MY CALL: This is an excellent alien abduction movie and its effects and story remain strong despite the film’s age. Highly recommended to fans of the genre.  MOVIES LIKE Fire in the Sky: Alien Abduction (2014), Extraterrestrial (2014; which seems to be modeled after Fire in the Sky), Dark Skies (2013), Skinwalker Ranch (2013), The Fourth Kind (2009) and Communion (1989).

Our story begins as Investigator Waters (James Garner; The Notebook, Maverick, Space Cowboys) is gathered to hear and record a rather unusual missing person report from a group of loggers.  We flash back and forth between the actual events of the night before as Mike (Robert Patrick; Terminator 2: Judgment Day, The Faculty, True Blood), David (Peter Berg; Shocker) and Greg (Henry Thomas; E.T., Ouija: Origin of Evil) give their account to the suspicious Sheriff.  The crew of woodsmen seem to get along, except for the now missing Travis (D.B. Sweeney; Taken 2, Spawn) and Allan (Craig Sheffer; Hellraiser: Inferno, Nightbreed).  Diminishing any credibility in their story, Waters detects the obvious adversity in Allan’s peevish apathy of Travis’ disappearance, quickly making this more of an interrogation.

They recall driving home from work in the woods to see a bright “fire” in the sky.  Assuming it to be a forest fire, they continued, curious to discover the source.  As if dazed or intoxicated with fascination, Travis stumbles out of the truck toward the light.

The effects are, well, “very 90s” but competitive for its time (this wasn’t exactly a big budget summer blockbuster or anything).  But I appreciate the red smoky mist radiating from the space ship’s undercarriage like an overheated vessel.  Its surface shifts like magma before emitting the tractor beam upon Travis as his crew yell frightfully from the truck and flee before seeing what fate befalls Travis—adding yet more damning skepticism to their story.  Too scared to think, they just yelled “he’s dead” and tore off into the darkness.

“They took him,” they explain to Waters.  But, not surprisingly, Waters expresses doubt in their flying saucer story as if he was actively “trying” not to believe this tall tale.  And who could blame him?  During the search party the next day their story continues to simply not add up. Days pass with no sign of Travis and the whole town comes to think they’re all liars or, worse, murderers!  News crews and believers in extraterrestrials surface as the story goes national, but no evidence can be found to confirm their guilt or innocence.  The entire second act hurls us into a crime mystery after Act 1 set the sci-fi stage.

After 5 days Travis is found naked, with his humanity stripped away by the horror he surely endured.  What happened to him?  What did they do to him?

The special effects behind the aliens and their craft were awesome and maintain my attention even today!  Various chambers are enshrouded in membranes lined with slimy goop.  The inner shipscape appears somewhat organic a la Alien(s) (1979, 1986), complete with snotty, mucousy, crusty textures throughout.  This all aroused unease, but their “devices” instilled terror.

This film and its cast embrace the bewildered terror of such an event and captured the admixture of fascination and horror that may intermingle one’s reactions to such unknown, even unknowable things.

Much to my dismay, director Robert Lieberman (The Expanse, Rogue, Haven) turned to a career directing television.  Having not seen it since the 90s, I remain impressed by how well this film held up.  I’m strongly recommending this to anyone looking for a good alien abduction movie.  Despite its age, the scenes remain powerful and the effects are sufficiently compelling.  This movie is solid and I look forward to sharing it with more avid sci-fi fans!

MY CALL:  Highly recommended to fans of bonkers Asian fantasy-adventure films.  And no, I don’t mean high octane action or crazy stunts, I mean conceptually bonkers.  MORE MOVIES LIKE The Mermaid:  For more mermaid movies try The Lure (2015) or Killer Mermaid (2014). Want more Asian fantasy action or bonkers Asian-influenced adventure? Try The Devil’s Sword (1984), Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (2000), Shinobi (2005), Legend of the Tsunami Warrior (2008), The Good, the Bad and the Weird (2008), The Warrior’s Way (2010), The Painted Skin (2012) and Tai Chi Zero (2012).

Kung Fu Hustle (2004) was pretty silly at times, but knew when to reign in the silly for dire urgency. This film is more deliberately stupid, even slapstick, and feels suitable for children…at first, anyway.  We even get a nonsensical lesson in the fairy tale evolution of the mer people—grounded in some Waterworld theory that diverged the “descendants of apes” into man on land and merman by sea.  Seems legit.

This was rated R and, for most of the film’s duration, I fail to see why. In the beginning, it’s really more childishly cutesy than anything—with a more PG murderous slant to it. Shan (Yun Lin; Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back) is a mermaid sent to assassinate Liu Xuan (Chao Deng; Detective Dee), a developer who threatens the ecosystem of her dying mer-race.  Somewhere during her humorously botched attempts to kill him using sea urchins and poison, she instead shows him that money isn’t everything and they end up falling for each other.

The film makes a strong pro-environmental statement. Our greedy mogul Liu buys an environmentally protected island, procures a reclamation permit to develop the land, and commissions some sort of super-charged sonar devices to repel (errr…explode) marine life.  It turns out the island he bought was home to Shan’s mermaid clan (including Chi Ling Chiu and Mei’e Zhang), who live in a shipwrecked tanker where they take refuge from Liu’s sonar death rays.

The CGI is poor and the wirework is weak and executed too slowly, making long jumps appear more like floating in Willy Wonka’s bubble room. The only effects I appreciated were the Octopus man’s (Show Lo; Journey to the West) cephalopod legs.  We get a lot of that and he really steals the show!

Overall I wasn’t very impressed with the cute aspects of the film—although, admittedly, many would favor that sort of warm fuzzy Anime-romance propelling us from first date “I love yous” to a second date proposal. However, there was one scene that had me howling-laughing out loud for its entire duration. The “octopus teppanyaki scene” is absolutely worth the price of admission and perhaps the first scene worthy of a PG-13 rating since…well…we basically see Octopus get unassumingly tortured, with his tentacles chopped up and “cooked” in a sort of classic comedy scenario right in front of him.  His face is priceless!  Another hilarious part was the “police station scene” complete with silly sketch art.  And don’t even get me into the pants-crapping sonar test bit.

“Was this her?”

As we move into our final and most violent third act, things shift more into the “hard PG-13” stage that apparently earned this an R rating.  There’s no nudity, sex or profanity and there is no direct on-screen death (although much is implied and we witness several harpoonings and gunshot injuries).

Director Stephen Chow (Kung Fu Hustle, Shaolin Soccer, Journey to the West) mixes seafaring folklore with Asian action cinema. If you think you’re about to watch The Little Mermaid (1989) meets Kung Fu Hustle (2004), just know it’s going to be much closer to the giggly former than the latter despite a lot of third act mermaid slaughter.  And the action is not top notch—just passable.  But Chow does deliver all the zaniness you’d expect with his Kung Fu Hustle roots.  In addition to the scenes mentioned above, we have fishtail water sorcery smacking of an aquatic Dumbledore and the complete mermaid lair raid insanity including a mad marine biologist shooting machine guns and a leather-clad wealthy realty executrix (Yuqi Zhang; CJ7) giving kill orders and harpooning her business partner as if the two were employed by Doctor Evil!

Bonkers. This was bonkers.  I’m reminded of The Good, the Bad and the Weird (2008) and The Warrior’s Way (2010). This film is one part cutesy Anime romance, one part mythic-meets-modern Little Mermaid fantasy, and one part mermaid genocide lunacy.  No matter what you expected coming into this, I expect you’ll be entertained!

I was a fan of the Evil Dead (2013; podcast discussion) remake since day one. Our crew recently discussed the film during our Fede Alvarez Podcast Episode (summary HERE; stream it HERE) and there wasn’t much agreement as to its merits or flaws.  And while I realize the highly divisive horror patronage is littered with those who would disagree with me, I wanted to share 10 things I really appreciated about the film in greater specificity than I had previously addressed in my rave review of the remake.

1. A dedicated cast and star. The hardest thing to reproduce is what isn’t in the script: dedication. Jane Levy was put through the ringer for this movie.  Consider the sum of her scenes imparting uncomfortable physicality.  All the vomiting, crawling through mud, tree assault, being covered in muck…she went through a lot and took it in amazing stride much like Alison Lohman in Drag Me to Hell (2009) or Jo Beth Williams in Poltergeist (1982)—other .  She even endured being raped and impregnated by an evil spirit’s regurgitated vomit vine!  Between this performance and her subsequent team-up with Fede Alvarez in Don’t Breathe (2016; podcast discussion), I think it’s fair to not only suggest that they make a great team, but that Levy is the on-screen soul of these films.

In the past I’ve praised some actresses for what they physically endure on film: Jo Beth Williams (Poltergeist), Jenny Spain (Deadgirl), Isabelle Adjani (Possession), Elma Begovic (Bite), Linda Blair (The Exorcist), the entire cast of The Descent, Monica Belluci (Irreversible), the women of Martyrs, Charlotte Gainsbourg (Antichrist, Nymphomaniac), Alison Lohman (Drag Me to Hell), Danielle Harris (Halloween), Caroline Williams (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2), Jane Levy and Elizabeth Blackmore (Evil Dead), the cast of The Human Centipede films, and all actresses from the I Spit on Your Grave films, that poor victim in Cannibal Holocaust, the women of all other TCM old and new, and Last House on the Left films/remakes/sequels.

By the way, I know those Evil Dead tree rape scenes are tough to watch.  If this is unnerving you about future afternoon strolls in the park or planting a shade tree on your lawn, maybe look into 11 Trees I wouldn’t want in my front yard (or our Podcast Discussion on those Nasty Trees).

2. A dog by any other name… I was particularly impressed by the use of the dog in Evil Dead (2013)—subtle yet powerful. Rather than simply barking in the presence of evil and being a canary in a mine shaft, this dog was introduced as a point of comfort while revealing a psychologically traumatic experience to come: the cold turkey cleanse.  That poor dog (named Grandpa; likely implying a tough family loss) becomes a victim—we don’t see it transpire much, although it’s powerfully and brutally insinuated.  Quite contrary to the standard employment of dogs in horror it never goes after anything, never barks to warn anyone, and never stays close as if watching over anyone.  No…this dog is symbol of Mia’s humanity…and how much of her soul remains intact over the course of the film.  When Grandpa is found moments shy of death in the shed, Mia’s possession-compelled actions boil and blister the last of her humanity.  And when Grandpa dies, so lost is what we once knew of Mia.  Grandpa’s journey parallels Mia’s, and serves as the inverse measure of the demon’s hold on her.

