Film Review: Cheerleader Camp

Or to use it's current title 'Bloody Pom Pom's'.

The title is kind of a giveaway as to what you are going to get in this. A killer picking off scantily clad cheerleaders who are at a training camp? Yep! It was 1988 dammit, most films were like this.

It's easy to pick faults with Cheerleader Camp. The acting is terrible. The writing is terrible. The direction is literally done by a man who went to direct nothing but porn. But good lord it's entertaining. It is truly the definition of 'so bad it's good'.

I was going to use this paragraph to explain the plot. But that sentence about 30 seconds ago about picking off cheerleaders? That was it. Futile attempts at 'comedy' follow, mostly involving a fat guy farting, showing his arse, dressing in drag so he can look at sunbathing cheerleaders or trying to rap.

Hopelessly crap red herrings are thrown up - like the scary (not really) handyman or the silent cook. It is like the director skimmed over the script for Sleepaway Camp and decided it needed more pointless nudity. It even attempts a twist ending, but this is almost signposted throughout the film.

But for all these negatives, it's brilliantly entertaining and is some true 80's horror cheddar.

* (Film Quality)

**** (Entertainment)

=

*** (Overall)

Apologies for the equation in the rating but you can't give something so entertaining one star, or something so crap 4 stars. We need a medium. Nothing about this film any good, but you can't hate it.

Film Review: True Grit (2010)

For the purposes of this review please bear in mind I haven't seen the original in some time nor have ever read the book.

I'm not a massive fan of the remake. Even in a film I don't care about much. Not being harsh on the original True Grit, but when I heard that the Coen Brothers were remaking it with Jeff Bridges in the lead role, I wasn't exactly going to start a Facebook campaign boycotting it.

Along with David Fincher, The Coens are the directors that can do no wrong for me. OK, there was a rough patch a few years ago with Intolerable Cruelty (which I actually dug) and the ill advised Ladykillers remake. But look at the rest: Blood Simple, Raising Arizona, Barton Fink, The Hudsucker Proxy (Underrated), Miller's Crossing, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, O Brother Where Art Thou?, The Man Who Wasn't There, Burn After Reading, A Serious Man and for me one of the greatest films ever made: No Country For Old Men.

These guys could direct a guy reading a phone book and I'd be there.

I am pleased to say you can add True Grit to that list of classics. It's almost natural that they ended up directing it. Everything about it is so 'Coen'. From the themes of vengeance to the bizarre character names.

To rob a pun from another review - The Dude trumps The Duke. Jeff Bridges is superb as Rooster Cogburn, the Marshal hired by a young girl (Hailee Steinfeld) to find Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin - who isn't in this half as much as you would think) the murderer of her father. Cogburn is 'assisted' by LaBoeuf (Matt Damon), a Texas Ranger who has been on Chaney's trail for years.

The bulk of the film is mainly films with Damon, Bridges and newcomer Steinfeld and they just work together so well you want them to just do road movies together for as long as possible. Steinfeld is brilliant in the biggest role of her career, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if there is an upset at the Oscars.

As you'd expect from the Coen's everything is just perfect. Carter Burwell's score, the gorgeous cinematography, the script which while being serious, has some incredibly funny moments in.

It's watching films like this that remind me why I love cinema in the first place. And with this, The Social Network, The King's Speech, The Fighter and Toy Story 3 all battling for Best Picture at the Oscar's - I think one day we will look back in amazement at this year.

*****

The Coen Brother's do it again with another masterpiece. Yeah, it's a remake. But for once a remake shines. And trumps the original, which I have seen and barely remember. This I will never forget.

Film Review: Drive Angry

After stinkers like The Wicker Man, Next, Knowing etc. I often wondered if Nicolas Cage would start to play on the cult like name he is making for himself and in Drive Angry he surely is.

Totally over the top, gore packed and easily the stupidest thing that will hit cinemas this year, Drive Angry (Shot In 3D) tells the story of John Milton (Cage) who escapes from Hell to track down a Satanistic cult led by Jonah King (Billy Burke) who were responsible for the death of his daughter and the abduction of her baby, all while being followed by The Accountant (William Fichtner) who is tasked with returning Milton to Hell.

Caught in the middle of this frankly ludricous plot is Piper (Amber Heard) a ballsy broad who helps Milton out and ends up accompanying him to track down the cult.

