The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)

For many years, I have made the same bold statement to any person with whom conversation has turned in an any way relevant direction: 'The greatest creation of mankind is The Rocky Horror Show.' Now, I know...but Luna, what about all the fantastic scientific and technological breakthroughs that have allowed us to live free, healthy lives, and able to watch such classic motion pictures?! Your comments do not go unheeded, friends, but you know how I love me an essence, a time capsule, a window, a feeling, when it's captured in art so fantastically. And you also surely know that I love me an inspirational figure. Who doesn't? And on the (in no particular order) list of great Guthrie Inspirers are Roger Ebert, Stephen King, Wes Craven, Ira Levin, and Richard O'Brien.

In the cute Cambridgeshire village which plays glorious home to many of my childhood memories, we had an annual early-December party in the Village Hall entitled The Festival of Frolics, in which villagers would perform, entertain, get drunk, smoke indoors (remember those days?) and have a fucking good time - kids, adults, pensioners, all there, having real fun together. When I was about six, my mother and teenage brother were due to perform with a few of our friends, a song and dance routine. They had been busy getting wigs and makeup and feather boas together, and my sister and I were very excited. As my friend James' dad Stephen got up onstage that night in red tights and space-clown maquillage, he invited everyone to give him an R... as we spelled out the four remaining letters with him, my mother and brother and their friends strutted up onstage in long black coats, before throwing them off with the opening bass beats of the Time Warp, to reveal corsets, stockings, suspender belts and stilettos. Yes, my 17 year old brother too!

My sister and I thought nothing of it, except what fun! The next day, Mum played the show soundtrack for us at home (which quickly migrated to my bedroom), and not long later introduced us to The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Now, Mum had strict rules: You girls can only watch up until Eddie dies. Now I type that, it seems like a funny thing for a lawyer to be telling her six and four year old daughters. But we had found something special even in the music, and having born witness to the first half of the movie, we had to see the rest. So, being resourceful kids in what turned out to be a village full of Rocky fans, we spotted a friend whose parents had the VHS on the shelf, and snuck in a midnight screening. Badasses!

A phenomenon I'm sure many film fans can relate to is the one in which you watch subtly 'adult' movies as children, which you appreciate aesthetically, and then each time you watch it again as you mature, you understand another joke, the plot takes on a different dimension, you feel sympathies for characters you formerly detested. Noticing your own maturation of perspective is something really cool that favourite films can offer you. Especially when you're a six year old watching Rocky Horror. So I loved the songs, and I loved each wacky, totally individual character, but I was totally unfazed by Rocky and Frank's homoerotic relationship, or Magenta and Riff Raff's incestuous one, or Brad and Janet's sexually repressed one. Most of the humour I didn't understand for many years. But even then, there was something truly fun and magical about this crazy musical my family had introduced me to. It got to the point where our stepmother hid her copy of the video, she was so sick of hearing it. (Would it be cynical of me to suggest that one upside to having two sides of the family was having two VHS copies of Rocky?!)

Of course, the movie at home by yourself is one thing, but Rocky The Experience had yet to happen. When I was 13, a Sing Along Rocky came to a local theatre, so we had the Diet experience, whilst still getting to feel like badasses for wearing short skirts and high heels. But when I was 15, the real thing happened. I went with my mum, her partner, my friend and boyfriend (who came away with his entire torso signed by our theatre-going contemporaries), and my friend and I went all out on our costumes. We were 15, so our response to everything was a swift 'Fuck You', and we wore our shortest skirts, black lace bras and open leather jackets, teamed with fishnets and platform heels. As we headed through a car park of perplexed-looking businessmen heading home for the day, the slightest creep of anxiety hit me. But we had to only turn the corner to be swept up in a hoard of glittery, lacey, silky, stilettoey goodness to guide us in a bold path to the theatre.

I was the frizzy, dorky kind at school, and so in the midst of my rebellious streak, I stood in the grand foyer of that theatre buzzing. Never had I been in such rich company, surrounded by people who in one stark way or another were just like me. Whatever other shit was going on in each of our lives, we felt liberated and really alive when we were all together, in the theatre, in our craziest costumes, to share in this one musical-theatrical product written by a 30-year-old unemployed actor to pass the time. But even the feeling I had in the foyer was eclipsed by the first three keyboard notes that opened the show inside the auditorium. As those notes dropped, the room just erupted with cheers and cries, my ears screaming and my throat along with them. It was like a pressure change, or more an energy change. It felt like all the ecstasy and antici...pation we collectively felt as this show began manifested in some psychic wave and washed around us. It's odd how many of those life-defining highs and blissful calms I have experienced in a theatre, and they've often felt like spiritual experiences. And this is what I believe is so special about The Rocky Horror Show. Not just for me, but for millions of others all over the world, sharing in this show is the most profound, communal, and liberating high we could ever ask for.

And what's so amazing, is the origins of it all. My mum once told me that Richard O'Brien (who, it is certain, played in Jesus Christ Superstar back in the early '70s) was told he would never again work in theatre after being caught sniffing coke in a dressing room by Andrew Lloyd Webber. I have never found any source to back this story up (although Mum may have been told it by her actor brother who worked in the West End - but this doesn't exactly validate it either), but O'Brien has often told the tale of how, in a humble televisionless existence, he passed cold winter nights of unemployment by penning his sci-fi B-movie parody rock'n'roll musical. It opened on a theatre's spare stage, which seated an audience of less than 100, scheduled for a week's run. But something special happened, and word spread, as my dad's nostalgic tales of '60s and '70s life for young men and women often concur, and the show pretty much never stopped.

Maybe I am a total artfag for it, but I find many intrinsic qualities that I admire and am grateful for in the movies, and one of those is the occasional special production that can speak to every generation. Be it The Wizard of Oz or Disney's Classics, when the universal elements align, and place every right person and thing in the right place at the right time, a unique thing is born, and it brings me joy to think that all of those actors, directors, writers, artists of all descriptions, are beloved way beyond their own lifetimes for something they helped to create that became dear to so many people.

Now, I realise that the first almost 1400 words of this lengthy more-essay-than-review have barely touched upon the actual Rocky Horror Picture Show, ie. the 1975 movie. But as such a dedicated lover of the work, I felt it of vital importance to share an account of Rocky's true effect. And I set to writing it having just watched the Rocky Horror Show Live broadcast, which was an absolute scream. Not only did Stephen fucking Fry make a guest appearance as Narrator, but the legend himself, Mr Richard O'Brien did too, and sang out those final, fantastic, chilling lyrics that just floor me every time: And crawling on the planet's face, Some insects called the human race, Lost in time and Lost in Space, and Meaning. Christ, that's weird. I actually got the chills just typing those out. Watch this Live show recording if you get the chance. It is one in a million!

Anyhow, since back in my beloved old '70s, some buggers at 20th Century Fox fancied milking the show's cult success, they a movie of it. And thankfully, they green-lighted keeping the gems of the original show's cast: creator O'Brien as Riff Raff, the handyman, the charismatic Patricia Quinn as Magenta and the iconic lips, Little Nell as Columbia and...and...*serious drum roll* the legendary Mr Tim Curry as the insatiably seductive Dr Frank N Furter. Time may change me, my celluloid freezes time. Gods bless it.

To be honest, this is one of those movies where I really don't feel like explaining the plot, mostly because everyone knows it, and if you don't, just take what passion you had endured from me thus far and get your ass to see the movie!! So, I'm just going to approach this as 'among friends', as if you all know what I'm talking about.


