tangibly poor.

Patrick Wilson gives it his crazy-eyed best as Josh, but poor Rose Byrne is reduced to being nothing more than a squealing wreck. The comic relief of Carl and Tucker feels silly and misplaced with the only real saving grace being in the form of Barbara Hershey. Also, I hasten to add that many including our own Ben seemed to quite like this film, so I could just be getting bogged down in my own particular tastes and biases.

Although the official title contains the word “chapter” indicating that this is a continuation of the first film it actually acts as both a prequel, where we learn about Josh’s history with the supernatural and also as a direct sequel picking up in the aftermath of the first film. I can only assume that with any further chapters they will have to widen the field slightly as the focus on the serial aspects of the story has already seemingly removed any sort of originality and creativity, of which there was limited supply to begin with.

Ultimately though it’s pointless having a whinge about mainstream horror films and their successes because these films will still keep getting made and swathes of popcorn munching cinemagoers will continue to fork out the money to do so. You only have to look at the $5million budget and the $93million gross takings to see exactly why these kinds of films get made…

Insidious Chapter 2 is available now on Region 2 DVD and Blu-ray, from Entertainment One.

Review by Tristan Bishop

Vampires have always been about sex and seduction – right back to Sheridan Le Fanu’s 1872 novella Carmilla (filmed by Hammer as The Vampire Lovers), those befanged bloodsuckers have been beguiling us into dropping our guard and baring our necks for nearly 150 years. Cinema took a little longer to catch on, of course – I can’t imagine anyone getting hot under the collar for Lugosi’s Dracula or Schreck’s Nosferatu – but by 1958 Christopher Lee and Hammer brought the seduction angle to the forefront, ushering in a new age of vampiric sexiness, further built upon by Roger Vadim’s sadly neglected Blood and Roses and by Hammer themselves in the Le Fanu-based Karnstein trilogy. By the 1970s censorship throughout Europe had become so relaxed that film-makers such as Jean Rollin, Jess Franco and Jose Larraz were making vampire films that focussed almost solely on the carnal aspect of the undead – indeed in the case of Franco’s The Female Vampire (1973) some versions of the film featured explicit hardcore sex alongside the blood-letting. These Euro-sleaze items, with their dreamlike qualities and more honest depictions of what was once sublimated in the idea of vampiric hypnosis still have a massive following today, and Xan Cassavettes has obviously seen a fair few of these films, as Kiss Of The Damned’s look and feel seem informed by the work of these European pioneers – Rollin in particular.

The story chiefly concerns the relationship between Djuna (played by Josephine De La Baume), who has been a vampire for centuries, and Paolo (Milo Ventimiglia – IE Peter Petrelli from Heroes, now sporting a grown-up beard), a man she meets in a DVD rental store and who becomes instantly enamoured with her. At first she puts up her defences, claiming that she cannot see him due to her ‘rare skin condition’, but our Paolo is nothing if not persistent, and finally she relents and lets him in to the opulent mansion that she is borrowing from Xenia (Anna Mouglalis), who seems to be somewhat of a leader in the vampire community. Djuna shows her vampiric side after she lets Paolo chain her to the bed (for his own safety of course), but Paolo isn’t just after some hot vamp bondage action, he wants to be turned, to share in this mysterious, romantic existence. Everything seems to be going swimmingly – Djuna teaches Paolo to hunt animals for blood, forsaking the traditional human prey, until one day Djuna’s sister Mimi (Roxane Mesquida, who has previously heated up the screen in art house fare such as Gregg Araki’s Kaboom and the god-awful Rubber) arrives, ordered by Xenia to stay for a couple of weeks on her way to what amounts to vampire rehab. Mimi turns out to be rather different from her sister – rather than hunting animals she prefers the traditional ‘seduce ’em and suck ’em dry’ approach to subsistence, and her loose cannon approach threatens to upset the seemingly perfect existence of Djuna and Paolo, not to mention the wider, bourgeoisie vampire society, who are content to turn up at social functions and exist on synthetic blood.

