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Review by Stephanie Scaife

First things first: the less you know about Looper going in the better. This is definitely the sort of film that benefits from little to no prior knowledge of the plot, so although I will attempt to keep spoilers to a minimum I’d strongly suggest seeing the film before reading this review, or any other reviews for that matter.

Back in 2005 I was completely blown away by Rian Johnson’s awesome debut feature Brick, a teen neo-noir that oozed style and originality. His sophomore effort The Brothers Bloom (2008) was a slightly underwhelming con-man caper that didn’t particularly live up to the promise shown in Brick. However, I am very pleased to report that Johnson is back on form with his new film, Looper, a fantastically dizzying science fiction film that reunites Johnson with Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who since shedding his Third Rock from the Sun persona with a frankly astonishing performance in Gregg Araki’s Mysterious Skin (2004) has been on an upward trajectory every since.

Apparently originally written over ten years ago as a short when Johnson was struggling to get funding for Brick, Looper has successfully been expanded into a feature length film that, once it starts, doesn’t let up for its entire 118 minute running time. We’re told that in 2074 time travel is invented, but is immediately outlawed and is only used by highly organised criminals who in a future where murder has become near impossible due to advances in technology and police procedures have to send their victims back in time to be murdered, making it the perfect crime as the body is untraceable in their present and unrecognisable in their past. These murders take place in 2044 and are carried out by hit men known as Loopers. They wait in a specific location at a specific time, armed with a somewhat archaic weapon called a “Blunderbuss”, a simple yet effective weapon that makes it near impossible to miss anything within 15 feet. The person is sent from the future handcuffed with a bag over their head, the looper shoots them immediately, loots the body for their payment of silver before disposing of it, no questions asked. The two main conditions being that the target must never escape and that when the looper’s contract is over the crime bosses of the future will send their older self back to be killed, leaving a final massive pay off of gold bars and the knowledge that they have just 30 years left to live. This is known as “closing the loop”.

Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is a looper working in Kansas City under the watchful eye of Abe (Jeff Daniels), who has been sent from the future to run things in the past, and his gang of gun slinging henchmen known as “Gats”, led by the sneering Kid Blue (Noah Segan). Joe goes about his daily business; kills someone, takes his loot, goes to a local diner for some coffee, teaches himself French, indulges in some designer drugs and sex with a showgirl named Suzie (Piper Perabo). However, it soon becomes apparent as more and more loops are closed with increasing frequency that someone in the future is doing away with all the loopers and it’s only a matter of time before Joe is next. In one of my favourite sequences in the film, Joe’s friend Seth (Paul Dano) fails to close his loop, letting his older self escape and we find out exactly what happens to a looper when he breaks this cardinal rule, and believe me it ain’t pretty.

Soon the inevitable happens and Joe comes face to face with Old Joe (Bruce Willis), who manages to evade his younger self. Young Joe is intent on taking out his older self to fulfil his contract and enable him to embark on his lifelong plan to go to France. Old Bruce has other ideas though and wants to track down the Rainmaker, the future person who is behind all of the time travel assassinations, and kill him whilst he is still a boy and before he can ever become a threat. To say much more of what happens after this point in the film would be too much of a spoiler. However, what follows involves a woman named Sara (Emily Blunt), telekinesis and some toy frogs. We also get a quite extraordinary montage sequence of the 30 years of Joe’s life, should he have been successful in assassinating his older self, that is one of the most successful cinematic sequences I’ve seen in a long time. Johnson deserves a great amount of credit for creating a sequence that lasts perhaps just 5 minutes that explains so much, so coherently whilst at the same time invoking some serious emotions and raising some interesting questions about morality and who in the film we as the audience should be rooting for. Morality being one of the central themes of the film, something that it makes clear can never be black or white as all of our characters tread through very grey areas and make some tough decisions.

Looper really is an instant classic, something that you know people will talk about and remember for years to come and will undoubtedly spawn collector’s edition DVDs on every notable anniversary whilst fans pore over the tiny details. It’s a remarkable film that will have genre fans jumping for joy, as it’s a rare occurrence that we get an R-rated, original genre film that does not patronise its audience and assumes that we, as the viewers, are capable of making our own decisions and understanding something that is not a reboot, remake or prequel. Although slightly exposition-heavy at the start, Looper does leave you with unanswered questions that as a viewer you are left to answer for yourself and for that I applaud it. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not without flaws, and in particular it’s best not to think too hard about the time travel aspect of the plot, as with many similar films it sometimes falls foul of its own logic. In one scene Abe tells Joe that it’s best not to think too much about time travel as it fries your brain, so at least Looper is self-aware and actively encourages the audience not to get bogged down and to just take things as they come.

I also particularly liked Johnson’s vision of the future: a run down, sun-baked future that seems particularly realistic in its portrayal of how things may actually end up, bringing to mind Children of Men which also offered an all to believable version of the future, making it all the more frightening than the glossy, completely un-relatable future often portrayed on screen.

