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Review by Ben Bussey

Guess what: it’s zombie apocalypse time again. However, this time around things aren’t completely hopeless for the surviving humans, as the government manages to round up the bulk of the zombies and dump them in designated ‘danger zones.’ Alas, for professional stoners Edwin (Mark Wynn) and Tommy (Jy Harris), there proves to be a practical downside to this system. They’ve just happened to discover that, when liquidised into green goo, zombie brains are the world’s most powerful fertiliser, capable of growing, within moments, the most potent weed known to man. However, after taking a few bong hits and body-popping their way through an almost-naked rooftop montage (and not for the last time, I’m afraid) they come to the alarming realisation that they’re all out of green goo. With their town almost entirely cleared of zombies, they decide there’s only one thing for it: to head to the danger zone and score as many zombie brains as humanly possible.

And if that makes this film sound like Cheech and Chong/Jay and Silent Bob/Harold and Kumar meets Night of the Living Dead/The Evil Dead/Braindead (or Dead Alive for the benefit of my American friends)…? Well, that’s not exactly an accident. As to whether Bong of the Dead is as much fun as any of those films; well…

I won’t deny that my heart sank when this DVD landed on my doorstep. While I am not about to dismiss the amount of work that goes into shoestring productions such as this (shot for $5,000 in 15 days, a fact which the publicity will make a point of reminding you), the sad fact is that the vast majority of these films wind up so bad they’re borderline unwatchable. As such, when I say Bong of the Dead is an above average microbudget indie horror movie, this isn’t exactly high praise. If you have a taste for the self-consciously stupid, this movie may well give the odd tickle to your funny bone, but you’re also very likely to find your patience sorely tested along the way.

Things start off quite promising. The opening ten minutes or so illustrates the outbreak of zombie activity from the perspective of an elderly couple who are among the first to get infected, and takes the interesting approach of running entirely without dialogue. That combination of old-fashioned silent comedy and gore obviously evokes Raimi and Jackson, but in a more sophisticated manner than a great many imitators manage. It’s an impressive sequence which would work well as a short film in its own right; and, honestly, I think that might have been the better approach, as what follows is a damn sight less inventive and amusing. Here’s the thing: if the main protagonists are comedy stoners, it might be beneficial if they’re actually funny. And Edwin and Tommy… they’re really not that funny at all. Drawn in such broad strokes as to make any of the aforementioned stoner movie double acts look like the height of subtlety, the joke wears thin very quickly indeed.

A degree of respite is offered with the introduction of a third protagonist midway, namely Simone Bailly’s tough girl loner Leah. Unfortunately, this character quickly turns out to be as much of a two-dimensional cliché as her male counterparts, bonding with them in an utterly unconvincing fashion simply because it serves to move the story forward. Credit where it’s due, though; Bailly, Wynn and Harris are certainly better actors than tend to be cast in microbudget horror movies, but they just don’t have the chemistry they need to make the film engaging. This is all the more unfortunate as they’re on screen for pretty much the duration of the running time, which incidentally is at least twenty minutes longer than it should be. Sure, there are a few decent zombie attack sequences, particularly the agreeably OTT shoot-‘em-up/chop-‘em-up finale, but for the bulk of the film it’s simply these three actors exchanging dialogue, much of which is either spectacularly unfunny stoner jokes, or painfully over-familiar philosophical musings on the zombie apocalypse. If all this could have been pared back, Bong of the Dead might have been a perfectly passable midnight movie. As it stands, it’s overlong, repetitive and excessively self-indulgent.

While we’re on the subject of excessive self-indulgence, I’m truly taken aback by the jaw-dropping pomposity of Thomas Newman, the writer-producer-director-editor-visual FX-music composer-camera operator-director of photography-passionate-underdog-dreamer of Bong of the Dead. This is how the man describes himself in the trailer below. Seriously. And not only does he devote more than half of the trailer and the bulk of the official website to emphasising what a hard-working visionary he is (there’s a second trailer as well, with further self-congratulatory superlatives), he also devotes several paragraphs of the end credits to celebrating his immense achievement and the personal victory it represents over all those who told him he could never do it. Okay… once again, far be it for me to dismiss the effort and personal sacrifice solo filmmakers put into their work, but even so… maybe it’s just me, but there is something to be said for humility, isn’t there? Most filmmakers who create zombie stoner movies don’t really believe it makes them Orson Welles, do they…? I don’t know, I suppose it’s possible Newman is being ironic in his utterly ludicrous self-importance, but that’s not the impression I get. Watch the trailer and decide for yourself.

Still, much as I’m loath to give further praise to someone with such an inflated opinion of himself, I must concede that Newman has crafted a slick-looking film that you’d be forgiven for thinking cost a great deal more than $5,000. The photography, music, digital effects and practical gore are considerably better than those generally found in bargain basement horror. If we could only say the same for the plot, dialogue, characterisations and direction, then we might have been onto a winner with Bong of the Dead. Sadly, all we have is another half-baked comedy horror that is nowhere near as funny or enjoyable as it thinks it is, and there are few things more off-putting than that.

Bong of the Dead is released to Region 2 DVD on April 15th from Left Films; alternatively it is available for download now from www.bongofthedead.com.

Review by Keri O’Shea

“There is no clean fight in a war.”

Like many cult movie enthusiasts, I declare myself to be a huge fan of the films of Takashi Miike but in truth, I have only seen a tiny fraction of his work. To be fair, it’s hard to keep up with his output – the guy’s one of the hardest-working filmmakers in existence, often turning around two or three films per year, and many of his films don’t officially make it to these shores at all. So, I wasn’t too surprised that I hadn’t picked up on Crows Zero when it was completed around four years ago – it has already spawned a sequel – and I was quite content to sit down to my screener with no prior knowledge of what to expect. The result? I feel as though I’ve seen something pretty special.

