Haunter (2013)

"The ghost of a teenager who died years ago reaches out to the land of the living in order to save someone from suffering her same fate."

Remember Vincenzo Natali the director of "Cube" (1997) and "Splice" (2009)? Well, he's back with a supernatural mystery which is available via VOD just in time for Hallowe'en. Don't get too excited, though, because "Haunter" tries to be more cerebral than scary and fails at being either.

The biggest problem is that "Haunter" is another typically Canadian remix of over half a dozen already extremely well known movies and at least two recent TV shows.

The first things I thought of when I started watching it were "Groundhog Day" (1993), "The Lovely Bones" (2009), "Voices" (1973), and "Lady in White" (1988), but there are also some quite blatant borrowings from "The Others" (2001), "Marchlands", and "American Horror Story". Throw in a few tiny homages to "The Collector" (1965), "The Matrix" (1999), and even "Dark Skies" (2013), and you have your movie.

If the wind changes, you'll stay like that. Oh wait...

As "Haunter" is essentially a ghost story, there are bound to be some formulaic similarities to previous ghost stories, but that's still no excuse for all the cloning. It's laziness for the most part, although it's dangerously close to plagiarism in others. I've only read parts of "The Lovely Bones" novel and have never seen Peter Jackson's movie adaptation, but if I can see the resemblances, I'm sure Alice Sebold will!

I'm not saying that "Haunter" isn't fairly enjoyable or well made. The cinematography borders on beautiful, and atmospherically, it's not a million miles away from Spanish thrillers such as "The Orphanage" (2007) or several of the more "girlie" Asian horrors. The acting is competent too, apart from Abigail Breslin who only has one big-eyed expression and is prone to sighing, gasping, and breathing heavily to compensate. Consequently, there are more close-ups than are strictly necessary, but that's a minor niggle.

The three time periods of 1985, the present day, and the late 1950s look the part as far as I can tell. As somebody who has no idea what Ontario looked like in the main 1985 time zone, I assume that kids were into much the same things as I was, but I'm a bit dubious about the Atari games console or Siousxie and the Banshees still being popular in the mid-80s rather than 3 or 4 years before. I've always imagined Canada as being a few years behind everyone else, so maybe it's spot on. My Canadian readers will have to let me know.

Overall, "Haunter" is a decent but very predictable PG-13 ghost story with no scares, no swearing or nudity, and very little violence. It's an upgrade for teenage fans of "Goosebumps" or "Are You Afraid of the Dark", but it's far too kiddified if you're an adult. I'll give it an extra point because it held my interest to the end.

This poster sucks! Why is she in a jar? Why?

Farm House (2008)

(AKA "Farmhouse")



"Farmhouse is a psychological thriller set in the modern day mid-west. We follow a young couple as they leave their everyday lives behind and head out to a new beginning; starting over from scratch. After becoming stranded in an isolated vineyard in the middle of nowhere, the young couple is forced to face the secrets they're running from, all the while trying to escape the malicious intent of the vineyard's mysterious inhabitants."

Here's a blast from the past. Other than the gory torture scenes, I'd completely forgotten about this little gem until I was reading through one of my subreddits and realised that I ought to watch it again. How I forgot to review it is another story, but the end of 2008 and early 2009 wasn't the greatest time for me, and I had far more important things on my mind.

Anyway, having decided to rewatch "Farm House" to refresh my memory, at first I thought, "How many more times is 'Voices' (1973) going to be remade?" Of course, the plot isn't exactly the same, but there are many parallels in the first 30 minutes which should lead you to suspect an equivalent twist ending.

"Farm House" isn't a predictable ghost story though. The majority of the movie is a psychological thriller with extreme torture elements. I know that part of the horror genre has fallen out of favour and died away to nothing, but at the time it was great, especially when coupled with such mean-spiritedness and Kelly Hu being sexy as Hell (pun intended)! It's not that Jamie Anne Allman isn't beautiful in this too, but Kelly Hu is something else! The scene between the two of them involving a cheese grater will haunt you long after this movie ends, and you'll probably never look at a meat thermometer in the same way ever again either!

The acting is superb all round, although Steven Weber's psycho Samael eclipses William Lee Scott's not-quite-heroic Chad and Nick Heyman's valiant attempt at portraing the deaf Alal. The characters are stereotypes to some extent, and clichés abound, but there's actually depth to their characterisation which doesn't happen so much nowadays. How things have gone downhill in only 5 years!

