'Escape From New York' (1981) - John Carpenter.

This immortal Carpenter classic always feels completely fresh and vital everytime I watch it! I cannot help but get giddily swept up in darkly charismatic hero Snake's perilous mission into New York's dismal wastelands.  He remains an enigmatic figure, ex army who wholly rejects the machinations of the industrial military complex. Did the broken, but unbowed  Snake continue his criminal activities afterwards? Can't really see him as a fitness influencer, or a chirpy barista in a Portland artisan cafe? Perhaps, Snake Plissken can only really exist in our imaginations. Snake is so much grander than a hip cultural icon, I feel that he has become infinitely more mythical in stature. While there can only ever be one true 'Escape From New York', just between me and thee, I still dig on the luridly entertaining Italian versions!

 'The Black Belly of the Tarantula' (1971)  - Paolo Cavara.

An inventive Morricone score, a dazzling abundance of euro-totty, with bombshell Barbara Bouchet's brief appearence proving entirely memorable! There's a delightfully kinky killer, a singular modus operandi, and handsome Giancarlo Giannini's makes for a charismatic, unusually sensitive detective. Sexy and mysterious, the exhilaratingly kinetic rooftop chase provides additional zest to Cavara's captivating gialli. While The Black Belly of the Tarantula isn't especially gruesome, it is exceptionally well-made, replete with fine performances, and the compelling plot concludes excitingly in a pin-prickingly terse fashion!

'Terror in Beverly Hills' (1989) – John Myhers.

Hardline terrorists bloodily execute a kidnapping in glitzy Beverly Hills on able crooner Frank Stallone's watch, their first mistake! Routine 80s cheapnis B-Shoot 'em up is given additional heft by smooth due Stallone and B-legend Cameron Mitchell. Shallow, crass, and technically shoddy, its frequent bellicosity should keep hardened schlock-seekers amused! Moth-balled dialogue, bouncy, low-rent synth score, cheapo pyro, daytime soap thesping, conspicuous Pepsi product placement, and a weirdly dubbed William Smith lend Terror in Beverly Hills some additional schlock-tastic charm! Will the beleaguered president (William Smith) acquiesce to the evil terrorist's demands and release 55 of their Palestinian brothers? Watch the gloriously dopey, goof-laden Terror in Beverly Hills to find out, just don't say I didn't warn ya'!!!!! Snarkiness aside, Cameron Mitchell's hilariously hypertensive Police Chief is an expletive, bad-tempered treat! Slicker than a well-oiled whetstone, tougher than whale bone, granite hard marine Hack Stone is a one-man war zone!! 

 

 

 

'The Song To My Heart' (2021) - Paula Elle.

Tall good-looking musician with chronic writers block meets beautiful owner of Tea-centric cafe with a killer smile and prodigious lyric writing chops! Excluding the inevitable 'temporary estrangement trope', the hearts of our two telegenic songbirds harmonize mellifluously to make some beautiful musical together. Often far too cutesy for its own good, the 'crisis' was embarassingly 1st world, and the maddeningly smiley, serially sandal wearing rock n roll pop needed to get his grump on. Frankly, It's all a tad 'cheesy  listening', yet the leads are likable enough and any film whereby the sight of an oversized strawberry arouses paroxysms of pleasure can't be all bad!

 'The song remains the same' - Weirdlingwolf.

 'Love Stories in Sunflower Valley'  (2021) - Rob Lieberman.

This cuddly, earnestly heart string plucking drama stars photogenic Hallmark veterans Erin Cahill and Marcus Possner. Frustrated dogsbody, and aspiring journalist returns to her beloved hometown as assistant to hunky, gentlemanly reporter to write a feature on local altruistic matchmaker. Needless to say, awkward coffee-spilling beginnings belie inexorable chemistry, and true love rapidly blooms in picturesque Sunflower Valley. A bountiful harvest of small-town hospitality, folksy mommy-knows-best schmear, dewy-eyed reminisces, and heartfelt glances over home cooking, warmed fuzzily by sun dappled sentiment! Fine performances, and a lovely location do much to ease the drama's occasional lapses into cloying, love conquers all cliche. I appreciated the pleasing lack of enforced comedy, and don't have a problem with the film's well-meaning, wholly fantastical coda of there's a soul mate for all.

'Dracula II Ascension' (2003) - Patrick Lussier.

The fitfully fun, plasma-soaked, frequently fang-tastic sequel to 'Dracula 2001' is a serviceable B-horror blood spiller with a cool vampire slayer in the muscular guise of kung Fu priest Jason Scott Lee. After a zesty, Hammer-esque intro, there's a bit of a lull until the Spike-like vampire is bloodily resurrected. Uneven at times, and excluding the two Jason's I found the stock characters a little dull, plus it's a great shame director Lussier didn't shoot more of the film's exteriors in picturesque Romania. Overall, even with its rougher edges, 'Dracula 2 Ascension' remains a fun, if somewhat forgettable watch for haemoglobin hungry horror hounds!

 

Love on Trend (2021)- Nicholas Humphries. 

