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.

Raptor Sees it's Broken

There are movies that you expect to be pretty crappy which then turn out to be  pretty not crappy. The Broken, was one of those movies. I sat down to watch it and really was not pay to much attention for the first ten or fifteen mins. Then it got weird during a strange dream/flashback sequence and suddenly I was like WTF was that? Now I swear I will never look at a mirror the same way again, especially the sound of a breaking mirror.

Oh yeah, why you look 100% better with um...makeup

The story revolves around Gina McVey, played by the very hot Headey Lena (from 300), who after an accident and memory loss of events before it starts to believe that her partner is not who he is and has been replaced. As the story slowly evolves in an almost J Horror style we a picture builds up that shows an invasion of sorts. People having chest Xrays have their hearts on the opposite side than normal. This is rare. We get mirrors breaking for no know reason; until finally we find that something is coming through the mirrors. Doppelgangers of sorts and they kill the person they imitate and take over their lives Now I have probably spoiled of lot of the surprises for you, well it’s not the first time.

I’ve never heard of the Director/Writer Sean Ellis but he seems to have an eye for setting a scene up and uses European like slow takes the build these up. One creepy scene is a shot of the other side of the mirror. It’s pitch black with the only light coming from the mirror itself. This seems to be a clue as to why they want out. Another great scene plays out with Ginas father standing before a pitch dark doorway, then from the darkness behind him the face of his doppelganger appear and turns to look at him. It was moments like this that sealed it for me.

The pacing on this film is slow and if you’re not the patient sort this could bore you but if you don’t mind the slow build up it pays off. The reason for this “invasion” is never really explained and revolves around Ginas slowly returning memories. Also the ending is fairly open which a lot of people won’t like but I didn’t mind at all. There is nudity (Yay) and a couple of kill scenes but overall nothing too gory. The Broken appealed to me and in the end I give it a 7.5/10.

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.

Gavor's movie round-up #2

Over the last week I've been busy selling cars and my house in preparation for le grande trip around Australia. Because of this I haven't had my usual spare time to find and watch movies so here's a round-up of the movies I've watched lately (and that I don't want to devote the space to full reviews).

Planet Terror

Robert Rodriguez's underwhelming zombie movie as part of the Grindhouse feature collaboration with Tarentino. It's okay, but having just watched Dawn of the Dead(both original and remake) it pales in comparison. Good for a couple of beers and a bag of popcorn.

5/10

Dawn of the Dead (2004)

Takes all the subtext about consumerism and throws it in the bin then goes on to make a pretty decent movie about zombies. There are a couple of slow moments and not all of the acting works but I still enjoyed it. The grim ending leaves things open to interpretation, which is my kind of grim ending. Not as good as the original, but pretty close. The trailer below is rubbish and doesn't represent the movie well at all.

8/10

Shaun of the Dead

Funny zombies done right, and with a pretty good soundtrack too. Simon Pegg and Nick Frost work well together (and continued to do so in Hot Fuzz),  fingers crossed for more amusing collaborations in the future. Throw in Dylan Moran as a complete tosser plus the future Prime Minister of England as Shaun's mum and you have a great movie about zombies taking over London.

8.5/10

Drag me to Hell

Terrible, cliched shit with no laughs, no scares and almost no gore. I gave up about two thirds of the way through and skipped to the end. She dies. The end. Thank fuck for that. Someone please ask Mr Raimi to stop making movies.

2/10

Raptor is a Bastard

Every now and then there is a movie that’s just fun to watch. Inglorious Bastards is one of those movies. Directed and Written by Quinten Tarantino, like him or hate him you know you’re going to get a movie that isn’t like the rest. Tarantino has put together a cast of charismatic bastards that really step up to the plate and hit a home run. The movie is set in during World War II occupied France and the Americans have sent over a group of elite soldiers called the Inglorious Bastards, so named by the Germans. Well just The Bastards to them really. The bastards are sent on a mission to kill a number of German Officers at a movie Theatre screening a terrible German propaganda film about a Private Frederick Zoller, a sniper and war hero who killed over 300 enemy soldiers over 3 days. The movie pretty much just shows one sniper kill after another. The Bastards find out that Hitler and his inner circle are going to be attending the screening so the mission becomes more important and much more risky.

Do these pants make me look fat?

We begin the story with a French family hiding a Jewish family. In comes Col. Hans Landa “The Hunter” played brilliantly by Christoph Waltz as a cunning, charming and flamboyant self serving Nazi Jew hunter. The scene and dialogue where he corners the French farmer into revealing the Jewish family is truly masterful. He orders his men to kill the Jewish family but one of the daughters manages to flee. This is Shosanna Freyfus (Melanie Laurent) who becomes the owner of the theatre and has her own designs of finishing of the Nazis leaders by burning down the theatre.

