Movies: Storage 24

"London is in chaos. A military cargo plane has crashed leaving its highly classified contents strewn across the city. Completely unaware London is in lockdown, Charlie (Noel Clarke) and Shelley (Antonia Campbell-Hughes), accompanied by best friends Mark (Colin O'Donoghue) and Nikki (Laura Haddock) are at Storage 24 dividing up their possessions after a recent break-up.

Suddenly, the power goes off. Trapped in a dark maze of endless corridors, a mystery predator is hunting them one by one. In a place designed to keep things in, how do you get out?"

I'm not too sure about this film to be honest, but I suppose I should give it a chance at least. It's the big "Kidulthood and Adulthood" on the advertisement that's majorly putting me off of it. Not a fan of those movies. Still, sci fi horror has the potential to be fantastic at its best and hilarious at its worst, so either way 'Storage 24' is worth checking out. In cinemas from June 29th in the UK.

Reviews: Movies - Prometheus

'Prometheus' on the cover of 'Escape' by Apollo Cinema

'Prometheus' - director Ridley Scott's latest and highly anticipated dark science fiction film - was released on the 1st of June in Europe (except for France, Switzerland and Belgium, who got to see it from May 30th so that it didn't contend with the start of UEFA championship, apparently) and will be open for public viewing on June 8th in the US and Canada.

The ship: Prometheus

The film takes place before the story of the original 'Alien' (released 1979), and focuses on the search by scientists Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace) and Charlie Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green) for the origins of life on Earth. Their search, which is backed by the powerful Weyland Corperation, takes them to a distant star system based on archaeological evidence found on an island of the coast of Scotland. Although it is very apparent that the events in this movie take place in the same universe as 'Alien' did, it's kind of unclear where it stands as part of the series or as a reboot. Scott himself has expressed how the film "will explore

it's own mythology and ideas", though what that means I'm still not entirely sure!

Entering a giant skull building in a storm - sounds safe to me!

The plot contains lots of philosophical subjects about life and the creators of life as the two go in search of "the engineers" who created life on earth, and the reasons why. The plot is a little slow to get started, but gets better as it progresses. As with all the other films in the 'Alien' mythos, things take a turn for the worse after a relatively short period of time. Though thats pretty much expected! There are a few bits of the plot that seem to raise questions that don't get immediate answers (or just don't really make much sense), so I'm assuming that there will be another film after this. Still, that's not necessarily a bad thing!

As well as a fairly intriguing story line, the set design is well done and echoes the style of 'Alien' somewhat. The technology seems believable and functional, which helps the illusion of a futuristic setting and even Giger-style original designs show up, giving a nice dark alien atmosphere to certain sections of the film. One thing I did notice, however, is that in the future, wearing underwear that appears to be made of bandages seems to be en vogue!

Shaw: Clearly disturbed by the future bandage fashions

Anyway, the effects were good; the 3D is well done and adds to the atmosphere, rather than just having pointless scenes of objects flying in your face to show "this is in 3D". There was a slight problem with the titles in the film being somewhat blurry, but that doesn't really have an effect on the film! The prosthetics and make up effects were also solid throughout (although the old man make up looked slightly strange and unnatural).

All the actors played their parts well and were believable (though Guy Pearce's performance as the elderly Peter Weyland is a little weird!), which added to the atmosphere and allowed emotional connections. Charlize Theron as Meredith Vickers and Idris Elba as Captain Janek also both act well in their roles pretty much playing as opposites to each other. They help to give the film a solid grounding whilst also aiding plot development. The main part of Shaw carried the film well but had occasional moments where her character's emotions seemed erractic. Though this did fit well with her character and the stresses she was under. 

A refined android and his over-sized cocktail shaker

The best acting was by Michael Fassbender, playing android David, whos calm demeanor and emotional neutrality makes his character have a constant uncertainty to it. However, I would also have liked to have seen more of the sub characters such as Fifeild (Sean Harris) and Millburn (Rafe Spall) and seen them more developed, but they didn't get much screen time. 

Overall, 'Prometheus' was enjoyable and it had a good sense of brooding dread in parts (though it isn't quite as dark as earlier 'Alien' films) and I appreciated the creature designs and set designs and the development of the aliens plot. Though, to be honest the film did have a few slight confusing elements which didn't make immediate sense. This makes the film feel more like part of an upcoming series of films more than a stand alone story. This perhaps isn't really a bad thing and makes it feel more part of a larger story. I would say that the film is well worth watching, but don't go in expecting Alien -1, because the film really isn't really that, but something new altogether!

For trailers, discussion boards, stills, news, and more information about 'Prometheus' visit the official website:

http://www.prometheus-movie.com/

A-Z Challenge: Q is for...Queen of Blood!

