I fear for the Deadpool movie.

So this week "Deadpool fans" were treated with the trailer for the upcoming Deadpool movie. While the trailer has gotten a lot of hype, I can't help but see all the hall marks of potential failure.

It has an R rating so kids can't go watch it, I'm sure Fox should know that what makes the Marvel movies such a success is that EVERYONE can watch em, and I'm sure a massive part of the profits come from kids dragging their family to screenings; and what about the franchise outside the films? If kids aren't watching Deadpool then they aren't buying Deadpool merchandise, which in turn limits the franchise greatly.

You could argue that films like Mad Max: Fury Road and even Rambo 4 got decent results from it's R ratings, but these weren't superhero / comic book movies. These were established franchises that had a mature following. I think one major thing comic book movies should not over look is that kids still do read comics, regardless of how old comic fans like you and I are.

Lets not forget what happened with The Punisher films. The first film had an R rating with generally negative reviews that barely made it's money back. (Budget of 33 Million earning 54.7 Million at the Box office)

Punisher: War Zone upped the antics and embraced the characters violence (Much like the Deadpool film intends to do) and though it got slightly better reviews (mixed to negative) it earned 10 million at the Box office on a budget of 35 Million.

 Now lets talk character and plot.

We know Ryan Reynolds can be funny, but his witty on-liners did nothing to save the Green Lantern film. You can argue that that's because the story for GL was crap, but we haven't seen him do anything in the Deadpool trailer except be Van Wilder in a red suit. There is no hint of a plot and no sign of a character arc to explore. We see him start off as a funny guy dying of something terminal turning into a funny guy fighting "bad" guys.

Plus Deadpool on his own is meh. In the comics his most memorable moments come from him messing with other established big league heroes, none of whom will be seen this film because it's a Fox movie and not a Marvel film. We saw him take a punch from what looks like Colossus in the trailer, but who cares about Colossus? We might get a surprise and see other Xmen characters in the final film, but I highly doubt that.

In fact Deadpool went from having several books staring him to just one where his the title character and another where he shares the title with Wolverine. The rest of his appearances have him guest staring in other titles. It will also be interesting to see if the film adds the "forth wall breaking" stuff that Deadpool does a lot of in the comics.

I predict that the Deadpool film will be a decent flick that will pull favorable reviews but will fail at the box office.

Having said all of this, there is a part of me that really is hoping that this movie does do well.

Why?

Because I want to see a R rated Punisher film that has a decent budget. I want a Terminator movie that doesn't have a fucking PG-13 rating. I want studios to be able to reliably invest more into R rated movies knowing that there is a market for them, instead of watering every action film down to something they can sell to the kids because they think that's the only way that they can make money.

It is for this sake that I hope that the Deadpool film is much more than just the Merc with a Mouth and actually has some bite to all it's bar, like I said, there was no hint of this in the trailer but maybe the film is hiding it's aces.

I might go watch it, though I wouldn't break a date for it... what about you?

Terminator: Genisys - I loved it.

When I first heard about Terminator: Genisys (TG) I was both skeptical and excited. Skeptical because I know that Hollywood is going through a phase where they're  grabbing at anything that can rake in the cash and any franchise that already has a fan base is big game.

I was also skeptical because I was afraid it would end up as a "star vehicle" for Arnold Schwarzenegger. The way Terminator 3 was just a machine to boost popularity during his election, I felt that TG might be just something done to get him back into the game. Not that there's too much wrong with the later, he does need to make a come back some how and what better way than to reprise his most iconic role.

The excitement I felt for the news of TG was from me being such a massive fan boy of the Terminator franchise. T1 and T2 are near perfect movies for me and seeing them as a kid shaped my taste in so many mediums.

Once I laid my eyes on the early trailers I was very hopeful. The film looked to be at the very least an decent action movie and for all the story and time theory the Terminator films try to cram into themselves, at the heart of it their main attraction for me is the action.

Sadly though before the film even came out we had the bullshit plot reveal in the trailer. A plot point so essential to the over-all enjoyment of the movie that even the films director Alan Taylor (Thor the Dark World/ Game of Thrones) couldn't believe got out. So right of the bat there was some serious controversy with the film's story. As a Terminator fan it was a major step away from the films backbone in a sense, but I was still keen.

Then the early reviews got out and the film was pretty much panned across the board. Bad reviews were coming from "fans of the series" and even a few sites whose words I hold as the bible truth pulled no punches when it came to trashing the film.

Despite all this I was pretty much set on watching the film for myself. Now this might come as a surprise to some, considering I used to host a film review show, but I'm not a fan of going to the movies. Mostly because I like watching movies that I know and lover over and over again. It takes a very special film to get me out of to the films.

So last night I went to watch Terminator: Genisys with pretty much no expectations except to re-enforce the negative reviews the film already has.

And you know what?

I can't believe the shit reviews. Let me preface what's to come by saying that though there might be things to hate in this film, as a Terminator fan there are a lot of things to love.

I thought TG was the best film in the franchise since Terminator 2 and that's saying a lot. It may not be the best Terminator movie because that's highly debatable between T1and T2, and it may not be the best sequel because that's definitely T2.  But as a Terminator Film, it stands right up there with the first two films and it has become the unofficial Trilogy for me.

Terminator: Genisys knows it's got big Arnie size boots to fill, and it makes no quarrels with letting us know that it knows the first two films are great because the way the film is made, the first half of it pretty much lives in the original Cameron films shadow.

