Movies seen in 2013

Mediocre thriller with a fair amount of gore. A small group of buddies who work as cooks in an asylum for the criminall insane are attacked by the inmates when the power goes out and the doors are unlocked. Has its gory moments and a scene that made me wince involving a hapless cook being burned to death on the stove. Why do I watch this shit? No bloody idea.

I really have to stop putting these images in my subconscious, sheesh.

This movie had its cute moments, but I thought it was trying too hard to be poignant. The film is about a socially clueless 12 year old kid who can hear music in almost everything and believes his real parents (he is in a boy's home) will come for him one day, that they will hear his music. He takes off to New York and meets up with a good-natured little homeless scamp who takes him home to a condemned building full of other 10-14 year old kids in a scene reminiscent of "Hook", when all the Lost Boys are going wild. Robin Williams plays a character named the "Wizard" who oversees the homeless runaways and makes them play music on street oorners for pocket change. (Robin Williams didn't seem sure if he was playing a bad ass in this film, or a lovable iconoclast just trying to help the street kids). It was completely unrealistic- everything from August taking off and then being adopted by the Wizard and his gang, to being "discovered" and sent to Julliard to "study" free of charge. I wasn't sure if this movie was aimed at adults or little kids... it had moments suitable for both those groups. In a word? Weird.

Surreal, bizarre and unforgettable melodrama starring Kyle MachLachlan (agent Dale Cooper from "Twin Peaks") and directed by David Lynch. David Lynch always creates dreamy, surreal visions of the truth behind the masks we wear, and you either tend to like his stuff (with its unusual emphasis on every day objects and slightly slower-than-most-people-like pace) or you don't. I love Kyle MacLachlan and enjoy the way Lynch creates villains. Frank Booth (played by Dennis Hopper) just gives me the chills.





For me, personally, there are some days when, as much as I love Lynch, I can't "get into" his world. If you are in the mood for something bizarre and dreamy (not to mention strangely erotic), check this out, but if you want something a little more down-to-Earth, skip this one for a bit.

Interesting fictional movie based loosely on the actions of members of the Animal Liberation Front (ALF). This film follows the dedicated mission of a young ALF member named Charlie, who is hell-bent on righting moral wrongs as they pertain to animals (those in the factory farm world and those in the experimental lab setting). I found the movie a bit choppy and discordant, but there is nothing else really like it out there and as a huge animal rights supporter, I am glad I saw it. The actor who plays Charlie was really easy on the eyes, too.





The movie had a definite "Hackers" feel to it- slick, anarchistic and slightly glossy (I am sure real life animal liberation is not nearly so "cool") but yeah, I definitely think everyone should see it, especially those "into" animal rights.

Funny Canadian indie film about two "Easter Bunnies" who are fired from their jobs after failing to deliver chocolate eggs to a single home on their route. I can't remember which one is which (I think Mike is the fatter Easter bunny of the two) but they both respond to their job losses in amusing and funny ways- alcoholism, getting a job siphoning sewage, selling all their worldly possessions, et cetera. Reminded me of a stylistic commercial that dragged on for 90 minutes instead of 30 seconds... which isn't an insult, stylistic cartoons have their place (anyone seen those Panda cheese commercials where the Panda goes apeshit and does passive aggressive things if people don't eat his brand of cheese?) I am giving it 7 stars because it was original and unique, but not something I am ever going to watch again.

Collection of animated tales centering around a green rock said to be the source of all evil, with a real "killer" heavy metal soundtrack. The movie was so-so, but I think back in 1981 if you were stoned out of your mind this would have been quite the crowd pleaser. Had a definite 17-year-old boy feel to it (every cartoon segment featured some huge-breasted, scantily clad woman getting it on with the "hero", usually a nerdy, physically attractive substitute obviously intended to be a proxy for the average viewer). The animation wasn't half bad, but it wasn't exceptional, either. Felt like I was watching a strange hybrid of "He-man" and any other show on Teletoon Retro. If you like Teletoon Retro, the idea of appearing like an 80s pothead teen and old metal music, this one is for you!

