Convoy of Girls - a nazisploitation with a lot of storyline, now, that's something you don't see everyday. It actually looks like a warmovie, with some scenes excepted, of course. The main storyline is about an officer whose former girlfriend is now in trouble and serves with the Women's Auxiliary Forces. We all know what that means, but she doesn't. When she finds out, she tells the officer and he tries to help her. No torture except some slight whipping in one scene and not much nudity either. Instead, the director focuses on the storyline, which is nice for a change.

Thir13en Ghosts - wow, nice movie! The ghost stuff is nicely made, the story is OK, the acting is good and the atmosphere is kind of creepy. After having watched the film, I watched the extra about the 12 ghosts which was nice too. Some nice twists in the story makes this film intersting until the end. There is a bit of cheesy stuff in the final sceens, but I can forgive the director because of the rest of the movie. Recommended.

Death Race 2000 - wow, cool! I don't like racing movies, but this one is different. Carmageddon the movie! Stallone i priceless and Carradine delivers as well. The whole resistance thing is supposed to make the story more interesting, but it appeared a bit foolish to me. Apart from the race and the media mockery, the fact that this is supposed to be in the very futuristic year of 2000, makes this movie really enjoyable. Recommended.

House IV - well, this one is about a house, at least. It is almost 100% cliche, but near the end you get a plot twist which is kind of nice. The house, which is built on an old Indian burial ground (wow, how original!), houses several spirits, but they don't appear often and thus it makes them very dull. Only one time they do soimething impressive, and that is not even scary. OK to watch, nothing special.

Alien 3 - a bit far fetched, this one. Like always, the alien doesn't give up and revives itself in a nice way which I won't spoil. After that, it is more of the same. Alien chases humans, they try to kill it, they think it is dead but it is not, it starts over again. I think it'me, but the alien looked a bit cgi to me in this one. Not as cool and beautiful as in the first two films. Atmosphere is OK, ending is predictable. Poorest Alien film so far for me. I have one more to go (I don't count the AvP series, they are on a level of their own - somewhere down in the abyss).

They - I fell for the Wes Craven mentioning on the cover and found out he wasn't the director after all. Bummer. I expected to get a very stupid or dumb movie by a second rate doirector who needed it to put a famous name on the cover just for sales. So I was surprised when I got something with nice acting (nothing special, but nice) and a good atmosphere. It was kind of creepy throughout the movie, well done.

Spoiler:

The drawback on this film is that the director fails to make a beautiful plottwist or something out of the fact that the viewer is torn betwen two thoughts: are those students mentally ill, or is there really something going on with monsters coming to get them?

Although you're not getting some answers in the end (and it is possible to discuss whether that is good or bad) I still recommend this one.

Friday the 13th - yeah, I hadn't seen this one yet. Chupa once posted that part 1 is quite boring. I can't compare, because I haven't seen any other F13s, but that this one is not very spectacular is something I can agree with. Almost all killings happen offscreen, or at the edge of the screen. You never see more than a slight detail of the killer. That has a purpose, I know, but it does make the film a bit boring. The ending is OK, but I heard a lot about it already and I had watched Scream, so it wasn't reeally a surprise to me. It id make Scream a tad better for me, though. I think this is a classic because of the series that followed, but if you want to have fun or gore, pick something else.

Near Dark - not your everyday vampire film, this one. I liked the girl, she looked a bit like a TV host from my country whom I like. The stry is original, the violence is OK, although I disagree with the statement on the cover that this is "the most violent vampirefilm ever". Others easily surpass this one on that front. What really, really disappointed me in this film is the ending. It was so cheesy, that I secretly hope that it all was a cynic approach from the director, but then he did a too good job at hiding that. I fear however, tghat it in't meant to be cynic, and that makes this a candidate for the top 10 worst endings ever. It spoils the movie a bit for me. So I recommend the first 70-75 minutes of this, the rest is emotional bullcrap.

You are a bit jaded my friend. But I agree with most of the above. All those early slashers are special to me. Later on it just got to formulaic and too much comic relief. I hate comic relief... hate hate hate.

I would recommend at least the first three Friday the 13ths.