Now there's going to be some spoilers here, but nothing as major as what has already been leaked through the trailers.

Because of the way the film is made and its plot unfolds, to me the first bit of TG plays out like a love letter to Terminator fans.

The opening scene which features a battle between the human resistance and Skynets hordes of machines is finally getting the visual respect it deserves. Sure the SFX isn't the best, but these days we know CGI when we see it. What turns this around is that we get to see something we've only ever heard whispers of in the previous movies and that's the turning point in the war against the machines.

In fact we get to see the fall of Skynet as told by Reese in the first film. This is the Resistance victory that promoted Skynet to send a Terminator back in time to kill Sara Corner. We get to see it unfold... with a twist of course.

What follows this is pretty much Terminator Nostalgia as we see pretty much the opening of Terminator one redone. The fan boy in me jumped like a giddy school girl as I tried to figure out whether the scenes were Arnie's T-800 arriving in the past was redone or simply touched up versions of the original. Either would be awesome.

 Then we have the film's Kyle Reese follow suit, arriving in 1984 and from here any avid fan would know that film makers were going out of their way to put in nods to the orginal series.

There is a bit where a cop car pulls up to investigate the light show from Reese's appearance and it is spot on a replica shot of the cop car pulling up to investigate the T-1000s appearance in the second film.

It's also important to note that Terminator 2 also suffered from a trailer reveal of it's plot and if we hadn't seen Robert Patrick's character as the baddy in the T2 trailer it would have been safe to assume he was the good guy and Arnie was the bad Terminator again.

I got all that from that cop car simply pulling up.

Then we have the bit in the clothing shop where Kyle is being escorted out by two cops and he gives a confused glance at a silver store mannequin. This same gesture was done by the T-1000 in Terminator 2 for-shadowing it's full silver body appearance to come.

I honestly could go on with this list of nods but the point is for the Terminator fan in me these were just awesome (The smile gag from T2, the ability to learn after removing the chip), but it doesn't end with all this nostalgia of course because we have a franchise to reboot so half way through the film decides to rear in it's own identity and by now I am so pumped by all the fan service the film has already given me that I am open to where ever the film wants to go. It's almost as though the film makers wanted to prove that they know "Terminator" before they showed us what they had in mind for it's future.

I also liked the way Arnie was not the aggressive killing machine he was in the first two films and despite his age was forced to be in the third film. Here the film gives us a reason for his aging and slower reflexes and this created a solemn moment for me as a fan of not just Terminator but of the Governator himself, moments that even made me sad at times.

This coupled with suggest that the T-800 may actually be learning how to feel and take responsibility of who it is protecting at almost an emotional level, sounds like a silly bull shit sci fi moment, but you know what? We're dealing with time traveling robots here, lets not get hung up on robot logic.

Movie logic wise though the film doesn't suffer. We have characters doing what we'd pretty much expect them to do without looking stupid. By the time we get to the "John Conner Reveal" I can buy it. In fact I'm kind of glad they leaked this in the trailer because it's such a "WTF" moment that instead of brooding over it at the movies, knowing about it before you go in makes it easier to accept.

"Easier" is used sparingly though because I'm still not a 100% sold on the "John is over of them now" thing because a part of me feels like it robs us of the the films "back bone" and that is that everything we do in these movies is to protect John.

But then again, to turn that idea on its head. I respect that.

There isn't much else I can tell you about what I liked with out telling you the about the whole movies, but for me as an action film and a Terminator Sequel/ prequel / reboot, TG really delivered. So for the life of me I do know what critics and film goers were expecting to give the film such harsh reviews.

But then again Fast 7 got about 81% on Rotten Tomatoes. A movie about cars and action that barely has a 2 min race in the opening and no action till about 35mins into the damn movie. Even then the action is spread so far apart that it tries to up the drama factor even though none of these movies are known for it's stars acting ability.

Terminator: Genisys on the other hand knows exactly what it is and doesn't let up. It might even be by some standards a by-the-book action flick, but the thing about these "by the book" films is that they come in flavors and this one is Terminator Flavor.

Let me end this by saying that Terminator: Genisys may not be the best Terminator film, but it is a better entry in the series compared to what's come after Cameron's T1 and T2. If you are a fan of the series or just in the mood for a good action film, Terminator: Genisys hits the spot.

Christopher Nolan: Please stop ruining my favourite characters

Yes I am a massive comic book fan and more so a huge Superman and Batman fan. I have read every one of their comics from Issue one till the issues this month.

And I hate Christopher Nolan's take on my favourite heroes.

Nolan's Batman: I don't kill people.

And yet he blows up anything in his way when his driving from point A to point B.

When he was asked to kill that one guy at the League of shadows place, he says no - then blows up the whole damn place killing everyone in it including the fake Ra's al Ghul... Then he kills Dent in the 2nd film.

Plus I hate how Nolan wants to make everything "Grounded" ... it's a Superhero movie. It's meant to have an element of the extraordinary. You can't look to explain everything and make it plausible. 


Not only did Nolan strip Batman of any of the things that make him a fan favourite; always one step a head, world greatest detective, less brawler more tactician, master of the shadows...

Nolan actually took the idea of a man wearing a bat suit and made it mundane. He sucked the joy out of it and made this "matter of fact" thing, but for all the "realism" he tries to force into his movies he still expects us to suspend our disbelief for bull shit things like Batman escaping that bomb or "Robin" knowing Bruce is Batman because of a stupid look on his face? and what about that broken back that heals in 3 months or how he even got back to Gotham from that damn prison in the ground? ...in time to paint a giant bat symbol that will light up with flames on that bridge.