Based on the manga of Hiroshi Takahashi, creator of ‘Ring’ (and where would the Japanese film industry be without the creative universe of manga?) Crows Zero is set at the Suzuran Boys’ School, a violent, hierarchical hellhole where “a man’s worth is proven by his fists”. And yet, new boy Genji Takiya has transferred to Suzuran through choice. The links between Suzuran and a promising future as a yakuza (again, where would Japanese cinema be…?) are manifold; in Genji’s case, his yakuza papa has advised him that, if Genji can take over Suzuran, he can in turn take over his organisation. This is a rite of passage for Genji in a finishing school for crooks, it seems, so he begins to punch and kick his way through all the boys who stand between him and being ‘king of the beasts’, helped by a Suzuran alumni (and associate of a rival syndicate), Ken Katagiri, who has an axe to grind about never making it to the top himself. What follows is an almost military operation, with meticulous planning, strategy, allegiances and counter-allegiances – not to mention a hell of a lot of slugging it out! This is much closer in spirit to Fight Club than the generic martial arts style violence you might once have associated with cinema from this neck of the woods, and it is just as underpinned with some similar themes…

Takashi is an adept filmmaker, and so comfortable is he with his job that he can disrupt the pace and tension for break-out interludes – such as the arrival of a bunch of yakuza on Suzuran campus, who begin hassling and intimidating the boys, before pausing to decide on who is going on a run to the shops. This, but of course, is of no detriment to the film whatsoever, whereas in some hands that would feel too self-aware, too uncomfortable. The impression I got was of a director with the utmost confidence in his abilities. The shifts from ultraviolence to humour (which is often physical) to, and I mean this sincerely – pathos, are cool and organic. Whilst Crows Zero is a much more linear and accessible film than the most outlandish of Takashi Miike’s movies, by the end of the film we can see that it still manages to juggle three separate strands of story occurring in different places, bringing them together satisfactorily and neatly.

There is some innovative editing here too. When Takashi ‘chops’ a scene into a sequence of short, rapid edits – for instance, as someone is knocked backwards by a hefty punch – it really gives the impression of how the scene might appear drawn on a comic-book page. Add to this the use of colour – often stripping the on-screen action down to black, white and red – then you have a really effective marriage of comic and movie, which doesn’t rely on something as extensive as the effects in Sin City to create a crossover, but which looks just as interesting and stylish. This is aided and abetted by this incontrovertible fact: Takashi is an accomplished action director. The fights are meaty, and the quality of synchronicity achieved, even in scenes with around forty participants, was a pleasure to behold.

However, so far I have ignored a key aspect here, and that is the story itself. Genji starts out as a character with almost nothing to say for himself, only a driving ambition to prove his worth in the School of Crows – but there is a system at play in Suzuran, and he needs help to understand it, which brings him to the attention of Ken, a thirty-something who knows what the consequences of harbouring unfulfilled ambitions can do to a person. Theirs is an unlikely friendship, but you know what? It’s believable and warm, not to mention very funny. As well as all the necessary ass-kicking Genji has to do to get closer to his goal, Crows Zero is also a look at the value of companionship. Genji isn’t the lone wolf he first sets himself out to be. Both characters grow exponentially during the course of the film’s two hours, but perhaps it is Ken’s development which is most striking. He begins his on-screen life as a scraping, clownish figure – abhorred by his yakuza boss, taken less-than-seriously by almost everyone else, he’s a man who is living with being second best. By the end of this film, he is something quite different. A strong supporting cast adds credibility to all of this: the violence might be superhuman, but the interrelationships have enough substance to make the character arcs seem real.

As a high-action, darkly comic piece of cinema, Crows Zero is note perfect. It’s loud, frenetic and a lot of fun. It’s just that bit more special, though, because the bonds which the characters form add real backbone to an already visually-spectacular movie. Perhaps there’s an even more serious point behind all this, too, albeit one which Takashi doesn’t need to hammer home at every given opportunity to render it effective: this point is that life is short, and you need to get out there and go for it while you can. This film comes highly recommended.

Crows Zero will be released on DVD by MVM on 9th April 2012.

Review by Keri O’Shea 

Some of the hardest things to watch unfold on screen are tales in which ordinary people – people  who are perhaps only once-removed from being any one of us, thanks to an event in their lives – are propelled into extraordinary circumstances, as they simply try to get by. This isn’t easy to do: underplay the characterisation and the gravitas and the film looks trite; slather on the high emotion, and you are left with sentimentality. So, when these tales are told well, when the pathos and depth of the film provides its audience with a close interest in how the story plays itself out, then there is much to be applauded. The Yellow Sea is one of these films: a massive movie, chaptered into four parts and weighing in at two hours and sixteen minutes (which is actually significantly shorter than the Korean release) it gives a complex, deliberative examination of how the best laid plans can go to waste, and how, for one man, his situation eventually corners him.

The film starts in a location which, I have to admit, I never even knew existed until watching The Yellow Sea: the Yanbian Korean Autonymous Prefecture is a sort of hinterland between areas controlled by China, Korea and Russia – and its capital, Yanji City, is a tough area with lots of hardship (and those who come from there – known as Joseonjok – have to contend with prejudice against their ethnicity). People unable to find work in this area try to find a way to move elsewhere: this is what our lead character Gu-nam’s wife has done. He’s managed to secure a visa for her in South Korea, but Gu-nam (Jung-woo Ha) has run himself into some serious debt with the local gangsters – a debt to the tune of 60,000 yuan, something that an impoverished taxi driver will never be able to repay alone. As for his wife, he has lost touch with her since she crossed into South Korea. No phonecalls, nothing, and certainly no money being transferred to his account. He’s desperate, and worried, but he keeps fucking everything up by gambling what he does have in the hopes of a big win. This is a man at his lowest ebb, and people who frequent the lower depths of humanity can smell out people at their lowest ebb from a mile. His debtors tell him he has a ‘saviour’ – a shady local figure by the name of Myun (Kim Yun-seok). Myun wants someone killed in Korea. Hell, Gu-nam could even try to track down that wife of his while he’s there. Oh, and he has to get the job done within ten days, or his elderly mother and his daughter will be killed.

What follows for Gu-nam is a journey. Not a journey of the type which documentary filmmakers like – where self-knowledge makes someone a better person, or where one’s outlook on life is improved; instead, The Yellow Sea grinds an already unhappy man to ashes as he tries desperately to make sense of the wider picture he finds himself in – a world of organised crime, rival gangs and  ulterior motives. It isn’t just a journey, it’s a pursuit. If that all sounds boringly familiar and rather too similar to the reams of crime thrillers we already have, then I can assure you, the tone and style of this film stands alone.

