brettmcneill Reviews

Poltergeist (1982)

What Happens When All That Scares Children is Put into a Film

[9/10 · 10 August 2008]

Poltergeist has almost every child nightmare imaginable. The creepy tree outside, the clown, the closet, something under the bed, loud thunder, you name it it's here. And what's Wonderful about it is that each fear is almost universal to every person who watches this movie, making it a much more scary experience.

It starts with a normal family. As always. One night, the youngest child (a girl) gets up from her sleep, goes downstairs and starts talking to the TV. Her family sees this and are a little worried but brush it off as a 'child thing'. Then weird things start to go on all over the house. Chairs start pushing themselves out from the table, before stacking themselves on top of it. Then that night during a thunderstorm, one of the kids (the only boy) is grabbed by a tree from his window and then is almost devoured by the tree. While the rest of the family tries to save him, the little girl is (as most of the object in her room) is sucked into her sucked into her closet. The rest of the movie revolves around the family trying the get the young girl back from the house spirits.

What makes the movie work most is that fact that is more about the family more than the scariness of the ghosts. The characters are real and believable so you care for them and are scared for them. Whats wrong with the movie is the disjointment of scares. Most of what is truly terrifying about this movie happens during the last ten minutes, of we do get a couple of scares before then (ex. the tree) but for the most part they're at the end. But this aspect lets us learn about the characters more and making the movie better than it would have been.

I think if i had seen 'Poltergeist' when i was a kid I still wouldn't have been able to sleep (I know some people who did and still can't) but that only shows how much of a good scary movie this is and it also makes you sad that there aren't much like it anymore.

Star Review: ***1/2/****

The Ruins (2008)

Good but could have been GREAT! (Spoliers)

[8/10 · 7 April 2008]

Generally, there are three types of people who will (or have) seen this film: 1. Horror buffs 2. Movie buffs or 3. people who have read the book. I fall under all three categories and after viewing the film I'm a little lost for words but I'll do my best to voice my opinion.

The plot of the movie is a group of American tourists meet a German tourist who says he is going to an ancient mayan temple to find his brother. The other tourists want to see some ruins so they tag along with the German and his Greek friend. Went hey arrive at the temple they are surrounded by Mayan men who kill the Greek and force the rest up on the temple. The horror on the hill end up being a evil vine that eats flesh and can mimic sounds. Horrible events ensue.

Now granted the movie's plot may not sound great (or even scary for that matter) but it is. i saw the trailer for this movie way back in January and thought, that looks way to scary to even sit through, but as time wore on i got more curious to what the movie was about (the trailer was very bland) so I decided to read the book. Well after I finished i thought the movie would be superb, especially since the author was penning the screenplay.

Now I actually feel horrible because before I saw this I was telling my friends that this would be the next 'Exorcist' and would have people fainting and puking in their seats. Well on that front it fail miserably (thats my movie buff coming out). As an adaptation, it wasn't bad. All the deaths get jumbled around to other people but still have there effect as in the book. But the main thing about the adaptation is, IT'S TOO DAMN SHORT! The book was over 500 pages. The movie is a little over 90 mins. and you actually fell that its too short. Also the ending is abrupt and also (as many people has said) a cop out to the books ending. And I felt sort of cheated.

But on as a horror buff I must say this movie is marvelous. the acting is a million times better than any other. The effects aren't cheesy. It actually relays more on psychological scares than gore (actually the gore is used psychologically) and it had one of the best premises in years but the problem it uses so many horror clichés (horror vacation, the sole girl surviving) but although they do this its actually logical and most things they do are very much so and, in a horror movie, logic is very rarely found.

On the whole this movie was very good although it has its flaws but it's definitely the scare movie to see (I don't think next weeks Prom Night will top it.) Grade: ***/****

P.S. Best Line: "Four America tourist don't just disappear!" so true why does everyone thing this line sux?

The Shining (1980)

Read the book!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! May contain spoilers

[1/10 · 3 July 2006]

The shining is probably this worst adaptation ever. I saw this movie when I was 8 and it didn't scare me then I read the book which is one of the most interesting page turners I've ever read and realized that this movie is just style and no substance.

Plot: A family of 3 move up to a hotel to take care of it during the heavy winter season. And wouldn't you know it the hotel it haunted and the ghost make dad go crazy say the hilarious line "Heeeeeeeeeere's Johnny" and try and kill his family.

The acting was dumb except for Shelley Duvall who I think did an amazing job and she was the one who was nominated for a razzie. Why not nominated Jack Nicholson or nominate it as the worst picture of the year. Note: Friday the 13th was nominated for worst pic the same year and the movie is 100% scarier and better than this movie.

