Raptor is Heartless

Every now and then there are scenes and depictions in a movie that just creep you out. In Heartless it’s a street gang but I’ll elaborate.

Wow what a crappy poster!

Heartless is revolves around Jamie Morgan (Jim Sturgess), a photographer born with a heart shaped birth mark on his face. This has caused him to be withdrawn and lonely which was made worse when his father, who he looked up to, died earlier in his life. As the movie continues news stories of violent and unprovoked murders begin to be reported on the news. Then one night while taking a picture he finds an image of a disturbing creature in the background. This sets him on a path to find out what it was and discovers that there is a demonic gang incinerating random people with Molotov’s. He is eventually approached to Papa B(Joseph Mawle) who turns out to be the devil who offers him his hearts desire for one simple task, graffiti a wall. Jamie asks for to fall in love and in a phoenix like scene is reborn without the birth mark. He then meets Tia played by a cute Clements Poesy and they fall in love. This all starts to fall apart when the Weapons Man (Eddie Marsan) calls in on Eddie to help him complete his task of murdering someone by ripping out there heart while still alive and placing it on the church steps. Wait a minute you say, that’s not graffiti? Yes the devil lied. Who knew? Things all go down hill from there.

So what do you see here? Yo momma. Bazinga!

Director and Writer Phillip Ridley has put together an eerie and at times disturbing movie on a small budget. The British cast all give very solid performances. Jim Sturgess as Jamie is a flawed anti hero. The birth mark is his weakness rather than a strength and when this disappears he gains his confidence back or so it seems. The other characters are not as fleshed out as Jamie unfortunately and the story revolves mostly around this character.  Joseph Mawles Papa B is menacing in an underworld bikey boss sort of performance. There wasn’t a vast range of emotions to show but that seemed to help rather than hinder character.

I want to talk to you about God. Wait come back! I have pamphlets!

Now the creepy part that I mentioned above is the gang with the serpentine faces, screeching bestial screams all while dressed in hoodies and jeans. I must have been the meshing between the demonic and street gang that was unnerving but it worked for me. The tension and unease was also built up in news reports of violent crimes and second hand accounts of what was happening so that when Jamie actual meats up with the gang there is a certain about of dread already built up.
On the down side and also a spoiler warning the movie ends with the ambiguous notion of it was all in his head which I find to be a cop out most of the time. I can kind of accept it here but barely as there were clues throughout in a Sixth Sense kind of way. The pacing was also a little to slow at times especially at the beggining.
Overall I would say it was a reasonable effort as a Faustian tale. I give it a 7/10.

Raptors Breaking his Day

Daybreakers goes on a great premise, the world has been converted to Vampires and there are only a few humans left. This is a problem for Vampires since they need blood to survive….because they are Vampires see. It’s just like if all the cows in the world suddenly died how would we get our Macas? McTofu burger anyone?

It's really not the Matrix and 28 days later at all....FYI Yo!

So the Vampires go about farming humans for blood but knowing this isn’t sustainable they also look for a blood substitute. This has not gone well like exploding of said vampire not gone well. Charles Bromley (Sam Neil) is head of the corporation which farms the blood and his lead scientist Edward Dalton (Ethan Hawk) is the lead scientist working on the blood substitute. Dalton has become disillusioned with his failures and when he runs into a group of human survivors led by Audrey Bennett (Claudia Karvan) and decides to help them. Bennett takes them to Lionel Cormac (Willem Dafoe) who is leader of a camp of survivors. He used to be a Vampire but cured himself by accident using….THE POWER OF THE SUN….yes that’s right. Now Dalton is trying to replicate this. Oh vampires that don’t get blood for a long while go feral and turn into these half bat creatures.

I'm soooo pretty! Oh so pretty. So pretty and witty and gaaaaay.

Daybreakers is directed by the brothers Peter and Michael Spierig who brought us Undead and is largely and Australian production. It’s quite polished and has a very dark dystopian feel to it, sort like Ethan Hawks older movie Gattica.  Ethan Hawk and Dafoe put some effort into in to their characters and Sam Neil is quite insidious as Bromley, he seems to do subtle evil pretty well. Must be all that practice at being the Anti-Christ from Omen 3. Claudia Karvan gives us some female acting muscle here. We also get Vince Colosimo as a scientist here. What? Wasn’t he in the Wog Boy? Ok what ever. Finally with a minor part we get Isabel Lucas the girl that played the sex transformer chick from Transformers 2. She’s basically eye candy. All in all the performances were adequate. I wouldn’t call this Oscar wining acting but good enough.

Isabel Lucas. Role: Eye Candy.

On the Special FX side we do get some crazy bat vampires. There are explosions, car chases, gun fights, a few bodies getting ripped up and lots of blood. There are also some freakish scenes of vampires lining up for Coffee/blood or kid vampires just hanging, as you do or peoples eyes lighting up when the lights go out breifly waiting for a train.
I did like the plot overall. It grabbed me more towards the end when the true version of the cure was show but I’d have to say the last 2-3 minutes kind of spoiled it some. It was if they wanted to tie off the loose ends. It was virtually the last few mins. They didn’t need that.
Overall the Daybreakers was quite watchable with some good ideas put on screen and some competent acting. I give it a 7/10.

Raptors Mega Day!

Recently I watched the B grade movie of Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus. Why? Because I’m a sucker for both punishment and giant monster movies.

Oh yeah, full on Plane eating!

Both the two monstrosities are released from some glacier after being trapped for hundreds of thousands of years meh why not millions, that’s a number too, and carry on the battle of eating planes and oil rigs um WTF? Yeah that’s pretty much how it all starts. Some scientist in a sub played by 80s pop princes Deborah Gibbs see some soldiers in a chopper cracks open some ice with some fancy charge thingy, that’s the technical term. The first thing the octopus does is take down an oil rig. Why? Who knows, maybe it looked like it’s mommy. The Mega shark then jumps some 2 to 3km out of the water and eats a passenger plane…yeah that’s right. Obviously physics or for that matter logic are part of this movie. At some point you get Lorenzo Lamaz as some super army general called Allan, he orders the navy after the beasts and yes you get it, get eaten. Nom, nom, nom. Eventually they decide to use phermons to lure the beast to America and Japan where they well eat people and then decide to use the same tactic to lure them together so they can have an unholy union and make sharktopus babies or eat each other.

