White Zombie

Year: 1932

Actors: Bela Lugosi, Madge Bellamy, Joseph  Cawthron

Director: Victor Halperin

Running Time: 69 minutes

Plot:

Along a desolate road in the Haitian mountains, a carriage bearing Neil Parker and Madeline Short encounters a funeral in which the body is being buried in the road. Further down the road, the coach stops at the sight of a man of satanic appearance: six human shapes step forth, and the horrified driver shouts "Zombies!" signalling the first appearance of the living dead in American cinema.

Review:

Very soon after Bela Lugosi’s success in Dracula and Murders in the rue morgue he landed a starring role in White Zombie playing the villain “Legendre” he played this role to perfection, the role meant he had to use a lot of facial expressions and a very spooky voice to give the movie an atmosphere which coming fresh from the movie Dracula he had the expressions down to perfection.

Madeline short parker was played by the beautiful Madge Bellamy, she played 2 kinds of roles in this movie, first she was a normal very happy fun loving women set to marry her true love Neil Parker and then the 2^nd role she plays the White Zombie who is being controlled by the evil Legendre, She also had to play the role to perfection for it to work not allowing herself to show any kind of emotion in the face just a blank stare, she didn’t have a lot of dialog throughout the movie but I think she played the best role from start to finish.

This style of old horror movie always has to have a brilliant music score to give out the atmosphere for each scene and this score was amazing, when you combine the score with the brilliant facial expressions by Bela Lugosi you instantly got a chill going down your spine and a feeling of dread as to what is going to happen next, there were a number of scenes were the music score was playing that filled this movie with tension and suspense the scene that stands out most for me is towards the final 10 minutes when  Madeline was standing on the balcony outside her bedroom window and her husband Neil Parker was shouting up to her from the shores the music was playing in the background giving you suspense to weather she would notice him in her zombie state or not you get a glimpse of her remembering as she walks away from the balcony but then she goes back into her zombie state, that scene is possibly the most memorable scene in the movie because of its music score.

Even though the picture quality wasn’t great and it was shot in very dark black and white the makeup and special effects were done brilliantly for its time the Zombies looked like they were the zombies you would see in any traditional zombie film today.

In the 1960s the film’s distributer Frank Storace wished to produce a restored version of the film but the copyright owners of the film refused him permission to the original footage they had in their possession so the movie has never been restored from its original look so every now and then the picture and sound would jump and I would miss the most important word in the sentence, this became a little frustrating as I really got into the movie and was fixated by how brilliantly it was made, one scene in particular was Doctor Bruner and Neil Parker were having a conversation Doctor Bruner was sitting at his desk and then the scene jumps and all of a sudden he was standing in front of his desk having the same conversation.

The film was shot in only 11days which is amazing when you think of how much is going on throughout the movie, the acting was brilliant until the final few minutes which unfortunately seemed very rushed maybe being shot in only 11 days was the cause of that.

Scores:

Music score 8/10

Acting and Expressions 7.5/10

Unfortunately because of the last 6 or 7 minutes of acting and the fact the scenes and sound would jump every few minutes I can only give this movie an overall enjoyment score of 7/10

Written by

Evil Bob

Phantasm 2

Year: 1987
Actors: James Le Gros, Reggie Bannister, Angus Scrimm
Director: Don Coscarelli
Running Time: 93minutes

Plot:

Mike and Reggie are back and ready to kill The Tall Man, after Mike is released from a hospital Reggie takes him back to his home to stay with his family, but The Tall Man has other ideas for the 2 friends. 

A beautiful young girl starts to appear in Mike's dreams and they form a connection. He can feel that she's in danger and needs their help - will they find her before the Tall Man can get to her too?

Review: 
Again Angus Scrimm is back as the tall man and again he delivers such a fantastic role they really could not have picked a better actor to play the Tall Man he really is fantastic as the main villain.

This time Reggie and Mike are on the road passing through different ghost towns that have been completely destroyed by the Tall Man, each town give a very scary atmosphere and make you wonder as to what the Tall Man has been up to while Mike was in the mental hospital, Mike who was originally played by Michael A Baldwin is not played by James Le Gros this is his first staring role in a movie and boy does he deliver the goods, He plays the role to perfection his character is a lot more grown up than the Mike from the first Phantasm movie and he is out for Revenge for the death of his brother Jodie.

