"Why don't you eat my fart" - Tyler (Jason Crowe)
Student project/fanmade horror anthology. Volumes of Blood features 4 urban myth tales all based in a community college library. With a wrap-around plot about the pupils & film crew telling the stories, while a killer stalks them.
As a teeth cutting exercise for those involved its undeniably ok and features some fun atmospheric moments, but for the average viewer like me it didn't amount to a great deal.
Original list and the 30 rules http://ift.tt/1NM2ApG
This is a tentative draft and bound to change. Plus my movie viewing will be cut down drastically when the game No Mans Sky releases, luckily it isn't till late in the month.
3 - Never had the opportunity to know him. So I put in Virgin Soldiers as he was a big Bowie fan.
7 - picked from scumbalina, who always stumbles over oddities.
...plus 20 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
.:: Scavenger Hunt #14 May 2016 - Film #6 ::.
"I spent the entire night processing Chester the molesters report" - Detective Wilder (Pam Grier)
Grier plays single mother and detective Della Wilder, whose trying her damnedest to crack a murder case involving a rogue doctor played by Heuer. Only Della becomes romantically involved with him.
Forgettable, painfully dated and wasted the talents of Pam Grier & Rutger Hauer in what can only be described as 80's cable TV movie like filler roles. Reminded me of a double episode of Cagney & Lacey, only with more cheese.
.:: Scavenger Hunt #14 May 2016 - Film 14 ::.
"They say dead mans shoes are unlucky, but what of dead childrens toys?" - Narrator (Jasper Britton)
This is about the closest I could get to an unseen Hitchcock. While I agree its a stretch to credit it to him. Because this is built around his work which seemed more a poducer/editor role, and looked far more like Bernstein at the wheel.
Night Will Fall is a documentary about a restored Sidney Bernstein and Alfred Hitchcock documentary that lay unfinished, had been long forgotten and thought lost. Till researchers in 1984 discovered footage that turned out to be their unfinished/shelved film from 1945 about German concentration camps. That was simply titled 'German Concentration Camps Factual Survey' that was intended to be feature lengh.
While HBO/Andre Singers 'Night Will Fall' succeeds at what it intended, its likely that its modernistic talking heads format strips away much of the power that the bleak original GCCFS had.
Incidentally Billy Wilders similar war documentary Death Mills used material from the same soldiers and war correspondants, I had done a letterboxd review of that but its gone missing in action, likely due to a TMDB page/information change or something.
"Even if he is a bit queer he's a gentleman" - The landlady (Mary Ault) obviously in caption text
I'm sure even Mr. Novello had a wry grin when he first read that. I originally rewatched this to add to my scavenger hunt 14 list as my unseen Hitchcock pick, but decided to go with the documentary 'Night Will Fall' because it features footage he shot from a Belsen concentration camp.
Ever the sly dog and showman, Hitch skillfully builds suspense then pulls the rug from under the audience in the final minutes. It features a nervy bath scene reminiscent of the shower one he shot years later for Psycho. Ever the perverse foot fetishist, he even self indulgently includes a close-up of virtuous Daisys twinkling toes.
Style wise its clearly influenced by one of Hitchcocks other passions German expressionist cinema. I wouldn't class it among his best features, but its definitely his most impressive silent era ones, and probably best till Lady Vanishes, that came 11 years later.
..:: Machismovision - Film #35 ::..
.:: Scavenger Hunt #14 May 2016 - Film #30.5 ::.
"yelp... please continue" - Samantha (Lili Simmons)
I couldn't choose between this or 'Hateful Eight' in Scavenger Hunt 14 so bent the rules and picked both. So glad I did too because they've both been immensely entertaining.
Having seen and enjoyed S Craig Zahlers previously penned movie 'The Incident', its great hes swftly stepped-up with 'Bone Tomahawk' his directorial debut. It's an hybrid western/horror about a tribe of cave dwelling cannibals kidnapping a young married nurse. The towns sheriff alongside the nurses husband form a posse to get her back.
Its rare cross genre movies like this succeed in both fields, but it gleefully bucks that trend. It does take its time to pick up steam, but boy did that slow build payoff. Russel, Fox, Jenkins and Wilson make a fine little ensemble, plus being a 'Banshee' fan it was cool seeing the mighty purty Lili Simmons.
..:: Machismovision - Film #34 ::..
.:: Scavenger Hunt #14 May 2016 - Film #30 ::.
"When I knew me had the son of the bloody nigger killer of Baton Rouge..." - Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson)
Tarrantino's second western riffs on Hitchcocks Lifeboat and stodgy television westerns, utilises an hand-me-down horror soundtrack and arguably past their prime actors... yet somehow still manages to come across as being one of freshest movies of the last few years.
A stagecoach carrying a bounty hunter and captee travel through a snowy Wyoming wilderness, while en route to hand in his bounty. They pick up a couple of extra passengers and are forced to stopover in a mountain lodge to see out an inbound storm. Only they the lodge isn't as safe a shelter as it appears.
Its a slightly more subdued affair than 'Django Unchained', certainly less showy but definitely still on a par with it (I honestly couldn't pick which I prefer out of the two). 'The Hateful Eights' kinda his version of a revisionist western thriller with a black comedy edge. The ensemble cast, mostly familiar QT actors all performed brilliantly, especially Leigh, Russel & Dern. Plus great seeing Madsen & Goggins dragged out of grade z-movie junk. Most memorable moment was definitely Jacksons hilarious OTT 'black cock white mouths' revenge subplot.
..:: Machismovision - Film #33 ::..
.:: Scavenger Hunt #14 May 2016 - Film #9 ::.
"One way or the other, you die at the end" - Willie (Robert Blake)
A well-known local indian Willie Boy kidnaps an half indian named Lola, figuring it isn't as serious as it appears Sheriff Cooper half heartedly forms a posse to bring the renegade to justice. Only because its close to an election, Coop and the posse are pressured into bringing him in dead or alive, with a strong public sway towards dead.
Having to compete with Redfords most fondly remembered film 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid' (also released in 1969) probably didn't help Willie Boy's box office or reputation. And I'd guess sympathizing with the pesky Paiute stealing women didn't help it a great deal either. Which is a shame because its an entertaining ride. Blakes effective as the fugitive and Redfords charismatic as ever, love his retort to the standing mayor. Highlights the final chase with Dave Grusin's freak-out rattlesnake-a-like score. Due to its slushy doomed romantic side and lulls in action its probably best saved for a free wet afternoon viewing.