This is writer/director Xan (short for Alexandra) Cassavetes’ first feature, but she’s had a bit of an edge on most first-timers, being part of an impressive dynasty – Her father was the legendary director John Cassavetes, and her mother his long-time wife and muse Gena Rowlands. Xan acted as a young girl in some of her father’s films, and, more recently had a role in Alpha Dog (2006), as well as directing shorts and documentaries. Unsurprisingly, her style is assured and impressive here, and what could easily have seemed like mere pastiche of classic Euro-sleaze is filtered through more modern techniques (notably the impressively-paced editing courtesy of Taylor Gianotas and John F Lyons) and up-to-date versions of the vampire mythos – The influence of True Blood here is undeniable.

Kiss Of The Damned has a lot more going on than merely being a undead mash-up, however – there’s some real substance to the story. Like all good ‘monster’ films this is really about people, and about how much we are willing to let ourselves be seduced by materialism and social status (something which has been implicit in vampire stories since the start). An early scene where Paolo begs to be let in to Djuna’s house is a great inversion on the well-known inability of vampires to enter a house unless invited – he does not need to be ‘glamoured’ by a vampire (not intentionally, at least) in order to want to become one – the existence itself is seductive enough to him, something which I would imagine many viewers would agree with.

The soundtrack is certainly worth a mention– switching dizzyingly between fuzz-tone guitars, synth drones, classical music, wailing operatic vocals and a stunningly good harpsichord and funky drum piece which recalls the groovier end of Jess Franco’s soundtracks – props to Steven Hufsteter for his work here.

The trump card of this film, however, is the casting of Roxane Mesquida – The kind of actor who effortlessly exudes sex whenever the camera is on her. Her Mimi is the fly in the ointment, a vampire who knows what she wants (sex and human blood), and isn’t afraid to go out and get it – She is tolerated by Xenia’s liberal society, and she is happy to indulge in the materialism whilst eschewing the polite pretentiousness, and her seductive and deadly presence gives the other characters (and, indeed, the audience) several questions to ask themselves about their true nature. My one minor quibble about the film comes from Roxane – As her first language is not English (a trait, in fact, shared by most of the actors in the film), some of her line reading seems a little odd. But then my French is dreadful, so she’s forgiven. Plus I don’t think I’ve ever seen a sexier neck-ripping on film. There. I said it.

So if you’re willing to be seduced by a vampire film that stimulates the intellect as well as the baser areas, open your collar and bare your neck for Kiss Of The Damned.

Kiss of the Damned is released to Region 2 DVD and Blu-ray on 27th January 2014, from Eureka Entertainment.

Review by Ben Bussey

I daresay we’ve all been to family get-togethers at which we’ve quietly fantasised about something along these lines. Feigning joy at being reunited with blood relations with whom we share almost nothing but mutual resentment and contempt, obliged to discuss what we’re doing with our lives and (invariably) our careers, what we’ve achieved, what a shame it is we’re not doing as well as so-and-so, and shouldn’t we consider doing this instead… honestly, haven’t we all from time to time wished a band of homicidal masked maniacs would start peppering the place with crossbow bolts and spare us further indignity?

A great deal can be said about the plot of You’re Next, though it would prove hard to do so without venturing into spoilers – which, fear not, I intend to avoid here. While the central idea is strong, there are without doubt some elements which may strain credibility just a little. And yet, it works. It all works. While there’s an overriding air of naturalism, this is still very much a horror movie, very much following horror movie logic – which means, of course things happen which wouldn’t in the real world. And while it’s all played outwardly straight, it’s positively gushing with gallows humour from start to finish. (Particularly the finish. No lie, I genuinely barked with laughter at least three times in the final moments.)