Reggie Bannister reprises his role as Reggie the ice cream vendor, He did all his own stunts except for the one stunt were he has to jump over a chainsaw because they wouldn’t allow him to do that stunt because of the obvious dangers, again he delivers the role to perfection which makes Reggie my favourite character role in this movie just like he was in the first Phantasm, just like in the last movie when something can go wrong for him it usually does which sometimes can make you cry out with laughter and you can’t help stop yourself feeling sorry for him.

This time mike has a love interest with a girl called Liz Reynolds who he has a psychic connection with through his dreams, she is played by an actress named Paula Irvine she plays the part well and she is a very attractive women which helps! Although her character is one of the main character’s she just doesn’t feel like one of the main cast more like a supporting member because she just doesn’t deliver the role at the same level as Reggie Bannister, Angus Scrimm or James Le Gros, in some ways I felt like her character was a little too useless she didn’t really do anything to help out she just kind of stood in the background and did nothing, this wasn’t her fault though because the script just didn’t give her enough to do.

Again they went with the more simple special effects such as the Tall Man wearing clothes a couple of sizes to big and platform shoes and so on but the best effect they did was when Reggie’s house blows up with his family inside they used a real house and wired it up to explode so you couldn’t really get any better than that.

The gore is a lot more effective in this movie than the first Phantasm you see a lot more death scenes and they are twice as brutal, My favourite death scene in this movie was when the Golden sphere was chasing Mike and Liz crashing through several doors and ends up killing an undertaker by drilling its self through his back coming all the way up to his mouth.

I think the Tall Man had a lot more dialog in this movie and he really does has the most frightening voice my favourite scene with the Tall Man is when he chokes a priest with his own necklace and then walks up to him and uses my favourite quote from a movie “You think when you die you go to heaven? You come to US!! Every time I watch that scene I get a chill go through my spine it’s a great atmospheric scene.

The music score to this movie was different to the original it used the same beat but they made it more modern personally I preferred the original but that isn’t to say this wasn’t a great score it still gave a lot of atmosphere and many frights.

This movie had a budget of $3,000,000 which was 10 times bigger than the first Phantasm movie and I think they used all of the $3,000,000 very well nothing about the movie seemed like it was a waste of time my only criticism is I wish they gave Paula Irvine more to do and kept the original score.


Scores: 
Characterization and acting 8.5/10 
Atmosphere and Gore 9/10 
Music score 8/10 
Overall enjoyment for this movie is a definite 8.5/10 

Written By

Evil Bob

Phantasm

Year: 1979
Actors: Angus Scrimm, Michael Baldwin, Reggie Bannister
Director: Don Coscarelli
Running Time: 88 Minutes
 
Plot: 
After the deaths of Jody Pearson's parents he is left raise his 13 year old brother Mike in a small town disturbed by mysterious deaths of it's residents. Jody, Mike and there best friend Reggie who is a ice cream vendor and family man are getting suspicious about the local mortician AKA "The Tall Man", as they start to realise he is causing all the deaths in the small town, they begin to learn about what evil plans he has in store for all the corpses and where The Tall Man comes from.
Can they stop him before its too late for all the Residents of the small town ???
You'll have to watch it to find out!
 
 
Review:
Personally I think The Tall Man is Angus Scrimm's best role to date and he will forever be remembered as The Tall Man from phantasm over any of his other movie roles, Reggie Bannister is a fantastic Actor and played the role of Reggie the ice cream vendor which I personally think not only is it the best role Reggie Banister has ever played but it's the best character role in the whole movie, he is hilarious and nothing ever seems to go right for him, he stands out more than any other character and Reggie Bannister plays the role to perfection.
 
The atmosphere in this movie is very frightening it's a great case of dark and gloomy things that go bump in the night although in this case the dark and gloomy things are kick ass Dwarf Zombies out to serve only 1 master The Tall Man !!!
All jokes aside I really did enjoy this movie it will go down as being one of my favourite movies of all time, the characters are great they are very interesting which drag's you into the movie making you feel for them at every twist and turn, you feel nothing but sympathy for Mike as the tall man sets out to destroy his life and then end it.
 
