31 Days of Fright, Day 24: The Woman

Welcome to day 24 of 31 Days of Fright here at Road To The Movies! In today's episode, Gabe goes to extremes with...

THE WOMAN
2011
Rated R

This ain't no date movie. Unless, of course, the story of a family who captures a feral woman in the wild, chains her up in their cellar, and proceeds to collectively "civilize" her sounds like a date movie. If you meet someone who thinks this does sound like a date movie, you should probably either run like hell, or marry them immediately, depending on your particular persuasion. That actually sums this movie up nicely.

I first heard of Lucky McKee's The Woman shortly after its film festival premier (the name of the festival escapes me, but it may have been Sundance), because a guy in the audience caused quite a ruckus when - just after the movie ended - he stood up in his chair and started shouting his revulsion at the movie's degradation of women. I can't argue that the women in the movie are literally treated like animals, but that's clearly not the point of the story, and I have to wonder if the whole thing wasn't just a stunt pulled by the filmmakers to garner some press for a movie that, in all likelihood, would never have made it onto most people's radars.

Don't take that to mean that I think The Woman is a bad movie. And when I say bad, I'm not referring to morality. While the pure, brutal misogyny of the male lead is clearly going to be too much for even some dedicated horror fans, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about filmmaking. Director Lucky McKee has quite a following - albeit, of the cult variety - and not without reason. He's clearly got a vision, and though there were many aspects of the movie I didn't like, I did feel that it was effective and that its scope became clear by the end.

The Woman is a movie that deals in extremes. Extreme misogyny, extreme submissiveness, extreme abuse, extreme retribution. This is both its strength and weakness. The extremities of the situation do make sympathetic characters even more sympathetic and the ending - which you can see coming as soon as you learn the setup - that much more satisfying, but the trouble is that the extremes carry beyond the story and into the performances. There is no nuance on display here, no subtle characterization. All of the characters are cartoons, and - at least for the first half of the movie - it's quite off-putting.

My biggest hangup with this film is that I just can't picture a world in which the titular Woman could even exist. When we first meet her, though her clothing is ragged and filthy, it's clearly manufactured, and she's carrying a knife straight out of an Eddie Bauer catalogue. So she's getting her supplies from somewhere, and given her apparent nature, I'm guessing the people she's getting them from aren't surviving to tell the tale. So, if people are going missing in her neck of the woods, and if she's so lackadaisical about keeping hidden that a guy who thinks smoking while hunting is going to help him bag a deer could happen upon her and go unnoticed, why hasn't she been caught already? I know that this is a moment where I should just suspend my disbelief and accept it as a given for the sake of the story, but it bugged me the whole time I was watching.

In the end, though the setup of the movie bothered me and I felt the performances were one-dimensional, there is something to be said for a movie that can seriously disturb me at this point in my horror fandom. Lucky McKee is a talented storyteller, though I think he should look into finding actors who can do more than the hundred-yard stare to indicate inner turmoil. Though I hated elements, I didn't hate the movie as a whole, and though I did see everything coming a mile away, it still managed to shock. It ain't perfect, but it ain't bad. Just don't watch it on date night.

6.5/10

-GABE


Thanks for riding along! Be sure to click on the banner below to check out our YouTube channel, where you can watch our videos, "like" them, subscribe to the channel, leave a comment or a question, or even suggest a movie for future review. You can also check us out on Facebook (CLICK HERE) and Twitter (CLICK HERE). And don't forget to check back every day in October for a new installment in our 31 Days of Fright!

You asked for a video, you got an apology.

Hello all you persnickety passengers and video voyeurs! Well, looks like this week's video was a bit of a bust. Gabe offers his sincerest apologies, and invites you to read the written review of the movie we screwed-up by clicking HERE. We promise to do better next time!





Thanks for riding along! Be sure to click on the banner below to check out our YouTube channel, where you can watch our videos, "like" them, subscribe to the channel, leave a comment or a question, and don't forget to keep checking back every day in October for more 31 Days of Fright!