The Rocky Horror Picture Show is just perfection. In my opinion, the best arrangements and vocals and actors to ever come together to perform it. Susan Sarandon and Barry Bostwick are onboard as, as Patricia Quinn once put it, the 'token Americans' to keep Fox happy, and they're both fantastic, with Bostwick bringing a surprisingly strong singing voice and nice faux-masculinity and Sarandon serving up some of the most delightful comic timing and characterisation she's ever done. And the crazy thing is... although Brad's solo song is deleted, Susan Sarandon is not as good a singer as she is an actress, and most of the cast had no screen acting experience, it is still perfect. How is it that often, it's the younger, professionally yet-unpolished, uncalloused groups who tend to happen upon these game-changers? Despite all these deficiencies, it is just brilliant. It is funny, it is exciting, it is engaging, it is at times heart-wrenching, and ultimately, somewhat chilling. It takes us through a spectrum of emotions, all of which lead back to absolute pleasure.

And perhaps the most poignant element of Rocky is summarised in one line of lyric from one of its songs: 'Don't dream it, be it.' Rocky represents liberation and inspiration and aspiration, it urges us to do what we really want and need, and to feel free of repression. The movie continually breaks the fourth wall, inviting us in to share its philosophy, addressing us as its unconventional conventionists. It's good, cheeky, innocent fun, in which we can be who we really feel like, no matter who we have to be elsewhere. This, my learned friends, is why Rocky Horror is the greatest creation of mankind.

Black Christmas (1974)

Today I decided to revisit a retro early-era slasher from 1974. Much can be learnt about the genre from watching the earliest examples. Where Last House on the Left gave us among the first "bad guy jumps out just as victim is escaping", Black Christmas presents POV killer shots, predating Sleepaway Camp, and even Halloween. As Halloween would go on to do, the opening sequence is from the perspective of our antagonist, here the deliciously ambiguous Billy, who is used to absolutely perfect extent.

Despite the writer's claims that his script was inspired by a Canadian mass murder, it seems far more likely that it originates in the form of the urban legend, The Babysitter and The Caller. We all know it: an innocent young woman is all alone in a big house, looking after the neighbour's child, when she is hassled with threatening phone calls, which are eventually traced from inside the house. On top of the 2006 remake, this concept has been used in several other horrors, including the original and remake of When A Stranger Calls. Now that remake was a really tense, terrifying ordeal... right up until they showed us the killer's face, and then he was suddenly in plain sight for the remainder of the film. It killed the effect like the words 'not tonight' kill a boner. It left my sister and I movie-blueballed, and we were not impressed.

So the first time we saw this fantastically '70s original movie, we were overjoyed. Not a single glimpse of our stalker's face did we get... all we ever saw was a silhouette, and one eye... once. This keeps things terrifying. Consider in Silence Of The Lambs, when Clarice has finally cornered Jaime Gumb in the house, she is confident and proud, and ready to take him down. However, when the place is plunged into darkness, she is scared, because she knows she is being watched, but can't watch back. This is exactly the primal fear that Black Christmas taps into, and it is immensely effective.

This honestly is one of the superior early '70s horror movies. It is simple, understated, surprisingly unexaggerated, and yet overwhelming in its atmosphere. Lesser movies (and certainly the majority of modern ones) like to use that typical shrill string music to create eery, still scenes in which threats may be lurking; Black Christmas embraces the silence, and recognises its merits in scaring people. But where appropriate, sound is used creatively....

The movie is set in a sorority house a few days before Christmas. All the girls are partying and readying to go home for the holidays, the resident gang including Jess, played by the beautiful Olivia Hussey of Romeo & Juliet, and Barb, wonderfully portrayed by Margot Kidder. And all the festivities cause the appropriate ruckus to mask a surprising number of murders within the house, performed by the creep Billy, who lives in the attic. The girls receive illegible phone calls from a guy they've dubbed 'The Moaner', and take it all fairly well. The drama that stops this from being a totally straight-up slasher pic manifests between Jess and her troubled musician boyfriend Peter. He is under immense stress about an upcoming exam at the academy where he's spent the past eight years, and she is unintentionally pregnant, and plans to abort.

This is another pattern you'll notice in early genre examples: these were not just gratuitous gore shows, but often had some political or ideological theme about them. To me, Black Christmas was something of a statement about the women's liberation movement that was gathering such momentum at the time, and the opposition it faced from those not so hot on the idea of equality. Each of the women at the house are independent in nature, and working hard towards a self-sufficient future. They are massacred for their troubles by a confused, reclusive, faceless man. In the foreground, we have the dispute over abortion between Jess and Peter: he insists that she keep the baby, even forbids her to abort it, and Jess refuses, insisting that she will not be forced to give up her future and ambitions. Very noble and sensible sentiments. But Peter is "an artist - he's highly strung", and so when one mad phone call is attributed to him and his anger, the finger is pointed at him. After all...have we ever seen Peter and 'Billy' in the same room at the same time?

Now the ending of the movie concludes its message and stance. It is easy for movies depicting female suffering to be dubbed 'misogynist' and the like. Actually, it is easy for people, out to get offended on others' behalf, to dig out something to complain about in almost any movie. But you know what I mean. Some may say, having watched a house full of independent, middle-class young women being slaughtered by some limp gimp of a man, that the movie itself is misogynist. Firstly, it seems to me that misogyny is rather like going into labour: you notice a million little things that could be a symptom of labour, but when it's actually happening, there's not a doubt in your mind about what's taking place, and how could you, in hindsight, have thought that those tiny things were the real thing?

If an entirely male crew wrote, directed, produced a movie which expressed severe hatred for women; if the casting agents said to each actress hired, "Thing is, we hate bitches, and we plan to degrade, marginalise and otherwise offend you by making this picture"; if the entirely male crew had showed up to press releases and premieres vocalising their hatred of the female population, and highlighting the movie's intention to express hatred and discrimination... then perhaps, we could say a movie is 'misogynist'. But otherwise, movies of quality tend to carry some message or moral at their core, not necessarily shared by its creators, but something worth expressing. It is a medium. Don't shoot the messenger, right?

If this movie, broken down into a basic motive, was something close to Independent Woman = Threat to Masculinity, therefore Independent Woman + Threatened Man = Dominant Male, therefore Problem = Solved, then perhaps there would be some undercurrent of masculine insecurity, as raved about by Siskel and Ebert back in the day. But if the formula were as simple as this, with women being punished for their independence and self-assurance, then surely Jess would pay the ultimate price for daring to abort Peter's baby. Perhaps we'd even be subjected to some MacDuff-style forced c-section for a particularly melodramatic effect.

But, if ambiguously, Jess survives the ordeal, and Peter is killed. If basic survival vs. death is totted up, does the movie's sympathy swing in Jess' favour? But what of the ambiguity of the ending? Billy is obviously still lurking, so it obviously wasn't Peter. He may yet kill Jess, but so far as we witness, he does not. The way I read it, Black Christmas is addressing the opposition to the women's liberation movement. Billy, the opposition, has claimed many victims, who remain unnoticed and unmissed. Jess, the liberated woman who will have an abortion, has come through male oppression, and will live on to do as she wills. However, Billy is still stalking, observing her with the potential for being another victim. Bottom line: Female liberation has gained its momentum, but it is still under threat, and must be conquered by assertion.

NOTE: I felt the ending I just concocted was sufficiently emphatic that I should leave it there, but I must somewhere add that this movie contains some of the most psychedelically '70s outfits a vintage hippie like myself could ask for. Guys in fur coats, anyone?!

Eden Lake (2008)

Holy shit, what a movie!! Our British cinema industry isn't really in too much of a habit of making horror movies nowadays, although Hammer was recently revived for periodic releases. Eden Lake is a tragedy, a living portrait, a social statement - it is everything you don't really find in modern horrors. Back in the '70s and '80s, as I have discussed in other reviews, horror was used as a channel for points to be made. Black Christmas examined the defensive patriarchal opposition of the women's liberation movement, Last House on the Left reflected on class tensions and Vietnam angst, and it is exactly the movie that I saw serving as inspiration throughout Eden Lake. It is a powerful, gripping, appalling horror of the strongest kind: the ones that lie squarely within the bounds of reality and possibility.