Gun and bat? I think he is over compensating?

The Bastards are lead by Lt. Aldo Raine played hilariously by Brad Pitt as a chin thrust out no nonsense military man with an American Indian blood line. With his band and his second in command Sgt Donny Donowitz, the club beating “Bear Jew” played by Eli Roth they start a campaign of gorilla warfare designed to unnerve the Germans. I would have to say Pitt and Roth probably have the funniest scene in the movie with a “Who speaks the best Italian” skit.

When they are asked to meet an undercover contact, Bridget von Hammersmark (Dianne Kruger) a famous German movie actress, a British officer, Lt. Archie Hicox (Michael Fassbender), is sent in with two of the bastards. Things don’t go as planned when they find that a there is a small party in the tavern selected for the meeting for a German Staff Sergeant becoming a father and also cunning SS Officer. The fire fight that ensures leaves everyone dead but Hammersmark. Unfortunately the aftermath ends up being investigated by Col. Hans Landa who puts a snag in their grand plot.  Speaking of dead, I would have liked to have seen more of Michael Fassbender with the almost Ian Fleming style British officer but alas eggs had to be broken.

Hi, I'm 5ft 8'' arian features, like long walks on the beach and oh I'm a Nazi.

Back to Christoph Waltz, he is in my mind the centre of this movie, you could say its Melanie Laurent but she paled in comparison to the performance given by Laurent. He was so likeable that I kept thinking man this guys is going to get you but hey so what! He’s the man. This is when he is in control and has all his moves planned out but as one scene shows with Hammersmark he can be extremely violent and irrational when betrayed.

Visually the movie is spectacular and the costumes and settings are very authentic. The violence goes from violent to over the top. There are club beatings, Scalping (The Bastards trademark) and yes gun fights and explosions and frankly all good fun. The script is rattles along at a good pace and the only real problem is the size of the cast. You may want to see more of one character but being so many some of them obviously some get left on the cutting room floor. Still after all that I have to say that the best parts of Inglorious Bastards is the dialogue between characters which in my mind tend to be clever without becoming pretentious.


Inglorious Bastards is a great World War II action movie, a great script and great actors. I give this one 8.5/10. Blow the next thing up thanks.

Humanity's End (2009)

A great example of how far we've come with CGI when a movie can (at times) look so good but play so badly.

Cool fonts, things blowing up and someone in a welding mask....so far so good.

Humanity's End (YouTube trailer) promised so little yet delivered slightly more than expected. Far off in the future of a cliche story involving too many races, sub-races and plot holes - homo sapiens is wiped out by the Nephilim. The Nephilim are a race that evolved parallel to homo sapiens but always strived to grind humans under their heel. After being destroyed, coming back, being destroyed again and coming back again,  the Nephilimhave teamed up with Homo Technis(I think) to destroy all humans. Homo Technis is an off shoot of homo sapiens, their street name being the Konstructs. Throw in some bio engineered races and bio engineered robots (not clear on the distinction) and you've got a movie that tries to do too much with too little yet succeeds at creating some, at-times, impressive visuals regardless.

Did I say humans were wiped out? Well mostly. Two survivors, a breeder and a mercenary captain, team up with another woman who thinks she's human but turns out to be a robot, plus a bio engineered bald guy and a ship called Blue. They fly to Mars with the purpose of finding weapons that turn out to be of no consequence to the plot, then manage to destroy the entire Nephilim fleet with a single fighter (their big ass ship being all crashed on the planet). Also, the Konstructs are now humanity's friend as part of a suddenly revealed double cross by the Konstructs against the Nephilim. Could have sprung the surprise BEFORE killing all other humans. Oh and the mercenary guy is killed at the end. His character was rubbish and his acting poor so it didn't matter so much. I was a touch sader when Blue, the computer, was taken offline.

While on the topic of acting, I must say I struggled to detect any. There was talking at each other, bad emoting, fake crying, a laughable sex scene(but in fairness I think it was supposed to be) - but no actual acting or character building.

The effects on the other hand were plentiful and generally well executed. Given the low budget there was obviously a mix of good and bad, but for the money they got some decent sets and many many effects. Ships, explosions, more ships, guns, more ships. All externals shots were quite attractive and the ships well realised, however the explosions and some of the incidental effects came out pretty awful. Overall, plenty of eye candy and most of it good.

