OLD (2021) - I'LL TELL YA WHAT'S OLD, M NIGHT SHYAMALAN AND HIS DUMB ASS MOVIES. AND DON'T EVEN GET ME STARTED ON "LADY IN THE WATER" CAUSE THAT MAKES THIS LOOK GOOD!

 
This is how I felt after watching Old. 

I want my 5.99 back! I'm not going to sugarcoat it- I've never really cared for this guy's work and when I tell you the one and only movie of his I really like and keep in my collection, you'll probably leave the blog. The Village, there, I said it. I just always thought the idea of a bunch of people that had been through traumatic experiences starting their own thing in the middle of the woods was brilliant but the looney dialect they gave all the characters was also annoying. Still, I'd rather listen to those blubbering idiots any day compared to the oafs that inhabit the beach in Old. 

Not only did I not care for any of these characters, practically every line in the script is devoted to supporting or explaining the premise. What ever happened to leaving in a little room for imagination to connect the dots? Instead, we get a lesson in the theory of relativity from a bunch of morons we could care less about. I don't know, I just don't get it. Nor most of his films since the early days. I wasn't even that crazy about Signs, especially the casting. And don't even get me started on Lady In The Water, very possibly one of the worst movies of that decade, if not all time.  

Don't mean to be crass but the only thing I found entertaining in Old was the bikini's.  1.0 stars/5

3 NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD ALTERNATIVES - OFF COLOR FILMS COLORIZED (2004) REANIMATED (2009) & NIGHT OF THE ANIMATED DEAD (2021)

 

If you dig all things NIGHT 🌙✨of the Living DEAD related like 👍 I do, then consider these 3 😁 interesting alternatives -

I can totally dig the purists who like their NOTLD organic, the original slime of the black and white film. For those wanting to venture further out, there have been several colorized versions but the only one worth it's salt is Off Color Film's 2004 version produced by a studio called Legend. The exteriors look better than inside the house but it's still a fine color version. 

"Reanimated" from 2009 has a great concept - use the original audio track from the film but film new animation from a variety of artists. Ironically, it's that variety that seems to be missing. I found it to be boring and not continuous enough. 

The new Night Of The Animated Dead is certainly an interesting take on things with new animation that sticks to the script word by word but uses different voices. The character's faces don't seem to retain the original characteristics with the exception of Barbara who pretty much looks like herself. The animation is pretty cool though and this one ultimately gets lumped with "worth at least one watch" especially for NOTLD fans.

Night Of The Living Dead - Colorized (Off Color Films - 2004)  2.75 stars/2.75

Night Of The Living Dead : Reanimated (2009)  1.0 stars/2.75

Night Of The Animated Dead (2021) 1.75 stars/2.75

VAL KILMER IS "THE SUPER" (2017) - A CREEP WHO LIKES TO DABBLE IN BLACK MAGIC, SPEAK TO HIMSELF IN TOUNGES AND SCARE LITTLE GIRLS IN BASEMENTS - SERIOUSLY?

 

A retired cop takes a job as one of three supers in a huge high rise in Manhattan. People have been mysteriously disappearing and all clues point to the strange one of the three played by Val Kilmer. Now it looks like the super's harassing one of the cop's two little girls. There's only one solution - the super's gotta go down. I mean, if you were a retired cop with two little girls and a guy that looks like Kilmer chasing them around the basement, wouldn't you?

However, this is a supernatural thriller so there's much more going on here that I don't want to spoil. Suffice it to say - keep your eye on the daughter's clown toy because it's a puzzle that acts as a key to the puzzle of what's really going on in this apartment high-rise the size of the Chrysler Building.

Kilmer proves once again why he's one of the greats, acting mostly with his face and strange utterances. Love the music and production design. Most of the reviews were not as kind but I found this to be a quality, enjoyable and genuinely scary horror thriller. Streaming free on Vudu, Tubi and YT.  3.0 stars/5

JEFF FAHEY AND BRENT BRISCOE ARE MINERS TRAPPED 600 FEET "BENEATH" (2013) THE SURFACE - NO TIME, OXYGEN'S RUNNING OUT, HALLUCINATIONS, AND THEY'RE TURNING ON EACH OTHER!

 

Brent Briscoe's second-to-last feature finds him teaming up with Jeff Fahey as a couple of veteran miners leading a group of younger miners. A woman who is only supposed to be along for that day starts to hallucinate as their peril of being trapped slowly worsens and their oxygen runs out. Are her comrades really turning on her and each other or is it really the ghosts of another mining accident years before?

Production design is excellent and the film does have some good scares once it gets going. Fahey and Briscoe are totally in their element here but they are better than the material they have to work with, A strong lack of character development and past history, we want to care for these folks and their dilemma but know very little about them. 

