I Spit on Your Grave 2 (2013)

"Katie is trying to make it in the cutthroat world of modeling. When she innocently accepts an offer to have new photos taken for her portfolio, the experience quickly turns into an unthinkable nightmare of rape, torture, and kidnapping. When a twist of fate finally frees her from her captors - beaten, battered, bruised, and broken, she will have to tap into the darkest places of the human psyche to not only survive her ordeal, but to ultimately find the strength to exact her brutal revenge."

Starring Jemma Dallender (from "Hollyoaks") doing an American accent, Joe Absolom (from "Eastenders") with an Eastern European accent, Mary Stockley (from "The Woman in Black" remake), and a load of Bulgarians who you've never heard of, Steven R. Monroe's "I Spit on Your Grave 2" is not only the underwhelming sequel in name only that you would expect, but also the rape-revenge clone that nobody asked for or needs.

Annoying handheld camerawork which refuses to stay still, more screaming than is strictly necessary, multiple black screens to show the passage of time, and bucketloads of mean-spiritedness don't add up to anything remotely enjoyable. "I Spit on Your Grave 2" is just a time-wasting mess of predictable tropes, bad acting, and generic torture porn.

As someone who makes no secret of loving "extreme horror", even I have my limits when it comes to poor quality dreck like this. I was, by turns, bored, disappointed and thoroughly dissatisfied. All the criticisms of the first "I Spit on Your Grave" remake which I defended are now totally applicable to this movie instead. It's gratuitous for the sake of being gratuitous, soulless, and not even as entertaining as "Hostel" with its clichéd xenophobia.

Although things start off realistically enough, the whole raping, drugging and kidnapping shenanigans progress into being more ridiculous than harrowing. I'm sure that there are certain "Women in Horror" bloggers who will have a field day with the rape scenes because, let's face it, they've got puritanical sticks up their asses about this kind of thing, and their whole pointless lives are dedicated to seeking out the controversial so that they can pretend to be morally superior. As it's all they have to attract readers to their hypocritical blogs anyway, I'll let them have at it this time because nothing here was able to float my boat.

"Tell me how much you want to watch my showreel from Hollyoaks!"

Jemma Dallender isn't as attractive as Sarah Butler, her vain character is instantly dislikeable, and her change from being a haughty, prudish model to a semi-feral sewer-dweller has to be some of the laziest storytelling that I've ever had the misfortune to see. Aside from dozens of lapses in logic, her incredible character changes are unintentionally comical unless this movie is supposed to be a comedy. Given that the 1978 original is one of my top ten horror-comedies, maybe this isn't meant to be taken too seriously either, but how someone frail enough to be described as weighing about as much as a "leaf dripping wet" can develop superhuman strength after only eating half of a spit-roasted pigeon and three cans of beans is still absolutely mindboggling!

Despite being extremely graphic, the gory revenge elements are equally uninventive and lack the poetic justice which would make them memorable. All the background noise and screaming which obliterates the payoff lines is beyond irritating, especially as there's no way on Earth that anyone could decipher the most important one. I replayed it ten times before giving up!

I hate to say it, but after looking forward to "I Spit on Your Grave 2" ever since I first heard about it, I can't recommend this movie to anyone.

No One Lives (2012)

"A gang of ruthless highway killers kidnap a wealthy couple traveling cross country only to shockingly discover that things are not what they seem."

Have you ever heard of "No One Lives" before? No? Me neither. Usually when a movie has such beautifully gory set pieces, the internet goes crazy with the buzz about it, but bizarrely, not this time. Thus, we have one of the main problems with anything put out by WWE Studios: For some reason known only to them, they just aren't promoting their movies adequately. The limited theatrical release of this one is another testament to their lack of faith in their own product.

