The Strain sort-of Review

Television shows(TV shows for short) have slowly but surely been out-doing their theatrical counter-parts, entertainment wise, for a good part of the past decade. You could probably point the finger squarely at LOST back in 2004. That show came out of nowhere and became a huge phenomenon in no time.

So every network went looking for the next huge sci-fi/fantasy genre hit. Cue AMC and The Walking Dead in 2009. Nobody expected a Zombie drama based on an Indie Comic to do well. I'm sure if they expected it to make as huge an impact as it did, AMC would've ordered more than 6 episodes for the first season.

Walking Dead ended up being an even bigger hit than LOST ever was.
I knew that from this, other cable networks were going to comb the landscape of the independent comic book scene to find the next possible hit. No surprise, the FX Network struck first, announcing a TV show based on the "police procedural in a super hero world" comic book Powers.

That was in 2010, and Powers has been stuck in developmental hell, with only a pilot filmed at this point. I don't even think FX plans on airing Powers anymore, now that I've heard that the Playstation Network is developing the show for their new line of original programming.

FX, which has a fine history of edgy dramas, was now without their own Walking Dead.

This past Sunday, FX debuted their latest drama, The Strain, based off a series of horror novels, and a Dark Horse Comics series.

This show was completely off my radar. The only reason I knew I'd give this show a chance was because FX has a fantastic track record with tv dramas in the past. My two favorite non-Breaking Bad shows from the past 5 years are Justified, and the sadly canceled-too-soon boxing drama Lights Out from 2011.

When I learned that The Strain was about Vampires, I probably rolled my eyes. I then heard that it's a vampire-virus that infects NYC, which sounded a bit better, but I still wasn't looking forward to it. Even the knowledge that the great Guillermo del Toro was one of the creators did nothing to peak my interest past "meh, I'll check it out". I wouldn't have even remembered that it was premiering this past Sunday if not for my buddy Phil reminding me via telegram.

On a whole, I absolutely loved this first episode. It did a really good job of having a lot happen, without giving too much away. The episode had a great creep factor too it, as the idea of an airplane landing without any communication whatsoever is fantastically scary. I couldn't help but see a correlation between this and the beginning of the movie Nightmare City, with the silent airplane lands and sends out countless scabby-headed zombies(it's a great film, if you've never seen it).

The show has a good cast, with the best-known actor being fat Hobbit Sean Astin as a member of the CDC team that is checking out the spooky airplane. I will say, despite the solid cast, the acting is a bit on the cheesy side, and it might bother some. I forgive that because this is based on a comic book, and the violence is fantastic.

Speaking of that, this show will satiate any gore-hound. I won't go too deep into details, but I do need to point out that The Strain features a brutally beautiful(brutiful?) head-smashing that blew me away. It was unnecessary, awesome and sets a violent tone for the rest of the series.

My only problem with The Strain is a hokey sub-plot about Dr. Ephraim Goodbody and his year-long separation with his wife. We first meet him as he's late for his marriage therapy session, where wifey and the therapist do a damn good job making this poor guy look like an asshole because he very busy with his job at the CDC. The CDC! It's not like he's a butcher or a mall security guard! And the guy's obviously not a dick, and obviously loves his wife and son, and at one point wifey's new boyfriend says that no man should put his job before his wife while they watch a news report about the airplane and how it could possibly be a health risk, which is where Dr. Goodbody is! I mean how stupid is that?
Perhaps as the show goes on, we'll get some back-story featuring Goodbody killing kittens or something that's deserving of this treatment, but so far it's moronic.

The show is filmed beautifully, too. Every shot looks great. I don't know if that has anything to do with Del Toro's hand on the series, but I hope the episodes he doesn't direct still look as good.

The show also features:
-Crazy old Van Helsing-type with make-shift sword in his cane!
-Zombie vampires!
-The hispanic guy from Veronica Mars!
-Neil Diamond!
-Milk!
-The WWF's Kurrgan!

I am excited to see what's in store for the rest of season 1, because as far as I'm concerned, The Strain is well on it's way to outdoing not only Walking Dead's first season, but it's entire series altogether.

The Strain is a head-smashingly good time!

Uncanny eX-Fest 2014

This past weekend, Exhumed Films held their annual celebration of exploitation cinema, eX-Fest. Here's a rundown of the day's shenanigans:

-We celebrated a birthday.




-Prizes were given away to lucky members of the crowd.

