Back in the early 90s, I would occasionally babysit the kids next door to get some extra cash (or any for that matter, as I was trying to find a work/life balance between schooling, job hunting, and friction at home). Amongst their collection of VHS tapes there was a copy of Warlock, and I don’t…
Tag: effects
Friday the 13th (2009) – Marcus Nispel
In 2009 Paramount Pictures and Warner Brothers (who own New Line Cinema) working with the production company Platinum Dunes gave us a soft reset on the Jason Voorhees (Derek Mears) story and did their best to up the gore and nudity. The script seems to want to be a combination of the first three films,…
Saturn 3 (1980) – Stanley Donen, and John Barry
Gorgeous set and production design can’t save a film with a number of top drawer stars (Kirk Douglas, Farrah Fawcett, and Harvey Keitel) thanks to a heavily edited final cut, and flawed story. Not to mention some miniature and model work that may have worked in the 50s but looks incredibly bad in the 80s,…
Freddy vs. Jason (2003) – Ronny Yu
After the mess that was Jason X, Freddy vs. Jason, the film that horror fans had been waiting for, ends up being pretty damned entertaining, despite some inconsistencies in tone, effects, and in-universe continuity. Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) has been forgotten, so he seeks a way to bring fear back to the young people of…
Phantasm: Ravager (2016) – David Hartman
For the first time, Don Coscarelli lets someone else in the director’s chair for an entry in the Phantasm series (could you imagine a reboot, or a television series rework of this?) though he had his hand in the script as well as producing. Reggie (Reggie Bannister), Michael (A. Michael Baldwin), Jody (Bill Thornbury) and…
Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives (1986) – Tom McLoughlin
Jason (C.J. Graham) is back for another go around, as he gets resurrected and is now a truly unstoppable killer. Tommy Jarvis (Thom Matthews – the third actor to play the role, another problem that causes a lack of empathy and continuity with the character) is no longer in a mental institution, but he’s still…
Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985) – Danny Steinmann
1985 gave us perhaps the worst entry in the Friday the 13th franchise. The fifth film, in the series, delivers us a Jason movie without Jason in it. The story picks up a half a decade (?) after the previous film as Tommy (played by Corey Feldman in the previous film, and briefly in this…
Edge of Tomorrow (2014) – Doug Liman
Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt, Brendan Gleeson and Bill Paxton star in this fun sci-fi action film that plays like an alien war version of Groundhog Day. Cruise stars as Cage, a major in the American army, working as a media adviser, following the beginnings of an alien attack that has taken over most of Europe….
The Twonky (1953) – Arch Oboler
I venture into a new section of DK Books’ Monsters in the Movies, one dealing with monstrous machines, and the first one I encounter is a sentient television set in The Twonky. This kind of sci-fi comedy is probably more relevant today, when seen through the lens of mobile phones and modern technology, instead of…
Monsters (2010) – Gareth Edwards
It’s time for another close encounter with alien beings in the next title from DK Canada’s Monsters in the Movies, this time, the creature’s are earthbound, and despite the titles are they really monsters? Or perhaps it’s the humans who are the monsters? Six years ago a space probe returning to earth with samples of…
Child’s Play (1988) – Tom Holland
For kids of the 80s is there a more terrifying killer doll than Chucky as seen in director Tom Holland’s 1988 film? It’s been awhile since I’d seen this one, so when it popped up in DK Canada’s Monsters in the Movies I was excited to see how it stood the test of time. Long…
Dante’s Inferno (1935) – Harry Lachman
Spencer Tracy gets a glimpse of hell in the next title featured in DK Books’ Monsters in the Movies, Dante’s Inferno. Tracy plays Carter, a forceful and determined young man, who finds success and a pathway to greed, avarice and more when he joins a concessionaire run by Pop McWade (Henry B. Walthall). After a…