Jenny (Kelly Reilly) and Steve (Michael Fassbender) are your typical young middle class couple with their whole lives ahead of them. Jenny, a sweet thing with a very Mia Farrow quality about her, is a nursery school teacher, and approaches everything sensitively and smilingly scorns her partner for swearing. Steve is the lovable, rugged Irishman, who likes to kid about, but thinks and acts with reason. Steve is planning to propose to Jenny, and so takes her for a weekend away at a remote quarry that he visited with his dad as a kid, which is due to be developed into a luxury gated community. The first night of their trip, the couple stay at a pub B&B, where flabby slobs wearing tracksuits and gold chains clutch pints of 'Wifebeater' and spit at the pavement. The beer garden is overrun with gobby Northerners who smack their kids about and constantly yell. The opposition is established.

When the couple get down to the quarry, it is a vast and beautiful wildland with a lake running through the centre, but thankfully, they are driving some fancy Jeep which handles the terrain with relative ease. The sign for the new development called Eden Lake is graffitied with the eloquent slogan Fuck Off Yuppy Cunts! Down on the beach, a gang of chavs show up and start wreaking chavoc (see what I did there?!) Naturally, they have an aggressive dog in tow, that terrorises strangers, and an obnoxiously loud boombox. Steve casually approaches, and quite reasonably asks them to turn the music down and keep the dog in line. Here we have a defining moment, which fully establishes the theme of the picture as class conflict.

I have lived in various parts of England all my life, and have a fairly diverse experience of social classes and cliques. Our society has changed immensely in recent years as 'benefits culture' and what sociologists refer to as the Underclass have been on the dismal rise. This means that the timewasting dickheads from school who came from bad homes no longer have to earn a lifestyle for themselves, but have it handed out to them, and the formerly widely-held working class pride of providing for one's family seems to have gone out of the window. The actual working class, who work in lower paid and lower skilled roles, is shrinking in population, as the effortless underclass lifestyle begins to be inherited. A whole generation have seen their parents sitting on their arses, smoking and screaming and getting everything for nothing, and so the cycle begins. The majority of violent offences are committed by people of this very nature. In this country, turn on the TV at 9am and you will be treated to a smorgasbord of the nation's most dim-witted, thuggish, shameless and useless, being made into a spectacle, and at the most tasteless of times, celebrities.

Eden Lake addresses the battle of the classes. Jenny and Steve are middle class, respectable and well behaved. The gang of youths, which includes Jack O'Connell and Thomas Turgoose from This is England, are the underclass, who have no respect for others and no idea of civil boundaries. A wide shot of both parties sat on opposite sides of the beach illustrates the spectrum of not only class, but inherently morals, values and humanity. The gang further antagonise the couple, and steal their car. This leads to a fistfight in which Steve accidentally stabs the dog. You can practically see the infamous 'red mist' fall over the owner's eyes. From this point on, it's fair game, as far as the kids are concerned.

Let's discuss the kids, and that's what they are. The ringleader is the terrifying thug Brett (O'Connell), who is volatile, controlling and violent. Everything that goes on is his idea. He has a few other boys with him, some look no older than 12, and a witless girlfriend Paige, who is ordered to film the gang's atrocities on her phone. Brett literally forces these children to inflict violence on the couple, and when things don't go his way, the most effective, yet vile and haunting moment in the movie takes place. Another child, a very young boy named Adam, who looks about ten or eleven, is roped into the proceedings, and when Jenny narrowly escapes her death and runs for the hills, Brett hangs a petrol-soaked tyre around the child's neck and sets his head on fire. This image haunted me for years after I first saw this movie, and it was with it in mind that I approached a rewatching with caution. But it is exactly what it should be: it is the crucifix in The Exorcist, it is the eyeball in Hostel... for a serious movie (and I say this to exclude any ceaseless exploitation fests that are lesser works) to reach its full impact, it has to dare to make its statement without any sugar coating. If we are to fear for society, for our children, on the message we take from watching this movie, we have to be given something to really fear. And here, we fear not demons or even evil adults, but twisted children. Brett's rage is boundless, he is wicked to the very core, and this we can be sure of, because of this single act.

Poor Steve has bled to death and been burned after being captured and tortured by the kids. It looks like Jenny might make it, now that she's managed to kill one of the kids, stolen a van and sped off towards town. But if the middle class heroes, or at least one of them, survived the ordeal, then the movie wouldn't be making its point. She unwittingly crashes the van in the garden of (here comes the Last House twist) Brett's parents' house. The family assist her at first, until they get a frantic call from Brett telling them what's happened, and they realise the van belongs to a family member. As is typical of these sorts of people, a gang of about half a dozen furious men arrive to avenge their thug kids, and Jenny is dispatched. But not before we see Brett appear, and get beaten like a puppy by his old man, and disappear to his room where he glares at himself lengthily in the mirror, as if in acknowledgement of his disease, but gutless self-absolution. He sees his own treatment, as many a PC social worker would, as justification for his own actions. He is not human enough to recognise his responsibility in breaking the cycle he knows all too well the effects of.

There is a primary and secondary message in all this. The first is that Britain is finally broken; no matter how the civilised reason and negotiate, they will be beaten down by senseless violence. The second is that violence is a cycle; the aggressor was formerly the victim of a senior aggressor, and has been conditioned into a mindset of violence. Eden Lake is terrifying because it is so true. It was met with some criticism over stereotyping of working class people, but as I have already addressed, the numbers of people like the children in this movie are on the rise, warranting a classing of their own. There is still, as ever, a perfectly peaceful, respectable working class out there who live honest and good lives. But in a country where Jeremy Kyle can make three shows a day for ten years and still find new people to appear, I concede that people can't really be blamed for drawing such conclusions.

Born Innocent (1974)

Every now and then with a child star, particularly one from the '70s, you have to wonder what their folks were thinking. I don't really plan on questioning how well juveniles are taken care of on set: it is a tricky topic, given the often inevitable outcome of the poor soul's trip to Hollywood. Some (Jodie Foster and Brooke Shields) turned out to be well-educated, classy and talented adults. So after The Exorcist (all dubbings and doubles aside), was there anything Linda Blair's parents weren't OK with? Video interviews with Mr and Mrs Blair show them to be very decent, loving and caring parents, which is all the more baffling: at least Terri Shields made herself obvious as a maniac with such ludicrous claims as "people want to see a sexy child". Linda's Act I consisted of regular victim roles, and one would surely be excused for questioning her overseers' choices. But then, despite being far less mainstream these days than Foster or Shields, Linda also turned out great. Solid B-movie credentials over the decades, solid commitment to various charities and animal organisations, including her own, and a good sport at horror conventions galore.

Exhibit C in the Blair Victim Files, after The Exorcist and Sarah T. respectively, is Born Innocent. Another (many more came) made-for-TV movie which took advantage of Blair's cute face and apparent lack of parental controls. Sarah T. was a good girl really, who became sucked up in depression and addiction and expressed remorse for the damage her troubles caused to others. Chris Parker is different. At least in the end. The sour-faced youngster is introduced with a swell of sympathetic string music that reoccurs throughout the movie. Chris is a young runaway who has been arrested again, and makes herself scarce in the holding cell crammed with young, female Peter Stormare types. She seems out of her depth in the whole runaway business: the other girls look ready to chew the balls off a wrestler, but Chris crouches in the corner, her sweet face obscured by her hair.