Low budget film loosely based on the life of serial killer Henry Lee Lucas and his sexually deviant lover, Otis O'Toole. The special effects were nothing to write home about, and neither was the acting. The movie didn't pose any significant philosophical questions. It didn't gross me out or creep me out. It was totally underwhelming.

Don't bother with this one, people.

This movie is no doubt the remake of the 1980 movie. A pack of young thieves come back to their childhood home, only to discover it has been sold by the bank to a couple who have recently lost their young son. The young men, irate, take the homeowners and their friends hostage and phone their "mother", threatening the lot with death if they misbehave. One of the party-goers, George, is a medical doctor and the crazy family insists that he "save" the baby boy of the family, who is sporting a massive sucking chest wound due to being shot in a botched bank robbery. If baby boy dies (I already forget his name, that's how little I cared for the characters) then George will die, too. Oh, yeah... the "boys" have been sending money "home" to Mom, unaware that the house has been resold, and when Mom finds out one of the home-owners has been pocketing the money, she is doubly pissed. Stressful, gory little movie. I didn't care for the characters, they all seemed shallow and dull to me. And they kept mouthing off or disobeying, and that just had me even angrier at the stupid idiots. Quite a few could have made it if they had just stopped disobeying.


The ending was completely over the top stupid and made me want to throw a wrench through the television screen. If you like idiotic people being tortured simply because they are idiotic, though... this one is for you!

This movie thoroughly creeped me out. Lillian and Geoffrey Gaines move to the country so Geoffrey can work on his super top-secret vivasection and torture in private (he apparently is trying to make strides in the "organ transplant" arena using "animal models"- mice, rats, and later a dog and a little calf). Lillian is a painter who wants to become pregnant and is irritated by Geoffrey's secrecy and lack of interest in their relationship. As the movie progresses the audience becomes more and more wary of Geoff and his "scientific" (bullshit) experiments. The shots of the vivasected animals was both heart-breaking and eerie, as was the shots of the "test models" being dumped into black garbage bags. The end scene is a horrible creature, half dog and half calf, struggling to stand in the yard. This freaked me out and actually made me feel almost tearful because we humans do fuck with animals so so much for idiotic reasons, and then spend billions on ads trying to rationalize our inherently insane and sadistic tendencies. Some netflix reviewers said that this movie was boring, but I don't agree. It is slow moving compared to many movies designed for those with the attention spans of bumblebees, but it is eerie and pensive and asks of us all: "just because we can do something, should we? What are the moral implications?" There were quite a few times watching this I wanted to jump into the novie, karate-chop Geoffrey in the jaw and save the little creatures he was about to cut into.


I can't figure out why this film isn't a cult classic.

Sweet comedy about a hippy man-child named Ned who is sent to jail after selling marijuana to a police officer (the police officer basically sets up the bust and Ned, being kind, gives him some pot, the cop refuses to take it for free, Ned suggests 20 bucks and boom... he is in jail). After jail, he stays with his trio of thirty-something-year-old sisters who all believe they have adult-hood figured out and that Ned's blind optimism and hippy, laid-back ways make him a loser (albeit a lovable one). But as he stays with them, stirs things up by being honest and the shit begins to hit the fan, the begin to see that maybe Ned's way of being in the world isn't that immature, afterall. Oh yeah, Ned has a dog named Willie Nelson. Cute, sweet comedy. And I generally don't care for comedy movies at all.

