There is one special effects sequence in Eli Roth’s “The Green Inferno” (2015) that is technically very well done. I won’t describe it, for fear of spoilers here, but if you know that Greg Nicotero was in charge of effects for this movie, and you know the TV show with which he’s associated, then you have a pretty good idea of what this sequence entails. (Hint: it’s “The Walking Dead.”)
This movie also makes excellent use of its Peruvian location, and the real tribe employed as extras.
Beyond those two things … this really is a rather mediocre horror-thriller, folks. It’s nothing to write home about. In fact, it seems amateurishly made on a few levels, especially considering the creative talent Roth exhibited with films like “Hostel” (2005), “Hostel 2” (2007) and “Cabin Fever” (2002).
This movie held my attention, and it does serve up a disturbing horror film that’s weird and different — which is what I think Roth is known for. But, regrettably, it just wasn’t especially well scripted, performed or directed. I’d give it a 4 out of 10.
Young people, let me try to explain what it was like for a kid who loved movies in the early 1980’s.
There was no trivia section for the Internet Movie Database. There was no Internet Movie Database. There was no goddam Internet. This meant that information about new movies came mostly from other second-, third- or fourth-graders. And that was one imperfect grapevine.
Sometimes the information was flat out wrong. Brad Fisher told me at the beach in the summer of 1980 that Han Solo dies in “The Empire Strikes Back.” (Yes, “Star Wars” fanatics, I am aware that Harrison Ford wanted the character to die. Now grow up and watch Ron Moore’s “Battlestar Galactica.”)
Other times, the information was technically accurate, but confusingly articulated. Such was the account of Jason Huhn, the kid across the street, of Ridley Scott’s “Alien.” (That was a 1979 movie, but I wasn’t even allowed to watch the bowdlerized version that was on television a few years later.) “Its head is like a tube.” Jason told me thoughtfully. “It has, like, two mouths. It has a mouth, and then a mouth inside a mouth.”
Finally, the other boys’ reviews were occasionally just too spoiler-heavy. In 1984, I had the entire rope-bridge scene in “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” memorized in detail before I got to see the movie myself. (Maddeningly, most of Mr. Greiner’s sixth grade class had seen it before I did, and Jason Girnius was particularly exuberant in recounting its climactic fight.)
“Halloween III: Season of the Witch” was something of a different animal. None of the kids in the neighborhood could figure that one out.
“Michael isn’t in it!” That was the buzz. To a boy in the 1982, Michael Myers was an icon on par with “Friday the 13th’s” Jason. (Leatherface was a bit before our time, and Freddy Krueger and Pinhead hadn’t arrived in theaters just yet.) Even those of us who weren’t allowed to watch the movies had heard all about him. It utterly confused us that that a “Halloween” movie could be made in which he was absent.
It … looked pretty scary, at least. Its poster and tagline suggested that young trick-or-treaters would be victimized instead of teenagers old enough to babysit, so that was more frightening to a young boy. (As an adult today, I suggest that this movie absolutely did not turn out to be a classic horror film, despite the pretty terrifying basic plot device revealed at the end.)
Today a simple Google search would inform us of John Carpenter’s plans — an anthology series in which every subsequent “Halloween” sequel was a standalone horror story with the holiday as a theme. (I think I’d question the wisdom of that even as a kid; the studio wisely resurrected the slasher four years later.)
But the gradeschool grapevine was not so informed. There weren’t even any tentative hypotheses among the kids on my street. I think we just shrugged it off and returned to talking about “Star Wars.” We just figured that adults sometimes did some really puzzling, really stupid things. That’s a belief I still hold today. In fact, I’m pretty sure that I occasionally engender that belief in others.
Respect it.
The first episode of television’s “Minority Report” (2015) has all the bells and whistles of its 2002 cinematic source material, but little of its skilled storytelling. I’d rate it a 6 out of 10, and that probably reflects my positive bias connected with my love for the classic film.
The show looks great — the special effects are well thought out, well rendered, and in abundance. Visually and in terms of its fictional technology, this is terrific way to revisit the future that was painstakingly envisioned for the fantastic movie. The show is an earnest follow-up, too; you can tell that the writers respect the film and were reaching for its unique vibe and its fast-paced suspense.
Regrettably, the pilot here just doesn’t suggest that this will be an unusually good show. The writing and directing are average, at best, and some of the acting is downright poor. A hastily conceived plot features one of the movie’s plot-driving psychic “precogs” rushing to intervene in future murders, which he can still predict, like some kind of lone, nonviolent, pre-emptive vigilante. A cheesy covert partnership develops between him and a tough-and-sassy-but-sexy, single, female cop. And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Cue the bad dialogue. I honestly think my friends and I could have come up with something better than that.
Oh well. It can’t all be “A” material. At least, that’s what I’ve been telling people who bitch about my jokes on Facebook. And this was just the pilot — maybe the show will get better.
I tend to obsess a little about spoilers, so I’m reluctant even to describe the plot of the Season 6 opener for “The Walking Dead.” The story I thought we’d see absolutely wasn’t the story we saw, and the very first scene should be a terrific surprise for the viewer. Suffice to say, this episode was fantastic — I’d give it a 9 out of 10.
After five seasons, even a diehard fan of the program can ask about its screenwriters, “How long can they keep this up?” This is a horror subgenre that’s hard to keep fresh. But the show still succeeds.
The writers are trying, and it shows. I suggest that this actually is sometimes a pretty smart show. A nice amount of thought has gone into the major action set-pieces since the start of Season 5 — everything from strategy, tactics, terrain, diversion, leadership, and even differing levels of training for new or seasoned combatants. When one protagonist refers to our heroes’ adversaries as “an army,” I began looking at this episode as … “military horror?” Is that even a thing? Anyway, it’s a refreshing change for fans of zombie horror who are tired of the spate of second-rate movies on Netflix — those typically show attractive twenty-somethings in vague battles, cheerfully rattling off dry one-liners while swinging impact weapons, despite their lack of any training or experience. This episode offered horror fans both exploding zombie heads and an intelligently staged battle to follow. Nice stuff!