When hauled up in court, the ball is dropped on Chris at the same time it is on us. The Judge rather compassionlessly reveals that her parents have handed over full custody of her, making Chris a Ward of the State, a.k.a. Hapless Victim of Society. So off she is carted to a half-way house for unruly girls, where she is swiftly and clinically examined by the Nurse Ratched of the joint, a steely woman named Lasko. Stripped off and her cavities searched for substances, Chris seems further still out of her depth when told, "Girls get drugs in here any way they can." At this point, she's probably starting to wish she had smuggled in some dope.

Cute little Chris quickly comes to the attention of the resident aggressive dyke, who leers at her and seems to have a gang of cronies at her disposal. The staff are all incompetent, and mostly very hostile, with the exception of counsellor Barbara (Joanna Miles) who defends Chris from punishment when she offends the others. However, none are efficient enough in dealing with juvenile delinquency, as the tough lesbian proves when she and her gang corner Chris when she's in the shower. They pin her down and rape her with a toilet plunger. (So Mr and Mrs Blair, about your supervision of your 15 year old daughter's role choices...) That said, this scene is incredibly powerful, and is tackled with gritty realism by the actors and cinematographer. Without this scene, we would not have a full understanding of either the abuse of Chris, or the abuse in general of institutions. At this stage in the game, Chris is the softened victim, who recognises her own pain and feels sorrow.

Having earned a little merit, Chris is granted a visit home. Being that she was an affluent runaway, it's safe to assume that this is not such a privilege after all. Within minutes of being home, shit is going down. Her dad is one of those short, wide, balding assholes who goes red all over with rage. Her mum is a hopeless neurotic who just sits home and chainsmokes. The dad beats the mum, and Chris helplessly looks on. The dad later abuses his daughter, remarking on her tight jeans and smacking her about. The one person left to turn to is Chris' brother, who, although seemingly regretful, offers up every excuse he can muster as to why he cannot save his little sis from the abusive background he fled himself.

It is a sad situation when, actually given the option, Chris returns to the institution in favour of staying on at her parents' house for a few more days. And isn't it a miserable statement about the realities of child abuse? This incident cements the poor kid's downfall. She finds herself with nothing to live with, no life to return to, no goal to work towards; she might kill herself if she hadn't found some evident comfort in her bitter surroundings. Accompanied down the muddy slope by the same mournful string instrumentals, Chris eventually hits the bottom. She is finally just another runaway, problem child, young convict. Another brick in the wall, graffitied with 'Jesus Saves' and 'I Wish I Was Dead'.

Sadly, some forty years later, this is not one of those films we can say feels dated. The message, or warning, still rings hauntingly true. Life is easily fucked up. Especially when you're a parent fucking up your child's life. Talk of The System, and all its atrocities, is no less nowadays. Some may argue that it's only ever gone downhill. Children, being taken from or discarded by their parents, being circulated like unclaimed luggage on a carousel, through a stringy network of homes and institutions, and finally deposited on the other side of parental responsibility, with no qualifications, no support, no home and very little other than crime to turn to.

Wes Craven: The Guy Who Guided Generations of Gore

Whether you know me in everyday life, or through my reviews, you will know that my favourite horror movie of all time is Last House On The Left, and I regularly bring it up, as well as its creator Wes Craven. The movie, and the novice young hippies who made it happen, have served as great inspiration to me in the last few years. It taught me about how to make a brilliant picture with minimal resources; about those magic moments where exactly the right people make exactly the right statement at exactly the right point in time; about appreciating a piece of art as it was intended to be viewed, in the context of its surroundings at the time of conception. Not to mention it introduced me to the music of David Hess.

I have loved horror movies for as long as I can remember. I think it began with R.L. Stine's legendary Goosebumps books, and the subsequent TV series. My village library had the episode The Haunted Mask on video; the scariest episode ever made, and even the cover of the tape scared me. But no matter how many nights I couldn't sleep, I couldn't stop bringing the tape home. I just loved to be scared. It was at the shamefully late age of 20 that I discovered Last House, and it did as Roger Ebert promised: it "rocked me back on my psychic heels." It was a whole new level of horror, yet it was one of the oldest levels of horror.

Wes Craven was a cool and interesting guy. When he started out making movies, he was a married philosophy graduate, a father of two young children, with liberal hippie ideals who was breaking out of his fanatically religious family background. His pal Sean Cunningham (later creator of Friday the 13th) recruited him to write and direct a mind-blowing horror picture he'd been given funding for. The whole production was cheap and unofficial: lack of union relation, lack of permits, and nothing but KFC on the menu. And somehow, the talented guerrilla crew of just 28 people, created a bold, fierce work that Ebert, who solely appreciated and recommended it, correctly predicted would be a sleeper hit.

Despite an early struggle, and ultimate submission, with typecasting, Wes went with his strengths, and established himself as an icon of Horror. Many of his legendary works have proved inspirational enough to be remade, spun-off and sequelled, and his imagination has given birth to some of the genre's most infamous figures. And this morning, the sad news has broken that Wes has passed away, at the age of 76. What an incredible legacy to leave behind. What a fascinating, diverse journey his existence was.

Four years ago, as I sat in the lecture room of my Film Studies class, I found my calling, when my analytical essays turned out to be really pretty good. I started doing it in my spare time, and dreamed of becoming a real-life Film Critic, with a big shiny Press Pass that got me straight into the theatres, and a column in actual print with my words upon it. About a year ago, I was hit by a tornado of cynicism, and told my mother I thought I might train as a teacher. Writing would just have to be my hobby. But the experiences of several NQT friends of mine were no real picnic, and the all-consuming nature of their careers left it clear to me that although teaching may be the safe option, it would ultimately wipe out any real ambition I had. What sealed the deal was when I watched a documentary on horror movies, and I felt totally, and weirdly, at peace. Scary movies, enjoying them, writing about them and discussing them, was what I really loved to do. And I was actually good at it. It took some daring, but anyone who ever made it had to take the leap. And I'd rather have tried and failed, than resign myself to an unfulfilling life.

The work of Wes Craven has communicated with me in many ways, and his lifelong activity in service to the great Horror genre, and its hoards of fans, is what will see his spirit and wild imagination immortalised, in all its dark, bloody, fantastical, gory glory. Mr. and Mrs. Craven, lunatic Baptists that you were, thank you for giving the gift of your son Wesley to this world. It is probably the greatest thing you ever did.

Creep (2015)

Netflix can't keep up with me in bed. Honest to God, every night, I lie there, scrolling endlessly for a new horror movie to watch. I've watched them all, and they send a new one our way perhaps once a week, once a fortnight during a particularly dry spell. Despite its periodic impotence, Netflix continues to do good for indie movies and original series, offering a widely visible platform for their hard work. I have seen some obscure movies thanks to Netflix... Willow Creek to name a terrible one...Devils Backbone Texas to name a moderately better one, Afflicted to name a very decent one. And following these three titles in their found footage style, comes a movie far more daring and bold in its approach, in the form of Creep.

Not to be mistaken with British picture made in 2004 with Run Lola Run's Franka Potente and Harry Brown's terrifying Sean Harris, which is a far more disturbing experience than this, but only because it really goes there with the physical violence. This Creep really likes to play psychological games though, and on the most vulnerable of people. The movie taps into the widely held fear of strangers from the internet. As almost any freelancer could surely tell you (and I can certainly vouch for this), while scoping for suitable jobs to lend your skills to, you are liable to come across a bit of a weirdo every now and then. Creep's freelancer is Aaron, a cameraman, who has answered a Craigslist ad for a $1000 working day at some remote (albeit fucking fabulous) house up in the mountains.