31 Days of Fright, Day 23: Thou Shalt Not Kill... Except

Welcome to day 23 of 31 Days of Fright here at Road To The Movies! In today's episode, Gabe takes stalking to a new level of laziness with...

THOU SHALT NOT KILL... EXCEPT
1985
Not Rated

I have a love/hate relationship with movie trailers. I’ve been burned far too many times to ever fully trust them, and I genuinely think that I should be able to sue movie studios for releasing trailers that spoil the films they’re advertising. However, if it weren’t for trailers, I might never have discovered so many of the movies I’ve come to cherish so much.

Seven years ago, a movie called The Man With The Screaming Brain was released, and I was there. I’m up for just about anything Bruce Campbell related, and he not only starred in this movie, but wrote and directed it as well. Needless to say, I didn’t need to be convinced. I bought it the day it was released.

In addition to a surprisingly good movie (surprisingly, because it was released by The SyFy Channel, back when they were The Sci-Fi Channel), I saw a trailer for a movie I had never heard of but became instantly infatuated with: Thou Shalt Not Kill... Except. The ellipses alone would have been enough to sell me on this flick, but it actually looked pretty cool, in a so-bad-it’s-good kinda way.

The movie tells the story of a wounded Vietnam vet who survives the war only to find himself at war with the deranged, murderous cult that rolls into his rural town and begins laying waste to its inhabitants - not the least of whom is his girlfriend and her father.

I went straight to my local video store (yeah, we still had one back in’05, but its days were numbered), only to find that they didn’t carry it. I checked at Hollywood Video and Blockbuster too (they stuck around a little longer, but they’re all gone now), but it was a fool’s errand. Those guys never did have a decent selection.

Eventually I stopped looking. I got Netflix not too long after that, but they didn't have a copy at the time, so Thou Shalt Not Kill... Except just sort of got forgotten in the constant shuffle of newly discovered movies.

Cut to this week. I was at the last video store in town (not a proper “video store” at all, really – one of those “entertainment megastores” with a rental section) with my Road To The Movies co-host, Jonathan, when we happened across a copy of Thou Shalt Not Kill... Except, which looked to have only recently been released on Blu-Ray. Needless to say, after a short recounting of my experience trying to find the movie, and after a quick look at the case, we had to see it.

We were not disappointed.

It was everything I’d hoped for. Violent, gory, corny, absurd, funny, schlocky, over-the-top – this movie has it all. I’m a dedicated fan of bad movies, and this is one bad movie that hits on all cylinders. The acting makes porn look like The Royal Shakespeare Theater. The shameless use of stock footage would have made Ed Wood proud. Sam Raimi’s performance as the hippy cult-leader – yes, that Sam Raimi – is so grotesque, so excessive, so hilarious that it’s worth the price of admission alone.

I don’t want to spoil the movie for you, as watching it for the first time is truly an unforgettable experience, but I will say that if you’re a fan of insanity like The Evil Dead trilogy or wonderful schlock like Troll 2, then this is the Vietnam movie you’ve been waiting for. Your best bet is to get a crowd of like-minded friends together, crack some brews, and enjoy.

I suppose could be room for debate in some people's minds as to whether or not this is a horror movie at all, but not in mine. We have characters we care about (or, at least, we're meant to care about) put in truly horrifying situations by some really horrible people who commit some extremely horrifying acts (well, acts that would be horrifying if every scene weren't so absurdly over-the-top). If this had been done seriously and had been helmed by a competent director, it would be one deeply disturbing piece of cinema. And I know that there are people who claim movies like this and movies like The Devil's Rejects or Silence of the Lambs aren't horror, but all I can think to say to someone that jaded is, If stuff like that doesn't horrify you, you should probably seek professional help immediately.

Like I said before, I love bad movies. I’m actually trying to start a local bad movie festival. This one is a prime candidate; so good at being bad that it’s downright awesome.

