Review: Cell Count - 2012

Cell Count

Director: Todd E. Freeman

2012

Horror/Sci-Fi

If you get the decease you’re as good as dead. Russell’s wife Sarah’s got it and she has no chance of surviving what so ever… except for the chance Dr. Brandt offers Russell. He has the choice of seeing his wife suffocate by her own blood and vomit and to pay tens of thousands of dollars for the hospital costs or join in with his wife in a little experiment. Dr. Brandt is very convincing and promises that Sarah will be free of the decease within weeks. But Dr. Brandt fails to inform them of the side effects. Maybe the decease itself isn’t so bad after all, maybe the curse is worse?

I get the feeling that this is set somewhere in the near future but it could very well be told as a present time story as well. It’s not really important just as long as you don’t expect space traveling and serious futuristic technology. All in all it seems pretty realistic actually. Apart from a few details as the decease for instance. The cure is kind of out of this world as well but that’s not very important. What is important is the suspense and the experiment itself! What’s it all for and what results and conclusions are Dr. Brandt hoping to find?

The film doesn’t give you too much information, which is a good thing; just enough to keep it interesting. The pace might be a bit slow to begin with but after half the movie or so that’s no problem anymore. The suspense takes over and the questions that the movie has accumulated begins to really take over you mind!

We get some answers of course, otherwise it would not have been such a great movie I think, but there are still unanswered stuff at the end. That bothers me a bit since I feel like the missing bits and pieces are very important! They might very well turn the whole purpose of the film upside down depending on the truth. The entire timeline might get different if the answer is told in a different way. Maybe this is an intentional move but the director to make us think about it after the film has ended. After all, some of the most interesting films I’ve seen leaves something for the viewer to think about.

If we were to talk about the acting and makeup effects for a while I wouldn’t have much to say. I have absolutely nothing to complain about. I think all of the actors portray their rolls trustworthy. And the makeup effects are done the same way. It might not be pretty but it’s always realistic!

It is a love story about a man who gives everything up for the woman he loves. But it’s also a story about a sadistic doctor when seeks a cure for an incurable decease. Why he does this is one of the remaining questions. I don’t think its money, possible fame but not probable. I wish that the ending scenes would have given one more clue. But it’s still a great movie and it will be graded as one!

8/10

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News: Hudson Horror Show 666

I just got a press release for this event. It's a little too distant for me to attend but I'm sure it's worth while if you are in the area!

On Saturday, December 1, 2012 (12-1-12), the Hudson Horror Show 666 features a whopping six films (for the price of five), along with shorts and vintage trailers, all off rare 35mm films. It is a massive, sweaty 12-hour burst of horror and exploitation!

This is by far the largest and most diverse range of films we have ever presented. The show starts and the sky will be torn when you run from the devil's rain! Actor Ernest Borgnine, William Shatner, Tom Skerrit and a performance by John Travolta, this is the coolest of Satan Chic classics from the 70s.

One of the greatest exploitation movies of all time, Switchblade Sisters, talks about the Dagger Debs, the tough girl gang whose members was hot as hell. Quentin Tarantino loves this movie, but have not really stolen from it yet!

Not many sequels can be just as their predecessors, but PHANTASM II is one of the few. With more action, more dwarves, and well, more balls, crushes Phantasm II myth that all sequels suck.

There are no dwarves in Re-Animator, but director Stuart Gordon unrated bloodbath has just about everything else. Mad scientists, zombies, Talking Heads and the most insane oral sex scene ever committed to celluloid, this film is cinematic proof that Jeffrey Combs was robbed of a Best Actor Oscar 1985th

Let the trumpets sound for Crom, after 30 years, the original Conan the Barbarian makes triumphant return to the big screen! Forget boring, anemic remake, Arnold Schwarzenegger breakout movie gives more blood, blades and chest than most vintage slasher films.

Speaking of slasher films, what is a Hudson Horror Show without one? Have no fear as our mystery film now appears to be the original Black Christmas. Again, screw the remake, it's the original yuletide horror classic from 1974, which many claim to be the very first true slasher film. And any movie with John Saxon kicks only major ass!

Be sure to get extra money we will have vendors selling more goods than ever before. Comic books, movie posters, super cool magnets, rare DVDs, T-shirts, artwork and more will be fighting at the HH666. Horror Author Jason Gehlert will also be in attendance signing copies of his brand spanking new book, Jeremiah Black. This book sounds even sicker and more twisted than Jason's other works, for all his info go to www.facebook.com / jason.gehlert.

Advance tickets are $ 26.00 in advance on our website, if one day tickets left, they will be $ 30.00 at the door day show, cash only. Doors open at noon, show starts at 01:00 and runs until 12:00. A ticket, you get entry in and out all day.

