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REVIEW: Thinner (1996)

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Thinner: C-

Confession time! I saw Thinner in the theater… TWICE! I saw it once, and then the week after, I saw it was playing as part of a double feature with Bad Moon, so, I did what any blue-blooded 13 year old American at the time would have done: I sat down for Thinner a second time and proceeded to rethink my life during the opening credits.

This movie is funny, but that’s okay because the subject matter begs to be executed in a comical manner. The story revolves around a morbidly obese criminal defense lawyer named Billy. He is a celebrated member of the community and a hero in the world of organized crime as he just lied his size 48 pants off to get some mob bosses acquitted in a huge court case. The guy looks fucking ridiculous; they take one of those “That Guy” actors (who usually has a supporting role in like, every TV show and dozens of movies), gave him the lead role in Thinner, and stuck him in what looks like a caucasian version of the Nutty Professor costume.

He has an awesome night of binge excess in which he eats a bunch of desserts, gets drunk, and, while getting road-head from his wife, smashes his car into a gypsy who was crossing the street, killing her. Talk about the cherry on the ice cream sundae of Epicurean-lawyer partying! I have never seen being dangerously overweight look so good!

Billy uses his influence in town to get off scott-free; no murder charges or DUI for Billy! Just some judges and cops back-slapping him and sharing one big unified LOL over the corpse of this stupid gypsy who totally cock-blocked poor Billy right at the climax of his dessert/brandy/blowjob party. Hahaha! Stupid gypsy!

As he’s understandably mocking this dead gypsy and reveling in his apparent invincibility, the gypsy’s dad puts a revenge curse on him that makes him lose weight at an alarming rate. At first, Billy gives no fucks; he gets stoked because he can finally see his dick again, but when he starts putting the pieces together, he realizes that he’s going to wake up as a skeleton one day no matter how many pieces of deep-fried wedding cake he dips in mayo and lard.

He enlists the help of the mob, specifically Joe Mantegna, who does the Fat Tony voice the whole movie (automatic letter-grade bump), to intimidate the gypsies into lifting the curse. They finally cave and drag the “Thinner” curse into a pie. Whoever eats the pie gets the whole curse at once and shrivels up like the Crypt Keeper. Billy feeds it to his cheating whore of a wife and his BFF with whom the wife was boning.

How they stretched this into a 90 minute movie, I do not know. This is a thinking man’s movie. And by that, I mean there is a lot of negative space and “thinking” scenes where Billy is tracking the gypsies down and trying to figure shit out. Nothing scary about it. It’s basically a comedy.

REVIEW: The Fan (1996)

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The Fan: C-

Like Cape Fear? Welcome to a wonderland of type-casting where you can re-experience some of the DeNiro dementia as he plays Gil, a knife wielding baseball fanatic who stalks major league baseball’s biggest slugger, played by tax evading martial arts vampire Wesley Snipes.

If you thought it was going to be a movie about a possessed ceiling fan or something, you are just plain fucking wrong and obviously didn’t use context clues while viewing the above image from the movie. This is a pretty average thriller in which we see escalating scenes of stalking and violence. DeNiro has tons of knives and makes his trademark “it smells like shit in here” face whenever he hits a roadblock during his stalking or whenever Snipes rejects his slightly homoerotic and obsessive advances. At one point, Gil cuts a dude’s tattoo off. That’s pretty funny.

You should check out the Rotten Tomatoes reviews for this. They are so polarized and laced with bad baseball puns. Critics can’t decide if the movie is a “home run” or “out.”

Anyway, Gil kidnaps Snipes’s son and demands that he dedicate a homerun to him or his kid is getting shanked. It’s like The Make a Wish Foundation on crack! The climax is so stupid that I felt a little cheated. I actually really enjoy suspenseful thrillers in which the antagonist uses his/her brains to manufacture conditions ideal for some stalking. I like the sociopathic manipulation and the methodical planning. So when this movie, which does depend on and include this sort of guile, wrapped up in like two minutes with a police showdown on the field of a major league baseball game, I was a bit upset. It was just really abrupt.

I feel like the action-y ending is what Scott (the director) was probably most excited about. Action movies are what he was best at, even if it sometimes looks like Michael J Fox was doing the camera work during action scenes.  All in all, not a bad movie and worth a watch.

REVIEW: Against the Dark (2009)

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Against the Dark: C

Steven Seagal, for whom I have a totally biased and sentimental attachment, plays a Blade-esque sword wielding vampire hunter in a post-apocalyptic future Europe. If he wasn’t the lead role, this movie would probably get an F. His team of heroes and some assorted women and children are trapped inside of a vampire infested skyscraper and Seagal has to get them to safety before the government nukes the area and/or the vamps eat them. Kieth David’s bad ass plays the General in charge.

There are plenty of walkie-talkie scenes that are basically this:

“Damn it, Seagal, I’m going to bomb that area of the city!”

“No, General, I need more time!”

“Damn it, Seagal! Alright… but hurry it up, damn it!”