I'd be interested to see what the same studio could do with more money. My sincere wish is that it'd free them not only to create more and flashier effects but also pay some decent actors and buy a proper script. That's a movie I wouldn't mind watching, the world needs more sci-fi movies with ships, explosions and humorous one-liners. Throw out the fucking subtext and intense stares and throw in more leather pant and cleavage. There, done.

No boobs, no acting but lots of decent effects (remembering the budget).

5/10

Raptor gets out of the Crypt

The Crypt seems to be a movie that is trying to be a new take on Descent but doesn’t achieve quite what it’s planned out to do. It involves a group of criminals, who after a car jacking gone wrong decide to go for a bigger and safer heist by stealing jewels from an old early 1900s crypt. So they wonder down and soon find themselves trapped. Gasp! Who would have thought that would happen? So now they are stuck underground and stealing jewels and the spirits of the dead are killing them one by one.

It plays by the numbers. If you seen one escape from a haunted house/cave/paper bag movie then you’ve probably seen this. The acting, while not terrible, wasn’t what you’d call great and the script seemed to have a few too many plot holes such as one of the characters saying that the dead are killing them because they have the jewels. So they dump the jewels but after all her speech about jewels are bad she decides to keep some…WTF! Get rid of it you moron!

The ghosts were reasonably cool with glowing eyes but again nothing too spectacular. It tried to setup some creepy moments which were hit and miss probably because by this point I didn’t really care if they lived or not and was rooting for the ghosts. One or two of the kills weren’t too bad such as the hand down throat but most involved the cast getting dragged away and that’s it.


In the end I wasn’t overly impressed. There was a booby shot at the beginning so that put up the score a little which was 4.5/10. Blah, watch it if you have nothing else to do.

Raptor Visits District 9

The first Peter Jackson movie I ever watched was Dead Alive when I didn’t even know who he was. Well he didn’t direct District 9 but it was his brain child to get it on screen with reasonably new director Neil Blomkamp. Blomkamps first short film, Alive in Joburg, was the inspiration for District 9. He has done a surprisingly good job of directing here. The screen play is tight and the pacing doesn’t lag at all especially once the things begin to heat up and he manages to get a lot out of performances of a relatively low key cast.

I told you to go before we left!

The premises of District 9 is that an alien ship arrives in Johannesburg, South Africa and they find the worker aliens to aboard to be in a bad state of malnourishment and without leaders. The aliens are processed and placed in a slum called District 9 and looked after the MNU corporation. Enter Wicus Van De Merwe played by first time actor Sharlto Copley who is put in charge to relocate the aliens to a nicer cleaner District 10. While his group are serving out the papers he comes across a flask with a liquid in it and accidentally sprays it on himself. This starts his transformation into an alien and a really bad week. Along the way he discovers what the MNUs real interests are invested in alien weaponry and bio technology, which they haven’t been able use yet, and that one of the aliens may be able to help him get back to being a human in a trade to allow the aliens to leave Earth.

For a first time actor Sharlto Copley plays Wicus to a T. He portrays him as a rather enthusiastic and naïve individual who’s well meaning intentions are based on human prejudices towards the aliens and treats them more like intelligent animals rather and advanced race. Little things like calling them “prawns” due to their resemblance and even “exterminating” a cache of alien eggs and the referring to the popping sound they make when set on fire suggest a blasé attitude to creatures. The movie itself doesn’t make any excuse about being an apartheid piece, I mean set south Africa with aliens segregated from, I’m pretty sure that’s blatantly obvious enough for everyone.

Yes, no Michael Jacksons. Gasp!

The locals and gangs are now taking advantage of the aliens as well which is an interesting juxtaposition that suggests that there is always someone praying on the weaker even if things change. Alien sex with whores and buying their alien technology for cat food (It’s like cocaine to them) are just some of the schemes but also more sinister machinations of Voodoo cannibalism of the aliens to gain their powers.

There are some plot holes that can be overlooked, such as, where is the rest of the world? I mean if aliens came to Earth you would have scientists from everywhere looking into this not to mention all the major countries involvements. Overall these can be overlooked.  The SFX are fantastic, the aliens are CGI generated as is the awesome mech suit Wicus hops into at the end. Pew pew anybody?  For those looking for exploding humans and aliens there is plenty of that with a great fight scene at the end.

Hello Sir. Have you seen an anyone who is 7ft tall, looks like a prawn and can't speak English?

This movie is an action think piece with a lot of humour thrown in to boot. You can walk away from it thinking man, humans are bastards or I can see their point or just walk away thinking “Wo awesome dude” but you will walk away thinking about the movie which in my mind makes it great. I give this one 8.5/10 for sheer alien in the eye action.

