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.

A very special episode of PIS Movie Review - Movie round-up

Welcome to PIS movie round-up episode 1. In PIS movie round-up I'll cover, in brief, some of the movies I watched less recently (and so am a bit sketchy on) and titles I really can't be bothered going the whole hog with. Grab yourself a rubber device, settle back and enjoy...

Dead Birds - A bunch of wild west characters end up in a haunted house and the ghosts kill them off one by one. I watched this little flick alone with all the lights off, well, alone if you don't count the beer. Dead Birds is honestly the only movie to creep me out for over an hour and I had to take a break at the halfway point because it was just so intense. Sadly, the last act of the movie is a bit of a mess and lessens an otherwise well constructed and scary movie. 6.5/10

Body of Lies - I'm a married man with two kids but for some reason DiCaprio does it for me. Like Blood Diamonds, which I also enjoyed, Body of Lies is a well constructed movie with few surprises but plenty of tense scenes, good acting and top action. I forget the plot but it was something to do with terrorists and pineapples...or similar. Anyhow, worth a look. Better then a turban in the eye. 7/10

Benders Game- Cocking disappointing after the larb that were the first two Futurama movies. Benders Game was sorely lacking in laughs, jumped around and had no place in the overall narrative of the four movies. Bollocks of the highest order but perhaps better if served with cheese and vodka. 5/10

Balls of Fury- Surprisingly un-entertaining. I think this is the one with the table tennis, Christopher Walken and hot chick. Umm. That's it really. The chick was hot. 4/10

Rambo (the new one) - John Rambo kills the entire Burmese army with arrows and knives and shit. If you're a male this movie makes you believe in miracles, much like Sliding Doors or Sleepless in Seattle does for women (or whatever movies are big with women these days). When Stallone gets on the big shooter at the end you realise there's nowhere else for action movies to go, this is the pinnacle. For that reason only I have to dock points, Rambo ruins every action movie that will ever be made from this day forward. 8/10

Doomsday - I love post apocalyptic movies. I didn't like this. I think. Memory is a bit vague. Better go watch it yourself. To be on the safe side I'll include a picture and a 3/10.

Doomsday - Breasts and fire.....actually, I think I was a bit harsh on this movie

 Outpost- Nazi zombies kill mercs. Shit ending - I really fucking hate the trend of most horror movies these days to end on a down note. Everyone dies...wow, dramatic. 5/10

Abominable- Badly made costume attacks nubile girls and crippled guy. Costs were kept down by using the monster suit from Harry and the Hendersons. Some breasts. 3/10

And that about wraps it up. Join me next time for more movie reviewing brevity!

Raptor throws up on Feast 3

What the fuck! I could end the review on that. Just What the Fuck!! Lets add some more exclamation marks too !!!!!. Now before I begin lets talk about the first Feast movie directed by Mike Tristano. I loved this movie. It was original, clever and funny and while it slapped the audience in the face at times it didn’t take them for granted. Great movie. Well done….so back to Feast 3: The happy Finish. What the Fuck!

I guess she saw the movie

I hated this movie. I rarely say that but I just walked away from this thinking this was the worst pile of dog crap that ever crept out of some mangy bitch with piles. I didn’t care about the main characters and when someone rocked up that you though hey, this may go somewhere, they get killed…again…and again….aaaaand again. “But” I hear you say, “that’s the point of the movie, it goes against type”. The point is it has no point? Are you kidding me? My two year old nephew could write a script better than this. And then there is the ending….let me just say What the Fuck! The few saving graces were some nudity and some funny gore gags and FX. That’s about it.

 This movie was a whole excuse for the writers being unable to come up with anything intelligible. Let’s just say that Feast 3 left me unsatisfied and calling for some Pepto-Bismol for a case of A grade heart burn. 2/10.

Dead Heat (1988)

Not pictured: nudity. Crazy, I know.

Dead Heat - starring Treat Williams, Joe Piscopo and Vincent Price (in one of his last roles) - is a horror/comedy vehicle from the director that brought you the 1989 version of The Punisher and also edited a bunch of pretty good movies. Mark Goldblatt in case you're interested.

In a nutshell, Dead Heat revolves around two cops and a machine that brings the dead back to life. From what I could understand the character played by Vincent Price was swindling rich old people into giving up half their fortune in exchange for eternal life, the catch being that those brought back to life only lived for 12 or so hours before melting into goo. Of course that part wasn't demonstrated to the captive and above all cashed up audience.

The movie zings along at a decent pace. Characters appear and are then slaughtered off screen, the action is okay, the jokes are horrendously bad and the acting is pretty abysmal. The one exception to this is Treat Williams, who I found far more believable than any of the others. Overall it was a budget 80s cop flick only with zombies instead of Colombians, Mexicans, Italians or whatever culture we're making fun of at the time.

