Category Archives: Canadian Horror
American Mary
Pretty sure you all have seen American Mary
Meet Mary.
Mary’s just your typical med student who wants to be a surgeon, who’s also up to her eyeballs in debt, a total starving student as she says at one point. To make ends meet, she decides to try to her hand at stripping but things don’t exactly go as planned. Instead of stripping, she’s asked by the club’s owner to help save the life of one of his boys who is extremely hurt for whatever reason. $5000 if she agrees to help him out. So of course she does. I would too for that kind of money and I’m not even in med school.
Next she starts to get harassed by a woman named Beatrice, a dancer from the club, who has had extreme body modification done to look like Betty Boop, while really she just looks uber creepy. Bea has a friend who wants to be a living Barbie doll and as such wants…well…she wants the full Barbie package including the whole no genitalia and asexuality bit. Once again there’s a lot of money on the table and since Mary’s still in debt, she once again agrees to do it. Poor Mary, this is really the start of her downfall.
Beatrice. Totes creepy, right??
After Mary does this surgery, more follow till…well…if you actually haven’t seen this one, I don’t want to ruin it for you but let’s just say Mary gets drawn into a seedy underworld and then something unspeakable happens to her that makes her go just a teensy bit cray. Just a teensy bit though… 😉
Seriously, this movie rocks more than words can describe so if you haven’t seen it GO NOW!!! I included a link up top just for you! Damn, I love Katharine Isabelle. She is so phenomenal and so incredibly hot. I need to go watch this again, like right now. Laterz.
The Tall Man
So my friend, Gory, came over last night to hang and my roomie decided to hang with us because she’s been sick for a few days and was feeling like shite and he & I were gonna watch movies. We go through my Netflix queue (which you know mostly consists of “sin, deviance, schoolgirls, zombies, T&A!, sinful dwarves” and so on and so forth) but came across this (they both breathed a sigh of relief at the normality of it) and I finally, finally watched The Tall Man
FUCK YOU, TALL MAN, FUCK YOU.
Yeah, so, there it is. That pretty much sums it up. Of course, I’ve had about 12 hours to cool down because if you’d seen me right after I watched this piece of crap…well…Gory couldn’t stop laughing at my pure unadulterated vitriol. Sorry, Gory, some things make me very passionately happy or very passionately angry and this was one of the things that made me very passionately angry. Like almost throwing things angry.
Hi, I’m married to Justin Timberlake.
Look, I have nothing, absolutely NOTHING against Jessica Biel. I think she’s pretty super hot and once upon a time I was totally interested in how her career would turn out. Unfortunately, this is the first thing I’ve seen her in, in AGES (and if she’s done a whole bunch of indie movies that I’m unaware of, please let me know so I can watch them and wash the bad taste of THIS out of my mouth!), and this movie does her absolutely no favors because it’s basically one expression through out. Jessica Biel looks tortured, cries, look tortured again, cries and so on and so forth (okay, I suppose that could count for TWO expressions…). Dear Mrs. Timberlake, you had a somewhat promising career once – if you want to be known ever again as anything other than Justin Timberlake’s wife, please don’t do movies like this. Please do movies where you show a range of emotion, movies that are GOOD. Love, Me.
Even with that whole Silent Hill travesty in my past, Misty still thinks I’m pretty cool.
And this chick was in it and I dig her, even if she was in Silent Hill (another movie I do not love). And Ellen from Supernatural is featured here as well. The cast is good. That’s what makes the whole thing sadder. 😦
See the thing that made me so cranky was that:
1) I recall this being marketed as a horror movie. This is NOT a horror movie. It’s also not a thriller (oh it tries to fake you out by being a thriller for the first 30 minutes or so but it’s NOT). It’s a drama. In fact, I think my exact words when this was over were – “This is a movie someone made because they wanted to make a commentary on children’s places in society but they didn’t want to go the Christian drama route.” (Please note, I have nothing against Christianity or religion or anything like that when I say “Christian drama”, I’m referencing those movies like Fireproof and anything Kirk Cameron’s in. You know what I’m talking bout, right?)
2) I am all for suspension of disbelief but this movie asks me to push those boundaries WAYYYYY too far. Yes, even further than say believing there’s a sinful dwarf who along with his mother is kidnapping women and sexing them up. I can believe/disbelieve that. But this?? And I can’t say what I’m talking about in case you haven’t seen it because that would equal *SPOILERS* but if you have seen it you know what I’m talking bout right? “Hi, meet my adopted kid! Where did I adopt him from? Shut up, don’t ask questions.” WTF, movie, WTF?? That is one of the most ridiculous things I have seen in ages and I make it a habit to watch ridiculous things.
He’s not in this movie, obviously he is in Phantasm but this image keeps popping up and it’s cool!