You’re all free to accuse me of reading too much into this or manifesting meaning where there’s none.  But the moment we were introduced to that dog on screen and Mia uttered his name I quivered when she called him Grandpa.

3. Why stay in the house? This intervention crew (i.e., Mia’s friends) is dedicated to task. Because really…shouldn’t they have relocated?  Yeah, I said it.  I know for horror movies to work we often rely on the stupid decisions of our protagonist victims.  But come on.  There was a weird smell and they discovered 89 brutally gutted animals hanging from the ceiling in a putrid state of decay in the basement.  It may not have been the smartest decision to stay, but we all aren’t the smartest, are we?  But perhaps they should have stayed.

They stayed out of dedication and love, however misled.  We are informed that Mia had endured (and failed) detox interventions and her brother warned that she’d probably not “survive” another.  They had to do this now—dead cats and creepy barbed wire books in the basement or not.  It may not be the best justification for staying in that “murder cabin” which was broken into for some clearly satanic ritual and basement pyre using the most frighteningly gift-wrapped book ever…but it’s still a justification.  Think about it.  At least they gave us one—and it’s one that some of us may have even endured ourselves.

4. Not everything need be explained. And what about those cats hanging in the cellar? The film doesn’t take the time to explain why they’re hanging there. They’re just there.  If you understand their connection to witchcraft and cleansing, then you do.  If you don’t, you can either inquisitively look it up or remain baffled as if it was just there for the sake of being effectively gross set design.  As someone who understood its significance, I appreciated it.  If you want to know more about the stimulating topic of historical felicide and its links to witchcraft, start digging into the internet.  A similar such reference surfaced completely unexplained in Warlock (1989): “You are to be hanged, and then burned over a basket of living cats.”  You can bet your ass I spent a few hours online reading historical accounts linking druidic practices to Medieval Spring Festivals with animal sacrifices and, ultimately, the burning of cats (an animal with purported connections to the Devil) beneath a hanged witch to cleanse all links of evil.

5. Less is more. Especially when talking about Evil Dead cabins, less is more—in that a tiny cabin can somehow house an epic chase scene (after Ash) featuring an unseen force tearing through the framework traversing an unreasonable distance. This was a replayed concept in this remake, but it wasn’t replayed at nearly the same volume.  In Alvarez’ hands, it was more tactfully and realistically handled.

I love the floorplan. I think the Zillow listing should read “a quiet, secluded getaway—your cabin in the woods can be both cozy yet surprisingly spacious.”  And by spacious I mean that basement was huuuuuuuge (kind of like Ryan Reynolds’ basement in The Amityville Horror remake).  It was like a room with a hallway that then led to the murder room—and apparently longer than the entire cabin’s floorplan.  And, oh nature.  Since 2013, only The Hollow (2015) could match the forestscapes that graced the genre.  I know what you’re thinking: “John, what about The Forest (2016)?” And to that I’d warn that however nice those woods looked (or however good Natalie Dormer looked), don’t watch that garbage movie (“Forest Horror” podcast discussion here).

6. Clichés do not equal flaws. A cabin in the woods done right is still a trope, but landing a well-executed trope is an art. Our victims find themselves stranded when recent rainfall causes flooding, marooning them on their secluded elevation with their ill-fated cabin.  Some viewers apparently thought this was ridiculous.  To that I must contest—is it sillier than what happened to the bridge in Evil Dead 2 (1987)?    And secondly, have you naysayers ever been camping in the mountainous woods?

As a biologist, I’ve done quite a bit.  And in 2011 a colleague and I couldn’t even reach certain campsites due to flooded roads and wet erosion-uprooted trees in the mountains (the Ozarks).  You see, in the mountains 2” of heavy rain means waaaaaay more than 2” of water, as all that rolls downhill.  The same thing happened to me in northern Queensland, Australia when I was “trapped” for a week after a tropical depression and after all the rain stopped.  The point I’m making for the skeptical flat-land-dwelling city slickers out there, is that heavy rain in or near the mountains results in flashflooding (all the time), much as you may have seen here in Evil Dead (2013) and in The Damned (2013; the highest grossing film of the year in Colombia, and bearing much Evil Dead influence). It doesn’t always take the forces of evil and warped bridges to strand someone.

7. The Locomotion of Evil. The original Evil Dead (1981) presented demon-possessed victims lop-sidedly dancing above the ground. Their bobbing levitation was erratic, disconcerting; clearly inhuman.  Rather than duplicate this, the present remake instead alters body control in lieu of demon-possessed minds.  As limbs swing to attack victims they do so with a lack of proper coordination…almost as if the arm was being swung by an external force.  This is especially evident when the one-armed Natalie (Elizabeth Blackmore) swings a crowbar at her boyfriend.  It feels darkly purposeful, as if the macabre puppeteering of the limb leaves no hope for remorse by the attacker.  That, and the twitching.  I liked the twitching.  Reminds me of trying to start a car with a weak or dead battery, or trying to pull on a glove that’s too small.

The loss of control is terrifying in horror movies as well as reality.  You don’t need to have seen A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987) to have a fear of awakening paralyzed during surgery.  Even waking up after sleeping on your arm can be more than a bit unnerving.  Now imagine the apparent loss of control is in the body of a loved one, staggering towards you thrashing a sharp object with wildly erratic semi-limp arm.  Yeah, it’s weird!

8. Iconography need not equal repetition. Some criticize these new characters because none of them had the singular impact of Ash. But no character ever will hold a candle to Ash—too much of our horror history and education compares to him and he is a horror icon.  So why try?  Instead Ash’s quotables are rephrased and divided among the characters.  The same is done with the most famous scenes (e.g., the evil hand severing, who gets bitten, who takes charge for what reason and when, chainsaws and electric turkey carvers, locked in the basement), leaving no one completely helpless nor any one character the most probable or obvious hero (which I admit has some inherent fault to it, not having a clearly identified hero).

If you go to a remake because you love the original, you shouldn’t be disappointed when you witness something different.  Did you really want a carbon-copy of the same script simply executed with different actors and filmmakers?  Probably not.  Those of you who actually want modern play-by-play remakes should recall Cabin Fever (2016) or The Thing (2011; a prequel/remake).  If your love for the original was so easily befouled, you shouldn’t have gone to see this remake in the first place. There, I said it. Me? I go see them either way. God forbid someone try to give a product their own ideas or spin.  It may suck, sure.  It might.  But what percentage of horror movie releases are awesome to begin with?

9. It’s actually scary. Having now seen this movie three times (I know, not a lot, but enough), I can comfortably say this movie is a bit jarring. Basically nothing makes me jump anymore.  It’s all internalized and, even if scared/jumped/shocked, you would never know it even if you were watching me closely.  I won’t even flinch typically.  That said, in this remake there were moments I knew were coming yet still their execution and imagery managed made me jump (a bit).  Any such surprising scenes in the original would be accompanied laughter (by me, anyway—I’m pretty sick).  But some of the remake’s scenes still get me and put me on edge.  Not an easy task.  Bravo, Fede!

10. The filmmakers knew they’d get flack. Fede Alvarez (Don’t Breathe) knew exactly what he was getting into when he signed on for this.  The moment new remakes are announced, the world population of horror fans divide into groups: those who are excited for anything honoring their past loves, those offended that anyone would consider remaking something that “doesn’t need to be remade,” and those in the indifferent crowd who will eventually see it either way when it hits Netflix or Redbox.  Just look at the internet reactions to the remake of Stephen King’s It (2017).  Many are excited, but the overall consensus isn’t exactly a confettied welcome party like the final scenes of The Phantom Menace or The Force Awakens. Fede took a risk and I think it paid off well.  Not just in terms of money, but respect.  Sure, you might not have loved this—you might have even hated it.  But I loved it.  And no one film is designed for everyone.

If you enjoyed my cinematographical deconstructive analysis, please check out my comparison of 2011 and 1982’s The Thing and John’s Horror Corner presents: Critically comparing the Poltergeist (2015) remake to the original Poltergeist (1982).

MY CALL:  Fans of visceral and unapologetic yet intelligent horror should enjoy this.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Baskin:  Really hard to say.  This film is “a little” like a lot of iconic horror films without really being terribly similar to any one of them.  In this review I make comparisons to 13 horror films.  Among those, I’d say Hellraiser (1987), Event Horizon (1997) and The Void (2016) are the closest match without really being a match at all.

The Turkish word “baskin” means “[police] raid”

We spend nearly the entire first 30 minutes of this film getting to know a squad of five Turkish police officers.  A band of crooked perverted storytellers, they beat up kitchen boys, walk out on the bill, have Turkish hip-hop singalongs in the squad van, and clearly watch each other’s backs.  Over the course of this strange character study, I come to find them almost equally as despicable as, well…sort of likable.

They respond to a call to the remote Turkish countryside, a land of poor radio signals and eerie local folklore about shrines. It feels like The [Eastern European] Hills Have Eyes (1977, 2006) complete with shallow gene-pooled locals and a creepy abandoned manor.  From there, things take an infernal turn for the worse and to tell you more would ruin the fun.

For his first-time feature length film, director Can Evrenol (The Field Guide to Evil) packs a mean punch. Long dialogues stage our characters like the acts of a play, and the discontinuity in our timeline creates a surreal, trippy, nightmarish tone in which we question what’s actually happening—what’s actually connected?

From surreal we slip into pandemonium stew flavored with just dashes of numerous familiar horrors: momentary sprigs of The Blair Witch Project (1999) and Session 9 (2001), the atmospheric aroma of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and Hellraiser (1987), a macabre Martyrs (2008) meets The Last Shift (2015) marinade, and the warm cult charm of Nightbreed (1990) and Silent Hill (2006).

There is a mild sense of Lovecraftian madness, but having lost its elegant subtlety to an evil meat grinder.  Not sure what I mean?  Think Event Horizon (1997) or The Void (2016), complete with other-worldly explanations of what Hell “really is.”  I mean, it gets brutal, gross, a bit perverse, and gory. There’s lots of blood, some intestine-tugging disemboweling, throat slitting, eye gauging and even a twisted (but thankfully brief) birth scene.

Some things are sort of explained, other things are somewhat implied, and some specifics leave us in the dark to figure out on our own—and that’s okay. Much as with The Shrine (2010) or Oculus (2014), this film will drop the curtain leaving you asking yourself “what just happened,” “was all that real” and “what was up with all those frogs?”  Then, regarding the most important of your questions, you’ll probably pause and say “oooooooh, that’s how it’s all connected” as you realize what happened.

