Certificate:

Director: David Slade

Release Date: 16 June 2006

Tagline: Strangers shouldn’t talk to little girls.

Main Cast:

Patrick Wilson … Jeff Kohlver

Ellen Page … Hayley Stark

I can suspend disbelief, and I can just about cope with a plot hole (as long as it’s not a major one).  But these conditions apply only to otherwise great films. Hard Candy, however, is not a great film.

It’s totally unbelievable and ridiculous. If you couldn’t give a monkey’s toss about realism, then you might enjoy this. It feels like it wants to be intelligent torture porn, but the reality is that it is neither. Having said that though, I felt a bit tortured watching it.

Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars

Certificate:

Director: Christian Alvart

Release Date: 17 November 2006

Tagline: The Good is the Evil in it.

Main Cast:

Norman Reedus … Polizist Schmitz

Christian von Aster … Polizist Wagner

André Hennicke … Gabriel Engel

Antibodies is the thinking man’s Silence of the Lambs. It’s a quiet paced drama that gets slowly murkier and the lines between good and evil get somewhat blurred. It’s a far darker story than the above, and is, in my opinion, better. Don’t get me wrong – I really liked Lambs, but it was undoubtedly ‘Hollywood’. Antibodies is a far more disturbing experience. I like disturbing films. They really get under your skin and make you question not only life in general, but also aspects of yourself.

Can’t say much else really, as to do so would spoil the film.

It’s not perfect, but it’s a very good film and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Certificate:

Director: Alejandro González Iñárritu

Release Date: 18 May 2001

Tagline: Love. Betrayal. Death.

Main Cast:

Emilio Echevarría … El Chivo

Gael García Bernal … Octavio (as Gael Garcia)

Goya Toledo … Valeria

A horrific car accident connects three stories, each involving characters dealing with loss, regret, and life’s harsh realities, all in the name of love. And bloody marvellous it is too!

Although there are three stories, it never gets confusing as they overlap beautifully.

It’s not really possible to go into it any any great detail because it would take far too long. The above is really all you need to know!

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Certificate:

Director: Steve McQueen

Release Date: 31 October 2008

Tagline: An odyssey, in which the smallest gestures become epic and when the body is the last resource for protest.

Main Cast:

Michael Fassbender … Bobby Sands

Liam Cunningham … Father Moran

I was born in 1971 and grew up with the threat of IRA terrorism every day of my life for the best part of thirty years. I avoided the Hyde Park bombing by a matter of days, and I never went to London at Christmas because the threat was far too great. I have nothing but contempt for those responsible for the deaths of so many. Let us not forget that these people were responsible for the Enniskillen Remembrance Day service bombing atrocity.However, I heard that Hunger was supposedly neutral, so, despite my reservations and being the film lover that I am I decided to watch it.

Certificate:

Director: Peter Jackson

Release Date: 10 February 1995

Tagline: The true story of a crime that shocked a nation.

Main Cast:

Melanie Lynskey … Pauline Parker

Kate Winslet … Juliet Hulme

Sarah Peirse … Honora Parker Rieper

Heavenly Creatures is the true story of the infamous Parker-Hulme murder that took place in New Zealand in 1954. Jackson chose to focus on the intense friendship between Pauline and Juliet rather than make an historical look back at the events. This was an excellent decision, because in order to understand how they came to murder Honora you need to understand their relationship.

After the initial prologue which introduces us to 1950s Christchurch, the film starts with what should be the final scene (in much the same way as The Accused did). This scene is taken from testimony from the witness and is therefore extremely accurate.

The film takes its material not only from testimonies of those involved, but most importantly from Pauline’s diaries. Although some of it is disputed by the real life Juliet Hulme (now the author Anne Perry), it is pretty much how things happened. She claims that their relationship was not physical (although the ‘night of the saints’ is taken from the diary), and that they did not make clay figures. If the latter was indeed not the case, then I would suspect that those scenes were in the film as it was the best way of portraying the characters and events of their imaginary world of Borovnia. However, I may be totally wrong about that.

Heavenly Creatures introduced both Lynskey and Winslet and both are superb.

There is a fantastic website called ‘Fourth World – The Heavenly Creatures Website’ and it contains extensive material on both the film and the real life events. In fact, you may find it beneficial to know the background before watching the film. I have seen it twice now, and the film finds a new level when you watch it after reading all about it.

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Certificate:

Directors: Jaume Balagueró & Paco Plaza

Release Date: 11 April 2008

Tagline: One Witness. One Camera.