It´s not a he, but a her. And a very well known her atm, her latest film just won the oscars. Yes, Near Dark is directed by Kathryn Bigelow, from Hurt Locker fame. I know that the movie isn´t much for todays standards, but back in the day it was great.

You are both right in the sense that should I have watched these movies in the time they came out, I'd probably have found them fantastic. But, since I can't do that anymore, I can only write my present opinion. And, I had expected a lot more from such a famous slasher, I guess that played a role, too. I agree on the later formulaic thing.

Besides that, there are enough movies from the 80s and before which can still grab me and be enjoyable 30 years later.

About Kathryn Bigelow: yes, I could have know that it was a she. That was just my male chauvibnism playing up It explains a lot about the ending, btw. I liked the rest of the film, though.

Yes there are. But not that many, at least for me. Even Evil Dead (a fav of mine) seems to be loosing it´s charms.

Well, I know I watch lots of movies (karst even thinks I'm jaded ), but there still are films out there which surprise me or get me going in a way I wouldn't have expected. For example "They", which I watched recently was a pleasant surprise. Not a supergood movie (not in the same league as Evil Dead), but I still enjoyed it a lot. Oh, and as you can read on this very same page I had a lot of fun watching Death Race 2000. And there are many more, even older ones.

Skeletonman - well, this is not one of those good movies I described above. It is pretty bad, even. And if you like bad movies you will find this boring, as it is very, very repetitive. Some ghost horse rider kills off marines in the woods. And then he does it again. And again. And again. Wow, the only movie which was more boring and more repetitive was Beastly Boyz, my alltime superboring "horror" movie. Skeletonman has two things going for it: 1) Casper van Dien is in it and he dies a gory death and 2) although I had expected it to be more spectacular, it still is very cool to see a helicopter shot down by a bow and arrow. Avoid this one.

Helga Shewolf of Stilberg - nazisploitation without nazis, how do you call that? This film poses this question, because it has everything a nazisploitation should have, except nazis. There are uniformed people, there is a secret prison with harsh guards etc, but no nazis. Everyone wears a red armband with a weird sign on it. It is not a swastika, hence there are no nazis. Well, the film itself is pretty OK for a -sploitation, it has some violence, a lot of sex of which some is voluntary, some isn't. Helga is an interesting main caharcter, although she is called Elsa in the original French audio. It ranks among the upper mediocre sploitation movies. It is not as good, but neither as dull as others.

Haunted Forest - this was a bit of a disappointment. Weak storyline about a tree spirit which takes revenge on people because 100 years ago they wanted to burn down the forest. Pffft. A lot of J-horror stuff is in this one, even the cover makes you think of J-horror. The problem is, it is really fake J-horror, as any starting Japanese director would do this better. The only thing I liked was the final shot, in which nothing original happens, but it was a nice touch to this film, which is better left avoided.

The Nude Vampire - the title confuses me, as several different characters in this movie state time and again that there aren't any vampires around, while they are supposed to be them. It actually is about a guy who wants to live forever and tries some experiments. People lose their lives over the experiments and then a bunch of (non-)vampires tries to stop the scientists from comleting their work. Very slow and very boring. I knew Rollin made vague stuff, but this really takes the cake. Since this was one of his first movies, I'll just forget about it. I just regret I paid good money for this DVD.

Skinwalkers - a nice change to werewolf cliches. Two clans of werewolves have a dispute about going on the way they are, or ending the curse under which they live. The "good" werewolves lock themselves up every full moon to prevent them drinking human blood, as it will get them addicted to it. Nice touch there. The "bad" werewolves want to kill the child who can end the curse. Nice acting, even good acting sometimes. Effects are good too, only slight cgi annoyance. Rhona Mitra looks nice once more. Recommended.