MY CALL:  This action-adventure film is very ambitious and very successful because it relies on great characters as much as a great fantastic tale. It’s also the best of the franchise.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Pirates of the Caribbean:  People who love this likely prefer grand-scale worlds as found in the Harry Potter films (2001-2011), The Lord of the Rings (2001-2003) and The Hobbit trilogies (2012-2014), Jurassic Park (1993) and The Matrix trilogy (1999-2003).  I’d also strongly recommend the STARZ series Black Sails (2014-2017; 4 seasons).

With Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales coming out (2017), I felt the need to revisit the Pirates anthology.  The Curse of the Black Pearl kicks the series off with an outstanding adventure film that I continue to adore.

Director Gore Verbinski (A Cure for Wellness, The Ring, The Mexican, The Weather Man) is a man of depth and range.  The varied nature of the action will please viewers of all ages.  Ranging from daffy character-catapulting gags to fancy footworked swordplay, the stunts are abundant, diverse and, most notably, uncommonly interesting. The seafaring battle is especially engaging, being equal parts tense, funny and exciting, and all contributing to making this an outstanding somewhat family-friendly (at PG-13 with numerous off-screen kills) adventure movie. I love seeing the cannonballs tear through the ships with splinters raining across the screen. Watching the action scenes was simply energizing!  But bringing rewatchability and synthesis to the screen are the characters!

As Captain Jack Sparrow, Johnny Depp (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Transcendence, Into the Woods) has manifested a character that no Renaissance Festival or Comic Con has gone without for almost 15 years now. This Keith Richards-mannerismed pirate has a drunken-boxing swagger and a nigh-slurred savoir-faire making him unforgettably charismatic…yet nervously twitchy.  His somewhat bewildered and oft-shocked expressions draw nothing but grins.  From his very inception on screen we know he is not to be trusted, he has a sharp retort for everything, and this man knows how to make an entrance!

The cruel swashbuckling yin to Sparrow’s yang, Geoffrey Rush (Gods of Egypt, The Warrior’s Way, The King’s Speech) is a master of villainy and imbues Captain Barbossa with equal parts cheeky piracy and gross goon.  He’s so convincingly menacing, it’s hard to imagine he was ever Jack Sparrow’s first mate.  Rush owns every moment he’s on screen as readily as Depp, and the two steal the show in their race to end a curse from their stolen Aztec gold.  During Barbossa’s efforts to gather all the gold coins and Jack’s efforts to steal his ship back from Barbossa, a blacksmith’s apprentice’s love is taken captive and all sorts of motives and chases cross paths.

But really, all the characters are memorable.  The bumbling duo of pirate deck swabs (Once Upon a Time’s Lee Arenberg and Dark Ascension’s Mackenzie Crook) who smack of Abbot and Costello with the menace Home Alone’s Marv and Harry; the tactful use of Barbossa’s feisty monkey; the recurring foolish guards of the Royal Navy (who recur through at least part 3); we all love Governor Weatherby (Jonathan Pryce; Game of Thrones, Taboo); and even Will Turner’s (Orlando Bloom; The Hobbit trilogy, The Three Musketeers, Troy) blacksmith master had his moment to shine.  As our fair female lead, Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley; Domino, Love Actually) is drawn with all the classic damsel tropes…which she appropriately crumbles in the wake of her very defiance of them.  At only 17 years old, Knightley gives a solid performance for her iron-willed Elizabeth.

While overall gorgeous and a joy to watch, the CGI (particularly the undead pirates) didn’t hold properly up.  I mean, it still looks very good and quite entertaining—but while absolutely stunning at the time of its release the quality drop (by today’s standards) is inescapably evident.  But this is more than compensated by iconic scenes whose impact transcend the somewhat dated CGI.  The underwater scenes are numerous and crisp, the swab’s wooden eye managed to almost feel like its own character, the undead march along the ocean floor was unforgettable, and seeing our two dueling skeletal captains dancing in and out of the death-knelling moonlight lives up to the trailer moment.

This film is simply fun for everyone and if someone tells you it’s not, they’re probably just a constipated grump. Don’t listen to constipated grumps! Moreover, I find the film is just as enjoyable today!

MY CALL:  These sequel had loads of action and loads of gore—and it almost all sucked.  But that’s okay, because the dialogue was also by far the worst in the series.  So if you’re having a “bad movie” night, this is your movie!  MORE MOVIES LIKE Wrong Turn 3: Dead End:  Wrong Turn (2003), Wrong Turn 2: Dead End (2007), The Hills Have Eyes 1-2 (1977, 1984, 2006, 2007), Just Before Dawn (1981), The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) will all continue to satisfy the hillbilly horror subgenre.  Maybe Cabin Fever 1-3 (2002-2014) for the gore hounds.

Our latest franchise director (Declan O’Brien; Cyclops, Sharktopus, Wrong Turn 4-5) makes this third film yet trashier and yet more looney than Dead End (2007).  Of the three Wrong Turn films so far, this is absolutely the most classless.  In under 4 minutes we endure twenty-somethings smoking pot, breast-baring nudity for no reason (not even for a sex or shower scene, but just because), and dialogue hardly worthy of pornography.  No really, the girl actually says things like “do you think I’m a slut,” “I thought you loved my boobs” and (in reference to taking off her top) “the girls gotta’ breathe.”  At this point you’d think we’d be wasting our time to watch any more.  But hold on.

This may be trashy, but we get loads of great gore (still in the first 10 minutes).  Much as Dead End (2007) opened with the fantastic scene deliciously cutting Kimberly Caldwell in half (with guts pouring out), now arrows shoot through boobs and popping eyeballs, a spear is thrust through a dude’s mouth and a piano wire booby trap reminded me of Cube (1997) and Resident Evil’s (2002) laser grids.  The stabs, penetrations, slices and blood spurts are CGI (like, way obvious CGI)—but the gore is so abundant and playfully executed that I’m honestly already loving this!  Not only that, but our sole recurring inbred hillbilly cannibal Three-Finger (Borislav Iliev; Wrong Turn 5) is back and giggly as ever!  Based on the punishment he’s taken, he may just be immortal.

After that great action medley we take a wrong turn for the worse. Meeting this sequel’s main victims, we find ourselves painfully enduring a prison yard scene that’s as cheesy as can be.  The horribly over-expository dialogue reveals that inmates Floyd (Gil Kolirin; Return to House on Haunted Hill) and Chavez (Tamer Hassan; Sucker Punch) will be transferred through the back country of Greenbriar West Virginia along with under cover US Marshall Willy (Christian Contreras), posing as another inmate.

Our transferred prisoners’ bus crashes, Chavez takes charge, and the inmates hustle through the dark woods towards their freedom.  But after that gore-slathered opening sequence we suffer through long stretches of forced “story” and wretched lines as we desperately await the next death scene.  Thankfully our mutant Three-Finger and his young deformed kin Three-Toe come in strong with more booby traps.  Between a razor wire net and a spring-loaded spike trap, Rambo: First Blood (1982) crosses paths with Predator (1987) as the traps seem to be the greatest strength of the movie.

The acting, writing and directing were clearly the worst of the franchise (parts 1-3, anyway).  The plot really couldn’t have been worse, nor more poorly executed.  I honestly missed the stagnant direct-to-DVD dialogue of Dead End (2007).  Yet, somehow, this remained generally quite watchable and entertaining.  Inferior to its predecessors, but not unworthy of your time if you’re a fan of the franchise and stupid action for the sake of gore.

Perhaps most amusing is that in this Wrong Turn film, the victims made no wrong turns.  The worst turn, however, was when the filmmakers gave us several long (and boring and very stupid) fist fight scenes between inmates during power struggles. So bad… SMH…. so very bad.  Overall, the trap death scenes are pretty cool and pretty cruel.  I enjoyed many a maniacal giggle.  But outside of the booby traps, this movie had loads of action—and, other than those traps, it all sucked.  The finale action finds even new levels of lunacy, even feeling cartoonishly ridiculous for a Wrong Turn sequel.  Bad movie lovers will revel in it.

Even if you consider Wrong Turn (2003) a “bad movie,” this is a “badder movie” that barely keeps its grip on its so-bad-it’s-good status for our entertainment.  Much to my dismay, it’s barely a B-movie because I think it was actually trying to be good.  All attention was aimed at action and gore, but sadly, not the atmosphere.  Nothing was ever really tense, unnerving, or even creepy.

Oh dear…the same director was behind parts 4 and 5, for better or worse.  I guess it just depends on your taste.

MY CALL:  Fans of shark attack films and fun yet nerve-wracking movies that make you yell at the screen and smile.  MORE MOVIES LIKE The Shallows:  Probably Bait 3D (2012; B-movie), The Reef (2010), Open Water (2003), Jaws (1975), Shark Night 3D (2011) and Deep Blue Sea (1999; over the top). If you want something sillier there’s Piranha (1978), Piranha 3D (2010) and Piranha 3DD (2012).

This film’s tone makes for a nice change of pace amid the bad shark movie extravaganza that has filled the last decade (e.g., Sharktopus, Mega Shark, Sharknado 1-4, Sand Sharks, Megalodon, Megashark vs. Giant Crocosaurus, Snow Shark, Megashark vs. Giant Octopus, Jersey Shore Shark Attack, Dinoshark, Attack of the Jurassic Shark, Jaws in Japan, Ghost Shark, Malibu Shark Attack, Super Shark, Swamp Shark, 12 Days of Terror, Two-Headed shark Attack, Shark Swarm, Sharks in Venice, Spring Break Shark Attack, Shark Attack in the Mediterranean, Red Water, Hammerhead, Shark Lake…need I go on?).

Let me just start by saying this film is GORGEOUSLY shot.  Taking a break from Liam Neeson’s never-ending “old man action film” comeback, Jaume Collet-Serra (Run All Night, Non-Stop, Unknown, Taken) does a phenomenal job capturing the hidden beauty of such sights cameras typically fail to do justice.  Yes, there are some camera angles favoring the curve of Blake Lively’s butt and, well, other curves.  But don’t let that distract you—not too much anyway LOL—from the elegance of all else the camera captures when not swooning her form.  The colors and lighting are crisp perfection.  This feels like watching Blue Planet (2001) or Planet Earth (2006) in HD.

After losing her mother to a long battle with cancer, Nancy (Blake Lively; Age of Adeline, Savages) visits the very Mexican hideaway her mother once surfed.  Exquisite use of screen-on-screen phone tech gives us a sense of Nancy’s unflagging independence and determination during her personal walkabout while identifying her desire to remain connected.  Almost instantly, Nancy is a most personable character and we understand the organic relationships she has with her hungover travel mate and her kid sister.  I was also impressed with the likability of her kind driver (Óscar Jaenada; Pirates of the Caribbean: On stranger Tides, The Losers) who, despite an endearingly moderate language barrier, had a lot to say.