The entire film (as you may have made out from the plot, the title, Nicolas Cage's involvement) is just ridiculous, but this time unlike The Wicker Man and its ilk it is played for laughs, and most of the main cast seem intent on winning some kind of overacting competition.

Nine times out of ten you would think Cage would win but despite some tough competition from Burke as the cult leader and Tom Atkins (The Fog, Creepshow) as a veteran police chief, William Fichtner's Accountant literally stole every scene he was in, and without a doubt (and without spoiling it) had one of the best entrance scenes in a film I have seen.

It's a worthy addition to the growing cult of Cage worship. In that finding his films so bad they are good, but Drive Angry does have some great moments and action, and of course the sight of Cage looking like Chad Kroeger from Nickelback is worth the price of admission alone.

****

Another swerve from Nicolas Cage, slightly restrained in his performance compared to the scene stealing Willam Fichtner, but its OTT, stupid and most importantly of all doesn't take itself too seriously, a trait that has been all to common with Cage films in the last few years.

Film Review: Supergirl

I'm a huge fan of the Superman franchise. While never really being a big comic book fan I consider the 1978 film with Christopher Reeve to not only be the best comic book film (notice I didn't say adaptation) ever, but one of my favourite films of all time.

Of course the sequel turned into a bit of a disaster with Richard Donner being unceremoniously kicked off the film and Mark Lester taking over. And that whole situation didn't rectify itself until just a few years ago when the Richard Donner cut was released on DVD.

The boxset it was released on included almost everything. The first 4 films, Superman Returns, hours of documentary material, even the pilot episode of Superpup - a 1958 TV show that had little people dressed as Superman universe characters but dogs. Surprisingly the show was never aired.

But the one thing the set was missing was Supergirl. Strange, as it is mentioned during the documentaries and was re-released at the time. I decided to go back and have a look and see if it was as bad as everyone remembers.

It's not. Obviously, it's not brilliant and along with Superman III and IV, it was one of the biggest follies of the 80s, but it's not THAT bad. Probably on a par with the third Superman film. The fourth of course occupies another realm of suck.

The plot concerns Kara-El (Supergirl, played by Helen Slater) and her quest to return an orb which is the power source for a group of Kryptonian survivors. Obviously the orb goes to Earth and ends up in the hands of Selena (Faye Dunaway) who is in tune with the occult and harnesses its power in a attempt to take over the world.

One of the main problems with the film is something I guess they could do nothing about, but at least they could have not done it so much. And that is mention Superman. Kara-El is Superman's niece so this happens quite a bit. Everytime it does I was just reminded of better films, and how much better they were than this. And referencing these films repeatedly was bad enough but there was absolutely no need to further remind viewers by having Jimmy Olsen (Marc Mclure) in it.

Another downside is the cast totally phone it in. Slater is fine as Supergirl but Dunaway, Peter O' Toole, Mia Farrow and Peter Cook (who I can only assume was angling for some of Dudley Moore's Hollywood fame) all look like they don't want to be there. You can see why the makers pumped these big names into it with a unknown as the titular character - look at Marlon Brando in Superman. But I guess it was a case of them just looking at the script - it was never going to set the world on fire and you can understand why Christopher Reeve dropped out of a cameo appearance at the last minute.

The score also grated on my nerves a touch. While you are never going to top John Williams there is no need to include a headache inducing keyboard stroke to signify 'launching into flight', a true sign of the decade in which it was made.

The films runs along at an OK pace (although it could do with a ten or fifteen minute trim which apparently it had at one point), with some watchable action sequences but it's all pretty pointless by the end. I can't see how the filmmakers (including director Jeannot Szwarc, fresh off Jaws 2 and about to make another big flop in Santa Claus: The Movie) thought this was a franchise making film. Maybe it's the weakness of the characters - no one in the last decade has tried to reboot it, and this is saying something for the remake mad generation we live in.

**
Not as bad as everyone makes out. Watchable, if overlong stuff. But constant reminders of the better films in the franchise and a starry cast on autopilot make this a Superflop.

Film Review: La Horde

Just when you think that the whole genre of Zombie films has been exhausted of ideas, another one comes along. This time we look to France and La Horde (not really worth a translation is it?) and while it doesn't exactly reinvent the wheel, it is brilliant fun.