My main issues with Looper are somewhat superficial; Gordon-Levitt’s Bruce Willis make-over is sort of distracting and weird, but credit to him as an actor to pull off such a strong performance that never resorts to straight up mimicry. As he has such a lovely face naturally it seemed a shame to alter it, I personally would have preferred Bruce to be in the prosthetics. There’s also a rather too convenient coincidence involving Suzie the showgirl that sort of bothered me, but not enough to really dampen my enjoyment of the film overall.

As with Source Code last year, Looper really is a smart and imaginative piece of genre filmmaking that warrants a trip to the cinema. Not only will you find yourself watching a fantastic film but if enough of us go and see it then hopefully it will prove to the powers that be that there is an audience for these sorts of films and we don’t all want to be seeing the likes of Paranormal Activity 4 or some other terrible, production line film with an assumed existing audience. So do yourself a favour and check Looper out.

Looper is currently on wide release from EntertainmentOne.

Review by Ben Bussey

This is one of those reviews that seems a little arbitrary at this point. I’m half-tempted to just cut & paste Annie’s storming write-up from July and write ‘I concur’ at the bottom. Of course, that would not only be selling short the countless thousands upon thousands of Brutal As Hell readers who hang upon our every word (cough, ahem, etc.); it would also be selling short a film which most richly deserves the praise that has been heaped upon it from most corners this past year or so. That which at a glance seems unlikely to offer much (uninspiring title, generic premise, director best known for Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus) turns out to be something truly special; a horror comedy that not only packs blood and guts, but heart as well.

Yep, Some Guy Who Kills People really resonated with me. In order to fully explain why, I’m going to have to get into some spoilers. Well, maybe I don’t have to, but I’m going to. Don’t worry, I’ll warn you good and proper before I do so; if in doubt, don’t read further than the big scary picture below, and/or read Annie’s spoiler-free review at the link above. In the meantime, without giving anything major away, here are the essentials:

Our hero, if we can call him that, is Ken (Kevin Corrigan), a 34 year old who still lives with his mother. You’d be forgiven for thinking he’s the biggest loser alive; indeed, it seems Ken’s own self-assessment doesn’t stray too far from that. Stuck in a dead-end job at an ice-cream parlour – the only one he could get after a suicide attempt landed him a stint in a secure psychiatric hospital – Ken seems utterly disconnected with everything about his mundane existence, outside of one detail: his burning, murderous fixation on the jock scumbags whose sadistic bullying back at high school left him the shell of a man he is today. However, there may yet be a few little beacons of hope for Ken. There’s Irv (Leo Fitzpatrick), his co-worker and lifelong friend, who’s always believed Ken was capable of more; there’s Stephanie (Lucy Davies), a sweet but similarly fragile woman, who might just be the kindred spirit Ken needs; and then there’s Amy (Ariel Gade), the 11 year old daughter that Ken knew he had, but never had any contact with before now. Will any or all of these be enough to steer Ken off the path of bloody retribution..?

Like I said before, it’s a synopsis that might seem to promise one thing, but delivers something quite different. If you’re anticipating a bleak, nightmarish portrait of a tortured loner spiralling into insanity, you’ve come to the wrong room; Franck Khalfoun’s Maniac remake is just down the hall. While Ken’s situation is by no means sugar-coated, it’s certainly not all woe-is-me doom and gloom. Quite the contrary; this is a really, really funny film, writer Ryan A. Levin keeping proceedings steeped in droll acerbic wit without ever detracting from the drama. Ken’s emotional constipation leads to a fair few comical scenarios, but it doesn’t get into that painfully embarrassing, comedy of humiliation a la The Office; despite everything, Ken remains a loveable, highly relatable character. But the lion’s share of the laughs, as I’m certainly not the first and won’t be the last to remark, come from Barry Bostwick’s Sheriff Fuller. As both the man investigating the murders and also the man dating Ken’s mother (the also-hilarious Karen Black), his inability to put two and two together when it’s all right there under his nose is just hysterical. But again, don’t assume he’s another stereotype; this isn’t just another bumbling cop caricature, but a nuanced character, getting truly first-rate delivery at the hands of Bostwick (who, I confess, I would not have realised was the same guy who sang Damn It Janet all those years ago). Also keeping things far from gloomy are the kills. None of that oh-so-contemporary torture bollocks here: these deaths are swift, splattery and fun, much like old Mrs Voorhees & Son used to do ’em.

And, as mentioned, there’s also a great deal of heart in this movie, and much of that comes through the notable female characters. Karen Black’s mother, while making no secret whatsoever of how exhausted she is with her son’s ineffectuality, clearly says every harsh word in the hope that he will grow stronger. As for Lucy Davies’ Stephanie: I’ve seen reviews that have criticised her character as being gratuitous, but I must strongly disagree. Oftentimes such female characters in films of this nature are indeed little more than window dressing, there to provide the male protagonist with something to reach for, and not a great deal else. By contrast, Stephanie is a fascinating character in her own right, just as wounded and alone as Ken is; she needs him as much as he needs her, and finds it every bit as awkward coming out of her shell. Subsequently she’s a great deal more three-dimensional than many ‘love interests’.