Oh yeah, full on Bridge eating!

Well that’s all very well and good but how good were the special FXs hey. They must have been monumentally awesome! Er not really. They slid from passable to very average to gauge your eyes out crappy. They also had a habit of reusing scenes. I swear I saw the same scene of a soldier guarding a secret base three times. Also the ship and submarine bridges were in a electricity plant or something. I guess the budget didn’t cover that.

Oh yeah, full Shark on Octopus action!

The acting was ok for a B grade movie you just had to roll your eyes a lot to get past most of it. Believe me at the end of it I thought that it was the world spinning and not me.

This movie was sucktastic. Hey watch it if you have nothing else better to do like knitting or trying to see how long you can make a Mintis wrapper. I give this a 3.5/10.

Raptor Clashes in his Pants

I remember watching Clash of the Titans as a kid and thinking this was one of the best monster movies ever. EVER God dam it! Hey why would we question the opinion of a 12year old. Anyway looking back the movie was a little flawed here and there and possibly held together by duct tape in parts but overall still pretty cool. So when I heard a new version of Clash of the Titans was coming out with Sam “Blue Alien” Worthington as the lead of Perseus I was just a little excited. I’d heard bad things about the 3D version of it so I decided to give that a miss and see it in 2D. That made me $10 happier. Don’t take my word for the 3D version as I have no idea…ah what the hell, I’ll voice my unfounded fact less opinion too, the 3D was craptacular! There I said it.  So what did I think of it and compared to the original? Read on….

Hey do you think saw us with our skirts down?

First off, the cast in this is great. You have Sam as stated who is always a commanding screen presence. He puts on his action boots here and goes for the throat. Two thumbs up. I heard he did a lot of his stunt work too which always helps the action shots. Next you have Liam Neeson as Zeus and Ralf Fiennes as his brother Hades. There’s some great acting right there. The story pretty much pivots on the two characters battle for dominance on the Olympian Gods and the mortals. Zeus feels betrayed by the mortals and wishes to teach them a lesson, Hades on the other hand wants to overthrow Zeus and make the humans his slaves. Caught in the struggle are Calibos (Jason Flemming) Perseuses father and the man who began the mortals war against the Gods and Io played by a cute Gemma Arterton, Who? I don’t know she was cute anyway. Io is a woman cursed with immortality for refusing to have rumpy pumpy sexy with a God. Go the bra burning! She pretty much helps and advises Perseus through his quest. Andromeda (Alexa Davalos) role is probably one of the biggest differences from the original movie. Where in the first she was the love interest and the driving force of Perseuses quest she is now just part and victim of the battle.

Oh uh hmmm, yes I see, yes. If we cut here here, lift here, stretch here I think we can make you a star. OH GOD! Your head fell off!

On it’s own the new Clash of the Titans makes a great action movie. There are battles and fights, monsters and stunts left right and centre. The CGI effects are good although the medusa was a little plastic in her facial features she was still pretty good. What this version of the movie did better than the original I thought was the concept of the group of Greek heroes gathering together to journey on an epic quest. Of course most don’t make it but that is part of it. Heroic, tragic and epic. They also included in the mix a Dijin named Sheikh Suleiman who was very cool.

Gemma Arterton likes Chocolate...I hope that's chocolate.

Where it lacked from the original was in depth of story. Where in the first we saw more of Andromeda’s plight, Caliboses back story and the bickering between the Gods, this has mostly been flushed out for a smoother ride. It’s not terrible as it does make the ride quicker but still you kind feel like you wanted a little more.

Halloz littlz peoplez

So overall I’d have to say I enjoyed the new version. It had good pace, lacking in some areas but a fun ride. I give it a 8/10.

Raptors Short Shorts:

Paranormal Activity:

I sat down to watch this in the dark and alone as instructed by Gavor. Congratulations, it creeped me out for the rest of the night. Stupid movie go bang now! The character of Micha annoyed the crap out of me. Here is Katie telling him that bad shits going to happen and it’s been happening to her all her life but no he decides to be a macho duchebag and “handle himself”...er it himself.  Anyway. Idiot.  When someone says we can get you a demonologist specialist to help you, you say yes thanks sir would you like me to bend over now. Anyway, still pretty good for the creepiness. 7/10.

7^th Moon:

This one was really lack lustre and by the books not to mention getting the car bogged twice to get the movie started and the guys in white makeup playing the ghosts were really kind of dumb. Amy Smart was in it, that’s kind good right? Well yeah but she needed more kit off. All that agree say “I”…good then. I give this one a 5/10.

Silent Hill (2006)

I don't know a single thing about Silent Hill the video game beyond the 10 minutes I played of #4 (The Room) and the 20 minutes I played of #2 (supposedly the best of the lot). To be fair, I played both on a PC and apparently the ports are as dodgy as your 15-year-old 486, so I always let it slide that both games sucked hard. I simply fucking hated them.

Flash forward to 2010 and I'm sitting at home in my best jodhpurs deliberating upon what to watch next when I notice a move called Silent Hill. The only reason I missed this on release was my antipathy toward the game series, or so I surmised because I can't remember it being released. Anyhoo, off I went into the video world of Silent Hill once more. And fuck, it was good.

I have no mouth yet I must scream. And shout. Let it all out.

See, there's this little girl who dreams of a place called Silent Hill and tries sleep walking off of cliffs. Naturally this worries her parents a little so the mother (Radha Mitchell) ...


...whisks her off to Silent Hill for some personal PI work. Here's some more of my PI work into Radha...



