Chill [2007]

"Chill" - message from the makers of the film directed toward the many pissed off movie lovers who want their 88 minutes and few million brain cells back.

Synopsis: A research scientist dabbling in the art of "quackery" stumbles upon eternal life...fast forward 18 years and he's running a deli slash quickie mart and living in a refridgerated warehouse in the back of the building with a thrown together Leatherface wannabee assistant whom he sends to run the streets looking for hookers with nice skin (I guess customers 'round these parts pull out). Sam, a down on his luck unemployed writer, get's hired as the store's stock boy, and bangs Ashley Laurence (Hellraiser) who is currently being creepied to death by James Russo (Donnie Brasco). The story gets real good when Sam literally walks into some dead bodies and the proverbial cold shit hits the freezing fan...yes man...it's Chill.

Review: Why oh why do so many filmmakers hate Lovecraft so...or disrespect him enough to only spend the skank-change they've collected/begged for a street-week when trying to adapt one of his stories?!?! Chill is laughable. From the neverending eerie score through scenes without eer (?!?)...to the irrelevent dialogue, mundane acting and overall ineptitude...all lead to the one of the worst special effects finales made in film...ever! You've been warned...skip it.

2/10

Splinter [2008]

The best creature feature of 2008...

Synopsis: Two wannabee campers are hijacked on a rural highway and held hostage by a felon on the run, and his sniffy mcneedleinarm girlfriend. When the vehicle of escape overheats the four are bunkered down in a gas station recently inhabited by a Goldblum-in-The-Fly-esque creature of unknown origin.

Review: Bend me over and call me Sandy, Splinter can give it to me any which she wants. Splinter is quite possibly the best American horror since...errrrr...fuck I don't know, since the last real good one. I could go on and on about all it's positives, but let me start and finish with what it DIDN'T have: No pointless power-tool/sharp-object-to-an-extremity torture, no gimme-a-raping-break, slit-my-wrists and feed-me-drano dialogue, no obvious trademark plotholes or inconsistancies, and quite possibly, no wasted minutes. Add it to your must see netflix queue...like right fuckin now.

9/10

Midnight Movie [2008]

"Master of Horror-esque quality, just missing a master..."

Synopsis: A mash up of highschoolers, bikers, theatre employees, a cop and a Dr. take in a 1960's cult horror film written, directed and starring a psycho who can transport himself in and out of the movie through the simple power of fear...ooooooooooooo!

Review: A pretty good idea...but faulters at it's first steps in a new direction. Bad acting can be forgotten with the slightest dose of scares and a deplorable story can survive amidst some great kills...Midnight Movie doesn't offer either latters. How can one be fearful of a 5ft 9in 160lb killer weilding a Christmas tree corkscrew or be entertained by his yawn-enducing hole-punching slaughters!?!?! I think I'm about a dozen MTV-years over the speed limit on this road to ruin.

5/10

An Ear To The Blood Soaked Ground - The Thaw [2009]

From the producers of the Canadian cult zomedy sensation, Fido (2007), comes the wintry tale of an infectious parasite exhumed from an ice excavation of a wooly mammoth. Hopefully, a better Larry Fessenden's The Last Winter (2006), starring everyone's favourite huckleberry, Val Kilmer, with possible The Thing (1982) undertones.

Dead In 3 Days [2006] aka In 3 Tagen Bist Du Tot

"...I know what you did last summer...errr, winter...and not quite the last one"
Synopsis: This time...our five good looking teens are in Austria. After each receive a seemingly unalarming text message, "you'll be dead within 3 days", one goes missing and the rest will shortly find themselves in similar predicaments if they walk around at night in panties, water drips from numerous faucets, they try and solve the case themselves, cops laze around, or parents have no elderly influence whatsoever.

Review:  A decent effort for a ripped-off, heavily cliched, mash-up of scenes from other horror films, but it's from Austria...so high five!?!??! Perhaps I would've enjoyed it more if I wasn't constantly clenching my fists in rage at my inability to rip out the offcenter post-chin piercing of non-hot lead actor Sabrina Reiter...looking forward to DI3D 2 skank! The most enjoyable character was killed first (a big no-no in horror), the "angry bitch" didn't get what was coming to her, and who deserves to get killed right after bending over to save a snapper?!?!? Albeit, the aquarium kill was deeeee-licious! Saving grace award goes to some excellent cinematography by
David Slama. NEEEEEEEEEEEEEXT.

5/10

Cold Prey [2006] aka Fritt Vilt

"...fuck if I know why this one isn't a strip of ass-jam."

Synopsis: Yep, another group of 20-somethings once again venture into the great outdoors for some carefree fun and merriment, until a deranged psycho, with a dispensable backstory, aims to spoil the mood by offing them indivually using a signature weapon with high fright appeal!

Review: Cold Prey succeeds by maintaining a perfectly balanced core and limiting it's attempts to stray from tried and true methodologies. If I not mistaken, Cold Prey's only originality is it's Norwegian origin. It's a slasher without gore or bodycount, it's a thriller without being overly frightening. The strong cast build likeable characters, shot in a cold and claustrophobic setting, and came out well polished and tightly constructed. Would've loved to have seen some Scandanavian nudity, a couple good kills or and at least one envelope pushed.

6/10

Rahtree: Flower of the Night [2003] aka Buppha Rahtree

An homage to The Exorcist? "Here you are Bill...a steaming bowl of ass droppings I tribute...to you."
Synopsis: Yet another young asian woman find herself meeting a tragic death, but this time our victim decides to haunt the living until her vengeance is complete!

Review: CRAAAAAAAAP. Not even worth a review, however, I'm feelin' generous and kind, so consider this ya lucky day...stay away from Rahtree. It's first third is an interesting boy stalks girl, boy fucks girl, boy fucks over girl and girl dies from excessive bleeding from the vag plot...over a dreary score...with effective dark tones and emotions to write home about. Then someone shits the bed and the next hour's nothing more than a few dozen Thai-nese running, screaming and flailing their arms in the air beacause a girl with bad make-up keeps appearing and not killing anyone. Who funds this shit? Maybe dump some of that financing coin into the country's rice industry and the world can stop worrying about the shortage. So said boy returns and we finally get our now-who-fuckin-cares-about revenge and the world is a better place again...but the cliches continues...so is it?!?!

4/10

100 Tears [2007]

"...see it just for the kneeless midget chase through the woods!"
Synopsis: Two tabloid reporters, looking for a career boosting story, find themselves on the bloody trail of the merciless carny clown and his huge, and I mean HUGE, meat cleaver.

Review: 100 Tears has been on my radar since it's gory trailer showed up at Terrorfeed.com almost 2 years ago. The acting and dialogue looked amateur, it's kills looked over-the-top and hardgore...and it couldn't have been more spot-on. The body count is stupid ridiculous and get's rollin' with the slaughter of an entire half-way house in only it's first few minutes...consider my appetite for morte dans la cinema aptly satisfied. Our clown killer is hulking, menacing and ruthless...think Capt. Spaulding without a sense of humour. Running time is short, leaving the tossed-together detective story and painful dialogue sub-scenes bearable. I can't help but think of Intruder (1989) as a quick comparable. All in all...a must-see for any self-respecting gorehound.

8/10