Up until now, I really haven’t been feeling the Adam Wingard love. Plenty of people, including some of my Brutal As Hell cohorts, have hailed him as one of the best and most original horror filmmakers to emerge in recent years. To be fair I’ve still yet to see any of Wingard’s other features, but what I have seen – his contributions to V/H/S and The ABCs of Death – did not impress me in the slightest. All I got from them was hipster smugness and casual misogyny. All this being the case, I wasn’t expecting much from You’re Next. From the premise and what little I knew of the director, I anticipated something far more mean-spirited and sleazy, with dumber characters, cheesier dialogue, and more excessive violence, most likely with a sexual element. I’m very happy to say I was wrong on all counts. Other than wishing he’d turn the lights up a little and not shake the damn camera quite so much, I have nothing to say against Wingard’s work here.

Not only is You’re Next a refreshing step away from the predominant rape and torture fetishism of recent years – it is also manages to keep its fanboy elements in check. Absolutely, Wingard’s film wears its influences on its sleeve, from its Claudio Simonetti-esque synth score (very nice work from Mads Heldtberg, Jasper Justice Lee and Kyle McKinnon) to the Nancy Thompson-esque survivalist tactics employed by Sharni Vinson’s heroine, to the presence of scream queen legend Barbara Crampton in the mother role. But there’s no nudge-nudge wink-wink, no smug “see what we did there?” moments. It doesn’t beat you over the head with explicit references, and – praise be – it doesn’t ape a 70s/80s aesthetic in that wanky neo-grindhouse way. It may honour the spirit of yesteryear, but it’s very much a modern movie – and, while it’s perhaps not quite unique enough to be a gamechanger, I certainly hope it’s a good barometer for the kind of horror movies we can expect in the future, in which entertainment value is valued over fucked-upness.

Yes – You’re Next is first and foremost about having a good time. Forget about the guys in animal masks bursting through the window. Whatever the (frankly misrepresentative) marketing* might lead you to think, this really isn’t every home invasion movie from Ils to The Purge all over again. This is a smart blend of character-based melodrama with heavy comedic overtones, where the emphasis is not on pain and torment but on the personal journey of these characters. As such, it’s a great ensemble piece. The fraternal relationship between AJ Bowen, Joe Swanberg and Nicholas Tucci is brilliantly realised; we don’t need to hear specifics to recognise decades of deep-seated tension and mistrust, and all three actors carry it off beautifully. I was a little apprehensive to see Ti West cast as a filmmaker – that’s about as near as You’re Next gets to the dreaded ‘nudge-nudge wink-wink’ – but happily this element was not overemphasised (and you just know the makers of this movie have been asked the same ridiculous questions Swanberg asks West here). We also have great work in the parent roles from Rob Moran, and of course Barbara Crampton. On which note… pardon me, but holy shit, Barbara Crampton. No word of exaggeration – you’d be forgiven for thinking they cast a 27 year old actress and put the tiniest dab of silver in her hair. She has still got it. And of course she’s still a damn fine actress, as well as being damn fine in general.

However, there is absolutely no question as to who owns this movie – and it’s Sharni Vinson. Again, this is someone I had no expectation of going in, having never seen her act before (I know, I can’t believe I missed Step Up 3D either), and as I was aware going in that she’d turn out to be a kick-ass heroine, I won’t deny a little anxiety in the first twenty minutes or so. Once again – adopts Kevin Spacey Lex Luthor voice – WRONG!** Rest assured, this is not I Spit On Your Grave 2; our heroine does not suddenly muster superhuman strength and a head full of military tactics out of thin air. Yes, the explanations behind her skills are a little larger than life, but – once again – this is a horror movie, and a little larger-than-lifeness tends to be part of the deal. The main thing is – she absolutely convinces, not only as someone with the ability to put boot to bottom with much gusto, but also as a (relatively) ordinary young woman going through quite the emotional rollercoaster. I’m so sorry I missed this in the cinema, as I can so easily imagine the kind of huge cheers some of her biggest scenes might have garnered from an enthusiastic audience. I certainly hope we see more of Sharni Vinson in the future, as she’s clearly got what it takes to be a grade-A action heroine. (And look, I got through that whole paragraph without once mentioning feminism…)