To add to the film's drawbacks there were two other movies released in the years 2013 and 2014 with the same exact title and this film is listed as both so if you're going to check it out make sure it's the "Beneath" about the miners.  2.5 stars/5

ANDREW STEVENS IS STALKING MICHAEL SARRAZIN'S GIRLFRIEND IN "THE SEDUCTION" (1982) - MORGAN FAIRCHILD IS THE TV NEWS ANCHOR WHO HAS EVERYONE IN A TIZZY

I don't know if I should feel proud or embarrassed that I saw this in the theaters when it first came out. I do know I had completely forgotten about it until showing up recently in a Vudu sale. (And by the way I still call it Vudu, not Vudu Fandango. Who the hell wants to say Vudu Fandango when you can say Vudu?) 

Further surprise came when I discovered that it has held up well thru the decades, in fact, it's a pretty decent thriller all in all. Probably one of the last good things Michael Sarrazin did and the height of stardom for Andrew Stevens who up until then had appeared in small parts or five-liners (Shampoo, Las Vegas Lady among others)

Also look for a young Coleen Camp in a great supporting role. Without spoiling, one of the things I really liked about this was the ending was very realistic and truly fits the profile of these stalkers and what happens to them ultimately. This one's worth checking out and is on sale for seven dollars right now on Vudu. That's Vudu, not Vudu Fandango. 3.0 stars/5

"WICKED, WICKED" (1973) THAT'S THE TICKET - SAN DIEGO 1972 MEETS PHANTOM OF THE OPERA IN THIS ONLY FEATURE EVER PRODUCED IN DUO-VISION....DUO-WHAT?!

This man seriously needs to get tested.

Having carved it's own unique niche almost fifty years ago, Wicked Wicked remains the only film ever produced in Duo-Vision. Which may be a good thing. Some bloke got the bright idea to do a whole movie in split screen and call it Duo-Vision. That it turned out to be for a low-budget drive-in horror flick is only to our benefit as B-movie fans. And it's not a bad flick. 

A serial killer is on the loose in a seaside resort and it's San Diego 1972. Tiffany Bolling, one of the most charismatic starlets of B-cinema, shows off her singing skills as the hotel's entertainer and she's one of the main reasons to see this freaky flick. And to it's credit the split screen editing is quite good as is the location and a little gore thrown in for good measure. 

On the other hand, the film's music, played by a single organist is awful. One can understand what they were trying for but it's the wrong organist and a bad score. Also, legendary 60's actor Arthur O Connell is badly miscast here as the hotel's custodian and looks like he'd rather be somewhere else. Special effects are cheesy but somehow blend well with the rest. While I can't really explain why, somehow the flick has a certain patina to it that works. Viva La Wicked Wicked! 2.75 stars/2.75 Only available on DVD thru Warner Archives. 

WE ALSO DIG...

TIMECODE (2000)

How 'bout FOUR screens at once? Mike Figgis (Leaving Las Vegas) uses four digital cameras at once and charts his story using music staff paper to create a bold experimental film. Since it is physically impossible for every viewer to look at each screen at the same given moment, in effect he created the only movie that is a completely different movie for each person but still the same movie. Ya dig? A great cast of A-listers and it's all improv! Highly recommend. 3.0 stars/5

THE "IT'S ALIVE" BABIES ARE BACK... THEY'RE HUNGRY AND HAVE GROWN IN NUMBERS IN LARRY COHEN'S IT'S ALIVE III : ISLAND OF THE ALIVE (1987)

 

BOO!

Larry Cohen's string of 80's classics such as Q The Winged Serpent and The Stuff seemingly came to a close with this eighty percent turkey, the third and final film in his own It's Alive trilogy. Cohen teams up once again with his favorite actor Michael Moriarty which helps the proceedings much and funny man Gerrit Graham does his campy best as a lawyer in a courthouse scene. 

The courthouse scenes are more entertaining than the island stuff! Once the mechanical babies come in the film starts to meander and somehow the babies themselves are not realistic as should be. Karen Black is a bit miscast and underused. One of those "worth at least one watch" films - sage advice from an amateur movie critic heheh. 1.75 stars/2.75

YOU CAN NOT DESTROY "IT!" (1967) - NOT BY FIRE, WATER, FORCE OR ANYTHING MADE BY MAN - RODDY MCDOWELL IS IN CAHOOTS WITH THE GOLEM OF PRAGUE!!

 
Roddy McDowell takes good care of his mom. 

What a great time of the year this is! All the blogs are doing their spooky thing for October and the streaming services have gone whole hog horror. So thought I would chime in with one of my personal favorites, a great British horror flick filmed in 1966, released in 1967. 

A young and dapper Roddy McDowell plays an assistant museum curator who has a very unique relationship with the museum's latest piece, a 9 foot tall statue of the Golem of Prague. What will he do with his newfound friend and power? And what's the deal with his dead mother?

Roddy was a major rising star at this time and his lead performance here is at once strong, enthusiastic, psychotic, comedic - classic Roddy McDowell at his best. 

A bit hard to find, except for some old VHS issues, does not look like it was ever released digitally, at least not here in the US. The only version online I could find is a fairly decent upload on DailyMotion below, enjoy!  2.75 stars/2.75

                              Golem gets all the girls.