Anyway, moving along, they are chased by a cop, crash, and all three end up trapped in Silent Hill. The daughter goes missing after the crash and the story becomes one of searching, being hunted and seeing a bunch of pretty cool stuff. Except to the characters, to them that shit is pretty scary. There's guy with a pyramid for a head (funnily enough called pyramid head by SH fans) and a bunch of things that scuttle along the ground making a funny noise. It's better than I make it sound.

Eventually mum and the cop run into the remaining inhabitants of Silent Hill and it turns out they're remnants of the population, evacuated after a fire started in the coal mine beneath the town. Over the years they've gone batshit religious and like to hunt down and burn witches among other things. The scene where the key characters are pursued by pyramid head up to the church sanctuary and he skins one of the crazy churchies, is simply an awesome spectacle.

In the end the daughter is rescued but she's found to be the good side of a little girl possessed by a demon many years previous to the movie. The possessed little girl is now a grown woman, a warped and twisted cripple with scary powers of demonage. Seems the town people tried to burn her once and now she's really pissed off.

Welcome - come for the fog, stay for the crazy

In a hectic finale, the cop is burned alive (graphically), the demon possessed woman goes on a rampage of slaughter in the church (not graphically enough) and the woman plus her daughter escape. As a little aside to the main story, we also see the husband searching for both wife and daughter. He talks to people near Silent Hill and even visits with the local cops from a nearby town, but it's a totally different place. No fog, no monsters, no church. In the end he goes home empty-handed, as does his wife. But while he is in a normal house, she and the daughter are in a house filled with and surrounded by mist. Are they dead already? It's your call because the movie ends.

So I really liked Silent Hill, sure it was long and the acting was so-so, but the story was pretty good and the atmosphere appropriately eerie. Everything else such as effects, direction and scenery was above expectations also and in some cases pretty darn good. Silent Hill for me was like heading out to a bar for a few quiet drinks and coming home later wearing a different pair of pants and a sombrero. You thought it might be an ok time, but it turned out to be a ripper.

8.5/10

Raptor goes a little Gozu

You know Japanese make some really weird ass films. Not to say that the rest of the world isn’t capable but well theirs are all the weirder mainly because they are crazy Japanese.

This guy fails at applying sun screan

Gozu is a film directed by Takashi Miike the guy who did the Master of Horrors episode Imprint that caused a little controversy, I guess who just didn’t want to give up here.

Hello, my name is fred and when I'm at home I like to dance in my undies.

The story stars with two brothers, Minami and older brother Ozaki, who are part of a Yakuza gang. When Ozaki starts to go a little crazy by beating up Yakuza attack Chihuahuas, the head boss orders Minami to get rid of him at the Junkyard. So along the way Ozaki dies and Minami looses his body. So he begins a search to find his brother and comes across more weirdness like a guy with half the pigment missing from his face who gives him a hand or a hotel run by a brother and sister who can speak to the spirits. The Sister also has a tendency to “Milk” herself which seems to tie in with a cow headed daemon. The daemon during a possible dream gives him a letter that directs him back to the junkyard where he finds that his brother has been compacted and the proof is his flattened skin. It’s at this time a girl rocks up saying that she is his brother. He takes her back to the yakuza boss who tries get amorous with her. Oh did I mention the boss can only get it off by placing the handle of soup ladle up his butt? Well there you go. So Minami steps in and stops him with lets say some electrocution involving said soup ladle. Ouch. Finally it all ends with Minami and the girl having sex a hand coming out of her crotch and latching onto his penis and then the girl giving birth to his brother fully grown…yeah seems like she can stretch.

Wave to the cameras!

What can I say, this movie just drew me in mainly due to what the fuck factor, you know that thing where you brain doesn’t quite register what the hells going on but you still want to know what happens next. The acting was pretty good as far as I could tell. They were speaking Japanese. The effects were nothing spectacular although well done. The daemon cow scene was creepy and the birth scene well just ouch really, ouch. Don’t worry the girl was fine after it and they all walked off happy.

I give this a 7/10 mainly for the weirdness. Oh yes for the weirdness.

Some babies are a little late coming out but this is ridiculous.

Raptor Sees a Blood Moon

Blood Moon Rising is a flick that could have done with a bigger budget and probably a better cast since the story was actually interesting. It involved a cursed couple who are transformed into a werewolf and vampire by some she bitch Vampire because she had the hots for the guy (Vampire).  The she bitch gets killed and buried but a clause in the curse states that she will rise again if the girl(werewolf) is killed and using a Necrenomicon type book open a gate to hell. Oh, her fathers the devil. Add some vampire bikes, zombies created from the wolf bite and the cast from a horror movie shoot and it’s general mayhem.

This poster looks cooler than what the movie actually does....why God why!?!

This poster looks cooler than what the movie actually does....why God why!?!

The movie was filmed with a grind house style even with annoying loss of voice sections, man that was annoying since it happened like 3-4 times. I’m sure once would have been enough. They also used the old dust hair on the screen, missing footage and burn out scene tricks too. I didn’t mind them so much.

The actors generally went from bad to ok. I guess the Darrell Lee (Neal Trout) the soda shop teller was probably the highlight as a comic obsessed gun carrying idiot. Although the surprise was Ron Jeremy who shows up as a sleazy producer and promptly gets eaten by zombies. Way to go.

The CGI that was in this was pretty average. It wasn’t used to much but when it was it mediocre. There was a lot of practical blood and guts and head exploding done which was pretty good. Some of the devils at the end looked like they were out of the World of Porn Craft back lot. Especially bad was the werewolf. Man was that a crappy looking werewolf. Let me not explain it other than to use the word craptacular. Also anyone bitten by the werewolf gets teeth. The only way you can tell a werewolf from a vampire is they also have fangs on the bottom row. That’s it.

Reiterating this move would be great with more money thrown in. I mean it had zombies, werewolves, demons and vampires.….oh yes and some booby shots. What more could you want? More money I guess.  I give this one a 4.5/10.