Watch all the way to the end of the credits, and you’ll see that the thank-you list ends with a simple “thanks for watching.” In a curious kind of way, that says it all. Sure, we could dissect You’re Next this way and that, relate it to the state of the modern family, modern employment problems, modern gender roles, the global financial crisis, and so on and so forth… but when all is said and done, You’re Next is only a movie, as someone said once or twice. It keeps things simple, aiming to captivate and entertain its audience throughout, and to handle some relatively sophisticated ideas without being all smarty-pants about it. You’re Next succeeds admirably in all these goals – and if, like me, you missed it on the big screen (not hard to do, as it really didn’t get the release it deserved), then here’s your first essential bit of DVD viewing for 2014 (and an eleventh-hour entry into my 2013 top ten).

You’re Next is out on Region 2 DVD and Blu-Ray on 13th January 2014, from Lionsgate.

* Another thing that might surprise you given the marketing – we don’t hear Perfect Day once.

** Strangely fitting how that’s the only memorable line in Superman Returns, don’t you think?

Review by Quin

I feel like I have been waiting my whole life to see this movie. I grew up about an hour away from Disneyland. From about the age of 4 until I was 12, my family would spend the day there at least once a year. This was just enough time to not get sick of it or take it for granted, as well as enough time to become completely obsessed with the place. Even as a very small child, I wasn’t overly interested in Disney films, but Disneyland was a completely magical place where dreams came true. Even now, as an adult in my 30s, I go back once in a while and I can still get that same feeling I had there as a kid – innocence, wonder, hope – not necessarily the ingredients of magic and dreams, but the older and more cynical one gets, those things become much harder to find.

Escape From Tomorrow is where my childhood meets my love of horror films, and it does all of this at the happiest place on earth. The film was shot mostly between a combo of Disneyland in Anaheim, California and Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida. The really amazing thing about it is that it was filmed without the knowledge of anyone within the hierarchy of the Walt Disney Company. This is truly guerilla filmmaking at its finest, most daring and most technically impressive. Disney has some endlessly deep pockets and could have gone after the filmmakers with a vengeance, and while they certainly haven’t given the film their blessing, they’ve actually gone the route of the other extreme – they seem to be simply going on as if this film doesn’t even exist. Whether the Walt Disney Company wants to believe it or not, this film is out there. Anyone with a computer and about 4 dollars can rent it from any number of places around the internet.

Even though it was shot at two Disney theme parks, it takes place at the one in Orlando. Jim White and his family of four are just starting their vacation when Jim gets a call from work informing him that he’s been fired. In a split second following the phone call, he contemplates suicide and gets locked out of his hotel room by his young son. So begins Jim’s trip into madness at The Magic Kingdom. Any sane person would fly home immediately after losing their job, but Jim decides to not tell his family and continue their stay at the money sucking machine that is Disney World. The day starts with an awkward moment between Jim and his wife, and devolves into bizarre hallucinations and encounters with some very strange characters.

For a film like this, shot in a public place with real people as extras (whom I am guessing didn’t sign release forms) the black and white cinematography is beautiful. Shots must have been planned out ahead of time because they are executed brilliantly. This is one of those black and white films with really high contrast; the blacks are jet black and the whites are bright, while still maintaining a subtle grey scale. But the images are clear and easy on the eyes. It sometimes feels like a French New Wave film with a touch of Cinéma verité. The actors are all people I don’t recognize, but I did find out that the father is played by Roy Abramsohn who was in Creepshow 3. Oh, you didn’t see that? Yeah, me neither.

The acting is pretty solid and believable, but the acting is not the reason to enjoy this film. This film works on a surreal, nightmarish level that I would compare to Eraserhead or Begotten. But having said that, Escape From Tomorrow is easier to follow than Eraserhead and more entertaining and enjoyable to sit through than Begotten. In my notes, I wrote down that Escape From Tomorrow is the most fun I have ever had sitting at my computer, watching a movie. This may be slight hyperbole. But it’s exactly how I felt when I wrote it down. I loved it and can’t say enough good things about it. I can’t promise that you all will feel the same way. But I think I can confidently say that it is something different that is worth your time. If for no other reason, you can watch it as a symbolic way of sticking it to the Disney machine – but I sincerely hope viewers get more out of it than that.