Then there’s Ariel Gade’s Amy. Hers is undoubtedly the most pivotal female part of all, and thank goodness they found so talented a young actress for it. As easily as it could have sunk into sentimentality, the interplay between Corrigan and Gade is natural, involving and refreshingly low on Jerry Maguire syrupiness. At the risk of getting myself reported to STFU Parents, I must say that, as a father myself, the core theme of finding new reason and purpose through parenthood really hit home. It’s an easy thing to mock (and I suspect some of the BaH staff are ready and waiting to do so), but I expect for many of us it really rings true, much as it will in a different way of Ken’s relationship with Stephanie. That mutual need, the bond of love – both romantic, and familial – can be a powerful redemptive force.

This, however, is not the only form redemption takes in Some Guy Who Kills People – but if I’m to discuss that, it means – you guessed it –

Spoilers to follow…

Right, you can’t say I didn’t warn you…

Some Guy Who Kills People not only celebrates the redemptive power of love, but also that of creative expression; more specifically, the creative outlet offered by horror. Yes, there’s a bit of a twist in the tale, one which some reviews have shamelessly given away without warning –  and that is, though we don’t know it until the final scenes, Ken isn’t actually the killer. Just so I don’t go crazy spoilerific I’m not going to say who the killer really is, but I felt I needed to mention it here because of the reason Sheriff Fuller finds to exonerate Ken, in a moment of unexpected yet not uncharacteristic wisdom. See, Ken’s one largely secret talent is his tremendous skill as an artist. It was a high school comic book satirising the jocks which most provoked their wrath all those years ago, and the results of that surely played some role in Ken never pursuing artwork as a career; subsequently, he now draws only for himself, primarily graphic depictions of his imagined revenge. But the key word there is imagined. The Sheriff recognises that this vivid, gruesome artwork is where Ken gets out his rage: that he is a creator, not a killer.

I should think this won’t be a lesson lost on most readers here; I’m assuming we’re all big enough horror fans here to understand that appreciation of the genre is not about taking the gruesome fantasies literally. Unfortunately, as we have seen online in recent months, there are still a great many lazy-minded types who don’t have a taste for horror (which is fine), who subsequently assume all those who do like horror to be stupid and/or dangerous reprobates (which is most definitely not fine). As such, it is timely and refreshing to see a film which passionately and intelligently argues in favour of horror in this way, emphasising that graphic violence in fantasy does not invariably lead to violence in reality, but rather provides a means for cathartic release. No, it isn’t pretty and it isn’t tasteful, but that’s the whole bloody point (pun intended). And, as Some Guy Who Kills People also emphasises, it’s entirely feasible to have those thoughts, enjoy those images, and walk away living a happy, healthy, peaceful life.

Phew, for a review I considered arbitrary I’ve certainly made this one last… and I should think I’ve made my feelings clear. Easily one my top 10 films of the year, Some Guy Who Kills People is a must-see. So see it.

Some Guy Who Kills People is out in UK cinemas on 5th October, then on Region 2 DVD, Blu-Ray and on demand on 15th October, from Grimm Entertainment.

Review by Tristan Bishop

Ghost stories are big business right now. Whilst horror fans are generally happy to consume low-budget exercises in search of thrills (and sometimes a little innovation), mainstream audiences are lapping up the most archaic of spooky stories, as evidenced by the massive success of Hammer’s version of The Woman In Black, and the likes of Insidious – roller-coaster box office juggernauts designed to make you propel your popcorn skywards (presumably so you will then buy more). Sinister is firmly in this category – It’s commercial and free of depth or anything really new, but what it is is a precision engineered scare machine, and boy is it impressive.

Ethan Hawke takes the lead as a writer of true crime novels (I swear that every other main character in horror films is a writer. I’m demanding more authenticity from now on – we need more accountants in lead roles. Maybe some call-centre operators?) who is struggling to follow up his hit book of ten years past. He’s had a setback or two with his last couple of books, we are led to believe, including possibly letting a killer go free. Whoops. Anyway, in order to keep wife Juliet Rylance and their two kids fed, he decides to move into a house, that, unknown to his family but known to Mr Hawke, was the scene of precisely the gruesome family slaying he is writing about! Naughty Ethan! As luck would have it, he discovers an old box of Super 8 film and a projector in his loft and scans through it, discovering to his horror that the cans all contain a different Super 8 film in which a family is slain. Investigating further he discovers a horrific demonic presence lurking in some of the frames on the films, and then things start to happen around the house…

Sinister starts off with a very arresting image – A ‘found footage’ (wait! Don’t run away!) shot of a family of four being hung from a tree, hoisted by an unseen hangman. It’s an undeniably disturbing image, and sets a tone of unease from the off. This, it transpires, is one of the homemade snuff films found by the main character, and I must say that after the glut of godawful glorified home movies churned out recently under the found footage genre umbrella, it’s rather refreshing to see it used as a device so effectively (although I can just imagine a big shot producer demanding that some video footage be stuck in the film, because Paranormal Activity makes money). The film achieves a real intensity by using this footage, along with a combination of spooky occurances, mental disintegration of the main character and some very naughty jump scares (with very loud bangs on the soundtrack, so I would advise a trip to a cinema with a good soundsystem for this one) to do its work – and work it does. The screening I attended saw more than a few of the hardened film reviewers jumping out of their seats (and at least a couple of genuine shrieks of terror!)