What I did enjoy were the effects, prosthetics and general level of technical expertise. In particular the Chinatown butcher scene is awesome, well thought out and kind of horrific. Sadly though, an interesting premise and good effects were wasted with a crap script and horrible acting. Perhaps a remake should be on the cards using an all new script that exploits that central idea and builds a bunch of clever scenes like the Chinatown scene. Throw in some good jokes, decent actors and an underlying theme that explores the feelings of those brought back to life yet facing death again - and we have a winner. Someone send me lots of money and I'll get right on it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iq90fHRJOiA - Trailer

5/10 - Dead Heat had some potential, but ultimately it's a dead duck.

Oh and the ending was fucking terrible. I think I had a 6/10 in mind until I saw the ending.

Star Trek (2009)

Watching a new Star Trek movie and knowing that frothing masses of people holding plastic tricorders milled around cinemas worldwide in their pyjamas waiting for the midnight showing while I just wandered in on a whim with no knowledge of what the movie was all about makes me feel a little bit as if I'm missing the point of something grand. A little bit. Mostly I feel like a better person for it as I drop change in their tin cup then go about with my cushy life.

But anyway, enough with comparing Star Trek fans to bums, on with the review. As hinted above I knew next to nothing about the movie before watching it; the crew was all new, it was a 'reboot' and that guy from Heroes was in it. Speaking of the cast, we have Chris Pine replacing Shatner as Kirk (not do-able, but he tried), the above mentioned Heroes guy - Zachary Quinto - as Spock (who did a pretty good job) aaaand Simon Pegg as Scotty. Standing in as generic bad guy is Eric Bana playing Nero, an angry Romulan with a mining ship more powerful than the death star. Kirk's father was played by an Australian actor once seen in Home and Away. This amused me very much since the last time I saw him was on an advertisement for said soap opera - wearing board shorts and staring seriously at the horizon in true soap opera fashion. Either he was considering cosmic issues you and I could not possibly understand, or he really needed to shit and couldn't remember where the toilets were.

Star Trek cast posing for a shot at the after party

I'm not going to bother with the other cast or characters because either I don't know the actor, don't know much about the character, or the character they played was relatively minor. Suffice to say that I was happy with the performances and nothing stood out as crap acting from the Martin Lawrence school of 'oh god what is he doing??!'.

Basically the plot is this (STOP READING NOW if you're one of those whiney 'no spoilers' idiots). A small ship captained by Kirk's father is blown up by a larger ship captained by Darth Vader but someone central to the overall plot is rescued by being shoved in an escape pod. Later, the young and rebellious man - let's call him Luke though his real name is Jim - joins Starfleet and is mentored by an older guy. Then along comes Vader...no wait I should consult my notes...Nero actually, and Nero uses his mighty death star to destroy a planet (the Vulcan home planet - that might be important to know). Did I mention that Nero is from the future? Well he is and by coming to the past, pursuing an old Spock by the way, he creates an alternate trouser of time thereby justifying and explaining this reboot of the Star Trek universe. Neat idea. I'll leave out the reasons for all of this just in case you missed the spoiler warning and are busy composing a bile filled comment about how I ruined your day. Before you do please allow me the courtesy of  saying fuck you and let's move on.

In the end the plucky crew fly their banged-up ship to the rescue and everything is good again.

So down to it. What I really enjoyed was seeing how the various crew members met and what brought Kirk to Captain-ship at such a young age. The story was okay and the SFX quite good so if you're looking for some enjoyable sci-fi, regardless of whether you even know what a tricorder is, check out Star Trek.

On a side note - I'm normally a really hard marker and difficult to please but lately I've seen some bloody entertaining new releases and Star Trek is one of them. Therefore, so people don't think I'm a soft reviewer, I won't be reviewing any of those great movies for a while - if ever. Instead you can look forward to such greats as Lifeforce, Rise of the Reeker and the new Punisher movie.

8.5/10: The new Star Trek really did go to the final frontier, entertaining me. Damn you Abrams.

Disclaimer: While writing this I came across a cool video demonstrating the similarities between A New Hope and this Star Trek movie. I unashamedly borrowed some concepts from that video for this review. 

Raptors Take

I like 'em Star Trek movie a lota. Beam me up! 9/10

Berserk for X-Men Origins: Wolverine

 I have to say I am a comic book geek.  Iron Man, Kapow! The Hulk, Smash! X-Men, Boom! So when I heard that X-Men Origins: Wolverine was going to be made I was like a giggling little school girl with too much candy at her tea party. So what did I think? Does anyone care? Of course you do! It was great. For those that wanted to see Wolverine go sick on some bad guys asses (in a purely plutonic way of course) then this is the movie for you.

Ok now give me EMO! Yes! Yes! You dirty monkeys!