After the death of one of their colleagues at the hands of a gang, a group of cops decide to go vigilante and take vengeance on the gang by storming the high rise tower block in which they are housed.

This goes almost immediately pear shaped, but before anything can happen zombies storm the building and the cops and the gang must form an uneasy alliance to get out alive.

Unlike the Romero '...of the Dead' films the undead in La Horde are fast (which I don't find a problem - after Zack Snyder's terrific Dawn Of The Dead remake I can accept both fast and slow zombies) and for some brilliant reason can actually defend themselves a bit which we see in two memorable fight scenes.

To drift off on a tangent for a moment - it's strange what I can accept in Zombie films as opposed to say Vampire ones. We've seen fast zombies, slow zombies, talking zombies (Return Of The Living Dead), teleporting zombies (City Of The Living Dead) but when it comes to vampires that just shimmer a bit when exposed to sunlight? I'm out.

Back to the film though - the action sequences are all superb and include some great zombie kills (almost predictably the group find a stash of cool weapons in the tower block and use them all to fantastic effect).

If the film had a downside it would probably be the female lead. Portrayed through most of the film as a take-no-prisoners hard case, the character slips back into the generic helpless horror film female character way too often and easily, then straight back into the original tough persona. Took me out of it a bit.

But overall La Horde proves there is plenty of life (unlike the horde) in Zombie films yet. In terms of comparisons to recent films it's unfair to compare it to the likes of Zombieland which was an out and out comedy which just happened to have zombies in, but when you stack it up against Romero's most recent Survival Of The Dead it knocks spots of it. Which is the highest praise for a film like this you can get.

****
Off the chart zombie fun, with only a bit of shady characterisation letting the side down. Highly recommended for all fans of the genre.

Film Review Catch Up

Before last weekend, you could be fooled into thinking that I had vanished from the blogging scene. Instead I was trying to reinvent how I reviewed films. Firstly, I started a Facebook group that anyone could join, posting news, reviews, trailers, music videos - anything entertainment based. That is still running, and I will continue to post reviews there.

I also post my reviews on the Ultimate Geek Forum, but I didn't know what to do with the blog. As you may remember, there was also a Thom's House Of Film blog, but that left this one pretty barren as I seem to have now trained myself to keeping my rants contained to Facebook or Tweet length.

So, the next few blogs I will be posting will be slightly older reviews from these other sources. Hope you enjoy them.

Film Review: Hobo With A Shotgun

I have a lot of time for Rutger Hauer. Best known for his outstanding performance in Blade Runner, I prefer his lesser known roles like in Wanted: Dead Or Alive or The Hitcher (which, to this day, is still one of the creepiest performances I have ever seen).

So I was looking forward a great deal to Hobo With A Shotgun when I first heard about it. It is based on a competition winning fake trailer during the time Quentin Tarantino and Roberrt Rodriguez' Grindhouse came out, and ended up being used with the other fake trailers during Grindhouse screenings in Canada (where first time director Jason Eisener hails).

The plot concerns Hauer's titular hobo who arrives in a new town to find it has been overrun by the criminal and the corrupt. He decides to take justice into his own hands and kill his way to the top - crime boss The Drake (Brian Downey).

While it's not a massive problem with what it is, the film does try a bit too hard to be shocking and gory. The violence is absolutely insane most of the time - body parts being shot off, a pedophile Santa being blown away, glass eating, a bus full of school kids being incinerated...it's not subtle stuff, but as a 'grindhouse' film that's kinda the point.

Hauer is on good form as the Hobo, and the rest of the cast are suitably over the top. The introduction of two armor clad killers called The Plague is quite strange though, as is the inexplicable octopus moment (you'll know it when you see it), even the hooker with a heart of gold character isn't as one dimensional as you would normally get.

Extra points must be awarded to the use of music over the end titles also, the choice of 'Run With Us' by Lisa Lougheed (the end theme music from 80s cartoon The Raccoons) is a masterstroke, and fits in with the retro feel of the film perfectly.

In the end, Hobo...succeeds with what it set out to do, but it's pretty much what I expected it to be. It's hard to put a finger on that kind of criticism with a film, but it did exactly what it said on the tin, should I have expected anymore than that?

***1/2

A solid genre film, but it is the film you expect it to be. For the most part, not in a bad way, but I did find it was trying a bit too hard with the violence. Worth a watch, though.