8/10

-GABE


Thanks for riding along! Be sure to click on the banner below to check out our YouTube channel, where you can watch our videos, "like" them, subscribe to the channel, leave a comment or a question, or even suggest a movie for future review. You can also check us out on Facebook (CLICK HERE) and Twitter (CLICK HERE). And don't forget to check back every day in October for a new installment in our 31 Days of Fright!

31 Days of Fright, Day 22: Tucker & Dale vs Evil

Welcome to day 22 of 31 Days of Fright here at Road To The Movies! In today's episode, Jonathan can't find anything but good things to say about...

TUCKER & DALE VS EVIL
2010
Rated R

Let me start off by saying this movie is phenomenal. I know that’s a bold statement, and a bold way to start a review, but it really is that good. It’s your classic hillbilly horror story turned on its ear (with hilarious results). It follows the hillbillies, rather than the college campers, who happen to be two normal guys making an innocent trip to restore an old lake cabin together. Once there, they go fishing and witness one of the college kids falling off a rock and nearly drowning. They save her, but all her college buddies see is their friend getting taken away into dark territory by two weird men.

I won’t go any further into the plot, because that’s the point where things get awesome… in a BIG way. It’s hard to call this movie "horror" because it’s so damn funny, but it also takes it all the way. It’s gory, violent, funny, weird… everything I want in my horror. The story is great too, as is the (sometimes hilariously ridiculous) dialogue, which is, in my opinion, flawlessly written. The characters were absolutely off the wall and extremely cliché (in a great way) but the hillbillies were deep and sensitive. While the writing was amazing, the acting was even better. Each character was based on a specific type of person, and all the actors pulled them off perfectly. There is little room for error when making a movie that completely exposes the ridiculousness of a certain genre, and this movie did it perfectly.

This is normally where I’d talk about what I didn’t like about the movie. But, honestly, there really isn’t all that much to dislike. I won’t go too into detail because of spoilers, but the end does get a little convoluted and starts to drag, but that really fits in with the genre they’re parodying. Actually, all the things I didn’t like I also don’t like about other movies in the genre. Obviously, I don’t have much of anything but good to say about this movie. You might not want to watch it if you’re uncomfortable with blood and guts (and a lot of it) or a ton of swearing, but if you’re a horror, action, or comedy fan, this is one to watch. I would go so far as to say it’s an instant classic among horror and comedy buffs alike.

10/10

-JONATHAN


Thanks for riding along! Be sure to click on the banner below to check out our YouTube channel, where you can watch our videos, "like" them, subscribe to the channel, leave a comment or a question, or even suggest a movie for future review. You can also check us out on Facebook (CLICK HERE) and Twitter (CLICK HERE). And don't forget to check back every day in October for a new installment in our 31 Days of Fright!

31 Days of Fright, Day 21: Night of the Comet

Welcome to day 21 of 31 Days of Fright here at Road To The Movies! In today's episode, Gabe finds himself in the fight of his life as he struggles to describe the...

NIGHT OF THE COMET
1984
Rated PG-13

If you've stuck with me this far, you know I'm a man who seldom finds himself at a loss for words. I have something to say about damn near everything, and can usually carry on at length about even the most trivial of subjects, but as I sit here at my keyboard and consider how to articulate my feelings about the 1984 valley-girl apocalypse film Night of the Comet, I'm drawing a blank.

While I tread water and wait for my brain to throw me a lifeline, here's the setup: A comet that hasn't passed near Earth for nearly sixty-five million years (you know, back around the time the dinosaurs went extinct) is about to make an appearance, and the whole world is excited. In a plot twist only a psychic detective could predict, the comet ends up wiping out nearly everybody on Earth, leaving behind only piles of dust dressed in the latest (1984) styles. The few people smart or lucky enough to have stayed inside got a lower dose of whatever the comet was handing out, and only turn into uber-violent zombie types instead of drying into powder. The fewer still who were shielded by steel at the time (this bit comes out later) were spared entirely, and are left to deal with the psychotic freaks who didn't have the good sense to sleep inside a suit of armor. Among these lucky, lucky handful are a pair of teenage sisters who - among other things - happen to be trained from childhood in hand-to-hand combat and the use of firearms. They team up with a hispanic trucker and... But I don't want to ruin the plot for you. Let it suffice to say that an group of less-than-trustworthy scientists, a small clan of murderous stock clerks, and a disembodied disc-jockey all factor into the story at one point or another.