As for the story, it's hard to tell you anything about it without spoiling it for you. Obviously, I don't mind giving spoilers for bad movies, but I prefer to keep them to a minimum for good ones. Suffice it to say that "Farm House" is pretty harrowing stuff and makes director George Bessudo's previous movie "Lake Dead" (2007) seem tame in comparison. If you look up the plot outlines, there are some superficial similarities between the two, of course, but it's like comparing apples to oranges. Everything (including the location, cinematography, and talent) is superior in "Farm House" to anything that was part of the After Dark Horrorfests.

Yes, I know I was going to stick to more "Hallowe'eny" movies this month, but my cunning plan has already been scuppered by a ton of new DVD and VOD releases. I don't suppose it matters much. Any horror movie is good this month, right? But if you want to see something truly horrific, I recommend that you grab yourself a copy of "Farm House" as soon as possible. The "Twilight Zone"-esque reveal goes on for a few minutes too long, but I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Another one for "The Vault".

Escape from Tomorrow (2013)

"In a world of fake castles and anthropomorphic rodents, an epic battle begins when an unemployed father's sanity is challenged by a chance encounter with two underage girls on holiday."

As someone who has never set foot inside a Disney theme park or watched any Disney cartoons in his life, I have no idea what the conspiracy theory fuss is about "Escape from Tomorrow". All I know is that Disney has made a couple of classic feature length cartoons to keep little kids quiet, and a few mediocre G-rated "family" movies for everyone else. I do remember a scandal about part of a castle on some VHS artwork looking like a dildo, back in the day, but I couldn't tell you the name of that movie without looking it up, or why it would even matter to anyone. Disney is nothing to me, never has been, and never will be. In fact, the only time I was ever in Orlando, Florida, I went to Universal Studios, Busch Gardens, Seaworld, and Gatorland instead.

Why am I telling you this? Well, it's because "Escape from Tomorrow" is set in a conflated, fantasy version of Disneyland and Disney World, and huge parts of the footage were filmed in both without Disney's consent. Thus, the novelty factor of this movie is for people who've never been to them and wonder what they look like inside. Although you could learn just as much by browsing YouTube videos, this is supposed to be better because it's in black and white, is all so subversive, and is likely to get sued, even though it isn't. No, I don't get that last part either.

There's also a lot of faux intellectual bullshit being spread about "Escape from Tomorrow" suggesting that it's like the works of David Lynch, but I didn't notice any similarities to "The Elephant Man", "Dune", "Blue Velvet" or "Wild at Heart". Some of the scenes were clearly filmed using greenscreens, but the overall effect isn't distracting. Is that what David Lynch does? Maybe they are talking about a different David Lynch who goes round theme parks with a handycam. Having said that, "Escape from Tomorrow" isn't a bad movie, but it's far from being a great one either.

SPOILERS!

"Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?"

The crux of the story is that a henpecked, middle-aged man named Jim (Roy Abramsohn) is looking for a bit of the other on the final day of his vacation. Fired from his job, emasculated by his wife Emily (Elena Schuber), and with his mid-life crisis kicking in, he uses his kids (Jack Dalton and Katelynn Rodriguez) as a cover to clumsily stalk two teenage French girls who attract him by being so high on life (or whatever illegal substance it is that makes them unable to stop laughing). As clichéd and unoriginal as this rather neat borrowing from European-style dramas may be, this is the only bit of "Escape from Tomorrow" that's really good. The acting is decent, the stereotypical effects of a mid-life crisis are portrayed perfectly, and it's all quite believable.

A second "story arc" begins after Jim pervs on a nurse (Amy Lucas) who puts a bandaid on his daughter Sara's scraped knee, and then has an affair with a fairly attractive woman (Alison Lees-Taylor) of his own age instead of the Lolitas who, deep down, Jim knows that he doesn't stand a chance with anyway. Again, this is acceptable storytelling and nothing to strain your brain over. Maybe hooking-up with a stranger in a Disney park for a bit of kinky afternoon delight is far-fetched, but I'm sure stranger things have happened.

Later, although this is my interpretation rather than what is actually shown to happen, the two French girls (Danielle Safady and Annet Mahendru) and their boyfriends realise that Jim is a bit of a sad/creepy pervert, and send the plainer girl with braces on her teeth over to boldly spit in his face and end his little game. Everything else can be written off as Jim's fantasies, daydreams, his mind wandering, his "fever dreams" as he dies from flu, or whatever else you want to call it. Because, if you accept anything else as Jim's reality, the rest of the movie falls apart afterwards.