Once dropped off at the secret beach that perfectly matched her mother’s photos, she takes to the water—the fantastically serene, perfect, beautiful water—with some of the action-shots of her rides rivaling Blue Crush (2002) and admonishing marginal glimpses of the ocean’s rocky floor.    She makes some passing friendly acquaintance and submits to the call of the waves until she’s the last one in the crystal water.  Everything was just so…but then it happened!

Clouding the water with lacy wisps of blood, she claws at the gaping wounds of a nearby mauled whale (of all things), terrified of her unseen assailant.  Her independence is all she has now.  She’s in for the fight of her life. With a wounded leg, a desperate sprinting swim to a submerged rock finds the company of an injured seagull, unable to fly and nervously chirping with every little tidal splash.  Chittering all affright, I was so warmed when Nancy fed the gull a crab.

This movie has taught me a few things about myself…

1. Never in all my life of being plagued by these birds while eating my lunch on the beach would I have thought this, but I’ve never wanted to adopt and love a seagull so much in my life! That bird deserved a Best Supporting Actor nod but got robbed like Wilson (Castaway).  I kept shifting from being nervous for Nancy and awing over the bird. We even discussed the gull in our podcast (Ep 83: The Best Non-Human Characters of 2016).

2. Flare guns no longer offer me any sense of security.

3. Apparently, I yell a lot during buoy scenes.

4. I have a newfound fear and respect for jellyfish.

5. This shark was sent back from the future fully equipped with a T-800 cybernetic endoskeleton produced by SkyNet®. That’s literally the ONLY explanation I have for this thing’s strength and unwavering focus.

Let’s be honest. We all know what’s gonna’ happen. She’s going to get in the water to make a run for it, the shark will appear, and she’ll scramble back to safety.  It’ll probably even happen more than once. Yes, we all know this. So, imagine my pleasure when it happens and I instantly clench up and get nervous for her as if I didn’t see it all coming.  Jaume Collet-Serra (also House of Wax, Orphan) is no stranger to horror and he seems now to have a better grasp of it than ever…and well-complemented by his skills acquired in recent action-suspense films.  So, every time Nancy dips her toe in the water, we are nervous!  And when the shark attack scenes come, they are intense!

Enjoy this film. It’s the kind of nerve-wracking suspense you know and see coming, but it’s still fun to experience every time.  Plus, it’s fun yelling at the TV if you’re like me and get really involved. Don’t trust me? Then check out Mark’s review—he loved it, too.

MY CALL:  Outside of a few shocking and impressive gory scenes, this film was largely just very poorly written and tedious despite boasting a solid cast.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Beyond the Gates:  Other “reality-altering board game” films include Open Graves (2009), The Black Waters of Echo’s Pond (2009), and of course the non-horror adventure classic Jumanji (1995).

Is it just me, or does Graham Skipper (right) look like a hybrid of Rainn Wilson and Elijah Wood?

Months after the mysterious disappearance of their father, Gordon (Graham Skipper; Tales of Halloween) and John (Chase Williamson; The Guest, Siren, John Dies at the End) return to their home town to pack up dad’s old video store.  The estranged brothers clearly never got along well in adulthood; their relationship is understandably awkward and a tad contentious.  But they find comfort in their shared memories of the store, nostalgically wall-to-walled with videotapes.

I loved seeing the deep, tall rows of movie racks. How I miss those days.

Still inside the VCR of the video store office, the brothers find a VCR board game tape called Beyond the Gates.  The game has a hostess, Evelyn (Barbara Crampton; You’re Next, Lords of Salem, Chopping Mall, We Are Still Here).  This hostess seems surprisingly more “interactive” than one might expect as she speaks directly to the players and mentions their father’s soul…from the TV!

The game affects people who aren’t even playing like Gordon’s girlfriend Margot (Brea Grant; Smothered, Halloween II, Dexter, Heroes), a childhood friend-turned police officer (Matt Mercer; Contracted, The Mind’s Eye, Madison County), and John’s jerky friend Hank (Justin Welborn; Siren, Southbound, V/H/S Viral).  Despite this cast of horror-experienced actors, once the “horror” begins the poor writing hamstrings their performance.

The game is a complete mystery.  Not in that it is “mysterious” in nature, but in that I had no idea how to play the game. Evelyn says “to get the key, roll the dice,” they roll the dice, they get a key…and something awful happens. LOL. This repeats itself a few times.  Even though the key scenes don’t make any sense, along the way we do get a satisfying voodoo doll scene bringing someone to a splattering disembowelment (a pretty solid scene, a blast actually). It was a delicious mess.  But overall the game is aimlessly random, gathering keys to open a magical gate to another world (Hell?) that has appeared in their basement.

We understood how Jumanji (1995) worked—you rolled the dice, occasionally landed on a location or read a card, and then you lived the result.  Simple.  Yeah, these filmmakers must not have seen that Robin Williams classic. LOL. Our only comfort is an exploding head here, some gooey head-smashing gore there, and all the while never understanding why.

Director Jackson Stewart’s first feature length film overall, I fear, long missed the mark. The movie fan nostalgia of the video store was a nice touch, even if handled better by a more experienced filmmaker.  The real victories of this film were the gory scenes—which were quite impressive even if their surrounding scenes and staging were poor—and the score.  During the opening credits I was swept away to the 80s as if I just popped a VHS tape in the VCR to watch this very film.

The ending wasn’t satisfying. It harkened back to 80s horror in a mildly pleasing manner for the closing twist, but the resolution of the game itself (i.e., the violent finale and the reasoning behind characters’ actions) was just wretchedly incomprehensible.

It’s hard to recommend this. However, there was just enough that I’d be interested to see what he does next and, perhaps most critically, with a very different writing team.  I’m not really sure how much freedom Stewart really had.

MY CALL:  I guess it’s watchable, but this sequel really isn’t worth it.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Sinister 2:  Well I, for one, loved the first Sinister (2012). But in all fairness, people have different taste. So, here’s a second opinion (review here) from the other half of MFF. For more murderous horror twins, try Goodnight Mommy (2014).

Fleeing an abusive husband, Courtney (Shannyn Sossamon; Wayward Pines, Sleepy Hollow, One Missed Call, The Day) secretly moves to a family-owned property with her twin sons, Dylan and Zach.  Little did she know, something awful happened at the property.

Her sons are the worst twins ever.  They fight constantly and rely on each other for nothing.  Dylan is a special boy.  He’s been seeing the boogeymen in his closet, having freaky nightmares and macabre daytime visions, and he has some ghostly young friends who share old 8mm family snuff films.  For whatever reason, Zach not only knows about all this, but he’s jealous!

Our now-ex-deputy (James Ransone; Sinister, Prom Night) senses the horrors that befell the Oswalt family (in part 1) will somehow happen again at Courtney’s hideaway.  He befriends, warns, and protects Courtney and the boys.  Then, you know, things get worse.

Even when we see them coming, some of the death scenes are unexpectedly shocking.  They feature immolation, alligator attack, electrocution…but they seem to fall short of the horrifying impact they had in part 1.  We seem to just be going through the motions.  It feels like the filmmakers tried, but were just less inspired than the original Sinister (2012) team.

Moreover, Bughuul just didn’t feel right.  He seemed more… “human.”  Less other-worldly; less demonic.  Bughuul, the eater of children, remains unnaturally unnerving.  But however creepy he is in this film, it’s still notably “less” than he once was.

Another downgraded aspect of this sequel is that everything seems too “organized.”  Bughuul has hired kid ghost interns to do his recruiting and he seems to be running an undead kinder-horror school complete with a home video film curriculum.  There’s practically a schedule and demerit system.  The terror of discovery (previously endured by Ethan Hawke) just isn’t here, and it’s the very thing that gave the original it’s gut-punching impact.  At least it’s rated-R—as horror should be.

None of part 1’s soul-rattling magic is to be found here in director Ciarán Foy’s (Citadel) sequel, and the third act is most disappointing of this sequel.  Sigh… oh well.  The film was mildly entertaining and I don’t regret giving it a shot.  But, that said, I’m not recommending this to anyone.  It really has no merits.  Shame.

MY CALL:  This sequel is a blast. Admittedly, it’s much harder to get into with this very messy plot, but the effects and action and scale retain its ranks high among popcorn adventure films.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Pirates of the Caribbean:  First things first: you better see The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003; the BEST of the franchise, in my opinion) before you see this! People who love this likely prefer grand-scale worlds as found in the Harry Potter films (2001-2011), The Lord of the Rings (2001-2003) and The Hobbit trilogies (2012-2014), Jurassic Park (1993) and The Matrix trilogy (1999-2003).  I’d also strongly recommend the STARZ series Black Sails (2014-2017; 4 seasons).

With Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales coming out (2017), I felt the need to revisit the Pirates anthology. Having covered The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) last week, it’s on to Dead Man’s Chest to continue this outstanding adventure franchise that I continue to adore.

This epic saga sequel does many things its predecessor did not. We open on a much darker note with Miss Swann (Keira Knightley; Domino, Love Actually) and Will Turner’s (Orlando Bloom; The Hobbit trilogy; The Three Musketeers, Troy) freedom and lives at stake, the crewmen of the Black Pearl have lost faith in their quirky Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp), and our new villain Lord Beckett (Tom Hollander; Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation, Taboo) is far less likable than was Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush; Gods of Egypt, The Warrior’s Way, The King’s Speech).

Despite the grimmer opening, we see many fleeting notions from part 1 brought to light as Jack’s broken compass finds purpose (destiny, in fact) and his scar-branded wrist’s origin is explained. Both of these mysteries, it seems, are linked to the menacing Lord Beckett’s desires.

But what hasn’t changed at all is Gore Verbinski’s fine eye for grandiose scale and gorgeous camera work.  Squirrely as ever, Jack Sparrow’s shenanigans continue as he poses as a cannibal chief and is chased across the beach by the whole tribe in a laughable trailer clip.  His twitchy mannerisms are back in full idiosyncratic force and if his character was the reason you bought this, then it’s worth the price of admission and then some.  But most characters’ motives have become blurred in this complicated sequel.