So yeah. I hate this movie. I think it was terribly mis-marketed and completely beyond the realms of reality. So what do you guys think? Am I overreacting? Should I just chalk it up to a case of me being tired and having a really bad headache when I watched? Or did you all think it was as bad and anger inducing as I did?
The First Five – Monster Brawl
Okay, gotta be honest – I really watched the first 40 minutes of this not just five. BUT I honestly didn’t realize I was still watching it till my friend, The Brad, called and I was like, “Why can’t I hear what you’re saying?? Oh…this stupid thing is still on??” So that totally counts for a First Five. Right? 😉
Yeah…so…I’d like to start by saying that a movie that involves monsters and wrestling should be AMAZING. FUCKING AMAZING. It’s like having a movie that involves hot girls and jello wrestling – how do you go wrong???? You can’t. You just can’t go wrong with that. And yet…*sighs*. WHAT THE FUCK, Monster Brawl
Speaking of Foley’s…
Speaking of Foley’s though, Dave Foley is in this movie and from what I saw he spends the entire time with a look upon his face that clearly indicates he has no CLUE how he got in this film. None at all. Also his “character” is continuously drinking from a flask…yeah, “character”…*cough cough, wink wink*
The oh so amazing “Cyclops” makeup…
Oh and let’s talk about this guy for a minute, shall we? Someone be a dear and tell me when exactly Cyclops (Cyclopses…Cyclopi…what’s the plural??) developed laser beam eyeballs that can melt the faces off people. Because that happened. TOTES.
Why, yes, that IS her name – “Lady Vampire”. There’s also another woman called “Witch Bitch”. Don’t even get me started on this bullshit.
The most boring monster fights you’ll ever see…
So to sum up – FUCK YOU, Monster Brawl. You go hide somewhere and hang your head in shame.
P.S. Next Classic Movie will be The Usual Suspects!
Cinema Schminema’s Favorite Horror Movie Moments
Every year, round this time, t.v. stations start playing things like “100 Scariest Movie Moments!” and “100 Scary Movies You’ve Never Seen!” and so on and so forth (and did I just totally sound old there by saying “t.v. stations”? Can you still refer to them as such?) so I thought I’d do some things along similar lines here for Halloween Month. Hopefully, you find it fun (and if not leave me a very nice comment asking me to never ever do this again, please). I wasn’t entirely sure what to entitle this since some of these may be scary, some may be stupid and some may be just WTF? so we’re just going to go with “favorite” horror movie moments. This is also (obviously) not a full list just my current top five. There may be more forthcoming. Oh and….
*WARNING – SPOILERS AHEAD*
So if you haven’t seen a particular movie and don’t want to know what happens in a certain part, get the heck outta here now!
I.
My first favorite horror movie moment comes from my all-time favorite Korean horror flick EVER. A Tale of Two Sisters
II.
To some this may not be a horror movie but to me it is. There’s lots of reasons why but I won’t go into them here, mostly because I’m doing a guest post for Tyson over at Head in a Vice on Black Swan
III.
If you haven’t had the pleasure of watching Suicide Club (Unrated) (English Subtitled)
IV.
Alice
V.
Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed
Ginger Snaps
Today was supposed to be a review of The Sinful Dwarf but apparently the universe has decided I shouldn’t watch this movie because it’s making it really, really hard for me to find and watch. So I am sooooo sorry, theipc!!! I’m sincerely hoping to have the movie in hand in time to watch and review for Friday!
I really don’t have the words to describe my overwhelming adoration of Ginger Snaps
See Ginger. See Ginger snap!
Ginger (Isabelle) and Brigitte (Perkins) are an unusually close pair of sisters who live by the mantra “Out by sixteen or dead on the scene, but together forever.” Gloriously goth (I think it was still called goth in this era), the sisters do all sorts of fun things like creating gruesome death scenes and taking photos or playing “Search and Destroy” at school (pick out a person and describe how they’ll die). The Fitzgerald girls have some issues.
We may or may not kill you and ourselves. We haven’t decided yet.
On the eve of her first period, Ginger gets bitten by a werewolf and starts to undergo some….unusual changes, while Brigitte races to find a way to cure her of her newfound sexin’, partyin’, killin’ and eatin’ people tendencies (which is mostly achieved by hanging out with the school druggie – dude’s smarter than your average pothead!) during which time Ginger slips further and further away from her sister. Seriously, this movie has everything. Family drama, werewolves, gothiness to the core. And the best part? It’s the first of a trilogy. While this one is fine as a standalone, the other two aren’t terrible to watch at all. They don’t compare but they’re nice little bonuses in the Fitzgerald story. Oh!! And Mimi Rogers plays their mom. You may know her as Tom Cruise’s first wife.
Chill, B. I was hungry.
