VHS and Betamax You Have Recently Rented

[LaGoosh]

16 hours ago, Merzbow said:

If it wasn't for Strange Darling it's be my top thriller of the year but there's not much between them.

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We finally have our female Patrick Bateman!

 

I watched this last night, it was pretty good. Except for one insane moment where the bloke counters being drugged with ketamine by snorting loads coke and is back to health and perfectly normal. Absolutely fucking mental.

[BomberPat]

Nightmare On Elm Street

Watched at Regency Street Cinema as part of an Evolution of Horror live podcast evening thing. First time watching it since I was probably about 14 or 15. Not a single bit of good acting in the entire film but I don't care, it's still fantastic. The effects are brilliant, and Freddy Krueger is still genuinely creepy and sinister before he turned into a comedy act.

I think Halloween is the greatest slasher film of all time, and the fact that it still holds up so well despite everything it has done being ripped off a million times by every subsequent slasher is proof of that, and Nightmare is a close second for similar reasons; it manages to take all the tropes that were already firmly established, and the addition of dream-logic makes them fresher and more inventive, and even justifies some of them - you don't need to explain how the killer can move so quickly from one place to another, or why you suddenly run so slowly, because it's a dream and that's how these things work. Brilliant.

I also love how this era of slasher movie gore hasn't got to full gross-out levels of showing internal organs or anything, it's just tons of blood. The human body in these films is just an ambulatory sack full of blood.

[Merzbow]

All About Lily Chou-Chou

An absolutely beautiful yet harrowing slice of teenage life, online identity and how brutally horrible young people can be to each other. It's gained another generation of fans recently which I imagine was partly down to the film's aesthetic and how it captures Y2K era culture so perfectly, from the filming style to the use of the early internet and the eras tech which the younger gen are mad for now.

The film can be a bit all over the place at times, it's not exactly cohesive but I forgive it as it just adds to that weirdly dreamlike feeling.

[Bellenda Carlisle]

Some horror stuff as it's the season 

Frankie Freako (dodgy download) 

I absolutely loved this, it's a recent Canadian b movie that's a throwback to 80s puppet horrors like ghoulies, critters, puppet master etc. It's about a square dude who summons some troublemaking little party animal monsters for a bit of excitement. It's so silly and cheap but in all the right ways for me, the tone was perfect and the film was just adorable. Results will vary but I loved it.

Heretic (cinema)

This was the total opposite, a very wordy tense slow creeper. Really enjoyed this, brilliant acting from the main cast, loving Hugh Grant's experimental phase. As Dmal said, a very hard film to give an ending but the tension, mystery and performances carried it to the end.

Never let go (cinema)

The film with Halle Berry in the wilderness  I didn't hate every scene in isolation but as a whole i found it boring and not really for me. I liked the main kid though.

Speak No Evil (cinema) 

I thought this was great. Being stuck with a way too intense, escalating english nutter is the most relatable horror I've seen in years. I'm much more scared of that than being attacked by a dead child molester in my dreams so the tension was very palpable. James Mcavoy is on a Russel Crowe/Nic Cage wild one in this and I'm all for it. Always happy to see Mackenzie Davis, i even watched a rotten tv series where the only thing that survived post nuclear apocalypse was a twee touring Shakespeare company just for her.

[Cod Eye]

3 hours ago, BomberPat said:

Nightmare On Elm Street

Watched at Regency Street Cinema as part of an Evolution of Horror live podcast evening thing. First time watching it since I was probably about 14 or 15. Not a single bit of good acting in the entire film but I don't care, it's still fantastic. The effects are brilliant, and Freddy Krueger is still genuinely creepy and sinister before he turned into a comedy act.

I think Halloween is the greatest slasher film of all time, and the fact that it still holds up so well despite everything it has done being ripped off a million times by every subsequent slasher is proof of that, and Nightmare is a close second for similar reasons; it manages to take all the tropes that were already firmly established, and the addition of dream-logic makes them fresher and more inventive, and even justifies some of them - you don't need to explain how the killer can move so quickly from one place to another, or why you suddenly run so slowly, because it's a dream and that's how these things work. Brilliant.

I also love how this era of slasher movie gore hasn't got to full gross-out levels of showing internal organs or anything, it's just tons of blood. The human body in these films is just an ambulatory sack full of blood.

Do you not think Robert Englund's performance as Freddy is any good? I agree about the rest of the cast's acting being iffy(barring maybe John Saxon, who I love), but Englund was absolutely brilliant and one of horror's great performances. For such a personable and warm individual in real life to portray pure evil and creepiness the way he did was amazing!

  

[BomberPat]

46 minutes ago, Cod Eye said:

Do you not think Robert Englund's performance as Freddy is any good? I agree about the rest of the cast's acting being iffy(barring maybe John Saxon, who I love), but Englund was absolutely brilliant and one of horror's great performances. For such a personable and warm individual in real life to portray pure evil and creepiness the way he did was amazing!

