Your move (2017)

Director: Luke Goss
Starring: Luke Goss, Robert Davi, Luis Gatica .USA/Mexico. 1h 36m

Tell me if you’ve heard this before.. a man manages to remotely catch the violent abduction of his loved ones, but this man has a unique art of skills and some dodgy connections and he’ll do anything to get his loved ones back. It’s not another part of the Taken (2008) universe but a poor relation to the revenge genre, written and directed by Luke Goss.

I have to admit that it’s not a terrible attempt for a debut movie, but for someone who has a wealth of direct to DVD movies under his belt, along with co-starring in some major movies, I’d have expected a lot more from him being behind the camera. It would be a common assumption that something from Guillermo Del Toro would have worn off on him from their work together in both sequels to Hellboy (2004) and Blade (1998)??

Motorrad / Motorbike (2017)

Director: Vicente Amorim
Starring: Carla Salle, Pablo Sanábio, Juliana Lohmann, Emílio de Mello, Guilherme Prates .Brazil . 1h 32m

The wonderful set up for this movie is filled with mysterious characters and a mythical folkloric wonderment that builds up Amorim’s film into a pensive dark thriller just to be doused by blood and sinew by the final scenes in what could have been the premiere gore soaked Brazilian thriller of the year.

Starting out with a strange sequence that see’s a young man creep into what seems to be an abandoned workshop, he finds a rare and valuable component on a bike being worked on and attempts to steal it, it burns a pattern into his hand as he’s literally caught red handed, a wisen old man rambles on about a fabled curse on those who are willing to steal for vanity and selfish reasons but a beautiful young woman eventually takes pity on him. But is it too late for him or is this a question of the soul.

The Wildling (2018)

Director: Fritz Böhm.
Starring: Bel Powley ,Brad Dourif, Collin Kelly-Sordelet, James LeGros, Liv Tyler. USA. 1h 32m.

Strangely this movie reminds me of Teen Wolf (1985), in a roundabout way it’s very much a coming of age Werewolf movie and yet speaks poetic volumes for a reawakening of feminity for anyone who feels a call for the wild.

Anna (Powley) grows up confined in a room in a remote house in the woods, looked after by her Daddy (Dourif) who is keeping her safe from the Wildlings, strange creatures with folklorish natures who stalk the woods. As Anna matures she starts noticing differences, as many girls do, although a dreaded fear sets in to her Daddy and he starts injecting her in the stomach with an unknown substance (although if I learnt anything from Ginger Snaps (2000) then this is a Wolfsbane concoction). This only slows down her development but doesn’t stop it, eventually it leads to Daddy attempting to commit suicide but it goes drastically wrong and Anna is rescued by mild and ever caring Sheriff Ellen Cooper (Tyler) while the authorities are trying to work out what do to Ellen adopts the girl temporarily and tries to give her a normal life. Ellen’s younger brother Ray (Kelly-Sordelet) is a similar age to Anna and tried to help out, but by the time the pair are ready to go to Anna’s first house party, the teen, without her miracle drug is starting to transform again, her human teeth are being pushed out by something much sharper but the only person who has some insight and who is willing to help her comes in the guise of a one eyed man wearing a wolf skin who lives in the forests surrounding the town played by the multi talented James LeGros .

Baskin / Raid (2015)

Director: Can Evrenol
Starring: Gorkem Kasal, Mehmet Cerrahoğlu, Ergun Kuyucu. Turkey. 1h 37m

This surreal Turkish gory horror, directed by Can Evrenol, based on his 2013 short film by the same name, although in this  blood soaked feature length debut he turns up the nightmare factor to full. Not running totally parallel it’s like a lucid dream within a dream, something more like Inception (2010) Vs Hellraiser (1987). While it’s not obviously as to what’s going on, the puzzle presented within Baskin is not something that you’ll be able to work out until the end, providing you have the stomach to get to the bitter end. There is a heavy handed dose of blood, meat, strange symbolism and a chilly silenthillesque atmosphere that is bound to entertain horror fans throughout. It’s crowning achievement is that it successfully manages to make you a passive spectator as this incredibly vivid nightmare unfolds.

It Comes at Night (2017)

Day 7 – It Comes At Night 

Director:Trey Edward Shults .
Starring. Joel Edgerton, Riley Keough, Christopher Abbott, Carmen Ejogo, Kelvin Harrison Jr. USA. 1h 37m.

In the aftermath of a apocalyptic virus that has wiped out most of our modern civilisation a family tries to carve out an existence in the backwoods of the USA, after bringing in some outsiders their laus trophic tale brings the two families together before everything gets ripped apart.