As for that damn voice; just the fact that Nolan heard Bale do that ridiculous voice and didn't try to change it - is fail.

Most people don't even like the Nolan Batman films for Batman. They like them because of the villains. With Joker being the most loved.

You wanna know why the Joker was so awesome? (Aside from Ledger's phenomenal performance) ... because we don't know anything about him. The mystery to his chaos was the major draw - he was like a force of nature. In comparison to Nolan's neatly laid out Batman he was a breath of fresh air.

Plus the villains are the only ones who actually get any character development in Nolan's films, look at Dent or Ras. At the end of the 3rd film Batman isn't any better at being Batman. In fact in Rises his a freaking joke - especially when he goes up against Bane.

And as for Man of Steel. Nolan completely lost the plot with that one. We know his looked at Superman comics... but has he actually sat down to read one? For all the reason Man of Steel fails as a Superman movie there's one that sticks out like a sore thumb.

Superman doesn't kill people - no matter what the reason.

For everything that has a capacity to do good, it has an equal capacity to do evil.

Superman, through his strengths and attributes has a great capacity for for good... what keeps him from going evil? His morals. We can't just have him killing people, no matter how it's justified. You and I can't kill people, because no matter the reason it's still wrong and we have to answer to it.

Who does Superman answer to if he kills someone? To have him carry out an act like that totally destroys the foundations of his character, because it's a total abuse of his power. And that alone is proof that Nolan and the Man of Steel crew understand nothing about Superman.

And did he have to kill Zod? It's not like Nolan's Superman did anything to show that he cared about the people around him. He trashed half the city and never took the fight anywhere else... like he would have done in the comics.

Why couldn't he just grab Zod and fly away? Why couldn't he just stand in front of the heat rays? Why couldn't he just cover Zods eyes with his hands? Yes he would have gotten hurt - but if he cared so much wouldn't it have been worth the pain? With all his powers and all his "love for humanity" the first thing that came to mind was to snap a living things neck?

Bull shit... complete and utter bull shit.

Yet people eat Nolan's crap up.

And Superman doesn't have to be a "bad ass" - his not edgy or hardcore. There are hundreds of inter-changeable comic characters to fill that niche. Superman IS the boy scout, he IS the naive farm boy with the weight of the world on his shoulders.

And his not just an alien from another planet. He was born and raised an earth kid, a simple farm boy.

The Batman persona is the real Bruce Wayne and the playboy billionaire is the façade. But for Superman - it's the other way around. The godly spaceman is the outer shell, inside Clark Kent - born and raised - is the real person.

This was totally lost with the dull, emo portrayal of Superman in Man of Steel.

Up yours Christopher Nolan - if you don't like making Superhero movies, then stop getting involved with them.

And yes my hate is directed to Nolan because he and David Goyer wrote the script. Zack Snyder should go back to directing music videos. His ruined Watchman - the only comic book to receive a Hugo award and now he helped ruin Superman.

Go Goa Gone: Bollywood finally gets bitten

As a kid I watched a lot of Bollywood films, mostly a lot of movies staring Amitabh Bachchan.

Till this day he is one of my favorite actors, and not just out of Bollywood. His film Toofan was something I watched over and over again as a kid because it was the closet thing I could get in terms of a "superhero" movie which was in my mother tongue.

Amitabh Bachchan as Toofan (Hurricane)

 As I grew older and got into movies, mostly horror movies, I started drifting away from Bollywood a bit. Through my folks I would still catch a few of the classic films, but mostly I grew up on 80s horror out of the states. 

I don't think I've ever been excited about a Bollywood film since my Amitabh Bachchan days, but this week I came to know about one film from the mother land that has me pretty pumped.

Go Goa Gone is an up coming Zombie Comedy from Bollywood. Not only are these guys finally putting out a Zombie movie... but they've decided to make it funny. Which is cool because even the supposed "serious" Bolly Horror movies like Purana Mandir (Another favorite) have elements of comedy and the usual sing and dance, which detracts a lot from the tone of the horror.

The film is being directed by the duo of Raj Nidimoru and Krishna D.K who are US based film makers originally from India. And looking at the trailer for their film Go Goa Gone you can tell that these guys love zombie movies.

I see hints of Shawn of the Dead in there, as well as sharp nods to most zombie movie cliches. My particular favorite is the "Bad Ass" character in the film as played by Saif Ali Khan. His a Desi boy parading as a Russian lol.

The film has already gotten some major hype online and was even trending the other day on Twitter. With zombies being everywhere these days, just the novelty of a Bollywood made zombie movie brings a bit of freshness to the genre.

 The premise is pretty straight forward, but provides the rigth set up:

When three friends head to Goa to get their minds off all their stress, they realize that their visit has been rearranged by zombies. Seeking the help of an Indo-Russian zombie slayer named Boris (Saif Ali Khan), they must fight together to defeat these intruders!

Check out the trailer and tell me that it doesn't look like fun.

And then?

And then I had a great day off yesterday. Chowed all over town, did a bit of working out, caught up on my reading.