This is a beautifully made and shot film; huge in scope, it moves through vast vistas in China, Korea and Yanbian, capturing a large background cast of people – thousands and thousands of people, sometimes – all going about their business as our protagonist, in contrast, is shown to be markedly alone against this backdrop. Far Eastern poverty and crime has a jarring look and feel to it, and its cramped, coughing, sickly and smoke-filled spaces look very different to their Western equivalents. Meanwhile, through all of the long shots, we have Gu-nam: with almost no dialogue, he acts his story through his facial expressions alone, and most of the camera time is devoted to watching his face intently. Where he is concerned, there is claustrophobia and unease – captured most perfectly as he is smuggled to Korea by ship, a man alone in a teeming, nightmarish and alien space, his face betraying his confusion, then panic, then the resilience of someone desperate to save his family. Most of the film takes place in shade or outright darkness, too, giving the impression of a parallel world and its players, hidden and only partially-known.

The Yellow Sea works by revealing layer upon layer of human interest, which almost invariably means human suffering (and the fact that it expresses that suffering so well means that the gory sequences are all the stronger). Part and parcel of this is the way deprivation motivates people, and also – to be fair – how stupid people can be, when it comes down to it. I don’t just refer to Gu-nam in that respect; ineptitude figures highly here, be it from the police, who struggle to do their jobs, or the gangsters themselves, who also fail several times to take control of their situations. But then, strolling effortlessly into all manner of chaotic situations comes Myun – the only guy who seems to take stock of everything and see things go his way. Compared to Gu-nam, Myun is the polar opposite – a sort of jovial madman, whose presence in the plot definitely keeps an already-interesting character study even more engaging.

The main issue I had with the film was, simply, its potential to be confusing – it is a long, at times convoluted and maze-like story with masses of characters, interrelationships and interactions. Evidently Korean audiences have less of a hard time with this; as I mentioned, the film has actually been significantly cut shorter for this release, but for me the wealth of details to take on board was a challenge, as was the length of the sitting. This did interfere with my appreciation of the film to an extent, but by the same token, I wanted to unpick the various plot strands. In a weaker story, I would have been more indifferent to it. 

This is a tragic story motivated all the way through by love, with more than its share of blood and high tension, but for me, the strongest feature of The Yellow Sea is the strong writing which allows such poignancy from the main characters. Although Gu-nam is in many ways an ambigious figure, you cannot but empathise with him, and the end of the story? The gut-punch to end them all. This is a dark piece of storytelling from director Hong-jin Na.

The Yellow Sea is released to Region 2 DVD and Blu-Ray on 26th March, from Eureka. For more info, visit www.theyellowsea.co.uk.

Review by Keri O’Shea

The Raven feels as though it has sneaked up on its audience a bit. I remember hearing about this proposed release a long time ago: my initial excitement gave way to a sneaking suspicion that the whole project had collapsed in on itself, as so often happens to compelling projects – and then, out of the blue almost, here we are – The Raven is alive and well and on general release. So has it been worth the wait?

What I will say in the film’s favour from the outset is that it dares to do something a bit different with rather tried-and-tested subject matter. Poe must be one of the best-represented authors, if not the best represented author in horror cinema – and it seems that the author and his works are impossible to differentiate between in the minds of many filmmakers in a way which is quite unusual. And yet, for all the various versions of the man himself we’ve seen over the years, we haven’t really had Poe as a man of action. The Raven not only brings us this man of action, but it also places the originator of detective fiction at the heart of a detective story. The result is an enjoyable, though at times rather strained story which doesn’t quite live up to its promise.

Rather like From Hell (2001), The Raven uses a factual basis – in both cases, an unsolved mystery – and then extrapolates a plot around those real-life events. Here, we have an imaginative exploration of the last few days of Poe’s life. The real Poe was found in mysterious circumstances: no one knows what happened to him in the few days before he was picked up, incoherent, outside a tavern in Baltimore and taken to a nearby hospital, where he died the next day. The Raven fantasises about a turn of events which lead up to that death. In its universe, Poe is in love with a beautiful young heiress called Emily (Alice Eve), whose father (Brendan Gleesson) perhaps understandably isn’t all that keen on her spending time with the ‘thirsty’ man of letters. However, the presence in Baltimore of a serial killer who seems to be copying killings from Poe’s short stories soon supersedes that little problem, and Poe begins to work alongside the Baltimore Police to try and capture the murderer. The killer makes it personal when he kidnaps Miss Emily, and threatens to kill her, if Poe does not engage with him by writing short stories about the situation at his behest while both Poe and Detective Emmett Fields (Luke Evans), who is leading the case, try desperately to find her.

For me, the screenplay smacked of graphic novel somehow. I’ve know I mentioned From Hell – which obviously was a graphic novel – but The Raven just had something to it which made me wonder if it had first appeared in that format (though it didn’t) with its lashings of self-awareness, history-lite style and pacey plot lines. What this film basically does is to rework a tried-and-tested literary figure – rather like Sherlock Holmes, say – into a more urbane form: John Cusack’s Poe has a young love interest, a race against time to complete and the potential to save the day, which does make for an engaging story. Pulling a figure like Poe into that mix isn’t without its issues, though. I think that Cusack did a reasonable job in the role, because the real Poe was an odd character, and combining Poe’s extreme torpor with this extreme excitability was always going to be a tough call (it would have been interesting to see what Ewan McGregor or Joaquin Phoenix, who were both in line for the role of Poe, would have made of it). At times, perhaps, I felt that there were rather too many elements to the character of Poe as brought to the screen here – a little ‘all things to all men’. This ‘all things to all men’ approach also seemed to mean that, to ground the character in the real-life writer who inspired it, it was necessary to load as much direct quotation of Poe poetry/prose into the film as possible, and some of this felt a little unnecessary.