Raptor Howls at the Moon

So last weekend I caught the The Wolfman at the movies. This was one of those movies I was looking forward to but was a little worried that it would be…well crap really. I’m happy to say it wasn’t crap but a reasonable fair. This I can pretty much say was mainly due to the strong acting guns of the cast.

Director Joe Johnston has a number of well know movies under his belt such as Jumanjii and Jurassic Park III and some Visual Effects notably from Indian Jones and Star Wars. Here he has brought to life the Victorian period along with the superstitious village atmosphere meeting the forward thinking city folk.

Do these teeth make me look angry?

The story centres on Ben Talbot (Benicio Del Toro) and actor who returns home to his windowed father, Sir John Talbot (Anthony Hopkins), after the death of his brother to some wild animal or crazy psychotic. He encounters Gwen his brothers now widowed wife played by the lovely Emily Blunt and promises to track down the killer. After tracking down some gypsies they are assailed by the werewolf and he is bitten.  Soon London sends their finest to help track down the killer and by finest I mean the Detective on the Jack the Ripper case, Abberline, non other than Mr Smith himself, Hugo Weaving.  This leads to the eventual confrontation between Ben, the Werewolf and Abberline.

As you can see, the cast is really strong and they do put their acting chops into this and make quite the believable and dramatic presentation. Del Toro does a great job as the brooding Ben and even manages to make some of the cringe worthy lines laudable. Anthony Hopkins plays the liege of the family as a distant broken man slowly drifting into madness. At first I thought he may be playing to his role in Dracula but believe me it’s wildly different from this. Hugo Weaving is great as always as the Abberline, a cunning and grounded man who doesn’t believe in the superstitious; by the end of the movie his views are shattered.

Emily Blunt actually plays a very strong heroine as Gwen. She isn’t simpering and does take action herself in lie of events.

19th century Victoria is recreated beautifully. From the cities, to the clothing and even scenic locals of the misty woods it’s exactly what you’d expect. Now the werewolf transformation was pretty good although it did look a little CGI at times. The werewolves themselves were mostly practical FX which is great and harkened back to the old black and white Werewolf movies but every now and then you just look at the makeup and think, I wonder if that mask is going to fall off or can you pick your nose in that thing? Also there is a lot of killing and gore in this. We have decapitations, eviscerations and I’m sure there was and emasculation there somewhere amongst the severed limbs.

On the other side the end fight see did make me giggle a little also with all the latex masks and body fur running about. The big reveal of who the identity of the werewolf was so obvious that I don’t even have to mention it here but let’s just say it’s one of the above. Finally there was a couple of cliché dialogue scenes were I did groan a little, these saved only by the deliverance of the actors.  Oh yeah, no boobies at all to see in from here to Queen Victoria herself.

Overall the Wolfman is a very good creature feature with a couple of fury areas that could use a trimming. I give this movie a 7.5/10.

Raptors thrown up an Alien Uprising

Every now and then you pick a movie that you end up regretting like a cheap $5 hooker from the night before. Alien Uprising was probably that Hooker. At least it didn’t have teeth.

Beware DVDs bearing pretty cover pictures

I sat down to watch it with some hopes of maybe a Sci-Fi channel grade movie. You know, okish but with chances of rain. The first 10mins of Alien Uprising were really good. The crew was waking up from hibernation a space ship. We find out they are marines. Ok maybe this won’t be another movie trying to be Aliens. Nope, no such luck.  The marines need to go to a prison planet to quell an prisoner uprising and find out that they have been using the prisoners in alien hybridization experiments the result of which is terrorising the prison populace. “Wait, Wait, wait Raptor” I hear you say “that doesn’t sound all bad, It can be saved can’t it” Yeah sure. Throw a decent script at it and maybe at least half a mil in green backs then sure. Unfortunately it turns out that this movie is trying to be Aliens,  complete with a crappy alien which is a guy in a Halloween mask as far as I can tell, marines acting all marines and a backstabbing corporation guy who yes eventually get’s killed by the hybrid.

What about the acting? Well some of the mains were passable. Rebecca Kush who played Lt. Louise Dun was reasonably good as were two of the prisoners who I can’t remember the names of (scientist guy and the African American). Unfortunately the rest of the cast sucked 5 day old ass that has been sitting in vomit basted with crap. I mean at one point we had a shuttle leaving in a desperate escape from the prison of stupid and 4/5 of the escapes were shaking with the G-forces of the escape. The 5^th person, some female marine was staring blankly ahead as if she was bored or maybe was watching a day time soap. What’s more is they kept cutting back to her. Really? Why?! For god sake why? Or for example at the end were the corporate guy is about to get killed by the alien he screams out Nooooooooo. Then there is this long pause and….guess what? He does it again. Che? Why? Edit that out. You don’t need that.

Finally the CGI/FX. Boy these were woeful. At the start they show the ship approaching the planet. Not bad. Looks okaish, nothing special. Then obviously there $200 dollar shoe box budget ran out and all the ships, base and position of the cast were shown on wire frame models. This maybe was an attempt at retro cool.  Well it was done badly so it failed and took you out of the movie more often than not.

My advice, if you can’t afford to do a sci-fi or even get a decent script, then don’t. It’s not brain surgery.  I have seen some Starwars fan movies better than this and I’m pretty sure they don’t have a huge budget either.

So at the ass end of this review I’m giving Alien Uprising a 3/10. No boobies for me.