It’s really hard to get behind our protagonist in this sequel. Because…who exactly is the protagonist?  In part 1 Barbossa was bad and Jack was the antihero who teamed up with Will and Elizabeth while Norrington and the Governor got in the way, although well-intentioned.  The plot was actually rather complicated—but it was well-explained, justified, and easily followable. Now in part 2 the cephalopod-faced Captain Davy Jones (Bill Nighy; Underworld, Shaun of the Dead, Jack the Giant Slayer) is the bad guy, but Lord Beckett is sort of another equally dangerous bad guy from the sidelines, Norrington wants to double cross Jack to get his rank back from Beckett, the Governor is dealing with Beckett to save his daughter Elizabeth, Jack double crosses Will to save himself from Davy… the convolution goes on and on and it really makes it hard to root for anyone.  When everyone is double crossing everyone else, who’s the hero? Apparently, it’s Will and Elizabeth against everyone else…sort of.

The Flying Dutchman is fantastic. Jones’ malformed crew are an awesome spectacle and a worthy follow-up to Barbossa’s undead pirates, with Davy Jones at least nearing the menace of Captain Barbossa and the crew’s sea affinity/curse affording every bit the supernatural touch we desire.  

Despite all this Herculean effort in adding numerous new personalities to our story (e.g., Davy Jones, Beckett, the Witch, Bootstrap Bill), something is missing from this film—from the whole experience.  The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) created a vast world plentiful with characters, but Dead Man’s Chest seems only to have regurgitated that world (just picking up where we left off).  And while there is more world-building, our new curse swings in on the coattails of part 1’s Aztec gold and hits with a bit less impact in the flurry of conflicting character motives.

Yes, I’m loving all the action and effects and seafaring ship fights and swashbuckling.  But the story fails to sweep me away as did part 1. Perhaps I was enamored by part 1’s world-building, but I was so much more invested in it, too.  This sequel is very cool; a great popcorn flick loaded with interesting creatures and a great premise.  But “cool” doesn’t move me, it just entertains.

But let’s talk about its popcorn appeal since this is an OUTSTANDING popcorn movie.  Much as being introduced to Avatar’s (2009) flora and fauna, our eyes are candied with the fine CGI details of Davy Jones and his Flying Dutchman.  Like the shock of red hair in Brave (2012), each of Jones’ beard-like tentacles move independently with their own personality (it’s quite a sight) and, of course, Nighy brings a splendidly enjoyable personality as well.

Meanwhile the ship is festooned with clam clusters that seize shut with the movement of passers-by or the pound of a peg-leg on a floor board, giving the Dutchman a proper life of its own.  In fact, while aboard the Dutchman or among its crew there’s always something moving in the background on the characters—sea anemone mouths, Davy Jones’ tentacled pointer finger that seems to have a mind of its own, spider crab legs twitching on someone’s back, a moral eel peeking from a stomach hole.  These small yet satisfying details are rich throughout the film and contribute to its ongoing rewatchability.

A big selling point in the trailer was the Kraken.  Yeah, it’s neat.  To a keen eye, the CGI held up…okay, I guess.  It’s clearly not so wowing as it was in 2006, but this thing is still a joy to watch and it gets a lot of screen time as its slimy, suckered, wandering tentacles ravage, crack and splinter huge ships to shambles and fling the crew about.  And when it roars jettisoning mucousy muck all one can do is laugh.

Our plot finds incomplete resolution by its end, which harbingers the return of Barbossa to rescue Jack in part 3.  This sequel is loads of fun but, as is the fault of many trilogies, this part 2 exists largely to bridge characters from part 1 and set the stage for part 3.  However, with that said, I feel like I enjoy it more now (having seen it before, and now along with part 3) than upon its initial release.  In other words, it wasn’t a great sequel back when there were only two films, but it serves as a finely enjoyable 2^nd installment of an anthology of now 5 films.

MY CALL:  Good but not great, satisfying yet poorly-written, and made proficiently enough to be a jumpy-fun movie night.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Demonic:  It’s not at all fair to compare them, but Poltergeist (1982, 2015), Grave Encounters (2011), Paranormal Activity (2007) and Insidious (2011).

Years ago this film initially hit the rumor mill hard and now, years after its premier release (in Asia, Europe and South America, 2015), it curiously has yet to find US distribution.  Director Will Canon is a relative newcomer to the horror game with this obscure-by-distribution film—also released under the titles House of Horror, La Casa de Demonio, Demonsko, A Casa dos Mortos, House of the Dead and Haunted. What got me interested was that this was backed by James Wan (The Conjuring, Dead Silence).

Responding to a call at a purportedly abandoned murder house, Detective Lewis (Frank Grillo; The Purge: Anarchy, Mother’s Day) finds the remnants of a satanic ritual and the mass murdered bodies of those who performed the dark rite. During Lewis’ investigation, we jump from the present to the past and observe the events that transpired.  Meanwhile in the present, the best answer Dr. Elizabeth Klein (Maria Bello; Assault on Precinct 13, Lights Out) questions can get from the lone survivor is “the house did it!”

John (Dustin Milligan; Shark Night 3D, Slither, Final Destination 3) had been having visions of his dead mother; a haunting perhaps.  He seeks the help of paranormal specialists and ghost hunters Sam (Alex Goode), Donnie (Aaron Yoo; Disturbia, Friday the 13^th), Jules (Megan Park; Diary of the Dead), Michelle (Cody Horn; Magic Mike) and Bryan (Scott Mechlowicz; EuroTrip).  To quell these visions, they return to the haunted house to set up cameras, conduct an evocation (a séance), and try to prove the presence of spirits.  The plot is already a bit shaky here. It is suggested that his haunting will persist unless he returns to the house, but there isn’t even a hint of explanation as to why.

Upon arrival to the house the “camera set-up routine” serves as an ice breaker in these ghost hunter and haunted house movies.  This is where the film finds its personality.  We’ve seen similar scenarios in Poltergeist (1982, 2015), Grave Encounters (2011), Paranormal Activity (2007) and Insidious (2011).  We get the lay of the land, find some creepy clues, get to know our protagonists’ quirks, and maybe even some supernatural things happen right under our investigators’ noses as they position their hardware in the homes of feisty poltergeists.

This film features some found footage (maybe 25% of the movie), but it is definitely not a “found footage” horror.  It’s not particularly awesome (yet no explanation as to why this 2015 film still hasn’t had a US release in 2017), but I certainly find it entertaining.  I’d even watch it again.  The atmosphere is more than creepy enough (though it pales compared to Paranormal Activity, Insidious, The Conjuring, Dead Silence, Poltergeist, etc.), there’s a couple of jump scares, and couple of legit scares. While most of what we see are brief spectral figures and doors opening and shutting on their own, they seem to be executed proficiently enough to elude actively feeling “old hat.”  In fact, no lie, these jump scares were REALLY FUN!  There’s little to be said for clever or innovative or original content. Just good, plain, consistently capable execution for maximum jumpiness.  Its greatest shortcoming is that the story is very thin.  The end gets more than a bit wonky, but it’s nothing I can’t forgive for the fun ride.

This honestly deserves a wide release.  It may get panned by critics, but it’s a fun date night, it would make money (the budget was only $3 million), and no one would leave feeling cheated.

MY CALL:  Lots of action, lots of pirate crews, lots more complicated plot. This sequel really just seems to be about “more” than it is about development.  World-building continues, but at a much less gratifying pace than before.  This is the least rewatchable of the early Pirates trilogy.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Pirates of the Caribbean:  First things first: you better see The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003; the BEST of the franchise, in my opinion) and Dead Man’s Chest (2006) before you see this! People who love this likely prefer grand-scale worlds as found in the Harry Potter films (2001-2011), The Lord of the Rings (2001-2003) and The Hobbit trilogies (2012-2014), Jurassic Park (1993) and The Matrix trilogy (1999-2003).  I’d also strongly recommend the STARZ series Black Sails (2014-2017; 4 seasons).

With Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales coming out (2017), I felt the need to revisit the Pirates anthology. Having covered The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) and Dead Man’s Chest (2006), it’s on to At World’s End to continue this epic adventure franchise…

The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) had a rather complicated but followable plot for a Disney vehicle. Since then, each sequel has subsequently added more head-scratching complexity and compound double-crosses across the board confounding one’s ability to keep up with what’s going in the franchise and, occasionally, what’s even going on in this movie!  In other words, this is the most confusing thing Disney has ever done since their decision that The Lion King (1994) needed sequels.

Picking up from the end of Dead Man’s Chest (2006), Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley; Domino, Love Actually) and Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush; Gods of Egypt, The Warrior’s Way, The King’s Speech) head to Singapore to recruit the aid of Captain Sao Feng’s (Chow Yun Fat; The Monkey King, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Hard-Boiled) crew to save Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) from the Land of the Dead in Davy Jones’ Locker.

Meanwhile, by Lord Beckett’s (Tom Hollander; Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation, Taboo) order, pirates and all known pirate associates are being wholesale hanged into pirate extinction.  You’d think the pirate captains would all want to work together to save their kind…you’d think, right?  So the plot follows the pirates’ path to unity against their greater enemy while, remaining like a Dead Man’s Chest (2006) hangover, an entanglement of backstabbing motives are painstakingly (although occasionally humorously) sorted out.  Needless to say, this is not intended to work as a standalone film and you should dare not see it unless you saw Dead Man’s Chest (2006) very recently.  I saw parts 1 and 2 a month before this and I found myself needing a bit of a refresher on all the ongoing sly motives from Dead Man’s Chest.

The voyage to Davy Jones’ Locker takes Swann, Will Turner (Orlando Bloom; The Hobbit trilogy; The Three Musketeers, Troy) and Barbossa to the end of the world.  But why save Jack right now?  Well, it turns out he holds one of the nine “Pieces of Eight,” and thus he must attend the Brethren Court of pirates with this important and mysterious object.  Upon finding Jack in his unpleasant Underworld, he is hallucinating and even more insane than is generally accepted as normal…for Jack anyway.

It seems that each Pirates installment introduces a new pirate captain—which basically adds a new person with their own backstabbing agenda. We had Jack, Barbossa and Davy Jones (Bill Nighy; Underworld, Shaun of the Dead, Jack the Giant Slayer), and now we find Captain Sao Feng.  The numerous double-crosses from Dead Man’s Chest (2006) persist with Turner needing the Pearl to save his father from Davy Jones, Lord Beckett holds Davy Jones’ heart as collateral for his pirate services, Sao Feng turns on Jack and Sao Feng turns on Turner after Turner turns on Jack and Barbossa, and Davy Jones apparently had always been at odds with the swamp witch (Naomi Harris; Skyfall, Spectre).