If you’re not already enticed into watching this (and seriously I don’t understand how that could be except for how I can’t seem to truly find the words for this epicness), I leave you with some awesome quotes and the trailer:
The fuck, B. This is your idea. If you don’t like your ideas, stop having them.
A girl can only be a slut, a bitch, a tease, or the virgin next door.
Brigitte: Are you *sure* it’s just cramps?
Ginger: Just so you know… the words “just” and “cramps,” they don’t go together.
Ginger: Think she’s pretty?
Brigitte: If I wasn’t here would you eat her?
I get this ache… And I, I thought it was for sex, but it’s to tear everything to fucking pieces.
Eddie the Sleepwalking Cannibal
Today is a guest post by the always lovely Tyson over at Head in a Vice. If you haven’t already, I highly suggest you head over and check out his site as he always does fabulous work AND has a couple of really sweet projects running (such as Desert Island Films and IMDB Top 250 Films Reviewed). Thanks again for this Tyson!! YOU ROCK!!! 🙂
Eddie: The Sleepwalking Cannibal is a Canadian-Danish co-production about an artist called Lars (Thure Lindhardt), who takes up teaching art in a small Canadian town. On his way to his new job, driving through the Canadian back roads Lars drives into a deer in the middle of the road (bloody jaywalkers!). Though the animal manages to survive the accident, it remains unable to move and Lars humanely decides to put it out of its misery. He finds himself a rock and proceeds to try and smash its head in.
In doing this, it’s almost as if something inside of him stirs, and he realises that this brutality is giving him inspiration. It appears as though violence stimulates Lars’ brush, which is an important fact especially considering that the man hasn’t made any new work in years, much to his art dealer Ronny’s (Stephen McHattie) dismay.
Lars
Once he gets to his job, he finds that one of his pupils is Eddie (Dylan Smith), who never speaks and appears to have learning difficulties. Lars ends up looking after Eddie and lets him stay at his house, as it turns out that the school is legally bound to look after him due to his Aunt funding the academy. Over time Lars discovers Eddies secret – that when he sleepwalks he eats things, namely animals and people. Although disgusted at first, Lars realises he can harness this and uses Eddie to continue to give him the inspiration for his painting. There were no real twists in the story from this point on, and it ends in a predictable fashion.
Eddie
The film has a nice pace to it, and director Boris Rodriguez manages to mix together a decent blend of horror and satire but also never overplays the genre elements. Acting wise, although this is a very low-budget film, the majority give good performances. Lars is a likeable enough character that is really the ‘bad guy’ in the film, he just happens to find artistic inspiration so elusive that he’ll take it where he can get it, and that to him the ends justify the means. Eddie is just doing all that he knows really, and is used by Lars. Dylan Smith really is the stand out performer, although he never speaks he manages to be a likeable character that I felt sorry for, and he has some great subtle mannerisms, despite what he was capable of doing in his sleep! The love interest for Lars comes in the form of fellow teacher Leslie (Georgina Reilly), and again she plays her role well.
Leslie
It is a weird, darkly comic tale that I saw marketed as a film in the same mould as Shaun of the Dead. Sadly, whilst Shaun was a brilliant film, combining humour, zombies and violence perfectly, Eddie never gets near the same heights. Whilst it doesn’t shy away from a little blood and violence, to animals and humans, the humour was never really present. I’ve read reviews which describe this as ‘terrifically funny‘ and ‘the best horror-comedy in years‘. Part of me wonders if they were indeed reviewed by someone involved with the making of the film, as with all due respect this is not a film which should be getting 10/10 ratings like it has at a couple of places. Either that or I’m just being cynical, and it’s just me that doesn’t ‘get‘ it.
In conclusion, sometimes a movie title shows us exactly what we are getting, and no film can do that more than Eddie: The Sleepwalking Cannibal. It’s a film about a cannibal named Eddie, who eats living things when he sleepwalks. If that doesn’t sound like something you want to see then there is nothing I (or anyone way more important than me!) can say about it that will change your mind. As the saying goes, ‘it does exactly what it says on the tin‘, and in fairness it’s really not a bad film and a refreshing change from anything else I’ve seen for a while. It knows it’s a low-budget B-movie, and it never strays far away from this path. I guess if it had a more serious tone and offered up a bit more blood and gore, or alternatively ramped up the comedy I would recommend it a lot more. As it is, Eddie is a harmless little film that whilst I wouldn’t recommend you go out of your way to catch, if you see it cheap or on TV then it may give you a chuckle or two.