Raptor Goes Trick r Treating

Let’s admit it, most horror anthologies usually aren’t very good. You may get a good story out of the 3 or 4 shown but they rest tend to be crap. Fortunately when I sat down to watch Trick r Treat I was pleasantly surprised. The four stories in of themselves were pretty good but the thing that impressed me the most was the way they interwove them together. It wasn’t a simple four stories wrapped up by another. Each story was linked to another by something almost like watching Pulp Fiction but with ghosts and ghoulies. There was a short prologue story which kind of kicks off the whole chain and eventually the last story links back to this which was cool. The first story was to do with a Serial killer(Dylan Baker) and the humorous way he tries to dispose of his latest victim. The Second story centred around the telling of a tale of murdered children on a school bus and a group of kids that go down to the lake to offer tribute to them but have other motives. Thirdly is the story of Little Red Riding Hood, a vampire and werewolves. This one was pretty cool itself with Anna Paquin from X-Men playing the Little Red. Finally it ends with a grumpy old man(Brian Cox) who hates Halloween and a little pumpkin headed daemon who teaches him the true meaning of Christmas…er I mean Halloween. This one was probably my favourite and Brian Cox played a great old man battling it out with the little imp. Come to think of it another one from X2.

Mum says that putting a sack on my head means I'm really good looking.

All the actors handled themselves well and were quite believable. The director was Michael Dougherty who really hasn’t directed much at all but based on this I think he really should. He has a number of acting and writing credits to his name as well including the screen play to X2 which is one of my favourite movies.

The cinematography and colours of this were just beautiful. Highly above it’s straight to DVD standard. Shots of a mountain-scape that drops to a school bus sinking into a lake or a street with pumpkins head lit with candles really brought out the atmosphere. There were times were the effects were a little off such as the werewolf transformation scene which had short stints of CGI that didn’t add up but overall most effects were practical. The last story had some really nice practical work. There was blood but not too much really for a horror movie or maybe I’m just desensitised to it all.

Dear god they ripped my dirty dreams out of my head and put them on film.

Sadly there was no boobage in this film. Awwww I hear you all say…Wait! I lie. There was a glimpse of boobs in the werewolf transformation scene. Yay! Don’t blink or you’ll miss it.

If you don’t like horror anthologies I’d still recommend watching this was to see how one should be put together. For myself I give this one a solid 8/10.

Seventh Moon (2008)

You know how sometimes there's a product that really grabs your interest but no matter how hard you try it doesn't seem possible to get your hands on it? You obsess about it a little, build your own mythology the product can never possibly match. You know this deep down but it doesn't stop you. Seventh Moon was one of these things. By all reports a good horror film, the details were sketchy but included some of my favourite movie aspects like handheld cameras (a la REC or Cloverfield), demons, gore and hot women. The trailer..well see for yourself.

Looked like hot larb to me and the kicker was how difficult it was to find anywhere showing it. In the meantime it became my golden movie; something other people raved about, containing all my favourite elements and elusive in its existence. Then, I came across a copy. I should have known better.

Don't get me wrong, Seventh Moon is an okay flick. Set in China on the seventh full moon of the year, the story revolves around an old mythology and the festival associated with it. Every seventh moon, ghosts arise and seek flesh - any flesh. In the cities this isn't a problem but out in the countryside people take the myths very seriously, leaving live animals outside their houses so the ghost's hunger can be satiated.

Into this stumble the idiot Americans; Melissa (Amy Smart) and Yul (Tim Chiou).

The newly wed couple are on their honeymoon when the tour guide driving their car wanders off in the dead of night leaving them alone in the dark. They proceed to stumble about rural China, encountering another luckless man (in a robe) caught out in the open as well as a bunch of ghosts. The ghosts are kind of disappointing as they're naked extras painted up white. So anyways, the trio bumble about in the dark for a while longer until the man decides he'll be better off alone and knocks Yul out. This seemed like a great plan to me, leave the whiny American of Chinese extraction as bait and do a runner in your bathrobe (or whatever the guy was wearing, some white robe thing). The plan goes awry and robe man is forced to run from the ghosts, though in the end they catch and presumably eat him. I say presume because the last we see of robe man is the ghosts dragging him into the long grass. This brings me to another point of unhappiness, the gore. There is none unless I was watching some cut down PG version. Sigh.

Following some more running about, the honeymooning couple are lured into a mansion filled with creepy people holding candles and told they'd be safe there. An odd woman gives them something to drink, which they both go ahead and drink without a second thought, and next you know they've stripped off for sexyness and sex in front of a bunch of weirdos. Cut to them dressed in white robes, outside, locked in bamboo cages. Surprise! Every year the village lures outsiders as the ultimate sacrifice so none of their neighbours are taken. Brilliant! Obviously robe man from earlier in the movie was their original sacrifice, yet somehow he escaped.  Moving right along, the ghosts take Yul away for killing and leave Melissa to be sexy another day. Instead however, she hunts down the ghost's secret lair (this is a genuinely creepy scene) only to find Yul on the brink of death, his blood being drained away so he can die then arise as a ghost himself. Cue escape. The end.

Aside from the average story, dodgy SFX and lack of gore there was no shaky first person camera work. Is this the same movie I read about? The camera was shaken around sometimes but never was it done in a way to suggest that first person, live and unedited experience. A disappointment for me, but others will disagree I'm sure. Enjoying shaky camera work puts me in a select group of people who can handle it without feleing sick and appreciate the premise that less is sometime more. This premise does not apply when considering gore or naked female bodies.

Seventh Moon was an okay horror movie but it broke my heart and for that I give it 6/10.

As an aside, I watched Return of the Living Dead last night and it was pretty good. Two thumbs up for the chick who spent half the movie naked though wearing a flesh-colored prosthetic over her hoo-ha.

Raptors Hellraising Experience

Today I have two Hellraiser movies for you. Hellraiser: Deader and Hellraiser: Hell World so lets continue on with my special thought on part 7 and 8 of this blood soaked series.

Oh crap, another splinter

Hellraiser: Deader revolves around a journalist who investigates a cult called the Deaders when a video tape is sent to her office showing a girl being killed then resurrected. The journalist, played by Kari Wuhrer who I last remember being in Sliders and still pretty hot, eventually tracks down the Deaders amidst warnings from Pinhead that they are raising an army and are a threat to him. Honestly, what kind of a threat are a bunch of resurrected wannabes to a demonic S&M hook throwing leather fetishist. The movie set a moody atmosphere but in the end the pay off was a little drab. Also the Cenobites hardly appeared at all. You got Pinhead making a warning or two early on then they appear at the end to clean things up as usual and that’s it…I mean sure the nudity was there in the film but there wasn’t anything to surprising in this one. The acting was solid enough and there is a little killing here and there but it’s a pale comparison to some of it’s predecessors. I gave it 6/10.