Now to Stanley Kubrick, what went wrong man? Mind I've only seen four of his work (five if you count A.I. but i don't cause he didn't direct it) which are A Clockwork Orange, 2001, Full Metal Jacket and this, but the other were so much more than this (although i really gotta watch 2001 again cause i really didn't get it)but I'll forgive Stanley for this atrocity of a movie but for a long time I didn't see any of his movies because I thought they'd be as bad as this.

Bottom Line: Read the book before you slap a 10 on this and call it a masterpiece and I can see why Stephen King didn't like this movie.

Spice World (1997)

Please don't hate me. The best bad movie ever!

[10/10 · 2 July 2006]

First off i only gave this movie a 10 to get it out of the bottom 100 because it doesn't deserve to be there. Second, how don't people find this movie hilarious and entertaining? I'm a guy and I remember i watched this movie because i thought Baby Spice was hot and then i found myself laughing my a** off.

Plot: Spice girls have five days to prepare for their first live gig and they meet the most wackiest characters on earth.

OK yeah there is no plot but it doesn't matter. The jokes and the characters keep me laughing and having a fun time.

Bottom line: THE BEST BAD MOVIE EVER!

Grade: ***/****

House of 1000 Corpses (2003)

Ew! (spoilers)

[1/10 · 2 July 2006]

That's all I can say about this horrible film.

Now, no matter what people have tried to convince me, this is not a satire it can't be a movie consists of just people getting killed, and thats already been done, in the Texas chainsaw massacre. I think the only real change in this movie is that this one doesn't have th4e chainsaw which was the highlight of the original.

The thin plot of this movie has four people who are looking for scary things in Texas (irony, i think not) and they come across I creepy gas station that has a haunted tour ride that apparently shows the psychos that had lived in Texas (leatherface was not there) and there is one really creepy one named Dr. Satan. The kids being as stupid as they are ask were they can find were Dr. Satan use to live. Well the gas station clown give them the directions and the kids go away. Then they pick up a girl hitchhiker and the car breaks down. The girl says her house is near were the car is and they go to the house the people there tow the car back to the house and they fix it up. But when they try to leave the people won't let them and they knock the kids out. Then it just blood and guts and this the only film that actually made me puke and it would have been alright if this was entertaining. The deaths consists of cutting hands off then cutting the person in half. Then the other three have to endure a weird ritual were they have to dress up like rabbits (ruun rabbit) and one get shot brutally when she tries to run away. The other two are lowered into a pit were people are living and they run through the tunnels look for a washout. One ends up meeting Dr. Satan and the girl walks in on the Dr. skinning the other guy (puke, puke) and she runs away Satan chase after her she kills him and makes the tunnels collapse. She gets out and hitches a ride with the guy from the gas station and then one of the killers pops up from the back seat.

Friends of mine recommended this to me and after this and their recommendation of Queen of the Damned i never listening to them again. I probably wouldn't have seen this movie other wise.

Bottom Line: Ew, disgusting, gross, puke worth, Rob Zombie why? Bu there is some good that comes from this. My other friends who didn't like this recommended the sequel The Devil's Rejects and i was hesitant to watch but it was really good and don't worry you don't have to see this one first. I watch Devil's with my friend who had seen this one and he never asked once if that was because of the first one.

Grade: 0/****

The Last House on the Left (1972)

So disturbing it will make you cry! Then the vengeful ending will put a evil smile across your face.

[10/10 · 4 May 2006]

This movie was disgusting and unlike my title suggests I didn't cry. I did cry, however, in the deleted scenes.

I bought the DVD one day, looking for a movie to scare me and i heard good (or bad from some peoples perspective)things about this movie. So I watched it and fell in love with it, it was disgustingly horrible but it was well filmed, acted, directed and everything else and i did like the whole 70's vibe about it. Anyway, I started watching the special features and oh my God i watched the deleted scenes and I had my DVD remote in my hand, and I didn't take my eyes off the screen. Instead I started to cry and yell at the screen "WHY? WHY ARE YOU DOING THAT TO THAT GIRL? WHY? YOU INHUMAN F%@$'S" and i eventually looked away but i couldn't stop watching for some reason. I'm so glad it wasn't in the movie.

As I said before the acting, directing, and cinematography are excellent. The lighting was amazing for the budget and it was a delight to watch.

The ending is the Jewel of this crown of dread. The killers who we now loath so much we could shoot the screen, have stumbled into the house of one of the girls they have killed and, wouldn't you know it, the parents find out. Then the killers get it just as bad as the girls did(including the infamous were one of the killers survives but with his condition I would rather be dead).