The score for this movie was composed by Fred Myrow and Malcolm Seagrave it was fantastic it gave a horrifying feeling whenever it was played and worked really well with the movie.
 
My favourite couple of scene's in the movie are when The Tall Man Stands at the end of Mikes bed and his a bunch Zombies grab Mike from each side of the bed and when Mike looks in the mirror and see's The Tall Man standing behind him and quotes his famous word "BOY" and then 2 hands break through the mirror and pull him through, those 2 scenes are full of atmosphere and filled me with dread which is how a real horror movie should make you feel.
 
This movie is a Classic and had years to collect such a high reputation, it is a great example of how simple special effects can be so effective, Angus Scrim standing at 6ft 4inchs tall already he used platform shoes and suits several sizes to small to make him seem even taller, so he looked perfect for the role of The Tall Man, His dwarf zombies where all played by small children and the Flying Sphere scene was made using a finishing line attached to the sphere which was designed and crafted by Willard Green, The shot were the Sphere was attached to the mans head was filmed by sticking it to his head, then pulling it off, and filming the shot in reverse, so it looked like it flew into his head, they were all simple special effects but made the film stand out and look amazing.
 
The Movie's running time was originally 3 hours long, but Writer and Director Don Coscarelli thought it was to long for people to stay interested in watching it and made a number of big cuts to the film which ended up being only 88 minutes long, which for me was a shame id have loved to have seen the movie as it was originally shot and intended, However you can see a number of these cut scenes in the later instalment Phantasm IV: Oblivion (1998) but the rest are believed to be lost.
 

The movie Spawned 3 Sequels, Phantasm 2, Phantasm 3 Lord of the dead and Phantasm 4 Oblivion, However this remains the best of all 4 with Phantasm 2 coming a very close 2nd!!

Scores:

Characterization and Story telling 8.5/10
Music and Atmosphere 9/10 Overall score for enjoyment of this movie is an easy 8.5/10, its just a shame the movie was not on for the full 3 hours, however I loved it and I thought it was inventive and new, there is no better villain than The Tall Man, DON'T MISS IT!!!

Written By
Evil Bob

Sick Nurses

 

Year: 2007

Staring: Chol Wachananont, Winchan Jarujinda, Kanya Rattanapetch, Chidjan Rujiphun

Director: Piraphan Laoyont & Thodsapol Siriwiwat

Run Time: 82 minutes

Plot:
Dr Taa and seven nurses harvest organs from the hospital where they work to sell them on the black market, when one of the nurses, Tawan threatens to tell the police about what is going on, Dr Taa and the other nurses including her own sister, Nook murder her in cold blood, however 7 days later Tawan come back to get revenge on everyone who played a part in her muder.

Review:

I didn’t expect much from this movie, I never really heard anything about it so I wasn’t sure what kind of horror this was going to be weather it would be a sleazy sexual exploitation horror movie or a serious horror movie, I guess you could say it fell under the category of both, although there wasn’t really any sex scenes in this movie it was clear that the director’s tried to exploit the beautiful women in a sexual manner while still holding a consistent serious tone to the movie with some added black comedy.

The makeup and effects were brilliant all through the movie I was amazed at how good everything looked, the hospital décor had a very eerie feel to it, and you could almost sense that death was just around the corner, the make up to the ghost was brilliant she was covered in pure black makeup from head to toe with very long dark hair and a long black dress.

The spirit could also take over parts of the nurses bodies such as their arms or legs to make them do things to them self’s, when this occurred there possessed limbs would turn to pure black to represent the possession of the limb which also gave a very eerie feel to what was happening.

There were many creative and torturing death scenes my favourite being, one of the nurses being wrapped in long black hair like in a spider web and then being put head first into a fish tank forcing her to drown, it’s a shame the director didn’t notice that there was a reflection of a crew member in the glass of the tank

There was not much dialog which for me was a bonus because I struggle to keep up with the sub-titles however because of the lack of dialog and the way the movie kept throwing you between different time lines it was hard to follow who was who and what was going on in the movie, but that didn’t take anything away from the story telling its self because towards the end everything fell into place and gave me a bigger understanding of what was happening and why these things were happening.