All in all it was a very productive day, though it did get a little depressing when my PS3 died. After corrupting my 250 hour Dark Souls save last weekend, the Piece of Shit 3 finally decided to give me the finger and call it quits. Luckily one of the retail outlets here has a reasonable price on PS3s and give them out on hire-purchase, so I'm hoping to pick up a new one next week. I need to get one because if I don't play the Last of Us I'll die. (That's right Kayla - I will)

But thanks to the awesome Steam sale that's been happening since last week, my gaming fix won't be lacking any time soon.

Since Sunday I've been mucking around with Deadlight which has to be one of the better takes on the zombie apocalypse for video games. The only travesty with Deadligth is me taking so long to buy it, but thanks to the wait and the sale I managed to get it at a great price. I was actually hard out for this game for some time, ever since I saw it release for Xbox Arcade back in July. As far as story and atmosphere goes, Deadlight is a trip to play, and the ending actually left me sad and moved.

 
The game itself plays like Limbo with zombies, with puzzles and platform elements pasted against a 2D design. If I had to complain about anything it would be that the jump button sometimes lags a bit, but aside from that the game is a downloadable masterpiece. Plus the Steam edition comes with a host of extras including all the promotional materiel for the game along with developer diary videos and concept art to unlock.

It took me about 4 hours to finish the game, and this was with me taking my time to find as many secrets and such as I could. The supposed game time was one of the factors that put me off buying the game right away because in terms of Fijian Dollars, a short game for $30 can be a little disheartening. But for the sale price of $15 bucks I felt the game was a great deal. But then again $15 was intended international market price. Though the story is short, to pay through it is quite a feeling. A lot of the games themes and atmosphere reminded me of Cormac McCarthy's The Road. Plus I'm a sucker for survival games and even now I'm debating if I should pick up I'm Alive as well.

I think it's safe to say that Deadlight is one of the best zombie games I've played, and for a budget downloadable title it does a lot to elevate the genre over some of its AAA contemporaries.

Tonight I'll be doing some creative writing as Alan Wake since I picked that up on Steam as well this morning. This is another game that I was interested in when it first came out but for some reason or other just never got around to playing. I'm actually sort of in the mood for the whole Twin Peaks thing that the game seems to have going on.

Aside from the vidya games my girlfriend and I have been brushing up on our 80s horror movies. Since Halloween we've been digging up all sorts of 80s B movie goodness. Mostly we've been after movies that are considered "under rated" gems. Though a lot of what we found should have been left 'unseen' - a lot of it was very entertaining. I've actually  got a couple of new faves now as well. One of them being the Jeffery Combs flick From Beyond.

 To be fair though this film is already considered a cult classic, so falling for it is not too obscure, plus Jeffery Combs is like one of my favorite horror movie actors.

Another movie I had to watch was Alligator, because as a kid I had this one VHS rip of the animated feature Fire and Ice and the trailer for Alligator was at the beginning of the tape and I'd watch it over and over because I thought it looked like an awesome creature feature. I was glad to find out that the film was not a let down and was in fact very well put together. It reminded me a lot of Jaws, and it was very well acted with some great one liners. It's also one of the better "it came from below" horror movies I've seen - right up there with C.H.U.D. (or down there?)

Another thing my girl friend and I have been spending a lot of money on recently is eating out. We've been visiting a lot of restaurants and dinners that we normally pass by, just to see what kind of specialties they might have.

Last night was funny though because I've been trying to watch what I eat, especially for dinner. So I had this great Thai Chicken salad and was all like - ok I'm set. But then like two hours later I was so damn hungry I could eat a baby. Lucky there was some left over Chili- chicken in the fridge. So I guess I gotta polish my dinner options a bit.

I'm looking forward to chilling this weekend, as i had spent the last weekend at the office working on a documentary for FBC TV.

And I can't believe where are days away from kicking of December, man this year went by so fast, and I know we say that about every year, but 2012 really did just fly by. I'm hoping to use my Hibiscus trips either in late December or maybe early next month.

What have you got planned for the rest of the year?

Early Screening: Abraham Lincoln - Vampire Hunter

The short of it: Starts off great but then decides to take itself too seriously thus loosing the plot and spoiling what could have been a no brainer action/ horror flick.

And here's the long of it:

 No Major Spoilers

There's a certain amount of disbelief that you need to suspend when watching Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, but this is pretty much a given with a movie that carries such a premise, and at first it is pretty easy to get into it.

The movie kicks off into the thick of things pretty fast. We are introduced to young Abraham and it's established that slavery is a bad thing, then his dad pisses off some guy and there are Vampires.

Soon Abraham meets a man that offers to train the would be President in the art of hunting the blood thirsty undead. This involves a brief introduction to kick ass period weapons, crash course on Vampire lore and some awesome Axe-fu training.

First lets check out the good stuff. "Abe Lincoln: Vamp hunter" has some awesome action bits. Fights are brutal, but very stylized and look freaking sweet. The vampires look pretty damn freaky, with deformed, unhinging jaws filled to the brim with razor sharp teeth and they are fast as heck and can vanish into puffs of smoke like ninjas, o and everyone back then knew a little bit of  martial arts.

There is one very awesome fight that takes place in the middle of a horse stampede that really kicked ass.

Sadly the action in the film is where the highlights stop.

The pace of the movie is a little broken and more often than not it feels a little rushed, if the movie were a book (and it is based on a book) it would feel as though entire chapters were just missing from the final product. This is made worse when they try to squeeze Mr Lincolns love interest into the plot.

