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Cabin Fever (2002)
What was the point of this movie again?
At the video shop, it was a choice between this and 'Feardotcom'. I'd heard some good reports about 'Cabin Fever', some claiming it as one of the best horror movies of 2002, and it had the delectable Jordan Ladd in it, so we went with this.
Five friends travel into the wilderness of redneck-America to spend a week of debauchery in a log cabin. After a run in or two with some of the locals, the kids start getting infected with some sort of flesh-eating virus, and the battle for survival begins, with friendships put to the test, a very healthy helping of gore and nudity, heaps of randomness, and possibly the smartest character in a horror movie to date (when his friends get infected with the virus, he grabs a couple of six packs and takes off running).
Performance-wise, 'Cabin Fever' is not outstanding, but certainly not terrible. The expletive-littered dialogue is ropey at times but provides a few decent laughs throughout, and when the virus starts taking hold of people, the make-up job is really quite impressive, providing probably the best shocks (and I use that word lightly) in the movie. On a whole it's fairly predictable but not altogether bad. There are some random, usually quite amusing moments - the "party" deputy; Dennis, the Karate Kid; the old man in the shop; and director Eli Roth's cameo as stoner Justin ("Yeah, he's a professor...") - but you're given the distinct impression that these were thrown in purely to flesh out the script to make it feature length, and thus have no real impact on the story. The last five or ten minutes descend into a farce, and the last scene in the shop is pretty unnecessary.
It's very bloody, it's mildly amusing, and there's enough nekkidness on show to keep the morons entertained, but other than that it serves no obvious purpose. Just about watchable, thanks to the two gorgeous female leads, and, of course, Dennis.
Dreamcatcher (2003)
Catching z's
As horror stories go, Stephen King has written some corkers in his time, but for every corker there's a handful of disappointments, this, unfortunately, being one of the latter.
Dreamcatcher tells of four childhood friends, now leading very different lives, who reunite once a year to spend a weekend in a log cabin in the woods. When, in their youth, they saved a disabled child from a gang of bullies, the disabled child rewards them with a gift, an unspoken telepathy and ability to predict some future happenings. Twenty years on they have united for another weekend in seclusion, but find themselves with some unwanted extra-terrestrial visitors, hotly pursued by a gung-ho military commander.
Firstly, the movie looks eerily beautiful, mostly set in snow covered woodland, at once comforting and haunting. The special effects are mostly quite good, but verge occasionally on the cartoonish. Largely, a very stylish movie, which seems to be the norm for all these Stephen King adaptations that are sadly lacking in actual content.
Unfortunately, that is where the praise ends. A good cast do their best with a hokey script, but most of the players are either horribly miscast or underused. Damian Lewis, excellent throughout TV's Band of Brothers, struggles with his characters schizophrenic episode which seemingly comes out of nowhere, with little or no explanation, while Morgan Freeman uttering the line, "Those poor schmucks... they drive Chevrolets, shop at Wal-Mart, never miss an episode of Friends. These are Americans.", is only made all the more laughable by his ridiculous hair. The plot advances on a line all of it's own, never sure whether or not to provide an explanation for some of the more far-reaching plot devices (Jason Lee and his toothpicks? Come on!). With half an hour to go I found myself nodding off (although it was 6am) and when the end did come it was wholly unsatisfying.
Having not read the book, but having been told that a lot had been left out of the film, I can't help but feel perhaps this would have worked better as a mini-series/2-part TV movie. Not worth going out of your way for, but if it's on TV and there's nothing else to do, you might as well.
Panic Room (2002)
Stunning choice of wardrobe for Jodie Foster
Sorry, I just had to get that in there before I started.
'Panic Room' is essentially a basic cat-and-mouse thriller with a decent premise, typically over-stylised by director David Fincher. Fincher's work is mostly enjoyable, and the end result looks polished and pristine, but sometimes you have to ask yourself exactly why he does things the way he does.
When Jodie Foster and her daughter move into a new house, they must spend their first night in the panic room, a specially reinforced room built into the house to protect you and your family in the event of a break-in, as that is exactly what has happened - burglars, in the form of Jared Leto, Forest Whitaker, and Dwight Yoakam, who, incidentally, have come for the hidden millions in the panic room.