If this was all starting to sound a bit crazy, hold on, there’s more.  This movie features ship-to-world flipping, the edge of the world, a zoinked out Jack, catastrophic whirlpools and destructive armada seafaring battles.  We also follow the trajectories of two pairs of love interests (sort of hinting at a third, and joking a fourth), with one (Elizabeth and Will) spanning the entire franchise thus far and another that I dare not spoil (because it’s neat and sort of integral to the plot).

But despite all its craziness, it has brought clever and satisfying semblance to some formerly trivial familiarities (e.g., the wooden eye, the swamp witch, how Davy Jones got his tentacle beard).  Not only that, but we build the mythology of the trilogy (now one of five films).  We have added a God, a Pirate King, the actual Pirates’ Code and power structure, and the supernatural rules governing the Flying Dutchman and its captain’s heart.  These concepts are so cool but…I won’t say they fall flat. But they miss the mark a little.

You see, this is an immensely entertaining Summer blockbuster popcorn flick.  However, at the end of the day, this strikes me as by far the least impressive of the first three Pirates films.  I can rewatch The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) forever and I’d subsequently enjoy following it up with Dead Man’s Chest (2006).  But I’m content to say that At World’s End will be viewed the least of the three.  Sure, the action is fun (loads in fact) and the effects are solid (especially Davy Jones and his Flying Dutchman crew), but the urgency really isn’t there and I just don’t care what happens between my oohs and aahs.

It almost feels like four or even five film plots of conflicting motives and love interests and good guys and bad guys got shoehorned into one messy trilogy.  It makes it hard to get invested, but there’s a lot of neat stuff here, too.

This third epic installment closes just as its predecessors: with an in-your-face revelation of what adventure is to come next!

MY CALL:  Among the Pirates anthology this was clearly the worst. Entertaining, but nothing I’ll choose to watch again.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Pirates of the Caribbean:  First things first: you better see The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003; the BEST of the franchise, in my opinion), Dead Man’s Chest (2006) and At World’s End (2007) before you see this, if you even bother to see this fourth installment. I’d suggest skipping this and going straight to Dead Men Tell No Tales. People who enjoy this franchise likely prefer grand-scale worlds as found in the Harry Potter films (2001-2011), The Lord of the Rings (2001-2003) and The Hobbit trilogies (2012-2014), Jurassic Park (1993) and The Matrix trilogy (1999-2003).  I’d also strongly recommend the STARZ series Black Sails (2014-2017; 4 seasons).

So much has changed over the course of four Pirates movies. Now pledged to the crown, we find a bewigged Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush; Gods of Egypt, The Warrior’s Way, The King’s Speech), peg-legging about complete with make-up, explaining how he lost the Black Pearl.  Much as did Norrington in parts 1-2, Barbossa’s allegiance his shifted dramatically.  But we’re used to that in this franchise, aren’t we?

Picking up where At World’s End (2007) left off, Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp; Blow) endeavors to find the Fountain of Youth, and he must do so before the Spanish find it first!

Jack needs a ship, and finds opportunity when rumors of “another Jack Sparrow” (an imposter) signing on new crew members.  This imposter is Angelica (Penelope Cruz; Blow, Vanilla Sky), Jack’s ex-girlfriend and the first mate of the sorcerous Captain Blackbeard (Ian McShane; Jack the Giant Slayer, John Wick 2).  Interesting how undeath seems to be a theme throughout the Pirates films.  Rumored to have returned from the dead, Blackbeard has created “zombified” crewmen and wields a magical control of his ship.

To reap the gifts of the Fountain of Youth requires a mermaid (Astrid Bergès-Frisbey; King Arthur: Legend of the Sword). Only one problem: mermaids are ferocious man-eaters.  The mermaid attack scene was outstandingly fun.

Director Rob Marshall (Chicago, Memoirs of a Geisha) picks up the fourth installment of the Pirates anthology after Gore Verbinski’s original trilogy. So, what does that mean for us? Well, nothing good really.  Our senses are no longer dazzled by Verbinski’s realization of grand scale.  And this loss of scale is not limited to the cinescapes, but the execution.  Jack’s stunt-rich shenanigans are fine, but seem just mildly entertaining iterations compared to his past films.  And whereas the swordplay choreography itself was on point, the overall scenes and fights lacked impact.  Moreover, whereas many ship sets looked excellent (as is the mega-budget franchise standard), several other sets (e.g., the caverns) felt as if they spawned from a far lower budget film—certainly not the product of a $250 million blockbuster!  It’s as if we set up our coolers and lawn chairs at dusk awaiting fireworks only to be met with sparklers.  And speaking of sparklers, this was the first Pirates film that had no significant ship-to-ship combat!

It doesn’t help, for my taste anyway, that everything seems “sillier” in this sequel. We have silly disguises (many times over), silly balancing gags (like a teetering ship), silly escape gags (like climbing a tree backwards and sling-shoting oneself), silly maneuver gags (like tying up 8 men at once by running around them with a rope like a cartoon character)… is this to make this more kid-friendly? I even had to watch a completely forced man-mermaid love connection transpire, boasting no more chemistry than that between a man and an actual fish.  Where’s Will and Elizabeth when we need them?  Their love was credible.

On the other hand, the plot is not overly complicated.  The double-crosses were few, and the story was followable without having seen The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) and Dead Man’s Chest (2006), like yesterday, in order to have a clue what’s going on—which was the case with the confounding At World’s End (2007).  Another perk was that, as usual, the ships look fantastic.  I always loved how every captain’s ship had as much personality in appearance as the men crewing them.  But, with that, another downer: we lost many members of the crew we had come to love… and the tentacled effects we came to love!  Oh, right, and why was this Fountain of Youth plot even important???  There was really never a “good” reason to find the fountain outside of greed.  Ergo, no urgency for us to care.

Overall, this was a dud. It’s a huge budget popcorn movie and I didn’t exactly hate watching it as a standalone film—unlike the overly prequel-reliant parts 2 or 3—but this was the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull of the Pirates anthology. We all know it’s there, but none of us want to acknowledge its existence after we’ve seem it.  I’d suggest the next time you watch the original trilogy, skip to Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017) and ignore this one.

MY CALL:  This abundantly indie psychological horror pits friendship against paranoia.  MORE MOVIES LIKE They Look Like People:  Little is similar, but for more psychological horror try The Voices (2014), Session 9 (2001), Last Shift (2015), Identity (2003), Gothika (2003), 1408 (2007), Mine Games (2012), The Babadook (2014), Hide and Seek (2005), American Psycho (2000), The Uninvited (2009), The Visit (2015) and Goodnight Mommy (2014).

Seeking confidence physically and professionally, Christian (Evan Dumouchel) is a nice guy with a crush on his likewise nice boss Mara (Margaret Ying Drake).  Somewhere between building up the guts to ask Mara out and meeting her for their first date, he crosses paths with his old, estranged friend Wyatt (MacLeod Andrews), who happens to need a place to crash.

Just one thing… Wyatt is secretly getting phone calls from a stranger with instructions to prepare for a great battle with the evil that infects the people around him.  He’s almost certain that he’s not crazy…almost certain.  But we are left to wonder if schizophrenia or some other mental illness isn’t causing these possible psychoses.

This little film is good at cultivating tension. Featuring some nice shots, this clearly indie film is in the hands of proficient but forgivably inexperienced filmmakers. The dialogue is a bit flat, but I appreciate the apparent effort behind the writing.

There’s much endearing humanity to be found here and, while this is obviously a “beginner” film, I feel that the style more than makes up for the flaws in execution and the rather coarse editing.  As for the aforementioned style, we find a refreshing mix of levity and suspense.

We have some highly effective creepiness and characters that matter.  In his first feature length film, writer and director Perry Blackshear does well enough to interest me in his future projects—although I won’t be recommending this movie to mainstream horror fans.

MY CALL:  It’s not “great” and there are no “wow” moments, but this movie is a nonstop action sequence and I find it pretty entertaining…even if I probably won’t want to see it again for another 10 years. LOL.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Resident Evil:  Resident Evil (2002), Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004), Resident Evil: Extinction (2007), Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010), Doom (2005), the Silent Hill movies (2006, 2012) and the Underworld franchise (2003-2017) come to mind.  For a fine ratings vs earnings comparison of the Resident Evil and Underworld franchises check this feisty article out.

It seems that asking folks to list the Resident Evil movies in order of quality would be harder than getting an entire theater of fans to agree on pizza toppings—I’d say 1, 3, 5, 2, 4.  This fifth franchise installment, as with each of its predecessors, manages to deliver a new take on presenting the Resident Evil world and the next step in an elaborately plot-holey but perfectly followable plot.  The movie opens with a franchise recap (Milla’s typical narration) before picking up right where Afterlife (2010) left off.

Paul W. S. Anderson (Resident Evil 1 & 4-6, Mortal Kombat, Event Horizon, Soldier) continues to helm the beloved Zompocalypse franchise and continues to spread his love of slow-motion during our opening action sequences.  The irreplaceable Milla Jovovich (The Fifth Element, Resident Evil 1-6, Ultraviolet) returns as Alice fighting her way out of an Umbrella corporation virus outbreak simulation facility.  She is joined by Ada Wong (Bingbing Li; Transformers: Age of Extinction), who is butt-kickin’ cute in her gun-geisha mistress outfit.  She also bumps into her Jovo-clone’s daughter (Aryana Engineer; Orphan) and her simulation clone neighbor (Michelle Rodriguez; Resident Evil, The Fate of the Furious).

Of course, at some point, Alice wakes up and spends abundant screen time scantily clad in a research facility before finding a ninja dominatrix outfit and all the weapons she could ever want.  Just conveniently waiting for her just like when Beckinsale awakens from her cryo-chamber in Underworld: Awakening to find her boots and leathers “right there.” Shortly after Alice’s hips and side-boob show, Wesker (Shawn Roberts; Resident Evil 4-6, xXx: The Return of Xander Cage) appears to drop an exposition bomb to explain the whole movie to us.

Under orders from the Red Queen, they are being hunted by Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory; Resident Evil 2 & 4) who is controlled by some weird mechanized heart-spider (that never gets explained) attached to her sternum which, like her cleavage, goes well-exposed throughout the movie.  At Valentine’s side are Rain (Michelle Rodriguez; Resident Evil, The Fate of the Furious) and Todd (Oded Fehr; Resident Evil 3-4), both bad guy clones of Alice’s former friends.  During this pursuit, a team including Kevin Durand (Legion, Real Steel) and Boris Kodjoe (Resident Evil: Afterlife, Surrogates) are working their way into the Umbrella facility to rescue Alice and Ada…and they’re working for Wesker!?!?!

