For a film called “Axed,” I was expecting something really dark and gruesome, and yet in the end I didn’t realize how trying Ryan Lee Driscoll’s horror drama would be. It’s a practice in tedium and boredom, with a mean spirit that is often very forced. If that’s not enough the direction leaves much to be desired with a series of performances that are sub-par at best. It’s a despicable film about a despicable man, torturing despicable people for no real reason, when it all boils down to it.
Apparently Jerry Dandridge from “Fright Night” had a sister. And she’s pissed that Charlie Brewster killed him. She plans to get revenge on him by tracking him down, taking residence in the same building he resides in, and staging one of the most convoluted revenge plans ever written. She wants to turn Charlie in to a vampire, but then she also wants him to believe that he’s going crazy. She shows him that she’s a vampire quite often, but also wants him to think that she’s merely just a stage performer and Charlie is going nuts because–well–going crazy makes the blood sweeter?
After the last few outputs from Chiller Films, I had almost no confidence in “Chilling Visions” as an anthology compilation. Surprisingly, as a display of talented filmmakers, “Chilling Visions” really offers five tales based around the human senses that are unique, entertaining, and often creepy. While the whole lot isn’t perfect, three out of five of the tales are really good genre entries. I’m always open to a new basis for an anthology movie series, and I’d love to see Chiller release a new five senses movie anthology every year to see what filmmakers can do with the ideas.
Imagine waking up one morning to run your errands, and you’re then stopped by police who insist you’ve committed a horrible crime? And what happens when everyone else you come across swears you’ve committed this horrible crime, and you know yourself that you’ve never even held a gun? How do you convince everyone that you’re an innocent man, when people can identify you as a criminal, and present evidence that contradicts your claims? What happens when you’re about to go to jail for a crime you have committed and can’t prove that you didn’t commit it? That’s the nightmare Manny Balestrero, a family man, finds himself in, in Alfred Hitchcock’s gripping and awfully horrifying thriller that sees a wrongly convicted man who has no chance of proving he’s committed the awful crime he’s been accused of.
One thing about “Horror Stories” that brings it down from the get go is its lack of ambiguity. Often times this anthology over explains the stories, and can never seem to have confidence in its own plot elements. That said, while “Horror Stories” surely won’t be confused with the brilliant “Three… Extremes,” it’s definitely a solid and often times very scary horror anthology with four really entertaining stories that will keep audiences watching, even when they falter and stumble.
You have to wonder if Gus Van Sant either garners an enormous amount of hubris, or just has a masochistic streak in him. Why else would he dive head first in to a remake of a hallowed horror and cinematic classic? And why else would he deliver a remake that’s exactly shot for shot? And “Psycho 1998” isn’t a remake that’s shot for shot with some liberties taken. It’s shot for shot to where director Van Sant copies every single shot of the original film, except with new actors. Van Sant fills the remake with a surreal tone in the vein of David Lynch to where the movie is adrift in a time period blurred between the fifties and contemporary time.