Escape From Tomorrow is available in the US now via online platforms.

Review by Tristan Bishop

Watching a lot of low budget films can be a testing, if occasionally rewarding experience. For every hidden gem you stumble across that leaves you wide-eyed and eulogising its greatness to your friends, there are a least fifteen titles that you could happily sleep through, and a few more that make you want to throw the disc out the window (hard to do in these increasingly digital times). Low budget film-making and the attendant struggles are certainly laudable activities, but so often the art and craft are subsumed in unimaginative storylines, duff scripts, amateur acting and snooze-inducing pacing. Plus, when focussing on the horror genre, there is a dispiriting tendency towards bandwagon-jumping, commercial considerations being what they are – so it’s always nice to come across something which takes you by surprise.

Emulsion isn’t a horror film in a traditional sense, however – the term ‘psychological thriller’ seems to have fallen out of use these days, but I can’t think of a better way to describe Emulsion. In fact, the plot set-up, a man searching for his lost wife, put me in mind of a couple of classics of the genre: Polanski’s Frantic (1988) and George Sluizer’s Spoorloos/The Vanishing (also 1988). Ronny (played by Sam Heughan) is an obsessed man – his wife Isabella vanished in a multi-storey car park, and he spends his days searching for her. The film places us a year after the event, and Ronny has taken a job in the car park where she disappeared, desperately searching for any clue he can find. But Ronny doesn’t seem like your average kind of guy – he dresses like Berlin-era David Bowie starring in a Fritz Lang noir, and spends his evenings watching and re-watching home movie footage of Isabella on a 16mm film projector. He’s a man literally out of time, doomed to repeat himself day after day. He even tries to leave town, but is unable to pass the bridge on which he proposed to his wife. Then, out of nowhere, clues to Isabella’s whereabouts start to appear, and Ronny begins to unravel the mystery. But will he like what he finds?

First things first – Emulsion looks great. I mean, really great. Deep, rich colours and nice compositions (including some exterior long shots that put one in mind of Rian Johnson’s cracking teen noir Brick) go towards making the film look like something you’d be proud to have on your living room wall. Singh’s pedigree as a working director of commercials has obviously given him the skill to pull off something which looks like it came straight out of the Hollywood A-list. Speaking of which, there’s an obvious comparison here – David Lynch. The eagle-eyed among you will have spotted that the previously mentioned Frantic and The Vanishing both came from 1988, and, both, visually and script-wise, more than a few cues have been taken from Lynch’s work of the period – especially 1987’s Blue Velvet. Things aren’t all great, however. Despite a capable turn by Heughan in the lead, many of the supporting actors seem a little hesitant. Whereas Lynch uses unnatural performances to unnerve the audience, here it just seems like the cast sometimes just don’t know what to do with the portentous dialogue they’ve been given. Singh wrote the script as well as directing – very common practice these days, despite increasing evidence that even a great director is not necessarily a good writer, and, although it’s certainly nowhere near the worst example I’ve come across in recent times, it tends towards the clunky on several occasions.

In fact, I’ll be honest – for the first half of the film I wasn’t too impressed. Sure, the visuals were beautiful, but jarring elements like Ronny’s archaic sense of style, and moments such as a group of gangsters watching an angel-winged woman sing opera, put me off slightly. Thankfully, come the plot revelations at the hour mark I was taken by surprise. This is actually a film that ties up loose ends, and what I assumed at first were irritating stylistic flourishes were actually clues in Ronny’s mystery. In fact, I want to watch the film again just to see how much I didn’t pick up on the first viewing – and it’s not often I can say that.

Emulsion is not perfect by any means, but it is different, and impressive and intriguing enough for me to flag up Singh as a name to watch in future, and stands out like a beacon amidst a sea of low budget dross.