The acting was sometimes very corny but at the same time great, when things started to get serious you could see the pain and fear in their eyes which gave me a real feeling to what was happening to the nurses, although I still think they deserved everything that happened to them at the same time I really did feel somewhat sorry for them and that made me want to see more, there was a few scenes in particular that I did not understand like why was there confetti and blood falling all over the doctors and professors at the conference while they were all singing and dancing, I am guessing this was all supposed to add to the atmosphere and feeling of dread but it really didn’t work for me it took away any of the fear I had and turned it into something that I just thought was silly, I think it was a bad move on the Director’s behalf.

At the end thought that there were a lot of shocking twists and turns throughout this movie and every death scene was unique and inventive with a brilliant score to add to the atmosphere, the only real problem was it was only on for 82 minutes and it felt like they tried to cram to much in that short amount of time, i think it would have worked out better if the movie was on for longer.

Scores:

Atmosphere and Scares 6.5/10

Acting and characterisation 6.5/10

Storytelling and plot 6.5/10

Overall enjoyment score 6.5/10

I thought it was inventive and offered me something I have never seen before it had its faults but nothing to serious that you couldn’t forgive.

Hatchet

Year: 2006
Staring: Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Joel Moore, Tamara Feldman, Tony Todd
Director: Adam Green
Running Time:  83 Minutes
 

Plot:  
It's Mardi Gras in New Orleans, and Ben (Joel Moore) has reached booze and boobs overload. Recently dumped and pining after his girlfriend, he enlists his pal Marcus (Deon Richmond) to accompany him on a swamp tour in a boat that travels the spooky murk surrounding the city. Marcus is less than enthused until the crew of the low budget movie "Bayou Beavers" signs on, including amateur cameraman Shapiro (Joel Murray), pneumatic Misty (Mercedes McNab) and ditzy Jenna (Joleigh Fioreavanti). Joining them on the rickety cruiser are the painfully wholesome couple Mr. and Mrs. Permatteo (Richard Riehle and Patrika Darbo) and the beautiful-but-sullen Marybeth (Tamara Feldman).

Led by the P.T. Barnum of the swamp tour industry, fast-talking but slow-thinking showboater Shawn (Parry Shen) the tourists are decidedly underwhelmed by the fog, low-hanging branches and aggressively quiet sounds that Shawn tries to pass off as frightening. He launches into the story of Victor Crowley - yup, a legend in these parts - who is known to haunt the swamp. The boaters wave off the story as part of Shawn's continuing nonsense - except for Marybeth, who is notably discomforted.

Review: 
The movie starts of awesome very fast paced, in the first 10 minutes you get 2 deaths which is great because most of the time it takes along time to get into a movie.

The movie has a lot of suspense and some very creative death scenes that you wouldn’t believe, the characters are great in this movie and it’s a shame when they start being killed off because you like all of them, the acting is really good but like any typical slasher movie you get the odd bad acting, but it kind of blends into the back ground because the movie is so much fun.

I loved the background story to Victor Crowley who is played by Kane Hodder who also did a lot of Friday the 13^th’s as Jason Voorhees, He also plays the role of Victor Crowley’s father which is the first time in a movie he is not wearing a mask and it shows us his real acting skills which are perfect for the role.

There is no Shying away from the gore, a few death scenes are some of the most brutal death scenes I have seen in slasher a movie of this type, a lot of this movie feels like a modern up to date version of Friday the 13^th which is not a bad thing because it gives up a raw feeling of knowing what is to come and knowing that Victor Crowley is not going to just lay down and take a beating.

Personally I think the make up to Victor Crowley is brilliant and very detailed, it has a disturbing look to it, and I think it is very refreshing to see a new Horror icon which we haven’t had since Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers or Freddy Kruger.

The Bad things about this movie are very few, mainly the length of the movie, I could have easily watched this movie for another 30 or 40 minutes, and the only other thing is I wish they showed more of the back ground story to Victor Crowley because I think his story is brilliant.