The trouble is that, for God knows what reason, writer/director Randy Moore decided to completely bollocks-up everything (after the "intermission" at the 61 minute mark) with a totally incongrous scene set inside a mini version of the Epcot dome, wherein it's revealed that Jim is some kind of "sleeper agent" who is being used by the Siemens company to monitor the effects which exposure to the Disney park at a young age would have on his adult life, and in particular, his imagination. So it's all a big experiment being run by the technologically advanced powers-that-be behind the scenes a la "The Cabin in the Woods"? Some might say that this is "intentional misdirection" or playing with the rules of filmmaking, but I call it a gyp! What a pile of horseshit!

"It's a giant testicle!" ...on his head!

The story would have played out better if Jim had been tasered by park security for being a creepy stalker, and he then had to explain to his wife how he lost track of their daughter. The events which follow, including how he works out that his daughter has been kidnapped by the woman who he had an affair with, would then have a more satisfying flow to them and a solvable mystery rather than creating a load of headscratching for the hard of understanding. Unfortunately, I'm sure somewhere out there, there's an original European movie with precisely that plot (I just can't remember the name of it right now, but trust me, I will!), and Randy Moore didn't want to get sued by those filmmakers for plagiarism instead of being non-sued by the Disney corporation who couldn't give a damn about him. Scandal will sell a movie, but only if it's the right kind of scandal, eh?

There's more hogwash at the end in the form of Jim coughing up hairballs because he has "cat flu" (WTF?), and a group of "men in black"—or rather "men in overalls"—who take Jim's dead body away, implant his son Elliot with false happy memories of the Buzz Lightyear ride which he never went on instead of the sadness he probably doesn't even feel over the death of his father (if Jim even was his father), and clean everything up as if nothing ever happened: because nothing bad ever happens at Disney. Oh, it's all so "meta" and pseudo-philosophical that it makes you want to puke!

After two days of thinking about the epilogue and wasting my time by writing out a ten page ecphrasis of the movie to see if I'd missed something which would tie it together better, I can now happily explain it as nothing more than "a tragic reminder of the real life ambitions which the evil Disney corporation stole from one man". Jim isn't reborn, it isn't the afterlife. It's just a flashback to the "real" Jim in the part of his imagination which he never used, i.e. it's what we saw earlier in the mini Siemens minidome, hence why the Epcot dome is shown again just before the epilogue scene happens.

Yup, that's the big intellectual message of the movie and, give or take insulting the Disney Princesses/cosplay girls for being hookers for Japanese businessmen, and saying that the turkey legs (which are sold in the theme parks, not just Disney!) are really made of emu, that's all "Escape from Tomorrow" has got: Disney's brainwashing will stop you being what you are meant to be.

So will making or watching overhyped, shitty independent horror movies. Jog on.

Baby Shower (2011)

"Four ex-classmates get together to celebrate the pregnancy of one of them. The venue chosen for the party is a country house located one hour away from the city. It has been a while since the four of them saw each other for the last time, and one recently committed betrayal threatens to destroy their long and deep friendship. The revelation of a dark secret and a series of violent deaths transform the baby shower into a nightmare. A very disturbing one."

Something which surprised me after watching "Baby Shower", and then looking up reviews to steal pictures from, is that there aren't any positive reviews of this movie to be found on the IMDb (or anywhere else for that matter). That seems very odd to me, and means one of two things: either not enough people have seen this movie yet, or a lot of copying and pasting has been done from one review to another. Bearing in mind that the "critics" in every case mainly retell the story in their own spoilerific words, I have no respect for any of them, least of all one who hated the movie because it had subtitles, and another douchebag who I know didn't give it his full attention because he practically lives on Twitter.

I have no idea what director Pablo Illanes did to upset these "reviewers" apart from placing non-comedic versions of the "Sex and the City" girls in the middle of a Chilean forest and bumping them off in fabulously gory ways—especially as I think the whole idea is absolutely fantastic—so just because he's managed to bring one of my own sordid dreams to life, I'm going to give "Baby Shower" a thoroughly positive review to redress the balance.