The period detail is well-observed though, looks appealing, and in terms of gore there is quite a bit of blood during the course of this film. Hey, if you like Poe’s short stories, you might care to take a guess at some of the methods of dispatch you may see if you go to see this… sadly though, the filmmakers have plumped for ample CGI blood splatter, for reasons best known to themselves, and this does make the murders feel a little less realistic – a shame, really. Still, ours not to reason why.

Though there are flaws, overall this is a reasonably entertaining movie with some decent ideas at its core – it’s just that in the execution of these ideas there are some issues, and certainly some issues with the big reveal at the end, although the twist ending could have been played out in a much more obvious way which would have lost a fair few audience members’ sympathies, I’m sure. I suppose the more you know about Poe – the more you have an opinion on the man, or his work – the harder it might be to relax into the right viewing mode here, because you will see a few things stretched a long way to accommodate the plot, despite knowing that this is not a biopic. Also, if you’ve seen Jeffrey Combs playing Poe in the Masters of Horror series, you may well find yourself making some comparisons…

The Raven is in UK & US cinemas now, from Universal.

Review by Nia Edwards-Behi

This keeps happening to me. I hear about a film. I avoid the specifics of why everyone loves it. It becomes something of a festival darling or a genre fan favourite. Then, I eventually watch it and… oh. That’s it? Is the hype machine doing its worst, here, or am I just contrary? Adam Wingard’s A Horrible Way to Die is exactly one of those films. It has gained a great deal of praise through a successful festival run, and deserves a great deal of that praise. I will try very hard to explain why a beautifully directed and wonderfully acted film left me cold.

A Horrible Way to Die tells of Sarah (Amy Seimetz), a recovering alcoholic trying to rebuild her life having escaped past trauma. As we witness her recovery, through her burgeoning relationship with Kevin (Joe Swanberg), we are also privy to the life of Garrick Turrell (A J Bowen), a convicted serial killer on the run. We soon learn that Garrick is searching for Sarah, and he is the trauma she’s tried so desperately to escape.

A great deal of skill lies in A Horrible Way to Die’s non-linear narrative. Information is revealed to us completely out of order, but successfully so – not once does the film feel convoluted (well, not until the end, but more on that later) or confusing. As a result, the film keeps enough from us to remain intriguing, while allowing a great deal of insight. While withholding a reasonable amount of narrative detail, A Horrible Way to Die’s biggest strength lies with its characters. In the central role of Sarah, Amy Seimetz gives an absolutely wonderful, nuanced performance. Sarah is damaged, but she is recovering. She is incredibly sympathetic – we aren’t patronised with a simpering, woe-is-me recovering alcoholic stereotype, and instead we’re offered a character who struggles. If she’s struggling, it means she’s trying, and it’s refreshing to have a character who stumbles and makes mistakes in a rather human way, rather than a character constructed to complain in lieu of actually doing anything. Her somewhat fumbling relationship with Kevin, is, by and large, endearing, Kevin being equally as dysfunctional, his awkwardly well-intentioned advances appearing quite natural.

But hey – we’re not watching a romance. All the while, we’re treated to Garrick’s life on the run, with a few new murders thrown under his belt. Much seems to have been made of A J Bowen’s performance, and, while impressive enough, it didn’t particularly blow me away or leave Garrick as a memorable anti-hero in my mind. There seems to be significantly less depth to his character, as he kills someone, cries a bit, kills someone again, cries…it’s all a bit like he’s jumping up and down on one spot, rather than going anywhere. In the flashbacks to his and Sarah’s relationship, little is revealed other than that he appears to have been a loving enough partner…except for when he’s sneaking off in the middle of the night to his garage of death. Something about Garrick did not wholly convince me of his status as fearsome serial killer, but I can’t put my finger on what.

Additional to its strength in characters, Adam Wingard’s direction of A Horrible Way to Die is quite masterful. Normally, I’m one of those people who abhors the over-used shaky-cam style of filming. However, it really, really works here. The focus is constantly changing, the frame never wholly still. It’s incredibly stylised, but it’s particularly effective in not only reflecting the unstable characters depicted in the film, but, as it progresses, seems to instil in the film an over-bearing sense of unease, as though the uncertainty of narrative and character lies in the very fabric of the film. The score, an ambient, insidious thing, adds to this sensation, and is put to great use in the film.

So, wait… why didn’t I like this film? It looks great, is wonderfully acted, interestingly plotted… well, I have two primary gripes. Firstly, the use of gore in the film. The film is pervasively violent in its aura, but it feels, at times, as though Wingard did not have faith in his own abilities, and so threw in some ‘ew, gross’ moments to compensate. The few moments of graphic imagery in the film are frustratingly conspicuous, and, for me, incredibly distracting from the otherwise wonderfully crafted film.

This is a small complaint, though, compared to my main point of annoyance: the overly sign-posted, unnecessary, ineffective and utterly pointless twist. If you’ve crafted a film so well, to stick on a twist in the last five minutes will serve no purpose except to make me think that you never had an ending for your story. The twist is dull, on-the-nose, convoluted… and just plain lazy. Without going into too much detail, it undermines the very basis of the rest of the film – its interesting characters – to the detriment of some and to the WELL DUH YOU DON’T SAY of others. Wingard seems to use a twist as justification to leave the whole film unsatisfyingly open-ended. I adore films that do not provide full narrative closure (as non-horror examples, cf. The Wrestler, Dogtooth, Shame), but that lack of closure still needs to work as an ending to a film. A Horrible Way to Die did not succeed to do so for me, and as a result does not end with a satisfying sense of ambiguity, but instead with an overwhelming sense of laziness.

Maybe I’m turning into a cynic. Maybe I’m a pedant who gets too hung up over little details like, er, an unsatisfying ending. There’s no doubting that Wingard is a talent to watch, and A Horrible Way to Die is a film worth watching. Regardless, I can’t help but feel a little resentful of being denied a wholly satisfying film experience.

Anchor Bay Entertainment release A Horrible Way To Die to Region 2 DVD and Blu-Ray from 19th March.