-EF announced upcoming shows for the Summer of Sci-Fi:
Starman and Escape from New York on June 20th
The LOST Film Fest on July 20th
Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and Dune on August 23rd

-And then the film spools rolled:

THE EAGLE'S SHADOW
I did not grow up watching kung fu films, and I'm not a real big fan of them as an adult, so I was not thrilled when the first film was indeed Kung Fu-y. Thankfully, Eagle's Shadow was a lot of fun.
This early Jackie(or Jacky in the credits[which I pronounced JACK-AYE]) Chan film featured the greatest fighting style in history: Kitty Cat Style! Me-OW!
When Snake Style fails Jack-Aye, and he recieves one too many ass-whuppins', he gains Kitty Cat Style after watching a cat fight a cobra for several minutes. If only everything in life could be learned that easily. 

Great stuff, and highly recommended.

FACE TO FACE
I gave this spaghetti western 20 minutes, and then bailed when I realized that it severely lacked spaghetti. I fed the meter. Chatted with people. Probably took a leak.
This is great stuff why am i not a professional writer yet?

BAMBOO HOUSE OF DOLLS
A "women in prison" film, that was about 75% enjoyable. Somewhere in he middle the movie became really boring, but regained steam during the finale. If you took a shot every time you saw boobs or heard the term Jap, you'd be dead.

THE BEST OF SEX & VIOLENCE
This is a trailer compilation movie, so a few of us took this time to go get a nosh at Pizza Rustica. Despite my love for all day film festivals, it was way too gorgeous of a day to spend all of it indoors, and this pizzeria has a great outdoor section. We bullshitted about everything from wrestling to ex's for an hour, and then we trotted back to the I-House for our next film.

THE MAFU CAGE
I had no idea what the good goddamn christ was going on in this film for the first 15 minutes. I kept asking "What the fuck's a mafu and why is Carol Kane going to kill herself for one?"
As it turns out, Mafu was an orangoutang.
Carol Kane plays Cissy, who, as a child, grew up with her father in Africa, and is now living with her sister in America after Daddy died, and raises monkey's in a large cage at her house. The problem is, Carol is as nutty as a pile of hammers and keeps killing her Mafu's. Then things get crazy.
This was a slow burn, and I loved every minute.

CLASS OF 1984
Was this film a little too mainstream for eX-Fest? Not at all. Although I'd heard of this gem, I had never seen it. This gritty 35mm print made my first watch all the better.
The plot is simple enough: new music teacher in a inner city High School has to deal with a sleaze-ball gang that "runs" the school.
If your still not interested, just know that it features the always awesome Roddy McDowall.

COONSKIN
I wanted to like this film, I really did. It had a lot going for it, like Barry White and Scat-man Crothers, dirty 1970's Harlem and being animated by the great Ralph Bakshi. The problem is there's too much time that passes where absolutely nothing happens. Most of my friends went home during Coonskin, but I'm glad I stuck around for the final film.

Eager Beavers
Despite the ridiculous title, this was not a porn.
Some dude in the worst fake beard in film history gets ornery with a waitress at a nightclub, and decides to follow her home and murder her to death. He then proceeds to "shave" and get a job as a bouncer at the same club so he can kill the rest of the girls who witnessed the crime.
This was highly entertaining, but I feel that eX-Fest should end with something a little crazier.
If I had set the order of films, I would've put Eager Beavers first, and ended with the Jack-Aye Chan Joint. Definitely more of a crowd-pleasing ending.

That brings us to my only real issue with this year's event: there was nothing too crazy shown. After the big "to do" the EF guys made about the van-load of film prints that they acquired, we really thought that this was going to be an insane event, which I feel it was far from.
Maybe they're saving those for the LOST Film Fest in July?

Still had a great time, though, and I can't wait for the Summer of Sci-Fi.

VHS is going Viral for it's third installment

VHS is easily the most polarized horror film to come out in forever; people literally love or hate it. Even amongst my fellow horror bloggers.

I loved the first VHS film. I did a "blind buy" a few years ago, and was pleasantly surprised when the stories were all supernatural based. I'll admit that I almost gave up on VHS on my first watch because within three minutes, the shaky cam gave me a splitting headache.
I'm glad I stuck with it, because the VHS experience was a fun one.

The following year we got VHS2, and I'm ashamed to say I have no finished watching it. I viewed the first two segments and I did enjoy what I'd seen so far.

Yesterday it was revealed that we will be getting a third VHS installment: VHS Viral. I wonder if it's going to be "videos on youtube" set-piece?