Okay, I admit that in my imagination, it would only be the most irritating characters from "Sex and the City" being tortured in insanely erotic ways that wouldn't ever legally make it to film, but you have to take what you can get. Obviously, nobody would want to see anything bad happen to Charlotte (Kristin Davis), since she's the only pretty one in the show, and I'm pleased to say that her lookalike Ángela (Ingrid Isensee) doesn't suffer too much either (except emotionally!). Everyone else does—oh, yes, indeedy—and there's lots of blood, nudity, and mean-spiritness to enjoy here!

Aside from (but including) the boobs and blood, the cinematography is sometimes quite beautiful, especially for a low-budget foreign movie (if you can call $900,000 low-budget!), and the location looks the part. Where logically there should be spaciousness, the atmosphere is parodoxically claustrophobic, and that takes some doing, especially as the camera looks at everything you want to see and quite a few unpleasant things which most people don't!

"You have to let go of who you were to become who you will be."

With a hint of "Rosemary's Baby" (1968) and a little bit of the craziness from "Inside" (2007), the plot itself isn't the most original, but it's handled in a much better way than either of those aforementioned borefests. Let's face it, I might like "Rosemary's Baby" myself, but it's still 45 years old and has become horribly dated now. It was never very believable to begin with, and teenagers are more likely to laugh at it. On the other hand, "Inside" is simply an overrated idiot play with unrealistic gore, and I'll never understand its appeal if I live to be a hundred.

Thus, even with its stereotypical characters which aren't really developed, and other clichés such as non-functioning cell phones abounding, "Baby Shower" is much more suitable for a modern audience, especially if they're sick puppies like me who appreciate realistic woundings and creative kills. The fact that the actresses are some of the best-looking women in Chile also doesn't hurt. Just pick out your favourite and enjoy her for as long as she remains on screen.

Once again, I'm not going to give any spoilers because I hate it when other people do that. Suffice it to say that the sexy "Samantha" character called Olivia (Claudia Burr) steals the show from creepy lunatic Soledad (Patricia López), but the rest of the cast are still impressive. In particular, Sofía García, Francisca Merino, and Kiki Rojo don't play typical helpless victims; they fight back and scream very well indeed!

The only eyecandy for the ladies is Álvaro Gómez as Julio whose first appearance is shirtless and riding a horse, so you can imagine the impression that makes! He's not quite Marcus Tandy from "Eldorado", but women shouldn't be watching horror movies for hunky men anyway. To be honest, women shouldn't ever watch horror movies like this in the first place because they'll only bitch about the gratuitous nudity, misogynistic violence, and rape afterwards. I've had enough of those prudes to last me a lifetime, and I'm sure you have too.

As "Baby Shower" isn't available on DVD yet (except in Germany), you'll have to be a Netflix subscriber to see it legally anywhere else, but you should definitely check it out if you're into the gory stuff, and unlike some dumbass reviewers, you don't mind reading subtitles.

Highly recommended.

Coffin Baby (2013)

"Hollywood, California is turned upside down by a series of strange and horrific murders creating chaos and turmoil in tinsel town. One particular victim is kidnapped, held captive and subjected to witness the torture and murder of numerous other victims. It is by her will, strength, and faith that she must survive the ordeal. Her escape seems hopeless and only worsens when outside supernatural forces become more difficult to contend with than her captor..."

To be honest, I didn't think this was going to be any good, and I only watched it because of the Lianne Spiderbaby plagiarism scandal. According to the IMDb, Lianne Spiderbaby has a bit part in it as "Samantha's sisters [sic] double", but it's only a "blink and you'll miss it" moment.

For anyone else who cares, "Coffin Baby" is supposed to be a follow-up to Tobe Hooper's "Toolbox Murders" remake from 2004. Most people thought that the project was abandoned a long time ago, but apparently not. The "rough cut" version is now floating around the big name video streaming sites as a dubious freebie.

Based on this allegedly incomplete version, I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by the opening scene. I have no idea who the gorgeous blonde is, but the tension and cat scare really did it for me! No, I'm kidding, the cat scare is as clichéd as the acting is abysmal. But damn, the gore which ends that scene is lush!

Unfortunately, it takes almost another 20 minutes before the meaningless plot gives way to more gory goodness. In that time, you have to put up with a badly handycam-filmed police investigation full of non-actors. I swear that if I didn't know any better, I'd assume that the camera was covered in butter so that it kept slipping out of the cameraman's hands, or he had some kind of seizure. Nothing else could explain the poorly framed shots and constant movement when there needn't be any.