Dog Soldiers (2002)

Just a quick one. I was really disappointed by this half arsed mess of a werewolf movie. After all the hype, all the time I spent (2 minutes) borrowing a copy and the hundred odd minutes sitting down to watch it, I can safely say this movie is underwhelming.

While it's true there's gore, soldiers, monsters and a woman; Dog Soldiers is never convincing. We have acting at Friends level (shouting fills in for emoting), non-existent scares and a mixed bag of characters. Two of the characters are memorable in that I can actually remember them at all. There's the short guy who has an epic fight with a werewolf and the older guy who dies. The key character's main traits appear to be his odd shaped face and scraggy hair, because those are the only things I remember.

Kevin McKidd - I act like I wear a shirt...er...unbuttoned

Redeeming features? Some cool scenes, Doctor Who's son (Sean Pertwee) and an ending where someone survived.

You got sauce on your suit/rug. Better get that in to soak.

Not the best werewolf movie going around after all. Boo

5/10

Raptor Becomes a Fan

If you had to break into the Lucas ranch so that your dyeing friend can watch Star Wars Episode 1 would you do it? Of course dude and that’s the premises of Fanboys. In 1998 Eric Bottler (Sam Huntington) has left his best friend Linus (Christopher Marquette) behind to start his career but when his other friends, Hutch (Dan Fogler) and Windows (Jay Baruchel), let him know that Linus is dying of cancer and may not get to see the anticipated Episode 1 then they all come together with an old dream they had about a road trip to break into the Lucas Ranch and see the movie before it’s too late. They are joined by Zoe the very cute Kristen Bell but all is not easy for is it not the destination that is most important but the journey. Along the way they encounter a Star Wars fans greatest nemesis the Star Trek fan. These are lead by an extremely geeky nay nerdy Seth Rogen who also turns up as a Star Wars loving pimp later on. We even get a cameo from the Shat himself, William Shatner. Kaaaaaahhnn!!! Yeah I had to say it. The guys do have some issues to work out, Eric being true to himself instead of a corporate monkey, Linus with his mortality, Hutch and his dream to own a car detailing business and Windows who is also on the trip to meat a girl he met online. These issues are all helped by The Chief (Danny Trejo) and a lot of marijuana of course in a spirit walk.

Only one of us can hold the Light Saber! Ok two of us...but no more.

This is a movie for the fans but also for anyone who has had a dream, a dream they would dare to fulfil. Ok enough of that. It’s a pretty good movie. The characters are likeable and you want to see them get there in the end. It all resolves itself quite nicely even if a little bitter sweet but the high jinx along the way is worth it. I would say that Star Trek fans beware, they get a bit of a bashing in this…and really why not although the new movie rocked.

Tell me this isn't your Star Wars fantasy...not so much the one on the right.

I give this movie a 7/10 and a must see for any Star Wars fan. If you’re a Trecky…well you may want to watch it anyway and then have a shower to wash the Star Wars taint off. May the force be with you.

Kristen Bell...she can hold my Light Saber anytime

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.

Late night double feature: Session 9 and The Grudge

Recently I was retrenched from my job of almost 3 years, and it really sucks. Blah blah blah etc etc. The crux of it is that I've lost a bit of motivation lately so I find myself sitting up drinking beer and watching movies/reading books long after I should have gone to bed. Bad for my youthful looks, good for this review site. Last night I had a late one which included watching football then going on to view a couple of movies I'd read were unsung horror classics of the 2000s.

Note: If you're about to scroll down looking for breasty pictures, please be aware in that neither of these movies included nudity or sex. They've been marked down accordingly.

 Session 9

Imagine a world where all horror movies included David Caruso as a lead actor. A lot of intensity, looking out of windows at nothing in particular and wearing sunglasses even after sunset. He'd have to be the softly spoken character with a nerve of steel and murky past. Why does he sleep in that van? Did kids at his school call him Bluey? What's with the implied but overlooked drug use plot line?

But I digress right from the start. Session 9 is actually a thriller set in an abandoned insane asylum and so named for a series of tapes found by one of the characters. Each of these tapes contains the recording of a doctor and former patient as they discuss her irrelevant mental condition and past crimes. The tapes are labelled sessions 1 to 9, with 9 being the ultimate reveal of her naughtiness. Session 9.  She's kind of crazy on the tapes with 3 seperate personalities that each take turns talking to the doctor. The princess represents innnocence, Billy is her protector and there's a third personality that embodies murderous rage. He only pops up on tape 9, surprise!  This whole plot line, beside giving the movie it's name, felt detached from the rest of the movie. It also failed to be creepy. In hindsight I'd have cut the whole she-bang and renamed this flick 'No-boob Asylum Movie'.

