AtB

Attack the Block and Super8 make for a fantastic double-feature, though the former kicks the pants off the latter.

OK, mindless blind gorilla-wolf aliens swarm through a council estate (aka the projects). The local, er, citizenry take matters into their own hands, partly out of pride, but mostly due to a learned distrust of civic authorities.

It's not a deep film, to be sure, but it's not afraid to be morally ambiguous, and the dialogue is outstanding. Yeah, the ending was a bit cheezy, but there was some restraint there.

* * * R A T I N G * * *

Attack the Block(IMDB)

 Wince : [**___]
 Flinch : [**___]
 Retch : [**___]
 Gape : [***__]

 Beerequisite : [****_]
 Pornability : [_____] (**** for gorilla-wolf aliens)
 Obscurity : [*____]
 Explicability : [****_]

Best hope for a spin-off series:  Mayhem & Probs

Slither

Meteor crash-lands, parasite infects local man, spawning an alien invasion of slugs that turn their hosts into zombies. The small town is doomed!

Firefly's Nathan Fillion is horrible as usual (psst! Nathan, act!) as the town cop, but Don Thompson more than carries the weight of the film as the foul-mouthed mayor.

* * * R A T I N G * * *

Slither (IMDB)

Wince : [***__]
Flinch : [***__]
Retch : [***__]
Gape : [***__]

Beerequisite : [***__]
Pornability : [*____]
Obscurity : [**___]
Explicability : [***__]

Phil the Alien

Take me to your leader, eh?

Phil's dad crashed the car, dying in the process and leaving Phil stranded far from home. Phil and his dad are shape-shifting aliens from a planet of peace (with periodic eruptions of ultraviolence), the car is a spaceship, and far-from-home is Canada.

A fun film with a drunken alien, a talking beaver, a whale-loving secret serviceman, a messiah cult, polychromatic fur coats, an alien dissection lab, and lots of White Dog (beer, whiskey, whatever).

* * * R A T I N G * * *

Phil the Alien (IMDB)

Wince : [**___]
Flinch : [***__]
Retch : [*____]
Gape : [****_]

Beerequisite : [****_]
Pornability : [*____]
Obscurity : [****_]
Explicability : [***__]


Best off-the-menu ordering: "Sammy the alien". See the quote on IMDB.

Cloverfield

Hyped in Manhattan, hated by Ron Jeremy*, compared with Blair Witch due to its "found footage" approach.

This is a simple film: a monster is rampaging through Manhattan, the main characters are idiots, everyone dies. The film's big money shot, the head of the Statue of Liberty getting rolled down some LES street, is shown fairly early to let you know that it's time to just sit back and watch everyone get killed.

Very enjoyable, for what it is -- what it is being a monster movie with no script to speak of and a lot of shaky camera work (which, if you follow modern cinema at all, shouldn't bother you). Seeing it in Manhattan makes you leave the theater cringing, constantly on the lookout for CGI tentacle-legs to come crushing down from above.

The monster is a vague CGI thing that seems different every time it appears (oops?), the introductory party/romance scene is far too long and dull, and the character with the camera not only fails to point it in the right direction, but is so annoying that you find yourself pray he dies so that someone else can take a turn behind the lens.

All in all: fun to watch, more fun to bitch about at the pub afterwards.

* * * R A T I N G * * *

Cloverfield (IMDB)

Wince : [****_]
Flinch : [***__]
Retch : [***__]
Gape : [**___]

Beerequisite : [****_]
Pornability : [_____]
Obscurity : [_____]
Explicability : [**___]

* Ron Jeremy does not appear in or around this film; He simply expressed His great Displeasure at a book-signing shortly after seeing this.

Breeders

Wow, this one is pretty bad. A man in a gimp suit is raping every virgin in Manhattan (hence the film's short running time), impregnating them with black slime and leaving a post-hypnotic suggestion for them to attend his midnight basement jacuzzi party. A young doctor and a cop use every stilted line and cliche at their disposal in a futile attempt to prove the existence of a scriptwriter, ultimately leaving the audience to make that leap of faith on their own.

Everything bad about 80s movies is in this one. Bad acting. Big hair. Awful clothes. Synth soundtrack. Questionable sets. Implausible events. On the plus side, the virgins share a rare allergy to underwear, and shuck their clothes at every scene change.