Review by Ben Bussey

What makes a rebel? The dictionary definition is “1. a person who refuses allegiance to, resists, or rises in arms against the government or ruler of his or her country; 2. a person who resists any authority, control or tradition.” Presumably we’re safe to disregard the first definition in relation to Roger Corman, given that at no point does Alex Stapleton’s engrossing documentary mention the prolific filmmaker ever having been involved first-hand in an armed uprising. We might even poke holes in whether the second definition fully applies, as over the decades Corman’s films have tended to pay close attention to that which was popular among filmgoers at the time, and sought to meet that demand as cheaply and quickly as possible; such deliberate pandering to existing cultural trends could hardly be described as the acts of someone resisting tradition. Ah, but then there are those other two factors to which the rebel is resistant: authority and control. It’s here that Corman really earns his rebel stripes. As Corman’s World details, from the very beginning he’s been driven by a determination to make his own films in his own way, and to grant similar freedom to those he has taken under his wing; a great many of whom have, of course, gone on to become the most successful filmmakers in Hollywood.

The list of his one-time protégés, most of whom show up in this film at one point or another, reads like a Who’s Who of Tinseltown for the last forty-odd years: Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorcese, Robert De Niro, Jack Nicholson, Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, Jonathan Demme, Ron Howard, Joe Dante… we could go on. It is this sense that Corman is the unsung (perhaps illegitimate?) father of post-70s Hollywood that is the cornerstone of the Roger Corman legend, and quite rightly so. But this film emphasises just how great a role Corman played in what came to be classed as the counterculture, not simply as a developer of new talents but as a filmmaker in his own right; how throughout it all he resolutely refused to play the game, even when it would surely have been easy and profitable to do so.

For the most part avoiding the in-depth character study approach many such documentaries tend to follow, Alex Stapleton keeps the focus squarely on Corman’s film career. We’re told of how Corman first moved into independent producing and directing after getting stung by the studio system, leading him to work with American International Pictures, and how down the line his frustration with interference from above saw him break away further and found New World. Given how little he has directed in recent history, it’s easy to forget just how prolific and varied a director he was before retreating largely to producing from the 70s onwards. And his output was nothing if not varied, from his Ed Wood-ish creature features, to car chase movies, to rock ‘n’ roll teen pics, to pseudo-historical fantasy adventures, and ultimately the celebrated Edgar Allen Poe movies with Vincent Price.

The sad part is, Corman seems to have stepped back from directing just when he was becoming really interesting. As well as the Poe films, the 60s saw him direct a number of contemporary-set films that really tapped into what was going on at the time in the US, notably The Intruder, The Wild Angels (whose dialogue quoted here will be familiar to anyone who’s ever heard Primal Scream’s Loaded), and The Trip. Of these, 1962’s The Intruder – an anti-racial segregation drama with an early turn from William Shatner as a hateful white supremacist – seems to have been the most heartfelt for Corman. Sadly, it received a hostile reaction from audiences not yet ready for such a message, which seems to have dissuaded Corman from ever going into such serious and topical territory again. This might explain why, by the 70s, his productions grew progressively trashier; for which, I suppose, we can at once be sad for what might have been, and yet also intensely grateful for what is.

Given this is an officially sanctioned documentary, it’s certainly not the most unbiased account of Corman’s career, and might be accused of seeing things through slightly rose-tinted spectacles at times. AIP’s Sam Arkoff and Jim Nicholson tend to be portrayed as the villains of the piece, which might not sit well with some; after all, their contribution to exploitation cinema is a significant story in its own right. Also, framing the account of Corman’s career progression is footage from the set of one of his latest productions, Dinoshark; this is presented as though it is a worthy addition to his oeuvre, which, as anyone who’s seen those recent SyFy Channel productions should be able to tell you, simply isn’t the case. Yes, it’s great that despite being well over retirement age he’s still driven to keep making movies after all these years, but I can’t be the only one wishing he could be a tad more discerning in his project choices; for, as this documentary demonstrates, Corman actually does have taste as well as business acumen. It’s fascinating to witness how, at the same time that he was churning out women in prison movies and the like for the drive-in market, he was also handling the US distribution of films from the likes of Bergman, Fellini, Antonioni and Kurosawa.

That said, when questions of taste and quality arise in Corman’s World they are generally cast aside with little aplomb. As quoted on the poster, Scorcese declares that those under Corman’s wing understood that “taste was out of the question,” whilst Jack Nicholson notes, in that unmistakeably Jack Nicholson fashion, “by mistake he actually made a good picture once in a while; I was never in it…” (Be on the lookout, however, for a moment of uncharacteristic tenderness from old Jack.) Much is also made of Corman’s penny-pinching ways, from refusing Ron Howard his desired number of extras, to not providing water on desert shoots, to not telephoning his bride-to-be from the Philippines because it would have been a long distance call. On the flipside of this, though, Corman’s insistence on staying in the low-budget field is demonstrated to be (at least in part) ethical; an interview from the 80s shows him quite rightly complaining that the tens of millions blown on Hollywood productions could and should be put to much better use in this troubled world of ours. That’s surely even truer today, when budgets upwards of $150 million are alarmingly commonplace.

Of course, from a film fan perspective the issue is not whether Corman’s World really gets to the heart of the enigma that is Roger Corman; we’re far more likely to be concerned with whether our favourite films are given enough coverage. Alas, at only just over 90 minutes and with a great deal of ground to cover, a lot of stuff inevitably falls through the cracks. I for one would have loved to have seen a bit more on the Poe films, his role in bringing The Wicker Man into cult status, and some of my personal favourites which are barely touched on: the WiPs, Piranha, Rock ‘n’ Roll High School, Humanoids from the Deep and Barbarian Queen to name but a few. Francis Ford Coppola is also conspicuous by his absence, given that the bulk of (as Bruce Dern puts it) Corman University’s most notable alumni get a look in. One can’t help but wonder just how much material may have hit the cutting room floor – it certainly didn’t hit the deleted scenes, as this disc doesn’t have any – for the documentary has clearly been in production for some time; contributions from the long-since deceased David Carradine and Irvin Kershner are evidence of that. Having recently seen and thoroughly enjoyed Scorcese’s 3 hour + documentary on George Harrison, I certainly feel Corman’s career warrants similar treatment. But even so, there can be little doubt that Stapleton has emphasised the chapters that really deserved emphasis; she’s done a great job conveying the legacy of Roger Corman and the debt he is owed by contemporary cinema, particularly here in our beloved realm of cult film.