There’s a lot of sword-swinging and the vampires actually look alright. You could set your watch to their appearance. There is running/hiding, a walkie-talkie argument, and then some crusty-ass vampires hop out and get chopped up by Seagal. This cycle repeats every ten minutes or so. It’s pretty repetitive, but catchy, like the chorus to a rap song.

Seagal’s actual identity is never explored. He’s not a cop or military. He’s just a tough dude with a sword. I was basically raised by Seagal’s films, but this is another one that reveals how old he’s getting, the poor guy. For the past ten years, they have stunt doubles do EVERYTHING (not just the martial arts, but also tasks like running or jumping). They must summon him from his trailer and film him swinging the katana a few dozen times, mumbling one-liners, and waving his hands mystically. He wears a baggy trench coat and sits down a lot. They have to speed up the fight scenes that involve any actual Seagal footage too. He has gotten so slow, my grandma could beat him in a race to the toilet.

If you like the Blade movies and/or Seagal, you’ll like this. If you also dig action movies where dozens of stuntmen are abused this is for you.

REVIEW: V/H/S (2012)

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V/H/S: B

I’m usually not into found footage movies, but this one was incredibly charming and had a clever design. The film manages to use the found footage model to engage one of my favorite types of horror movies: The Creepshow/Tales from the Crypt frame narrative.

Instead of a Crypt Keeper or a comic book, the outer frame of the story involves three criminally pathetic hipster-misfits who like to engage in Clockwork Orange type behavior like smashing stuff and terrorizing women, which they also film so they can LOL about it later. They are hired to break into some old guy’s house to steal a rare VHS tape. When they get there, the dude is dead, rotting in front of an obelisk of static filled televisions and a mound of VHS tapes. The hipsters decide to watch the tapes and each one is a miniature found footage horror movie. I thought that shit was clever! In between each tape, creepy shit starts happening at the house and it escalates to a tasty climax after they view the last tape.

Tape 1 is about three super irritating frat-type bros who get fucked up by a vampire/succubus after a long and annoying night of partying. They drink their faces off, snort some blow, and take some babes back to their hotel room. Man, after like 20 minutes of a seemingly pointless bro-odyssey through the annals of the dive bar scene, it is so much fun to watch them get maimed/eaten. The girl who plays the monster does a great job. With minimal effects and delicious gore, this was my favorite vignette.

Tape 2 sucks. It’s about a couple who go on their boring 2nd honeymoon only to be stalked/molested by a mysterious and also boring switchblade wielding woman in between their boring bickering and yawn-inspiring escapades. Really anti-climactic. Oh, and boring.

Tape 3 is about some buddies who decide to go camping in the woods. They didn’t decide to get murdered by a fucking specter, but that’s not typically something one gets to decide. There’s some funny gore and typical irresponsible teen behavior in the forest a la Friday the 13th. One girl almost pulls off a Schwarzenegger from Predator as she slows down the antagonist with booby traps. The ending is pretty cool.

Tape 4 is about a woman who has a strange bump on her wrist that shows up about the same time a tribe of midgets starts haunting her house. Instead of a camcorder, this footage is found from her Skype convos with her BF, who strangely doesn’t seem to like her investigating the midget phenomena. This tape ends with a “twist” that you sort of see coming, but I’ll bet you can’t guess the specifics.

Finally, Tape 5 follows some friends who go to a Halloween party only to be terrorized by a bunch of poltergeists. Meh. It’s okay.

I heard they are already making a sequel. I hope they call it L/A/S/E/R/D/I/S/C.

REVIEW: Let Me In (2010)

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LET ME IN

 

Let Me In: A-

I had to slap myself a few times to make sure I wasn’t dreaming when I watched this. It’s actually a horror remake that doesn’t defecate all over the material on which it is based. Then I had to slap my friends to make sure they were awake. Then they slapped me back and I started crying a little and we had to pause the movie. It was really embarrassing.

The movie (based on a great Swedish film) is about a little boy who is neglected and pushed around to the point of alienating depression who meets a little girl who is secretly a vampire. They strike up a friendship and they bond because they are both outsiders. If you ever felt like a nerd or misfit as a kid, this film will push all your buttons. If you ever felt like a little girl vampire, it’ll probably do something for you too. But you aren’t a little girl vampire, so maybe watching stuff like this movie is just feeding this weird complex you have, you weirdo.

The mechanics of human/vampire symbiosis are explored in a new and interesting light; we still have the ghoul character (which is always fascinating), but other codependency situations and survival tactics are explored that I can’t recall having seen in another vampire film. The film really makes you question whether or not the pair have a genuine friendship or if they are engaged in a complex courtship ritual that vampires use for their own longevity. Can vampires, even after living for several lifetimes, feel and even love? Or are they complicated chameleons? Different movies have different rules, but the design of the film and the interactions between the two made me ask these questions.

