Friend Request

"Friend Request" (2016, Simon Verhoeven, Warner Bros., Freestyle Releasing, Wiedemann & Berg Film, SevenPictures Film, Two Oceans Productions) is a supernatural horror centred around social media and a college campus.

Laura (Alycia Debnam-Carey) is a popular girl with over 800 social media friends. She lives off-campus with a group of pals and gets good grades. One day, she receives a friend invite from a reclusive girl in her class, Marina (Liesl Ahlers). Laura accepts the girl's request, seeing that she would become Marina's first friend... She even tries to connect in person. Big mistake. The girl becomes obsessed and takes very public umbridge when she is not invited to Laura's birthday dinner, vowing to get revenge on Laura for slighting her.

Laura gets freaked out and deletes Marina on social media. The next day news comes that Marina has committed suicide. Not just that, but she filmed it and the video has went viral about campus. In her death video, Marina publicly names Laura as the reason for her suicide. Laura's many friends begin to shun her and she soon suspects that she has been cursed...

The film has a good premise. Social media is the latest trend in horror lore, taking over from some of the older evil-technology films including the "Ring" series, etc... It does suffer from some bad scripting, some hammy scenes and a lot of tropes: of course the recluse is a goth, of course she is an orphan...

It's all very by-the-numbers, but is perfect for its target audience - teens who may just be getting into horror. As an established horror fan, it falls a little flat to me, but I don't believe I'm in their intended demographic. Whilst that does make the film suffer a little, it does deliver some good scenes and a strong, if flawed, message about being careful who you add on social media, and how much of yourself you put out there. You just never know what will be used against you.

[Image: Warner Bros., et al]

Hani

Shrooms

"Shrooms" (2007, Paddy Breathnatch, Vertigo Films, Capitol Films) is a film about taking hallucinogenics...

A group of American college students go on a camping trip in Ireland and take a lot of hallucinogenic mushrooms... After telling some scary stories by the campfire the group retire, but Tara (Lindsey Haun), takes a deathcap mushroom which causes her to have seizures and begin to see a creepy figure stalking them all. As the night progresses, Tara witnesses the deaths of her friends at the hands of the creepy creature... Or, is she just tripping?

A trope heavy feature with some heavy handed scripting and a meandering plot with some obvious twists. The trippy atmosphere is effective considering the subject matter, however, it does make the the already slow plot seem even slower. It's a film about taking mind-bending mushrooms, but a slightly more coherent plot could have saved what was a promising film with some good, if tropey, jump scares.

[Image: Capitol Films]

Hani

Holidays

"Holidays" (2016, Kevin Smith, Gary Shore, Adam Egypt Mortimer, Scott Stewart, Nicholas McCarthy, Dennis Widmyer and Kevin Kolsch, Sarah Adina Smith and Anthony Scott Burns, Distant Corners Entertainment, XYZ Films) is a horror anthology inspired by different well-known Western holidays and celebrations.

Valentine's Day
A bullied teenaged girl has a crush on her swim coach and decides to get him something gruesome to show her feelings...

The characters are quite well built up in this short with a fun, if slightly predictable end. But the run time is very short in order to fit in the whole calendar and so the short suffers a little by having to pack everything in quickly, losing some of the pacing.

St. Patrick's Day
A teacher tries to make a withdrawn new child come out of her shell. The child informs her that she will only smile when she makes the teacher's deepest wish come true and leaves a small snake emblem on the desk. Over time, the teacher's wish comes true, but maybe not the way she really wanted.

A short that has some really good, creepy elements and a lot of potential, but just didn't have much to do with St. Patrick's day (other than snakes) and managed to feel oddly longer than the other shorts. It didn't pack the punch that the plot deserved.

Easter
A little girl sneaks downstairs the night before Easter to catch the Easter Bunny delivering her eggs, only he is not what she anticipated, and there is a penalty for seeing him in the flesh...

Probably the most successful short of this anthology, the plot packs a nice punch but the small run time and budget also limit it.