Oh, and one last thing about Corman’s World: the original soundtrack by Air is boss.

Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel is out on DVD and Blu-Ray on 26th March, from Anchor Bay Entertainment.

Review by Stephanie Scaife

Here we have the sophomore effort from Canadian director Jon Knautz, who brought us the amusing festival pleaser Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer in 2007. This time he plays it entirely straight in this ambitious but ultimately disappointing horror film that arrives on DVD and Blu-ray this week.

Ambitious young journalist Carmen (Cindy Sampson) is desperate for her big break after being assigned nothing but fluff pieces by her editor at the magazine, so after hearing about the disappearance of a string of backpackers travelling through Eastern Europe Carmen thinks she may be on to the story that will make her career. The last tourist to go missing was Eric Taylor, and after a lacklustre police effort his exasperated mother is more than happy to have the help of an enthusiastic journalist, giving Carmen access to his personal belongings. After reading Eric’s journal Carmen tracks down his disappearance to the (fictional) Polish village of Alvania. Hot on the heels of the story (and conveniently without telling anyone where they are going) Carmen, her long suffering photographer boyfriend Marcus (Aaron Ashmore) and the wet behind the ears magazine intern Sara (Meghan Heffern) head off to Poland to investigate.

Usually in these kinds of low budget horror films the filmmakers are desperately trying to pawn off their cheap Eastern European location as someplace else, but here we have Canada as the stand in for Poland, which looks more than a little odd. So we find our hapless trio in Alvania (aka Ontario), predictably being shunned by the frosty locals, who appear to be dressed like medieval peasants for some inexplicable reason. There is also a dense and spooky fog in a nearby forest that clearly warrants further investigation; however they are quickly warned off by the locals and told to leave immediately. This does not deter Carmen who insists on going back to explore the fog further; of course things do not go well and Carmen and Sara both get lost and separately come across a bizarre statue that bleeds and whose gaze follows their movements. This is one of the more effective scenes and the statue is actually pretty creepy, creating an air of menace that is unfortunately rarely repeated elsewhere in the film.

After seeing the statue both Sara and Carmen are plagued with visions of the townsfolk as demons and by whispering voices. Still not taking the hint that all is not well Carmen coerces Lidia, a little girl from the village, into taking the trio to a sacrificial tomb where they find the corpses of the missing tourists, including Eric, who all seem to have bizarre masks embedded onto their faces. Once within the tomb they find themselves surrounded and Sara and Carmen appear to be the next in line for a mask fitting…

It’s at this point that the otherwise slow build begins to pays off with some decent gore and make-up effects, and the plot itself takes a sort of unexpected turn which, whilst it stops The Shrine being entirely predictable, doesn’t make up for the fact that it has up until that point been fairly dull. There is also the entirely unnecessary political message, which is about as subtle as a brick to the head, regarding America’s foreign policy, and a smattering of misogyny is thrown in for good measure, leaving a rather unsavoury taste in my mouth.

The Shrine does try to do something with its limited budget but it never really quite succeeds, instead coming across as an overlong pilot for a network TV show, with that standard of acting to match. It never really finds its footing or holds your attention despite a few creepy moments. You could probably do worse in the over-saturated market of straight-to-DVD horror, but that’s hardly high praise.

The Shrine is available now on DVD and Blu-ray from Arrow Films, and includes no special features.

Review by Stephanie Scaife

“A repo man spends his life getting into tense situations.”

I should start off by saying that Alex Cox’s (Sid & Nancy, Straight to Hell) Repo Man is one of my all time favourite movies, making this review a little tough to write as it’s near impossible to be objective when wearing the rose tinted spectacles induced by a dearly loved classic, whose flaws you’ve overlooked for years. This endlessly quotable off the wall comedy satire sci-fi hybrid has retained its popularity over the years for a reason: it’s so unique and of its time that it remains relevant today and never seems tired or dated, making this new disc a much welcome addition to Blu-Ray.

I went through a phase a little over ten years ago of trying to catch up on all of the cult classics that I’d somehow managed to miss over the years. I was working in a record store where we were allowed to borrow the movies for free, so it provided the perfect opportunity. Harry Dean Stanton has been a long standing favourite actor of mine and I’ve loved him in everything from Pretty in Pink to Alien, so on this particular occasion I had decided to do a double-bill of Repo Man and Paris, Texas which was to provide an unlikely but rewarding double-bill viewing experience, culminating in both films immediately going into my top ten list.

Anyway, I digress, back to a review of Repo Man… what first stuck me about the film was its nihilism and irreverence combined with a wicked sense of humour and a post-punk fuck you aesthetic. Repo Man starts off as it means to go on, with a batshit insane opening sequence where J. Frank Parnell (Fox Harris) is pulled over by a cop as he drives a Chevy Malibu though the desert. The cop opens the trunk of the car, releasing a mysterious light from within (the contents of Tarantino’s infamous suitcase in Pulp Fiction clearly owes a debt here). We the viewers do not see the contents of the trunk but the cop is frazzled on the spot, leaving nothing behind but the smoking stumps of his legs still standing in his motorcycle boots. Parnell speeds off into the desert, leaving a trail of dust in his wake and the fantastic Iggy Pop theme tune kicks in. Straight away you know you’re in for something very different here.

We meet Otto (Emilio Estevez), a punk kid who gets fired from his job as a shelve stacker at a local supermarket. (One of the ongoing jokes of the film is that all the produce you see is completely generic: think a tin that is simply labelled “Food – meat flavoured” and cans that are labelled “drink.”) Upon returning home Otto discovers that his hippie stoner parents have donated his college fun to a TV evangelist and that his girlfriend is cheating on him with his friend Duke (Dick Rude). In his dejection he takes to the streets where he has a chance encounter with Bud (Harry Dean Stanton), a repo man who works for an amusingly named auto repossession company, the Helping Hand Acceptance Company. After being tricked into aiding Bud in a repossession Otto finds himself seduced by the quick cash he earns and throws his morals to the wind before buying himself a suit and joining the ranks of the reprehensible LA repo men, including Bud, Lite (Sy Richardonson) and Miller (Tracey Walter). All amusingly named after major American beer brands, despite the only product placement in the film actually granted was by the company that provides those car air fresheners shaped like trees.