Obviously, the movie business is a bit of sideline for the masters of wrestling shows which delight small children and the poorly educated, and the days of MySpace when we were all encouraged to watch "See No Evil" starring Kane (whoever he is or was) are long since over, but the whole thing feels like a conspiracy. Every big name horror site has hated this movie and gone out of their way to tear it apart. Perhaps they weren't given enough of a financial kickback or something. That also wouldn't surprise me in the least.

Maybe the usually PG-13 friendly WWE are ashamed of "No One Lives" for being R-rated. They shouldn't be because it pretty much rocks if you overlook some of the acting, weaknesses in the script, and a few lags. The dialogue may be more than a little bit hokey, but at least it suits the tone of the rest of the movie. Let's he honest here, "No One lives" is a lot of fun in an over-the-top and mean-spirited way.

With recognisable actors such as Luke Evans and Lee Tergesen in it, I didn't even know that "No One Lives" was a WWE movie anyway although I should have realised that something was slightly amiss when a big, fat, tattooed guy showed up. Other than the fact that he's disgustingly overweight and useless at acting, I wouldn't know that he's a wrestler since I don't watch that crap. I don't know his name and never want to. Even his character is more use dead than alive, but I'll say no more about that because it's a huge spoiler.

Directed by Ryûhei Kitamura of "The Midnight Meat Train" (2008) fame (but nothing else that I've ever seen), "No One Lives" is a difficult movie to place in the horror genre. It starts off as a crime drama about kidnapping, but then really goes into action mode due to a very physical and credible performance by Luke Evans who plays a kind of cross between Freddie Clegg and Rambo.

Although Lee Tergesen starts off well as a crime boss, he's somewhat wasted. I may not like the movie, but he was a lot better in "The Collection" (2012). Adelaide Clemens (from "Silent Hill: Revelation 3D"), on the other hand, isn't very convincing because the part is simply too big for her. Having said that, I can't actually think of anyone except Melissa George who could have done it better, and unfortunately, she's too old now.

Standouts include Derek Magyar as the evil Flynn and Lindsey Shaw as Amber ("the only one with a soul") who go above and beyond what you would expect from TV actors. America Olivo is also her usual self, but I love America Olivo and she can do no wrong. She gets her boobs out too, which is another reason why she needs to be in every horror movie from now on as far as I'm concerned.

As you would expect from a $2,900,000 budget, production values are very high throughout "No One Lives". Not only is the gore outstanding, all of the stunts are exceptionally well choreographed. Presumably that's where WWE's many years of faking fights must have been extremely useful.

Not knowing what to expect, I was impressed by how original "No One Lives" was in places, and even as a seasoned horror fan, I didn't see the twists coming. Mind you, if I live to be 100, I'll probably never see the twists coming in any thriller because I'm not wired that way.

It's not scary as such, the tension could have been handled much better, but for what it is, "No One Lives" is highly entertaining. It's not the greatest horror movie ever made, but it's well above average when compared to most of the junk available right now.

The Collection (2012)

"A man who escapes from the vicious grips of the serial killer known as The Collector is blackmailed to rescue an innocent girl from the killer's booby-trapped warehouse."

If you can survive the migraine-inducing, pop video-style opening credits or you're a teenager, you might enjoy the latest "Aliens" remake known as "The Collection". Okay, so there are no aliens in it, but for those of us who are a bit older, it's exactly the same story as "Aliens" (1986) give or take a lot more gore and torture.

I'll be honest, I didn't like "The Collector" (2009) apart from the alternative ending. I much prefer the 1965 cat friendlier version. Arkin isn't a character that I can relate to, and to be blunt, "The Collector" is too far-fetched, has no tension, it looks cheap, and it bores me to tears.

So why did I watch "The Collection"? Well, I suppose I had to since it's the last horror movie of the year with a worldwide theatrical release. I still didn't really want to review it, but I needed to justify my reasons for hating it as much as all the other grumpies.

Here we go again!