The other portion of the movie follows an asbestos cleanup crew as they push to get the asylum tidied up and ready for redevelopment. The crew is made up of David Caruso, a tired looking irish guy who doesn't drink or hit anyone randomly(initially), a young kid with a mullet, some hick character who stole Caruso's girlfriend and a smart guy who should be a lawyer but instead opted to clean up asbestos. Er, sure. I have a computer science degree but I'd rather clean sewers. If you can swallow that bullshit you're sure to love this movie.

In a nutshell, these characters are all shit. They have vague motivations, weak emotional responses and wander around doing random shit throughout the movie. The irish guy hit his wife when she spilled water on him, the hick finds treasure in the incinerator, the smart guy discovers those tapes, the kid likes loud music but is afraid of the dark and so on. As the movie slowly bores you to death it's portrayed as a supernatural flick - in that weird stuff happens, lights go off, sounds are heard and theres a scary chair upstairs.

Sweet baby Jesus! Make it stop!

The hick dude eventually goes to the asylum at night to collect his treasure and while there runs afoul of some one or some thing. Later in the movie he reappears but has lost the ability to form coherant sentences. He dissapears again and only the kid has seen him. Is he a ghost? I really didn't care. This sort of thing goes on for another half hour. Scary bits, people looking out windows, the irish guy gets angry. There's a brief moment where we suspect Caruso of being the bad guy but right at the end it turns out the irish guy actually killed his wife and baby when she spilled that hot water on him. This scene is showed over and over again in the course of the movie, each time slightly different to the last with the ultimate scene being him stabbing her and the kid to death. Nice guy. He then goes on to kill everyone else and the movie ends.

While not really a horror movie, Session 9 tries to present itself as one by having an asylum, scary (or not) tape recordings of a crazy person, people acting strangely and characters that might or might not be ghosts. In the end the tapes mean nothing, the ghost guy has just been lobotimised with an ice pick (for some reason) by Mr Irish, and all the weird behaviour can be attributed to the fuckwittedness of the characters. This movie was vapid and un-entertaining. The plot was fatuous. The dialogue didn't use as many important sounding words as I just did. In short, Session 9 will scare you right to sleep.

4/10

The Grudge

The Grudge is a remake of the well regarded Japanese horror movie, The Grudge. This movie is told piecemeal from the viewpoint of several characters, starting from pretty much the present day and going back into the past to show other characters.

In the beginning a young girl cares for an invalid woman until something in the attic kills her. This something is basically a pale woman with dark hair that covers most of her face, the emo ghost as I called it. The only thing I found scary was the prospect of her music and clothes taking the world by storm and making us all look like total wankers. The story rolls on. Some young thing, played by Buffy the vampire slayer, takes over the case of  the old lady and quickly experiences the naughty old emo ghost - and her son whom I'll only mention one more time in passing due to his complete irrelevance.

Just as a brief aside, I never understood what the attraction of Buffy was until I saw this movie. Sarah Michelle Gellar is pretty hot in a way I'm unable to describe; in the first scene my initial thought was 'look at her nose!', but that quickly devolved into an appreciation of other things. Is it the body, the emotive acting, nose envy? I don't know.

What follows is a showing of some past events. Another couple, business type man and his horse-faced wife, move into the house with his mother, the demented old lady. They're both killed in short order, leaving the old crone alone and in need of someone to help her. Business guy's sister is then killed off in her apartment after escaping from emo ghost in an office building. I'd like to say this was relevant or creepy but it was more like something a 6 year old is scared of and had no bearing on the story whatsoever.

Finally we come to the reason for the hauntings and murder (do ghosts commit murder?). Turns out emo ghost was once a flesh and blood woman married to some guy. Emo woman had an obsession with her old university professor and wrote him letter after letter outlining the depths of her stalker-ness. Jelly and rubber rockets were involved I believe. So anyway, the husband guy finds her obsession diary and goes crazy; killing emo lady, their son and even the cat. I'd like to mention the cat is killed in their bathroom, please insert wet pussy joke here. Husband hangs himself and this whole story is kicked off. Unfortunately. As an aside, professor guy comes by and sees the bodies then throws himself off a building. Professor guy was Bill Pullman so this can be viewed as a 'good thing'.

Back in the present, Buffy rushes to the house to save her doe eyed boyfriend - only to fail horribly and start a fire that burns his body along with the ghost. Oh wait, no she doesn't. The firemen come along and put the fire out, so emo ghost is free to kill and kill again. Movie ends with the ghost standing behind Buffy, probably on the cusp of making a cutting remark. Cut to credits. Get it - cutting, emo? No? Ok, roll score.