Youthful, aspiring fashion designer Allie (Jocelyn Panton) meetcutes dashing tech guy Colin (Giles Panton) and tumultuously, her lofty career aspirations, and love palpitations coloufully intertwine as they discover they are tailor-made for one other! Sadly, my terminal lack of interest in fashion remains wholly unmoved by Love on Trend, but Allie's amiable boss/chum Kendra (Amanda Wong)is a propah sweetie, and, unlike cold reality, in fuzzy Hallmarkland all of life's travails are amicably resolved in a suitably cutsey fashion.

 Mexican horror rocks!!!!!

The Vampire (1957) - Fernando Mendez.

 

Pretty Marta (Ariadna Welta) returns to her ancestral home, only to discover that her beloved aunt is dead, and the once grand estate is greatly dilapidated. The forbidding atmosphere is drenched in dismal doom, her other aunt appears strangely youthful, suggesting something monstrous is afoot! The blood-chilling horror escalates following the arrival of darkly mysterious Count Lavud. With engaging performances, evocative, eerily cobwebbed sets, a charming protagonist, with German Robles making for a mesmerizingly malign revenant! A compelling, immaculately staged Gothic horror, The Vampire is a scintillatingly spooky South American shocker well worth sinking your teeth into.

 

 

Italian horror rocks!!!!!!!!

'Zombie Holocaust' aka Dr. Butcher MD. (1980) - Marino Girlolami.

Zombie Holocaust forms part of the 'unofficial' Ian McCulloch 80s terror trilogy. This certifiably insane, island-set splatter-fest luridly resembles the sinisterly shambling results of a deranged scientist's attempt to splice together Zombie Flesh Eaters & Mountain of the Cannibal God. Abundant gore, a massively underrated Nico Fidenco score, and the infamous 'falling dummy with the wayward arm' has made Zombie Holocaust a bona fide cannibal cult! Time has been inexplicably kind to this ferociously flesh feasting folly, since the entertainment value, planned, or otherwise, has enjoyably increased since its grisly Grindhouse birth. Now with all its glistering HD viscera bloodily reinstated, Zombie Holocaust delivers the gory goods!!!!

 

 70s horror rocks!!!!!!!!!!!

'Massacre at Central High' (1976) - Rene Daalder.

I couldn't help but notice that dopey hippy dippy Spoony's rebellious graffiti would get him some serious FB jail time! Meaner than Mean Girls, grislier than Halloween, this teenage terrorist's massacre is bigger than Texas! If the ill-fated Central High had initiated Hall Monitors, this gruesome tragedy might well have been avoided!

 

 

'Crocodile' (2000) Tobe Hooper.

Crock N' Roll!!!! Horror maestro Tobe Hooper's killer creature feature 'Crocodile' crocks rilly hard, dude! This swamp stalking behemoth has a killer Smile, golden hypnotic eyes and a HUGE appetite for your life! The boozy spring breakers are eminently edible, the CGI is a crock, but the sublime animatronic K.N.B crocodile is a propah beast!!!

 'Tooth is stranger than fiction!' - Weirdlingwolf.

 

'Shark Attack' (1999)  - Bob Misiorowski.

South African Shark Attack movies rock!!!!

 

It has to be said that Casper Van Dien is on handsomely heroic form in part 1. I always thought that there was something fishy 'bout CGI fishes, so it's kinda dishy to see some real fishies! (sadly, there are a few in part2)'Some fin is very wrong with these sharks!' It goes without saying that chum shark movies are better than others! In these Great White infested waters, it's gill or be killed! 3 puns for the price of one! BOOM!!!!!!

 

 

'Zombie Flesh Eaters' (1979) - Lucio Fulci.

Lucio Fulci's 'Zombie Flesh Eaters' rocks!!!!!!!!

The gnarliest splatter FX are old school, to stop a flesheating zombie, the headshot remains a golden rule! Scuba diving babe, Auretta Gay makes me drool, sharks fighting zombies is cool, but the healthcare really sucks on Matul!

 

 

 

 

Snowkissed 2021 - Jeff Beesley.

Pretty Manhattanites, neurotic writer Kate (Jen Lilley), and her more gregarious photographer friend Jayne (Amy Groening) are on assignment to picturesque Banf to interview a reclusive author. Upon arrival in this snowpeaked paradise the inevitably cutsey love-matching is above average. The likeable performances are engaging, with an enjoyably effervescent text, and the dazzling winter wonderland backdrop of beautiful Banf provide wonderful distractions. It's somewhat unusual for a glossy Hallmark romcom to be almost entirely cheese free, Snowkissed feels far less synthetic, as there's a tangibly unforced charm to these handsome couple's amorous coupling. I enjoy the sugary, glutinous sentimentality of Hallmark fare, but Snowkissed's life affirming positivity is edifying. The dazzling natural splendour of Banf is no small part of the film's appeal, and Kate and Noah's (Chris McNally) grand gesture is quite lovely!

'Soul Survivors' (2001) - Steve Carpenter.