Let's begin with the completely alienating characters. No, they're still not aliens, but they might as well be. What do I have in common with teenage nightclubbers or rich people? Since at least 1994, nothing. 1994 was the last time I set a foot inside a nightclub, and even then I only had one pint of beer before I left. I can't remember the music that was playing, but it was loud enough to make my ears ring for the next four hours so I decided to call it a day. As for rich people, yeah, I wish. I certainly don't have anything in common with Newt, I mean Arkin (Josh Stewart), either.

I love torture movies or "torture porn" (if you want to call them that) so I will admit that the giant lawnmower shenanigans in the nightclub are kind of cool. Of course, it's all as ridiculous as any of the traps in "The Collector" or the "Saw" movies so take any praise I give with a huge pinch of salt.

The other torture scenes in "The Collection" are more about the aftermath than really seeing anything so it's a huge bait and switch for the most part. A tongue gets pulled out and there are a couple of scary spiders in the first half hour, but that's it until the Space Commandos, I mean "small private army" on a rescue mission, are led into The Collector's lair by Arkin. In formulaic slasher style, the barely-defined cannon fodder start getting picked off one by one in various unpleasant ways by old Gimp-face and his drugged-up or booby-trapped victims.

The next 20 minutes up the ante with some decent impalements, but there's still nobody to care about or anything that you haven't seen before. Like I said, there isn't that much to see anyway, just a lot of screaming to make up for it. Our kidnapped heroine, Elena (Emma Fitzpatrick) befriends an instantly predictable blonde nutjob who you know is going to be trouble, and the grunts all look worried or intense as they manage to get themselves decimated. Surprisingly spry for someone just out of hospital, Arkin decides to ditch the grunts in favour of whatever his own agenda may be.

At around 50 minutes in (I know because I was timing it), some tension is generated as the remaining cast members locate and rescue the pretty member of the Space Commandos before she's cut to pieces by a net full of razorblades. It's easily the best part of the movie, but it's too little and far too late.

The resulting scene is just an excuse for the poetically-justified demise of the kooky blonde, more animal cruelty (but who cares because it's only dogs this time anyway), and the loss of the reason why they all went into the hotel for all of a minute. On the bright side, thanks to Arkin being clever, a S.W.A.T. team shows up but does nothing except call the fire department! Boring, boring, boring!

Lock her in a cage until her hair grows!

The final minutes contain some of the most ludicrous things I've ever seen in a horror/action movie. After escaping from a cage by having his already broken arm rebroken, Arkin then has it reset and heals in a way that Bruce Wayne in "The Dark Knight Rises" would be proud of. As if there wasn't enough lack of realism in "The Collection" in the first place!

The climax is then like something out of a console game with The Collector (Randall Archer) very much as the "final boss". There's a "surprise" self-sacrifice by the lead Space Commando, the female Space Commando (who just happens to be black!) has been on borrowed time anyway so she's out, and the now seemingly superhuman Arkin metamorphoses into Ripley to beat the crap out of The Collector without even the need of a yellow space forklift! All that's missing is the famous "Get away from her, you bitch!" line.

In its favour, "The Collection" isn't bad looking (it looks better than the "Saw" movies anyway), and Elena is far from being the most annoying or useless heroine in a horror/action movie. She doesn't do a lot until the end, but what she does is important even if the result of her actions in saving Arkin allow The Collector to escape his fiery death too. Talk about unsatisfying!

But wait, there's more! Not content with one ending which promises a sequel, there are actually two! Worse than that, there's a small loophole in the epilogue which might mean that Arkin has the wrong man! It's doubtful, but now there'll probably be a second sequel, a third, and God knows how many more every year to replace the "Saw" franchise. Oh, no, that's all we need!

I don't know about you, but I can barely wait for the next installment set in a prison full of English skinheads.

The Secret of Crickley Hall (2012)

"A year after their son goes missing, a family moves to Crickley Hall. When supernatural events begin to take place, Eve feels the house is somehow connected to her lost son."