* * * R A T I N G * * *
Breeders (IMDB)

Wince : [*****]
Flinch : [*____]
Retch : [*____]
Gape : [***__]

Beerequisite : [****_]
Pornability : [***__]
Obscurity : [**___]
Explicability : [***__]

What I would do different: Spend the ten bucks to have someone write a script.

Scene I'd watch on endless loop: Breeder chicks in an alien hot-tub filled with milky-white fluid.

Memories I want to erase: Those tan lines!

Meatball Machine

A splatterfest in the vein of Iron Man. If you haven't heard of this movie by now, you probably shouldn't try to see it.

The film begins with the worst fighter in the history of anger using his skills to win over the girl of his dreams by repeatedly throwing his face and kidneys at the fists and toes of her date. Surprisingly enough, this works, and she is smitten long enough to be taken over by a parasitic alien that uses humans as a vessel for bloodsport.

Our hero allows himself to be taken over as well, and puts his well-honed martial skills to work saving/killing his girlfriend by bleeding profusely over her weapons in a rarely-seen display of Rust-Fu.

They live happily ever after... fighting each other.

* * * R A T I N G * * *
Meatball Machine (IMDB)

Wince : [***__]
Flinch : [****_]
Retch : [***__]
Gape : [****_]

Beerequisite : [****_]
Pornability : [**___]
Obscurity : [**___]
Explicability : [**___]

Zebraman

Stripey!

One of the most twisted and innovative directors out there, Takashi Miike, serves up a variant of the generally detestable "if you believe in your dreams, they will come true" films that turns out to be damn entertaining.

The premise is straightforward: take a man who is a failure as an adult(he is unable to befriend or chastise the children he teaches) , a husband (his wife is cheating on him), and a father (his son is bullied at school, and his daughter is a teenage prostitute), give him a lifelong obsession with a superhero whose television show was scrapped after 7 episodes, mix in a wheelchair-bound kid who shares this same obsession, and pit these two against a horde of green-slime aliens bent on taking over the earth.

The failed teacher has made a Zebraman costume as homage to his childhood hero, and at night he dresses up in it and beats the stuffing out of... pillows. One night he ventures outdoors in costume, ostensibly to show his new wheeled friend his black-and-white finery, and encounters another nutcase wearing a crab-mask and wielding two pairs of scissors. Battle ensues. In the course of flailing about like a schoolgirl, the teacher is filled with the spirit of Zebraman, and thus begins his career as a costumed crimefighter.

Miike's rather jaded and unflinching humor crops up now and then, and the story takes a few odd and unexpected turns, making for an unconventional superhero-wannabe movie. It is well-worth the two-hour investment and, however predictable the rest of the film may be, no-one is going to be able to forsee the Zebraman finishing move.


* * * R A T I N G * * *
Zebraman (IMDB)

Wince : [***__]
Flinch : [***__]
Retch : [*____]
Gape : [***__]

Beerequisite : [***__]
Pornability : [*____]
Obscurity : [**___]
Explicability : [***__]

Scene I'd watch on endless loop: "Zebranurse!"

Doubly-irreverant nickname I keep wanting to use: "Miike Mouse"

Wild Zero

The second half of Friday's double feature.

I was not going to give this its own post ... and then I remembered the Captain! This guy has a Prince Valiant (sometimes red!), a goatee, a milk habit, and a pair of laced-up-the-haunch lycra shorts that would make the entirety of the Folsom Street Fair blush. He giggles a lot, pops pills, drives a flame-spouting (don't worry, they all do that) merc, and packs an RPG. He, uh, may or may not be straight, though between the hair and the ass-huggers it really doesn't matter.

The Captain is hunting rocker Guitar Wolf (backed by Bass Wolf and Drum Wolf, naturally), who is racing to help psuedo-rocker Ace, who is trying to find his hours-old girlfriend Tobio, who is being attacked by zombies. Did I mention she's a tranny? Or the Lara Croft ripoff in a houndstooth bodysuit? Only in Japan, people, I can't make this stuff up.

As far as rockabilly zombie (not vampire) movies go, not bad. Otherwise, eh. Has its moments.

* * * R A T I N G * * *
Wild Zero (IMDB)

Wince : [****_] (-1 * for subtitles)
Flinch : [**___]
Retch : [**___]
Gape : [****_]

Beerequisite : [*****]
Pornability : [*____]
Obscurity : [***__]
Explicability : [***__]