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The Ghouls (2003)
Swing and a miss
A lot of attention has apparently been drawn to THE GHOULS thanks to its decent showings at horror festivals; truly the reason that I picked up a copy from blockbuster. Being an indie film maker myself I love watching other work to see what's going on out there, and I'm truly a sucker for "zombie" movies. Kudos to Ferrin on getting this distributed (truly a near-impossible feat) but after watching it, I kind of wonder why.
The story itself had a promising opening, an abnormal hero with an (hopefully) abnormal profession. It created a picture of a believable/real man in Los Angeles who stumbles across something extraordinary. The acting, albeit very flat, was not horrible...but truly needed to be a lot stronger to save the plot...
Now the problem, it seems to me at least, would be that the plot proceeded in a fairly straight-forward...dare I say tiresome/old manner. There were few surprises (if any) and I found myself not paying attention to the story or the characters and more towards the technical follies of the film:
1) SOUND- THE GHOULS should prove to everyone why you need to actually pay attention to sound...I can hope that it was just the copy I rented, but in all honesty after being to most of the festivals around here I'm thinking it was just that bad... 2) CONTINUITY- I loved watching our hero's car window go up and down between shots. 3) SHADOWPLAY- This would be a great THE GHOULS drinking game: "Drink every time you see a crew-members shadow!" 4) SHOT CHOICE- Hey guess what? You can actually tell when you're shooting through a windshield and when you're not...might want to deal with that one next time...And I think Mr. F may need to take a look at the purpose of an establishing shot in a good old film text book before we get another 10 seconds of traveling car...before the car is in the shot.
THE GHOULS did have a few bright spots: The makeup/gore was quite good (particularly near the end), the dialog had a few bright spots and some of the actors genuinely seemed to belong there.
In conclusion...if you've ever wanted to make a movie rent this one and it shows you what you could do with DV....or watch 28 Days Later (shot on the XL1 series of cameras) to see what digital can do with a horror film
The Saddest Music in the World (2003)
Odd Tribute
The Saddest Music In The World is a very odd contribution to the musical tragi-comedy. In the standard Guy Maddin style (go Winnipeg go :) the black-and-white imagery is very visually interesting, particularly if you are familiar with the old black and white films. While it may not have many laughs throughout, it does offer a few lighter moments just due to their absurdity. It is also able to offer a very interesting look at Central Canada during the Depression; the sets are slightly abstract with an almost Burton-esque feel to them. Performances were good all around, McKinney being a personal highlight (being familiar with him from his days with Kids In The Hall), but there are many strong performances throughout.
And what's a Canadian film without hockey?
The Amityville Horror (1979)
James Brolin Sure Can Sharpen An Axe
I was amazed that this movie had attained such status in the horror genre. The fact that something like this movie could spawn so many sequels is amazing; I do understand the appeal of James Brolin sharpening an axe for what seemed to be half of the movie, and the desire to see more of him with a beard (as hard as that would be)...but really beyond that the movie really didn't do much; however, I did enjoy how the "Ultimate Evil" house stole money...that really proved to me that the house was evil.
Now I shouldn't be too critical as I was not born when this movie was made (thus never seeing it in theaters in all of its axe-sharpening glory) but the fact of the matter appears to be that this movie was used to get a whole bunch of horror movie clichés thrown together in one big yawn-filled feature... Even though it is filmed in such a straight forward, documentary-esque style (with little artistic appeal beyond those glowing windows and the repetitive shot of the house with some flowers), there were so many different story lines that were not pursued that one is left to ponder a great deal of the film, that apparently happened for no reason, after its over (whether you wanted to or not).
I can understand how some of the effects may have frightened viewers at the time, but what surprises me is how this could even be seen as shocking when it is released 6 years after The Exorcist (and two years after The Exorcist II, which...yeah we'll focus on the first one). Did no one go to see The Exorcist, as it looked too scary and just went with Amityville?
Well I guess if you're terrified by James Brolin chopping wood and a cat, this movie is for you.