Soon word goes around that there is a $20,000 reward on offer for the repossession of the Chevy Malibu we saw at the start of the film and it’s every repo man for himself. Otto soon finds himself up against not only his co-workers but rival repo gang The Rodriguez Brothers (“Goddamn-dipshit-Rodriguez-gypsy-dildo-punks”), not to mention that he’s being tailed by suspicious government agents and unwittingly teamed up with Leila (Oliva Barash), a UFO enthusiast who believes the Chevy contains the carcasses of alien specimens stolen from Roswell. Add to this a healthy dose of 1980s Regan era satire, an awesome west coast punk rock soundtrack and some rather remarkable cinematography from Robby Muller (who funnily enough also worked on Paris, Texas and is a regular collaborator with Wim Wenders, Jim Jarmusch and Lars von Trier) and you’ve got the genre bending Repo Man, the very definition of a cult classic if ever there was one.

This Blu-Ray release from Eureka’s Masters of Cinema series is a pretty appealing package; it looks and sounds fantastic in this newly re-mastered edition. It also comes with a host of extras, although somewhat disappointingly none of which are particularly new, including an interview with Harry Dean Stanton from 2004 where he proves himself to be a particularly difficult character, resolutely refusing to stick to the topic of Repo Man and instead choosing to talk about his love of Marlon Brando and his somewhat defiant but occasionally zen views on life and the world we live in. He casts himself as the crotchety old eccentric you’d expect, especially after hearing Cox lament the number of times Stanton stormed off set, and having to rewrite scenes because he believed him too unpredictable and dangerous. The disc also includes featurettes, commentary (which includes executive producer and Monkee Mike Nesmith), the hilarious TV edit of the film which includes some creative dubbing over the profanity (“flip you, melon farmer!) and a new 10 minute introduction by Cox who is as likeable and unconventional as always; I particularly enjoyed his story about where the “John Wayne is a fag” dialogue came from. Overall an acceptable package for a fantastic film.

Repo Man is available in the UK from 20th February on Blu-Ray from Eureka.

Review by Ben Bussey

A word of advice to microbudget filmmakers who plan on subjecting us to yet another by-the-numbers torture flick: might be best to give yourselves a title that doesn’t invite cockney rhyming slang. Flashing the word ‘terrible’ in the opening sequence perhaps isn’t the best step either. First impressions count for a lot, you know. You might want to at least craft the illusion that your film has something going for it, and that it might in any way be a fulfilling use of the viewer’s time. I mean, if you’re not actually going to go to the trouble of writing an interesting story populated with interesting characters, or find interesting actors to perform it, and put the whole thing together in an interesting way, then – I don’t know – at least give it an interesting title. Call it Bigfoot’s Giant Chicken Sandwich, or something. Or Killer Pigeons of the Outer Hebrides. So it wouldn’t have any connection to the film itself; big deal. Who’s really going to give a shit, when you’ve made a film of which we can pretty well guarantee absolutely no one is going to give a shit about anyway?

(Incoherent, rambling opening paragraph? Maybe. I don’t care. I just had to sit through this turd sandwich.)

Right then: to set the scene for the benefit of the casual reader who still thinks there’s a slim possibility they might wind up actually giving a shit about this film (you won’t, I assure you), there’s this quirky little social club of murderers. There’s a rich politician type in a suit, with an attractive oriental daughter. Then there’s a sweaty bloke in a vest and camouflage jacket, and a vaguely glam young woman who talks too much, and a leather jacket/ goatee beard guy who also talks too much. Actually, all of them talk too much, with the exception of a marksman type guy who only opens his mouth now and then, and under the circumstances I still feel that he talks too much. I’m not in a forgiving frame of mind right now, what can I say? Anyway, this bland bunch of uninteresting stock characters systematically abduct another bunch of similarly bland and uninteresting stock characters: computer nerd guy, serial womanising misogynist guy, goth girl, rich girl, sporty girl, scary girl, ginger girl. (Okay, I made up the last two. I have to amuse myself somehow, as mentally reliving this vapid excuse for a film isn’t going to do it.) Presumably the first bunch of uninteresting characters have done this thing six times before, as they class this as – yes, you’ve guessed it – the seventh hunt. I’m not quite sure how they class it as a hunt, however, given that they each take one of the prisoners, incapacitate them, talk to them for a while under some pretence of exploring deep psychological themes, then kill them. Not a great deal of actual hunting going on. They just talk, and talk, and occasionally stab and punch, and go on, and on… but then, oh, there’s some sort of twist, and then oh, there’s another twist of some sort, except by that point you really will have long since stopped giving a shit, assuming you were ever so foolhardy as to start giving a shit, because the entire enterprise is so mind-numbingly tedious, uninvolving and stupid from beginning to end.

If I was in a more generous mood, I might offer a few words in defence of writer/director/editor JD Cohen, inasmuch as the camerawork and editing aren’t too bad in spite of the utterly bog standard DV stock and obviously overdubbed dialogue. However, as may already be clear, I’m not feeling generous right now. I’ve sat through too many of these half-baked, poorly conceived, terribly realised microbudget shitfests to be kind towards yet another when it comes marching along and whisks away another ninety minutes of existence on this earth that I won’t be getting back.

I beseech thee, microbudget indie filmmakers, wherever you may be (this particular film’s Australian, if that matters to anyone) – you really must start making more of an effort. There has long been a romantic notion about indie film, that it is the arena in which new ideas can thrive, new voices can be heard, and real risks can be taken. Every now and again we still see glimmers of that. And yet year after year we get so many of these painful excuses for films, all of which look like crap, sound like crap, have crap actors delivering crap dialogue and acting out crap scenes, and generally leave the viewer with little to say about the whole experience other than, “Gosh, that really was a load of crap.” Furthermore, I beseech the distributors who keep picking up these pieces of crap and putting them out there for the world to see…STOP. The more of this worthless crap you put out there, the more lazy, unimaginative filmmakers are going to pop up thinking, “Hey, if that piece of crap can get distribution, maybe I can make something crap and sell that too.” And so the cycle of perpetual crap will go on, until you find good products to put out there, or produce some good products of your own, or – I dunno – find another line of work.