Mother's Day
A woman who cannot stop becoming pregnant every time she has sex is taken hostage by a coven of women who cannot have children.

A pretty horrific premise, but the short was a bit artsy and dithery and then switched direction completely again.

Father's Day
A woman finds an old cassette tape from her deceased father and listens to it. The voice on the tape takes her down memory lane (he recorded it whilst out walking with her younger self years before) and then asks her to go to a special location to meet him...

A beautifully made short that came together into an emotive piece. However, the time limit again robbed the plot of the finale it deserved and made the rest of the build up seem wasted.

Halloween
A douchebag who runs a pay-per-view webcam porn site using ladies he's lied to as his cam stars meets his deserving demise at the hands of his victims. Oh, and it's also set on Halloween.

This is the Kevin Smith piece. I like Kevin Smith, but his work can be very hit or miss for me. This one was a miss. My main problem with it was that it had very little to do with Halloween; the most horror-centric holiday on the calendar and you take it to this generic, anytime of year gore-fest. Talk about wasted opportunity. The short also tried to be funny, and also be serious and didn't seem to know what it was.

Christmas
Seth Green and Clare Grant star in this virtual reality/jingle-all-the way inspired piece. A man goes to extremes to ensure he gets the latest gadget for his family's Christmas; a UVU virtual reality visor which shows you the real you. However, he and his family may not be too comfortable with their real selves, or each other's selves once they plug in...

A good concept with some good scenes that are again reminiscent of older festive films. Although it wasn't the most engaging short in the bunch, it did its job.

New Year's Eve
A serial girlfriend murderer sets out to welcome in the new year his way....

A good short with some gore and a nice twist. It rounded off the anthology on a high after some obvious lows.

This anthology is a mixed bag containing a lot of misses. There's no enveloping story which could have brought it together and each segment is very short (even by anthology standards) and has to round off quickly often taking away from each piece's story somewhat. Some segments are better than others, but certainly none jumped out enough at me to make me want to rewatch this film again. I think each director was trying too hard to make their segment the 'weirdest' of the bunch and many veered too far away from their core holiday, losing the point of the film.

There are better anthologies out there which make this one look like a film student's 2nd year project.

[Image: XYZ Films]

Hani

Street Trash

"Street Trash" (1987, J. Michael Muro, Street Trash Joint Venture, Lightning Pictures) is a bad taste body horror film about homeless people based in New York.

A liquor store owner discovers a case of old, cheap booze called Viper in his stock which has gone bad. But he decides to sell it cheap to the local homeless community. Unfortunately, Viper
causes anyone who drinks it to gruesomely melt to death.

The cops are trying to find the cause of these puddle-y deaths and also deal with Vietnam vet, Bronson, who has taken over the local junkyard as his own private, hobo kingdom.

A strange splatter film that makes other splatter films look sensible. This is definitely my favourite film about melting New York hobos... Possibly because it's also the only one! Gross, stupid and crude this film is just insane to the max.

The effects are daft, with the men and women melting into gooey primary colours, but also gross with body parts sagging off and splattering all over the place. The characters are oddly funny and sad and the film enjoys a grimy shock factor.

Some scenes of note include an excellent chase scene and a game of 'keep away' with a severed member instead of a lunchbox and a lady melting boobs first into a gooey mess.

Weird. So very, very weird.

[Image: Lightning Pictures]

Hani

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)

"Invasion of the Body Snatchers" (1956, Don Siegel, Walter Wanger Productions, Allied Artists Pictures) is a film noir-esque, sci fi film about plant-like aliens which can create a realistic replica of any human and replace that person. The only flaw being the replica's complete lack of normal human emotion. The film is the inspiration behind the phrase "pod people".

When people begin to say that loved ones are being replaced by identical copies Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) begins to suspect that there is more going on than a case of Capgras delusion! He and his ex-girlfriend, Becky Driscoll (Dana Wynter), begin to investigate the supposed mass hysteria, when they make an unusual discovery: a half-formed replica of someone they know!