The theme of the movie is “Evil Goes Global.”  But nothing felt particularly global about it (until the very last scene).  The tone and setting was notably less effective than previous franchise installments.  The global element seemed that the simulation facility has different cityscapes—which Alice goes through like video game stages, one after the other—which emulate Moscow, Tokyo, Suburbia, and so on, so that potential world power buyers could see how a virus outbreak would affect their enemy nation’s metropolises.  All that these “stages” accomplished was making the franchise feel like a video game; a fault which, until the release of this installment, the franchise had successfully avoided.

Throughout these levels we find undead Russian soldiers, the giant hulking ogres from Afterlife and they still throw their axes in slow-motion, and we see a lot of a super-sized tongue lasher monster from first Resident Evil.  However, the execution of their action is rather lackluster.

Featuring solid zombie attack action and combat choreography, I liked the bright white hallway action sequence.  The gunshot blood-splatter gore was occasionally decent, but left much to be desired.  In fact, I could say that about most of the action.  The sprinting zombies with their quad-unhinging tentacle jaws (like Blade II’s vampires) were cool…at first.  What happened?  Similarly shocking, the hand-to-hand combat was best in the franchise, but it lacked good finishers and standout moments.

Minus a few story-building scenes, this movie essentially boils down to a continuous 90-minute action sequence.  This probably sounds amazing, right?  It wasn’t.  All the action felt a lot like “background action” in an otherwise great action movie.  You know?  Like when Optimus Prime was fighting Megatron, there were soldiers and other Autobots fighting Decepticons in the background (and it looked good), but nothing particularly cool would happen with the background fighters while the camera was focusing on the two heavy hitters.  In Retribution, this action is never punctuated by awesome moments; there are no highlights or climaxes.  Perhaps worst of all was the arctic martial arts finale between Alice, Rain, Valentine and others.  Hand-to-hand, Asian weapons, guns, and a lot of clever choreography…it was all entertaining. Very entertaining.  But I kept waiting for the “Wow.”  It never came.

The movie ends with a very Terminator-SkyNet apocalypse standoff at the White House between the remainder of humanity against a legion of Resident Evil beasts as if the videogames vomited all over the screen (perhaps in a good way).  So, as they tend to, they could easily pick up part 6 at the exact moment that closes Retribution, much as Retribution did with Afterlife (2010).

I have had a blast revisiting these films. Even the lesser installments are fun to watch (as long as it’s been a while).  Looking forward to part 6.

MY CALL:  This really wasn’t a very good horror anthology unless you’re looking for slapstick drunk/high humor told over sexual and “dark genre” themes. There’s not much horror to be found here…nor quality.  MORE MOVIES LIKE The ABCs of Death 2.5:  The ABCs of Death (2013) and The ABCs of Death 2 (2014), both of which also feature 26 very short films by 26 different filmmakers and both of which were better than 2.5.

MORE HORROR ANTHOLOGIES:  Dead of Night (1945), Black Sabbath (1963), Tales from the Crypt (1972), The Vault of Horror (1973), The Uncanny (1977), Creepshow (1982), Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983), Stephen King’s Cat’s Eye (1985), Deadtime Stories (1986), Creepshow 2 (1987), Tales from the Darkside: The Movie (1990), Necronomicon: Book of the Dead (1993), Hellraiser: Bloodline (1996), Campfire Tales (1997), 3 Extremes (2004), Creepshow 3 (2006), Trick ‘r Treat (2007), Chillerama (2011), Little Deaths (2011), V/H/S (2012), The Theater Bizarre (2012), The ABCs of Death (2013), V/H/S 2 (2013), The Profane Exhibit (2013), The ABCs of Death 2 (2014), V/H/S Viral (2014), Southbound (2015), Tales of Halloween (2015), A Christmas Horror Story (2015), Holidays (2016) and XX (2017).

If you’ve followed my reviews for a while now then you ought to know that I love horror anthologies.  In some anthologies all of the short stories are directed by one person and written by another (e.g., Creepshow), other times we have three to six films (20-30 min each) each crafted by different filmmakers (e.g., V/H/S),  but in this case each of our 26 short stories has a different writer and director.  In fact, these were the 26 runners-up The ABCs of Death 2 (2014), for which each submission had to be titled by the letter “M.”

Unlike many anthologies which feature a story teller or wraparound story (e.g., Creepshow, Tales from the Darkside: The Movie) or taking the approach of linked stories in which one component of the previous story links us to the next (e.g., Southbound, Trick ‘r Treat), this anthology simply delivers a series of horror shorts related only by the first letter of their titles.  This is a cool notion and all, but realize that out of the top 52 submissions, these were numbers 27 to 52 whereas the best 26 made it into the previous anthology (The ABCs of Death 2).

Also, a bit strange is that there is little horror to be found here. Mostly these films are very dark comedies.  In fact, this would best be advertised as a “dark genre anthology.”  As I watched, I gave each 3-minute short film a “gut response” rating of 1 to 3 (3 being best, 1 being worst; sadly, there are a lot of 1s).

These short films cover a variety of horror, genre, and sexual themes including vampires, decapitation, cross dressing, maggots on wounds, an elderly Van Helsing, mutant ninjas, dismemberment, guts, a VHS-cyborg samurai, a poop golem, bile, vomit, sex scenes, perversions, boobs, full frontal nudity, mass suicide, genital mutilation, necrophilia, oral sex gone wrong, and some others I’m sure I’ve forgotten.  There are several foreign language shorts, including Spanish and (I think) Italian.  With as little spoiling as possible, here is an account of the short films with a few comments.

M is for Moonstruck [2.5] (directed by Travis Betz) boasts some innovative (even if cheap) style!  It’s cut paper animation…with a cut paper sex scene and cut paper nudity! LOL.

M is for Mother [2.5] (directed by Ryan Bosworth) is pure cheesy fun, complete with a great title shot and a fun CGI spider.

M is for Malnutrition [2] (directed by Peter Czikrai) is a barely serviceable zombie film.

M is for Marauder [1] (directed by Steve Daniels) is a garbage pail film about adults trying to kill each other while riding Big Wheels.  Some will find this hilarious.  I found it a bit annoying.  Watch it with friends and beer and you’ll get a few chuckles.

M is for Mobile [1.5] (directed by Baris Erdogan) features torture via text.  It’s cheeky.

M is for Mess [2] (directed by Carlos Faria) sexually fetishizes a man’s curse of defecating through his bellybutton. Of course, it’s disgusting.

M is for Marriage [3] (directed by Todd E. Freeman) is among the better produced, written and acted films. It involves some sort of pathogen…or parasite…or infection.

M is for Mind Meld [1.5] (directed by Brett Glassberg) is about a volunteer for some really twisted scientific experiments.

M is for Messiah [1] (directed by Nicholas Humphries) is a garbage pail film about a stupid cult. This was frustratingly bad.

M is for Make Believe [1] (directed by Summer Johnson) is about some little girls giving horribly improper first aid to an impaled man costumed as the King of the Fairies.

M is for Magnetic Tape [1] (directed by Cody Kennedy & Tim Rutherford) is dorky “stoner humor” full of dumb gore and inane dialogue. It’s funny, but terrible.

What can I say about M is for Munging [1.5] (directed by Jason M. Koch & Clint Kelly)? This is exactly what you think it is. Exactly!

M is for Mermaid [2] (directed by Ama Lea) is about a couple of fisherman who catch a topless mermaid, and it’s very silly.

M is for Meat [2.5] (directed by Wolfgang Matzl) is a trippy little stop-motion film about a carnivorous chicken leg. Yes, I meant exactly what I just said.

M is for Mariachi [1] (directed by Eric Pennycoff) features a death metal band with the best band name ever, a head banger, and a lot of murder.

M is for Mormon Missionaries [2] (directed by Peter Podgursky) features pushy, homicidal Mormons…or does it?

M is for Muff [2] (directed by Mia Kate Russell) is dumb, perversely funny, well-produced, and features a kinky accidental death.

M is for Matador [3] (directed by Gigi Saul Guerrero) might have been the most unexpectedly pleasing film. It involves a sick game of dress-up, roleplay, and the revenge of some scantily clad, blood-covered women.

M is for Manure [3] (directed by Michael Schwartz) is about a young man and his disgusting creation of vengeance.

M is for Mutant [2] (directed by Stuart Simpson) is a slapstick Australian film about some virus that causes stop-motion face-bursting mutants monsters.  It made me smile.

M is for Merry Christmas [1] (directed by Joe Staszkiewicz) features a British Krampus with some self-doubt issues.

M is for Martyr [1] (directed by Jeff Stewart) exhibits zero filmmaking effort and a marginally interesting concept.

M is for Mom [2] (directed by Carles Torrens) is somewhat well done, and features a ghoulish child with a crush.  The title seems a bit out of place.

M is for Miracle [1.5] (directed by Alvaro Nunez) is about a rabbit that falls from the sky and a psychopath in a bunny suit.

I have no clue how M is for Mailbox [2] (directed by Dante Vescio & Rodrigo Gasparini) got its name. This foreign language short features a creepy kid on Halloween.

M is for Maieusiophobia [3] (directed by Christopher Younes), the fear of giving birth, features disturbing Claymation, gory guts, and a weird pregnancy.

Well, there it is—a cornucopia of weirdness.  I wouldn’t recommend this. There are too many good horror anthologies out there.

MY CALL:  Unless you simply want to see Reynolds play more of a character than himself, this will likely disappoint you. Reynolds and the cast do fine, but the plot just isn’t compelling nor does anyone really get to shine.  MORE MOVIES LIKE The Captive:  There are so many better abduction films out there. I’d start with Ransom (1996), Prisoners (2013) or Gone Girl (2014).  There are also better Ryan Reynolds films out there.

First off, I feel the need to warn my fellow Ryan Reynolds (The Change-Up, Mississippi Grind, Deadpool, The Voices, Life) fans out there.  This is not a Ryan Reynolds movie.  It’s more of an ensemble cast featuring Rosario Dawson (Rent, Alexander), Scott Speedman (Underworld, Duets), and Kevin Durand (Resident Evil: Retribution, Smokin’ Aces, Mystery Alaska).

This film definitely took Reynolds out of his comfort zone (i.e., he didn’t play himself or anything even close to it).  He plays a father tortured by distrust and guilt.  After leaving his young daughter alone in the car at a pie shop, he returns to find she has vanished.  Reynolds does a more than convincing job falling apart as he is bombarded by accusations from investigators who think he was involved, blame from his wife, and the grief and disconnection any parent would experience under such dire circumstances.