All right, enough stalling. I'm still not quite sure how to describe what I feel about this movie. There are some really great moments - the brief repartee between the sisters while test-firing their newly acquired submachine guns leaps to mind - and there are some really crap moments - the utterly suspenseless scene where Hector searches his mother's house, for instance - but overall, my feelings are very confused. I honestly don't know whether I love this movie, hate it, or don't care. It pulls in so many directions at the same time that I can't tell which direction I'm moving in. Maybe none at all.

This is an '80s movie, so right there I don't really know how to take it. It seems like every movie made between 1982 and 1992 was a roughly equal mix of crap and fun. I'm generalizing unfairly, of course, but I mean aside from the really big films of that era that everyone already knows about. When it comes to small, independent or low-budget movies, the '80s were a very strange time. It's obvious that everyone involved in cinema back in those days was doing a LOT of blow.

It's also an apocalypse movie, and - with very few exceptions - I love apocalypse movies. But it doesn't feel like an apocalypse movie. It feels like the apocalypse happened, but nobody in this movie noticed or cared. I think this is probably due to a lack of acting skill, but it really feels like these characters are not taking any of what's going on seriously. But is it bad acting, or is it great acting? Are the characters just that vapid? I don't know. I just don't know.

The strange shots of the red sky aftermath of the comet is a rather confusing element as well. We are treated to shot after shot of the empty city, drenched in red from whatever the comet did to the atmosphere. The problem is, the effect - while a good idea - is so damn inconsistent. All of the shots that don't show the sky are in regular light, but when we see the sky, everything is red. It's very obvious how the effect was created, but my question is, why didn't they light this movie consistently? If the sky is red and the sunlight filtering through it is red, why isn't everything red? I guess it's sort of symptomatic of how I feel about this movie as a whole. I just can't wrap my mind around it.

In the end, I feel that I liked the movie while I was watching it - I certainly never felt the desire to turn it off - but in looking back at it, I just don't know what to think. I'd like to say, If you like This Movie or That Movie then you'd love/hate Night of the Comet, but I have no freaking clue what to compare it to. A Boy and His Dog maybe? Even that feels wrong.

I guess the best I can say is that this is a movie for the curious. It's the kind of movie you should look into if you don't really know what you want to watch. Maybe it's exactly what you're looking for. Maybe it's not. And maybe, like me, you'll look back at it and say, What the hell do I even think about that?!?

5/10

-GABE


Thanks for riding along! Be sure to click on the banner below to check out our YouTube channel, where you can watch our videos, "like" them, subscribe to the channel, leave a comment or a question, or even suggest a movie for future review. You can also check us out on Facebook (CLICK HERE) and Twitter (CLICK HERE). And don't forget to check back every day in October for a new installment in our 31 Days of Fright!

31 Days of Fright, Day 20: Godzilla

Welcome to day 20 of 31 Days of Fright here at Road To The Movies! In today's episode, Gabe goes sightseeing in Tokyo and just happens to catch a glimpse of...

GODZILLA
1954
Not Rated

So far this month we've seen schizophrenics, freaks, zombies, demons, cannibals, murderous animals, fish-men, psychopaths, aliens, ghosts, werewolves, pagan gods, sharks, and fairy tale creatures, but we've yet to spot a good, old-fashioned giant monster. Well, who better to fill the slot than the King of Monsters himself, Godzilla? And I didn't say that wrong. I'm not talking about Gojira, the original Japanese movie. I'm talking about Godzilla, the Americanization of that Japanese movie, starring Raymond Burr as a relatable white man who conveniently translates the movie into language we can understand!