Scores:
Overall I loved the movie think everyone should watch it.
For acting and characterization 8/10
Atmosphere and scares 7.5/10
Gore and death scenes 8/10
Overall rating for this movie I cant give it any less than 8/10 I thought it was very refreshing and inventive.


Written By
Evil Bob

VooDoo Lagoon

Year: 2006

Staring: Ashley Hamilton, John Noble & Lara Cox

Director: Nick Cohen

Running Time: 80 minutes

Plot:

Nick Cohen writes and directs this voodoo-themed tropical horror. A group of college students books a bargain dream holiday to a remote tropical island, unaware that they have been lured there by the island's malicious owner to fulfil an ancient voodoo prophecy. Paradise soon descends into nightmare as the voodoo curse grips them, pitching friends and family members against one another in a desperate fight for survival.

Review:
The movie starts off really good, with a good looking cast that seemed to be talented actors for the first 25 minutes, then movie takes a sudden turn for the worse.

There is Looming music for the final hour of the movie that doesn’t stop, even when its just 2 people talking to each other you can still hear the same music in the back ground you heard about 20 minutes ago none stop, unfortunately it doesn’t stop until the credits start rolling, I’m guessing it was supposed to give the movie some kind of atmosphere but all it did was irritate me.

There seems to be no sound effects what so ever which again gives no atmosphere at all, even when the boats engine is turned on you don’t hear any sound effects you just get the constant irritating music in the back ground instead which wouldn’t have been so bad if it wasn’t for the fact iv been listening to the music for the last 40 minutes.

The story and movie had potential to be good, but the script was terrible and hard to follow, it had a lot of twists and turns in the movie that were unexpected, but to be honest I didn’t understand a lot of what was going on due to bad story telling and bad acting, and when something shocking was supposed to happen at that point I no longer cared about the movie so it wasn’t really a surprise.

Now we get to the CGI, WOW! I have to say it’s the worst CGI I have ever seen in my life the spiders looked like the were glowing in the dark and had no detail to them at all, it is a prime example of why I do not agree with CGI in horror movies over the real thing or puppetry and costumes.
On the plus side the first 25 minutes was good!

Scores:
Music and atmosphere a rating of 2/10
Special effects and sound effects 2/10
Acting and story telling 4/10
Overall Rating for this movie I will give a 3/10


Written By
Evil Bob

Insidious

Year: 2011
Staring: Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Ty Simkins, Barbara Hershey
Director: James Wan
Running Time: 102minutes

Plot:

Josh (Patrick Wilson) and Renai (Rose Byrne) are a happily married couple who have moved into their new suburban home with their three young children. When their young son falls into an unexplainable coma, Josh and Renai begin to experience strange things happening in the house that are beyond explanation. Suddenely, their lives are turned upside down by demonic haunting.

Forced to seek help and protect their family, they turn to an old family friend and soon realise, it's not the house that's haunted but something far worse...
 

Review:
The start to the movie was brilliant it took me back to watching alot of the 1980s horror movies when horror was for me at its peak.

The music, the scary atmosphere and look of the house was just brilliant the plot and the scares were better than any movie thats come out in the last few years since drag me to hell.

But that was the first hour of the movie, the movie is on for aprox 100 mins so you then have about 30 minutes of footage left befor the credits that were just like watching a typical up to date horror movie, which was very bland and the story took a big turn for the worst, it became very predictable wich was a shame as the movie was heading into the right direction to being a haunting classic.

The music was composed by Joseph Bishara who has done music for, night of the demons (2009), The gravedancers (2006), the music was genius, it gave a very scary atmosphere like back when i first watched The Omen, The Exorcist and Poltergiest.

Scores:

Plot and story telling i give this movie a 6/10 would have been 8/10 if not for the ending
For scares i give this movie a 7/10
The music i have to give this movie a 9/10 i loved the score by Joseph Bishara it made me feel like i was watching a classic from the 1980s

Now for an over all rating i will be giving this movie a 7/10

It is a brilliant movie and would have rated it higher if not for the last 30 minutes of footage as it had potential to be 9/10

for those who have never watched this movie should, dont be put off by it being produced by Oren Peli who did paranormal activity.


Written By
Evil Bob