It's been so long since I read James Herbert's 2006 novel which the BBC adapted for this lacklustre Hallowe'en TV offering that I almost forgot what a derivative crock of shit it was. I'm not going to say that Herbie plagiarised "The Devil's Backbone" (2001), but he was clearly influenced by it before "Britishing-up" the story. If he says otherwise, I'll find it very difficult to believe him. It wouldn't be the first time that James Herbert sailed too close to the wind as his famous lawsuit over "The Spear" will confirm. His "Sepulchre" is hardly a million miles away from Clive Barker's "The Damnation Game" as far I remember either.

In fairness, the classic "ghost story with children in it" pattern goes back even before "The Haunting" (1963) or "The Innocents" (1961); both of which have influenced every ghost story ever since. With so many supernatural movies in such a short space of time including "The Others" (2001), "Saint Ange" (2004), "Fragile" (2005), "The Orphanage" (2007), the TV series "Marchlands" (2011), and the even more recent "The Awakening" (2011), it's pretty obvious that there would be some similarities.

Given the basic premise, I'd be foolish not to throw in "The Dark" (2005) and "Half Light" (2006) as more of the same unimaginative cloning from the last decade although "The Haunting of Julia" (1977) and "The Changeling" (1981) also dealt with the "bereavement and haunting" formula long before them. There's just nothing new when it comes to ghost stories.

If you look further into the "six degrees of separation" style connections around "The Secret of Crickley Hall" as a TV miniseries, it's far more amusing where they lead. Director Joe Ahearne is most famous for "This Life" which I'm sure I've mentioned on this blog before as being the series which gave Andrew Lincoln of "The Walking Dead" fame his big break. In between the two, Andrew Lincoln was in "Afterlife" (2006) where he played a bereaved father who had lost his son and teamed up with a psychic played by Lesley Sharp. That series was written by Stephen Volk who wrote "The Awakening" (2011). Although there's no real connection, Lesley Sharp was in an episode of "Doctor Who" and so was Tom Ellis who stars in "The Secret of Crickley Hall". They weren't in the same episode or even the episodes of "Doctor Who" which were written by Joe Ahearne, but you can still smell the BBC nepotism a mile away.

Tom Ellis as Gabe.

Just to complicate matters even more, James Herbert's "Haunted" was originally a screenplay which was rejected as a BBC miniseries, Stephen Volk wrote the BBC's infamous "Ghostwatch" (1992), and Lesley Sharp recently appeared in "Whistle and I'll Come to You" (2010) - another BBC ghost story. If you also look at Tom Ellis' list of acting credits on the IMDb, he's a definite BBC regular and also appeared in "The Fades" - the axed supernatural drama from 2010. It doesn't take a genius to work out that all these people know each other or of each other to some extent. How many generic ghost stories were passed between the writers and the decision makers at the BBC is another matter though. There are too many coincidences for there not to be some collusion along the way. And people say that Hollywood is shady!

Conspiracy theories aside, it will always look like Herbert copied Volk who then copied Herbert back before Ahearne was brought into the shenanigans. The rivalry and borrowing by all three writers is probably more noticeable than any of them realise themselves.

After all this rambling, the main problem with "The Secret of Crickley Hall" is that it's an overlong story which can be condensed into one or two sentences. Basically, there's a wartime orphanage/home for evacuees where the sadistic governor kills a little boy by circumcising him so severely that he cuts his pecker off in the process. The governor covers up the crime during a flood and ends up as a ghost along with all the children he abused. In the present day, a family whose son was kidnapped a year ago go to live in the former orphanage, and all the ghosties get riled up to solve two mysteries in one.

Give or take a couple of even more sordid details, that's "The Secret of Crickley Hall" in a nutshell (pardon the pun). Indeed, it could be retitled, "The Legend of the Mutilated Peepee" since that's the big secret. I don't care that this is a spoiler because I can pretty much guarantee that you won't see the little "Jewish" boy get mutilated or "The Secret of Crickley Hall" turn into "The Jew Who Bled To Death". Oh, no, the politically correct BBC won't dare risk upsetting anybody with that. The last time they were brave enough to be controversial in a drama was when Dennis Potter was still alive. Curiously, they don't seem to care about overpaid Jonathan Ross or Jeremy Clarkson flapping their insulting gums though.