  

Yeah, to be fair I'm maybe not giving Englund credit there - I tend to give more credit to the directing and character design for why Krueger is so scary in this film, but none of it works without Englund bringing it all together. I wasn't thinking about him so much as the "normal" cast. 

John Saxon just felt like he was always one wrong acting choice away from becoming Adam West at any moment.

[Cod Eye]

3 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

Yeah, to be fair I'm maybe not giving Englund credit there - I tend to give more credit to the directing and character design for why Krueger is so scary in this film, but none of it works without Englund bringing it all together. I wasn't thinking about him so much as the "normal" cast. 

John Saxon just felt like he was always one wrong acting choice away from becoming Adam West at any moment.

Being a massive Elm Street fan, ive seen and read everything there is to be found about the production, etc. Barring the make up, the vast majority of character choices came from Englund himself. 

The shower scene in Part 2 shows what a Freddy without him would have been. How they thought they could just put a stunt man under a mask after part 1, I'll never know?

Like I say though, I do agree about the rest of the cast. I know it was a necessity due to the budget(and to be fair, 80's slasher acting was almost universally dodgy), but a more solid "supporting" cast could have pushed the movie even higher!

[Devon Malcolm]

1 hour ago, Bellenda Carlisle said:

Always happy to see Mackenzie Davis, i even watched a rotten tv series where the only thing that survived post nuclear apocalypse was a twee touring Shakespeare company just for her.

Absolutely every word of this applies to me too.

[Frankie Crisp]

Sting (Netflix)

This is great. After seeing the trailer I was expecting something B-movie/tongue-in-cheek, but it was a bit darker than that. At times we were thinking all bets were off when it came to victims, and the use of the ventilation system throughout worked really well. A really fun 90 minutes.

I need a break from shark films so I might have a spider season on the back of this.

On a side-note, when I just logged it on Letterboxd, I read @Devon Malcolm’s review and burst out laughing in the middle of the office.

[Devon Malcolm]

46 minutes ago, Frankie Crisp said:

 I need a break from shark films so I might have a spider season on the back of this.

I just watched a French one on Prime called Infested, it's quite similar to Sting and just as good.

[DJM]

Copshop
A good, old-school (Assault on Precinct 13-esque) action-thriller with a simple but effective plot (a con artist hides out inside a police station whilst on the run from an assassin), good action and a good cast. 

Guns Akimbo
A fun, 90-minute action-comedy with some entertaining videogame-style violence throughout. 

Till Death
An entertaining thriller, about a woman who whilst celebrating her wedding anniversary at a lake house, is handcuffed to her husband as part of a sick revenge plot and has to survive as two killers arrive at the lake house. It's a little silly at times, but it's also under 90-minutes long and Megan Fox is quite good in the lead role. 

One Cut of the Dead is a fun horror comedy, whilst One Cut of the Dead Spin-Off In Hollywood is entertaining enough but a weaker, shorter and less effective rehash of as the original.

The Watchers is an underwhelming supernatural horror film.

Willow Creek
An awful found-footage film about a man and his girlfriend who try to capture firsthand evidence of Bigfoot. 45 minutes of them talking to locals about Bigfoot, followed by 20 minutes of them sitting in a tent listening to sounds outside the tent, followed by 10 minutes of them getting lost in the woods. It's boring, it's never scary and there is no tension or atmosphere at any point during it's short runtime. 

Themla
A good supernatural drama about a girl who whilst trying to deny her feelings for a female friend, causes her suppressed psychokinetic powers to reemerge. 

Reminiscence 
A decent sci-fi noir thriller with an interesting story and a good cast, but it's derivative of other (better) films, lacks focus and depth and is a film you will probably forget most of soon after watching it. 

[DavidB6937]

I don't know why I thought I could get through Wild Robot without crying but I tried. I failed. What a mess. Beautiful. Gorgeous animation. Ruined me.

[ReturnOfTheMack]

Because I'm a horror film wimp my Halloween was shared between Tucker and Dale Vs Evil, and the first 3 Hotel Transylvania films.

 

AND I ENJOYED THEM ALL!

[Hannibal Scorch]

Heretic wasn’t what me and Mrs Scorch were expecting but I thought it was an entertaining watch even if the last 1/3 went a little bit bloated. Hugh Grant was obviously wonderful. A career which has gone from foppish romantic lead to some really fun roles in the last few years. But Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East did a great job as the two Mormons. 

[Devon Malcolm]

Just came back from Anora. What I was expecting was the magic Mikey Madison performance everyone has reported. What I wasn't expecting was how funny it was going to be for such a long time. I think the ending is junk and there's some casual homophobia in here which is a really weird choice in 2024, and Sean Baker is a director who I continue to be suspicious of despite mostly really liking his films. But when this is being a slapstick comedy, what a film it is.