Emulsion has theatrical screenings lined up across the UK in January; find out more at the official Emulsion website, and on Facebook.

Review by Ben Bussey

“I may see dead people – but then by God, I do something about it.” I won’t deny, as statement-of-intent one-liners go, it’s not a bad one. I haven’t read the 2003 Dean Koontz novel on which this movie is based, but I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that line comes direct from the book: after all, given it was published only a few years after The Sixth Sense – you remember, back in the days when everyone thought M Night Shyamalan was going to be the next Spielberg (ah, were we ever so young) – it would have had a far more timely pop cultural resonance. Indeed, the prevailing mood of Odd Thomas is a desperation to capture the zeitgeist for the young and trendy new wave of horror fans who sprang up in the wake of Scream and Buffy. A hero can’t simply do battle with a monster; they have to come out with a plethora of overly-verbose witticisms first, simultaneously satirising and celebrating US pop culture.

It also helps to challenge a few stereotypes along the way. Where Scream and Buffy re-cast the whimpering female victim as a badass survivor, Odd Thomas takes a fairly dweeby college-age boy and turns him into a tough, street-smart avenger for the recently deceased. It’s kind of a fun idea… but I suspect it would have seemed a great deal fresher a decade ago.

Anton Yelchin (Chekov/Kyle Reese/Charley Brewster 2.0) takes the title role of Odd – yes, Odd is his actual first name, which I’ve no doubt is meant to seem extraordinarily wacky. He has a humble life in many respects, living simple in a small town, working the grill at the local greasy spoon (do you guys use that term in America?), but unbeknownst to most he has inherited from his long-since institutionalised mother the ability to see ghosts. Among the few to know about it are the local police chief (Willem Defoe) with whom he has something of a father/son relationship; Odd’s abilities result in him being involved in a great many unsolved cases. Also in the know is Odd’s girlfriend, bearing the similarly colourful moniker Stormy (Addison Timlin), who works at a mall ice cream parlour and is equally adept at overly verbose witticisms, as well as looking cute in pink short-shorts.

It starts out like any other week – Odd chases down and beats the shit out of a child murderer twice his size, then heads to work and cooks eggs in an unnecessarily showy manner, the way Tom Cruise in Cocktail might do it – but then a mysterious stranger shows up surrounded by what Odd calls bodachs; nasty-looking phantoms which, of course, only Odd can see. Obviously Odd and Penny get their Scooby Gang investigating caps on, and soon come to realise that – wouldn’t you know it – the world’s going to be destroyed if they don’t act fast.

Sounds uncannily like the set-up for a TV show, doesn’t it? And that’s a significant part of the problem. With its emphasis on setting up quirky characters and establishing a cosy little community in which everybody knows everybody else, Odd Thomas feels less like a movie than a pilot episode – and, to be frank, not a terribly inspiring pilot episode at that. Take Charmed, The Ghost Whisperer and Smallville, throw them in a blender and mash up very, very gently, and this is pretty much what you’d end up with, production values and all. Not that I have any major hang-ups about it being a relatively cut-price production: that’s one of the things of interest about Odd Thomas, as it’s a pretty big departure for screenwriter/director Stephen Sommers, whose name is typically attached to such megabudget, CGI-riddled blockbusters as The Mummy movies. Given how painfully overindulgent his movies generally are, it’s nice to see him take a comparative back-to-basics approach, and I can happily say I enjoyed Odd Thomas plenty more than his last two films… but as his last two movies were GI Joe and Van Helsing, that’s really, really, really not saying much.

I don’t want to be too mean about Odd Thomas, because it’s a simple movie with simple intentions, and for the most part it hits its targets. Anton Yelchin remains a thoroughly likeable actor in search of a truly great role; Willem Defoe is his usual effortlessly charismatic self; and Addison Timlin is fine as the stereotypically doting, loveable, tenacious girlfriend. But there’s just no avoiding a painful sense of been-there done-that at every turn, while the movie tries so damn hard to seem hip. The plot is a bland, uninvolving hodge-podge of overfamiliar motifs and red herrings, anxious to come off way smarter and less predictable than it actually is – none of which is helped by a supposed big shock ending that should have been blindingly obvious for at least the previous twenty minutes to anyone who’s been paying attention.