Q is for...Queen of Blood

Sometimes also listed as 'Planet of Blood', 'Queen of Blood' is a 1966 sci-fi horror film directed by Curtis Harrington and starring John Saxon, Judi Meredith, Basil Rathbone, Florence Marly and Dennis Hopper. It's set in 1990, which although is now 22 years in the past, was 34 years in the future at the time of the film's release! 

Florence Marly as the alien in 'Queen of Blood'

Scientists receive a distress call from an alien ship that has crash landed on Mars and a rescue party are sent from Earth to assist them. A sole survivor is rescued and taken on board the ship. However, those on board realise something is wrong when, after unsuccessfully trying to feed the alien, the crew member assigned to guard her is found dead. The alien had eaten blood / flesh after hypnotising him!

They then try to get home in one piece as quickly as they can, before the extraterrestrial vampire has the chance to claim another victim. Will they survive?

The plot alone might not convince you to watch 'Queen of Blood', but how can you resist tag lines like:

"A deathless witch, who devours men, turns the Milky Way into a galaxy of gore!"

"From planets yet unknown comes out of this world HORROR!"

"Hideous beyond belief...with an inhuman craving!"

This post is part of the A-Z Blogging Challenge

Movies: Perfect Creature (2006)

Sci-fi vampire horror, ‘Perfect Creature’, from writer/director Glenn Standring, is set in an alternate reality New Zealand (Nuovo Zelandia), in which vampires and humans have co-existed peacefully for 300 years. That is, until someone who threatens all of this is born. I love vampire films, but I’ll be the first to admit that this one didn’t sound too promising on the surface. I gave it a chance though and was pleasantly surprised by the storyline, which was actually a reasonably original take on the sub-genre.

300 years ago, through some sort of genetic mutation, some male children began to be born as vampires. Due to their superhuman abilities and hugely long lifespan (over the 300 years, no vampire has died) they were seen as more perfect versions of human beings and highly revered as beings who are ‘closer to god’. Since that time, they became known as ‘Brothers’ and formed a church, which their human devotees attend.

Although the vampires of this world do not prey on humans, they still require blood and so willing volunteers donate it for the Brothers to consume. It’s an organization similar to the Catholic Church, where people donate money, receive guidance and confess their sins to the priests. Oh, and the Brothers also withhold masses of information from humans and forbid things such as research into genetics in order to maintain their power and encourage dependency.

Regardless of this peace, the Brothers still seek to make a ‘perfect creature’ that is half human, half vampire and continue to conduct genetic research secretly. Unfortunately, every attempt they make ends in either death of the newborn or a virus that causes them to go insane being present. When the half-vampire, half-human, so-called “perfect creature” Edgar (Leo Gregory) is finally born, it appears that he does not have the virus and is raised by the Brotherhood. However, as he grows up it becomes apparent that he too is infected, and he goes onto attack and kill people in an effort to start a war and stop Brothers from “serving” humans. Edgar’s biological brother, Brother Silas (Dougray Scott), and Lilly (Saffron Burrows), a human detective, team up and try to stop him.

The movie’s main plot makes a refreshing change from the “sexy vampire” and “vampire with a soul” storylines that have been made and remade countless times over the years. It also seems to cross over into the serial killer sub-genre too, which is much more appealing than the action or romance crossovers that have previously been offered. For example, Edgar always kills women and gives Silas various clues as to his whereabouts and the location of his next murder, in order to both assist his own capture and taunt Silas. There are also action and romance scenes in the movie, but they aren’t the main focus.

The setting of the movie is also really interesting, combining scenery, props, transport and costumes from Victorian England and the 1920’s-1960’s with modern and futuristic technology, architecture and clothing. There’s something of a Steampunk element to the cityscapes, which are further enhanced by the long, wide angle shots consisting of CGI mixed with real footage. This random mixture makes the film’s look rather unusual and unique and it really does seem like an alternate, darker version of a place that already exists. The closest visual style to it in a film that I can think of is ‘Bladerunner’, but even that is somewhat different to Nuovo Zelandia.

The acting is generally quite good too and Dougray Scott gives a particularly strong performance as the unemotional and inquisitive Silas, which is contrasted by Leo Gregory’s portrayal of madness and violence in Edgar. This again makes their relationship seem more like a police officer and serial killer than siblings or vampire hunter and vampire. Saffron Burrows, is also quite decent, but is not that memorable in her role. That seems to be more due to the character she’s playing rather than any lack of ability on her part though. Lilly appears to swing between tough cop from the streets and vulnerable woman devastated by the loss of her child far too often, but I suppose that is a plausible character trait for a grieving mother.