No release date, but it's likely to debut at Sundance, like the previous two.

Info courtesy of Viewer Discretion Advised

31 Days of Horror: Year 6 - Recap

31 Days of Horror 2013 - The Month in Review

Number of Films Watched: 31(32 if we count Blue Velvet, which Jesse tried to convince me IS a horror film. It's not. 46 if we count the Exhumed Films Horror-thon). This is the first year that I watched one movie for all 31 days, even thought I would go several days without watching anything.

Best Movie: Curse of Chucky - This one took me by surprise. Maybe it's because I went in expecting nothing, but Curse ended up being awesome, and Chucky has never looked better. Don't listen to the haters, give this one a watch asap.

Worst Movie: My Soul To Take by a country mile. This movie really brought to light that Wes Craven really never was much of a dialogue guy and should always have a co-writer(like he had on Dream Warriors).

Biggest Kill Count: Nightmare City with 74 deaths. This one got so crazy that I had to start analyzing the violence: "Well that guy only took a baseball bat to the chest, thats not a deathblow."
The number may have been doubled if I counted the scabby-headed zombie deaths.

Smallest Kill Count: The Blair Witch Project with 3 probably deaths(none are on-screen but the trio are never seen again).

Beheadings, head crushings and head explosions? Evil Dead '82 has a decent beheading, as does Deadly Spawn when a poor girl's head gets bit off by the Alien. Wicked, Wicked also has a decapitation using a good old fashioned guillotine.
Evil Dead '13 has a great bathroom porcelain head crushing, As does Saw IV with a pair of 100 pound ice blocks.
The best one was also the most unexpected, with an awesome head explosion in Halloween 6, which probably is Michael Myers' best kill in the entire series.

Chainsaw Fights? Sadly, none. Came close a few times..

Pimp-mobiles? None. What the hell.

Exploding Children? Yes! Thank you, Demon Knight!

Viggo Mortensen? YES! Leatherface - Texas Chainsaw Massacre III took me by surprise with that one.

Good month, not great. Will have to change things up a bit next year.
Coming next is my thorough review of the 7th Annual Exhumed Films 24 Hour Horror-thon.

31 Days of Horror: Year 6 - Part 7

One of the things I've really enjoyed about this month has been rediscovering films that I haven't seen since my early teen years, such as Hellraiser, Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3 and Last House on the Left. We continue that enjoyment today with...

MOVIE 30

What can I say about The Evil Dead that hasn't already been said a million times? Honestly, nothing really. It's a really good movie, and was surely scary as hell when it was roaming the movie houses back in 1982. Although I wonder if the stop-motion sequences were scary then, as I'm sure today's young, jaded horror fans would laugh at it as they tweeted during most of the film.
Unfortuneatly for me, I watched Army of Darkness first, and was pretty disappointed when my brother rented The Evil Dead from West Coast Video only to find out that this trilogy does not start off as funny as it ends. That's just the how my 13 year old self thought. Stupid stupid 13 year old me.
Kill Count: 4
Best Scene: I love all the stop-motion horror. It adds a disturbing element to the whole thing.
One More Thing: Forget Freddy Vs. Jason, I want Deadites Vs. Cenobites! That Necronomicon and the Puzzle Box have lots in common.

MOVIE 31

I purposely chose this as my final film for 31 Days of Horror, but it would seem after my third viewing, I have a lot more to say about it than I can fit into one quick review blog. Maybe it's just fanboy posturing, but I feel there's some deep layers going on with Evil Dead '13, and I plan on going into them in a deeper blog.
Kill Count: 6(and that includes the "Abomination" at the end)
Best Death: Probably the best sentence I'll ever type in my entire life: Death by chainsaw to the face, that then turns into total body evisceration. It's truly a beautiful scene.
One More Thing: I do not understand any horror fan who watches this movie and hates it. I respect everyone's opinions, but an Evil Dead remake(even though I don't think it's a remake) was going to happen no matter what. At least now it was done with care and respect for the source material.

THAT'S IT. 31 Days of Horror is over! I'm gonna go out and enjoy Halloween. You all should do the same. THANK YOU for reading!