Now just as much as $1000 for a maximum of 24 hours of your time is a pretty tidy sum, it is also almost so much that you rather expect you'll be fellating some hunchbacked hermaphrodite in a dirty basement by the end of the day for it. I mean, at least when Nev Schulman goes poking around with internet weirdos at their very own houses, he takes Max with him for backup (not to mention the considerable MTV crew, but still...). This cameraman goes it alone, and although this particular error doesn't see him to his fate, it seems a stupid move for a seemingly intelligent, college-educated fellow like Aaron (Patrick Brice). His personality, his sensibility and sensitivity are what escort him to an early grave, when that classic puzzle of Etiquette vs Instinct kicks in.

Up at the beautiful house in the mountains, Aaron finds nobody home. He is suddenly snuck up on by a weird looking fella played by Mark Duplass who, for better or worse, was adorned by the Lord with the face of the world's most prolific child molester. He reminds me somewhat of Michael Shannon's darker roles, but with the deadpan hardness of Ted Levine. One look at the dude, in his gorgeously sculpting running lycra, and we are certain who our titular Creep is. He is Josef, and he is weird. He is instantly very hands-on, hugging Aaron, insisting that this is by far the least weird thing that will happen today. Very encouraging. He swiftly invites the cameraman in, and hands him his $1000, thereby ruling money out of the equation, and making the encounter a 'relationship.' Further encouraging.

Josef explains that he is a cancer survivor, whose illness has returned in the form of an inoperable brain tumour, and he has little time left to live. Thing is, his lovely wife, who remains absent throughout, is expecting their first child, and so he wants to make a video diary of a day in his life, for his son to watch when he is older, in memory of the father he never knew. Very touching, and a pretty decent premise. For Aaron is no street-smart yob who throws a curse out every second word, he is sensitive and discreet, so he is never going to tell this poor dying man that this idea is very creepy and that he'd rather leave the premises post haste. He is going to suck it up, and sit tight, camera in hand, no matter how bizarre it gets. Cos let's face it, guilt stings worse than a knife wound.

It starts off as an 'Uncomfortable' reading on the Weirdometer. Josef strips off and bathes, holding his imaginary son in his arms and playing with him in a manner that would instantly look innocent were there an actual baby present. They go for a hike in the woods, during which Josef continuously runs off and jumps out at Aaron. He seems to get off on shitting people up. When they get back to the house, Aaron is talked into staying for a drink, despite his intention to leave. During this time, Josef makes a very queer confession. The cameraman has pulled one of those "oh yeah, the camera's definitely off" tricks. A while back, he found his internet browser history full of bestiality porn, and conceded that his wife had some sick fetish, which she flat out denied to him. So he went away under the premise of a work meeting, then broke into his house that night, wearing a fearsome wolf mask (Josef names it Peachfuzz, and brandishes the thing throughout the movie) and raped his wife, much to her delight. But when he returned from his 'business trip', she never mentioned anything, and was suddenly happy, and the internet history was clear again. By now, the Weirdometer is registering a solid 'Fearing for one's orifices'.

After Josef's shaking revelation, Aaron can't find his keys, and starts to get agitated, as he has been trying to leave for quite a while now. Josef plays it cool, and convinces Aaron to stay the night, but the poor stranded one drugs the weirdo's whiskey, and he passes out. While he's unconscious, Josef's phone rings, and the woman on the other end warns Aaron to get the hell out, as her brother is crazy, and there is no wife or child. This is the glorious 'Oh Shit' moment that sends the rest of the movie into its delicious downward spiral. Every good horror movie needs at least one of these moments: the impact that provokes a physical reaction in you, where you feel a thud in your chest, or a prickling in your stomach. I think to enjoy a lot of movies, we must temporarily resign our consciousness to that of the film, in order to fully receive its intended effect. When a picture lacks this artistic climax, it can fall dismally short of its potential. As Above, So Below is a recent demonstration of this.

From here, Aaron finds himself the subject of a dreadful stalking, which is handled in a sensitive and surprising manner. Many a horror victim have found themselves hunted from afar, but it is unusual to see a lone male stalking another lone male, with zero supernatural influences involved. The movie starts to steer towards the Fatal Attraction route, in which the perfectly plausible actions of an unstable human can be not only scary in a jump-out-of-your-seat, in-the-moment way, but also in the slowly-building-sense-of-menace way. It achieves what the better horror movies do; it's like the film version of clitoral and vaginal orgasms: they are quite different, singularly enjoyable, but best used in well-crafted combination. That we can be jumped out on and given the rushes of adrenaline whilst viewing, and later be haunted by a sense of real-life dread that could follow us home, is horror movie magic.

Found Footages are not usually known for their artistic camerawork; they are more of an excuse for the sloppiest and most negligent of production values. But movies such as Creep effortlessly demonstrate the making of an effective movie with minimal requirements. The one camera which records the story is used thoughtfully, and maintains a perfect balance of potent and meaningful shots, and spontaneous realism. When the camera (or Aaron, or us...it's all basically the same) finds itself suddenly in some symbolically-constructed scene, it is believable as coincidence, or accident. We are never reminded of our passive safety as an audience, not even when this stunning money-shot is thrown our way...

Duplass and Brice wrote the movie as a duo, with Brice directing, and it seems like acting in their own creation was a good move, both artistically and financially. Brice appears to be your typical Film School grad, with this being his first feature length credit. Duplass has far more works to his name, but they make a formidable team. Brice's academic and practical expertise help to make the entire picture look and feel beyond its means, and Duplass' acting experience lands him a role which he seems to be remarkably comfortable in. I say this, not to flippantly suggest that he has an extracurricular penchant for stalking or murder, but to emphasise the realism he achieves. Serious horror antagonists must be handled as such, not as a character to pretend to be, but as a being who we are to believe exists, and so has regular, human feelings and emotions. Ted Levine's Buffalo Bill is a great example. He is ridiculous, monstrous...and yet we know him. He could be that scruffy guy you see shuffling around the supermarket sometimes. More terrifyingly, Duplass could be your kid's school principal.

I believe professionalism is the key to Creep's success. It is not treated as a thrill ride, with a jump quota to fill and millions to make in box office dollars. It is treated (thank you, Mr Brice) as a serious, compelling story. Minimalist and realist. No need for effects, fancy equipment or even a cameo by Robert Englund. This, as a former academic film student myself, is what we strive to achieve in the field. It's got 'it'. Now, you see that long white bar across the top of the screen upon which you read this? Click it, type in Netflix.com, and thank me later.

The Pagemaster (1994)

"Just because something is a part of my childhood," writes Tommy Nelson on IMDb, "doesn't mean it's good." I must somewhat guiltily admit that I agree with Tommy. The Pagemaster was one of the movies of my sunny Cambridgeshire-based '90s childhood, with basically everybody I knew owning a copy on VHS, and all of us watching it, joyously and frequently. My copy had a Making Of featurette after the movie, which I would watch, fascinated. My stepmother would ask why the hell I wanted to watch that, and I would tell her because I wanted to know how they did it. She said, "well with artists and computers, of course", as if that were the extent of the effort involved. It was the need to know the secrets of the movie industry as a young child that really made the critic I am today.

I still own a functioning VHS player, for those few tapes which do not exist on DVD. To my absolute (and completely unexaggerated) horror, there has never been a UK DVD release, and the best I can get is a Region 1 import, or a Blu Ray, which I have no means of viewing. But the other day, a friend cleared out a bunch of her now grown-up kids' old videos for my daughter, and what the hell was among them? Yes, one of the top 10 movies of the '90s years of my childhood! (and that will surely become an article on here in due course!) So yesterday, my daughter and I sat down to watch it together. And I ended up noticing several things about it that I never saw as a child. Not bad things, necessarily, but some really leapt out at me.