The inclusion of Abe meeting his beloved Mary seemed very forced and the whole thing is just rushed through. They go from being total strangers to being lovers getting engaged in a blink of an eye.

It's around this time that the writer also remember that Lincoln was actually a real person with real life accomplishments which he then decides to add into the movie, and this fucks things up even more.

Suddenly the awesome action and combat that made the movie entertaining is given up in favor of crowd speeches and elections and other things that are too damn boring and go on for too long, distracting from the story.

I never expected the movies story to be a work of art, but I didn't think it would be so disjointed. On one hand the movies sets us up to believe in some obscure yet awesome notions and just when it's convinced us into a certain mind set, the film decides to believe it's own bullshit and take itself seriously which then really messes up the last third of the film.

I was so damn excited through the first half of the movie, cheering at heads being cut off and blood being splattered across the screen, but by the end I was actually dozing off to sleep.

Even the action that follows the 'Presidential' part of the film is hard to digest because now everything on screen just looks like bullshit.

 Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter could have been very awesome, something you go cheer at with your friends, but instead I think it ended up being something you pick up on DVD if there's nothing else on the shelf.

Might be worth a watch if you really like Vampires - or Abraham Lincoln.

Prometheus: Early Screening

This morning I got to watch what was my most anticipated movie of 2012. In the face of Dark Knight Rises, Avengers and whatever else have you, Prometheus was the one movie I was dying to see.

How did it hold out?

The Short of it: Prometheus is a good film, save for a few flaws it's probably one of the best Sci-fi movies I've seen in a long time, but I think fans of the Ridley Scott's 1979 Alien will appreciate it more, while the casual movie goer might like it for it's visual flare, but dislike it for it close nit story.

And here's the long of it: No Spoliers

Prometheus isn't an action movie and despite a few creepy bits it's not a horror movie either. The only way I can think to describe Prometheus is that it's a movie that tells a story. Not to make it sound boring because it's not. The 2 hours or so I spent watching Prometheus went by in a heart beat, because it's that engrossing.

Visually the movie is amazing, but it delivers it's stunning visuals in such away that none of it steals  from the plot being driven on screen. Every now and then I would think too myself : "whoa that looks awesome!" because everything is implemented in such a way that it all felt very practical and believable.

The thing that struck me the most is how everything looked so high tech and fancy in the film and yet you could totally believe that the events of Alien would follow this.

For example the Tech being used in Prometheus looks awesome, but you can still believe that the Tech in Alien would evolve from this. Even the vehicles they use are similar to the ones in James Cameron's Aliens. 

Speaking of Alien lets just clarify this, Prometheus is a Prequel,  but I can see now what Ridley meant when he said that it's not a Direct prequel.

Though the events of Prometheus don't link directly to anything that happens in Alien, the results of these events are seen in the Alien Films. It's very hard to explain without spilling the plot, but just know if you've seen Alien then there will be so many moments where you'll be going "o so that's it" or " o that's why that happened." Some of the locations look as though they were ripped directly from the older movie too.

In the end this is what I enjoyed most about the movie, the nods and set ups for Alien.

The Characters were a mixed bag of "interesting" and "meh." Ironically Micheal Fassbender's Android character of David was probably the most explored in the film, and though Charlize Theron was being set up as sort of the antagonist of the film - she was one of my favorite roles. I saw a bit of Sigourney Weaver's Ripply in her, as someone who looks like she knows what has to be done, and she does it with a look of shock and at times fear on her face.

The other characters didn't leave any kind of impression at all, mostly because they didn't get to do much aside from f**k up here and there to drive the story.

Spoilers but without giving away plot.

The only thing I didn't like about the movie was that the plot would make certain characters go against their established characteristics just to move the story forward. A few times I was like "Why the fuck would he do that?"

Some of the stuff the characters do are just dumb, and for a movie that's trying so hard to be believable you'd think they'd avoid such things.

Plus I also felt some parts of the movie were a little understated.

The main plot of "creationism" that's been seen in the trailers is very full on for the first 15mins of the film, before it's all but forgotten. Plus some of the major discoveries made by the characters are very under played.

"Hey their DNA is a 100% match to ours..."

" O that's cool ... hey ima go now."

 The movie does try to make us care about a few key moments, but a lot of these moments have such little build up or back story that you just don't give a shizz.

"Don't worry - we'll sacrifice ourselves to save us"

Wait - who the heck you? Have you done anything yet in the film?

After all this it might sound weird me saying this, but I loved the movie. Though it was a little underwhelming at first, it does well to add to the Alien mythos, which aside from Ridley and Cameron's contribution, isn't the best line up of movies to begin with.

At the end of credits I was actually stunned by it, despite the little hick ups here and there. It wasn't till I sat down and went over some of the plot holes and such that the annoyances I mentioned above came back to me.

If you're into sci-fi or just good movie making - then Prometheus will be very pleasing, but if if you're a fan of the Alien franchise then this movie will really shine.

Especially the very final moments of the film - that really did it for me. Not telling why.

EDIT: Wanted to add this link to a page I found which lists pretty much all the discrepancies I had with the movie.

The Avengers: Early Screening

No Spoilers

So this morning I had the absolute pleasure of watching a private early screening of The Avengers, which opens locally tomorrow but is due to release international on the 4th of May.

I'm not the biggest fan of the Avengers, and of all the movies that have lead up to this film event, I really only liked the Iron Man ones. But as soon as this movie started I was grinning like a little kid totally bedazzled by the awesomeness on the screen.