The whole thing is dark as fuck. The acting is fantastic. The little girl is the actress from Kick Ass and Hugo. She plays a ruthless undead monster and a tiny fragile pixie wonderfully. I was really impressed by Richard Jenkins. He goes from drowning in nutsack jokes in Stepbrothers to playing a really convincing and creepy ghoul. There’s gore, scares, and even a massacre.

REVIEW: Mirrors (2008)

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Mirrors: F

You know what aren’t scary? Mirrors.

In this cookie-cutter ghost movie, an NYPD cop has to outwit/battle a ghost who hides in mirrors. Glaciers melt faster than this plot moves and there are few consistencies in the “rules” by which the mirror monster must behave. The ghost can possess your reflection and then whatever evil shit it does to the body of your reflection-self, the damage is “mirrored” on your real-self.

Stupid idea, but whatever; I’ve watched and loved some horror movies with idiotic premises. So I pop the movie in and think “Fuck yeah, let’s see some mirror ghosts murder some people.” The deflated “wah-wah-wah” of a sad trumpet noise couldn’t play loud enough once I was knee deep in this mess of a film. The movie spends so much fucking time on exposition for a ridiculously unoriginal story that there is like a combined three minutes of actual mirror-carnage. You have to follow a detective as he slowly learns about a hospital which was built on top of another hospital which did some shady stuff to patients. Then you have to visit the childhood home of a patient and then a convent and then let’s look through some secret files and then blah-blah-blah a bunch of other boring, incredibly slow investigative head-scratching stuff made up of all the cryptic/generic dialogue you hear in a ghost movie where a character is “digging” for an explanation.

Finally: mirror demons. Oh man, when they figure out there is a mirror demon, it’s like Adam West as Batman solving one of the Riddler’s riddles. How they move from the clues related to the hospital conspiracy to comprehending the EXACT origin/parameters of the mirror demon is the real mystery. When the detective runs around destroying all the reflective surfaces in his house, much to the dismay of his skeptical family, you might have a heart attack because, suddenly, people are actually moving quickly and speaking without drab monotone, unlike what you’ve been watching for what seems like hours.

Also, the demon is really picky/choosey about flexing its power. Sometimes it just creepily scratches someone. Other times, it brutally murders them. The Amy Smart death scene is the best part of the movie. The demon possesses her reflection and opens her mouth so wide that it rips the top of her head off like a Pezz dispenser. The end of the movie is one of those abrupt Shyamalanian “twists” that some people love so much.

REVIEW: Leprechaun Back to tha Hood (2003)

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Leprechaun Back 2 Tha Hood

 

Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood: F-

The fucking Leprechaun movies never end. If howling obscenities at the television actually made shitty movies better, then I turned this into Oscar material the last time I watched it.

This time, the Leprechaun is in the hood again, because one time wasn’t enough. Some friends take his gold, against the advice of the “wise elder” character, and the Leprechaun hunts them and systematically kills them. There’s more weed, rap music, and jokes. The Leprechaun impales some dude with a bong. The whole movie comes off as a repackaging of whatever jokes/ideas they didn’t use when the Leprechaun was in the hood last time.

This franchise is so fucking dead, it boggles the mind. This movie was like watching someone dig up the corpse of their grandmother and move her hands around to make her knit one last sweater. When the movie wrapped up with another cliffhanger ending, I was so depressed that I called in sick to work and got in bed at like 7pm. But I wasn’t really surprised; there hasn’t been any real catharsis in a Leprechaun movie since the first one. The only reason it doesn’t get a UV is because I somehow watched the whole thing.

REVIEW: Leprechaun in the Hood (2000)

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Leprechaun in the Hood: D+

One year, for my birthday, someone got me this movie on DVD. Now whenever it’s my birthday, I tragically think of Leprechaun in the Hood instead of thinking about good things that make me happy.

“Aw yeah, bro, the Leprechaun is in the ‘hood! This shit is gonna be hella dope!” No it is not. If you were that guy who said that at some point: I hate you. The Leprechaun franchise isn’t quite revived with this film. I don’t know how to put it. The near-dead series is awkwardly resuscitated after being out long enough to get serious brain damage only to revive as Leprechaun in the Hood, which is a movie about the Leprechaun in the Hood. The comedy is cranked several degrees and the Leprechaun now kills black people instead of white people. For maybe a combined five minutes, this movie tries to be a horror flick.

Last time we saw the Leprechaun, he was a disembodied, enlarged version of himself floating around outer space. Now we learn that that shit didn’t matter and what really happened was that Ice T captured his ass. Three aspiring rappers get the Leprechaun all pissed off and he stalks them through Compton because they stole his magic flute. There’s a lot of people holding their guns sideways and rapping because the writers didn’t want you forget that we are “in the Hood.” There are about three times as many one-liners and “jokes” as the other four films combined and after the end credits finally fucking begin, you get to see the Leprechaun rapping, which is totally funny if you are totally lame. It is about as amusing as one of those Hallmark cards that play music when you open it.

If you have come this far with the series, you should just watch this so that you understand how bad things have gotten. If you watch it with some friends whilst drinking copious amounts of malt liquor, you’ll be okay.