Ethan Hawke plays his role very well, believable as a man obsessed by his work, conflicted on his reasons for being drawn to these mysteries, and the children in the film are also excellent in their parts. I wasn’t entirely convinced by Juliet Rylance however – she and her supposed husband lack any chemistry and she delivers their big argument scene in a very unconvincing manner. The other slight problem I have with Sinister is that, much like The Woman In Black, when the spooky things actually appear onscreen it loses some power for me. This reviewer is still insistent that the scariest film ever committed to celluloid is Robert Wise’s The Haunting (1963) – a film in which nothing is shown, and as such, all the scary-faced ghosts, ghouls and demons in the world won’t have me cowering behind a cushion to the extent that the fear of the lurking unknown will. I am aware that this is a personal viewpoint however – I have been disappointed when, showing the Haunting to people, they have enjoyed it but not found it remotely scary. Also, Sinister is very long for a horror film – 110 mins to be precise, and whilst the tension is well maintained for the most part, the ending does seem to go on a little longer than it needs to (which was, again, my major problem with The Woman In Black).

All in all then, if what you want from a horror film is for it to work very hard at making you jump out of your skin, then Sinister comes highly recommended – again with the caveat that you see it on a big screen with a thunderous sound system. I will put 10 pence on Sinister being a sizeable hit, which will no doubt inspire yet more big budget ghostly tales which will in turn became as toxic to the horror faithful as sparkly vampires and found footage flicks. But for now? Enjoy the ride.

Sinister is out in UK cinemas on 5th October 2012, from Momentum.

Review by Tristan Bishop

I’ll admit it. I had not heard any advance word on Attack Of The Werewolves and I was still incredibly excited about it. Any sane readers out there (are there any? Let’s pretend for the moment there are) will no doubt be asking themselves ‘why?’ right now. Well, let’s just say that firstly, it has werewolves in it, and I’m a big fan of werewolves, and, secondly, it’s Spanish. The Spaniards have possibly the greatest legacy of any country when it comes to werewolf films, and this is entirely down to the work and obsession of one man, the late Paul Naschy, who took his boyhood obsession with the Universal monsters of the 30s and 40s and played several of them in a series of lurid, colourful, comic-book style films made mostly in the 1970s. The wolfman was Naschy’s personal favourite, and he went on to star as Waldemar Daninsky, a man cursed with lycanthropy, in a dozen movies. Attack Of The Werewolves, therefore, by dint of title and country of origin, immediately brought Naschy to mind. The second thing I found out about Attack Of The Werewolves is that it’s a comedy, and then my heart sank a little, as I have seen a few too many lacklustre comedy horrors of late. Ah well, writing film reviews can be a tricky business, filled with letdowns and nasty surprises, so I resigned myself to more of the same and stuck the film on… thankfully I was surprised in a much more pleasant way than expected.

The film starts with a great (and somewhat saucy) graphic novel-esque title sequence explaining the historical background to the tale, and then quickly brings us into the modern day with struggling writer Tomas (Gorka Otxoa), who, along with his little dog, has been summoned back from Madrid to the place of his birth in rural Spain in order to be honoured with ‘the freedom of the village’. Things, unsurprisingly enough, are not quite what they seem however, and it transpires that Tomas has actually been brought back so that the locals can rid themselves of a century-old werewolf curse which can only be ended by spilling the blood of a direct descendant of the line which Tomas happens to a part of.

Now, that may well sound like a slightly spoilerific synopsis, but it isn’t – There are a couple of good twists waiting for you past those revelations, and Attack Of The Werewolves is a surprising kind of film in general, the biggest surprise being that it’s actually rather good. For the first half the film is slow, but not without a great deal of charm, most of which comes from the interplay between Tomas, Mario and Calisto (his highly annoying literary agent and the odd friend from his childhood who happens to have a rather worrying obsession with sheep), who all play their roles perfectly. However, when the curse and Tomas’ part in attempting to lift it become clear, the film kicks into another gear, and the laughs come thick and fast – One particular scene involving a finger had me laughing out loud, and whilst (like any comedy) some of the jokes don’t work quite so well as others, the aforementioned charm carries it through. As for the werewolves themselves, well, extra kudos has to be given for the old-school physical effects used for the transformations, and the beasts look all the better for it, although their movements and jumping have obviously been CGI-assisted. There is some good gore too, and refreshingly free (as far as I could tell) of the computer blood splatters that plague so much modern low budget material. All this is topped off by a cool soundtrack featuring some great Spanish indie rock and surf tunes that this reviewer is now going to have to track down.