Like I said, it looks good throughout, Fincher's trademark camera-work and effects and tricks on show nearly the whole time (shots moving through cup handles and cross sections of flooring), but what sets it above being just another run-of-the-mill thriller are the lead performances. Foster is excellent, as always, and the three intruders play brilliantly off one another. Yoakam injects a real creepiness to Raoul, Whitaker always the strong, level-headed Burnham, and Leto in frantic mode with a little hint of Tyler Durden as Junior (although he looks like he got Forest Whitaker's hairstylist).
There are some good action set pieces and a tense moment here and there, but nothing that's going to have you on the edge of your seat. The movies suffers a little from predictability and a lack of pace, but the dramatic finale rounds it off well enough. A salute to the fact that a movie can be good through good performances, so why does David Fincher insist on drawing it out so he can add more clever camera tricks? Is it for us or is it for him?
Night of the Living Dead (1968)
We have a lot to thank George A. Romero for
This is the one that started it all off, launching countless imitations and spawning 3 "sequels", the latest, albeit, coming over 35 years after this, the classic 'Night of the Living Dead'.
Seven people, mostly strangers, are trapped in a remote farmhouse when the bodies of the recently deceased return to life with one intent - to eat human flesh. As the number of 'ghouls' grow and more of them appear around the house, the inhabitants decide something must be done to move their number to a safer location in the next town. This, of course, is where the trouble really starts.
This low-budget horror/thriller is a fine example of how believable characters and buckets of suspense are much more effective than believable special effects and buckets of gore. A true landmark in horror film-making, many times emulated but rarely equalled, 'Night of the Living Dead' stands the test of time perfectly, remaining scarier and more chilling than most of whats on offer these days. Essential viewing for any movie fan, which handily doubles as a top notch training video for when the zombies do actually arrive.
The Butterfly Effect (2004)
Dude, where's my memory?
The trailer didn't look too exciting, most reviews I read were unfavourable, and I had no real desire to see Ashton Kutcher "doing serious", so it was only after a few friends recommended it that I decided to watch 'The Butterfly Effect'. And to be honest it wasn't as bad as I had expected.
Kutcher's character, Evan, has been prone to blackouts since he was young, an ailment apparently inherited from his institutionalised father. The blackouts occur without warning and he invariably wakes up in the middle of some sort of crisis, or at least considerably worse off than when he went under, with absolutely no memory of what happened. Kutcher plays Evan when he's 20 years old, and the blackouts have returned. After the death of an old friend, he manages to remember what happened all those times he blacked out, which opens a whole new world of possibilities.
The first hour or so of the film is well constructed, leading the viewer through Evan's fragmented mind, touching on some delicate subjects, and intermittently shocking us to make sure we're still paying attention. However, when Evan begins recovering his lost memories, the plot takes quite a turn and the quality of the film suffers. The second half of the film lacks the cohesion and narrative flow of the first half, and any tension created slips away with the continuity out the back door, seemingly replaced by violence and an unnecessary overuse of the word 'f**kbag'.
There are some good ideas on display here, some handled well, some manhandled, and the slightly bizarre ending left an odd taste in my mouth, like soap and ice-cream. It can be enjoyable but whether you'll think it was worth it after two hours is open to debate.
Chasing Amy (1997)
Affleck and Lee squabble over a lesbian
Chasing Amy is the third, and arguably weakest, of Kevin Smith's series of 'Askewniverse' movies, and is quite a departure from his first two offerings, Clerks & Mallrats. The trademark snappy wit and dialogue is still there, as are the buddy in-joking and the obligatory appearance of Jay & Silent Bob, but the more serious subject matter makes this a more personal film for Smith. When Holden (Affleck) falls for lesbian Alyssa (Adams), his relationship, both with her and with his best friend Banky (Lee) change irrevocably. Falling somewhere in between drama and comedy, but never quite reaching either, the story is a good one, but you can't help but feel it would've received better treatment in the hands of a more accomplished film-maker, perhaps someone who doesn't just cast his friends in the lead roles, although the three leads all deliver satisfactory performances. The dialogue often feels a little forced and produces some uncomfortable scenes, and as a result, when things go belly up for the characters, it's hard to feel any sympathy for anyone but Banky. There are some truly funny moments, usually courtesy of Jason Lee and this is an enjoyable enough movie, but the story kind of just fizzles out and may leave you feeling a little jipped.