Also present were the other things that people love about the show — great character moments, surprise character development, and terrific dialogue. The exchange between Morgan and Carol was goddam beautiful, and it makes me rethink my longstanding (and unpopular) criticism that this show sometimes struggles with characterization.
The suspense and tension tonight were absolutely perfect. I was on the edge of my seat until the end of story. And the final surprise development and cliffhanger there really drove me nuts, even if I have a pretty good idea why it occurred.
There is one question here that I am embarrassed to ask. I’m afraid I’m going senile. Am I the only fan who absolutely does NOT remember the character of Ron?! I … I thought that Alexandria’s Hester Prynne here had only ONE son, young Sam!
Hey, one more thing — if I’m onto something here, I’m going to be damn proud … and I don’t think this counts as a spoiler, as it is only an unconfirmed suspicion on my part. We see an erratic Abraham manically and cavalierly battle some zombies here. When asked why he was behaving strangely, he replies that he’s “taking the bull by the balls.”
He sounded a hell of a lot to me like the erratic Roger manically and cavalierly battling zombies during a fateful scene in George A. Romero’s “Dawn of the Dead” (1978). He keeps blurting, “We got this by the balls, we got this by the balls!” And both scenes involve people getting in and out of vehicles. The 1978 sequence ends poorly for Roger because of his carelessness. Does this mean that Abraham is likewise doomed?
This is the kind of footage that makes me want to get out and see the world — even if it is only “the world” between the Pacific and the Atlantic.
In case you’re wondering, this was indeed shot from the safety of a vehicle. (You kind of can’t tell, as I can’t see a windshield.) The source is the Facebook page for Kevin Bastarache Wildlife & Nature Photography.
The holiday arrives in a scant three weeks. I’ll be populating the blogosphere here and there with a few monsters. I hope you don’t mind.
From Wikimedia Commons: [“Julie Adams, famously pursued in the 1954 horror classic, “Creature from the Black Lagoon,” portrayed an FDA chemist who helped break up a trucking industry amphetamine ring in “330 Independence S. W.,” a 1962 episode of NBC’s Dick Powell Show.”]
Photo credit: By The U.S. Food and Drug Administration [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
I just shared this with a writer and musician friend up in New Jersey.
I had no idea that making a poetry chapbook was so easy — especially with the formatting options for Microsoft Word. Many of us are so excited (and maybe even overwhelmed) by the online and indie publishing arenas that we forget about a more traditional approach like this.
To me, it seems like a nice way to at least seek exposure. I’ve kicked around the idea of doing a public reading once or twice; it’s actually easy to sign up at the Bowery Poetry Club in New York City. (I regrettably never got around to it.)
But the “pocket-size” chapbook here looks so inexpensive to produce that it would make a nice handout for after a live reading, even if it includes only a handful of a writer’s best poems. If you write on a continuous basis, something like that would also be an interesting variation of the “annual Christmas letter.”
The options here would also work for a limited collection of prose, I would think. And depending on the quality of the printer, it would work for reproductions of artwork as well.
http://www.pw.org/content/diy_how_to_make_and_bind_chapbooks?cmnt_all=1
I have to give “The Collection” an 8 out of 10.
No, it’s not a classic horror movie — it’s derivative of the “Saw” movies, and it seems to result from too little thought by the screenwriters. The antagonist is a serial killer (and here a mass murderer) who employs extraordinary Rube Goldberg-esque machines to brutally trap his victims.
We know nothing about how he arrived at his expertise. (He appears to be a demon-possessed Thomas Edison.) His choice of victims is random. His modus operandi is puzzling. (Why bring a prior victim to a new crime scene?) And we’re not even shown how these machines work — only CG’ed tracking shots of cables and pulleys. Neither do we know why he has unarmed combat training that seems to approach the level of Batman’s. And the question I was left with by the previous film (“The Collector,” 2009) is still the most egregious omission — how on earth does our bad guy have time to invade a house or building and set all these things up?! There is SOME nice exposition about the killer’s motivations in some closing dialogue, and it’s wickedly interesting, but it’s cut short.
But, hey — this still got under my skin enough to be an effective horror movie. The opening action set-piece (YEESH!) was not only frightening, it was also something completely surprising. I knew bad things were afoot when we spot our horrible machinist lurking above, but … I didn’t expect THAT.
Even with almost no speaking lines, Randall Archer deserves credit for terrific physical acting throughout — not to mention some the best (worst?) crazy-evil eyes in horror film history. (Just LOOK at this mamajama in the second picture below.) Archer is a professional stuntman, and his movement and posture sell the role perfectly.
Even better is the presence of Josh Stewart, who returns as the first movie’s nuanced antihero. I’ll say it again — I love this guy. He’s a damned talented actor, and he deserves more leading roles in major films. He was even frikkin’ awesome in his small role as Bane’s craven little henchman in “The Dark Knight Rises” (2012).
And Lee Tergeson, who I remember best as Beecher in HBO’s “Oz” (1997-2003), is also great to watch.
There are other nice touches too. Like its predecessor, this movie could be smart and creative when it tried. The use of a gun here is pretty clever, even if it seems obvious in retrospect. (I wouldn’t have thought of that.) And the fate of some of our bad guy’s past victims is both fresh and very disturbing. If those ideas had been expanded on much further, this film would have risen above its status as a “Saw” imitator.
Finally, I love endings like the one we see here. I won’t say more for fear of spoilers.
Eric Robert Nolan, Author 