Review: The Bunny Game - 2010

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Review: London Zombie Epidemic - 2010

London Zombie Epidemic

Aka: Devil’s Playground

Director: Mark McQueen

2010

Action/Horror

A major medical corporation are about to release a new drug against stress. They take every precaution keeping it safe and do massive testing with 30.000 volunteering test subjects. At first everything seems to be fine but after at few weeks all of the test subjects has evolved damaging side effects – All but one! At first they became aggressive and soon they start attacking other people, spreading the decease even further. Soon almost the entire city of London or the world for all that we know is infected. But one of the test subjects – Angela Mills seems to be immune to the side effects and no one knows why, she doesn’t and the medical company or what’s left of it sure doesn’t. She needs to be found and taken to the medical teams for thorough examination! The path leads through hordes of zombie-like creatures that crave for human flesh.

I’ve seen my fair chair of zombie flicks. Bad ones and good ones, unusual ones, Italian, Irish and even a couple of Chinese ones I think. This one was produced in the UK and it has that British feel to it. It’s hard to explain and I’m not even going to try what it is that makes it feel that way, it just does. It has more of a realistic cinematography and that might be it. It seems like you anticipate in the actual actions instead of just watching the film. That was at rather good explanation after all. I’ll settle with that.

In this zombie film the zombies are raging fast and there’s nothing of the old frightening slow horror zombie in it at all. It’s not very frightening at all; it’s more or less an action film instead. I have no complains about that. It doesn’t state that it’s a horror movie any way. Well, of course it says so on the back of the DVD but I figure they claim it’s a horror film just because there’s zombies in it. I say it’s an action film first anyway!

The most common explanation for why the zombies exist is also abandoned, that is the non explanation as it’s usually not explained at all. They simply exist and there’s or there is to it. Here there is a failed experiment, it’s been dome before to be sure but I’d take that before “there’s no more room in hell” any day! It’s quite well acted and both the action scenes and the gory ones look nice. It’s not a splatter- or a gore movie but there are some scenes where the zombies eat from human victims and so fourth. It looks really nice and the makeup of the zombies looks good too!

Perhaps it’s a little too talky at times. All zombie flicks seem to take place, at one time or another, in a barricaded house of some sorts and the people get on each others nerves, the paranoia takes it’s toll I guess, and those scenes are a little too long in this otherwise fine movie! It’s a little bit different but it’s quite entertaining!

Review: Mammuth - 2010

Mammuth

Director: Gustave de Kervern, Benoît Delépine

Drama/Comedy

2010

Serge Pilardose is retiring from his job but it doesn’t turn out the way he planned to. He feels lost in the world and gets nothing done when he can’t go to work anymore. And even worse, his retirement benefits are not full since his misses some papers from his old jobs. He’s never been sick; he has always worked (since the age of sixteen) and he’s not very good at common chores (like shopping for groceries or fixing things around the house. What can he do? His wife tells him to get the missing papers so he gets on his motorcycle and goes to his old working places to get the necessary papers. On this trip some old memories that should have stayed buried in the past surfaces – bloody memories…

This film tells two main stories, one is very cynical and the other is more sad and heartbreaking. The first, and obvious, story is of course about the retirement. Serge is forced into a world he knows nothing about. Even making a phone call on a cell phone is a big deal. It's not easy to be forced into retirement. He can’t shop for groceries and he is a true Mammuth, an old creature not understanding the world of today. This might be part of the meaning of the title but there’s more later on. In the opening scenes there are loads of brilliant irony and cynicism deluxe. His co-workers give him a puzzle game after worked with him for ten years and every surrounding is brilliantly told. Serge keeps it together though, at least so far. He accepts and tries his best but it doesn’t turn out very good.

The cynicism continues when he doesn’t have the correct paperwork to get the right amount of pension. It's not easy to be used and expired and then thrown away like garbage, which seems to be the films bottom line. Nobody should be treated that way, still that’s the way it is. This social comment has been made many times before, even in very commercial action movies such as First Blood. The Park is Mine also comes to mind, but in both cases it’s a question of war veterans’, not retired butchers. There’s really no difference; the senior citizens of society helped build it and we should be grateful to them – period!

The other story tells the background to why Serge has spend so much time working during his entire life, what he wants to forget or even needs to forget it he’s not going to go under. I felt that it was a little too much of this and I found the obvious story about the gathering testimonials from his former employers or co-workers more entertaining. There’s no need for an in depth analysis of why certain things are like they are. They simply exist as far as I’m concerned.

But all that are minor problems and it doesn’t take away the fact that this, in fact, is a very good movie, an entertaining one with a perfect Gerard Depardieu in the leading role. He’s absolutely awesome and I don’t believe it could be made by anyone else in the same excellent manner.