Chauntal Lewis is hawt! Miserable-looking here but usually hawt!

Chauntal Lewis, playing the sister of the first victim, is extremely attractive and seems to be able to act a bit, but her character soon becomes as irritating as everyone else. Excessively loud American girls who don't follow instructions from authority figures are torture porn fodder just waiting to happen! To give credit where it's due though, Chauntal does provide a credible performance as a "scream queen". She definitely has a fine pair of lungs on her!

Once she's been kidnapped by a Dr. Phibes lookalike (I have no idea what the character's real name is) and locked in a cage, Chauntal is mostly tortured by having some kind of henna tattoo or supernatural branding burnt off her right forearm. I can't say that I disapprove of Dr. Phibes' actions because tattoos on women are absolutely disgusting anyway, but I assume it's all about either removing or invoking the power of magical sigils. Why? I haven't got a clue.

Roughly half an hour in, things change for the worse when what can only be described as a car full of wannabe "gangstas" and Elissa Dowling turn up to provide some unnecessary comic relief before getting killed in various brutal ways. Not to be mean about it, but I've never seen Elissa Dowling in anything decent, and I'm constantly amazed by how she keeps getting employed. Actually, I think I may have just answered that question for myself. There are some horrid practical effects and a lot of wish fulfilment in this scene, but it's still only filler.

"They see us rollin', they hatin'."

Between Dr. Phibes killing a random blonde, feeding Chauntal with popcorn while forcing her to watch a crappy movie, and hosing her down erotically, a police team led by Brian Krause from "Charmed" interrogate the sisters' joint boyfriend to create more padding. Somewhere in this mess, the story of their ménage à trois and their murdered baby comes out for what seems like absolutely no reason whatsoever.

Then it all starts to get even weirder as, after 10 days, Chauntel eats a cockroach, gets given an orchid because Dr. Phibes now loves her, and feasts on cooked human flesh from another blonde victim who looks just like the one who was killed earlier but with her previously sawn-off leg intact again. Hmmmm, so the Monty Python sketch about legs growing back is true after all!

At this point any attempt at maintaining the daily chronology or creating a logical plot goes right out of the window. There are more victims of the killer's toolbox (including the serial sister-shagging boyfriend), lots more blood and guts (plus a heart), Dr. Phibes gets an incomplete backstory about his dead mother in a coffin, and Chauntal starts to go through bouts of Stockholm syndrome as she's tortured into madness. This may only be a workprint, but there's no way it could ever be recut into something that makes sense.

"Love means never having to say you're ugly."

Rather than spoil any more of this utter crap for you by retelling the entire story like one of those lame "Women in Horror" bloggers who doesn't know the difference between a review and a synopsis, suffice it to say that things do not improve. I couldn't tell you if any of what happens with a little girl ghost and a cameo from Bruce Dern as a preacher is supposed to be real or an extended dream sequence anyway. It's all too muddled with zombies, ghosts, and decomposing corpses everywhere.

Somewhere along the line, writer/director Dean Jones obviously couldn't decide whether to go for a "They're all in Hell" cop-out ending or remake "Unborn Sins" (2005), so he did both and wasted several beautifully choreographed action sequences in the process. The abortion now known as "Coffin Baby" is the result.

By the way, I think Lianne Spiderbaby was a double for the first blonde victim in the bag rather than being Samantha's sister. At least I've cleared that up.

The Tall Man (2012)

"When her child goes missing, a mother looks to unravel the legend of the Tall Man, an entity who allegedly abducts children."

Don't you just hate reviews which start with "From the director of" and then proceed to recount all the details of the director's previous works as if that will make any difference to any opinion of their latest offering? I hate that too, but, in this case, I do think it's necessary to mention that, of course, Pascal Laugier also directed "Martyrs" (2008) and "House of Voices" (2004) as I have noticed a slight pattern forming with these movies, and it isn't something good.

To cut a long story short and probably spoil "The Tall Man" before you've even seen it, what is the deal with Pascal Laugier and all these films about children? In "House of Voices", it was all about ghostly orphans, "Martyrs" gave us kidnapped and tortured children, and now "The Tall Man" is all about the little brats disappearing for yet another reason.