For example, the movie is only an hour long. When you consider the then-advanced technology, big name stars and voice artists... it cost 27 million fucking dollars to make! And sure, three mere years after that smarmy git James Cameron broke new f/x barriers with the epic Terminator 2: Judgement Day, it's nothing terribly special. But it was a lot for its time, especially when you take into account the meagre box office performance of $13 million (yet, I suspect, the video - and video game - sales must have brought it closer to profit). So it's interesting that all of these resources would produce only an hour's worth of material.

Look at that little face!

But I primarily digress; let's get to the plot. Macaulay Culkin (who I only yesterday realised was a very cute kid) plays Richard Tyler, a bespectacled, paranoid little geek, who is obsessed with accidents, and the statistics that protect him from them. His bedroom is adorned with homemade 'No Smoking' and 'High Voltage' signs, earthquake survival kits and fire extinguishers... it's bordering on darkly humorous. But in reality, it's sad that a kid is already so haunted by fears that shouldn't have crept up on him for another ten years or so. So this is established as the situation that will be rectified by whatever adventure he happens upon. His poor parents desperately try to encourage their son to take the most banal of chances, like climbing the ladder of the treehouse his Pop (Ed Begley Jr.) is building him, and sending him to the hardware store for a pound of nails.

Suiting up in reflective jacket and motorcycle helmet like a knight going to battle, Richard mounts his trusty pimped-up Safety Cycle, complete with tall warning flags, windshield and double headlights, and heads out. Thing alert: when Pop sends Richard out to get the nails, it is a bright and sunny day, and when he actually heads out, it is almost dark outside, and storm clouds are brewing...how long did it take him to get kitted up? Anywho, Richard heads cautiously off, gets caught in a storm, and flees to the nearest building -- an ornate old library that looks more like one of the big museums in London. It is the library of dreams, with massive high ceilings and dark marble pillars and cases of leather and gold bound books reaching up out of view. Here he is met by eccentric-as-ever Christopher Lloyd as Mr Dewey, who has a "talent for guessing what people need", so perhaps could have done financially better in Deuce Bigalow's gig.

Whilst looking through the vast, maze-like bookcases for the public telephone, Richard comes across a wild mural on the dome of the ceiling, depicting several classic literary character, and the wizard-like, robed Pagemaster (Dewey's alter-ego). The kid slips on the wet floor and knocks himself unconscious, waking up to great globs and geisers of paint gushing down from the ceiling to form a giant CGI dragon, which consumes him and transforms him into an illustration in the book world. Here, he is instructed by the Pagemaster to pass three tests of Horror, Adventure and Fantasy, before he can find his way home, each of these genres materialising as anthropomorphic books, brilliantly voiced by Frank Welker, Patrick Stewart and Whoopi Goldberg respectively.

Whaddaya know?! I found a pic that demonstrates the terror!

From here to five minutes from the end, Richard and his friends run through incredibly short episodes with the classic literary characters, who are each depicted as very one-dimensional villains -- nothing more than a menacing obstacle to temporarily delay Richard's progress back home. However, they are all unusually dark. The entire picture is, more so in imagery than in theme. Colours are dark greys and greens, and there are a couple of images that still haunt me to this day. I actually regretted, at these points and others, showing it to my five year old. What a stupid bugger, I thought. The shot that takes the cake, is when Jekyll transforms into the hideous Hyde, coming straight up to the 'camera' with his hands concealing his face, and suddenly whipping his hands away, scr
eaming his name and giving the poor kids in the audience a full-screen close-up of his truly hideous face, and their parents a haemmorage-inducing earful of that shrill scream-pitch that only youngsters can reach. The close runner-up is during the friends' tackle with Captain Ahab in the middle of the ocean. Moby Dick, here depicted impossibly large and fierce in the eyes, charges their boat vertically, and shown from a bird's eye view, thundering imminently upwards towards them and chomping the boat to toothpicks.

The dark visuals and themes of the movie mentioned, another Thing pops up: the skies in the Pagemaster's world have an uncanny knack for turning dark green or red the instant the latest villain rolls up to be slain. And that's the other thing... these villains are in the habit of disappearing without actually being slain. Moby Dick savages the boat, and is never seen again. So what, did he just get bored and swim away? Surely he's still very much in the area. What does the evasive nature of these villains' pursuits teach Richard? Because this is, of course, the classic Wizard of Oz format, with a youngster with life lessons to learn being swept up in some fantastical journey away from their comfort zone and befriending three characters who will help them reach the correct realisations. Labyrinth adopted the same format, as have many, far less superior family pictures.

So what is Richard supposed to learn from this, quite frankly terrifying, ordeal? The animated portion of the movie's swift conclusion seems to summarise that he needed to learn to be brave. What did books, or reading, have to do with this lesson?... *cricket chirp*.... *tumble weed*...
And why exactly did he need to learn this? I suppose his neurosis wasn't completely healthy for a kid so young, but Roger Ebert rather correctly points out that the lesson here is that Richard needs to toughen up, take it like a man...he is basically trained to be a marine. And all with literature providing a false facade for the lesson. I almost scold myself for being so fucking cynical about a movie that brought so much excitement to my young life, but in a proper, grown-up review of a family film, the truth can hurt.

On the odd occasion, I have come across my hero Ebert dismally slating one of my favourite movies. The Lost Boys was a good example. The Pagemaster is another. One of the many phenomena to occur when you watch certain movies with frequency from childhood into adulthood, is that you come to realise that just because something has sentimental and nostalgic value, does not make it artistically rich or masterfully created; although The Lost Boys is very much both of these things, The Pagemaster is not. And it's often difficult when you hit the wall of maturity, when you see the product through adult eyes, which are lensed by knowledge of life and reality and common sense. One may be inclined to feel sadness, disappointment, emptiness as a result of this phenomena. Thankfully, I have learned to separate the quality from the nostalgic, and so, all these years later, can still enjoy The Pagemaster, and feel like I'm five again, whilst acknowledging with myself that it's not a well made movie.

Sleepaway Camp 2: Unhappy Campers (1988)

Sleepaway Camp is probably my favourite slasher discovery of this year. Campy, with a brilliant twist and material you quite frankly just couldn't and wouldn't make nowadays, it's the one out of every ten or twenty that you remember vividly, that you come back to watching again. It's a riot.

So it's only natural, in the big money-making machine that is often filmmaking, that someone would want to come along and mooch off of the original's success. In fact, it'd be fun to play a game where whoever thinks of the most horror movies without sequels would win a cookie. Along with action, it must be the most sequelled genre of all. But the difference with Sleepaway Camp 2 is that the usual 'big mystery' is already solved: we know Angela, the poor psychotic he-she from the original, is back with a vengeance, ready to slaughter slutty and insubordinate campers. Yes, as she reveals towards the end, thanks to a ton of good references from the doctors that treated her, she is cured and ready for gainful employment. Especially the kind that takes place in the exact same setting as her previous ordeal.

Angela is played quite nicely

Yeah...awful lot of this goin' on.

by Pamela Springsteen (yes, I found out, she is related to Bruce), and is the counsellor who surely has a problem with uppers, if her wide eyes and Osmondy grin are anything to go on. But while she is first to whip out a guitar for a round of Kumbaya, she is also the strict schoolmarmish one, who insists that "nice girls don't have to show it off." And who would she impart this wisdom to, if this camp (not Arrawak, but Rolling Hills) were not at least partially populated by teenage hoes who enjoy waltzing around naked? It seems Angela has found her calling.