Review: Primal - 2010

Primal

Director: Josh Reed

2010

Horror

A few students travel far to see some rock painting from 10.000 years ago. When they get there they have to go through a long tunnel to get to the actual site. Once there one of them gets infected by some sort of leaches and transforms into something that is not human. Mel, which is the girl name, become immensely strong and violent and has no problem tossing the others around. She runs of but soon starts to terrorize the others. It turns out that there’s something in the tunnel that she’s feeding. If it’s her former friends or wild animals doesn’t seem to matter to her. Soon it’s just a matter of survival – to kill or be killed!

Actually I expected this to be a pretty cheap splatter film. I’m glad to say that it wasn’t. The acting is quite nice and I don’t know if it’s the fact that it’s an Australian production that makes it more serious. There’s no humor in it which I like. The whole film can easily be taken serious and that’s always (well almost) a good thing. The story might not be the deepest but the characters are believable and nicely portrayed. I even think it’s kind of frightening at times and that’s not too common.

                                   

Although it’s not a splatter film it has plenty of nice gore in it. It’s not over-the-top but kept on a believable level. The transformed/mutated humans have really nice makeup attached to them. Ok, towards the end there are one or two scenes where there might be some overuse of CGI but as a whole I wouldn’t complain about that. There’s great suspense even when you can tell what’s going to happen next.

But there’s also things you know nothing about and my curiosity was running wild. The rock painting actually does tell a story but it’s not that easy to interpret. There’s obviously a presence in the tunnel/cave but what? We get bits and pieces of information but it isn’t until the end that we know for sure what’s there. Or do we? There’s an uncertainty about what’s really happening and even how the movie ends. I guess we’ll have to see if it was a happy or an unhappy ending if there’s ever a Primal 2.

Not that we really need one. I mean, this was good or even great at times but it stands on its own. We don’t really need further explanations to get the basic story. We can manage to live in uncertainty and that’s even a part of the greatness of the whole thing. If you haven’t seen this already, you really should!

Review: The Life and Death of a Porno Gang - 2009

The Life and Death of a Porno Gang Director: Mladen Djordjevic

2009 Drama

                                                                                                               

Marko is a young filmmaker with great artistic ambitions. However, it’s not so easy to get into the film industry and his ideas are shattered by producers who see no profit in his artistic projects. He makes contact with an adult film director and after a few days, he is offered to work for him. Marko does not forget his artistic ambitions and makes a rather bizarre pornographic story. This is not appreciated by his employer. Marko gets a new idea - a political pornographic variety show in Belgrade! A brilliant idea but the police shuts down the place on the opening night. So, Marko and his gang go on the road, the countryside might be more interested in the pornographic show. It is not exactly a success but there are at least those who appreciate the show. Soon, he receives an offer. A German producer convinces him that the really big money isn’t in pornography, at least not common one. No, he should make snuff movies – where people die for real on camera.Reluctantly Marko convinces the rest of the gang to go into the snuff making industry, an industry he knows nothing about but now the question is if he ever can get out of it...

Not long ago, another Serbian movie - Srpski film , caused a fierce debate around the web. I would lie if I didn’t say that it divided people into two sections, or really three sections - those who loved it, those who hated it and the others who had an opinion whether it should be banned or boycotted by the market. The film was obviously provocative, it was debated whether the film benefited or not from this. This didn’t attract the same attention at all, although I find this far more provocative and socially critical than Srpski film.

This is more humorous that the anxiety in Sprski Film. At times it feels like a black comedy in all the misery and it’s not nearly as obvious this film has to be shocking. It doesn’t have obvious disgusting scenes, which of course makes this film a more serious reflection, where the viewer is forced to think to understand the social criticism.  I'm not saying this is not the case with Sprski film, but it is a movie that you probably will find provocative whether taken as a socio-political message or not!

"Far more provocative than Srpski Movie"

So this is a more difficult film to feel disgust when viewing. Despite the title, it does not contain much pornographic material. A few isolated clips of gay sex and that’s all there is, more or less. It’s noticeable, but made in such a way that it only seems natural that it’s there. The entire film has such a documentary feel to it and it simply feels like it should contain those clips and scenes. It doesn’t really feels like there are any actors in the movie at all, it feels as if the actors are themselves – real people – and that’s quite unusual I think!

If I were to grade this it would be very high and getting higher the closer to the end as it gets. The movie gets better and better for each minute until it reaches climax. The actual pornography story that opens the film is certainly entertaining but it is not until the more sober elements come into play that it gets really masterful. This is a politically provocative film at its best!