You know, I'm kind of glad I decided to watch this version instead of the Japanese original. I have both, and it's not because this version is better. I'm glad I watched the American version because I have this sneaking suspicion that once I've watched Gojira, I'll never even consider watching Godzilla again.

If you've been following Road To The Movies for any length of time now, you know that I despise it when people - myself included - compare a work to its source material. It is my firm conviction that a work - any work of art - should be judged based solely on its own merit, and not on how it stacks up to what went before. That is what I believe. It's not always what I practice. What can I say? I'm only human.

The choice to edit Raymond Burr into the original film in order to make it more palatable to American audiences leaves a bad taste in my mouth to begin with, but the way in which the filmmakers went about doing it is almost unforgivable. Huge swaths of story have clearly been excised in order to shoehorn in Burr's Steve Martin (no relation), and from what I can tell, the story they cut was the far more interesting one.

Burr's Martin basically follows the Godzilla story around, contributing nothing to the equation beyond an english translation. If I hadn't known his character was jammed into the story as an afterthought, I would still have thought his character should have been cut in an early draft of the script. If anything, what we have here is a movie that gains a level of forgiveness from the foreknowledge of what went on in bringing it from Japan to America. If I hadn't known anything about it, I would have walked away from it thinking, What a piece of crap. As it is, my thoughts when leaving the movie were more like, Gee, I'd really like to watch the original now. It looks waaaaay better.

The scenes with Godzilla himself are truly awesome. I can't imagine what it must have been like for some kid watching it back in the fifties. The image of a rubber-suited man stomping through a miniaturized Tokyo has been hacked to death by more than two generations worth of parody and special effects jokes, but if you - like me - can sit down and really give yourself to what the filmmakers are doing, I doubt you'll be able to walk away unaffected. The silhouette of Godzilla roaring against a burning Tokyo skyline literally gave me chills.

As I've already said, the Japanese actors here get pretty short shrift. Raymond Burr does nothing and dominates the film, meanwhile the locals are actually solving the problem and they can hardly get a word in edgewise. Trying to enjoy the story as it unfolds is an extremely frustrating experience here, and had I not known there was a Japanese-only original version of this movie, I would likely have turned it off before Godzilla even put in an appearance. That would have been sad, because whatever images may have lodged themselves in your brain during a lifetime (in most of your cases, at least) of having Godzilla as a pop-culture icon, if you haven't actually seen this movie, you don't know the first thing about Godzilla.

Should you watch Godzilla? Maybe. If you want to experience a significant piece of pop-culture the same way the rest of America first experienced it - flaws and all - then yes. It's an interesting little piece of history. But if you're looking for a great monster movie, look elsewhere. Maybe to Gojira. I haven't seen it, but all the great moments of Godzilla are there, and minus the unwelcome uselessness of American gawker Steve Martin. At the very least, it sure looks a whole lot better than this mess.

4.5/10

-GABE


Thanks for riding along! Be sure to click on the banner below to check out our YouTube channel, where you can watch our videos, "like" them, subscribe to the channel, leave a comment or a question, or even suggest a movie for future review. You can also check us out on Facebook (CLICK HERE) and Twitter (CLICK HERE). And don't forget to check back every day in October for a new installment in our 31 Days of Fright!

31 Days of Fright, Day 19: Troll

Welcome to day 19 of 31 Days of Fright here at Road To The Movies! In today's episode, Gabe takes a trip down memory lane with...

TROLL
1986
Rated PG-13

I've said it before and I'll say it again, nostalgia is a thing best left unverified. Usually, that is.

The first time I saw Troll was during summer break of my eighth year. I was at my babysitter's house, watching it with her little sister, also eight. I remember that I watched it with her little sister because I remember thinking, "Boy, I wish I was watching this with her instead of her little sister." I've always had a thing for older women.