Hellraiser: Hell World, I have a bit of a gripe with this one. All I can say is this wasn’t a Hellraiser movie. This was some slasher movies with Hellraiser themes tacked on to it. You could have easily removed all the Hellraiser elements from it and would have still had roughly the same movie. Basically the story revolves around a group of 20somethings who played an online game called Hell World and one of them died. 2 years later they are then invited a Hellraiser party by the host played by Lance Henriksen. I wont give it away too much but it’s pretty obvious that Lance knows the kid and he takes out the gang in let’s say by the use of fear. There is also some nudity in this one, it can’t be all bad and the actors while mostly attractive enough could have been anyone really. They also do dumb things like at one point one of the girls is trying to get the attention of a cop outside a window but the cops can’t see her. Try breaking the window maybe? You have a whole room full of crap to do it with. What about sticking your hand in some cracks in the floor boards? Yeah that always turns out to be a good idea. Anyway, this would have all been ok but my stickler is that it’s NOT a Hellraiser movie. I don’t care what wrapping paper you used. I give this one 5/10.

Raptors One Eyed Monster

For starters let me just say that for a movie about the disembodied penis of Ron Jeremy killing people on the set of a porn movie. I hear you ask “Raptor, stop talking crap and tell us what the movie is?” Fine, since you asked so nicely. The movie is One Eyed Monster and the basic plot is what I listed above. Who’s Ron Jeremy? Well he is some huge, innuendo intended, porn star who started in the sixties and has been in movies with titles like Samurai Dick and Cherry Cheese Cake. The list of movies that he has appeared in is phenomenal. I’m talking over 1000. Sure some may be cameos only but dam that is still a huge body of work, innuendo again.

He still gets the ladies...for $75 an hour extra for back door action

The movie starts off with cast filming a porn shoot in some cabin that gets snowed in. During a break on the first Scene Ron Jeremy takes a walk outside and is zapped by a shooting star like alien. He seems fine until they continue on with the sex scene and his dick gets out of control injuring the starlet Veronica Hart, another old school porn actress and then detaching itself from Ron. He then goes to the big porn set in the sky and from that point on Ron plays the Alien Dick. Quite ironic really.

Anyway the Alien Dick is looking to procreate, hey you’re on a porn set why not, I’d want to do the same thing right but it sees all other non females as the threats so starts a killing rampage. This premise kind of falls down at several points such as when the pretty Jenny Guy is killed while making out with the rooky or when Carmen Hart is killed by fatal blow job. I guess it was still trying to figure out the right hole? On a side note Carmen Hart has stared in films such as Bless Their Little Holes and Big Cocks in her Little Box. These crack me up.

Too....much....viagra!

On to a few of the other cast members. Jonah, the token black guy played by Jason Graham who turns out to be well not so token and saves the day! Jason did a great job with this character with a down to earth no nonsense attitude. I was rooting for him from the start. Our heroine is played by Amber Benson from Buffy The vampire Slayer lesbian girl fame. We also get a hilarious Jeff Denton who plays the self centred asshole produce/director of the film. He gets it in the end of course…hehe in the end get it? Bah! Veteran actor Charles Napier also makes an appearance as an ex-soldier and hermit who turns out a pretty cool back story monologue.

We don’t see the alien itself for most of the film and get an Aliens’ eye view instead, when we do well yes it’s a 1.5ft long penis thing….what did you expect? All the kills are all tongue in cheek as is most of the movie.

I did enjoy this film plot holes included. This one was defiantly not made to be taken seriously. The acting was solid as was the editing and the movie itself looked polished enough for a low budget film. I give this movie a 6/10, a good watch if you have nothing else to do.

Big Trouble for Raptor

Today I will be reviewing one of my favourite films and a classic, yeah that’s right a classic, forget you Gone with the Wind, out your ass King and I this is Raptors classic and that one is Big Trouble in Little China. Queue synthesiser music.

Is someone here is a little under dressed?

This movie was directed by John Carpenter and has his signature all over it. From the now iconic synthesiser music that he is noted for to the creatures and goolies he has peppered through out this. Hi direction is spot on and considering it’s a side step from his usual horror fair it is a pretty impressive effort. The pacing ticks along nicely and the editing keeps it all tied together which could have easily caused this to fall apart or get bogged down with all the Chinese mysticism, legends and folk lore. This was kept to a minimum and mainly for comedic effect. The dialogue is snappy and the acting is good.

Feel my gaze of shiny!

Now past all that the real star her is Kurt Russel as Jack Burton. In my book there are only two rolls that Kurt Russel will ever need to play, one is Snake Plisskin from Escape from New York the other is Jack Burton. Who? “Jack Burton, me”. Kurt Russel turned this truck drive from ho-hum to a wise cracking, ego inflated hero who is just in the wrong place at the wrong time but now he’s going to get the job done. His character spews’ quotable lines like it’s going out of fashion such as the great opening monologue “have ya paid your dues?” The repour between Kurt Russel and Dennis Duns who plays Wang Chi is perfect. Wang Chi is Jacks friend and the guy who manages to rope him into all the trouble he just wants to avoid. The romantic interest, Gracey Law played by Kim Cattrall. A feisty and no mucking about lawyer out for the greater good and also trouble with a capital T! Now who is the bad guy in this? Lo Pan!...wait let’s add some more of them exclamation marks for good effect Lo Pan!!!!! Acted out with devilish flair by James Hong. Lo Pan is an evil sorcerer cursed by an Emperor and demon to live in undeath until he can find a girl with green eyes to appease him and the demon. Lo Pans nemesis is Egg Shen (Victor Wong), he knows everything there is to know about Lo Pan and has been trying to thwart his evil plans from the get go…or at least as long as he has know about him.