 

The Actors: Hugh Jackman is a perfect Wolverine (Logan). I couldn’t imagine anyone else barring myself in the role. I honestly believe he enjoys playing an un-killable guy with metal claws, the sick little monkey. Liev Schreiber plays Victor Creed (Sabertooth), Wolverines brother, and I’m glad he did. He brings a subtle menace to the performance and a feeling of unpredictable violence. Good choice I say.  William Stryker is played by Danny Huston, who I loved as the head vampire in 30 Days of Night. In here he is ruthless and manipulative just like you’d expect him to be. Now some misgivings on casting, Ryan Reynolds, What the fuck! He was in it for like 10 mins. His dry witty sense of humour was great but in the end I wanted to see more. To bad. Also Dominic Monaghan from Lord of the Rings fame as Bolt was one of the guys which I was hoping would make it a little longer. Oh SPOLER ALERT! Bah too late. We also get some guest appearances from other mutants such as Cyclops (Scott Summers) as a kid and Charles Xavier which tie in this to the X-Men Trilogy quite nicely.  Oh and finally Gambit played adequately by Taylor Kitsch was a bit of left field fun.

Where's my rubber ducky!

The pace of Wolverine is pretty good. It did let up a little during the middle where we had Logan living the happy life for a little while, awwwe isn’t that nice, just before the inevitable screwing over and we get to see Wolverine go schytzo again. Yay, my moneys worth. At the beginning of the movie we delve into Wolverines past and his relationship with his brother Creed. While both are angry old men, Creed revels in the violence and doesn’t deny his base nature that eventually ends in them parting ways. The end fight scenes are awesome with Wolverine, Creed and Weapon X all at it and had me cheering for more schnikitta schnik action.

So was Wolverine the best movie I had ever seen, ever? No, but it was a lot of fun, with a few misgivings here and there that I could easily overlook. So for my rating I give X-Men Origins: Wolverine a solid Comic Geek 8/10.

Raptor Gets a Splinter…Groan

Prostate exam?!?

For my first movie I’m going to be reviewing Splinter (2008), an indie flick directed by Toby Wilkins. The movie is about two college students who are wrangled up by two crims on the run from the law and end up at a gas station which happens to be the local hang out for a crazy arse parasite.

So to start, lets just say I loved this film. The plot kept me involved, the actors were pretty good and overall it was kept in the realms of the believable without going too far out or into any clichés.

Now, I'm a huge monster movie fan and this monster was reminiscent of both Ridly Scotts Alien and John Carpenters The Thing, both great movies. Lets look at the Alien similarities; you didn’t see the monster much and when you did it was quick glimpses or a blurry look. This would have to be due to the movies low budget but damn it, it worked. I found myself craning to see it around corners and thinking, "what the heck is that blur over there - dear god save me now! Oh…no I’m fine". On The Thing reference, the creature was grounded in reality which can make for great monsters. It’s a parasite that after entering the blood stream begins to take over the host and distort and shape them by breaking bones and twisting flesh. It’s attracted to heat and will mindlessly go after anything it sees as alive including cars and fire. It also has a few other surprises but let leave them for you.

Bottom line, I give this move a solid 7.5. I minused 1 for lack of nudity since I always go into a horror movie hoping the main actress will get her kit off. Also another minus a .5 for not having Arnold Schwarzenegger save the day. I also believe that a bigger budget would have decreased this movie but hey, I’m game. Go the big budget crap sequel!

Night of the Demons

I'm going to kick this off with two movies: one that is occasionally called a classic by those who don't get out much, and another that will probably become a bit of a classic...to people who don't get out much. Let's start with the older one - Night of the Demons.

To give you an indication of how much I enjoyed this movie let's just say I watched it in two parts (partly because of how much I liked it and partly because my 18 month old woke up).

Summing up in three words I would describe the movie as 'really, really boring'. Another three words that accurately reflect the movie are 'piece of shit'. I expected gore, demons and nudity; what I saw was a bunch of teenagers wandering aimlessly for 90 minutes spouting generic dialogue, intercut with demons standing still baring their teeth. One would expect a certain amount of demonic showboating, but these guys always stood still for the exact amount of time required that the protagonist could get the screaming over with and hightail it out of there. Every now and then a mediocre death was thrown in. Some nudity happened also. That's my review.

Night of the Demons is a solid 1/10 for being made, 4 bonus points for breasts and some flange, minus 2 for boring the shit out of me.

3/10 - Crap 80s horror with few redeeming features

I live, Again

So this where we will be blogging our movie reviews <looks around> hmmm it could do with some touch ups but I can work with it.

Your critics for this journey into ineptitude will be Gavor and Raptor.  Expect witness....um....like serious issues affecting man...and er some movies reviews that will be controversial and hopefully explicit. Yay explicit!

Oh by the way this was all Gavors idea so I blame him.

Coming soon, my first crappy PIS Movie review.

- Raptor