For more information about the show, head of www.hudsonhorror.com or email us at info@hudsonhorror.com. Advance tickets go fast and are only on sale until Monday November 26 at 11:59. Buy your tickets now! See you on 12-1-12!

Interested in becoming a vendor at the next show? Just shoot us an email to info@hudsonhorror.com.

Have a Happy Halloween!

Review: Doll Boy - 2010

Doll Boy

Director: Bloody Bill

2010

Horror/Short

This flick has a very shallow plot possibly not worth mentioning. Well, of course it is! It’s just that it can be describes in just a few words and it feels more appropriate to incorporate it into the text rather than use an entire paragraph in bold letters. The main thing about the flick isn’t really the deep plot anyway. We have all seen films where the main thing is to watch the killer kill his victims rather than a great character development. This is one of them! But the actor is quite nice and the killers mask is very creepy! He has some people locked up in this maze of tunnels that used to be a flea market of some sort. He terrorizes them by chasing them and kills them one at a time. That’s the whole thing really.

But as I said, the acting is good and the murder scenes are not bad either! There are some splats on the wall and things like that which add to the experience of watching it. Small details are often what make a movie like this watchable. You can’t really make an interesting movie with such a shallow plot without adding something. Here both the environment and the killer himself are very cool plus the actors as I already claimed a couple of times. There are also a couple of truly gruesome scenes – not necessarily filled with guts and gore – that makes me feel kind of revolting inside. This happens for the first time in the opening sequence and that’s a good place to start making it interesting for us.

Since the flick is just about half an hour long there’s really not enough time to add any suspense, but it’s still very exciting at times. I would be lying if I’d say it was all the time but as most movies it has its ups and downs. There’s more positive thing than negative thing though and considering that this is “Bloody Bill’s” directional debut I’ll be very forgiving.

I’m not sure if the intro trailers are for real or fake but I must say that I need to see a flick called Mister Fister and is about a lunatic killer obsessed by killing women in a certain particular way. I think you’ll figure out just how by the title! There’s also another one which seems very entertaining about cannibalistic clowns… God, I hope these are for real. That’ll put “Bloody Bill” up with some of the more deranged and sick directors out there! And I mean that in a good way! Just saying!

6/10

Review: The Sweet Hand of the White Rose - 2010

The Sweet Hand of the White Rose

Director: Davide Melini

2010

Short/Horror

I always have some difficulty writing reviews of short films. They don’t work in the same way as proper features and they usually tell the story in a very fast manor. It’s in the nature of them of course. To tell the story in just a few minutes instead of an hour and a half is a totally different thing. You need to be very precise with what you’re telling and there is no time for character development. At least very little time!

I think that writer/director Davide Melini does a fine job here. It’s very clear that the story follows to different individuals and that their paths will cross somewhere. It’s also very clear that the crossing won’t be a pleasant one… The moral of it all is that life is precious and that you should be careful about what you do on the roads. Yes, the story concerns a car accident! I can’t really figure out what the opening sequence has to do with anything though?

But it’s also a horror story! Or at least it has elements of it. The second part of it is very gothic and kind of scary. There’s a lot of inspiration from Asian ghost horror movies even if the themes is nowhere near as confusing as the Asian ghost stories can be. And I must confess that I got kind of fooled by it too. I thought I had it all figured out but I was wrong! I like being wrong! That means that the filmmakers have made a good job with the twists. There’s no point of having twists in a movie if you can smell them a mile away is there?

I liked this and I feel it’s a pretty damn important issue! Don’t drink and drive and don’t text and drive either! It can only end with disaster. This might be an eye opener to some!

7/10

Review: Gut - 2012

Gut

Director: Elias

2012

Drama/Horror/Thriller

Something is missing in Tom's life. Every day he goes through the motions, becoming increasingly detached from those around him. His best friend Dan thinks he has the answer, a mysterious video he's got to see to believe. What Dan shows him leaves Tom unsettled, flooding his mind with disturbing images and desires, and binding the two friends together with its ugly secret. As he tries desperately to forget what he saw, Tom's mounting feelings of guilt and disillusionment quickly give way to paranoia and fear. One video soon follows another and another, blurring the line between reality and voyeuristic fascination, and threatening to dismantle everything around them. 

I did not write the above description of the film but I found it being so informative that there was really no need to rewrite something original for the sole purpose of this review. Maybe I would have included that the film that might solve Tom’s problems and fascinates Dan is some kind of snuff-porn where a woman gets cut open with a scalpel. There’s really no need to leave this information out as the movies title kind of gives that away anyway.

The whole atmosphere in this movie within the movie is sexual but there’s no actual footage of sex or sexual encounters. Nor is there any real evidence of sexual arousal by the viewers of it. There is insinuated fascination but not really arousal. This means that the film is not there just to shock us but also to frighten us, which it does over time. To begin with Dan tells Tom that he ordered it online somewhere but later confesses that someone just sent it to him after he wrote his postbox number in some forum.