I’ll be honest with you, the film is not going to make anyone’s top ten of the year (unless you’re really REALLY into lycanthropes), but it is a small, affectionate, fun and funny tribute to the Spanish gothic of Naschy et al, and works very well on its own level. If you’re a fan of old school Eurohorror or just fancy a giggle or two, Attack Of The Werewolves is well worth a watch.

Attack of the Werewolves is available on Region 2 DVD on 8th October, from Kaliedoscope.

Review by Ben Bussey

Ever seen or heard of a movie called Ninjas Vs. Zombies? Well, that’s this film. Quite why they bothered to rename it for its UK release is beyond me, particularly given what a painfully bland and prosaic replacement title they opted to go with. Were they trying to avoid association with writer-director Justin Timpane’s follow-up feature Ninjas Vs. Vampires, which was released on Region 2 with little fanfare a while back, original title intact (which has a third installment, Ninjas Vs Monsters, currently in the works)? Were they trying to encourage association with Steven Soderbergh’s recent killer virus movie, which I haven’t yet seen but feel quite secure in assuming has very, very little in common with this…? Who knows. Who cares. The pointless retitling of low-budget horror films for overseas markets is a time-honoured practice that isn’t about to stop. I mean, how many alternate titles does Mario Bava’s Bay of Blood/Twitch of the Death Nerve/Carnage/Bloodbath have? You know how the saying goes: don’t judge a book by its cover, and don’t judge a B-horror on its first/second/third/fourth title.

So – now to consider Zombie Contagion/Ninjas Vs Zombies/Not Another Microbudget Zombie Flick on its artistic merits… oh dear, what kind of a hole am I digging myself into here…

Here’s the basic set-up in a nutshell: our heroes are a group of old friends, frustrated artists/filmmakers/musicians one and all, struggling to do what they’d hoped to do with their lives. One of them, Randall (Dan Guy), is in a particularly dark place since the death of his brother Eric (PJ Megaw). But what none of his friends know is that the force is strong in Randall’s family. Secretly, they’re master magicians, and it was Eric’s dabbling in the dark side that brought him to his untimely demise. But when the grief-stricken Randall manages to bring his brother back, he unwittingly unleashes a terrible curse on the town: Eric comes back evil, slurping up souls and turning folks into zombies every which way. Working some magic mojo to counteract this, Randall turns himself and his buddies into superpowered ninjas in order to fight back. As you do.

I think the best way to approach this film is to imagine what Kevin Smith would do if he made a zombie movie. Yes, he’d tour it like a carnival sideshow, add on a four hour post-screening Q&A in which he would talk incessantly about what a great innovator he is and how the entire film industry and all film critics are scum because anyone who dares suggest his films are less than exemplary is obviously jealous, and then he would bend over backwards until his gaping anus literally swallowed his own head like some particularly horrific deleted scene from Brian Yuzna’s Society… hang on, I think I may be getting away from the point here. Okay, imagine instead that Kevin Smith made a zombie movie when he was still good; say, he opted to do it as a follow-up to Clerks. There’d be Halloween zombie make-up jobs and bargain basement special effects aplenty, scenes in comic book shops for no good reason, a vast overabundance of supremely unsubtle film references, and a hearty dollop of twentysomething what-am-I-doing-with-my-life angst on the side. That’s just what Justin Timpane has put together, and perhaps unsurprisingly Kevin Smith’s films are amongst those referenced (including but not limited to the character name Randall). This is a film that seeks to tick all the boxes for fanboys, self-conscious of its own absurdity and doing its utmost to radiate enthusiasm for horror, comedy and action. And it kind of works, to a certain extent.

I’ve rabbited on enough recently on the subject of microbudget horror, so I won’t restate my whole case here: suffice to say, Timpane doesn’t do too badly with the clearly limited resources at his disposal. Yes, the film looks and sounds pretty poor, but the performances really aren’t bad, and neither is the script. Sadly, they’re not that great either. It’s nice that Timpane is not content to coast by on film geek humour alone, playing much of the action surprisingly straight, but as a result of this the film toes an awkward line between taking itself a little too seriously and deliberately sending itself up, and it never really finds a comfortable balance. Add in some fairly major pacing problems, and it’s really fighting a losing battle. Unusually for a film of this nature, it’s actually at its most assured when the focal point is a bunch of friends talking, and in some respects its hard not to think Timpane and his cast would have been better served by a more down-to-earth indie comedy (again, like good Kevin Smith), rather than the horror/comedy/action mix-up they’ve attempted here. Still, while I’ve seen better I’ve certainly seen a whole lot worse.

Zombie Contagion (if we must call it that) is available now on Region 2 DVD, download and on-demand from Revolver Entertainment.

Review by Annie Riordan

I know it may sound strange to many of you, but not only was I looking forward to watching a movie about a tree, I was also expecting it to be rivetingly entertaining. You see, I automatically expect non-American films to be way better than those made here in the same way that I expect items purchased at Harrods to be superior to the cheap shit they sell at Wal-Mart.