This is an imaginative and quirky tale that poses the question "what if Santa Claus is real and not anything like the jolly Coca Cola Santa Claus?" What if Santa is actually an ancient demon or monster, and his elves are Golem-wannabes? What if Santa had been buried by the Sami people of Finland and was waiting to be excavated? How much would Santa, or even his creepy little "elves", go for? Got the idea? That is "Rare Exports". I felt like I was missing out on a huge chunk of the movie. I even went to the chapters part of the menu and checked to make sure my DVD didn't skip a half hour or 40 minutes. We see the young main character at the beginning and his buddy break into an excavation sight, then young kid is on the phone asking about missing kids. The missing kid thing was pretty underplayed. I think if an entire Finnish community of kids just disappeared, people would be a little more upset, yet the only person to do anything is the boy (Pietari) and all he does is make a dozen phone calls. The music was over the top dramatic. And some of the slow-motion scenes had me giggling. But all in all this was an odd and uniquely enjoyable film.

Based on true events, this movie follows a young woman during her acceptance into college and her first semester away from life in a small German community. "Micheala" suffers from "epilepsy" and Mommy Dearest doesn't want her away at school. Daddy wants to make his girl happy. Micheala has some very subtle "freak out" scenes (as in, they were completely underwhelming) and claims to hear voices (although the viewer never really hears these voices) and dances a little bit too exuberantly one night. That seems to be the extent of the possession that has overtaken her. While I appreciate that this film much be much closer to life than "The Possession of Emily Rose", this version was also really... boring. I hate to say it, but I kept waiting for *something* to happen. If this chick is posssessed, so am I, for crying out loud!



I realize that we are not supposed to "know" if Micheala (in real life the young woman was named Anneliese Michel) was a victim of demons or was a true epileptic acting out her religious issues and anger at her strict mother, but even still, I felt this movie could have had a few more moments of eerie voices, shadows in the hall or perhaps contained reference to the fact that the real-life girl lapped her own urine up from the floor and ate bugs (nothing that dramatic in the movie). The movie did "feel" like it was filmed in the 70s, it definitely had that vibe going for it, which is why it has a 5. I like subtle films, but I wanted just a LITTLE bit more in the creepy department. Even 5 minutes of creepy shadows, voices and faces (possibly tricks of light) spliced into the movie could have helped considerably.

If this movie seems out of place... well... happy movies aren't really my thing, but I have promised myself I am going to try and watch something completely "light" and "fluffy" for every 3 or 4 movies featuring violence. This movie is about a 16 year old girl named Samantha who feels (rightfully) ignored by her family. They forget her 16th birthday and a series of comically cute mishaps fall into Sam's life over a 24 hour period (her maternal and paternal grandparents come for her older sister's wedding and one pair of them have a 16 year old foreign exchange student named Long Duck Dong with them, her pesky little brother makes smart-ass remarks and the hunk at her school seems oblivious as to her existence).

Maybe when I was 16 I would have liked this more... but probrably not. I couldn't get into this movie, probably because Sam's concerns are not concerns I ever had. The parts of the movie that are supposed to be funny didn't make me laugh.

Oh well. If you are a fan of John Hughes' other movies, you will probably like this one.

Boring little yawn-fest about a 16 year old who has to speak to a pregnant forensic psychologist after she delivers a baby on a class ski trip, stuffs its airways full of tissue paper and leaves the baby for dead (yes, it dies, surprise, surprise). The very middle-aged Tilda Swinton (forget the character's name) must ascertain if the teen knew she was pregnant and committed manslaughter or was delusional and had no clue she was pregnant (as she claims), et cetera. This one left me incredibly bored. I didn't care about any of the characters, they felt flat. "Stephanie Daley" didn't seem at all upset that her child was dead or that she was in trouble, just moody. Tilda Swinton playing a pregnant forensic psychologist investigating "ski mom's" actions? By the end of the movie, my eyes were closing. I expected some philosophizing about life, or personal liberties or responsibilities and we get... nada. I can't even say I disliked the characters, there wasn't enough there to dislike.