The Avengers kicks off with a scream and then never lets up save for a few moments to catch it's breath. But even in it's few 'slow' moments the movie is an absolute blast and I can not remember the last time I was so amazed by a big budget special effects movie. Block buster effects are a staple of almost every other action movie that's been coming out recently, but Avengers for me was able to make special effects special again.

Without giving away anything let me just say that the movie does sort of expect you to have seen the heroes individual films as it drops a lot of nods to them without explaining in great deal the points it brings up. This is fine though because if you're watching the Avengers chances are you have for sure seen these other movies.

Visually Iron Man would have to be the most stunning Avenger on screen, second only to Scarlett Johansson's bum, plus Tony Stark's constant banter makes him the most entertaining. On the other end of the spectrum would be Captain America who I thought had the most boring outfit and blandest character.

Mark Ruffalo's Bruce Banner was my favorite character in the film though, him struggling to contain the Hulk was nice and his subtle humor was a pleasant surprise when I was expecting most of the comic relief to come from Robert Downy Jr.

But the real star of the movie is the movie itself. All the characters get to rock the screen and have their own moments of glory and for something that has such a massive cast the film never ever feels bogged down. It truly feels like an epic.... sort of like the first time I sat through Lord of the Rings.

There's a lot of action, a lot of laughs and even a few moments that jerked my tear glands. It's also interesting to note that even though all the trailers for the movie are awesome, they give away little to nothing of the main plot, or at the very least there are a lot of surprises left in store even if you have watched the trailers religiously. For what it is, The Avengers is probably at the top of its game, and what it is is one hell of an action movie.

As soon as the movie finished I was so damn pumped...  be sure to stay till after the credits eh.

Massive nerd joy

Movie night!

My girlfriend and I just got back home from an awesome movie night over at my buddy Al's place.

It started off a little sad cause we wanted to watch Tucker and Dale vs Evil but for some reason the DVD player had the sound out of sync, so we decided to skip it and watch this one French flick called À l'intérieur (Inside).


I've been watching a lot of these French horror films recently and I had heard a lot of good things about this particular one.

Although my friends are always keen to jump in front of the camera for my horror shorts, they aren't too mad about horror movies. So whenever I get the chance I like to fry their nerves with some of the films I pick up here and there. I was gonna get them to watch Martyrs, but I've seen it quite a few times, and so has my GF. Then there the option to watch The Woman, but then I decided to go with something that I hadn't seen.

Inside was such a great film.

Some of the plot details were a bit iffy, and a lot of the time we were screaming at the main-girl to do things that were so stupid of her to over-look. But it was all a lot of fun. It wasn't the goriest movie... but it had exploding heads, scissor stabbings and knitting needles being thrust all over the place, which resulted in a lot of screams and uncomfortable laughter from all of us.

I gotta get my hands on more of these kinds of movies. Where the suspense and character building is balanced with awesome amounts of blood and madness.

Speaking of madness... we also watched a fun little Spanish short film called Deus Irae, which I would love to see made into a feature length movie. Check out the trailer below.



I really wanna do another movie night soon, but I want to try and get something that's more of a classic to round up the night. It's a lot of fun being tensed up watching an awesome horror film, but I love ending nights like these with something that we can watch without feeling violated at the end of it.

Like an old Christopher Lee movie, or maybe something with Jeffrey Combs :P

The Goon

Movie Trailers - Movies Blog

I love this movie trailer. The crew behind the film did an amazing job of bring this awesome comic to life.

The film's suppose to be out sometime this year, you can keep up with news on the project over at the movies official site.

Kania Na Yalo Bula (Short Film)

Hey guys... here's the short film my friends and I made for the Fiji Kula Festival 2010. Shot in 8 hours on a budget of $80... we hope you enjoy it :D

It's called "Kania Na Yalo Bula"... which in Fijian means "Eat the Living"

La Horde

I got to watch the new French zombie film La Horde today, and man was it good.

I had seen the trailer for this film a few weeks back, and thought it looked pretty brutal, so I had some expectations when watching this movie... gladly it didn't disappoint.


Though not mind numbingly action packed like the trailer suggests, the Horde starts off with what is essentially a pretty thin yet highly effective story. Some cops are out to take down the crummy criminals who iced one of their buddies. They get to a location, intercept the baddies, and then suddenly there's a zombie invasion.

... like I said: thin.

But it don't matter at all, because the Horde is to zombies what Dusk till dawn was to vampires.

It sets you up for one story and then drops you in the middle of something else.

The version I saw was French with subtitles, so it was kinda hard for me to judge the acting. But everyone filled their roles convincingly, though there were a few through away parts in there just to get the initial body count up and running. The movie looks great though with mad pacing awesome action shots that kept me excited the whole time I was watching.

Sometimes the film was so frantic and the visuals so over the top that it almost felt like a comic book movie.

The zombies in the show were not Dawn of the Dead remake standard in terms of make up and what not, but they ran and screamed very well. The make on these guys were a little more than blood and injuries, but the film moves to jarringly that the lack of detail is totally lost, and what you're left with is a mad zombie feeding frenzy that you just want to run away from.


My favourite part would have to be this one bit where the main guy is on top of a car in an underground garage, just hacking and shooting away at an ocean of zombies that's gathering around him. And his not even the most bad ass guy in the film.

Watch out for the crazy guy with the axe!