I think the white guy farted.

The story starts with Jack meeting up with Wang in San Francisco and after a card game gone wrong heads over to pick up Wangs’ fiancé. When she is kidnapped at the airport they wind up in an alley with him in his truck amidst a turf war between two rival Chinese gangs. Soon it all get’s weird and Lo Pans minions turn up, The Three storms, Thunder, Wind (must not make fart jokes) and lightning then finally Lo Pan himself. Jacks truck is stolen and it’s up to him and Co. to get the truck and girl back while shaking the pillars of heaven.

The SFX while still pretty good, are a little dated but that’s a minor point, there is no nudity (boo) and no gory effects or anything like that and in this case who needs them. This movie is fun, filled with hokey action, memorable characters and a great watch for anyone who is looking some martial arts, monster and bang kapow adventure. I give this one an 8.5/10

The Descent (2005)

A bunch of over-enthusiastic, under-skilled women go on a caving trip together to help move long the healing process of Sarah, a close friend who lost her husband and daughter in a car accident 12 months ago. Long story short, they get lost in the caves and killed off by a bunch of proto-humans called crawlers, though I don't remember them being referred to as such in the movie. In part, the women turn out to be their own worst enemies and the final score is something like Crawlers: 4, Humans: 2, as the girls manage to kill each other off both accidentally and through terrible revenge! Well done humanity, 2 hours in a cave and out come the knives.

"I am become death. I feel the spirit of Sigorney Weaver channelling through me!

I quite liked how several of the women had a moment of panic when initially trapped and attacked, then hardened the fuck up to go on a monster killing rampage. Very British. Had this been an American movie the group would have included a chisel jawed man to rescue their useless arses and a black ex-navy seal that taught them all the meaning of life through drinking your own urine and building a catapult from stones. He'd be killed meaninglessly. Back to the actually movie; some of the women go to pieces, some are terrified but keep it together and a couple just go Ellen Ripley bat-shit crazy. Two thumbs and perhaps something else up.

Overall, performances were good and the creatures believable. Gore was moderate when compared to Feast or Dawn of the Dead, but well done. No complaints there. The direction was tight and camera work quite stunning at times, I could really relate to the women imagine just how difficult it would be to keep your shit together in tunnels no higher than the length of their forearm. In fact, at least half of the tension and drama is drawn from the caving experience and environment, with the crawlers only showing up in the last third of the movie to really fuck things over.

The actresses aren't known to me but I particularly enjoyed the characters portrayed by Saskia Mulder and Nora-Jane Noone (of Doomsday vintage). These two acted like real people with natural reactions to everything around them and I appreciated their work.

As you may have read in the past, the ending is a bit arse - especially when you know the basic plot of the upcoming sequel. Sarah escapes and we see her drive to safety, then she's back in the cave again and the escape was all a dream. I don't enjoy that style of ending but in fairness she isn't actually killed, it's merely suggested as she lies in a dark cave with the cries of the crawlers growing louder and louder. Well here's the spoiler, she survives to lead the sequel. Apparently in the North American release that whole dream sequence was dropped anyway so her escape was a given.

To sum up:

The Descent - good old suspense with plenty of gore and decent monsters. 7/10

Raptors Final Wars

This week I managed to catch Godzilla: Final Wars. I like Godzilla and his big rubber suit but I’m by no mean the biggest Geek fan there is. I can’t tell you ever name of ever monster Godzilla has ever fought or what movie they were in but I can tell you this I have seen a handful of Godzilla movies and I can fake it with the best of them.

Yes more heads, more monsta! What FOOLS! I say more monsta!!

So in Final Wars monsters start attacking cities around the world and the Earth Defence Force (EDF) are overwhelmed with the task of trying to stop them. Suddenly the monsters all disappear due to the Xillien race having arrived and removing them. Of course the Xilliens are bad and this is all a big scam to rule the earth. After being revealed as bad they throw away all pretence of being good aliens and give the earth an ultimatum. Surrender or die…NEVER! That’s what the EDF guys say only more dramatically overacted and in Japanese. Que the release of the monsters again. In desperation the EDF decide to free Godzilla from an icy prison and then monster mayhem ensues.

and so it was that the Xiliens became a boy band...oh and one girl

There are a lot of monsters in this one. Gaigan is the main monster (half cyborg creature) and there is a big battle with him at the end but a lot of the other monsters get barely a 1 or 2 min fight if they were lucky. Also Godzilla doesn’t appear until roughly the last 30 mins of the film and it is 2hrs long. Other monsters that make an appearance are Mothra, King Caesar, Zilla and Rodan to name a few.  The monsters were a mix of practical rubber suits, let’s call this the classic look, and new age CGI. I have to say the CGi just wasn’t up to scratch. Also the America Godzilla makes an appearance and get’s trashed.

Yes a gratuitous Godzilla shot

Of course the EDF now has mutants to help save the world but they are nothing on Godzilla. As I hinted at previously, the acting is over the top Japanese action with much dramatic posing. There’s a lot of Wire-Fu action which is always cool but the one thing that I thought was great was the rough take no shit Texan Captain Douglas Fry who spoke actual English while everyone else spoke Japanese. Good stuff. He was probably my favourite cast member. Another note for Australians, Sydney gets trashed which is really what we all want to see isn’t it.

In conclusion, Godzilla wasn’t the best Godzilla movie I have ever seen but for sheer volume of monsters I rate this 6.5 and some guy in a rubber suit.

Raptor Goes out the Gate

Today I’m going to be reviewing the classic 80s horror film The Gare. Before I start a warning: There is NO NUDITY in this movie….Now I will wait a little bit while all the people who suddenly yelled, “WTF Dude! No boobies. Screw you and your little Gavor too” and walked away. Done? Good. Let’s begin.