There are, however, two things about ‘Perfect Creature’ that really drag it down. Firstly, the completely pointless sub-plot of Lilly and Silas falling in love. It adds nothing at all to the movie and just pads it out with unnecessary scenes. They may have been attempting to add some kind of ‘forbidden love’ element to the story (Brothers are not allowed to be romantically involved with anyone) in order to appeal to wome...audience members who might like that sort of thing. It certainly didn’t appeal to this audience member that it may or may not have been aimed at though. If anything, it detracted from the film and made Silas somewhat irritating when he was around Lilly or discussing her with others. It’s unfortunate, because until that point, there had been very few disappointing features to the film.

The other huge let down is the ending, which seems rushed and strange. There is a sudden shift of who the enemy is and a flurry of narration from Silas that’s only purpose seems to be to lead into a sequel. Even the production quality seems to deteriorate slightly and it takes on the feel of a pilot film for a series, rather than the stylish and atypical sci-fi / fantasy horror movie it had previously been. Were it not for this ending, it may even have been easier to overlook the irrelevant romance between the two main characters.

Whilst there were two rather substantial failings in ‘Perfect Creature’, for the most part, I did enjoy it. Although it probably won’t become remembered as one of the greatest films ever made, I appreciated Glenn Standring’s efforts to go in a different direction with a vampire movie and definitely recommend it to fans of sci-fi horror and modern bloodsuckers.

Movies: Indestructible Man (1956)

1956 sci-fi horror/crime thriller, ‘Indestructible Man’, from screenplay writers Vy Russell and Sue Dwiggins and director/producer Jack Pollexfen, tells the story of Charles “Butcher” Benton (Lon Chaney Jr.), who is in jail ready to be executed for murder and robbery, after being double-crossed by his attorney and two partners in crime. He swears revenge against the three men, before dying in the gas chamber. 

At the same time, a cancer research scientist tells his assistant to retrieve Benton’s body and bring it to the lab for experiments. During the experiment, which involves shocking Benton with copious levels of electricity, Benton is accidently brought back to life and becomes the ‘Indestructible Man’! From then on, he can’t speak, but has super strength and cannot be harmed by bullets, bazooka shells or seemingly any other method with which the police try to kill him. Benton then goes after the men who betrayed him.

You might be wondering why a cancer researcher specifically wants Benton’s body to experiment on. Or why studying cancer involves shocking dead bodies with 300,000 volts. Or maybe even why the doctor's assistant is allowed to claim Benton’s body from the morgue in the first place. But all this could probably be explained by assuming that Russell, Dwiggins and Pollexfen had read or seen ‘Frankenstein’ and wanted to recreate the same scenario, with a different story...whether that story made sense or not.

So anyway, a large part of the movie is narrated by the “hero” of the film, Detective Richard “Dick” Chasen (Max Showalter, listed as Casey Adams), who spends more time “chasen’” Benton’s supposed girlfriend, Eva Martin (Marian Carr doing her best Marilyn Monroe impression), than he does chasing actual criminals. Ignoring that, I find film-noir style narration irritating in general, but it’s especially unnecessary here because most of the things Chasen enlightens us about are already being blatantly shown on screen.

Portions of the film are set in a burlesque house, which seems to be the equivalent of setting it in a strip club nowadays. As racy as it might have been back in the 50’s, they only show women in swimsuit-esque corseted outfits, high heels and stockings, so it’s very tame and elegant when you see it now. I like burlesque costumes and 50’s glamour, so even if these scenes were just meant as eye candy, they were actually a plus about the movie’s visual style for me as well.

Luckily enough, Detective Chasen also likes burlesque and is more than willing to visit the dance hall (shock!); staring at all the dancers and literally following every woman that walks past with his eyes. I actually found his sexism, ogling and mildly inappropriate flirtation pretty amusing though (think of the character John Linden from the 1962 film ‘Carnival of Souls’ and you’ll know why!). Especially when he responded to Eva’s question “do you have a first name?” with “uh-huh…Dick”, whilst grinning like a twelve-year-old and sounding like an Elvis impersonator. I thought that his name suited him immensely well.

There is, of course, a real reason for Chasen going to the burlesque house - to interview Eva about Benton…and, naturally, to ask her out to dinner. And by dinner, I mean a hamburger at a drive thru. He does find out snippets of information, but Eva is so naïve and oblivious to what’s happening that spending so much time with her isn’t really beneficial to the plot.