31 Days of Horror: Year 6 - Part 6

MOVIE 27

TCM3 was a movie my friend put on at a slumber party I went to as a kid, that I was too terrified to watch. Any movie titled The Texas Chainsaw Massacre sounded way too hardcore for a kid at that age, and I really don't think I was exaggerating too much.
20+ years later, I finally watched TCM3, and while it's not for kids at all, it's certainly the tamest of the original trilogy. With that said, I absolutely loved TCM3. It has everything going for it: Ken Foree, giant, stainless-steel chainsaw, the Leather-Truck(!), and mother fucking Viggo Mortensen! I honestly had no idea that Viggo was in TCM3 when I popped the disc in, and it made the movie that much sweeter. Sadly, no chainsaw fight, and we came close to a head explosion, but instead we got a shotgun blast to the chest. Yawn.
Otherwise, Leatherface: Texas Chainsaw Massacre III is a great time.
Kill Count: 5(and 1 dead armadillo)
Best Scene: The unveiling of the Leather-Truck had me in hysterics.
One More Thing: TCM3 has the best movie trailer of the entire franchise, possibly of any horror movie ever.

MOVIE 28

I went into this one with an open mind, I really did. But it's just bad. Bad writing, pacing, editing, kills, lame attempts at humor. I'd swear they were trying to take TCM in a SCREAM direction, if TCM:TNG hadn't come out 2 years earlier. Only watch this out of extreme curiosity.
Kill Count: 5
Best Scene: I hate to say it, but Matthew Mcconaughey is highly entertaining in this. The movie's only saving grace.
One More Thing: The very end of the movie has a quick cameo by Marilyn Burns(the sole survivor from the original film) as she rolls by on a hospital gurney. She's oddly credited as Anonymous.

MOVIE 29

As much as I want to, I cannot hate this movie. TC3D was an unwanted, un-needed sequel/remake/reboot/retread that actually does a really good job at showing love to the original movie, all while trying to create a story of it's own. To little surprise, the new story pretty much falls flat on it's face.
TC3D says it's a direct sequel to the original 1974 film, yet the the story's protagonist, whose age is never given, cannot be older than 25. This is a plot-hole that you could drive a Mac Truck through. The writer's could've easily set the story in the mid '90s. All they needed to do was remove iPhones, change the music and alter a little dialogue. This(along with a few other aggravating points) really makes me want to hate this film to it's very core. But I can't.
It's very obvious to me that they cared for the original's history, and with some work this could've been an awesome film. I blame the fact that one of the writer's was best known for working on Soap Operas. Go ahead and hate on Texas Chainsaw 3D, it deserves it, but just know that they meant well. I truly believe this.
Kill Count: 21(may be the highest of the whole franchise)
Best Scene: Anything with Alexandra Daddario's exposed midriff. Hilariously, when she wear's a dress-shirt late in the film, she only buttons the very top, still leaving everything exposed to the word. It's like she had no time to do anymore buttons because a maniac was after her.
One More Thing: And don't even get me started on the fact that this movie was in 3D. *starts flipping over tables*

31 Days of Horror: Year 6 - Part 5

MOVIE 25

The last time I watched this, it opened the Exhumed Films' Horror-thon a few years back. Other than the original film, I'd seen this one the most in the series, but it wasn't until I sat down with an Exhumed audience that this movie became a completely different monster. It was at this moment when I realized that I really love watching movies with that crowd. It's something that cannot be explained properly, but needs to be experienced first hand.
As for the movie itself, it's certainly the 2nd best one of the series. Despite my love for NOEM2, you could easily eliminate it, and the rest of the films(until Freddy's Dead) have a pretty good flow to 'em, story wise.
Since Dream Warriors and Dream Master ended up being such huge successes, they sped-up the production of Dream Child, released it less than a year after Dream Master, and ruined the series, since it was a pretty weak installment and was a box office bomb. Freddy's awesome momentum was killed because of producer's greed. Sadly, this is not unusual in Hollywood, since H'wood killed-off plenty of horror franchises, some before they could even get any good steam going. But that's an angry conversation for another time.
Kill Count: 5
Best Scene: I really love the Freddy Skeleton scene. When you think about it, Freddy probably had to use A LOT of teen soul-juice to make that happen, which could've led to his defeat.
One More Thing: Why was Nancy cos-playing as Blondie from The Good The Bad and The Ugly at Philip's funeral?

MOVIE 25

Werewolf movie. Completely burned out. Back after the Horror-thon this weekend.
Kill Count: 6
Best Scene: Dick Miller: Occult Bookstore Owner should've been a tv show.
One More Thing: The movie ends with the lovely Dee Wallace turning into a Wookie and nothing will convince me otherwise.