But yeah. The Hollow is a movie about a haunted tree. A big, spooky looking hollow tree sitting all by itself in an open field. For hundreds of years, the locals have shunned the tree, believing its hollow interior to be haunted by Something Evil. Over the last four hundred years or so, many a young couple in love have been found swinging from the tree’s sturdy branches for no apparent reason. The history of the old hollow tree contains many gruesome myths and legends but no solid facts, save one: an exorcism was performed on the tree by the local Vicar, who soon after died from an “accidental” overdose of his own medication. One year after his unfortunate demise, his granddaughter Emma comes to close up the old house, bringing along her fiance Scott, her best friend James and James’ slutty blonde girlfriend Lynne.

And here’s where anything even remotely promising about the plot – as atmospheric up to this point as any of Arthur Conan Doyle’s many perilous and fog-haunted moors – comes crashing down with a sound like a million douchebags herp-derping in terror, and not being silenced as soon as they should have been.

Emma, the prim, proper brunette of the bunch, may be forgiven for being a tad uptight – she’s the granddaughter of an English Vicar, after all. However, her choice in men roundly sucks as fiance Scott quickly establishes himself as a typical popped-collar frat boy fucksock who fancies himself quite a bit more than anyone else does. He belittles James, he makes misogynistic statements directed at Emma, he brings a bulging baggie of coke to the party and is quick to suggest a round of strip Monopoly. He’s also keen on Lynn’s skanky ass, and being the one-dimensional vacuous cokewhore that she is, she really doesn’t mind. Apart from it all sits James, filming everything and just waiting for Emma to wise up and dump Scott so he can move in and pick up the pieces.

Unfortunately, it takes forever to happen and every last minute of that endless forever is captured on film and guess who gets to watch it? Seriously, this was the longest 4 hours of my life, and I was only 35 minutes in.

Finally, they all get coke-blasted and shitfaced and remember that there’s a haunted tree nearby! And hey, lets run out into the dark and investigate! Great idea! Drama ensues, spooky noises happen and slowly – VERY slowly, over the course of a very dusty and leaden 24 hours – the gang decides they need to leave. Except they can’t because James goes missing. So they have to go looking for him in the dark, all alone. And their cell phones won’t work. And the car won’t start. And the nearest call box has been vandalized. And there’s a dead fox. And Scott no longer loves Emma. And Lynn is still a whore. And the battery on the video camera is getting low, so lets keep shutting it off and then turning it back on every five minutes so we can film NOTHING AT ALL. Great, keep doing that for the last half hour of film time. “Did you hear that? I’m going out there! No, don’t! Okay, I won’t! We have to get out of here! SSSHHH! Did you hear that?” It’s a mobius strip of a movie, coming from nowhere and going nowhere. You already know what’s going to happen as the end was revealed in the films pre-credit sequence, so can we just FFW to the end already please?

This could have been a good film. Maybe even great. It had a nice spooky atmosphere to work with and some genuinely good ideas. Unfortunately, it didn’t utilize either, and comes off looking like one of the many, many, MANY ripoffs of the Blair Witch Project that all of us were sick to death of ten years ago.

I have a friend who lives in Suffolk, not far from Dunwich, where this movie was set and filmed. According to him: “(the area is) right next to the sea, and hundreds of years ago the village used to be a lot bigger but half of the cliff it was on just sunk below sea level. Apparently at low tide you can sometimes see the old church spire. Could conceivably believe it to be the home of some Cthulhu-like eldritch monstrosity.”

Now THAT would have been an awesome film! And the tree still could have been incorporated somehow. It’s a cool looking tree, no sense in letting it go to waste. But no. Instead we get over an hour of drama queens and douchebag kings, filming each other naked and acting like…well, like Americans. I could have spliced some footage from The Evil Dead into an episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians and been more entertained.

Please, England – don’t be like that, baby. I know you can do better.

Review by Stephanie Scaife

The original VHS sleeve of Puppetmaster is seared into my brain. It was one of those garish and enticing horror sleeves guaranteed to lure you in, and as an 8 year-old it was one I particularly remember desperately wanting to see. So, flash-forward 20 odd years and last night I finally got to see Puppetmaster for the first time, and unfortunately with over 20 years worth of expectations pilled on top of this DTV B-movie I was guaranteed disappointment, which is exactly what I got.

Puppetmaster was the first film released through Charles Band’s newly formed Full Moon Features in 1989 and remains its most well known property, perhaps due on part to the 9, yes 9, sequels that it inspired. Although Full Moon is also responsible for such gems as Gingerdead Man (Evil Never Tasted So Good!) and Killjoy (He’s Not Clowning Around!) and other such memorable DTV classics that has kept eager viewers in schlock ever since.

Puppetmaster starts in 1939 at the Bodega Bay Inn, California where we’re introduced to an elderly puppet maker named Toulon (William Hickey) who painstakingly handcrafts all of his work giving it a great deal of love and attention; but that’s not all, because an ancient Egyptian manuscript has come into his possession enabling him the power to give life to his creations, and live he gives them, murderous, psychotic life that is. Something that those pesky Nazis have cottoned on to, and soon they are knocking down Toulon’s door in a bid to get their filthy mitts on the manuscript, no doubt to use for some sort of evil doings. To stop this from happening Toulon packs away and hides his beloved puppets before blowing his brains out.

