Blake Van de graaf’s superhero opus is a cult film sadly without a cult, and that’s a pure crime of cosmic proportions. While his movie is very critically acclaimed, Van de graaf’s entry just doesn’t get enough love. Or more so, the love I think it warrants. Perhaps it’s just that audiences are burned out on superhero epics, but “Sidekick” really isn’t one of them. Most people will be quick to judge this movie on the cover, a one sheet that makes this look like a superhero comedy about a geek dressing in costumes to fight crime.
Amateur Porn Star Killer 2: The Snuff Version (2008) (DVD)
There’s a distinct difference between Shane Ryan’s movie version of “APSK 2” and his snuff version. One version is a safe and pretty clear fictional mock documentary chronicling Brandon and his ever devious quest to punish women. The other version, the snuff version, has much more balls. This is Shane Ryan’s original vision and more importantly, this is the actual director’s cut that dares to be much edgier and dynamic with its premise. While I completely understand the inevitable hot water Ryan would have gotten in to if he’d continued to pull the “fact or fiction?” gimmick with his “Amateur Porn Star Killer” movies, I really think in the end, it took something away. The constant reminders that this is fiction pretty much ruin any hopes of being sucked into the narrative. Sequels are hardly ever really good and frankly, there doesn’t seem to be a need for another from the Alter Ego flagship series, but “Amateur Porn Star Killer 2” is thankfully good enough where you can put your reservations aside to enjoy what Ryan puts on the table for us.
Re-Animator (1985)
Rake me over the coals all you want, but up until today, I have never seen “Re-Animator.” Shocked? You probably are. But the legendary horror film that’s managed to spawn comic books, video games, sequels, fan fiction, and even cross overs with other horror icons (Cassie Hack, baby!) has just evaded me all of my life. When I was a kid I was not allowed to see this, and as a young adult I found it difficult to track it down. It’s just one of those film classics that I could never really get a hold of and watch. Watching “Re-Animator,” I can see what every horror geek raves about because even at over twenty years old, Stuart Gordon’s gory sickening classic hasn’t aged much at all.
The Strangers (2008)
When people spout off about ridiculous nonsense declaring that Horror is dead, I often laugh at them, and then insist that there are still good horror movies out there. Great horror movies are still around, they’re just so much harder to find, with people still willing to scare us into submission. Take “The Strangers” a movie that’s garnered a rather excellent marketing campaign, but still suffers from being a virtual rip off of “Ils-Them,” a superior home invasion horror flick. Nevertheless, after watching great home invasion flicks like the aforementioned title, and “Inside,” I think “The Strangers” will carry along the rising fad with acute precision and some reasonable arguments for being one of the stronger horror films of the year.
Hack/Slash: The Series #13
Okay, when the hell did Cassie Hack become Clint Eastwood?
I’m all for Cassie kicking ass and taking names, but “Hack/Slash #13” is very self aware to the point where Cassie and Vlad aren’t even themselves. There’s no vulnerability in Cassie, no sense that she’s a plumber doing a job. She’s spouting wise cracks and one liners everywhere, and hurling some of the cheesiest trash talk I’ve ever read. And Vlad is almost too intelligent for his own good. Where is the Vlad who talks like Bizarro? Why is Vlad suddenly Sherlock Holmes while Cassie plays second fiddle? Why is Cassie becoming an action movie star?
42nd Street Blues: Waiting for the Second Revival
The “Grindhouse Review Fest” originally began back in 2007, when, to ring in the arrival of the much anticipated “Grind House,” we spent an entire month reviewing grindhouse flicks of old and new. And we had a blast. And so did our readers apparently, since the hits on Cinema Crazed jumped considerably around this period. So this year, we decided to do it again. With more movies, a small time crunch, and much better planning, we’ve gathered classic Grindhouse and Neo-Grindhouse from independent filmmakers, and brought to you the 2nd Annual Grindhouse Review Fest. And just to show you that we’re not fucking around with this occasion, we posed a survey to ourselves and to our gracious contributors to show that we absolutely adore grindhouse and all of its sub-genres from sexploitaiton, to nazisploitation. And we hope you love what contributors Lillian Patterson, William Garcia, and I, Felix Vasquez, have to say about Grindhouse movies, and why it’s one of our favorite hobbies as movie lovers.
Funny Games U.S. (2008) (DVD)
I recently watched “The Strangers” in theaters, and it was a thriller very heavily reminiscent of “Funny Games” in where our villains simply are. And the studios heavily marketed on the momentum from Haneke’s film to make it seem like a branch off from “Funny Games.” That’s likely because with both films our villains remain ambiguous. I never understood why we have to know the motives of our villains in horror films, these days. Why do we need to know about their life, or tragedy, and why do they need to have a theme of revenge or financial gain? Why can’t they just be psychopathic murderers who simply crossed you and seek to kill you?