It may end on a here-comes-the-sequel note, but given the off-camera legal woes that have resulted in it going straight to DVD, I suspect it’s a one-and-done for Odd Thomas; and I rather doubt we’re missing out on much there. I guess the material is there, given Dean Koontz has written a whole series of Odd Thomas novels – but if the movie is in any way representative of the book (not a given, I’ll grant you), then I can’t say I’m in any hurry to give any of them a read.

Metrodome release Odd Thomas to Region 2 DVD on 3rd February 2014.

Review by Quin

I spent almost the first third of this movie trying to figure out why the lead actress looked so familiar. This probably says something about my reading comprehension or my attention to detail, because in the blurb about the film, it clearly says that Nicole Fox was a contestant on America’s Next Top Model, the American Idol of modelling shows hosted by Tyra Banks. Now before you say, why are you watching that show, Quin? I have to say it just so happens, the one season of the program I watched all the way through happened to be Nicole’s season, lucky Cycle number 13. Not only was she a contestant, but she won. So here we have it, folks. If you win one of those reality T.V. shows, this is the kind of thing you can look forward to doing, unless you are Susan Boyle. Oh right, she didn’t win. Then again, maybe she did, depending on your point of view.

Nicole Fox plays Vienna, “Named after the city known for its Art Deco”. We get to see some of her vlogs (that’s video blogs, in case you aren’t hip to internet slang) where she tells about her troubled past as well as her dreams and aspirations. It’s probably not unlike the typical audition tape for America’s Next Top Model. Vienna wants to be a model and she wants to document her rise to stardom. She lives with her boyfriend Zack. Zack is a jerk who is clearly taking advantage of her, but Vienna doesn’t seem to notice. Vienna starts modelling regularly for amateur photographer Allan. Now when I say amateur, I mean ‘point and shoot digital camera with natural lighting’ amateur. He pays her, but he’s pretty creepy. Again, she doesn’t seem to notice, because clearly he is the gatekeeper to stardom. Allan is played by Clifford Morts. He looks quite a bit like Kyle Gass of the band Tenacious D and he has a speaking voice similar to the late Jack Nance of Eraserhead and Twin Peaks, but his overall demeanor and actions remind me of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s character in Happiness, who by the way, was also named Allen.

Redlands is John Brian King’s directorial debut. He previously worked as a title designer on everything from Boogie Nights to Lilo & Stitch. He’s certainly come a long way since his work with Disney. This even surpasses his work with Paul Thomas Anderson on the scale of pitch dark pseudo satirical realism. He’s effectively used a method that cinematic greats like Yasujiro Ozu and Jim Jarmusch have had great success with making it an integral part of their visual style; that is placing the camera in one spot and not moving it at all, creating a string of scenes done in one continuous take. Technically, this may not be as impressive as Scorsese’s long shot in the restaurant in Goodfellas. When the camera is still, lighting becomes much less of an issue. But this still makes it challenging for the actors. As long as they know their lines or are good at improv, this gives the scene a more realistic flow with the conversations. The acting in Redlands is good for the most part. There are a few awkward moments, but overall I was impressed with the cast’s ability to stay in character throughout these scenes.

I guess the best way to classify this film is as a cautionary tale – not that fame has a price, but wanting fame has a price. The press release states that it follows in the footsteps of Pier Paolo Pasolini and Rainer Werner Fassbinder. While I don’t doubt that John Brian King is an admirer of these two greats, he’s certainly no Pasolini or Fassbinder; I’d put him closer to the likes of Todd Solondz. Without question he’s a talented filmmaker with a great eye for composition. His conversational dialogue is effective, and he captures realistic portrayals from all of the actors with only a few moments where it feels forced. Overall I was engrossed to the point where I couldn’t look away from the screen. Apart from the chilling conclusion, most of the film’s brutality is what you see between the lines. The build-up is so slow and so careful, you get to the point where it seems like everything may actually turn out alright. Just a word of warning: don’t expect to feel good after watching this. Even so, I’m glad I did.

