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Intruder (1989)
Uncut version of superior 80's slash-fest
Scott Spiegels gruesome late 80's slasher flick has just been released in Europe completely uncut and region free by Dragon dvd, under the title Night of the Intruder. It's avaliable as a regular or special edition. Both are uncut. I decided to check it out (the special edition version) since i'd only ever seen the abortive BBFC UK cut (which, incidentally, allowed WAY more gore than the U.S. and Canadian "R" rated versions). It's pretty safe to say that, in the UK at least, given our current censorship climate, this would probably pass pretty much uncut these days, save for maybe the "head-in-a-crusher" & infamous "band-saw" scene. With that in mind, it would be wise to discard any negative review on IMDB which fails to mention the word "uncut".
By this point everyone will know what this is all about: Night-crew get savagely killed by-the-numbers while working late in a supermarket. You've got a capable little cast including the Raimi brothers, and cameo appearances by Bruce Campbell & even director Scott Spiegel himself (brief, this one!).
Yeah, it's all a little over-the-top, with gleefully graphic eye-impalings, stabbings, and heads being cut in half (all courtesy of KNB FX), but you can tell everyone involved had a helluva lot of fun making the thing. A true, no-nonsense horror film pitched directly at the fans, you get lots of whacky camera angles, black comedy and lashings of the old red stuff, making you wish they still made them this way. Really.
The Dragon dvd has been digitally remastered, although it still looks softer & a bit grainier than I remember. The sound - default German dubbed or selectable to original English - is extremely clear but does tend to have slight hiss behind it even though it's presented in Dolby Digital mono. The menus, naturally, are in German, but are very easy to navigate. Overall, it's all very acceptable, especially when you consider what you're getting: uncut region free main feature, director shorts, trailers, out-takes, animated scene selections, etc. It's a great little disc of a great little unpretentious horror-flick. You want gore? You want this version of Intruder!
Bloody Murder (2000)
Bloody murder? Bloody Hell, more like!
Before people keep using throw-away comments like "THIS IS THE WORST MOVIE I'VE EVER SEEN" on film reviews, they should try sitting through garbage like this. I've seen some utter incomprehensible, no-redeeming-quality trash in my time (sigh), and Bloody Murder adds to the pile. It isn't the worst movie i've ever seen (but then, like I said...), hoewever, this is bad. Very bad. Bad acting, direction, editing, continuity, FX, script, music, imagination, everything-in-the-world. Aaaargh! Watching this film was like being flayed ...and then having needles scraped across my bones. Watching this film was like being paid a visit by the dentist from the marathon man ...and then being thrown a well-done steak to chew on. Watching this film was like being born without skin ...and having to bathe painfully every morning in lemon juice. You get my point?
Kolobos (1999)
Dreams of a GOOD modern horror film can become a reality
What can I say: a bunch of kids from all walks decide to participate in a reality TV type of program, only to find, to their horror, that someone's butchering them one by one. This one came straight onto video & DVD in the UK and succeeds in outdoing almsot every single mainstream cinema release horror film in almost the last decade. Why? Because the guys who made it are horror fans who know EXACTLY what the horror fraternity wants. Okay, the plot's a little 2-dimensional, but the twist at the end... i'll not give anything away (even though I feel I should because MOST people have NO IDEA what on earth it was all about after viewing the last 5 minutes. Trust me, if you really pay attention to what you're watching at all times, you'll figure it out. And it is pretty smart). Thing is, this kind of reminds me of Michele Soavi's amazing Stagefright in that, the characters do the sensible thing and try to stick close together (unlike almost every other slasher film), but die anyway. And, oh, how they die: detailed eviscerations, face smashings, eye-piercings... Absolute mayhem not seen since the 80's. It's hard to believe this came out of the USA, given the current climate for chopping anyting slightly horrific (in a horror movie) to bits. Sure, it heavily borrows inspiration from the films of Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci (the teeth smashing is right out of Argento's Profondo Rosso and the eye-piercing strongly reminiscent of Fulci's Zombi), but who cares? The direction is slick, the editing is strong, the FX work is top-notch, the music is atmospheric (deliberately goblin-esque) and the acting performances are fine. Downside: it is a little short, and then there's THAT ending, which, even though I was able to work out and thought was fine, there's no denying that other people are just left feeling confused. According to a Fangoria interview the R-rated version of Kolobos is, while still more violent than just about anything else you'll see these days, heavily trimmed, so you're going to have to make sure you can track it down unrated to see it in its full glory. If you live in the UK I can tell you that the BBFC (astonishingly) passed the unrated version uncut. Lucky us (for a change). Gotta give this one a 9 out of 10. If you're a genre fan, once you see it unrated, you'll know why.
Cherry Falls (1999)
Cherry-Bomb blast
American Pie meets Scream!? Man, that "quote-line" put me off seeing this one for ages since I can't stand American Pie! Anyway, it's nothing like American Pie, and not much like Scream either, other than the fact that someone is killing people. Dunno if the 18 version we got in the UK is any stronger than the US R version, because most of the killings happen off screen (although the opening sequence is fairly disturbing). Still, there is one nice (hilarious) sequence where a cop gets it graphically in the skull with an axe (or maybe it was a hatchet, I can't remember). Anyway, what sets this one apart from most other post-scream slashers is the gruelling plot-line concerning rape. It's pretty heavy stuff (and Michael Biehn says this is a comedy! No way, with a plot-line concerning serious gang-rape, played as straight-faced as hell, this is no comedy; more a straight film with some intentionally funny scenes - which do work well to even out the tension). Is it scary? Nope, but it's fun; a lot of fun that doesn't take itself one bit seriously. I mean, come on: a serial killer who kills virgins rather than killing those stereotypical sex-mad teens of the 80's slasher flicks. Any criticism levvied at a plot-device as quirky as this is sure to be way off the mark. It's not trying to be smart, just a little different, because, let's face it, we HAVE seen it all before, and that at least deserves it a little extra on the old point-o-meter. Trust me, you co could do far worse on rental or purchase with your hard-earned cash than this one (Scream 3 or Urban Legends 2: Final Cut, anyone?).