I won’t say that I didn’t enjoy ‘Indestructible Man’, because it actually had a semi-decent plot and, smarmy as he was, Max Showalter wasn’t irritating as Chasen. Lon Chaney Jr. was also quite good in his role as Benton and managed to convey what was going on through his physical acting, only occasionally having help from those pointless voiceovers. I do wish he hadn’t tried to do the scary, Bela Lugosi in Dracula-like eyes though…they twitched so much it was hard to concentrate on anything else!

There were also some interesting shots with great cinematography, such as the scene in the prison where the bars of Benton’s cell are backlit and you can see a ‘tunnel’ of cells/bars in the background. These, however, were sparse and it was shot without the trademark hard lighting of both horror and noir, both of which genres it was clearly intended to be.

The main off-putting point about this feature though was the ending. I’ll warn you now that I’m going to give away the finale of the film, so if you want to watch it, don’t read anymore. Whilst the romantic sub-plot between Chasen and Eva at the end is also ridiculous, just as their previous conversations it was a source of amusement so I didn’t care. No, the problem I have with the end is that after being the ‘Indestructible Man’, unharmed by explosive shells and such, Benton is ultimately stopped by fire. Yes, that’s right, fire! After being severely injured by a flamethrower, Benton’s skin is no longer able to withstand anything and his super strength disappears too. It’s a little strange that being fried by electricity made him Superman, but a little flame could finish him.

Overall ‘Indestructible Man’ wasn’t a bad movie, but I can say it was one of Lon Chaney Jr.’s best either. It’s worth watching once and is amusing, but as a sci-fi horror/thriller, there are much better films in the sub-genre.

Movies: Mindwarp (1991)

I saw ‘Mindwarp’ for the first time, by accident last year on the Horror Channel. They advertised it as Dario Argento’s ‘Opera’, but this came on instead for some reason, so I decided to watch it anyway. The story is set in a post-apocalyptic land, Inworld. Everyone there is hooked into Infinisynth’s computer generated fantasies, in which they spend most of their time. Most people are happy to live this way, going ‘offline’ only to eat and use the bathroom, but a young woman, Judy (Marta Alicia), becomes increasingly frustrated by this way of life and tries to keep herself offline as much as possible.

Judy then has a meeting with the Systems Operator (Angus Scrimm; ‘Phantasm’, ‘I Sell the Dead’), who apparently controls the whole of Infinisynth through tubes in his brain and lasers from his ass. Following that, she’s taken offline permanently and left to fend for herself in Outworld, which is populated by mutated cannibals…and Stover (Bruce Campbell; ‘Evil Dead’, ‘Bubba Ho-Tep’)! Will she be able to escape this Hellish world? Will she and Stover get back to Inworld? Who is her father and will she ever find him? Does anyone even care? Well, if you don’t, then you certainly won’t enjoy this movie because that’s the plot.

I actually liked the concept of the film and, considering it was released 8 years before movies like ‘The Matrix’ and before the internet had become what it is today, it was an interesting twist on the usual ‘world in the aftermath of nuclear war’ and ‘the world living in a false reality’ movies. That being said, most of ‘Mindwarp’ is set in Outworld, which means it’s predominantly a sci-fi horror about mutants and cannibals, garnished with a healthy dose of gore and overdone special effects make-up, rather than anything else.

The acting from Angus Scrimm and Bruce Campbell was pretty good and I felt that they were very well suited to their respective villain and hero roles in Outworld. Scrimm is always a great bad guy, so for me that made the whole thing much more enjoyable. Campbell did have some silly moments (as usual), but generally he gave a sound performance. Marta Alicia was also fairly decent as Judy, though her dialogues were a little stilted and whiny in places, but that was appropriate to Judy’s character I think. However, I can’t say any of the other actors were much good, and the stupid, verging on comical, epic music didn't help them much either.

Unfortunately, as with so many movies, the ending was somewhat disappointing.

(There are some spoilers below, so don’t read on if you want to see it for yourself first.)

In what seemed a rushed and poorly thought out attempt to drag Infinisynth back into the plot, it turns out that everything Judy experienced was an elaborate hoax and she’d actually been online dreaming the whole time. Now, that sounds annoying but okay, until it’s revealed that the Systems Operator is actually her missing father who wants her to take over from him and sit in that chair with the brain tubes, shooting lasers out of her ass instead. So, now apparently Judy doesn’t have a problem with the world living through virtual reality anymore, because she’s now got god-like powers and has seen how bad things are without a Systems Operator. Except, none of it was actually real, right? Hmm…

Overall, ‘Mindwarp’ was pretty fun to watch and although it’s nowhere near as good as ‘Opera’, I didn’t mind watching it. Could it have been better? Absolutely! But it’s definitely worth seeing once and if you like strange B Movies with Angus Scrimm and Bruce Campbell in, you’ll probably love this one!