Author Archives: David
Review: Mom and Dad (USA 2017)
Mom and Dad, the latest film from Brian Taylor, one-half of the pair of madmen behind the miraculous Crank films, is similarly … well, apeshit bananas for lack of a better term. Taylor, working from his own screenplay, posits a … Continue reading
Review: The Avenging Eagle AKA: Long xie shi san ying; Cold Blooded Eagles (Hong Kong 1978)
Avenging Eagle is solid old school kung fu from the Shaw Brothers. It’s no pinnacle of the genre – there really isn’t that much to distinguish it from most Shaw martial arts films – but a good cast, baroque weaponry, … Continue reading
Review: Justice League (USA 2017)
Why did I even watch this? Masochism? Completism? I truly loathed Man of Steel, Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice (a movie as turgid as its name), and the execrable Suicide Squad, and had very low expectations for this Frankenstein’s … Continue reading
Review: Cold Hell aka Die Hölle (Austria/Germany 2017)
Cold Hell is a nasty little treat. I was expecting a thriller, but not a full-blown modern giallo. Cold Hell revels in the lurid sexualized violence and the neon washes and shadows of the best of Dario Argento and Sergio … Continue reading
Sridevi, Bollywood Queen, Passes Away at 54
Playing everything from the ingenue in Kamal Haasan’s giallo-esque thriller Sigappu Rojakkal (1978), to a whip-wielding bandit queen in Sherni (1988), to a bewitching snake spirit in the supernatural romance/horror Nagina (1986), Sridevi has long laid claim to my heart as … Continue reading
Review: Face Behind the Mask (Hong Kong 1974)
Chen Chi-hwa’s Face Behind the Mask is a solid piece of wu xia entertainment. It’s not revolutionary, and it really doesn’t do anything that hasn’t been done before. However, all the elements come together nicely to create a quick-paced piece … Continue reading
Review: Before We Vanish (Japan 2017)
Before We Vanish is a return to a rarely-seen side of Kiyoshi Kurosawa – a puckish, tongue-in-cheek take on the atmospheric horror that is the master’s stock-in-trade. Though he’s much better known for his deadly serious supernatural horror like Kairo … Continue reading
Review: Everybody Wants Some!! (USA 2016)
I’m not a Richard Linklater fanboy by any stretch of the imagination, and Everybody Wants Some is slight even by his standards, but damned if this wasn’t one of the most purely enjoyable films I’ve seen in years.
Review: Ten Violent Women (USA 1982)
I happened to watch a while back, and then was surprised to see that notorious grindhouse director Ted V. Mikels had just recently passed away. I wish this could be a better epigraph, but it’s a pretty terrible movie – … Continue reading
Review: Doctor Strange (USA 2016)
Not to damn Doctor Strange with faint praise, but the film definitely reaches the upper echelons of Marvel movies, hitting that entertaining and workmanlike sweet spot while not quite ever achieving cinematic brilliance. Doctor Strange is, as has been widely … Continue reading