Voodoo Moon
I really, really love Voodoo Moon
Starring Charisma Carpenter, Eric Mabius and featuring Dee Wallace and John Amos, this is the story of a brother (Cole) and sister (Heather) who survived a town massacre when they were kids. Now, it’s years later and they must return to fight the evil (SPOILER: It’s Satan!), which caused the massacre. Since that day, the brother has dedicated his life to fighting evil in all it’s many forms and has garnered a rich knowledge of spiritual knowledge ranging from Christianity to msyticism to voodoo, and has acquired a motley crew of extremely loyal people including bikers, ex-cons, cops and his ex-girlfriend who all show up to help him prepare for what may be his final battle.
Btw, Satan is a total hottie!
Is there anything truly original here? Nope. And the story can get a bit convuluted at times since there are soooo many peripheral characters. Plus the backstory is somewhat confusing because of various backflashes and vague references. But overall the concept was, I thought, great. It might just be that I’m partial to good vs. evil stories involving humans and Satan or one of the fallen ones. I’ve always found that creepier than Leatherface chasing screaming teens. (I can probably blame my Southern Baptist upbringing for that…)
Now don’t go losing your head!
Then there’s the fact that Cole could only defeat Satan (or Daniel as he’s called here) by using a mixture of religions. There were some Christian aspects in there, the aforementioned voodoo, Catholicism, some Buddhism, and so on and so forth.
Religion’s not bad, it’s how you use it…And this guy is using it unwisely.
The final thing I loved so much is how some of his friends have these seemingly random supernatural powers themselves. One woman heals him of injuries and one guy can hear his voice in his head (and then yells out to whomever is standing around, “I’m coming little brother!”) Oh and Cordy’s all psychic (who saw that coming?). This totally leads to fun!
Voodoo Moon
Fear Island
Fear Island, featuring Haylie Duff (mostly known as Hilary Duff’s sister), is basically little more than The Hole
The movie starts with Jenna (Duff) in a hospital telling a cop and psychiatrist why she is the only survivor of a massacre (sounding familiar, eh?). The movie alternates between scenes of her in the hospital and what happened on the weekend getaway on a secluded island (hmm….I remember seeing Thora Birch do something like this….). While The Hole was dark and at times disturbing (that Kiera Knightley vomiting scene was effed), Fear Island is more like a homicidal stroll in the park. The death scenes are on par with Final Destination only a little less creative. And there’s one death that’s just plain ridonkulous since it incorporates a snake jumping out of a cabinet. Who just plants a snake and walks away? What if the killer had forgotten which cabinet he/she stored the snake in and they were the one who opened it? Silly homicidal maniac.
This baseball bat will totally hold the killer at bay!
So yeah, everybody dies and there’s a big secret and a toy monkey that keeps showing up and yada yada yada and then the ending is basically the same ending as The Hole. Not much to see here but it didn’t make me want to tear my own eyes out either so…..
Spliced (a/k/a/ The Wisher)
I’m not sure where exactly to start with Spliced (aka Wisher)
Mary is a teen who absolutely adores horror movies. As she tells her school guidance counselor (who for some reason is able to prescribe medication to the students, wtf??), being scared arouses her. She and the counselor honestly seem a little closer than they should be….Mary also sleepwalks and has horrible nightmares (this does NOT seem to arouse her). Her father pretty much hates her for her sleepwalking ways (seriously, I thought he was the evil stepfather for awhile he was so horrible. Because sleepwalking is of course something a person does on purpose…..). He forbids her from watching scary movies and of course, being a teen, she goes to the movies with friends to watch the latest and totally hyped horror flick “The Wisher”. Now, lucky for us viewers, we actually get to watch a bit of “The Wisher” along with Mary and her friends and trust me when I say it’s just as fabulous as “Spliced” itself! Unfortunately, the movie is too intense for Mary (really? A tree eating someone is intense? What the hell kinda movies have you been watching, girl?) and she has to leave the theatre 15 minutes in. Also unfortunately, her father has realized that she’s at “The Wisher” and is on his way to get her….except he doesn’t make it…..wait, I totally forgot that part where Mary wished he would just go away when she left for the movie right? Whoops!
Anyway Mary is really upset about his death one minute and then totally nonchalant about it the next. Her little sister seems to be dealing with the whole death thing fairly well too (“We’re going to the cemetery? Cool!”) This is one cold family. Mary also hasn’t learned anything about using the word “wish” because she keeps wishing for things to happen and of course they do. So is the Wisher actually real? Is it her guy friend who wants to date her who seems to be creepily stalking her? What exactly is going on?? Well, my friends, you must watch for yourself to find out. Trust me, the whole story is pretty epically funny though!
Random points of interest:
I’m not sure what the year is in the movie. There are internet cafes but people still rent videos. Not dvds but videos.
Proper school attire includes wearing the same white halter top EVERY DAY.
In one scene, it’s night then daylight then night then daylight…
Said to creepy stalker boyfriend wannabe – “When you said you liked me did you mean as a friend or as a friend with benefits?”……Wait, what? Is there not a dating option in there?
Cinema Schminema 