http://i111.photobucket.com/albums/n...allen_ver2.jpg

Really got into this film but I have to admit it really creeped me out as well.

http://static.cdn.masjo.com/movie/im...-the-witch.jpg

^ Truthfully, it's nowhere near as terrible as you'd expect. There are two ways to approach this film;

1. As a fan of the Halloween franchise. Not a good idea.
2. Blissfully ignorant. A good idea.

A better cover would've been a picture of a milk carton with the Michael Myers mask on it with the words 'have you seen me?' underneath it, as there's literally nothing linking this with any other part of the Halloween franchise. No Michael Myers, no Laurie Strode, no Doctor Loomis, not even a mention of Haddonfield in it.

I thought it was pretty neat myself, and a very daring film to release with 'Halloween' in the title - you just couldn't picture Hollywood greenlighting something like this today. I reckon it's cool that it does something different, to the point that in parts it's more like a Bond movie than a sequel to a slasher movie. The ending was just about as dark as they come too. All that said, a lot of the acting's sub-par, some of the characters are just absurd, and note to the director - GUYS DRESSED LIKE ESTATE AGENTS AREN'T SCARY

Overall, I quite enjoyed it in. Certainly not a bad film by any stretch.

Yeah, it could've been so much better. I'm surprised there haven't been any other films to try and take the old 'what if your local superhero was a single-minded arsehole' approach to the genre myself.

PREMONITION

http://ssl.honoluluadvertiser.com/pa...remonition.jpg

It was OK. I expected it to be better.

HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN
Filmed in halifax, hobos eating glass, pedo santas, human piniatas, George strombolopolus (or however its spelled) getting iced with a hockey skate this movie is hilariously Canadian and entertaining.
If you love cheesy non stop gore this is it.
Probly top 3 best Canadian films ever

i liked it a lot - it was "different" - heck, I think this one and the first one are the only Halloweens I like of the entire series (including the remakes)

Today I decided that instead of doing anything constructive it'd be a better idea to just watch another couple of movies I've heard a lot about but never seen, starting with;

http://img.listal.com/image/898597/6...ts-artwork.jpg

^ Don't let that tacky MS Paint artwork put you off, as I couldn't agree with the top portion of blurb more. Pretty sick stuff, but I was just getting warmed up for...

http://allhorrormovies.com/images/salo.jpg

^ That picture should tell you all you need to know.

In a word; ewwwwww

Definitely not a film for the feint-hearted then.

I liked Halloween 2 myself. It's not quite up to par with Halloween I, but it's basically a direct continuation of the latter and not half bad - a bit like Rocky 2.

As for the remakes, I'm in the minority that actually enjoyed the first remake. It wasn't great, sure, but it had its redeeming qualities. The second remake was dull as all hell though, and pointlessly confusing too. Plenty of glaring plot-holes and totally un-needed twists too.

http://www.joedunthorne.com/files/gi...e-in-cover.jpg

This is the book cover, but it made an amazing film. Hysterical.

i saw tangled with the kids and liked it.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_ZLpZRHSM11...vie_poster.jpg

Black Swan

So I finally watched it. I have already mentioned couple of times that I don't really like Aronofsky based on three films I've seen (Pi, The Fountain and Requiem for a Dream). Only Requiem was tolerable, the other two, with their crudely, superficially depicted, self-important themes, I hated. That said, Black Swan is the best so far (I have yet to see the Wrestler), but that's not saying much. I liked it mainly because I have a soft spot for psychological thrillers and it worked in its favor that Aronofsky kept things simple. No big themes of life and death, meaning of the universe etc that he can't handle. The story is pretty straightforward, artist struggling to get in touch with her dark side and bring it forward through self-sacrifice. So this is something that gives a chance for some complex psychological portrait, but that wasn't explored beyond the surface and always in the most obvious ways. That's my gripe, it could have been a great film, but is only an okay psychological thriller/horror like many others and certainly not worthy of all the praise it got.

I liked that Aronofsky used close-ups and that really helped Natalie Portman's performance and a sense of paranoia and trap. I guess it was somewhat of a necessity, so that he could avoid as much as he can detailed depicting of dancing. But, too much close-ups soon lost its effect by the end of the film. It seems like Aronofsky is not very subtle, not very good in mixing things up, too dependent on repetitions through the film. Not to mention that he likes to bang his audience over the head with obviousness, just in case we don't miss something. So here, he made sure that the we were always aware of the duality of white and black swan through such means that Nina usually wears white outfit and Lily black (really!?). On top of that (or on top of Nina) we see a tattooed black wings on Lily's back (aha!). Characters are very thin, which is not a big deal for Lily as she can be seen as Nina's projection of who she wants to be. But character of Nina herself is also rather thin. There's no real duality in her which is important for the film's main theme. She's paranoid, scared, struggling from the start, a real mess. Throughout the film she just becomes progressively worse, but that's not really a transformation from light to dark. So what are her excursions into darkness? She masturbates, goes out, drinks and takes drugs, hooks up with some guy, she swears in front of her mother, rebels, has a lesbian fantasy. And that's it. Really! And all of a sudden, the black feathers are growing from her back. Natalie Portman's performance was very good for what she was asked to do, but she didn't have much of a character.

OK, I'll stop with complaining. It's just that I have more to say about what I didn't like than about what I liked. Despite all that I enjoyed this film from start to finish, it wasn't boring, and I will always enjoy a solid thriller/horror unless it's really stupid. But I have to say, this one is not even one of the best of its genre, let alone some masterpiece it was proclaimed to be. This kind of film is usually not nominated for Oscar (regardless of its quality), so that was kind of surprising at first. Never underestimate the power of hype.

I also enjoyed picking apart "homages" to other films and directors. OK, Aronofsky himself said (I think I read somewhere) that Polanski's Repulsion was a big influence. And yes I can see that, but not as much as I see Dario Argento, especially Suspiria, and Brian De Palma's Carrie. To me, Aronofsky's fanboying was pretty obvious.

Phew! Who manages to read all this, gets a cookie.

http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n...le_fockers.jpg
Oh man, no words can describe how horrible this movie was. I find it halarious how meet the parents is a trilogy now. This movie was nothing like the original, the second one had a couple of okay moments, but really not impressed. They tried to put in a bunch of "funny" parts throughout the whole film and it got really old. Doesn't even look like it was made by the same director. Just lame!