4/10 - The Grudge is not a frightening film, nor is it an interesting film. It falls onto the heap that includes overrated crap like The Ring and Session 9, medicore movies that do nothing new and throw up 'scares' not fit for anyone over the age of 6. I've seen scarier episodes of Land Before Time. Littlefoot, watch out for the sharptooth! SNAP! Er, TV off now kids.

I'm really sad because the music told me to be!

These guys are happy because they haven't wasted their night watching two shitty movies. Lucky bastards.

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.

Getting in with Leslie Vernon

Today I’m going to review a little movie called Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon. I’m not a huge slasher movie fan, while I will watch them occasionally if they seem interesting they don’t usually yank my goat. I see them as to much ho and hum but this one piqued my curiosity. I’d heard some good things about it so I decided to check it out. Well I came away thinking, hey that was pretty good.

Your singing into your beer makes my ears hurt

The plot revolves around a small team of documentary film makers who are invited to follow Leslie Vernon who wants to give rise to a new horror legend such as Freddy Krueger and Jason Vorhees. Leslie is played quite well by Nathan Baesel and portrayed with a dual personality. Without the mask he eventually wears he is a likeable character who spouts Jim Carrey quotes and seems to be very disarming but his real motive is to find his heroin, the girl that will survive his slaughter to tell the world about him and the new legend. The film crew headed by Taylor Gentry (Angela Goethals) unwittingly become part of his scheme and as they follow his setup of the perfect “teen massacre” they begin to realise that they may be in to deep with a guy who isn’t just a ineffectual wacko but might be the real thing. A quite amusing casting is Leslies nemesis in the legend, Robert Englund who plays Dr Halloran. I had to laugh.

Let me save you with these two meat hooks!...oh dear...

There are plot holes, I mean really are the documentary filmers  this stupid…well obviously yes  and the ending does seem to just all fall into place a little too neatly but hey I didn’t mind in the end. There are kills and then some nudity…score. I’m a simple man at heart with simple needs.

In the end I enjoyed this movie. I give it a solid 6.5 (7.5 or higher if your a fan of slasher movies)  and a possible rise of a new horror legend…well maybe.

Gutterballs

Purile, pathetic, poorly performed, pointless, ponderous garbage.This movie and everyone involved in it can go fuck themselves for wasting my night.

0/10

Dirty Harry (1971)

Quick one today because I'm sick with the flu. I watched Dirty Harry last night, the original genre reviving classic starring Clint 'I get more bad ass as i get older' Eastwood. I imagine back in 1971 that this was quite the eye opener. Violence, plenty of (really bright red) blood, some nudity (including full frontal though the longest shot is of a dead girl and she's supposedly 14).

The story goes like this, crazy guy is shooting people from rooftops around the city and Dirty Harry has to stop him. Dirty Harry DOES stop him, but he does so in a way that makes all evidence inadmissible. Bollocks says Harry. The killer walks free and Harry sets out to stop him, any way he can.

As mentioned, this movie was a sensation when released and audiences were polarised between those that enjoyed the gritty new cop out to serve justice even if it meant breaking the rules, and those who didn't like the violence or 'facist' way Harry did his job. Remember, this came out when hippies were still interesting and the age of Aquarius was going to do something something. Today it all seems a little quaint when compared to the shows we see on prime time television. The new age did not usher in a world of semi-nudity on our streets, freedom from shaving your under-arms and hordes of namby pamby do-gooders who are more interested in following the rules than punishing the bad guy. Instead we just got more movies like Dirty Harry.

Where was going with this? Oh yeah, Dirty Harry is a 1970s cop film that has aged moderately well but by today's standards doesn't do anything exciting.

5/10 for not boring me completely.

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.

Raptor becomes a Role Model

So as conversations usually go with Gavor before they degenerate into abuse hurling we were talking about our content we have been posting up and how I’m not contributing enough to entice the main stream audience and putting up all my geek porn instead blah blah I stopped listening after that so fine! I’m now going to debase myself and put up something all you non geeks can enjoy, yes that’s right you mum. So with out further delay I bring you Raptors review of the Role Models. Roll tape.