Ultimately, there is nothing too remarkable about any of Sleepaway Camp 2. It is tamer in almost every aspect than the original: although there are a lot of young boobs, there's no full frontal that the original is so infamous for; the murders are far less graphic and imaginative; the bittersweet sleaziness that characters like Artie the paedo cook brought to the first is largely absent. And in absence of any tangible originality (especially in view of no less than six Friday the 13th movies preceding this picture), a lot of ideas are borrowed from elsewhere, with particularly glaring reference to the legendary Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

As Angela slowly but surely builds a scene straight off of the Sawyers' family Christmas card out of dead campers, each murder under the guise of sending the kid home for bad behaviour, the staff start to suspect something is going on. But not in time. They just become tally marks for Angela's body count, which seems to be the main driving force of the plot. In a story with this many minor characters, it is surprising to see a conclusions that leaves every single one dead, campers and counsellors alike.

What's more surprising is how little is made out of such brilliant source material. I kept trying to remind myself throughout viewing that this was a professional production. It's just that acting is largely dreadful (with the conclusive survivor-on-aggressor scuffle shockingly choreographed and edited), camera work is slow and unadventurous, little decent use is made of soundtrack, and the script is poor (not even in the 'so bad it's good' kind of way). In fairness, it is a decent enough movie for one of those fun film nights with friends where you laugh and drink and eat pizza and stuff. It's a laugh... but it's by no means a great horror.



Although it may sound like a typical alternative, I still feel that some kind of corny reunion special back at Camp Arrawak with the counsellors and/or campers who we can assume survived the first movie. Because that would have more meaning to it than this movie does, which seems to exist as nothing more than an under-the-radar slashfest with little further context. Sleepaway Camp left us asking questions, wondering about motives and morals, about pasts and futures. Sleepaway Camp 2 leaves us wondering, and then suddenly not wondering, why Felissa Rose didn't reprise her classic role.

As Above, So Below (2014)

A fortnight ago, I was several hundred feet under the streets of Paris, wandering through endless tunnels walled with human bones, holding my video camera in one hand, and finding myself surprisingly regardless of the camera screen. I was focused on the real, what was going on around me in the place that I was at this very time. The footage was incidental; it could be looked at when I got home. For now, I was going to really have fun and learn a lot exploring the Catacombs. Having been alerted to the release of As Above, So Below from its exciting enough but rather usual marketing campaign last year, but not having seen it yet, I thought a lot about the idea of a handheld picture being made down there.

The Paris Catacombs only allow 200 people down at any one time, hence the often lengthy queue. The strange thing was, the place was so vast that we only saw perhaps six or eight other people the entire time we were down there. The majority of the time, we were alone. That sheds a little light on how huge the tunnels are, and that's the guided route. Visitors will observe alternative routes leading off of tunnels, the tourist route marked out by gates. Some of these alternative tunnels ride off into complete darkness. If people arrogant and intrusive enough to be found in a movie like this were to cut the locks and skulk off, it could most definitely end pretty disastrously.

What would make a movie like that even better, I decided, was my realisation that I paid no attention to what my camera was capturing, but what was in front of me. This offered massive potential for forces/creatures unseen to the characters but acknowledged by the audience. This could be really chilling. It was obvious: the Catacombs made for a brilliant horror film setting.

In fairness, As Above, So Below ended up going in a somewhat unexpected direction towards its conclusion, and although a bit messily constructed, it is a highly researched film. Respect must be paid for effort made. There is a lot of mythical and legendary namedropping, such as the philosopher's stone and Nicolas Flamel, and a lot of that irritatingly vague cryptography that the characters must battle their baffled little selves through. There is also a lot of jaw-dropping stupidity from one solitary character.

Leading lady Scarlett (Perdita Weeks) is a middle-class parent's wet dream. She looks no older than 25, yet she holds two PhDs, a Masters degree, and speaks six languages fluently (two of those being dead), and to top it all off, she is a university professor! She is everything I aspired to be at the naive age of 13. She is like Lara Croft. Because not only is she a painfully qualified academic, she is also a badass (which in this instance is synonymous with moron). She doesn't have the sexual prowess and ridiculously tightly clad bod, but she unlawfully trespasses on an Iranian cave system that is minutes from being demolished by dynamite, knowing the legal ramifications, and presumably, just how mindblowingly stupid and death-welcoming the decision is. All the warning alarms are blaring, and she finds the Rose Key, a large relic that her scholarly father sought his whole life. Lo and behold, explosives start going off all around her, and there is a frantic, and admittedly tense, run-for-life back to the exit, via helmetcam.

This is the format for most of the movie, plonking it in the increasingly cloudy subgenre I know and love...the Found Footage. The more people make this kind of fad movie, the more audiences ask, 'Who finds the footage?' The early and more classic examples of FF offered explanations as to the recovery of the materials, but of late, the genre is straying from being 'found', and settling as 'homemade'. There no longer has to be a barely-believable reason that this footage, exactly as it is presented to us, was recovered from some unsurvived crime scene or tragedy. It is now more of a medium, just a different narrative perspective, which continues to be exercised to varying levels of success. The premise for filming the incidents we witness are ever up for question: it helps if one or more persons has some kind of professional business in filmmaking or television; those assholes who just inexplicably film every mundane thing that he and his asshole friends do, with seemingly limitless battery power, are far less likely to keep our attention.

Scarlett is the subject of a documentary being filmed by Benji (Edwin Hodge) about her uptake of the search for the philosopher's stone, which drove her father to self-destructive madness. She seems minimally deterred by the stone's blatantly negative psychic affects, or by anything else for that matter. She breaks into demolition sites, churches, large underground tombs, and when her old flame George (Ben Feldman) is reluctantly recruited on her latest mission into the Catacombs, where she is convinced the stone is hidden, we find out that her shenanigans formerly resulted in the couple's incarceration in a Turkish prison. She is irritatingly relentless in her carelessness, which she masquerades as determination and adventurousness.

George speaks Arabic, which is why he is recruited for the various translations needed on the quest, and his skills are centre stage as he gives the English form of an Arabic riddle. And whaddaya know?! It still has perfect rhythm and rhyme, as though it were originally written in English, although this is surely impossible. Then, in a Paris nightclub, Scarlett ropes a semi-suave looking dude named Papion (not sure where the 'butterfly' symbolism occurs in any part of the film -- his parents must have seen in him some gentility which we do not). He is en garde, and swaggery, and he can show the group a non-official route to the treasure. And old Pap is a package deal: he brings relatively professional cronies along, who are experienced climbers, potholers, etc. Seems like a fairly safe setup for what is inevitably doomed to at least partial failure. Scarlett will still have her documentary regardless, we can concede early on.

It follows a fairly standard pattern at first: caves collapse, no way but forward, group leader arrogantly insists they take the tunnel of doom rather than the legit ones, a whole bunch of rather juvenile-feeling clue-busting, which Scarlett continuously solves quickly and inexplicably. It's always one of those things that could refer to fucking anything, and that only Jonathan Creek could solve, and only after several days of non-active conversations and thoughtful stares in a duffle coat. But then, a few peer-deaths down the line, things start getting... I dunno...not theological, not existential, perhaps a little spiritual. In another problem-solving scenario, and probably the most risky one yet, Scarlett concedes that the reason the world is going crazy and rooms are shifting and weird cloaked figures are stalking them, is that each of the survivors has some guilt, some personal demon which haunts them, that they must release before they are to get out. With a little Inferno referencing and a generally Abrahamic Damnation style, things steer away from the lower-market FF movies with many quick flashes of ghostly faces, and go in a far more big-budget direction with its ideology, leaning more toward the likes of Insidious and The Possession.

The plot and setting seemed relatively original for a movie of its kind, but it constantly felt like something was missing. We had the slow and subtle build-up, with plenty of calmness and establishment of plan and walking and talking, and the first few 'encounters' are typically ambiguous in nature, warranting the characters to shrug them off or not recognise them at all until shit really starts going down. And for the first hour or so, I believed that some kind of dramatic peak was imminent, but this movie left me totally blue-balled. All great (or good...or even just mediocre) horror movies must have at least one moment of forceful impact, the Oh Shit moment, in which everything that you have watched so far comes to fruition, and you feel thrilled. You need the moment in which everyday existence is turned upside down, and the hapless characters find themselves within a scenario that they never imagined they'd experience. We need the world to fall away.