Let me just remind everybody that I cannot stand any movies about children, movies starring children or meant for children, or, basically, anything to do with children in general. I hate kids, I have no paternal instincts whatsoever, and I'd rather have a house full of adult cats who I treat as cats rather than little "fur babies". So can you possibly imagine how disappointed I was by "The Tall Man" when the story turned out not to be about the "Slenderman" who abducts and tortures children?

Although the odds were against it with "The Tall Man" being Canadian and having an R-rating, I wanted this to be sicker than "A Serbian Film" (2010) or "Salò" (1975), but obviously without the paedophilia because that doesn't float my boat. What I wanted was something like an adult version of "The Witches" (1990) but with more extreme torture and death. Alas, it was not to be.

If you don't want any spoilers, stop reading now!

"I smell... dogs' droppings."

In spite of borrowing heavily from the "Slenderman" myth and spooky computer game to create a few visual red herrings, "The Tall Man" turned out to be a thriller with two twists which put it almost into the M. Night Shyamalan category of dramatic nastiness. I'm not an M. Night Shyamalan hater apart from loathing his more recent films, and I hasten to add that the key word in the previous sentence was "almost". As a movie, rather than specifically a horror movie, "The Tall Man" was actually pretty good. It also wasn't anything to do with the shitty "Phantasm" franchise.

Coming to it after just watching Rob Zombie's "Halloween II", I was impressed by the run down, recession hit look and atmosphere of the Canadian mining town which was obviously doubling for America. Everything looks like that where I live so the reality pleased me. Whereas Rob Zombie had his own agenda for using white trash characters, you can be sure that Pascal Laugier (like most Europeans) was definitely including some major social commentary here. I'm not going to spoil it for you too much because it's actually the motivation of the main characters and a very weak link in the plot, but if you take the idea that people who can't afford pets shouldn't have them and upgrade it to people, then you'll get the idea.

The acting was very good with Jessica Biel really standing out. I haven't seen many of her films, and I think she may have a reputation for not actually being that great, but she was fantastic in "The Tall Man". Ultimately, "The Tall Man" was her "vehicle", as they say.

I was very impressed by Jessica Biel's action scenes even though the aftermath of a few of them wasn't all that realistic. Her lack of make-up, or rather her lack of glamorous make-up, seemed to increase her screen presence as I found myself able to concentrate more on what she was showing rather than what she was trying to hide, if you know what I mean. The increasing number of scrapes, gashes and other wounds her character sustained pleased me even more. Some of those make-up effects were done very well indeed.

I didn't particularly care about any of the other characters, least of all the oddly mute girl played by Jodelle Ferland who, obviously, is no stranger to real horror films. Having her do the narration was a little bit weird, but the reason was revealed at the end.

Other recognisable faces included the now very old-looking "Cigarette Smoking Man" from "The X-Files" TV series, and Stephen McHattie who appeared to be channelling a slightly younger version of Lance Henriksen in an attempt to shake off his minor role as Hollis Mason in "Watchmen" (2009). I'm tempted to think that Pascal Laugier must have been a huge Chris Carter fan as "The Tall Man" reeked of "The X-Files" and "Millennium" right down to its British Columbia filming location.

As a movie with some quite unexpected twists, I was entertained by "The Tall Man" even though the final reveal of his identity and motivation was very weak. I was kind of hoping that he would turn out to be Jeff Goldblum just so that I could make some feeble joke, but, unfortunately, Pascal Laugier already beat me to the punchline with his lacklustre ending.

I'm going to rate "The Tall Man" as slightly above average. It's not really a horror movie, but it did have several reworked tropes taken from the horror genre in it. The similarity of the setting to the "Slender" game, which I've included a video about below, really made this a bit of a naughty cheat in the same way that "The Mothman Prophecies" (2002) also promised much more for horror fans than it delivered.



Have you seen "The Tall Man" yet? What did you think of it? Let me know in the comments below.

Mum & Dad (2008)

"Mum and Dad, and their 'adopted' children, Birdie & Elbie, work at the airport. The family live off whatever they scavenge from cargo holds, offices and hotels - including a steady stream of transient workers who populate the airport's soulless hub. When Lena, a young Polish office cleaner, is befriended by Birdie, she gets drawn into a nightmarish world of torture, murder and perversity. Imprisoned in a suburban House of Horrors and designated a 'Mummy's Girl', Lena's only options appear to be to become part of the family - and join them in their insanity - or die."