When Dan gets another DVD, and then another and another we realize that this is not sexual at all. At least not for the viewers. Tom and especially Dan can’t let go of it and feel themselves forced to watch. The fascination gets more prominent but we realize more and more that something about this is totally wrong. (when someone sends us DVDs of women being cut open we should feel kind of awkward don’t you think?).

What good about it is that there is a presence of the question what is real and what is not? Soon the DVDs start showing women that they know being cut open. Here stops the fascination and terror begins. Why are they receiving these DVDs? Who is sending them, and why? Are they even real?

The friendship of Tom and Dan are soon in jeopardy. They cannot support each other more than to a certain point. They just want the whole thing to end. In the end it’s all about mental instability and the need to protect ourselves. Looking out for number one and your own family is the prime directive. Your friends are really secondary!

I was surprised how well acted this was. Neither of them will get an Oscar nomination for their work but they portray the characters very satisfactory. The same thing goes for the directing and the visual effects are very good also! It was an exciting experience watching this and I feel that the suspense was there almost all along, which is truly uncommon for a low budget movie like this.

7/10

Photos by Will Serber, © Gut Productions, LLC

Review: Sick Girl - 2007

Sick Girl

Director: Eben McGarr

2007

Drama/Horror

Izzy is a young girl with some serious issues. She misses her older brother who joined up with the Marine Corps with whom she wanted to raise their little brother as their child. She’s overprotective about him and she stops at noting to teach bullies a lesson. She also kidnapped a schoolgirl and some dude who was unfortunate enough to pick her up when she was hitchhiking. And oh… She pissed a nun in the face…

I heard a lot about this movie and all of it was good too! This means that I got a little disappointed when I saw it just now. It’s always like that; you build up you expectations in your mind and the film comes out short. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a gruesome film that’s for sure, but the acting is less than good too much of the time. When they – and the girl who plays Izzy especially – act out emotions it’s just fine, but when it comes to deliver trustworthy dialog it’s an entirely different thing. But the dialog is quite bad too so I guess that evens it up a bit.

The weird stuff starts right away with Izzy pissing a nun in the face but after that it kind of slows down a bit. The story is told with several flashback and you need to stay alert to really understand what’s going on. There’s a lot of character building and it’s quite boring to watch if I’m honest. It doesn’t get interesting again until we get to see what Izzy keeps in the barn. And we gets to realize just how fucked up she really is!

Gradually the movie now gets more interesting even if the pace is on the slow side. When it comes to torture I think this movie falls short compared to other more explicit movies, but it’s so deranged that you can help but think what’s going on inside this girls mind! She keeps a straight face throughout the movie and that adds to the frightening feeling that this could be just anybody anywhere. You just can’t know what other people are thinking and what their most inner desires are. And once you realize it, it just might be too late!

6/10

Review: Grave Encounters - 2011

Grave Encounters

Director: The Vicious Brothers

2011

Horror

A reality show called Grave Encounters is about to record episode 6 of the show. This time they explore an old asylum which is supposed to be haunted. It’s obvious that the crew themselves don’t believe in the haunting for a second as they joke about it the first chance they get and when they’re not shooting essential material for the show. What we get to see it the unedited shoots of raw material of what was to be the last show of Grave Encounters…

This is obviously one of those found footage films that have been quite popular as of late. I don’t know what started the trend but horror wise I think that [Rec] and Paranormal Activity is most of all to “blame” for the boom. I don’t complain though, I feel that most of these films have something in common – a kind of tension! I like tension! That’s the main reason I watch horror flicks and thrillers most of the time. I’m not necessarily into splatter and gore just for the heck of it. I like suspense and these films can often give you that!

This particular film starts out pretty slow with a short presentation of what we are about to see. Some dude which is supposed to be some network guy tell us about the show Grave Encounters and that what we are about to see is the real deal!

The illusion is pretty good! The pace is quite slow to begin with and the team is obviously non believers of paranormal phenomenon. They’re just making the best TV they can do and as soon as they’re recording material for the show they look very serious about what they’re doing. It comes as no big surprise when the place eventually turns out to be hunted. The crew gets what’s coming to them and I can’t feel any pity over any of them. It’s not that they´re unlikable characters, I just don’t identify with them at all.

The chocking imagery it nicely made even if it’s quite sparse. I would have liked it to pick up the pace a bit more when the movie comes to an end. But you also have to keep in mind that the team is inside a mace of hallways and corridors and can’t find their way out. This is perhaps more frightening than the actual haunting of the place. The mental institution complex seems to move around its room, hallways and corridors just to keep them inside the building. It also seems that time works in a totally different manor than it normally should. Minutes seems like hours for the people trapped inside.

As a whole the movie is ok. It’s not terribly frightening and the pace is too slow but I’m still looking forward to the sequel!

6/10