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DarleneHamilton
Reviews
Tom Holland's Twisted Tales (2014)
Oh dear oh dear
I have loved anthologies for a long time and have seen lots but this was SO BAD! You can check my other reviews and see I have no issue with low budget movies and underground stuff so when I say I could not make it through this.....I got to the Bite segment and gave up. The Amber Benson segment was awful, the one with Danielle Harris and William Forsythe was okay and the Ray Wise one was good but the actors are all of a high calibre. No offense to Amber Benson's acting but it wasn't strong enough to save her segment.
How the guy who made my beloved Childs Play and Fright Night could also be responsible for this unmitigated drivel I do not know.
So sorry
Crawlspace (2012)
It's fine for what it is
This movie us weirdly retro, it has a Stepford Kids/Stepfather/people Across the Lake feel to it, I had to double check it was 2013 as it feels so dated! I'm not saying that as a negative btw.) It's far from the worst film I've ever seen. It was reasonably well acted, script was quite cringeworthy, mildly gory, there was some sex, (one with no boobs and one with boobs) usual highly implausible execution but it's a budget horror movie so I'll let it go. Usual horror flick rules apply, eg- don't over analyse the plot or ask how this can possibly be going on. How can people go missing and no - one notices.
Standard home invasion, enjoyable and disposable. Corny and charming.
4.5/10
Community (2012)
Uniquely British
CLEARLY MARKED MILD SPOILER
This seems to be one of those movies where you either you get it or you don't. It's uniquely British in that it deals with a British setting, the current Daily Mail readers fear of those pesky hoodies and treats it all with a British sense of humour. The initial set up is creepy before turning into a black comedy in the same vein as Jam and League of Gentlemen. The leads are pleasantly good looking in that vacant, generic 'Skins' way, all the character is provided by Terry Bird (who is fantastic as Dumpy) and Paul McNealy as Auntie.
SPOILERS ***
There's a scene where he removes his wig and speaks to Isabelle in his real voice and tells her how he discovered the secret of his weed and it is a amazing piece of work
SPOILER ENDS ***
To sum up, this movie is nowhere as bad as the reviews say, these people are either not Brits or have a very light sense of humour. It is also not a 'drugs are bad' movie. It's a pastiche, parody and mockery of the Daily Mail way of thinking with some random horror thrown in.
I was actually surprised by the twist too
Citadel (2012)
It's social commentary at the root but don't let that stop you
Only spoilers if you don't want to know anything
A man and his wife live in a sink estate tower block, at the start the horror is set where some kids (in the 10-14 age bracket) crowd his wife and beat her while he's stuck in the lift by the time he gets back up she is unconscious and a syringe is stuck in her very pregnant belly, she is in a coma but the baby was delivered safe and unharmed. 9 months passes and the man has developed agoraphobia, he visits his comatose wife at a hospice daily until she has to have her life support switched off. A nurse pities him and tells him that she's there if he needs to talk and gives him her number, a Priest from the hospice is at the funeral of the mans wife and tells him that the kids who attacked his wife will come for the man's baby daughter and that he is an idiot for still living on the estate. Sure enough he cannot get off the estate after handing in his keys and is forced to break into his old home and squat the night. The same kids break in and try to take the baby and that's when the man must accept that he will not be safe.
As a horror it has lots of unanswered questions but as social commentary it's flawless. The writer was actually attacked and developed agoraphobia so presumably this movie was cathartic, it's the Jeremy Kyle type hyperbole made up of middle class fear and is rooted in the belief that people on council estates are sub-human scum (as peddled by the tabloids) the movie points out that neither the left nor the right has the best plan for it but rather you must just accept that crap will happen and the best way to get on is to attack those who attack you and don't assume that all people who look like scum will be scum.
Like I said it's a movie about class wars and victim empowerment mostly however if you ignore that and choose to focus on it as a horror it's creepy, unsettling and downright awesome.