This is not at all a review by the way, if you want one keep checking out The Horror Club cause they'll have a review for it up soon. But I do want to say that if you like action and if you like zombies, this film will let you pass the time with a smile on your face.

It gets weak sometimes, but it very quickly picks it's self up and gets back into the gory zombie action, which is really all I want from a zombie movie.

Eat it Uwe Boll

Uwe Boll gets a lot of slack as a director, and yes his movies aren't the biggest hits, but you gotta admire the guy for sticking to it.

I wouldn't kill to see a Uwe Boll movie, but they are a lot of fun when viewed with a group your close pals. It's the stuff the future renditions of Mystery Science theater will be thriving on.

... and I kinda liked Postal.

Well... it seems good old Uwe is finally involved in something that's got my attention.

Uwe Boll groupie

Eaters is an Italian zombie movie that is being produced by Mr. Boll, it's about two guys who hit the road in search of survivors in a world infested by the undead. Aside from being up against hordes of zombies, they also come across non-zombie crazy people that no good zombie movie should ever go without. Directed by Luca Boni and Marco Ristori, I read some where this thing is expected to be out sometime in June. Check out a translated synopsis and a little more info here.

Now I may not have been too crazy about Uwe Boll's House of the Dead, but aside from the producer credit, I'm hoping this baby is going to be a throw back to the good old Italian zombie movies I know and love.

Check out the teaser below.



Like I said, I'm looking forward to this one. The trailer looked like the movie is having fun with itself, and it has the kind of campy-factor that actually works in the zombie movie genre.

While on the subject of foreign zombie flicks, the upcoming French zombie movie The Horde recently got it's own website. There's another movie I can't wait to see, when it comes to horror the French don't know where or when to stop, and they always deliver it in style.

Coffee, smokes and the The Eldritch Influence

Today I spent a pleasant afternoon chatting with my buddy Albie over coffee and smokes. Before that he and I had a meeting with a friend of ours about an upcoming web-magazine that we're putting together.

After the meeting nether of us felt like walking anywhere, so we just sat there and waited for happy hour at the bar across the street.

Was good fun.

When I got home I watched a brief documentary on the life of H.P Lovecraft called The Eldritch Influence, which was pretty interesting. It was basically made of a couple of writers who were influenced in one way or another by Lovecraft's work. Writers like Neil Gaimen and Brian Lumley, and one that I found particularity interesting, Ramsey Campbell.

Aside from sharing these writer's thoughts and understanding of Lovecraft's writings and ideas, the film also had a little background on Lovecraft's life and his own influences. Talking about things that interested him as a child and later on as an adult, that reflected in his work.

The only thing I didn't care for was this one bits were some people were pretending to be in some kind of Cthulhu dooms day cult, the whole thing felt kind of silly and sort of spoiled the flow of the films narration for me. Thankfully it's towards the end, and though it seems to go on for a while, it's quickly over and the rest of the show's pretty solid.

There's a nice bit in the end where the different authors talk about their favorite Lovecraft stories, which I found useful in looking for which stories I should look out for.

The show is filled with various pictures of Lovecraft, as well as artwork that depicts or is inspired by his work. There are also personal entries that are narrated, and give interesting in-site into Lovecrafts chracter and thoughts.

For fans of H.P. Lovecraft, or anyone who's interested in his work, this would be a nice place to start sussing things out. The show gives you an idea of what his writing were all about, and gives some direction as to which stories to look out for.

Off Topic: Solomon Kane

It was a sweet coincidence to find the trailer for the movie adaption of Robert E. Howard's Solomon Kane online today, as just this morning I had decided to dive into my copy of The Complete Chronicles of Conan.

Solomon Kane kicking ass

I'm not really the biggest fan of fantasy novels in general, but I love the sub genre of Sword and Sorcery, and Conan makes for the best of this genre. I've got quit a lot of his books, and I remember spending hours as a kid thrilled by them.

But when I got my hands on the 'complete chronicles' it was both awesome and daunting.

Housing the full collection of Howard's work related to Conan, the book is massive and can be a real chore to get comfortable with. For that reason I've only ever read it in short portions.

But last night I was reading one of my Lancer editions of Conan (which have the maddest covers by Frank Frazetta), when I decided to check out some of the notes and such from the Chronicle edition, and I haven't been able to put it down since.

Yes my thighs hurt from this thing resting on them, but what the heck.

So today as I was mucking around online looking for info on a new Conan movie I heard was being done, I came across this mad trailer for Solomon Kane.



Kane was one of Robert Howard's earlier characters, and though I hadn't heard much of him as a kid reading Conan, I got into the chracter when I started looking into more of Howard's work thanks to the inter-web. I particularity loved his Dark Horse comics series which was up their with their Conan run.

This movie looks pretty solid, and the review's it's gotten mention some impressive claims.

I guy in a Salem witch hunter out fit... tracking and kicking the shit out of demons and other nasties.

What's not to look forward to?

La Horde

Going crazy trying to get my bloody little hands on a copy of The Horde, a French zombie movie that looks freakin mad awesome.

If anyone has any info on where I can get it, that would be sweet.

Here's a little video segment on the film from the good people over at clevvermovies.com

Night of the living word.

Over the Easter weekend the Mayfair Theater in Ottawa, which apparently is the oldest active movie theater running since 1932, had a screening of the ever beloved Night of the living dead.

While I would loved to be in attendance, having never seen the movie on the big screen... some people used the screening as an opportunity for a higher cause.