As a miniseries, "The Secret of Crickley Hall" tones down the really disgusting stuff to such an extent that the barebones story is boring beyond belief. The book was short of scares anyway, but the brutality, paedophilia and incest which covered its weaknesses are scarcely touched upon in this pussified TV adaptation. I remember when the BBC used to have more balls. Honestly, "The Secret of Crickley Hall" makes me ashamed to be a British horror fan. What the Hell has happened to Britain since I've been away? What happened to all the gritty dramas?

Olivia Cooke as Nancy.

The characters in "The Secret of Crickley Hall" are merely stereotypical ciphers to move on the uninspired plot anyway, but the deadpan delivery of the actors in this miniseries is reprehensible. Olivia Cooke is the worst culprit. Although she's very pretty, and looks young enough to be in the orphanage as one of the orphans rather than their teacher, her monotone voice can't be disguised by cutely letting one glycerine tear run down her cheek. Could she act as if she cared even less? Can she act though? Probably not since she has to be all of 16 years old.

As for Tom Ellis (a.k.a. Dr Oliver from "Eastenders"), he's a little bit better as the sceptical Gabe Caleigh even though his taste in women must have gone on the wonk for him to end up with Suranne Jones (the mouthy one from "Coronation Street") as his onscreen wife. Okay, so a higher power miscast them together, but that's not how those of us with an unwilling suspension of disbelief view such a lack of chemistry or realism. All you want to say is, "He could have done so much better!" At least neither of them has mispronounced the word "us" as "uzzz" yet despite playing Northerners.

There's some bizarre thing about little fingers and a psychic link which makes absolutely no sense either. There doesn't even appear to be anything odd about Suranne Jones' hands in close-up so I have no idea what that's all about. Either it's a poor effect, bad camerawork, something that seemed more important in the script than it really was, or just feeble execution to match every other part of this travesty. It's hard to tell amidst the conflation and censorship. The psychic link homages "The Shining", of course, as does Tom Ellis' bad "Here's Johnny!" impression. I don't think he even tried to do any better. I can't blame him.

Suranne Jones as Eve.

Poor old David Warner has been wheeled out for this thing too as the old guy who used to be a young guy and knows everything. I've forgotten the name of that trope, but, yes, it's yet another familiar one. It's nice to see David Warner in something again, and he's the best actor in "The Secret of Crickley Hall" anyway. Not to take anything away from Donald Sumpter who has been in absolutely everything over the years, but he's not much cop (pardon another pun since he was in "The Bill") as a paranormal investigator. If he has more than four lines in the final episode, I will be shocked.

It's no surprise that both veteran actors have also been in "Doctor Who" recently. "The Secret of Crickley Hall" could even be "Former Doctor Who Actors Do Ghosties" if you want to be a real bitch about it. I suppose it makes a change from "Eastenders Does Ghosties" which has already been done to death.

I have no idea why the setting was changed from Devon to "oop North" except that occasionally the BBC vainly attempts to make Southerners believe that anywhere above Watford isn't full of Neanderthals who eat their own young. It's probably part of the same equal opportunities nonsense at the BBC which has forced every gay and racial minority actor into "Doctor Who" and "Eastenders" over the years. Yes, all six of them have been assured work by the same hypocritical company which allegedly turned a blind eye to Jimmy Saville interfering with little kids for over 40 years. Following that scandal, no wonder the BBC started to get cold feet about airing "The Secret of Crickley Hall". The ironic reminders in the subject matter are uncomfortably close to home, and there aren't any black or gay characters to redress the balance.

Susan Lynch as Lili.