Soon they realise they are surrounded as they desperately try to escape and save humanity!

A thrilling and poignant sci-fi caper which has been interpreted as capturing several underlying themes, including the 50s era fear of communism and an illustration of McCarthyism.

Themes and messages aside, this film was one of the way-pavers for films like "Night of the Living Dead" (1968) and all of today's apocalyptic, dystopian-world films. And all with very little on-screen violence and very few visual effects, aside from some human-sized seed pods!

The film remains a very watchable, very enjoyable piece of sci-fi and you will also spot Carolyn Jones who, in the 60s, went on to give her ever-memorable performance as the darkly ethereal Morticia Addams.

Definitely worth a watch!

[Image: Allied Artists Pictures, et al]



Hani

Dawn of the Dead (2004)

"Dawn of the Dead" (2004, Zack Snyder, Strike Entertainment, New Amsterdam Entertainment, Metropolitan Filmexport) is the remake of the 1978 Romero film.

Ana (Sarah Polley) is a nurse who comes home from a long shift to have her quiet night in ruined by the sudden zombie virus outbreak. Terrified, she leaves her home and comes across another small group of survivors. Together they take up refuge in the local shopping mall along with a group of inhospitable security guards. Quickly, however the mall is surrounded by the undead, attracted by the living treats within and the group have to decide what to do.

An uncommonly good modern remake with a good balance of gore, action and plot to keep the viewer entertained. The film also enjoys a good score and soundtrack. Despite a relatively large group of characters, there is enough familiarity built up to make some of their deaths feel like a loss and for the viewer to root for the demise of a select few.

Although the film does not convey the same deeper message of the original, it does create a good ride and allows enough adrenaline pumping scenes to make it a genre favourite.

[Image: Strike Entertainment, et al]

Hani

31

"31" (2016, Rob Zombie, Bow + Arrow Entertainment, PalmStar Media, Protagonist Pictures, Spectacle Entertainment Group, Windy Hill Pictures, Saban Films) is the latest Rob Zombie horror picture.

A group of carnival workers are travelling in their van on Halloween morning 1976 when they are captured by a group of mysterious people and are then forced to play a "Running Man"-esque survival game called "31" (after the date). The aim of the game is to survive for 12 hours while battling murderous, torture-obsessed maniacs with clown paint on, wielding weapons. The game appears to be for the amusement (and gambling interests) of a group of madcap aristocrats lead by Malcolm McDowell.

The film has the same chaotic feeling that most of Rob Zombie's film enjoy with sudden scenes of violence split by scenes of random banter between the characters. However, the overall effect is less easy to follow than his previous films with a major flaw for me being there were so many characters to begin with, especially since it became apparent that a lot of these characters weren't required and are quickly lost in the confusing capture scene. There wasn't enough personality built up around these surplus characters to make them an emotional loss either, so I didn't feel their demise to be of any significance.

The settings are familiar: dusty back roads of America, big empty warehouse... The jump from one to the other is jarring and seems almost like 2 separate films. Zombie has also paid homage to Rocky Horror, Texas Chainsaw Massacre and other genre favourites, but some scenes seem more like replication than actual homage.

The action and kill scenes are good viewing, but our protagonists leap a little too easily into the roles of survival killing machines against supposed professional maniacs. The villains are colourful but would have benefited from some more screen time.

I did really enjoy main villain, Doom Head (Richard Brake), who, although very chatty, had a really effective menace to his character on top of being very violent and giving a good monologue.

As did Zombie's "The Devil's Rejects", "31" features a good group of familiar and established cult and genre faces including Meg Foster (she of the mesmerising eyes in "They Live" and more recently, "Pretty Little Liars") amongst a cast of many others. The acting is good, but the style of scripting sometimes makes the aforementioned banter seem less comfortable between characters.

All in all, it will certainly not be overtaking "House of 1000 Corpses" as my favourite Rob Zombie film and suffers from a few pitfalls, but it had the gore and action to bring it back.

[Image: Bow + Arrow Entertainment, et al]

Hani