Crummy little "thriller" from 1997 starring Lisa Zane as a deranged nurse hell-bent on torturing a man who fired her father (which prompted her father to kill her brother and mother before shooting himself- clearly a stable family). This nurse suddenly becomes a murdering psycho after her father's double murder-suicide spree and also knocks off a completely innocent nurse caring for the evil boss man (really? She is just going to kill someone completely innocent?) Low budget, poor acting, "Misery" wanna-be.

Some movies are so bad, they are enjoyable (like Children of the Corn 3: Urban Harvest). This isn't one of them.

Sweet movie by David Lynch about a 73 year old man named Alvin Straight who, in 1994, takes off on a journey to Mount Zion, Wisconsin from Laurens, Iowa on his riding mower to make peace with his estranged brother, Lyle, after Lyle suffers a stroke. Alvin can barely see because of diabetes and for this reason does not have a driver's license, and the only grown child that seems to be in the picture has developmental/neurological problems. So off Alvin sets on his riding mower. The first mower doesn't make it far, and Alvin gets a ride home and shoots it with a gun, then buys a 1966 John Deere riding mower and starts off again. Alvin is played by Richard Farnsworth, who is just adorable. Sweet, pleasant movie.

Tense movie about the plight of a young couple living in a huge country house in Bucharest in 2002 (this movie is based on a true story) who are terrorized one night by a gang of shady assailants who seem hell-bent on killing them (the shadowy figures seem both carefully tactical and impulsive). This movie doesn't have much of a plot, but it does have an eerie, non-stop nightmarish quality that makes you unable to relax or feel at ease the entire time it is playing. The ending was disturbing- not in a bright, shiny way, but in a subtle, rat-chewing-inside-you way that I know will come back to me in visions for the next few months or years. Many of my nightmares seem to have scenes in them that could be almost identical replicas of some of this movie's images.

Fun and campy, but nothing special. Basically four episodes of the Twilight Zone circa 1983 comprise this movie. The first "segment" is about an angry middle-aged drinker who feels that his job has been unfairly given to a Jewish colleague (he is fairly vocal about this belief). The guy also calls blacks the "N" word, etc. He stumbles out of the bar in a rage and finds himself back in Berlin in 1939 and pursued by Nazis, then he suddenly finds himself being attacked by members of the KKK, then he finds himself in Nam being shot at (et cetera). There was no redemption for this dude, no chance for him to change.

Next segment is about a wise old black dude ("the magical black man:) played by Scatman Crothers (Dick from "The Shining") who brings a childish view of hope to members of Sunnyvale retirment home. This segment tried way too hard to be poignant (I wasn't surprised in was directed by Spielberg). Next segment features a young boy of about 9 or 10 named Anthony, who can apparently manifest anything he thinks of (and has a horde of people essentially hostage in his "house").


This segment was enjoyable, but again, not anything to write home about. I am pretty sure I saw part of this on TV before, too...
Last segment was my favourite, about a panicky man on an airplane convinced that a monstrous green man is on the wing, screwing with the engines. The guy goes into ful-out hysterics and has to be restrained and we discover that, perhaps, his crazy delusions may have had some basis in reality. The little girl taking polaroids on the flight also made me smile, she gave this segment a real "Freddy's Dead" feel (first 15 minutes or so, anyway) and the fish bowl effect made everyone seem sinister and a little crazy.


All in all, not a bad lineup of Twilight Zone episodes.

I love the TV series Twin Peaks (maybe my all-time favourite television series) so this movie (a prequel to the series) was right up my alley. It works, I suppose, as a stand-alone movie and follows the decline of a 17 year old prom queen named Laura Palmer who is haunted by nocturnal "visits" from some maniac named Bob. All we really know about Bob (at least at the beginning) is that he has been "having" her since she was 12 and that she is frightened of him. We also know that Bob's existence is linked to the murder of a young woman named Teresa Banks a year earlier. I won't say more in case you guys haven't seen the series yet.

I do wish Lynch had cast younger-looking actors, though. This is the character of Laura Palmer, who is supposed to be 17 (to me she looks like she is in her late 20s or early 30s).