Shock Waves

Underwater. Nazi. Zombies. Can it get any better than THAT?! Actually, in the case of this 1977 ‘horror’ flick…it could. The high concept premise is largely wasted by a flat, climax-less story seemingly inhabited by rejects from Gilligan’s Island. The kills are ALL of the bloodless variety and some of the actions by the ‘characters’ […]

The Creature From the Black Lagoon

In keeping with the underwater terror flicks of days gone by, I had to go back and revisit this 1954 classic after 20 or so years. This is a good one, a classic for a reason. Not only do they try to treat the material seriously, at least as seriously as they could given the […]

Monster: Humanoids From the Deep

Agh!! Humanoids!!! This cheesy horror schlock-fest from 1980 knows exactly what it is…if it is your typical un-PC story of a small community, fallen on hard times, that must rally together to fight a species of humanoid amphibious rapist/murderers that turn up on their coast as a result of genetics tampering (of course) with fish […]

Krush Groove

Bwahahahaa!!! This bizarre mishmash of rap drama/comedy/fantasy from 1985 is ‘laugh out loud’ingly bad. A complete bi-product of rap’s commercial ‘blossoming’ of the mid-80s that takes it’s inspiration from the tedious creation of DefJam Records and cheeses it up to 11. The cast consists largely of RunDMC, The Fat Boys, Sheila E and Kurtis Blow […]

Orca The Killer Whale

This Moby Dick-like movie from 1977 clearly rode in on the high grossing tail fin of Jaws and while it shares the whole ‘aquatic beasty with a bad attitude’ motif, it really is a different story in which the motivations, both human and animal, can’t fully be faulted. Another difference is that while the shark […]

The Grey

Very well executed ‘Man vs Nature’ film bolstered by believable performances all around. Liam Neeson, as usual, gives the role of Otway a hefty dose of gravity and conviction, not to mention an underlying current of effective sadness. And considering that the director’s previous film was the hyper-kinetic and flawed The A-Team, this one is […]

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (2011)

David Fincher’s signature style serves this twisted retelling of the Swedish book/film well. The differences between the two versions are subtle and both are valid. The score by Trent Reznor is very effective in a minimalist sort of way and all the acting is solid. And despite being the ‘Hollywood’ version, it strays away from […]

Sector 7

Wow. I had high hopes for South Korea’s first 3D creature-feature. This one REALLY wants to be The Abyss/Aliens. But it’s not. It’s really REALLY not. Everything about this movie is stupid. Nothing makes sense and the ‘characters’ are idiots who deserve to get munched on by the generic CG underwater beasty. And certain scenes […]

War Horse

Pure, old-school Spielberg. A lil over-cooked in the gooey sentimentality dept. but well balanced out in scope and acting. Some of the cinematography is gorgeous and the attention to ‘period’ detail is great. Some very cool performances from the horses (and a goose!) too. If you’re a fan of The Berg or just like old […]

A Boy and His Dog

Wow. A strange, mildly uncomfortable post WW4 apocalyptic tale from 1975. An 18 yr old Don Johnson is trekking across the desert with his psychic dog Blood, who he speaks with telepathically, as they search for food and women. This is pure ‘grindhouse’ fodder in the low budget and quite un-PC tone. There’s just some […]