The story then fast-forwards 8 years, when the investigators have come across images of whom they believe to be his kidnapped daughter…alive, and deeply embedded in an online pedophile organization.  Yeah, they went there.

The guilt and blame get pretty heavy, but I never found myself impressed with the story.  Reynolds’ character ends up in an uninspired chase scene finale and then things get resolved a little too quickly and conveniently for my taste.  I enjoyed this movie but, honestly, I think it’s just because I enjoy watching any Reynolds movie.  It was also interesting seeing Kevin Durand play something other than a big, strong, tough guy.  I guess this film allowed both of them to show their acting range a bit.

MY CALL:  Just a mediocre Ryan Reynolds movie that, really, I’d only recommend to serious Ryan Reynolds fans unless you’re looking for a fun, kinda’ bad movie.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Self/Less:  Reynolds has done his share of mind and body swaps. Among them are Criminal (2016), RIPD (2013), The Nines (2007) and The Change-Up (2011).

Ben Kingsley plays a billionaire terminally ill with lung cancer who buys more time in the form of a lab-generated body.  Not since Bloodrayne (2005) has Kingsley seemed so disengaged from the camera. It’s as if he actively hates playing this role more than his character hates that he his dying.  Every effort is made to display his lush lifestyle including his home, which looks like an oil Sheik’s penthouse from Furious 7 (2015) complete with indoor fountains.  Who has an indoor fountain!?!?!  It’s pretty ridiculous.

The body he buys is that of Ryan Reynolds (The Change-Up, Mississippi Grind, Deadpool, The Voices, The Captive, Life).  At first it seems that some effort was made to have Reynolds speak like Kingsley, but as quickly as he adapts to his new body he likewise adapts to speaking just like the Ryan Reynolds we’ve all known from his last ten movies.

Remember how cool it was in Face/Off (1997) to see Nic Cage and feel like we were watching John Travolta?  Or how in Like Father, Like Son (1987) it was so obvious to us (the audience) that a prestigious and pretentious doctor (Dudley Moore) was inhabiting the body of his high school son (Kirk Cameron)?  Yeah, there’s not of that here.  And I’m not sure who to blame.  After all, Reynolds has almost always played some recognizably snarky iteration of himself—although in the recent Woman in Gold (2015) he truly shocked me with his abilities to play a more soft-spoken and tender character.  Not as impressive but still noteworthy were his performances in Buried (2010) and Mississippi Grind (2015).  Both had more than just a glimpse of the Reynolds we all know, but they forced him outside his comfort zone a bit and it worked.

So, when a Kingsley-inhabited Reynolds talks like a thirty-something Reynolds instead of a calculatingly patient, intellectual business mogul, I have to wonder if it’s his fault, the director’s (Tarsem Singh; The Fall, The Cell, Immortals), the writer’s, everybody???

Needless to say, this is not a strong recommendation. It’s fine as a hangover movie. It will liven up a boring Sunday afternoon. And, for Reynolds-completists like me, you’ll get some of that classic Reynolds flavor we’ve come to love.  But what we won’t find is a good film.

MY CALL:  This gory remake is buckets of goopy, gooey, slimy fun. If you love 80s horror and practical effects, this is a major win! An 80s staple!  MORE MOVIES LIKE The Blob:  Well, The Stuff (1985) is the closest match by far, and a highly recommended favorite of mine. The Curse (1987) follows suit with infectious meteors, The Raft (segment from Creepshow 2; 1987) is satisfyingly close, The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill (segment from Creepshow; 1982) takes a botanical approach, and Street Trash (1987) demonstrates the dangers of drinking alcoholic beverages you didn’t order yourself. Even Life (2017) comes sort of close in theme and, although quite smutty, Bio Slime (2010) might serve some audiences well.

Everything was fine in our sleepy little northern California town until a homeless man witnessed a meteor fall from the sky.  Upon further investigation, he finds the meteorite contains some pink, bubbling, alien goo.  The mucous-dripping, pulsating, organ-like mass propels itself onto the man’s hand and…well…you know.

High schoolers Meg (Shawnee Smith; Saw 1-3 & 6, The Grudge 3) and Paul (Donovan Leitch Jr.; Cutting Class) find their first date interrupted when they hit the now-parasitized hobo with their car and take him to the hospital along with Brian (Kevin Dillon; No Escape, Entourage), a wildly mulleted juvenile delinquent.

That homeless guy gets it bad. After digesting his hand, the alien slime melts his innards.  You see, this organism is composed of a highly corrosive acid (think Alien), and as it digests you, it grows (more like Calvin in Life).  But Paul gets it the worst with a scene worthy of the movie poster.  He is enshrouded in a slimy digestive veil of death as the weight of the gook pulls the skin off his melting face and Meg pulls his arm, reaching out for help, gorily asunder from his disintegrating body.  Deeeelish!

The local Sheriff (Jeffrey DeMunn; The Mist, The Walking Dead) and diner waitress (Candy Clark; Amityville 3-D, Zodiac, Cat’s Eye) fall into the blob’s path and Bill Moseley (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, House of 1000 Corpses, Texas Chainsaw 3-D, Smothered) and Art LaFleur (Trancers 1-2, House Hunting) have cameos as well.  Much to our satisfaction, this horror movie cares about its characters and uses them well.

Director Chuck Russell (A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, The Scorpion King) does a fine, gory job honoring the 1958 classic with this sci-fi/horror remake. I’m quite fond of how Russell plays to classic tropes by sparing the virgin in lieu of the more promiscuous Vicki (i.e., Erika Eleniak; E. T., Bordello of Blood, Dracula 3000), yet violates expectations as nice guy Paul dies somewhat early leaving our young criminal antihero to save the day.

When our extraterrestrial bioplasm gets Vicki, it digests her from the inside out, collapsing her husk of a drained face as slimy tentacles emerge from her orifices before the rest of the amorphous mass emerges to engulf her date.  It’s a great scene!  This film seems to have a lot of great, gore-tastic scenes.

The diner sink, the phonebooth scene, the movie theater and sewer and church scenes… everywhere the blob goes, so follows a memorable, gory scene.  Where ever there is a crack or doorway to be found, likewise there is an opening through which this living ooze may erupt towards its victims like an offal-guts slinky.  There are so many excellent special effects pieces to be found.  This has loads of bloody gobbled-gook, a myriad of tentacles, and at one point it pours across the ceiling a la The Thing (1982).

If you have discovered a love for 80s horror and somehow haven’t seen this yet, just buy this. REALLY.  It’s an excellent piece of 80s horror cinema.  It even has a good ending!

MY CALL: This action/adventure movie may not be the epic movie you expected, but it remains very entertaining and successfully builds a world for the Dark Universe.  MOVIES LIKE The Mummy: The Mummy (1932, 1958, 1999) and The Mummy Returns (2001).

This film kickstarts the Dark Universe (monster universe) with a remake/reimagining/reboot of The Mummy (1932, 1958).  But, more accurately, I’d call this a present-day reimagining of The Mummy (1999) which, of course, was an adventure film approach to remaking its much older Hammer predecessors.

A duplicitous thief and soldier, Nick (Tom Cruise; Interview with a Vampire, Oblivion, Edge of Tomorrow) feloniously drags his snarky sidekick Chris (Jake Johnson; Jurassic World) along in search of hidden treasures buried beneath the sands of Iraq (once Mesopotamia).  But what they discover is most unexpected: a subterranean Egyptian Tomb in the Middle East!

Here to inform us of the significance of this cursed find, and Nick’s untrustworthy nature, is scientist Jenny (Annabelle Wallis; Annabelle, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword).  We also accrue context and narrative from Dr. Jekyll (Russell Crowe; Man of Steel, The Man with the Iron Fists), Nick’s premonitions and “connection” to our mummy, and a cursed friend that will undoubtedly remind you of An American Werewolf in London’s (1981) dark humor.

Arisen from the dead as an emaciated husk, our undead villainess Ahmanet (Sofia Boutella; Star Trek: Beyond, Kingsman: The Secret Service) sucks the life out of her victims with a pseudo-erotic kiss of death.  Reminiscent of Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988) or Lifeforce (1985), but not nearly as scary or gory, her victims (who all happen to be male) are drained to sunken corpses before our eyes only to be reanimated as her ill-coordinated servants.

Humorously nodding to the 1999 remake, she spends most of the film (almost a tad awkwardly) missing a part of her nose and cheek. Likewise, we also once again find swarms of dangerous vermin (now camel spiders), sandstorms with giant ghostly visages, a murderous betrayal in her backstory, Ahmanet gradually regenerates with each drained victim, and (true to the classic) a search for our mummy’s mate.  By the way, the special effects behind these scenes looked pretty cool (all CGI, of course) and I loved the twitchily marionetted movement of Ahmanet’s first minions. When we first see her ghastly resurrection and watch her raise the dead, it is truly the most horrific scene of the movie. That, and the swimming undead. Underwater undead is especially creepy…even if a bit over-the-top.

The action between Nick and Ahmanet’s undead minions captures a lot of the adventurous Brendan Fraser fun of Stephen Sommers’ The Mummy (1999) and The Mummy Returns (2001), while purveying the mindless horde sense of a zombie movie. That is, the mummy-zombies appear to be vile and murderous, yet the depiction of the action is more “fun” than dire as Nick punches through their heads and torsos (much to his shock) and tosses them around.  We never really worry about Nick’s health until he fights more dangerous monsters (i.e., Ahmanet or Hyde).

Were I to complain, I’d say that this never felt as “epic” as it was intended even though it clearly tried at every corner, maaaaybe biting off more than it could chew, to be big and bold and shocking (e.g., in retrospect, I giggle at the swimming zombies and their perfect aquatic coordination). But it was absolutely a fun adventure movie with a few dire scenes.  Director Alex Kurtzman fairs well with his first action/adventure project—and only his second feature length film! I’m not saying this was outstanding or anything, but it was “good” and very entertaining. I don’t think it has earned any of the scathing reviews suggesting this will halt the Dark Universe before it can even get started.

Moreover, I enjoyed how this movie kept the focus on our mummy while introducing the existence of the other classic Hammer monsters.  We get to know how these movies will plausibly be linked, we get an ending that bridges us to the next film, and that ending neither gives away what the next film will be nor does it keep this from being a solid standalone film.

The movie is fun, a lot of fun actually, and I’ll surely own it within a year. I may not have been wowed and the plot’s delivery wasn’t especially compelling, but I remain very excited to eventually learn what Dark Universe story will be told next.

The rumors are interesting…