Wooo glowy eyes

The Gate revolves around Glen, played by a really young Stephen Dorff, a 12 year old kid living in your average American Suburban family with his sister, parent and dog. When his friend Terrance (Louise Tripp) comes over one day with a Heavy Metal album from a band who was heavily into demonology they accidentally open a gate….INTO HELL!! Yes that’s right INTO HELL! Caps and all. Soon evil things begin to happen and their dreams and nightmares begin to become reality and eventually the demons come through starting with the small minions and then the big daddy demon. So now while the parents are out of town Glen, Terrance and his sister Al need to close the gate and so shutting out the demons from this world.

This really is a fun film. The performances are pretty good and a little 80s cheesy but overall the dialogue hasn’t dated to badly. Stephen Dorff was a fine little actor back then too it seems. Who’d ever realise he’s grow up to be…um in films…ok not so many lately but still.

When did they clone Michael Jackson?

Now the fun part, the demons. The SFX on make these was old school green screen Star wars stuff as well as practical FX. They are not always perfect and sometimes you can see the green screen outlines but some scenes such as when the big daddy major demon turns up are just beautifully made and reminiscent of some of the Claymation of Charles H. Schneer. Of course the minions are guys in suits but they look pretty cool.

I would recommend this to anyone who loves cheesy 80s monster movies as I’ve said before that would be someone like my manly self. I would give this movie a monstertastic 7 and a side note the guy who plays Terrance stars in the second Gate movie but that for a future review.

Getting Some Roasted Poultrygeist

So here I am, getting all annoyed that Gavor has posted nuddy screen caps of movies and while I’ve stuck to…well weak sauce play time pics so I thought what movie can I review that would bring the elements of Horror, Nudity, grossness and musical all into one? Then I chose the Trauma movie Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead. Now a warning to our more sensitive readers, first of all what the fuck are you doing on this site if you are, second this movie is not for everyone but if you don’t mind your movie with gross out humour, crazy gore gags,  B-Grade SFX , nudity and musical numbers, and really who doesn’t, then this movies is for you.

Wendy, have you shaved your chest?

Poultrygeist is directed by Lloyd Kaufman who has directed other Trauma movies such as Toxic Avenger and stared in more B grade films than I can point a voodoo stick at.  He also appears in the film as the older Arbie. The two stars of the movie are played with great energy by Jason Yachanin as Arbie our love struck hero and the very cute Kate Graham as Wendy the love interest turned experimentally lesbian. All the acting in her is very tongue in cheek and while not Oscar material it kept getting a laugh out of me. It really felt like I was watching some Armature Theatre company put on a comedy but because everyone was having so much fun doing it you just couldn’t help but be pulled in by it all.

Yes its Michael Jackson. Sorry I couldn't resist.

Other notable performances were Robin Watkins as General Lee Roy the unscrupulous owner of the American Chicken Bunker franchise and Joshua Olatunde as Denny the downtrodden African American store manager trying to make a mark for himself in this white mans world, of course he employs Carl Jr, played by Caleb Emerson, a bigoted yokel with a chicken fetish…go figure.

And now I shall make her skirt dissapear.

The story starts when an America Chicken Bunker is built over an Indian Burial ground which then brings about the curse of Chicken Dead. What first begins with a possessed chicken carcass soon turns into a gory outbreak of the Chicken Dead and this lets Lloyd Kaufman run loose with the toilet humour and gross out sight gags such as a fat guy with explosive Diarrhea painting the toilet walls or how about implants used  for a bread fillets. Meanwhile Arbie tries to win back the love of his life Wendy by getting a job at the one place that she has been protesting against for it abuse of chickens. As you can see Arbie isn’t the smartest sardine in the can. So when the shit hits the fan it’s up to Ardie and company to save the day and stop the Chicken Dead by finding their one weakness.

Yes she is cute and a lesbian.

Now you’re saying “Raptor that’s all well and good but what makes this so special?” and I would say “Well, dick that can’t help but point out the flaws in my movie review it would be the nudity but more importantly it’s the music”. Yes that’s right; this is a musical but what kind of musical. Well I’d have to say if you’d ever seen the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer then that’s probably the closest I could give and an example. The "Slow Fast Food Love" is a ballad sung by Ardie and Wendy and more importantly with Wendy half naked and a number of other naked girls but my favorite would probably be the Irish like jig by young and old Ardie titled Longing to Live/Waiting to Die".

This movie is full of flaws but the lead casts are so likeable and filled with stupid vigor that I have to give this one 7.5/10 and now lets roll the screen shots.

Outlander Gets Nordic Spice

Just this week I watched a movie that, for some reason, went under the radar of and didn’t make much of and impact on the movie scene even though it was a pretty good wathch. “What the Hell are you talking about Raptor” I hear you say. I’m talking about Outlander staring James Caviezel, yes Jesus himself, kicking alien but. John Hurt brings some class as the King and Ron Pearlman also makes a great appearance as the neighbouring leader Gunnar.

Do these furs make me look fat?

The brief synopsis of this movie goes something like this: Caviezel ship crash lands on Earth circa 700AD after a nasty alien creature called a Moorwen gets on his ship. Then the nasty creature does what all nasty aliens to best and goes on a killing rampage. Caviezel then teams up with some Vikings to slay the nasty “dragon”. Along the way are a few surprises and it develops in an almost Grendal like tale.

You want disco? You've got disco!

The real start of this movie though is the alien. It a beautifully visualized CGI creature incorporating light and shadow and while a most creatures loose something when the creature is revealed you definitely don’t get that here. It’s a vicious bastard but by the end, as the story develops you kind of feel some sympathy for it and anger towards Caviezel race

Awww he's so cute when he's OHGODHE'SEATINGMYSPLEEN!

As far as man vs monsters go this movie did a pretty good job, while probably not an orgional story I found there was a lot to like about Outlander and with a strong performance by the cast sealing it for me. So in the end I give Outlander a solid 7/10. Good job, stay away from the night lights.