Main Cast:

Manuela Velasco … Ángela Vidal

Ferran Terraza … Manu

Jorge Serrano … Policía Joven (as Jorge Yamam Serrano)

Pablo Rosso … Pablo

[.REC] is by far the best of the first person films I’ve seen and is really quite creepy and powerful. The tension builds slowly and then all Hell breaks loose! It follows a TV crew that are filming the night shift of a fire station. They are called out to what seems to be a routine job at an apartment block to assist the police with forcibly entering one of the flats. What they find there, however, is far from routine.

I found it much easier to watch than The Blair Witch Project and Cloverfield as there is far less erratic camera movement. It also has a degree of believability about it and has a great ending.

I’m not sure that a first person film will ever be truly outstanding as I just don’t think that the style lends itself to brilliance. [.REC] is, however, a very worthwhile film and no self respecting horror fan should miss it.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Certificate:

Director: Paul Verhoeven

Release Date: 2 January 1998

Tagline: Genocide doesn’t compare to this.

Main Cast:

Casper Van Dien … Johnny Rico

Dina Meyer … Dizzy Flores

Denise Richards … Carmen Ibanez

Starship Troopers is, in many ways, a strange film. Indeed, the title makes it look like it’s going to be a kitsch sci-fi film, which shows that you can never judge a book by its cover, so to speak. There is a lot of tongue in cheek satire, but underneath all that is a very serious war film. It is set in a future where militarism is primary, signing up is seen as very patriotic and noble and is as common as going to college.

The film follows a group of friends who join the military and find themselves thrown into fighting a bloody and violent war against a race of giant insect like aliens.

Starship Troopers has its fair share of gore and action and at no point does the film disappoint or get tireseome. I was pleasantly surprised to find a very good film behind the ‘popcorn’ title.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Certificate:

Director: James Watkins

Release Date: 12 September 2008

Tagline: An unforgettable weekend.

Main Cast:

Kelly Reilly … Jenny

Michael Fassbender … Steve

Jack O’Connell … Brett

Eden Lake makes for very uncomfortable viewing. It’s tense, bloody and very brutal. The most shocking thing of all though is that the youths’ behaviour requires no suspension of disbelief whatsoever. This film would not have been made a few years ago because none of us would have believed that adolescents could behave in such a deplorable fashion. Sadly, we now live in a shocking and morally bankrupt age. Incidents of mindless brutality and behaviour are becoming increasingly common in this country.

In a way, Eden Lake isn’t actually a horror film in the traditional sense. It’s horrific yes, but only because it’s far too close to reality.

Definitely one to watch. A sad comment on the state Britain is in.

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Certificate:

Director: Alexandre Aja

Release Date: 10 March 2006

Tagline: The lucky ones die first.

Main Cast:

Aaron Stanford … Doug Bukowski

Kathleen Quinlan … Ethel Carter

Vinessa Shaw … Lynn Carter

Emilie de Ravin … Brenda Carter

Dan Byrd … Bobby Carter

I don’t usually like remakes of classic films (I can’t see the point and they are almost without exception, inferior), but I really liked this one! It also makes a change to see a horror remake retain its C18 status and not watered down to get the teenage audience (C15).

As is the norm with horror films of this type the plot is very basic (no time should be wasted before getting down to the nitty gritty of torturing and axing people to death!). A family are going on a caravan trip and are crossing the rather barren countryside of New Mexico. Needless to say, they have to stop at one of those run down petrol ’stations’ in the middle of nowhere* where they come across a creepy man who recommends a short cut…

THHE is very, very brutal, gory and disturbing. The scene in the caravan with the three women and the baby is deeply unpleasant and quite difficult to watch.

Great stuff!

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

* I swear, if I ever find myself travelling across America, I’ll never stop to fill up at one of these places as they all seem to house deranged murderers!

Certificate:

Director: Pedro Almodóvar

Release Date: 1 July 1994

Main Cast:

Verónica Forqué … Kika (as Veronica Forque)

Peter Coyote … Nicholas

Victoria Abril … Andrea Caracortada

Àlex Casanovas … Ramón

Whilst not one of his finest, Kika is still very enjoyable. Almodóvar films are quirky and fast paced, and Kika is no exception. He has a unique way of making you laugh in situations that should not be in the least bit funny. You are never sure what’s coming next in an Almodóvar film!

I can imagine that Kika would not be to everyone’s taste, as there are a couple of scenes that are somewhat controversial, and many will not see the humour in it. If this is your first taste of one of his films and you don’t care much for it, it’s worth checking out one or two others before deciding if his style is to your taste or not (Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown is one of my favourites).

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars