Rewind This! (2013)

"Home video changed the world. The cultural and historical impact of the VHS tape was enormous. This film traces the ripples of that impact by examining the myriad aspects of society that were altered by the creation of videotape."

Even though this documentary's director, Josh Johnson, has been gobbing-off and exaggerating about how I called him "creepy" for being yet another two-day follower on Twitter who appeared on my followers list, said nothing to me ever, and then unfollowed me just because I didn't follow him back simply for existing, I'm not Harry Knowles and will give "Rewind This!" a fair review. Yes, Josh, I know you'll read this and report back to your new clique of pretend friends, so enjoy your time here!

For what it is, "Rewind This!" is an informative yet somewhat repetitive history of VHS. Interviews with several celebrities in the horror movie industry including Charles Band, Lloyd Kaufman, Frank Henenlotter, and Cassandra Peterson are mixed with nutty independent filmmakers and VHS collectors to good effect, but there are too many big names missing for it to be the "definitive" documentary on the subject. That tagline in the trailer has a Hell of a lot wrong with it!

Where's Paul from VHScollector.com or any of the other YouTube collectors such as KandJhorrordotcom? They aren't in this anywhere, but one of the last "mom and pop" video stores and some amusing sadsack who gleefully films no-budget camcorder movies for his own amusement take up a good chunk of time which would have been better spent on interviewing more collectors. Why do that when what people really want to see is the tapes themselves, the novelty big boxes, and a more indepth look at how all the different distribution companies came and went? Where's the advice for new collectors from old collectors? And how can you let someone who stacks her tapes sideways by colour pass by without comment on her incorrect way of storing them? Arrrgh!

Unlike the maker of this documentary, I was alive before VHS tapes existed and can enthuse a lot more about how they revolutionised the way we all viewed movies. These "90s kid" filmmakers are so spoiled by modern technology that they don't even know they were born! Sadly, it shows in such superficial presentations because of the lack of real life experience and research. Information such as how the Betamax phase was over before it began in Britain, or that PAL VHS rental boxes (in two different sizes depending on whether they were ex-rentals or sell-through) were plastic rather than the cardboard crap which the American NTSC tapes came in isn't even mentioned! I know you can't include everything, but that's exceptionally lazy considering that I know Josh regularly talks to a certain English VHS blogger on Twitter!

Overall, I enjoyed the nostalgic interviews with the celebrities, but learnt precious little about the collectors or what they had in their collections. I got some entertainment but no joy out of "Rewind This!"; it gave me no incitement or renewed enthusiasm to start collecting again, and I actually felt quite alienated by its Americanness. There's also far too much emphasis on business in what appears to be an attempt to discredit the innovators for their opportunist capitalism, but maybe that's just how I naturally read things negatively. In fairness, I've also seen infinitely more famous people disgrace themselves on YouTube once the smoke and mirrors are gone.

Thus, I came away from "Rewind This!" feeling like there's a much bigger story to be told, and there is. Fortunately, another documentary called "Adjust Your Tracking" is coming soon which promises to be better. It's still too early to tell whether either will be the "definitive" documentary about VHS, but collectors will probably buy both anyway.

Worth a rental.

An American Ghost Story (2012)

"When Paul, an unemployed writer, decides to rent and live in a house that's rumoured to be haunted, he puts his life and his relationships in grave danger as he obsessively attempts to get the story that will finally make his career."

Whenever a yet to be released horror movie which was made for under $10,000 achieves a 7.5 out of 10 rating on the IMDb, I smell shenanigans. Either not enough non-shills have found it and voted, or the "critics" who received screeners really did find it outstanding. The chances of the latter being true are invariably slim to none though.

Thus, as much as I didn't want to backtrack to another one of last year's movies—especially not one with a title change designed to cash-in on the success of FX's "American Horror Story" TV series—curiosity meant that I had no choice but to check out the ghost story formerly known as "Revenant". I'm pleased to say that I wasn't disappointed by my discoveries either. Although very little has improved since Derek Cole and Stephen Twardokus made "Human Behavior" (2006), at least this movie is in colour like something created in the 21st century should be.

Unfortunately, with annoying, atmosphere-killing background music throughout, "An American Ghost Story" fails to generate an ambience conducive to scares. Things improve enormously when silence reigns, but at its worst, the music sounds like a cat walking up and down a piano keyboard while a tone-deaf 5-year-old child practices chords next to it. Occasionally, it even overpowers the dialogue, and that's a real shame because the acting is fairly decent.

Stephen Twardokus is very good as Paul the obsessive ghost hunter who bites off more than he can chew, and natural beauty Liesel Kopp is ideal as his girlfriend Stella. Liesel Kopp has a lovely, expressive face with big, watery eyes that exude genuine fear in her nighttime scenes. It's a pity that Stella disappears from the movie after 30 minutes, but she's really only in it to represent the sane action which most people would choose when faced with living in a haunted house.

Even Paul's best friend Sam (Cain Clifton) is likeable, so I have to give credit where it's due for the casting choices and characterisation. Wendy Haines is a bit over the top as former resident Sue, and Jon Gale isn't quite so hot as Skip the house-owner, but they only have very small roles which don't add much to the story anyway. Both provide minimal exposition/confirmations about details which have already been said rather than falling into the "idiot lecture" trap.

So where does it all go wrong? Well, apart from the aforementioned awful background music which is only used properly in two action-packed places, "An American Ghost Story" is a very slow burn, and it's full of clichés and homages instead of originality.

There's absolutely nothing here that you haven't seen before, especially if you're a fan of haunted house movies. In particular, "An American Ghost Story" owes a lot to the "Paranormal Activity" series. You could even describe it as a conflation of all the jump scares from the "Paranormal Activity" movies without the camcorders and home security surveillance contrivances.

As much as I would love to praise the "old school" use of tripods and zooms to provide an easy film to watch, there are flaws with the cinematography. Some of the long shots never zoom in enough, and several others are poorly framed. One of this story's biggest contrivances is to have Paul investigating the house at night using a flashlight, which leads to scenes that are too dark to see properly. The intention may have been to cover-up a multitude of effects sins by using the darkness for cover, but it also makes Paul's actions moronic in a house with fully functional electric lights and no power outages!

The house itself is very modern, and amazingly neat and tidy inside. It may have a lot of mismatched wood going on—a mahogany dining table among light oak cupboards is the worst culprit—but it's not a sinister looking house at all. Apart from one of those Crosley Companion radios which is designed to look like an antique one, there's nothing creepy to see. The characters may keep saying how oppressive the atmosphere is, but the "Emperor's new clothes" technique doesn't work when the reality is so painfully obvious.

Even with its flaws, all but two of the jump scares work, but so they should since they've been done to death in other movies! Without spoiling things too much for you, I'll just mention that doors and cupboards open on their own, a basketball is predictably rolled towards Paul by an invisible being, the scary-looking radio switches itself on, and there's a chair-stacking homage to "Poltergeist" (1982) which made me groan. There are a lot of excessively loud bangs to catch you out, and one computer-based moment which I should have known better than to fall for (because I leaned in close to the screen) really works! All I'll say about it, after nearly soiling myself, is that I'm surprised that anyone still uses AOL mail... and you can't animate a jpg image! Well played, Derek Cole, you ass!

As you can see in the trailer, the big thing in "An American Ghost Story" is the use of "sheet ghosts" which, of course, also appear briefly in "Paranormal Activity 3" (2011). The last time I saw sheet ghosts before that was in The Avalanches' "Frontier Psychiatrist" music video. Sheet ghosts are traditionally used for comic effect as in "Beetlejuice" (1988) rather than being terrifying for anyone other than small children, but they work very well here. In its favour, "An American Ghost Story" seriously attempts to make sheet ghosts scary again!

What's my verdict then? All things considered, and with the wind blowing in the right direction, I don't think "An American Ghost Story" deserves its 7.5 out of 10 rating on the IMDb (note: it's now dropped to 6.2 and still falling), but I'm willing to give it a pass mark of 4.5 out of 10 simply because I was entertained. If "An American Ghost Story" was due to be released without any background music, it would be much stronger. It still wouldn't be more than a clone of other haunted house movies, but the sad truth is that the chances of ever seeing any groundbreaking originality in this subgenre is unlikely anyway.

"An American Ghost Story" is definitely worth a rental. If you aren't so enamoured by Katie Featherston that you've vowed never to watch another haunted house movie unless she's in it, you'll probably enjoy this a lot more.

An American Werewolf in London (1981)

"Two American tourists in Britain are attacked by a werewolf that none of the locals will admit exists."

Do I really need to review "An American Werewolf in London"? Well, just on the off chance that there may be at least one person on the planet who has never even heard of it, I'll ramble about it anyway.

I haven't rewatched "An American Werewolf in London" for almost three months now, which is probably the longest that I haven't seen it since I moved. I really can't count the number of times that I've used this film to enter my "happy place", but it's been a lot. Some people might find it weird that a horror movie forms a huge part of my comfort zone which I have very little desire to ever leave, but it does.

I don't know what it is exactly about "An American Werewolf in London" which makes me feel all snuggly and cosy inside, since when I've tried to analyse it before, all I could pin it down to were the rainy, opening scenes set on the Yorkshire moors.

David Kessler and Jack Goodman arriving on the moors in the back of truck filled with sheep isn't a totally happy event. In fact, it's a huge piece of symbolism which gives away that they are just lambs for the slaughter, and the name of the pub that they then visit repeats it. But socially awkward as the fish out of water that they may be, the pair are so instantly likeable that you feel like you've known them forever, and that makes what follows even more tragic.

If you had some idea in your head that "An American Werewolf in London" was going to be a comedy based on its witty script then seeing Jack get brutally torn apart will change that pretty drastically. When David initially runs away from the first werewolf attack, it makes you wish that there was some way of saving him, but like the original "Wolf Man" starring Lon Chaney, Jr., you already know that he's been doomed from the very beginning.