Nothing says manly like a Minotaur costume

Role Models stars the ever amusing Paul Rudd who plays Danny Donahue, a man so dejected with his life and job as a Minotaur drinks promoter/youth speaker that he is on the verge of cracking. Mean while his fried Wheeler, played perfectly by Seann William Scott, as Danny's  side kick Minotaur mascot who loves his job as it gets him all the girls he could want. As the inevitable happens Danny cracks after one too many school presentations dragging and his friend down with him. Long suffering lawyer girlfriend played by the cute Elizabeth Banks manages to cut a deal where instead of jail they do community service with the judges favourite organisation, Sturdy Wings led by Gale Sweeny (Jane Lynch) a reformed druggy/whore/gangbanger/you name it she has snorted it or done it. Both Danny and Wheeler want their hours to be over as quickly as possible and no enthusiasm is lost in their new charity work which is being a mentor to kids who need a friend, sort of like a big brother program. Bring in the kids, played by Christopher Mintz-Plasse (Yes, McLovin himself) and Bobb’e J. Thompson. Chris’s character is a LAIR aficionado, sort of a mass costumed war role play game where players fight with padded weapons and who’s parents think is weird. Bobb’e plays a foul mouthed little shit. End of story.

Did you fart?

So as you would in a story like this the two adults don’t get along with the kids at the beginning and after some ups and downs they all come together to fight the tyrannical King Argotron of LAIR (played wickedly foppish by Ken Jeong).

Now I have to say Paul and Seann played their characters to a T and comedic chemistry was defiantly there. Pretty much the rest of the cast were good for it too and some of the LAIR scenes were hilarious. I cracked up continuously through this one and let’s face it; we all like a feel good happy ending. On a side note Paul Rudd was one of the screen writers on this so good work there. If you liked movies such as Super Bad, 40 Year old Virgin and Knocked Up this one is for you. I give it an 8/10 for comedy gold.

Taken (2008) - Revenge done hot and stabby

Sometimes a magical things happens when you watch a movie. You're in the right place at the right time and your mind frame is perfectly aligned with the theme of the movie you're about to watch (of course this also applies to other media like books and music). Such a happening came about the other day at 30,000 feet, winging it overseas on an impromptu work trip after arriving back home from a holiday just the day before. Three flights in 24 hours does nothing for my state of mind. The seemingly decent movies on offer were 12 rounds(or 10, or whatever), Watchmen (which I'd already seen), Gran Torino, Taken, The International and some other movie that escapes me now. Not a bad selection for a 9 hour flight.

I went for X Rounds first, figuring it would be mindless crap to fill 90 minutes and get me sleepy. Or drunk. Or both. It was mindless crap. Restless, tired and with only one beer in me; I was a touch cranky when I decided to watch Taken - a movie starring Liam Neeson(who I quite like)  and co-starring Liam Neeson's fists. Also co-starring was Famke Janssen who looks like Claudia Karven and features the same lack of breasts. See.

You could land a plane on that chest

So on with the review stuff - man, I loved this movie. Liam Neeson is an ex-CIA operative, Bryan, who left the agency and moved to be near his daughter in downtown somewhere-or-other, USA. The ex-wife (Jannsen) has re-married a really nice rich man who looks somewhat like Colonel Sanders, so perhaps she enjoys hot wings (excuse my poor innuendo). Bryan's daughter wants to get out and see the world(ignoring her cynical father's outlook on the global village) so she heads overseas with a friend and they're promptly kidnapped by  sex-slavers(is that a label you can apply to someone?). Great setup for this one too, Bryan is talking to his daughter on the phone when the girls are taken and the kidnapper just happens to find the phone after the girls are taken away.

Bryan: I don't know who you are. I don't know what you want. If you are looking for ransom, I can tell you I don't have money. But what I do have are a very particular set of skills; skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my daughter go now, that'll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don't, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.
Marko: [after a long pause] Good luck.

I think we all know what happens next. Bryan goes bat-shit crazy and destroys most of the European sex slave industry with his bare hands. Long story short...

Bryan: A friend gave this to me. Its Albanian. You mind translating it?
Marko: [translates paper] "Good luck".
Bryan: You don't remember me? We spoke on the phone two days ago. I told you I would find you.

That's solid gold revenge movie right there. Of course Marko isn't top of the pile and Bryan goes on to kill a bunch more people before the happy ending.

Neeson was great in this movie, the last before the untimely and tragic loss of his wife. Let's hope he can get back to a happy place and produce more entertaining movies like this one. Janssen was pretty good as the wife, I don't have a great deal of time for her but she always seems to put in a decent performance - plus I spent the whole movie thinking she was Claudia Karven and I like Claudia. Speaking of Australian actresses, that chick from Neighbours who went on to become a minor singing sensation, then disappear, was in it too. Holly Valance! Yeah, that's her.

By the time I'd finished enjoying this movie I couldn't end the flight on a down note so I went on to watch Watchmen. Important footnote(footnote: this footnote not inserted as a footnote): I thought they edited airline movies, but no, the lovely breasts were front and centre for all my fellow passengers to enjoy.

To sum up the movies I watched during the homeward leg; Gran Torino looked good but the sound was too quiet to be heard over the plane noise and The International was shithouse.