I should probably mention at this point that the first time I watched Troll was also the last time I watched it. I would have watched it more, but I didn't own a copy, and for those of you who don't remember the eighties - either because you weren't born yet, or because you were too high on cocaine to form new memories during that time - actual VHS (or Beta, if that was your flavor) copies of movies weren't easy to come by back then, unless you had HBO. I didn't have HBO. My grandma did, and frequently recorded movies for me off of it, but horror - even of the tame variety - was pretty much verboten to me, so asking for her to record Troll was out of the question.

Back to the present! Well, yesterday, anyway.

Until the moment I hit PLAY on my Blu-Ray player's remote (Yeah, I'm livin' large.) I have no actual memory of what Troll was about. I just remember the titular creature's rather creepily expressive smile and that the movie both scared and thrilled the dookie out of me. I also have a fuzzy memory about something happening with a rubber ball in a basement, but that's it. The movie is an enigma, within which hides a shadow of looming dread. I simply have to watch it.

Well, as you've probably guessed already, this movie is anything but scary. However, Troll is also anything but unentertaining.

Troll. How do I love thee (or, at least, like thee a lot)? Let me count the ways!

Michael Moriarty can't not make me smile. From the very first scene, he's clearly in this to have fun. What other message could he be sending with that ridiculous hat? Factor in his '80s-montage-dance-scene to a protopunk version of Summertime Blues, and it's hard not to love this guy.

Anybody who doesn't love June Lockhart is a commie and a generally sketchy character. She's the ideal mother of the past (Lassie) as well as the future (Lost in Space), and if that doesn't warm your heart, you don't have one. Now, imagine her as the tough-but-kind, lonely old lady living on the top floor who is the only person a young boy in crisis can turn to for help. Got that image? Yeah. She's just as good as you imagine, and then some.

Then, of course, there's young Harry Potter. Yeah, you read that right. The main character's name is Harry Potter. Well, Harry Potter Jr., to be precise, but that's nitpicking. And the similarities don't end at the name. Turns out that the troll everybody is talking about is an ancient, evil wizard, and Harry's the only one who can stop him. When the scene finally rolls around where young Harry Potter is seated across from Eunice the witch (June Lockhart) and says, "Can you teach me to be a magician?" I just about deuced in my drawers.

And it doesn't stop there. I haven't even gotten into the way the evil troll transforms the apartment building our characters live in into a magical forest realm by turning the residents into gigantic turds that crack open and pour forth all manner of fairy forest life. Or Julia Louis-Dreyfus's prancing nymph seduction scene. Or Gary Sandy (no, you shouldn't have heard of him before) running in, looking and acting like a coked-up, American Graham Chapman. Or Sonny Bono's turn as a sleazy swinger whose total lack of taste would make even Joe Jackson cringe.

Oh, and Harry Potter is played by Atreyu. Yeah, this movie pretty much shits awesomeness.

On the downside, the story itself isn't that special. The director clearly has little to no talent, but in his defense, everybody is having so much fun here that the bad acting and scene structure sort of just add to it. There are moments where the movie drags, but at an hour and twenty-two minutes, it doesn't have a whole lot of time to bore you.

Ultimately, this movie was a good time. If you treasure recalling the chills it gave you as a child, avoid it at all costs, as rewatching will shatter those memories as soundly as a cinderblock dropped onto a crystal vase. On the other hand, if you've never seen it - or you don't mind reevaluating joys long past - I think Troll has a lot to offer by way of entertainment. It's far from the most fun I've had with a bad movie, but if you go in for that sort of thing, you could do a whole lot worse.

7.5/10

-GABE


Thanks for riding along! Be sure to click on the banner below to check out our YouTube channel, where you can watch our videos, "like" them, subscribe to the channel, leave a comment or a question, or even suggest a movie for future review. And don't forget to check back every day in October for a new installment in our 31 Days of Fright!