Fast forward to the “Present Day” (although quite obviously the late 80s) and we’re introduced to a gang of professional psychics, including Alex (Paul Le Mat) and Dana (Irene Miracle) who all suffer from terrible visions that they believe to have been sent to them by a former colleague, Neil. They travel to the Bodega Bay Inn only to find that Neil has killed himself leaving behind his mysterious wife Megan. It soon transpires that Neil had uncovered Toulon’s secret and his murderous puppets have come to life once again, only to wreak havoc upon our bewildered psychics.

The puppets of course are perhaps the only reason to watch this film and they are still fantastic even today. As a fan of in camera special effects and stop motion I absolutely loved these creepy little creations, particularly Leech Woman who spits blood sucking leeches onto her victims, and Blade, a trench coat wearing puppet with a hook for one hand and a knife for the other. If this film had consisted entirely of the puppets alone then perhaps it would have been considerably more watchable that the final result that is bogged down by an atrocious script delivered by even worse actors and a plot that I found to be pretty incoherent at times. Perhaps I needed to have seen Puppetmaster as a wide-eyed child wooed by the garish VHS cover and be wearing the rose-tinted glasses of nostalgia to fully appreciate this film but as a newcomer to the franchise I found it pretty unremarkable and whenever the puppets weren’t on screen just plan dull. Judging by the number of sequels and spin-offs though there is undoubtedly an audience out there somewhere for these films and this decent DVD transfer with a host of special features will definitely appeal.

The DVD comes with a number of special features including audio commentary by Charles Band, making of featurette, and a selection of Full Moon trailers.

Puppetmaster is available now on both DVD and Blu-ray from 88 Films.

Review by Stephanie Scaife

I was slightly apprehensive going into The Aggression Scale, a straight-to-video production directed by Steven C. Miller whose earlier film Scream of the Banshee was, to be blunt, crap. However I was pleasantly surprised by this low budget thriller that is, as many others have noted, like an R-rated Home Alone.

Bellavance (Ray Wise) is a local mob boss out on bail for murder who plans to flee the country with $500,000 that he has stashed away. Lo and behold however, the money is gone and Bellavance gets together his toughest men, led by Lloyd (Dana Ashbrook) and Chissolm (Derek Mears, on fine form) to hunt down the thief and retrieve his money via any means necessary. As is often the case when a straight-to-DVD screener comes through the mail, you sigh and hope for something that is at the very least watchable (which is often not the case) and to my surprise The Aggression Scale hooked me in from the very opening scene which is, to be fair, pretty much just 10 minutes of unrelenting violence as Bellavance’s men take out those who could be responsible for the robbery.

Then we are introduced to the Rutledges, a newly married couple each with disgruntled, misfit teenager in tow, as they move into their palatial new home. Now, do you think it could it possibly be the stolen money responsible for their move up in the world? Lloyd and his guys certainly think so. What they didn’t take into consideration though was Owen (Ryan Hartwig) and Lauren (Fabianne Therese), the unusual children of our suspected thieves, who give these guys a serious run for their money in a deadly game of cat and mouse. For a 15 certificate there is still a decent amount of gore and some particularly inventive injuries and death scenes, highlighting some decent make-up and effects work in what is clearly a low budget feature.

The Aggression Scale isn’t going to win any awards anytime soon and I doubt that it warrants repeat viewings, but it looks great and for what it is I found it highly watchable and at moments actually quite tense. I have a feeling that it will definitely find its audience on DVD through word of mouth and quite rightly so. Hartwig in particular is very good as the mute, sociopathic, mini-MacGyver and Ashbrook gives an intense performance as the calm and collected hit man Lloyd; and yes he’s Bobby from Twin Peaks, before you spend 20 minutes thinking you know him from somewhere, as I did.

Yes there are flaws, including some dumbass character decisions and a few plot holes that it’s best not to think about too closely, but overall you could do a lot worse than The Aggression Scale, which is a more than competent thriller/home invasion movie. I’m now very intrigued to see what Miller will do with his upcoming remake of Silent Night, Deadly Night.

The Aggression Scale is available on Blu-ray and DVD now, from Momentum.

Review by Ben Bussey

I know what you’re thinking, and sadly the answer is no: at no point does anyone in this film say “Ni.” Nor does anyone demand a shrubbery.

Okay, on the off-chance that wasn’t what you were thinking, you might be pondering what a new vampire film from Germany has to offer that we haven’t seen countless times already, particularly given the vast influx of vampire-based media in recent years. Marc contemplated this question last May, when We Are The Night was released in the US, and he found the film to be “far too close to the “pop” side of vampirism” and “highly derivative of too many other films.” I completely agree: We Are The Night really isn’t anything new, charting the misadventures of a newly initiated vampire in much the same manner as The Lost Boys and Near Dark (not that it was even a new story then), whilst giving the action a glossy metropolitan sheen reminiscent of the Blade and Underworld films (again, not that those films necessarily invented it), and of course not neglecting the obligatory post-True Blood charge of eroticism (again…). As Marc also rightly pointed out, it’s so low on scares and suspense that it barely even qualifies as horror.