And the crazy thing is that in this movie, it quite literally does, yet it is never enough. It's like 100 minutes of digital foreplay followed by the light going out...and not even a cigarette to conclude. It's all good stuff, but it didn't have any real climax. And moreover, the ending leaves everything unnervingly unanswered. From the course of action they've given us, we all make assumptions about the condition of the world the few survivors escape to. It's no real conclusion. But the movie is far less shaky and so more watchable than a lot of its kind, and gets some interesting shots, and some pretty great atmosphere from its sets.

I feel like I want to give As Above, So Below more credit than it truly deserves: the use of the Parisian catacombs is brilliant, themes are interesting and performances and camera work is somewhat above average. But the scary bits are far too diluted, and most of them turn out to have been contained in the trailer, which is one of my pet peeves. It seems unfulfilled, and that's how it left me feeling. Not all that I had expected. It's worth seeing, and it's fun enough, but if you're looking for a Found Footage movie that packs a punch, go for the Blair Witch Project, or even low-enders like Crowsnest and Grave Encounters 2. If you're strong of stomach, go straight to Cannibal Holocaust.

Cabin Fever: Patient Zero (2014)

 What is Sean Astin - former Goonie who pulled off the most convincing regional English accent perhaps ever performed by an American in Lord of the Rings - doing starring in the under-the-radar third installment of the Cabin Fever series? Perhaps the answer is: bringing a shred of respectability to the movie. The answer is most certainly: absolutely going to town on it! My very initial reaction to his involvement was pity - the poor thing's prospects must have dried up pretty sharpish since LOTR, as often happens in Hollywood. And that would have been a shame, as there is no doubt Astin is a very good actor. But quite honestly, after a mere minute of watching him perform in this picture, sympathy melted into admiration.

Astin stars as the titular Patient Zero, a.k.a Porter: a medical lifeline whose natural immunity to the virus he carries is of great interest to a sinister team of scientists. He wakes to the chilling news that his child has been claimed by the flesh-eating virus sweeping--- well, sweeping some area or other. It's sweeping enough to have killed off all that Porter knows, but contained enough for a runaway labmouse to cause unwitting terror to a yacht-driving stag party.

Now it is not an uncommon premise for a character to be held against their will with the knowledge that their former lives and companions are gone forever, but it's far less common to see such a role performed with a tangible nihilism. From his first delirious jabberings about having to buy school supplies for his little boy to his final questionable actions of the finale, Astin encapsulates a wretched man with about as many reasons to carry on living as methods of doing himself in.

Right?! Classic laboratory get-up!

Thankfully, for supposed PhD-holding medical research professionals, Porter's captors are remarkably stupid. Not only do the females wear full make-up, stiletto heels and blouses unbuttoned to their breastbones in a sterile lab environment, and drop infected labmice without even attempting to recapture them; they also reply "with my life" when their sleazy superior orders them into the cleanroom to restrain contaminated patients while he hogs the only bunnysuit and menacingly asks, "Do you trust me?" Needless to say, this particular scenario holds some rather disastrous and contagious consequences which were a probable joy for the F/X guys.

Now while all this is a fairly decent plotline, particularly given Astin's performance, one may actually wonder what the movie would have been like if solely focused on Patient Zero. As it happens, a full-length sci-fi feature seems beyond the makers. After all, fake blood and brains is easier to produce than meaningful scientific dialogue and plot. All good Cabin Fevers must have young and relatively attractive idiots to consume from the outside in: first it was college students vacationing in the woods; then it was high school students getting eaten up at a remarkable rate whilst attending Spring Fling. This time we have a stag party, containing groom Marcus (Mitch Ryan), who of course is being forced to grow up by his straitlaced wife, much to the despair of his Stifler-like friend Dobbs (Ryan Donowho) and brother Josh (Brando Eaton), whose girlfriend Penny (Jillian Murray) once fucked Marcus but that's their annoying secret which warrants her casually whipping her top off in front of him. We already have her down as 'the dead slut'.

They have done one of those The Beach things of paying a local fisherman to take them out to a supposedly deserted island. When the group question the huge institution looming on one side, the fisherman assures them "nobody home." They settle into their tropical paradise with tents, beers, snorkels and a bag of the local good stuff that looks more like ground-up tea leaves than any ganja. The couple go swimming and find a piscine graveyard. The girl flips out about it, and storms off to the tent where she soon notices weird grazes which quickly turn into gross lesions. Her helpful boyfriend first produces a whopping black dildo (complete with suction cup) which some weirdo brought along, and then reassures her that the skin condition is just a reaction to the local grass they smoked (ambitious idea). Then they treat us to a hardcore homage to the first Cabin Fever movie...

Remember when Karen and Paul are getting intimate and his bloodied fingers set the whole gruesome ball rolling? Well didn't you always want to see a guy's head emerge from between his girlfriend's thighs  to be sporting a bloodbeard with rotten bits of labia dripping from it? Didn't we all? And we anticipate it horrendously when Penny shoves Josh's face into her crotch with a squelch. It's a bit of a money shot in terms of shock and gross-out value, and it works hilariously well, producing a simultaneous gag and giggle.

Well, with Soon-to-be-Dead Slut's pussy dropping off like Danniella Westbrook's septum, the fellas decide that perhaps they need to seek medical attention, especially as the grazes are now starting to show on Josh. The girl waits at the tent patiently and quite calmly for someone whose sex organs are disintegrating. Exploring the bowels of the huge building on the other side of the island -- which in places is a fully functioning structure, and in others, nothing more than a cave complex -- the guys come across the remaining idiot scientists, who are pissed to be dealing with the escape of their prized subject. The cleavage-exposing blonde who dropped the mouse and said "with my life" tries to con the guys into assisting her, covering her deformities with a face mask (yes, the face is gone, but that rack is still perfect -- praise the Lord!).

Her boring colleague Camila (Solly Duran) warns the guys that the blonde is contagious and hasn't taken kindly to her newfound state, so shouldn't be trusted. Camila is perhaps the one true drawback of the film. Although I see that Solly Duran currently has 10 acting credits to her name, it feels as though she couldn't deliver a natural line of dialogue if you held a gun to her head, let alone paid her a moderate low-budget production wage to do it. Her presence is grating, her every word mechanical and painfully unconvincing. Typically, she is the irritating bitch we are stuck with til the end, as the female half as the Remaining Couple.

Which means, naturally, that the other dicks have to die. Only the two-in-one is memorable. The diseased scientist with the still-perfect titties is well and truly on the rampage, and escapes the clutches of the group, fleeing to the beach. Except by this point, Penny has grown tired of being left behind with decomposing genitals, and so goes on a little rampage of her own. Ding-ding-ding -- CAT FIGHT! Scratch that -- CAT FIGHT OF THE CENTURY! You know how brown paper bags go when you get caught in the rain...gradually drooping off in great piles of beige slop? As two girls, both in the later phases of a deadly flesh-eating viral condition, set about each other in a ferocious wrestle, bits and bobs start sludging off all over the place, and it's a fight to the death, until there's nothing left but a rapast fit for a vulture king. Awesome.

Cabin Fever: Patient Zero is apparently a prequel to the whole series, and is a semi-interesting way for the thing to go. Just like the laughable Hostel Part III, this movie is also, to quote my earlier review, "emaciated from Roth deficiency". There is little trace of the creator's original zest, and what we're left with in terms of memorability, is a show-stealing performance by one actor who deserves much better, and a beach that looks like a butcher shop fell of the back of a truck. Not bad, but not necessary either.