I usually don't post about non-horror movies (the type which isn't really in place here) or documentaries, but yesterday I watched one I really should tell you guys about:

Hearts and Minds - this 1973 documentary gives a harsh view on reality in the Vietnam conflict. Images from warfilms, actual war footage and some stock footage of vehicles are interwoven with interviews. The people who get interviewed are very different. There are politicians (pro and contra the war), but there are also GI's in the field, veterans (some of them without arms and/or legs), normal US citizens in the street and, and this is what I find so special about this one, Vietnamese people. People who got their houses burnt, people who got their villages bombed, a man who makes coffins (he is standing inbetween hundreds of them and he shows some of them "These here are for children"), etc. It impressed me a lot, and I have seen many documentaries before. The editing is shocking, in a way. For example, a former bomberpilot tells about the thrills of seeing things explode and immediately after you see images of napalm bombings. Heavy stuff. The images itself aren't so very shocking (although you might turn away when you see Kim Phucs family all burnt up by the napalm attack on their village), but the way the story is told, the editing, it makes it a tough watch. Highly recommended.

Survival Of The Dead - this one made me cry. After Carpenter, Craven, Argento and Jackson, Romero is one more director who has totally lost it, imo. Land of the Dead wasn't really so bad, Diary of the Dead was tolerable, but this is just boring. It made me think of House of the Dead (parts 1 and 2) a few times, which isn't a good sign for a zombiefilm. It just wobbles along, not really choosing a direction, and when you know what the theme is for this movie, you'll yawn, as it is very unspectacular. Some nice zombie action, but that's all there is. Everything inbetween is dull.

Dario Argento's World of Horror - nice documentary on Argento and his work up to 1985. Some making of stuff, some explanation about colours, or animals, etc. Some parts are about where he worked together with Bava or Romero. Other people from his crew talk about their parts and it is all pretty interesting. Argento looks a bit like a drug addict, though. And he is kind of weird, too. A shame he made such a downfall with his recent productions. Recommended.

Brain Slasher - when I clicked this, it was looking good. The cover is very misleading, however: such a creature doesn't exist in this film. Bruce Campbell does, though and he performs averagely. It's a post-nuclear world story, but it is not very gripping and it all just keeps moving along until the end credits roll. The machinery wih which the bad guys kill people is cool, but besides that, there really is nothing special about this one. Campbell should have skipped it too.

Apocalypse Of The Dead - heh, this one was actually quite good. Some cliches are presented, but then not fulfilled, which made me smile. It was nice to see Ken Foree perform in this one, he even paraphrased his famous sentence from DotD. Must have been copyrights issue, because the paraphrase sounded a bit lame, much worse than a real quote. The storyline is OK for a zombiemovie, and I must say this is one of the better zombieflicks I have seen in quite some time. Recommended.

Demonic Toys 2 - sometimes it takes a while before people decide to make a sequel, and Demonic Toys is an example of this. Eightteen years have past since Demonic Toys was released and now there is a sequel (not counting the Dollman and Puppet Master spin-offs). I was pleasantly surprised, as it is not a lame attempt to revive nostalgia for the Demonic Toys. Actually, the re-appearnace of the toys is made quite logical, although I missed some toys, like the robotsoldier and my favourite, the cuddly bear. There actually are only two toys from the first movie present, the Jack-in-the-Box and the "Whoops-ee-daisy" baby. Still, they make quite some mayhem, with a new companion at their sides. (At least it was new to me.) The killings are not plenty, and only sometimes they look great, but still I enjoyed this. Just don't watch it if you haven't seen Demonic Toys first, is my humble guess. Otherwise: recommended.

Tenement, game of survival - going in expecting some sort of Running Man-like film, this turned out to be something totally different. It reminded me a bit of Fight For Your Life, only this building was a more spectacular. It takes a while for this movie to pick up, but after that it is an enjoyable ride, with resourceful people fighting off a gang of punks. The elderly lady is cool! Although some characters did some increibly stupid stuff (everyone knows not to go down the stairs because the armed gang members are there, but still some go down from time to time), this was quite a good movie, especially in the atmosphere department. Recommended.

Creature - actually this is a mini-series, running for 165 minutes. According to imdb it has 4 episodes, but while watching, you don't notice it: it just playes like a movie, without credits or anything inbetween. The content is so-so, it is some kind of Jaws rip-off, with a sharklike creature harassing people on a Caribbean island. Of course the creature was made by the navy in experiments during the war. There was one nice plot twist, but all in all this was kind of flat. If you're really into sharks you should watch this. If you want horror, don't. It is way too long and it has too few gore to be appreciated by horrorfans.