But is any of this necessarily a bad thing? Alright, so We Are The Night really isn’t scary, nor is it particularly innovative, but provided you don’t take those as cast-iron prerequisites for enjoying movies (and if you do, then you must be used to regular disappointment), you may find it revisits familiar territory with just enough gusto, style and freshness to make for a perfectly enjoyable 100 minutes. It was one of the films I enjoyed most at FrightFest 2012, for the simple reason that, unlike many other films screened at the festival, it sets out simply to entertain, rather than shock and appal. I’ve long since been sick to my back teeth of dick-swinging pseudo-edgy torture films and their desperation to impress everyone with how big and nasty they are. Me, I want horror to be fun again, like the kind of films that got me into the genre in the first place – which includes the likes of The Lost Boys. And the real trick is, being fun does not mean having nothing to say. We Are The Night understands this, and provides some nice introspection on what it might mean to be a vampire in this day and age; or more specifically, to be a female vampire, in a world with no male vampires left.

When we first meet our heroine Lena (Karoline Herfurth), you’ll be forgiven for thinking her name is Lisbeth. Well, if she has a dragon tattoo we never get to see it, but otherwise it’s much the same MO: tough, smart, emo tomboy loner from the wrong side of the tracks. Picking pockets to get by, she narrowly escapes getting busted by a young stud of a policeman named Tom (Max Riemelt) thanks to her quick wits and quick feet. Later that night, anxious to escape the lonely tedium of her mother’s apartment, she hits the streets and soon finds herself at an underground rave thrown by Louise (Nina Hoss), six-odd feet of platinum blonde femme fatale. And wouldn’t you know it: she’s the local vampire queen, along with her equally vivacious protégés Charlotte (Jennifer Ulrich) and Nora (Anna Fischer). Louise has spent centuries in search of the reincarnation of her one true love, and thinks she may have found it in Nina. A few nibbles later and Nina is transformed into a whole new woman, with the promise of eternal wonders ahead. But is immortality all it’s cracked up to be, and do the ends justify the means?

Yes, there’s some pretty classic vampire lore at play here, where vamps cast no reflection and sunlight hits them like napalm. This certainly isn’t a PG-13 take on the undead, given Nora’s ecstatic declaration that they can eat, drink, snort coke and fuck as much as they want without any repercussions. Even so, while the film hints at the decadent excesses that might come with such a way of life, these are not shown in detail. While the leads are plenty sexy, sex itself is notable by its absence; and for once, the only gratuitous nudity is of the male variety. Violence is more common, but still comparatively mild, as the 15 certificate might suggest. Again, this may be my torture movie exhaustion speaking, but I actually found this de-emphasis on the visceral excesses to be fairly refreshing. It means that the focus instead is on the characters and their interplay, which is a good thing, given that this is a pretty well acted and well written film.

Above all the film emphasises the lifestyle clashes of Lena and the vampires. One particularly unique and interesting moment shows Lena literally transform as her vampirism takes hold; submerging herself in a bath, her hair grows and regains its natural colour, and all her piercings, tattoos, scars and blemishes wash away like mud. Immediately thereafter she’s swept away in the designer dresses and luxury cars that the vamps don’t leave home without. Yes, it’s a definite Ally Sheedy in Breakfast Club moment, but to the credit of writer-director Dennis Gansel and co-writer Jan Berger, the artifice of Lena’s new look/new life is apparent immediately. She hasn’t changed on her own terms; she’s being moulded into what Louise wants her to be. In the meantime, that handsome, charming young copper Tom hasn’t lost interest in Lena, but he’s not so keen to take her downtown anymore; well, not unless we’re using that phrase as some sort of vulgar euphemism. But which, if any of these is offering Lena the life she really wants? Louise champions vampirism as some kind of anarcho-feminist ideal, freed from the tyrannical rule of men, but in coming under her wing has Lena not simply traded one oppression for another?

But hey, if you don’t care to engage with all that fancy thinking, remember what I said earlier: We Are The Night is first and foremost designed to be fun, and in this it is certainly successful. It has a likeable cast, a fast pace, great cinematography, some witty gags (look out for a literary nod to rival Evil Dead 2’s use of A Farewell To Arms), and some really nice visual tricks up its sleeve for showing the world from a vampiric perspective: the dark is rich and detailed, whilst the light is overwhelming. Our vampire ladies walk on walls and ceilings, their bodies jerk violently at the taste of blood, and their undead eyes sparkle (just the eyes, mind). The accompanying featurette states that Gansel had been working on the project for over a decade, and this is easy to believe, as none of the characters come off half-baked, and there are clear hints of a broader mythology which could easily be explored further should they care to make a sequel; the ambiguous climax certainly leaves things open for them to do so.

We Are The Night is released to Region 2 DVD on 15th October 2012, from Momentum.