I watched this for all the right reason, Eliza Dushku! I'd happily file this under Hallmark horror, as it is a moderately spooksome romantic metaphysical chiller. I pretty much dug most of it, the nu metal/pop industrial soundtrack worked for me, and the occasional 'ohhhh! What's going on 'ere then? Moments maintained my interest. Dushku rocks consistently, I certainly didn't buy Luke Wilson as a priest, and moody Wes Bentley is surly/frowny for much of the duration. The final lachrymose scene is mawkishly written, but it didn't get in the way of Dushku rocking pretty hard in all her scenes!  You could deffo watch Soul Survivors with your nan.

Blood Moon (1997) - Tony Leung Siu-Hung.

Gary Daniels is a muscular, rudimentary actor whose limited dramatic capabilities are boldly contrasted by his exemplary martial artistry. Bloodmoon is another violent iteration of the maniacal kung Fu killer, happily, I happen to have a yen for maniacal kung Fu killers! The exhilarating fights are plentiful and brutally executed, while the plot and dramatic content are less meticulously rendered.

Frank Gorshin unleashes one of the more noisome, memorably hypertensive police chiefs, Chuck Jeffreys' conspicuous Eddy Murphyisms prove distracting, with Gary Daniels tortured profiler about as convincing as John Wayne's Genghis Khan. Death-dealing dynamo Darren Shalavi's masked psychotic pugilist remains one next level, ferociously femur fracturing fiend! I can't imagine that Bloodmoon is widely regarded as a cult film, but the singular acting choices, dismal dialogue and compellingly kinetic combat elevates Bloodmoon to a higher echelon DTV thrill-spiller, and should you appreciate an overwrought rooftop climax, this one's a doozie!

'Sweet As Maple Syrup' (2021).

Pretty blonde Brooke Nevin's glisters in this enjoyably sappy Rom com about passionate Maple Syrup producer (Nevins) who reluctantly hires handsome 'forensic tree expert' Dr. Derek (Carlo Marks) in order to increase her sticky yield of nature's yummiest nectar. As expected, the rocky road to gloopy romance reinforces the indomitable Hallmark coda of 'opposites ALWAYS attract'. Beloved family businesses will be saved, and everything tastes better with maple syrup, even small town sentimental schmaltz like 'Sweet as Maple Syrup. As an aside, I admire how open the professor is about his micro sprinkler, the perfect tool for shallow drilling!

Wicked World (1991) Barry J. Gillis.

Spawned from the same tweaked mind as Canadian horror cult 'Things', resembling  the madly misanthropic progeny  of H.G Lewis's The Gore Gore Girls',  Barry J. Gillis's similarly warped follow-up is no less unhinged!  The appropriately monikered 'Wicked World' is lurid proof positive that gratuitous violence, gratuitous nudity, gratuitous narration and gratuitous tan lines are NEVER gratuitous!  Driven incandescently mad by a searing hatred of mankind, drenched in downbeat delirium, the deliciously demented death-spree of this sinisterly storytelling serial killer are not soon forgotten! 

Weirdly, the shoestring budget merely tightens the addictive mania of this gloriously wrong-headed mindfuck! Having all the dramatic nuance of an improvised school nativity play, like an especially gruesome car-wreck, 'Wicked World' proves morbidly irresistible, one is compelled to watch! Suspending disbelief simply won't cut it, to more fully experience the apocalyptic sensibilities of 'Wicked World', viewers must be willing to temporarily detach themselves from reality! Accept the unacceptable, digest the indigestible, and fathom the unfathomable,  like culinary eccentricities laverbread, and surstromming, 'Wicked World' is, perhaps, an acquired taste!

'Story of Us' (2018) - Scott Smith.

No butchers, bakers, or candlestick makers but an earnest small-town bookstore owner who discovers that her beloved store is under threat from corporate property developers. Much like the durability a generic plastic chair, Hallmark's success/ubiquity is undeniably down to their dogmatic adherence to formula. Not always compelling, often anodyne, but modestly appealing if you are in the right mood for sugary, treacle-thick sentiment. The Story of Us is genuinely sweet, with amiable protagonists, aggressively small-town charm, and the erstwhile lovers O'Dell Sawyer (Sam Page) and Maggie Lawson's (Jamie Vaughn) inexorable romance feels far less contrived than usual.

 'L.A Heat.' (1989) - Joseph Merhi.

PM Entertainment's low-budget, bullet-shredded, late 80s shoot 'em up, L.A Heat is greatly elevated by the charismatic presence of big Jim Brown. LA Cops go hard after a violently  gunhappy drug dealer which affords bargain bucket action impresario Merhi plentiful opportunities for soft-boiled B-Movie badinage and righteous amounts of slo-mo squibage! The skeezy downtown L.A setting is grungily atmospheric, and there's a boisterously old school Blaxsploitation vibe throughout that I really dug. Straight-shooting detective Lt. Chance (Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs ) is a tough, likable good guy, and psycho cop-killer Clarence (Kevin Benton ) makes for a convincingly malign street thug.