REC 2 - wow, really enjoyed this one. It is the same storyline, seen from a different pov. Near the end, the storylines of parts 1 and 2 come together, nicely done. If you didn't like part 1, don't watch this. Style etc is the same. Sometimes it is a bit stretched as in the ways people get their hands on a camera so we can still follow what's happening, but most of the time it is pretty logical. Again, nicely done. Recommended!

Gayniggers from Outer Space - funny short (28 mins) with a lot of lulz. I'll have to rewatch it, as it was very late when I watched this one, and I know that rewatching this isn't a punishment at all. I remember it being overexaggerated at gay humour: gay niggers come from their planet Anus in their spaceship which is called something ringmuscular, and they are going to save the earth's manly population from female domination. Thuis they destroy every female they encounter, in order to be heralded by the men of earth as eternal liberators. If you like bad movies, this is for you.

Creature of Darkness - this very unoriginal title is from a film which is not breaking news either, but still I enjoyed this one thoroughly. It reminded me a bit of Xtro, but where Xtro has its dull moments, this one has less of them. It has an 80s feeling over it, while everything looks very modern in the film, they still can make you feel like you are in some rusty cinema in the beginning of the 80s, watching an alien flick. Because only part of the alien was built, all scenes where you can see the whole of the alien are CGI, and it looks butt ugly. The model parts are great, which is one more argument for the good side in the fight of animatronics vs CGI. While the victims are the cliche mixed group of students, it didn't annoy me this time, so the makers have done several things right. A shame about the CGI, without it, this would have been one of the best flicks I have seen this year. A nice movie anyway, I recommend this one too.

Were you watching the extended cut?
btw, the poorest Alien film is still a really good film

Alien 4 is not a alien film, its a dying whorish cancer on the face of the movie industry.

I´m forced to agree with spud (and I hate agreeing with anyone), even being a lesser Alien, it´s still a damm good movie. David Fincher rarely lets you down.

Wasting Away

Good Zombie flick with a nice, funny slant on the genre - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1027762/

Heh, I didn't say Alien 3 was a bad movie, right? Just a bit dull compared to nrs 1 and 2

Night of the Lepus - well, yeah, killer rabbits. They look very normal to me, although most rabbits I know don't run through mini gardens to make them look bigger. Only a few times in the movie, this trick succeeds, the other 95% of the time you can easily see the rabbits are normal sized. And their size is the only scary thing about them, the bloodied whiskers are a laugh Yes, this is bad, but if you didn't expect that after reading the title, you should watch more movies.

The Robot vs the Aztec Mummy - like all classics, the action is at the end. Until then, some morons keep you entertained with doing stupid stuff, the snakepit is holarious indeed. Pretty boring at times, but then there is something very stupid again and you can laugh about it. Luckily this is only 64 minutes, so you don't get the chance to get really bored. Only if you're into bad movies.

Nun of That - actionflick about some secret nun squad which kills bad guys. It is sometimes very funny, I laughed out loud a few times, and not because it was bad, but because the jokes were funny. The gore is OK, there is a lot of blood sometimes. The story is a bit lame, but all in all I enjoyed this one. Oh, and the nun does look pretty OK too. Recommended.

Someone's Watching Me - a thriller by Carpenter I hadn't seen yet. Idea is OK, woman in new apartment gets watched and lots of telephone calls by some mystery man. She gets scared but decides to fight back. I know it is a pretty early Carpenter film, but I like his horror films a lot better. It is not a bad movie, but it can't compare to Halloween, Christine, The Fog or The Thing. The ending was nice, though. And it is fun to see a young Adrienne Barbeau.

Zombies of Mass Destruction - funny and sarcastic zombieflick. Set in 2003, it milks the situation in the US with the Patriot Act and stuff going on. There's a real nice looking chick who struggles with the fact everyone thinks she's an Iraqi, there's the redneck family whose son loves the "Iraqi" and there are the man and woman both running for mayor, a gay couple and a reverend with a handful of people left in his church. There are some real funny jokes on the terrorist threat-thing. The zombies look good and the gore is OK. I laughed out loud a few times, so this one is (highly) recommended.