Taken - revenge action awesomeness distilled to perfection. 9/10 and a couple of metal rods shoved in your leg.

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.

Raptor Gets Saved

This is a little post viewing of Terminator 4: Salvation but I’m lazy, so sue me. So let’s beggin, does it have the deepest plot ever? No. Does it make you reflect on your life and change it for the better? Not really. Does it throw crazy SFX, action and thrills at you? Bloody hell yes. T4 Salvation was directed by McG who I’d never really heard of and from the looks of his imdb.com page hasn’t really done anything that’s interested me before hand…till now. Firstly I have to say that going into this movie I was expecting an action movie and it meet those expectations. Was it comparable to T1 and T2 and yes even T3. Absolutely and it delivered on exactly what was required, humans fighting robots and cyborgs on a grander scale with an “enemy within” story line. McG has done a great job at delivering a pop corn munching rata tat tat action that pretty much doesn’t let up.

Gavor has a man crush for Christian Bale. It's true he does. (Ed: No I don't)

Christian Bale as John Connor is great as usual, although he did lay the old gruff manly voice on a little thick. How many packs a day dude? His roles are always believable and I can’t fault him here. Sam Worthington is Marcus Wright who, in all reality, is playing the Arnie Terminator role but with emotions. Besides a few missteps with his accent he played quite the sympathetic anti hero and he kicked ass too which gives him a two thumbs up and whack across the head with a black rubber device. These two characters’ story lines crash together in the middle of this movie in mistrust and hatred but you know they will make it in the end by taking our the main Skynet facility together. Awww that’s nice. The other concurrent story line involves finding and saving a young and Idealistic Kyle Reese from T1, played by Anton Yelchin. Save Reese Save the world. Oh there is also Bryce Dallas Howard who plays Kate Conner, she doesn’t show up or do much and Moon Bloodgood as Marcuse’s romantic interest Blair Williams the super hot fighter jet pilot..super hot. Got it? Good.

The SFX were awesome. Giant robots Gatherers. Tick. Hunter killer motorbikes. Tick. T-600 and T800. Tick….WAIT! What the fuck did you say? T-800s? But that’s Arnie. He’s the governor of some meaningless state some where in a small backwater country called America. He can’t be in it. Yeah and nah. He isn’t in it but his image is in it and a pretty good job they did of it too mainly due to the Terminators not needing to show much emotion it wasn’t too much a CGI development stretch her but I did giggle excitedly when he appeared though. Shut up! Or I’ll kill you all!...ok calm now.

That's not a giant robot! That's my mother!

So let’s sum up. A great action movie with super SFX and serviceable plot that isn’t Shakespeare, which I give 8/10. Mostly due to the giant robot. Man it was big….Don’t look at me!!

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.

Jack Brooks Slays Raptor

Jack Brooks is a plumber. Jack Brooks has girlfriend problems. Jack brooks has anger management issues. Jacks Brooks kills monsters.

Does this remind anyone of National Lampoon's Vacation?

Let’s just say I love monster movies. Monster movies make me giggle like a school girl hanging upside down from some monkey bars showing her frilly panties for the boys. This was one of those fun, popcorn in your mouth monster movies. Kudos to the director and part writer Jon Knautz in keeping this a fun romp in the monster park. Have I used “monster” enough in this post enough? Never!

Let’s talk about Jack Brooks, played by Trevor Matthews to a T. When I say he has anger management issues, he has anger management issues even with his anger management. This all stems from seeing his family killed by some troll creature in the forest at a young age. This of course and the fact that he is a plumber means that he is fully equipped to deal with all kinds of nasties in and out of a toilet bowel. Trevor Matthews has made this character quite memorable in the vain of Ash of Evil Dead or Jack Burton of Big Trouble in Little China. I’m looking forward to a lot more of his roles in the future.

The next important cast member is Robert Englund, yes that’s right, Mother Fucking Freddy Yo. He plays Jack Brooks night class professor who happens to come across an ancient and evil heart in his back yard, as you do. After eating said heart he under goes quite the amusing transformation into, lets just say, a Ewwww. Yeah let’s say he transforms into an Ewwww. Mayhem ensues and the scene is set for Jack to save the day and get the girl….SPOILER: He gets the girl. Duuuh.

He gets the the girl, Ashley Bryant

 Now the SFX in Jack Brooks were al practical, which I don’t have a problem with here, and considering the low budget, done pretty well although at times a few extra dollars might have helped here and there.

Anyway, in the end I really enjoyed this one and recommend it to any monster aficionado. I give it a solid 8/10 and bring in Jack Brooks 2: Revenge of the Blockage.