Trey Edwards Shults (a name that’s hard to forget but easy to misspell) worked as a crew member on Terrence Malick movies and it seems that the experience has left a big impression on him, after his low budget debut SXSW, about an eccentric woman show up to a family reunion, he now digs his heels into horror that’s not quite horror… *gulp* post horror? This impressive movie whose title seems to have little to do with the content of the film.

Let us Prey (2014)

Let us Prey  (Horror,  2014) (18) D: Brian O’Malley W: David Cairns  C: Liam Cunningham, Pollyanna McIntosh, Bryan Larkin, Hanna Stanbridge, Niall Greig Fulton. 1h 28m. UK, Scotland.

Synopsis : Held in a remote police station, a mysterious stranger takes over the minds and souls of everyone inside.

 

This is another “when a stranger comes to town” style thriller, it’s likable under powered attempt as The Exorcist III (1989) styled Needful Things (1993). It has great production and a brilliant retro nouveau style in the small nocturnal confines of a remote police station. It’s a fragile thriller with a hint of mystery in the guise of “the man” (Liam Cunningham) but it’s not really scary,but serious enough on the gore to deliver a bit of suspense and the odd bloody shock, sadly it doesn’t deliver in the bravado department, there is no major showdown when this movie could have stepped things up at certain points it simply backs away.

The idea seems based on loosely on the same theme as Needful Things (1993) except this mysterious stranger offers nothing in return for showing the inhabitants of the hushed police station; their darker secrets and exposing their carnal sides. After an stirring Gothic fashioned intro, the stranger, Six (Cunningham) descends upon a sleepy unsuspecting village police station in the early hours and without delay starts terrorising the inhabitants. Including newly appointed PC Heggie (McIntosh), who’s already going through a hazing from her colleagues. Hanna Stanbridge returns in after the success of her sleazy character in the occult thriller Outcast (2010), while McIntosh looks a lot cleaner than her (almost) silent role in Woman (2011). Cunningham doesn’t have to do much, except look mysterious in the darkness and operate his silver tongue.

After scaring the police officers and firmly locked in his cell, Six, manages to talk a neighboring inmate into killing himself in a vicious manner akin to Hannibal Lecter vs Multiple Miggs; Soon, Six begins to direct his attentions to PC Heggie and flirts with her innocence, while systematically destroying every “good” person around him, the taboo relationship between two fellow cops and misdemeanors of a young car crazy lad soon get set aside for the bigger picture of trying to stop this bizarre stranger who carries a mysterious notebook, almost as confusing at the random scribbling as Ralph Fiennes notebook in Spider (2002). With edgy flashbacks of abuse from Heggie’s past; who starts to get frantic as the movie progresses until the final eureka moment. Where she finally remembers shes supposed to the heroine of the movie.

There are a few gory scenes forced in throughout the film, cameo’s that tell about various back stories leading up until this nights arrival of Six. The film fails to really get off the ground, even when the action heats up it’s then subdued by slo mo, there is a slightly tense soundtrack but nothing all that memorable. There is a heavy psychological buzz to make up for the lack of viewing the full carnage, and the film doesn’t know where it wants to make it’s bed, gore or psychological? There is an interesting lighting technique used throughout the movie, slightly resembling a stage play, lots of low lights painting colours in the background. A lot seems to have been done to keep the scenes very hushed and calm.

Ending with a debatable finale, it’s really up to the viewer what they really want to take away from this battle of good and evil present here. Let us Prey is a fine design, but a mere rough draft of a much greater movie, but as it is, a lot is just simply absent.

Rating – 6/10

R: The Exorcist III (1989) , Needful Things (1993), Law Abiding Citizen (2009),Outcast (2010)

V: Overall there is a murky religious theme running through this movie, it has a few bursts of inspiration but otherwise it’s really easy to cast it off as a wannabe exorcist horror. There is a good story there.. somewhere, it feels that more was put into the production of the movie than really intensify the story line. It’s still a good attempt and makes for an OK watch.

Q : “this is a one horse town”

“And now it’s a pale fucking horse”

OST: Nothing to note.
TIL : you don’t need a huge orchestrated ending to make a good film.
BS : I did quite enjoy the slow motion death dealing near the end of the film, but what captured my attention was the small clips of still life around the station, the old style clock ticking away the enchantment of the quiet calm atmosphere.
5B : Liam Cunningham
L: when a stranger comes to town, great intros part two, Selected Scottish films.
PD : Coming soon