The BBC missed a golden opportunity to replace the psychic with a Jamaican or Indian, but at least they've stayed truer to the book there. They couldn't use anyone Scottish either without reminding everyone of their stupid decision to axe "Sea of Souls". Knowing that Susan Lynch, who plays Lili Peel, fills the "minority" quotient by being Irish somewhat amused me. I bet someone at some point wanted Lesley Sharp for the role except that would have really given away how similar the present day part of "The Secret of Crickley Hall" is to "Afterlife". I still noticed though.

Since I'm writing this after seeing only two episodes, I can't say if the final one will improve anything. I missed "The Secret of Crickley Hall" when it was shown on BBC America (on October 28th) so I've had to follow the postponed UK schedule. I'm sure that the story won't change that much from the novel unless gay aliens fly in and abduct everybody or something comes out of left field like that. You can never tell what will happen with BBC TV adaptations of horror books as "The Haunted Airman" or any of M.R. James' ghost stories over the years can attest to. If it was a Stephen King adaptation, we would all be waiting for another giant spider so be thankful that this is James Herbert. Herbie just likes to destroy everything at the end so be prepared to see your licence fee wasted on some half-arsed flooding effects or explosions.

With the story taking place in two time periods, the most interesting parts seem to happen in World War II. Whether or not that continues, we will just have to wait and see. "The Secret of Crickley Hall" concludes tomorrow.

The Skin I Live In (2011)

(AKA La piel que habito)



"A brilliant plastic surgeon, haunted by past tragedies, creates a type of synthetic skin that withstands any kind of damage. His guinea pig: a mysterious and volatile woman who holds the key to his obsession."

Far be it from me to suggest that internationally acclaimed Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar copied Matt Eskandari's "Victim" (2010), but I had an overwhelming feeling of déjà vu when I watched "The Skin I Live In". Give or take a few minor details and a lot more money, they are both essentially the same story.

Apparently, the reason for the similarities is that both movies were based on "Mygale", a French crime novel by Thierry Jonquet which was first published in 1984. I don't know how true that is because I haven't read it. It still seems suspicious to me that both directors waited around sixteen years before making their adaptations, but maybe it was merely synchronism.

"The Skin I Live In" is certainly the better of the two movies dramatically although, I hasten to add, I thoroughly enjoyed "Victim" too. In fact, if really pushed on the subject, I'd have to admit that purely for entertainment value, I enjoyed "Victim" a lot more. "The Skin I Live In" is too slick somehow and there is no real horror in it apart from ideas involved in the subject matter.

One of the huge differences between "Victim" and "The Skin I Live In" is that Elena Anaya plays the transformed victim in the latter. I don't want to give away the plot too much because I know that there are still some of you who haven't seen this, but that is a very severe change which I think is done more realistically in "Victim". The captive of "Victim" also deserves what happens a lot more.

Pedro Almodóvar has admitted that he was also inspired by "Eyes Without a Face" (1960) although, in fairness, there are even bigger differences between the two stories. The homage is actually quite subtle since "The Skin I Live In" has more dramatic and tragic elements rather than horror.

The cinematography is, of course, outstanding with all the steady, well-framed scenes, that you would expect. There are still quite a few flaws because of the almost surreal nature of the situation, and possibly, because Antonio Banderas isn't all that believable as a surgeon. Antonio Banderas has a gift for being more traditionally comedic than the still very dark comedy of this movie required, but I appreciated that he played things as straight as he could.

As a "non-horror" with a horror theme, "The Skin I Live In" is a difficult film to rate overall. As just a Pedro Almodóvar movie, it's one of his better ones and very enjoyable. As a horror, it doesn't have a lot of gore or scares so it's quite weak. I'm going to rate it as "average", but the quotation marks are very important. It's a great film which simply didn't conform to the rules of the horror genre enough to score any higher.

Cassadaga (2011)

"A deaf girl attempts to contact her sister during a séance, only to connect with the ghost of a murdered woman."