7th Hunt is out on Region 2 DVD on 20th February, from Left Films. If you must.

Review by Keri O’Shea

Sometimes, when you least expect it, you stumble upon a movie which is so strange and so wonderful that it just lodges itself in your affections and refuses to budge, come what may. Sure, the warm afterglow of the first viewing will fade somewhat, but the impression overall remains – even if you become aware of any flaws which the film has, and even if you hear justifiable criticisms levelled at it. For me, Dellamorte Dellamore is one of those films. I came to it as a rather jaded zombie horror fan about to see – as she thought – a certain type of Italian zombie movie, and I came away drunk on a viewing experience which incorporated everything from projectile vomit to existentialism, all underpinned by sex, loss, glorious aesthetics and mordant one-liners.

It’s not too surprising, then, to hear how pleased I was with Shameless Screen Entertainment’s decision to give this movie a UK release, and I can only come clean about my enthusiasm! Still, for those of you not in the know about this 1994 film, here’s what you can expect…

Francis Dellamorte (Rupert Everett) is the custodian of Buffalora Cemetery, which is situated somewhere on the outskirts of a remote Italian town. When not indulging in his own brand of pithy misanthropy, Dellamorte is pondering the fact that some of the buried dead return to life after spending a week underground. Hmm. Oddly, Dellamorte and his faithful assistant Gnaghi can take zombies (pretty much) in their stride, but the arrival at the cemetery of, as Dellamorte describes her “the most beautiful living woman I’ve ever seen” –  a young widow, in mourning for her husband – sends him into self-doubt and, frankly, a loneliness he normally staves off by being offhand,  sardonic and efficiently crossing all the dead folk out of his copy of the local phonebook. But, as he also says, you can’t live on memories alone, and he knows there must be a life out there somewhere, beyond the cemetery gates.

He is determined to woo the forever-nameless woman (Anna Falchi) with this hope in mind – but, this doesn’t end happily, to say the least. When Dellamorte makes love to her on the grave of her deceased (they weren’t big on having secrets from each other), hubby comes back to outraged life and bites her. If Dellamorte was losing his grip on the world before, then this precipitates a nightmarish course of events at just the moment he seemed to be craving some meaning. All his brief romance with her shows him, though, is the inescapability of the death which surrounds him, literally or figuratively, and his love for her sets him on a collision course with the world which he wants desperately to sit up and notice him.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the world of Absurdism. This is the idea that the world is vast, chaotic and devoid of meaning, and that people will at last come to realise this: faced with an unknowable, unquantifiable world, Dellamorte makes one last-ditch attempt to overlay some sort of meaning on his existence, to find love,and he fails – in glorious shades of black comedy and horror. It’s one man against the world – it just happens to be a very warped world, but his plight is very human. If I may be self-indulgently wanky for a minute, and bear with me, but look at this quote from Absurdist philosopher Kierkegaard, discussing what it is to realise you’ll never make sense of it all: “I must act, but reflection has closed the road so I take one of the possibilities and say: This is what I do, I cannot do otherwise because I am brought to a standstill by my powers of reflection.” If you’ve seen the film, that may well remind you of a certain scene…and Dellamorte has reached this point. The result is a curious blend of laugh-out-loud humour and real pathos which I don’t think has ever been matched for me, not anywhere else.

All of this might have collapsed in a heap, albeit an aesthetically-pleasing heap, were it not for strong performances from the cast, and it’s hard to believe that Rupert Everett was ever second in line for this role behind the American actor Matt Dillon. Perhaps Dillon would have made a good fist of it, I can’t say for sure, but there’s something really pleasing about the circularity of Everett appearing in this film in the lead role, as his looks were the inspiration behind Tiziano Sclavi’s comic book character Dylan Dog – Sclavi being the author of the novel on which Soavi based his screenplay. Everett is on fine form here too, and even manages to make a very Italian film feel very British in places: no one from anywhere else in the world could or would dourly refer to a young woman throwing herself at an undead biker as a “silly cow”. The film is pinned together with these one liners, many of which might have sounded trite coming from just anyone, but Everett manages an earnestness which is compelling.

There’s an artistic eye at work here, one which can offset Italian café culture one minute with bloody death the next, but which perhaps most importantly sets up the whole tone of the movie with  one scene: the moment when Dellamorte catches sight of the gorgeous Anna Falchi for the first time is juxtaposed with the coffin of her husband sinking into the ground, only we’re shown this from a coffin’s eye view – even without the Italian title, death and love are tightly linked, and you just know the relationships at the movie’s core are always going to be problematic. Still, I don’t want to make this sound like a Bergman spin in the zombie genre – it isn’t, and every stroke of existential angst is matched by more conventional horror, some of it very funny and very grisly. This is a film which strives to do a great deal and, for me, succeeds. It’s horror with a heart and a brain, and its atmosphere is quite unique. Sure, some may find Soavi’s breadth of tone and style here bewildering, and in some circumstances perhaps I would have, too, but Dellamorte Dellamore works so well because perhaps it shouldn’t. If you fancy a movie which uses death (and zombification) to examine life, then look no further.

The Shameless release gives us a good quality print, with rich blacks, rich colours and good levels of contrast, while the audio track is crisp and clear. In terms of extras, I have to admit I was hoping for a bit more, but nonetheless the option of viewing this film in Italian with subtitles rather than in English is a boon. There’s also a photo gallery, a Shameless trailer reel (slightly redundant, I’d quibble, as trailers run automatically before you reach the main menu) and a commentary from director Michele Soavi and writer Gianni Romoli. The full release will also have a booklet containing Alan Jones’s on-set memoirs. ‘A real nice ossuary’ sadly not included.

Dellamorte Dellamore is out on Region 2 DVD on February 27th, from Shameless Screen Entertainment.