We live in an age of pop culture, where today’s horror fan didn’t so much cut their teeth on horror movies, as they did horror video games. Where older horror fans were exposed to “Dead Alive” or “Cemetery Man,” young horror fans spent their days in the world of “Left for Dead” and “Dead Island.” It’s an age where horror environments are fast moving, stories are simplistic and unchallenging, and monsters are now computer animated polygonal blobs running at us from all corners.
Tag Archives: Action
Independence Day (1996)
Roland Emmerich’s “Independence Day” is one quarter of a very decent albeit cliche alien invasion film, and three quarters an unwatchable adventure film. What opens with looming shadows and hovering space ships devolves in to a buddy comedy with catchy one-liners and plot twists much too convenient to buy. Even for a science fiction film about huge alien space ships. Apparently the government can see asteroids coming from miles away and predict when one will pass, but they can’t see space ships the size of two continents enter the atmosphere.
The Lone Ranger (2003)
Back in 2003, Warner had the bright idea to pretty much take the “Smallville” concept and apply it to the Lone Ranger. Rather than featuring a very young superhero, we were given a very young pulp hero. Except, they changed everything about the original hero. And tried their best to pass off a white cowboy hat and black mask as cool for modern audiences. There’s even a guitar version of the William Tell Overture in the closing credits. Guitars are cool, right? There’s a reason why Lone Ranger is a pulp character. He’s a wonderful superhero, but adjusted to contemporary style is not going to work.
Tower Block (2012) [Blu-Ray]
The Land Before Time (1988)
I really can’t imagine a film like “The Land Before Time” being released today. As a kids film it teaches about strength, courage, and the willingness to look for hope in darkness. But as a film in general, director Don Bluth offers a story drenched in sadness, terror, and an almost endless amount of sadness. “The Land Before Time,” like much of Bluth’s work, has held up monumentally well over the year with a beautiful eye for detail, painting a massive world on the threshold of evolving in to something new, while also losing much of its own species to death and turmoil.
Come Out and Play (2013)
Like the original film it stems from, “Come Out and Play” offers the question “Who Can Kil a Child?” If your seven year old cherubic daughter was trying to murder you with a hammer, could you kill her? Laugh all you want, but if it comes down to me, and an evil eight year old intent on hacking me to death with an axe, I’ll gladly bring the child down and any other evil children trying to murder me with a machine gun.
Lifeforce (Collector's Edition) [Blu-Ray/DVD Combo] (1985)
Occasionally silly, but still unique and very entertaining, director Tobe Hooper’s “Life Force” is a great contrast to his penultimate “Texas Chainsaw Massare” which relied on muted colors and grimey shades of brown and black to depict his world of vicious violence. “Life Force” is a vibrant and brilliantly filmed horror science fiction film filled with bold shades of bright blues and reds, with a premise that’s all too entertaining to ignore. Hooper doesn’t just create a vampire or alien film, but collides them to form a demented amalgam of a horror classic.