Over a year ago, my friend John Slowdeath was promoting "Cassadaga" on his blog as if it was going to be the best horror movie ever. I was, of course, quite suspicious at the time. Owing to the fact that I'd never heard anything about it before, and haven't seen a DVD of it for sale anywhere since, I'm still not entirely sure what all the fuss was about.

As you know, things move pretty slowly around these here parts when it comes to movie reviews. I watch at least three horror movies a day, but, since I have a life, writing about newer movies isn't one of my priorities. I'd rather watch and review old horror movies from the '70s than anything modern anyway, so it has taken me until now to start playing catch-up again.

The weirdest thing I discovered about "Cassadaga" is that there still doesn't appear to be a US Region 1 release of it on DVD. At least, that's my understanding based on my searches through Amazon for an affiliate link. Instead, it's only available as a Region 2 DVD which is no problem except for the extortionate price. Thanks to eBay, that's hardly an impediment either. You can guess which option I chose.

Is "Cassadaga" even worth $11.99 plus shipping though? Not really.

Although not exactly the same story, if you've ever seen "The Gift" (2000), you'd be forgiven for thinking that "Cassadaga" was a slightly reworked remake. Both movies are set in the South, both involve a kidnapper/serial killer, and, obviously, the psychic/haunting angle is almost identical. Comparing the two movies beyond that would be like comparing apples to oranges, but, superficially, they are just two versions of the same thing done by different filmmakers.

I know that there's nothing new under the sun when it comes to horror movie plots so I'm not going to make a big song and dance about it. The differences in "Cassadaga" were enough to keep me entertained all the way to the end, but I still wasn't really satiated by it.

The best thing about "Cassadaga" was Lily as played by Kelen Coleman. I honestly don't remember the last time I saw a deaf character in a horror movie and so she was something different. There's a mute character in "Mute Witness" (1994), of course, and numerous blind characters have been the victims of thrillers from "Wait Until Dark" (1967) through to "Blind Terror" ((1971) and right up to "Blink" (1994). I'm sure there are more which I can't remember, but deaf characters are still quite a rarity. As ever, if you can think of any, let me know in the comments section below.

I can't say that Kelen Coleman was very realistic in the role, but I think the plot hole was nicely avoided by her hearing loss being fairly recent and due to illness rather than from birth. I'm sure her voice would still have changed though, and I wasn't convinced that she couldn't hear anything. To be honest, I didn't really care that much as I was too busy admiring her long limbs and trying to work out if she was actually pretty or not.

"Cassadaga" spent a little bit too much time on characterisation and tended to focus more on Lily's love life with Mike (Kevin Alejandro) than it did on the horror elements, but I didn't mind that. The characters weren't the most interesting so they needed all the help they could get. I would have liked to have seen more of the serial killer, "Geppetto", doing his thing, but that's just my own sick preference. What was shown of his marionettes was still gory and more than enough to get the point across.

My second favourite character was, oddly, the cop played by Lucius Baston. He actually seemed like a nice guy and less dumb than cops usually are in horror movies. I won't say any more, but one of the most overused tropes just had to ruin everything there. I was very annoyed.

I was even more annoyed by the "Scooby Doo"-style reveal of the killer's identity since, not only was it predictable, there wasn't enough made of that character to even care. The "red herring" suspect was far more interesting.

At times, "Cassadaga" was a little bit confusing. It also lost its pace after about 40 minutes and then floundered for another hour as it swapped the focus of the plot way too many times. Combining a ghost story with a serial killer thriller was a nice idea, but it didn't really work in this case. Justice was served too quickly and far too neatly just to make way for yet another overly sentimental scene before the ending fell completely flat.

The few jump scares did nothing for me, and the epilogue with a final shock was completely unnecessary unless there is going to be a sequel. As much as I wouldn't mind seeing more of Kelen Coleman in movies, I really don't want to see a sequel to "Cassadaga" if at all possible.

The Collector (1965)

"Freddie, a socially withdrawn bank clerk and butterfly collector, decides to expand to collecting human specimens. That's where art student Miranda Grey comes in. Miranda matches wits with Freddie the icy psychopath."