I first watched "Mum & Dad" over two years ago when my local Hollywood Video still existed. Not only was I extremely happy to find a fairly new British horror movie, but I was quite surprised that they even had it. Just before they closed down, I went back and bought myself a copy of "Mum & Dad", and I love it so much that I've watched it over 20 times since.

I'm going to keep this review as spoiler free as I can because you absolutely have to see "Mum & Dad" for yourself. I haven't had my heart pounding so hard from the tension in a horror film ever before, so I'm sure that you will enjoy it too.

Basically, it's a modernised, almost "torture porn" version of "Girly" (1970) mixed with an unhealthy number of nods to the crimes committed by Fred and Rosemary West. At no point during any interviews about this movie, or anywhere on the DVD commentary, did writer/director Steven Sheil admit to using any specific real life murderers as his inspiration, but anyone British will pick up on it immediately. American audiences will notice a lot of similarities to "The People Under the Stairs" (1991) and certain scenes from "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" (1974). Like all horror movies, it's derivative, but "Mum & Dad" has a lot of original touches too so you can't really hold any reworking of existing genre themes against it.

It's amazing that something with such incredible production values was made for as little as £100,000. When I hear people crowing about how successful James Wan's "Insidious" was compared to its budget, it makes me laugh that "Insidious" cost over five times the amount of "Mum & Dad" and wasn't even half as intense. A lot of this has to do with where most of the funding came from. To qualify for a grant from the U.K. National Lottery, you simply have to have something so impressive that it's worth investing in.

As I said, I'm not going to give any spoilers apart from any that are unavoidable through praising this film. Perry Benson as "Dad" is cast completely against type, but it still works. Dido Miles as "Mum" is so psychotically evil that she is also completely different from anything I've seen her in before. I am still blown away by how good these recognisable TV faces are in such a demented horror film. Each of the main characters are memorable in their own way, and that doesn't happen very often. Toby Alexander as the mute "Elbie" doesn't even have a single line of dialogue yet conveys so much emotion with just his expressions. You will probably hate "Birdie", I know I did at first, though that's the point. Ainsley Howard nails her role too.

The acting and character development is just fantastic and way ahead of anything you'd usually find in such a low-budget independent horror movie. The nastiness of the dysfunctional family is so believable that it comes as quite a surprise when you watch the special features on the DVD and discover how nice (and funny) all the actors are in real life. It's like chalk and cheese and that's the sign of real actors. You can never go back to watching amateur handycam dreck after seeing something like this, although I'd advise you to never get involved with any of that crap to begin with.

Of course, the character who stands out the most for me is Lena. I had never really heard of Olga Fedori before though I remember her vaguely from a few episodes of "Eastenders". A quick check of her IMDb profile reveals that she's Ukrainian rather than Polish and is a Harvard Graduate. I think she's lovely and I felt for her character all through the film. The stuff Lena goes through is absolutely awful yet she remains one of the strongest female characters that I've ever seen in a horror movie. She has a lot of inner strength and really doesn't make any of the clichéd mistakes which other girls do and that is, of course, another credit to Steven Sheil's writing.

The practical effects are all disgustingly realistic although one gruesome scene near the end could be argued to be little bit too far-fetched due to their inclusion. You'll know exactly what I'm referring to when you see it but, the more I think about it, the more I can see how it could work. I am, of course, talking about a certain "Christmas decoration", so feel free to discuss it in the comments section below.

The make-up, costumes, set dressing, camerawork and, well, just about everything really is all first class, so I have definitely included this in my Video Vault. "Mum & Dad" is something I can bring out just to show my American friends exactly how sick and twisted us Brits really are. I highly recommend this film!

Shuttle (2008)

"A late night airport shuttle ride home descends into darkness."

I have no idea how I found this recently or why I didn't watch it when it came out in 2008 but I'm sure it had a lot to do with "Shuttle" being marketed as a "crime drama" rather than the gory horror film that it actually is.

Somehow I must have just started randomly adding things to my Netflix queue just to see what they were about and, to be perfectly honest, I was quite prepared to switch this off after the first 60 seconds or so because it looked like it was going to be a "Turistas" rip-off like "Train" (which was also from 2008).

I'm glad I stuck with it though as it was definitely the best film that I've seen this month, full of suspense and only slightly annoying characters. If people doing all the wrong things to escape from the killers in horror movies annoys you then this will frustrate the hell out of you too but in a good way. You can learn a lot from "Shuttle" by imagining yourself in the same situation and thinking about how you would handle it differently.