Redlands will be available on Video On Demand and Amazon Instant Video beginning January 10, 2014.

Review by Ben Bussey

High concept filmmaking is alive and well in the 21st century. Whether it’s a megabudget studio theatrical release or a microbudget straight-to-DVD, if you can sum it up in a sentence chances are you can sell it. Pacific Rim? Monsters versus robots. Megashark Vs. Giant Octopus? Erm… there’s a clue in the title. And now we have Battle of the Damned, with a set-up pretty well guaranteed to stir the loins of fans everywhere, thanks to its three key attributes: zombies, robots, and Dolph Lundgren.

Yep, you’ve got the measure of Battle of the Damned from that sentence alone, but here’s a smidgen more synopsis anyway. Seasoned mercenary Max Gatling (Dolph, obvs) is sent into an abandoned city in south-east Asia which has been quarantined off due to a rather nasty biological experiment gone wrong; that’s right, an evil corporation has turned all the townspeople into zombies (fast ones, just so that’s out of the way). Max’s mission is to locate and retrieve the corporate boss’s daughter, who is lost somewhere in the city. However, once Max tracks her down, he finds she’s not alone – and the ragtag band of survivors she is shacked up with don’t know the truth about her daddy. Their chances of getting out don’t look great – until Max crosses path with another potential threat in the form of some killer androids, deployed to clean up the streets. But with a little reprogramming, these may be just the allies they need to fight their way to freedom.

That’s right – this is a good old fashioned, dumb-as-shit-and-don’t-care-who-knows-it sci-fi action fest with a squirt of horror for good measure, oozing with self-awareness, but also with a not-entirely expected emphasis on plot and character. While it sadly lacks the budget to really do justice to its madcap vision, it doesn’t neglect to bring us a likeable cast and plenty of breezy banter. The end result isn’t likely to become anyone’s new favourite movie, but it’s a diverting enough 90 minutes.

I’ve long sung the praises of his Dolphness (having once penned a lengthy and positively gushing article on the subject at the now sadly defunct B Through Z), and there can be little doubt that the relative success of Battle of the Damned owes a great deal to his presence. One of the great things about Dolph, by contrast with many of his fellow 80s survivors, is his comparative lack of hubris; he’s always seemed as happy taking small parts in big movies as taking big parts in small movies. Obviously he’s on very familiar ground here as the grizzled man on a mission, but sensibly they don’t avoid the pressing issue of his advancing years; we have him putting on glasses to read maps, getting dismissed as “old man” by his mostly younger co-stars, and perhaps most refreshingly there’s no tacked-on love story with a woman young enough to be his daughter as we so often find in movies of this ilk. The gloriously named Max Gatling isn’t exactly a wisecrack-a-minute kind of action hero, but there’s a nice underlying droll wit throughout. The supporting cast also do themselves proud; for once, there are no real stand-out awful performances here, and the soap opera-ish subplots are actually handled far better than we might anticipate. Of course, many people of my age will be as bewildered as I was to see Dolph at one point rescued by Damian from Home and Away…

Unfortunately, given this is a movie about robots fighting zombies, the zombie and robot action really leaves a bit to be desired. The many chase and fight sequences are handled quite sloppily, with no real sense of scale or threat. It’s curiously low on gore for a modern straight-to-DVD B-movie too; we see zombies swarm and screaming victims disappear under them, but that’s about it. And unsurprisingly, the robots aren’t exactly the most impressive we’ve ever seen, and the obvious lack of funds means they are not utilised as often or as well as we might have hoped.

So, while Battle of the Damned may not be the monster mash-up to end all monster mash-ups, it’s a respectable enough addition to the oeuvre, and it’s decent enough midnight movie material.

Battle of the Damned comes to UK DVD and Blu-ray on 26th December 2013, from Entertainment One.