Ignore the DVD sleeve as this movie had nothing to do with Buffalo Bill from "The Silence of the Lambs". Even though there is a very slight possibility that "The Collector" may have influenced Thomas Harris (either as a movie or in the form of the original novel by John Fowles), the story is a lot different and the motivation of the kidnapper is even more bizarre than wanting to fatten girls up to make a costume out of their skins.

In this 1965 thriller by William Wyler, Terence Stamp plays a butterfly collector named Freddie who, after winning the football pools, buys a house and then decides that the easiest way to get companionship is by kidnapping girls. All he wants is someone to love him, but he's obviously as nutty as a fruitcake with it.

For the purpose of this story, Freddie kidnaps Miranda who is apparently an art student of some kind. It's been so long since I last watched this movie that I can't remember what she was studying, but it probably isn't important. I'm doing this review from memory because I'm too lazy to rewatch the movie, and I doubt that anyone will read this anyway.

Samantha Eggar plays Miranda. If you don't know who she is then you really need to check out "The Uncanny" (1977), "The Brood" (1979) or "Curtains" (1983). She was never primarily a horror actress, but she was certainly in a few of them which are easily available to buy on DVD. I honestly thought she had died a couple of years ago, but it seems that she is still very much alive and doing a lot of television (and even computer game voices) rather than movies now.

Anyway, I suppose you want to know if "The Collector" is a good horror movie or not? Well, it's not really a horror movie if you are expecting scares, blood and guts, or anything else which you wouldn't find in a very '60s thriller. Even though I used to really love this as a movie rather than a part of the horror genre, I'll be the first to admit that it's a bit slow and all very stagey.

I know for a fact that the youth of today would not make it through "The Collector" without a lot of complaining since it's two hours long with hardly any action. I first saw "The Collector" when I was a child and far too young to appreciate what was going on in it too, but I remembered enough of it to want to track it down on VHS many years later.

A lot of things were different to how I remembered them. I thought that Freddie really did love Miranda even though the whole set-up indicated that it wasn't really a good kind of love. It's more about control and hatred of everything which she stood for. His desire to be accepted by someone of her middle class now that he'd changed from working class to nouveau riche seemed to have a lot to do with his psychosis too.

I also mistakenly thought that Miranda eventually did fall in love with Freddie. Clearly, that's not the case as she tries everything in the book to escape from him. Give or take a bit of "Stockholm Syndrome" (or traumatic bonding), there isn't a lot to indicate that Freddie's experiment is anything other than a failure.

Not to spoil it for you, but the plot is reused in a more perverted form by "Grotesque" (2009), an extreme Japanese horror movie which has notoriously been banned in the UK. Allegedly, if the censors had paid attention to the end of "The Collector" in 1965, it would never have seen the light of day either.

If you have the attention span of a gnat then I don't recommend "The Collector" to you at all. If you like more psychological thrillers involving only two characters doing lots of talking then you'll probably love it.

Inside (2006)

When I went in search of "Inside" to rent, I actually ended up with the wrong thing first of all. Obviously this one wasn't in French nor did it feature pregnant bellies anywhere. For some reason the video stores round here have replaced the copies of "À l'interieur" with this one. Wal-mart have also withdrawn the latter due to complaints (probably from other people saying it was crap rather than any other form of disgust at the contents).

But, anyway, I enjoyed this version of "Inside". It was sort of a teenage version of Misery and Cheryl White played a real psycho-bitch-mother from hell. I really can't tell you any more without spoiling it for you because it's a very simple plot which deals with bereavement, guilt and insanity but in a slightly different way to usual.

All the acting was really good, it was shot well and the story kept me interested right up until the end. There was even some blood in it.

It's probably only another 5 out of 10 but it's very much in the same vein as all the only slow paced quirky indies out there. If you liked "The Invisible" or "Teeth", I think you'd all enjoy this one too.