Among all the obvious formulas, tropes and clichés, there are many elements of "Shuttle" which you know you've seen hundreds of times before. Everything from cellphones not working (in downtown LA!) to not making sure the villain is really dead before he comes back to get you again is thrown into the mix but it's all done so well that, if you haven't watched that many horror films, you could almost fool yourself into thinking that you are watching them for the first time even if it is all a bit far-fetched.

Where "Shuttle" lacks a certain amount of credibility is in how the characters react to obvious chances to escape from their ordeal. You can tell from the start that this is going to be mainly about the two girls in the story more than the others and they do the stupidest things. I'm trying to avoid spoilers here but, seriously, if you are being held against your will by someone you've already seen kill other people and you get their gun, you know what you have to do. Also, should you ever get the chance to be released for just a moment, it's all about self-preservation and screw everybody else.

Things that stand out in a positive way are that all the actors are really good though none apart from Tony Curran as the bus driver seem to be famous for anything other than TV roles. The two girls, Peyton List and Cameron Goodman, are very easy on the eye too.

The whole story may be somewhat ludicrous but the internal logic of the film is flawless and doesn't break the "willing suspension of disbelief" enough times to make you not want to watch it all the way to the end. The gory moments are surprisingly effective and quite realistic even though, again, there's really nothing that you haven't seen done before.

Because I had no idea what "Shuttle" was about or how it was going to end, I actually thoroughly enjoyed it. It just isn't the most original movie of its kind especially as it reminded me in some ways of "Judgment Night" (1993) and "Final Jeopardy" (1985) which I highly recommend even though they aren't horror movies at all. I suppose you could almost class any of these films as "survival horror" rather than "thrillers" but usually that term is used for things like "The Hills Have Eyes" or "A Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and none of them are in the same league as those horror genre classics.

As controversial as it may be, I'm actually going to add "Shuttle" to The Vault. I'm not sure that I would watch it again for quite a while (if at all) but it was certainly better than any of the other "Hostel" clones without being "torture porn" at all.

I need help with the name of a film

Here's a kind of competition for you. Let's see if you can work out the name of the film that I am going to describe using the few details that I can remember.

I just watched "The Disappearance of Alice Creed" (2009) which was excellent and I might review it later even though it wasn't a horror film. Anyway, it put me in mind of another film which I watched late at night on TVS or Meridian back in England probably around 2003-2004. I don't remember if I saw the beginning or the end and so have no idea what it was called.

Here are the bits that I remember:

1) Either a blonde American TV celebrity or pornstar is kidnapped for ransom.

2) She is shown either having sex or being raped (though probably not raped) on either a website or some kind of cable channel. The "rapist" is the leader of the gang of kidnappers who she seems to fancy a bit so it's not even rape. It's something like a business arrangement and not done for love.

3) Something to do with the kidnapping is to either boost ratings or get a load of internet hits with the result being a huge sum of money.

4) Maybe it isn't about ransom at all.

5) One of the kidnappers turns out to be the victim's boyfriend. He's black and probably famous but maybe not for acting. She has been in cahoots with him all along.

6) The head kidnapper is some kind of overly handsome actor who (and this could be a false memory) dresses like a medallion man with a white suit and black shirt. I'm thinking along the lines of Chris Sarandon or maybe someone with a beard... not sure about the beard.

7) Weirdly, the kidnap "victim" and her boyfriend have set up the whole thing.

8) I think the black guy kills his boss then the blonde kills him and takes the money.

9) Possibly she doesn't get the money either.

10) The film could have been made anytime from the late 80s up to 2000.

That's all I remember. I don't know why but I keep thinking that Traci Lords was in this but I know the blonde wasn't her. She's some kind of actress who isn't really an actress if you know what I mean, like a pornstar previously, but she did a pretty good job anyway.

Anyway, if you have any idea at all what this film is called please let me know. Even if you don't know, take a guess. You might be right.


Update:

I finally found out that the film was called "Stealing Candy" (2003).

From the IMDb:

Three ex-cons kidnap a famous movie star.

Director: Mark L. Lester
Writers: C. Courtney Joyner (screenplay), Dana Dubovsky (story)
Stars: Daniel Baldwin, Coolio, Jenya Lano and Alex McArthur