I started watching this movie with one of my friends who gets terrified by horror movies (although he sat through Signs with out flinching and I had night mares for a week) and he had to leave right before the scary stuff happened. I told him that next day that he was lucky he did because he would have s*** his pants.

Botttom Line:Great slasher (if you could call it that) that shows hints of were other movies like it got their ideas. E.G. Texas chainsaw massacre, the chainsaw at the end. Deliverance, the banjo music on the car radio.

Grade: ***1/2/****

The Master of Disguise (2002)

Get's old after three viewings.

[2/10 · 24 April 2006]

Kay The Master of Disguise was funny the first time I saw it because I can take kiddish humor. The second time I saw it, it went into so-so territory. Third time, there was only one part that was funny (my name is gammy, gammy numb-numbs)that lasts about 50 seconds which isn't worth the ordeal it puts us through.

The plot revolves around Pistachio, a thirty year old waiter who puts his underwear on his head and puts on a shaving cream beard, gets a cane and thinks hes a Shepperd. If that not a sign of a bad movie I don't know what is. Anyway his father is kidnapped and his grandfather enters in Exorcist fashion and tell him that he is in a family of people who can change their personalities to fight crime and Pistachio must find his inner master of disguise to save his parents.

I wonder if this looked good on paper because that cherry pie man was a little childish even for this movie, not to mention stupid. I have friends who are my age and love this movie and I can't believe it because it's so stupid but they adore it and think I'm crazy for not liking it. But you no everyone is entitled to their opinion.

Bottom line: Sucks except for a drag part that is pretty funny. I still can't believe i spent 10 bucks to buy this crap. And on a brighter note this movie single handedly ruin Dana Carveys career and my one friend who likes this and Wayne's World can't believed that happened.

Grade: */****

Valentine (2001)

There is only one killer scarier than this one. The one from Scary Movie!

[3/10 · 19 April 2006]

Valentine is one of those movies that has a not-so-scary killer (scary movie) and a very thin plot (scream 3) and the ending is so impossible to determine who the killer is I had to look at the trivia for this movie before I found out who it was.

The plot revolves around a back story about a kid who was tease and bully at a school dance (has Carrie written all over it) and has now come back about thirteen years later (so i forgot the actual number of years) to kill the six girls that picked on him at the dance. Now, (SPOILERS!) seeing as how the Adam guy is the only man guy here it's kinda obvious that he's the killer but then at the last minute is twists and makes one of the girls (Dorthey) the killer. Then when Adam has his girl friend, the last survivor, alone they fall a sleep and his nose starts bleeding like the killer's and thats when i got confused. If Adam was the killer why was Dorothy wearing the killer's costume and if the answer is Adam made her put on the costume why didn't she say anything? The acting is alright i liked The guy who played Adam's acting and Denise Richards was just trying to relive her Wild Things days when she plays the slut in this movie but she falls very very short of that. The other girls are forgettable, like this movie, in there roles and should have never agreed to do this movie in the first place.

Bottom line: This movie doesn't even make the it's alright category but into the so bad it's bad category. The director of the first Urban Legend Jamie Blanks directs this movie and to be honest you should just go watch that movie because it has a likable cast, nice deaths, (unlike this one), nice twist in the end and is so much smarter that this movie and even thought i liked that movie that was an insult to this one.

Grade: 1/2/****

Dave Chappelle's Block Party (2005)

Boring! (and also the worst film of the year)

[1/10 · 8 April 2006]

Dave Chappelle's Block Party is the worst movie i've seen in theaters since The Fog and (although i liked them) i've seen When a Stranger Calls and Date Movie. There is no plot except Dave planning his block party and since when do people like watching other people plan parties? Now i almost fell asleep in this movie and if it wasn't for a hilarious joke about a stripper and The Fugies i would have. Critics and people alike liked this movie and would like to ask why? I mean it's a block party. It would be more interesting if you were there then watching it on the big screen. Now i originally didn't want to go see this movie. But my friends wanted to go because they are big Chappelle fans and they thought this would be funny and a good trip to the movies. I still can't believe how naive they were. About ten minutes into the film i said to my friend "this better get better" and then twenty minutes into the film i sighed and m friend asked "Why do you hate this movie so much?" and later he would be complaining about this movie almost as much as i was. Thirty minutes in there is a scene where a bus is driving people to the block party and it shows a shot of the road through the wind shield and the audience saw a rain soaked twisted road. I leaned over to my friend and said "if this shot is the rest of the movie I'll be happy" unfortunately it wasn't. Bottom line: This movie is crap and it's a DVD Special Feature that no one will watch. And i swear this is the last time I listen to critics If you want funny see Date Movie that at least tries to make you laugh.

Grade: 1/2/****