Geographically speaking, "An American Werewolf in London" is somewhat flawed considering that the Yorkshire moors are over 200 miles away from London and the nearest hospital that David should wake up in after the attack would be much closer. Even taking into account the often maligned National Health Service system (which I miss more than you could possibly imagine) making some huge mistake, it's a huge plot hole which nobody has ever properly explained. But since the scenes on the moors were filmed in Wales, I suppose it's a moot point anyway.

A lot of people refer to "An American Werewolf in London" as a horror-comedy, and it's really annoying, especially for the director John Landis. It's a horror film with some moments of black humour, but it's primarily a horror film with a tragic ending. If it was a comedy then everything would be played for laughs, and there would be an upbeat happy ending.

"An American Werewolf in London" is probably best known for having one of the best human to werewolf transformation scenes in cinematic history. Make-up artist Rick Baker won an Oscar for it, and it's one time that you can actually trust a result from the Academy Awards. The transformation of David Kessler into a big, hairy, snarling beast was groundbreaking at the time and looks really painful. If there's any doubt in your mind that this film is a comedy rather than a real horror movie, that should be the moment that you realise your mistake.

"An American Werewolf in London" really only has a few moments of comic relief which, strangely, serve as a device to make the full-on horror scenes which follow them to be even more horrific. Giving the audience a false sense of security and then shocking the hell out of them is what makes "An American Werewolf in London" still a valid horror film today as it was when it was first released.

Of course, I'm a bit biased when it comes to the merits of "An American Werewolf in London". Not only do I view most of it through rose-tinted glasses, but it was one of the first films on VHS that I ever bought albeit on the "4 Front" label. I still don't have the "Full Moon" edition on DVD, just the regular "Collector's Edition", but I might upgrade soon to just to see "Tall Paul" Davis' "Beware the Moon" documentary which I know he spent years putting together.

Because no movie is ever perfect, there are obviously a number of flaws in "An American Werewolf in London" which I wish weren't there. For instance, David's bad dream sequences are messily placed and are more annoying than revelatory, and if they were cut entirely, it wouldn't make much difference as far as I'm concerned. Of course, some people like seeing David Naughton running around with his cash and prizes on show, and film buffs love discussing the ghoulish German soldiers who butcher his Jewish family, but I didn't think these surreal scenes were very well done.

Another thing which I've never liked is that the werewolf attack scenes are too short and you don't really get to see anything. I know a lot of that was to do with keeping the werewolf hidden as much as possible until the end, especially since as good as the design is, it's still animatronic and the animal's eyes are lifeless and dead. The same thing can be said of Griffin Dunne's puppet in the movie theatre scene. Maybe a CGI makeover would help these creatures to look alive, and I know from the documentaries on the "Special Features" that Rick Baker would definitely be willing to see it happen.

The best horror scene in "An American Werewolf in London" is, undoubtedly, the one where the guy gets stalked and killed in the Tottenham Court underground station. There is absolutely no humour involved at all, even the poster for the spoof porno film "See You Next Wednesday" seen on one of the corridor walls won't mean anything at this point. I wish that the rest of the film had more tension-filled scenes like this, but it is what it is.

My only big problem with "An American Werewolf in London", however, is the ending. Since everybody who watches this film really likes the love story between David and Alex, played by Jenny Agutter (just in case you thought that this story went into same sex relationships beyond the friendship of David and Jack), the tragic ending is not only saddening, but it's quite annoyingly rushed too. When the "bom diddy bom" from "Blue Moon" starts playing almost immediately over the end credits, the whole moment is lost. I blame John Landis for trying to fit every single song with "Moon" in the title into this without putting enough thought about where to strategically place them.

In closing, I may as well mention that I'm still amazed at how hot Jenny Agutter looks as Alex, and despite her very dated use of the English language, it's one of the few roles that I can stand watching her in. It may not be everybody's wish fulfilment to see one of "The Railway Children" get banged by the "Dr. Pepper" guy, but I'm sick like that, as you know. The shower and sex scenes are pretty racy even for 1981, plus there's a "film within a film" piece of soft porn which spices things up a bit too.

Incidentally, I've got Jenny Agutter's autograph, although not on a still from "An American Werewolf in London". I have no idea what movie it's from, so feel free to let me know. She looks a lot prettier than this in "An American Werewolf in London".

It's no surprise that I'm going to recommend "An American Werewolf in London" to you as probably the greatest werewolf film that's ever been made. The sequel "An American Werewolf in Paris" (1997) was a horrible disappointment, so you can forget about watching that. The Universal classic "The Wolf Man" (1941) isn't all it's cracked up to be either unless you like badly dated movies. One that gets mentioned by Jenny Agutter's character, Hammer's "The Curse of the Werewolf (1961), and the copycat Tyburn production "Legend of the Werewolf" (1975), would be my other recommendations.

For some people who absolutely hate werewolf movies, "An American Werewolf in London" may seem overrated, but as someone who has watched it a couple of hundred times over, I can assure you that it's not. Add it to your collection now!