The Mayfair Theater

A protesting preacher used the movie goers time spent lined up, as a quick chance to deliver a little street sermon, during which he talked about dying... and about how his not dead... and about how he used to be a really rotten guy and deserves to be in hell.

The guy actually has a blog and he wrote up a little account of the night here, complete with a video of the whole event.

Let it be known that I'm not bashing the man's effort, as I believe every one is entitled to his or her opinion. But people also have the right to line up for a movie they want to watch on their own account, without someone telling them they're gonna go to hell for it.

"Murder, gore, bloodshed and cannibalism
only begins to describe the kind of
‘entertainment’
that was being offered"
- Protesting Preacher

On the other hand, I actually thought the whole thing made for an awesome viral marketing video. Showing that even after more than 40 years... Night of the living dead is still able able to provoke all kinds of shizz. The video that the preacher put up had a decent little intro with posters of the movie and signs reading "night of the loving dead Sold Out" and a cool title: Night of the living word.

...clever.

Even the theater manager who had a few things to say in response to the preacher's post, later realized that any publicity is good publicity.

Here is the comment that I left on the post:

First off, great job with putting the video together... I particularly like the title.

But I think sir, if you were to actually watch the movie with an open mind, you might enjoy it.

'Night of the Living dead' was intended to be two thirds a horror movie and one third social satire, showing society eating its self up.

Though the horror and gore of "Night of the living dead" would be considered very mild by some of today's standards, I can see how it would be over the top for someone who may not be accustomed to it. But even the good book at time used extreme depictions of violence to enforce some of its messages.

It might do you good to have a look at the movie, if anything it might give you a better understanding in aid of your cause, or you might see that it's just a horror movie.

What ever you do stay clear of the 25th anniversary edition... it's a bad re-edit; adding junk that steals away from the original's greatness.

More animated gore

After I found out about the upcoming zombie animated film A.D that I have in the previous post, I decided to look for more animated horror action.

What I found was a trailer for a little gem called "Blood Trail"

And holy shit is this damn trailer freakin awesome... I mean gruesome :P



Blood Trail is a CGI horror piece based on a screenplay by Matt Cochran. Apparently it's set to be developed into a feature film, video game and graphic novel.

If this doesn't become a feature length movie... there is no justice in life.

Read more about the project here.

A.D = pure Animated Zombie goodness

This is going to kick ass... I can't freakin wait to watch this movie. Click here to head on over to Zombie Info to find out more.

Dante's Inferno: an animated Epic.

I'm not the biggest Anime fan.

Though I really liked Ninja Scrolls and grew up watching the likes of Voltron and Battle of the Planets... I don't go out of my way to collect Anime.

I do get interested if they offer something that fits into the little niches I crave. Like if it has zombies or if it's something creepy and grot. I might watch one with a cool robot/ mech in it...but even then I'll have to look it up first :P

But when I heard that Dante's Inferno was getting the Anime treatment... I was curious. The whole movie/ Anime tie in thing has been happening for a while now. The earliest one I can remember was the Animatrix that came out back when the whole Matrix thing was crazy. It served as a means to broaden the Matrix world, delivering some back story where needed.

Like Dead Space: Down Fall accompanied Dead Space the game, EA/ Visceral Games latest offering, Dante's Inferno, is coming with it's own little animated feature coming along.

But unlike Dead Space: Down Fall that was sort of a prequel to the game, Dante's Inferno: The Animated Epic maybe be more of a spoiler for any one who hasn't played the game.


Providing not only a further back ground to the game, the anime follows Dante as he makes a quick 88min trip to the 9th circle of hell. Though I'm not sure to what extent the story of the film mirrors the game... for me it gave away a few details that I wished I 'd have picked up from playing the game. On the other hand... I've seen some game content that wasn't shown or mentioned in the film. So lets see how it goes.

It all looks good though....

The story is divided into several sections, each named after a different portion of Dante's hell. And we see this vision through the eyes of several animation teams and directors, each of whom have a very distinct style in terms of art and such.

Though chracter wise, our hero and his buddies stay the same director to director, the visual take each team had is very intriguing. The film won't be braking any new grounds in animation, but it does have it's moments of awe. From an editors stand point I thought the whole thing was put together very nicely. Though I wished they a lot more wide scenery shots, that established the grand scale of what Dante was getting him self into.

It seems that in the game, the environment it self is almost a character on its own, and this I thought was lacking a bit in the film.

I had a bit of an issue with what seemed like a rush pacing of the film too, but after a while I just went with it.

I'm home> you're dead> o you've taken her>I'll save you>shit there's a door>I can't get in> I'm in> there's a boat> I'm on> shizz it's Satan!!

But I really did enjoy this film. Especially since I'm on this massive Dante's Inferno trip right now. For any one caught up with shizz about the game, this is a must watch. But I would advise you to play through the game first if you don't want your story experience spoiled.

Even if you're not having sleepless nights waiting for the game, this is definitely something to check out if your into anything animated. The styles the directors bring to Dante, serves well to bring out his different aspects. With my fave look being the art style for Limbo, Lust and City of Dis.

Heck I love em all...

And though the story may not be as grand as the original poem...it still feels epic.

This is going to be a welcome addition to my DVD collection, and after watching it I really can't wait to tear into the game.

The film comes with six different covers, show casing the 6 different animated styles... I think I'll go with either the first or last one here.

Check out the Trailer